Dwight Eisenhower’s Son Talks About D-Day

Added: 2026-06-07

[00:00:05]For much of the war period, you were at West Point. And I'm just fascinated to ask you what how was the war viewed?

[00:00:12]What were the what were your personal feelings about the war? A a you were in West Point preparing for war and b your father was in a position at that time where of of constant elevation in in terms of command. What what's your strongest feeling about that period?

[00:00:31]Well, uh, it's hard to compare it because we were very busy. They keep cadetses very busy at West Point did anyway.

[00:00:40]And, uh, we were primarily preoccupied with what our Dick's duties were and what was happening to us. Any family at home has got to be concerned about, uh, what's happening to the father in this case when he's overseas fighting a war.

[00:00:58]Uh I think I was probably lucky in a way because I was never worried about my uh my father's physical safety. Actually, he was he was in danger several times, but of course I didn't know that.

[00:01:11]Uh I had obviously a greater interest than average about the success of the operations and all that. But you know, West Point is used to general sons. They have a lot of general sons there. And even though my dad was the biggest general uh fighting in Europe, uh still I was not really singled out that much. I was not in a unique position. Other general sons, Patton was there. Dittle was there. Mark Clark's son, Bill, they were all cadets when I was when all this fighting was going on.

[00:01:46]So we were probably better off than most people would be out by themselves. we were with our within our military community.

[00:01:57]So it would made it easier I think.

[00:01:59]>> Well, you were preparing for a career in the in the infantry.

[00:02:04]>> Oh yes.

[00:02:05]>> Okay. So that in in a way that uh you knew as someone fresh out of West Point that what the war was going to hold for you was pretty serious business.

[00:02:17]>> Oh yes, we knew it was serious business.

[00:02:19]I don't know whether anybody really knows how serious infantry work can be when you get into it.

[00:02:27]But uh I never wanted to any other branch but infantry. And of course that was easy to come by because some of the other branches were a little bit more a little higher demand.

[00:02:40]Well, what you know, when I think you just mentioned a little while ago that um your father became a full colonel in in in 1941 around the time you were getting ready to go in and his position was constantly escalating at that particular time. You said you were worried about his safety. But what I'm trying to get at is I guess that the how the the West Point cadet felt about the progress and the the conduct of the ward. Was there a feeling of I want to get out there and fight or was there some other kind of a feeling that was there? I'm just curious.

[00:03:23]Well, I think that uh we were all anxious to graduate from West Point and we did graduate one year early and wanted to get out where things were more active. But uh they kept us so busy in doing our next immediate duty and also told us about how important we were staying there that uh I don't remember any tremendous agitation to to get out.

[00:03:52]>> I didn't know you had all graduated a year early.

[00:03:55]>> Oh yes.

[00:03:57]>> The the authorities had quite a problem because we started out with a four-year course. they had to squeeze our last three years into two. So we had sort of an abbreviated academic course. Also, of course, West Point had to prove to the country that West Point had gone to war.

[00:04:15]And so they kept us busier than they do most cadetses in normal times.

[00:04:20]But yes, my uh my dad got his full colony when we were at Fort Lewis on March 4th, 1941.

[00:04:28]He was chief of staff I think probably of the ninth core at that time and 15 15 months later he was commanding uh in Europe commanding US forces in Europe.

[00:04:40]Tremendous rise which I watched with a of course a great deal of interest but other people were watching uh with interest too and their their fathers were in somewhat the same boat. I remember that uh this the day that my dad got his first star. I was a plea and I was sitting in my room and Cadet Kittenberger of the first class came by and stuck his head in say, "Well, your father made his first star today, mister." And walked walked out, didn't wait for an answer. And I thought, "Huh?"

[00:05:10]So, I think we took it pretty much in stride.

[00:05:13]>> Well, it certainly sounds that way. I want to ask you next about your your uplose observations uh of the war.

[00:05:21]And in particular, I'm interested because of the focus of the show, if you could maybe when you went over there and you saw, you observed and you saw um how the Supreme Commander and the Supreme Headquarters um uh operated. If you could just sort of take us inside and maybe give us some kind of a little insights into what that is. When I tell people that Supreme Headquarters was 16,000 people, they, you know, they thought maybe it might be a hundred or two people, you know. What was it like?

[00:05:55]>> Well, actually 100 or >> let me know. Let me just ask you to say Supreme Headquarters. Uh, I uh on graduation by orders of General Marshall, I uh boarded the Queen Mary that same night, 6th of June, 1944.

[00:06:18]And 7 days later, having been at sea for all that time without any word of how the invasion had gone, I arrived in London.

[00:06:27]And then I went and spent about two and a half weeks with my dad.

