Dwight Eisenhower: domestic and foreign policy

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:42

Thirty-fourth US President Dwight Eisenhower is the first to come to power after twenty years of continuous Democratic rule. More about him, his course in foreign and domestic policy further.

Brief biography of the future president

The 34th President of the United States was born in the late nineteenth century, in 1890, in Texas, but he spent his childhood in Kansas, where the family moved just a year after his birth in search of a job. The parents of the future political leader were staunch pacifists, but the young man himself aspired to study military affairs. In many ways, it was the Military Academy that decided his future life, from which he graduated in 1915, in the midst of the First World War. The mother, in whose family there were no military men for four centuries, respected the choice of her son and did not condemn him.

Dwight Eisenhower was promoted to captain days after the United States entered the war. The ambitious young man sought to prove himself in battles, but they stubbornly did not want to send him to the front. Throughout the war, Dwight was in America and workedpreparing recruits to be sent overseas. For outstanding achievements in this field, Dwight was promoted to major and awarded a medal. By the way, he still received permission to go to the front, but a few days before the departure, a message arrived that Germany had signed a surrender.

During the interwar period, the young man continued to serve. He was on the Panama Canal, which in those years was occupied by the United States. For some time, Eisenhower came under the leadership of General Douglas MacArthur. Further and until 1939, the future leader was in the Philippines.

The United States was drawn into World War II on December 7, 1941, when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. At first, Eisenhower held senior positions at the Army Headquarters under General George Marshall, and in 1942-1943. he commanded offensives in Italy and North Africa. He carried out the coordination of military operations together with the Soviet Major General Alexander Vasiliev. When the Second Front was opened, Eisenhower became Commander-in-Chief of the Expeditionary Force. Under his leadership, the landing of American troops in Normandy took place.

The only dark spot on the biography of Dwight Eisenhower at that time was the initiation of the creation of a new class of prisoners, who were called the Disarmed Enemy Forces. These prisoners of war were not conditionally subject to the terms of the Geneva Convention. This led to the fact that German prisoners of war in the United States died en masse due to the denial of basic living conditions.

After the war, Dwight became president of Columbia University. He has received many degrees and awards in the fieldscience, but he was well aware that this was just a tribute to his actions in wartime. In 1948, he published the first part of his memoirs, which received a great public response and brought the author almost half a million dollars in net profit.

Political career

The beginning of the political career of the future US leader can be considered the moment when Harry Truman invited him to become the commander of NATO troops in Europe. Eisenhower believed in the future of NATO and sought to create a unified military organization that would deal with the deterrence of communist aggression around the world.

Ran for President of the United States when Truman's popularity waned due to the long war with Korea. Both the Republican and Democratic parties are ready to nominate him as their candidate. Dwight Eisenhower's party affiliation was determined by his own decision, the future leader chose the Republican Party. Eisenhower managed to win the trust of voters easily enough during the election race, and in 1953 he became the leader of the United States.

The course in domestic politics

US President Dwight Eisenhower immediately began to say that he had not studied politics and did not understand anything about it. The leader said the same about the economy. He planned to end persecution for leftist views, build highways throughout the country, and increase the state monopoly in the economic sphere. He decided to continue the programs of Roosevelt and Truman (New Deal and Fair Deal), raised the minimumwages, created the Department of Education, He alth and Welfare, strengthened social assistance programs.

Socio-economic development

The years of Dwight Eisenhower's rule (1953-1961) are characterized by the rapid growth of the monopoly of the state and capitalism in general. The budget deficit, which Harry Truman left as a legacy to Eisenhower, was reduced only by 1956-1957. In addition, the president failed to fully fulfill his campaign promises to cut military spending - the arms race not only required money, but also significantly weakened the country's economy and generated inflation. The anti-inflationary measures proposed by President Dwight Eisenhower were not accepted by Congress, suggesting exactly the opposite action.

Under Eisenhower, the United States suffered several economic crises. America's share of world industrial production has fallen, and the number of unemployed has increased significantly. The response of the president was very, very modest. He put energetic and truly talented people in high positions, relying on their experience, but he himself was bound by party principles and corporations that had a great influence on politics.

Domestic policy directions

Thus, the main directions of Dwight Eisenhower's domestic policy were:

1. Social policy, but now the Republicans have delegated some of the power to the localities: states, cities, unions.
2. The large-scale construction of housing and roads, which contributed to the creationnew jobs.
3. Tax cuts, reversal of some measures taken by the previous government to stabilize the United States economy.
4. Remove pricing and wage controls, raise minimum wages.
5. Start of the Black American civil rights movement.
6. Displacement of small farms by larger farms and so on.

