Architects of Power: Roosevelt, Eisenhower, and the American Century (Brief Encounters)

The United States is not a preternaturally inward-looking nation, and isolation is not the natural disposition of Americans. The real question is not whether Americans are prone to isolation or engagement, but how their engagement with the world has evolved, how events have made the United States a superpower, and how these developments have been guided by political leadership. Indeed, the great debates on foreign affairs in American history have not been about whether to have debates on foreign affairs; they have been between the competing visions of American influence in the world. In Architects of Power, Philip Terzian examines two public figures in the twentieth century who personify, in their lives, careers, and philosophies, the rise of the United States of America to global leadership: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Dwight D. Eisenhower. Terzian reveals how both men recognized and acted on the global threats of their time and questions whether America can rise to the same challenges today. Without this clear window into the stricken world that Roosevelt inhabited and Eisenhower understood, we are unlikely to recognize the perils and challenges of the world we have inherited. An 'elegant,' 'incisive' and 'original' study of the lives and careers of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Dwight D. Eisenhower who, despite their temperamental and biographical differences, held parallel views on the rise and exercise of American power, and were jointly instrumental in establishing and consolidating American supremacy in the postwar world. Both battled isolationism in their respective parties, and saw American power both in Wilsonian terms--as the global guarantor of human freedom -- and as the essential stabilizing force in the struggle against authoritarianism of the left and right. (The author, Philip Terzian, is literary editor of The Weekly Standard.) "The United States is not a preternaturally inward-looking nation, and isolation is not the natural disposition of Americans. The real question is not whether Americans are prone to isolation or engagement, but how their engagement with the world has evolved, how events have conspired to make the United States a superpower, and how these developments have been guided by political leadership. Indeed, the great debates on foreign affairs in American history have not been about whether to have debates on foreign affairs; they have been between the competing visions of American influence in the world"--Jacket Contents 6 Dedication 8 Apology 10 1 16 2 24 3 32 4 41 5 50 6 58 7 65 8 75 9 84 10 95 Epilogue 106 Bibliography 126 Index 132