Effective National Security Advising: Recovering the Eisenhower Legacy

Abstract

As the new president and his national security team ready themselves to address the global demands of a new century, they have two broad options. They can follow the precedent of the Clinton administration and take it for granted that the post-cold war international environment does not lend itself to overall planning, responding to international contingencies as they arise. Or they can conclude that precisely because international affairs are no longer defined by the extended confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union, it is crucial to establish priorities and minimize the danger of being caught flat-footed by emerging developments. To the extent that it opts for the latter, the new administration would be advised to take note of a national security advisory system that was devised and operated by a chief executive who had devoted much of his adult life to the organization of collective endeavors-Dwight D. Eisenhower, the architect of the Normandy invasion and the Allied campaign in Europe in World War II. During his time in the White House, Eisenhower was beloved by the American people, but widely perceived by political cognoscenti to have been a mere presidential figurehead. We now know, however, that the former supreme commander was an astute and informed political leader who advanced his purposes