[00:06:32]It was sort of a dream world in a way because here are all these highranking generals coming in and rather informally uh remarkably relaxed period considering that this was D plus 7 the day I arrived there. The day dayby-day fighting on the continent of course was being conducted by General Montgomery and I had the feeling that uh my dad was impatient to get into it all himself. He got very very detailed briefings. He really watched over very carefully over what was happening. But as any good manager does when somebody's been given a job and they're doing the job satisfactory, he doesn't nitpick.

[00:07:12]So, uh, I had little moments of revelation. One day, General Strong, the intelligence officer, came in. He pulled out a map and he showed uh, the Supreme Commander every German division was on the front there in Normandy. We hadn't taken Sherburgg yet.

[00:07:30]And he said, "Now, this division has fought very badly. This one has fought well." He gave a rundown. And of course, this was watched with tremendous interest.

[00:07:41]Uh the same afternoon, word came in that uh the supplies going across Omaha Beach were bogging down. So here's the boss on the telephone calling somebody and say if they want to keep their job, they better get that those supplies marching going a little faster across.

[00:07:59]It was heady stuff.

[00:08:02]I think my dad thought that I should probably be uh more uh stereed than I was. But you know, you get used to spectacular things in a hurry.

[00:08:14]It was a quite a revelation. He made a point, of course, to introduce me to everybody of any importance in the invasion, which sort of made me something of a relic, I guess, as as the rem the one who remembers all these people in the flesh.

[00:08:32]But then that was the beginning of my double life.

[00:08:36]From there I went back to Benning infantry school doing the same thing everybody else did.

[00:08:44]Uh sweating and digging fox holes and then every now and then in my life my career I get pulled off in the rarified atmosphere. Then back to the world of reality again. That was the beginning of it.

[00:08:56]It was sort of a re revelation one day sitting in Normandy here. Uh they hadn't taken St. Low yet.

[00:09:04]Here's a bunch of generals very a lot of them of whom I'd uh I'd known as a kid.

[00:09:10]General Jerro was the second father to me. There was General Lightning Joe Collins Bradley sitting around talking rather rather casually uh about the tactical situation about how things were going but also every now and then say well maybe we'll get some Cam bear cheese when we get down to St. Low.

[00:09:32]Uh it was an education to realize that these people were human just like uh you and me but at the same time carrying tremendous responsibility.

[00:09:43]I thought they carried their responsibilities very gracefully.

[00:09:49]They were friends.

[00:09:53]>> I wanted to ask you uh on this observation just picking up what you said. Um you you you told me yesterday um about the observation of Supreme Commander and how you were surprised how relaxed he was and that you were surprised at some of the things you read about the tenses. I wonder if you could share that with us. Now >> I think that's a characteristic of of my dad's my father's. He did not show very much the pressures he was under at times when he was in an office and things got uh confused. knew somebody was not doing he had a lot of temper. He he had a temper but generally the pressures that he had on him that were legitimate pressures on him he bore them.

[00:10:38]I happened to be in uh Sha headquarters for a day passing through in early April 1945 when the decision was being made to uh drive to the Elb River and stop there. lots of pressure from Churchill to push on to Berlin.

[00:10:58]Um, very very fluid situation. Now, it looked to me as if my dad was quite relaxed.

[00:11:07]Uh, I've heard I've read since then that his chief of staff, Beetle Smith, thought he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

[00:11:15]Uh, I don't know, but uh, he never did.

[00:11:18]Even in his presidency, the tougher it got, the more calm he seemed to be on the exterior.

[00:11:25]Maybe that's true of everybody. I don't know.

[00:11:28]>> I don't think it's true of everybody. I think it's an amazing trait.

[00:11:32]Let me ask you, you said you had seen all the key players and there are some personalities that um u we'd be interested in, you know, if you uh were able to share any of your, you know, thoughts that are on your mind. People like Bradley, Patton, Montgomery, um Beetle Smith, uh and so on. Is anything stand out about uh the the tight circle that conducted that war?

[00:12:03]>> Well, I think the the thing that was outstanding about among all of it was the amount of goodwill that existed between all of them. There have been lots of books written since the war about the wars between the generals and things like that. Well, of course there were differences of opinion and sometimes uh personal animosity, but not very much at that time. There was a gold lick Hitler and everybody was pulling on the same side. If you're college football team is up against a tough game that you want to win, you don't care much about the details, the personalities, the players who are making the touchdowns for you. And that's the way they uh that's the way they felt. That's the way they operated.

[00:12:42]They were uh everything seemed to be remarkably harmonious at that time. They were different personalities.

[00:12:52]Uh Joel Bradley was always seemed exceedingly calm, detached, uh self- aacing almost at the time when I knew him during the war.

[00:13:05]Uh Joel Patton, whom I've known as a kid, was always bullied, always on stage, always emotional.

[00:13:14]I've seen him break down in tears over things he just heard himself say.

[00:13:19]Uh courteous, courtly, surprisingly enough.

