Eisenhower's War of Words

Eisenhower's War of Words: Rhetoric and Leadership paints a revisionist portrait of Dwight Eisenhower as a strategic communicator who was highly involved in the series of crises that characterized his administrations. As a consummate cold warrior, Eisenhower understood that words, images, perceptions, and the shaping of attitudes was central to the ongoing battle with the Soviet Union. He used rhetoric - actions and messages intentionally designed to persuade - to achieve many of his goals.

To Ike, rhetoric were the central weapon for waging - and winning - the Cold War. Understood as a strategic art of selection, arrangement, nuance, timing, and audience adaptation, rhetoric became, for Eisenhower, the preferred means of conflict resolution.

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Examining both foreign and domestic crises, Eisenhower's War of Words reveals a chief executive who was always thinking, planning, and looking for the opportune moment to strike. Individual chapters are devoted to the crises concerning Vietnam, McCarthyism, the H-Bomb, massive retaliation, Open Skies, Suez, Sputnik, Little Rock, the U-2 Affair, and the military-industrial complex. Eisenhower's rhetorical leadership saw America through a decade that was anything but tranquil.

This book examines one of the primary means by which he accomplished that goal.