Reviews

Ike's Bluff by Evan Thomas

hoboken's review against another edition

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4.0

Thomas's usual excellent job and excellent writing. It is an ominous paradox that it takes a experienced military expert to understand the horrible costs and total unpredictability of war, how important it is to avoid it, and to know how to handle the people and forces pushing for it. Ike understood the generals at the Pentagon and the men whose greatest concern was to create conditions where they could maintain power and profit from arms sales. No President since has had his credibility or deep insight as our history from Viet Nam to current Syrian war talk demonstrates.

dan_petty's review against another edition

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4.0

Flirts with hagiography at first, but Ike's flaws appear by the end. A fine piece of popular history.

bryan8063's review against another edition

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4.0

I like how Evans focuses on Eisenhower's efforts on preventing a nuclear war. He knew how to bluff and had the skills and gravitas to succeed. On the outside, he held a strong line about keeping the option open to use nukes and keeping conventional forces spending in line, but in the White House, he tried to work out a detente to never make that kind of war a reality. I always enjoyed Evans' work, so it is another win.

spinnerroweok's review against another edition

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4.0

Other than David Eisenhower's memoir of his grandfather, this book offers the best insight into Eisenhower the human being who was president. Thomas brings Ike to life and really shows his personality. This book primarily focuses on his presidency especially on foreign policy and his health. This is a must read to understand this president.

mpetruce's review against another edition

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4.0

As more and more presidential files get declassified, the historical view of presidents change, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. As this book points out, Eisenhower was a much better, or at least much more interesting, president than past history has given him credit for. I enjoyed Thomas' book about Robert Kennedy as well. His scholarship is neither blind worship, nor is it utterly damning. He reveals the facts and analyzes them fairly and honestly. The result in this book was a much more complex president than people thought, at least in the realm of foreign policy.

I would add that this book, and many like it, should be required reading for those who insist this period in U.S. history was a more gentle, simple, innocent time. It really was not. They may end up dismayed with what they discover.

mdrfromga's review against another edition

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5.0

"Ike's Bluff" was the first biography of President Eisenhower I've read. Not knowing much about him, I had formed the impression that his military background may not have carried over with him into the White House.

He seemed nice, but probably not the tactician and strategist other presidents had been. I found, to the contrary, that he was indeed a master strategist when the stakes (the looming prospect of global thermonuclear annihilation) couldn't have been higher. He cultivated the impression that he was sometimes confused or unsure of details, all the while he was seeing many moves ahead of his opponents. He certainly wasn't perfect. He gave his subordinates and the CIA too much reign. But on the whole, the way he maneuvered the United States out of harm's way should place him among the top tier of presidents.

bobf2d33's review against another edition

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4.0

An easy read focusing on Eisenhower's approach to the Cold War. Well written.

gregbrown's review against another edition

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2.0

Bleh. Author clearly wants you to admire and like Eisenhower but the book's contents are either unconvincing or damning.

For unconvincing, take the book's central argument: Eisenhower was actually just bluffing every time he pondered or threatened to use nuclear weapons, bluffing so hard that even his own aides believed he would use them. This is Thomas' inference from Ike being a devoted poker and then bridge player, which is pretty bizarre. Ike was repeatedly saying in internal meetings that they should treat nukes as they would any conventional weapon, and asking about the possibilities of using some in crises. He was just bluffing his own staff?

For damning, take Eisenhower's method of public communication: deliberately bland and sometimes confusing to avoid revealing any actual information. When it worked, Ike was able to deftly avoid topics... but when it didn't, it made him look disastrously out of touch. And oftentimes the very topics they wanted to avoid were avoided for not so good reasons! Or take his pretty lax treatment of personnel, keeping not only Allan Dulles around but also his brother John Foster Dulles. Ike kept John Foster around to play the bad cop to his good cop routine, but that just places JF's extremism even more his fault.

And even if you're willing to forgive Eisenhower for pushing the CIA's reign of terror as cheaper than a larger conventional army, the book itself is kinda repetitive. Again and again we hear about his temper. So many anecdotes about his temper. And his health is terrible all the time too.

Anyways, a good breezy overview of Eisenhower's foreign policy, but not a particularly insightful one. Or at least, not brimming with the sort of insights it thinks it's giving.

aloyokon's review against another edition

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4.0

I actually had some knowledge of Ike's presidency before I read this book, but I never realized the extent to which he schemed, gambled, strategized, and bluffed to keep the peace in the early days of the Cold War. Although I would not count him as the greatest president of all time, I believe that Eisenhower's ability to prevent nuclear annihilation of the world makes him a successful executive leader in my book.

(I am pissed off over his tepid action on civil rights and failure to rein in the CIA though).

So kudos to Ike, and kudos to Evan Thomas for this page-turner!

ksammons's review against another edition

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4.0

Before reading this book, I had very little knowledge of President (or General as he preferred) Eisenhower. I remember a framed Parade magazine that hung in my dad's bedroom when I was a kid, on which Eisenhower looks serious and brave in full military regalia. I was afraid of the picture, as I always felt like Eisenhower was watching me with disapproval. Now I know that he probably was.

Eisenhower is a fascinating man, and his spirit is wonderfully captured in this book. I found myself worrying about him during his various health scares and rooting for him when the press attacked him or he was entertaining Soviet leaders at the White House. This is a wonderful profile of a very complicated and serious man. And, because of the subject matter, I believe it is especially poignant to read this book in modern times. With the constant threat of nuclear war hanging over Ike's head, he successfully navigated the US through a portion of the Cold War, and adapted to the ever-changing scientific developments of weapons and technology. Eisenhower proved to be a shrewd leader, despite the press often labeling him as a friendly, senile grandfather of a president.