Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhowerwas an American politician and general who served as the 34th President of the United States from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army during World War II and served as Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe. He was responsible for planning and supervising the invasion of North Africa in Operation Torch in 1942–43 and the successful invasion of France and Germany in 1944–45 from the Western Front. In...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPresident
Date of Birth14 October 1890
CountryUnited States of America
Leadership is a word and a concept that has been more argued than almost any other I know. I am not one of the desk-pounding types that likes to stick out his jaw and look like he is bossing the show. I would far rather get behind and, recognizing the frailties and the requirements of human nature, would rather try to persuade a man to go along, because once I have persuaded him, he will stick. If I scare him, he will stay just as long as he is scared, and then he is gone.
We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.
Together we must learn how to compose differences, not with arms, but with intellect and decent purpose.
The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
How far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without?
Things are more like they are now than they have ever been before.
Every gun that's made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms...is spending the genius of its scientists, the sweat of its laborers,
Don't join the book burners. Don't think you are going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed.
That was and still is the great disaster of my life-that lovely, lovely little boy.
I tell this story to illustrate the truth of the statement I heard long ago in the Army: Plans are worthless, but planning is everything. There is a very great distinction because when you are planning for an emergency you must start with this one thing: the very definition of 'emergency' is that it is unexpected, therefore it is not going to happen the way you are planning.
Here and there, there are some people who are supremely endowed, ... My memory goes back to Jim Thorpe. He never practiced in his life, and he could do anything better than any other football player I ever saw.
I don't attempt to be a poker player before this crowd.
Leadership: The art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.