Anti-communist policy

In foreign and domestic policy, Dwight Eisenhower adhered to anti-communist principles. In 1950, before Eisenhower came to power, a well-known nuclear scientist in the United States who was involved in a secret atomic project was arrested and sentenced to prison. The reason turned out to be in connection with Soviet intelligence, Klaus Fuchs gave the USSR information that could accelerate the creation of an atomic bomb by Soviet scientists. The investigation led to the Rosenberg spouses, who also worked for the intelligence of the USSR. The husband and wife did not admit their guilt, the process ended with their execution in the electric chair. The request for clemency had already been rejected by Dwight David Eisenhower.

Senator Joseph McCarthy made a career out of this trial. Two years before Eisenhower took office, he shocked the whole country with a list of communists who work in the United States government. In fact, there was no list, there would not have been a single communist in Congress, let alone fifty (or even more), as McCarthy claimed. But even after Eisenhower got intopresidency, McCarthyism still continued to have a significant impact on American society and politics.

McCarthyists have accused the new leader of being too soft on the Red Threat, although the president fired several thousand government and federal officials on charges of being anti-American.

Eisenhower refrained from public criticism of the actions of Senator McCarthy, although he greatly disliked him as a person. The president worked more and more on this problem in the shadows, realizing that open criticism of such an influential person even by the leader of the nation would be unjustified and would not bring the desired result. When the course of Republican Joseph McCarthy violated the civil liberties of Americans, military interrogations were shown on television. This caused even more public outcry, and on December 2, 1954, McCarthy was convicted by the Senate. By the end of the year, the movement was completely defeated.

The question of racial segregation in the army

The main directions of Dwight Eisenhower's domestic policy also include attempts to resolve the issue of racial segregation. During the war, approximately 9% of the personnel in the US military were blacks. Most of them (over 90%) were employed in hard work, only 10% served in military units, but almost no one rose above the rank of lieutenant.

Allied Commander-in-Chief Dwight Eisenhower took up this problem as early as 1944. He issued a decree on equalityopportunities and rights …”, nevertheless, four years later, he advocated the isolation of blacks in the army, because. otherwise, their own interests could be threatened.

At the same time, society actively raised the question that racial persecution and oppression of blacks is a disgrace to America. Particularly aggressive were young blacks who distinguished themselves on the battlefields of World War II. Eisenhower understood how burning this topic was, so during the election race he did not forget to mention that he would serve the interests of all Americans, regardless of race or religion. But during the years of the presidency, Dwight Eisenhower's domestic policy was silent on this issue. His reign was marked by several serious racial conflicts.

American "leading the world"

"Domestic and foreign policy - Dwight Eisenhower kept mentioning this - are connected, inseparable." An aggressive position in the international arena only provokes additional military spending, which, in turn, weighs down the state budget.

The Eisenhower Doctrine, an important document according to which the American president remained “positively neutral”, occupies a special place in the foreign policy of the then American government. This position was announced by the President in 1957. According to the document, any country in the world can ask the US for help and not be rejected. This meant both economic and military assistance. Of course, Dwight Eisenhower emphasizedSoviet threat (after all, it happened during the Cold War), but also called for protecting the integrity and independence of countries in need of help.

US Foreign Policy in Europe

The foreign policy of the American leader was aimed at strengthening the positions of the States in various regions. In 1951, the Commander-in-Chief decided that the US needed West Germany's help to establish military positions. America achieved the entry of West Germany into NATO and even put forward the question of the unification of the country. True, the Warsaw Pact was signed ten days later, and the unification took place only 34 years later, and Europe again divided into two camps.

Korean issue

At a meeting of foreign ministers in 1954, two issues were resolved - Indochinese and Korean. America refused to withdraw its troops from Korea, although already in 1951 the advantage was on the side of the United States, and it became clear to everyone that it would not be possible to achieve victory by war. Dwight Eisenhower visited Korea even before taking office in order to clarify the situation on the spot. A ceasefire was adopted after he took office in 1953, but no real peace agreement between North and South Korea has yet been signed. Formally, the agreement was signed back in 1991, but in 2013, the DPRK annulled the document.

Middle East Politics

The main directions of Dwight Eisenhower's foreign policy include the course in the Middle East. The nationalization of the oil industry in Iran was contrary to the interests of the imperialist states, and most of allGreat Britain. Then the British government, represented by Churchill, turned to the US President for support of the British position on the Iranian issue. Eisenhower remained neutral, but actively contributed to the creation of a military-political bloc called the Baghdad Pact.

US actions in South America

In Latin America, there was an "Anti-Communist Resolution" imposed by the policies of the Eisenhower administration. This document made third-party intervention legal in those countries whose government will take the path of a democratic regime. This essentially gave the United States the legal right to overthrow any "undesirable" regime in South America.

The United States actively supported the dictators of Latin America, so that the communist regime would not be established in nearby countries. It even went so far that the US military provided decisive assistance to Trujillo's dictatorial regime in the Dominican Republic.

Relations with the Soviet Union

Under Eisenhower there was a slight softening of relations with the Soviet Union. An important role in this was played by Khrushchev's official visit to the United States. The countries signed an agreement on exchanges in the field of culture, education and science.