[00:13:25]Dad took me to see uh the prime minister one day when the awful storm was raging on June 19th that would have destroyed any invasion other than whether was well established went by Whiteall and uh I remember a very bare office it was not the 10 Dowy street is in Whiteall and uh of course there's just the three of us sitting in this room Churchill of course I was a piece of furniture I was an aid But he was looking off into space. He wasn't paying an awful lot of attention to my dad that day. His main preoccupation was complaints against the dignity for the weather that had been given us. And he was saying they have no right to give us weather like that. It was great. Uh dad took me around see to see all of them. It was fun.

[00:14:18]>> Great memories too.

[00:14:19]>> That was very good on Churchill.

[00:14:22]>> Pretty good church.

[00:14:24]We uh we heard from um oh I I'm going to forget who it was now, but uh talking about Churchill holding forth at a dinner party with seven or nine people and so on and and that he just absolutely just took over the floor, you know, and and talked to on high or something. So anyway, appreciate you saying that. What about um uh Montgomery? Do you have any um recollections of him that you could share with us?

[00:14:53]Yes. Yes.

[00:14:56]Uh he was a a good soldier and a very competent general.

[00:15:00]>> I say Montgomery was a very >> Yes. Uh yes. General Montgomery was a a very good soldier and uh a very expert soldier in especially in set piece battles. Great technician. He made no effort to make friends among the Americans.

[00:15:19]uh and so therefore a certain amount of animosity grew up liked to go his own way. He was terribly preoccupied with himself. I met him oh five six times always for the first time. Not that I'm that great a charmer but I thought that maybe after a little while that he might have noticed that he'd see me before someplace. Never happened.

[00:15:43]He uh did not bear the same ranker toward the Americans that some of the Americans held toward him when I was researching the bitter woods.

[00:15:53]I got an hour's interview with him and after he'd gotten off his first couple of insults as to why the bulge was not necessary whatsoever if everybody had done things the way he wanted to in the first place. After he got a couple of insults off, he settled down. We had laughs. He asked about General Bradley and how's his new wife and they told us what a great job Bradley had done and some of the others couldn't have done so well and uh it was a rather uh very pleasant interview lasted 15 minutes longer than was planned. Afterward, I uh sent him the results of what I had taken down.

[00:16:34]Um I said that I won't necessarily agree with everything you say, but I want to make sure I understood you correctly.

[00:16:40]And he said in in the most sent back in the most meticulous handwriting on that yellow sheet of paper exactly the comments uh uh what I'd sent him. Some of disagree with this, but uh and was very very cordial. He was mixed bag Montgomery was, but he was certainly certainly a great net plus for the cause.

[00:17:07]>> Well, let I'd like to ask you because you um you had talked about Freddy de Gingong. Um there was after the bombs a a terrible uh disagreement between the allies as to what had happened and what was going on and um and so on. And I wondered if you could there was a moment finally that uh came where it looked like there was going to be a breakup of uh those who were in charge uh of the the the major effort at the time. and and I thought maybe if you could tell us a little bit about Freddy and how he related to Montgomery and how he related to the Americans.

[00:17:53]>> Uh General Danggon, Freddy de Gangon was the absolute opposite in personality from uh General Montgomery. Freddy again was a bon vivv liked good food liked his wines he liked good living whereas Montgomery was by policy a complete acetic uh Montgomery was a loner the gang was gregarious Montgomery made no effort to get along with the Americans and so all the entire burden of getting along with the Americans and everybody else in the theater fell to Freddy Ganggon who was a fellow that never talked down to anybody. He communicated with me later on uh on a equal basis. I always appreciate that the circumstances that you're talking about there's just uh toward the end of the bulge uh the entire northern sector of the of the first army had been turned over by dad the supreme commander to Montgomery and left General Bradley with really only the third army patent's third army uh that was necessary because the breakthrough occurred between where Montgomery was and where Bradley was.

[00:19:11]So, uh, since he was commanding US troops, Montgomery got back on the, uh, is one string that he always plucked on. He he wanted to be the overall supreme commander on the land for land forces in in Europe. and he laid his arguments out so strongly accusing the allies of total failure up to the point where he had taken over on the 20th of December.

[00:19:41]Uh to the point where uh General Eisenhower said this is it I can't stand anymore. So he wrote a a message that he was going to send back to the to the joint chiefs of staff combined chiefs of combined chiefs saying it's Montgomery or me.

[00:19:58]Well, I don't know how De Gangon got word of that, but he figured that this is the time that he had to take great personal risk to fly from Brussels to Paris and god-awwful weather. Went down there and was able to intercept the message in the nick of time and uh convinced uh Generalized to hold up his ultimatum to the combined chiefs for 24 hours. time for him to get back and explain to Montgomery, who seemed completely non plus in how he defended everybody, explain to him what he'd done. And so Montgomery sent a very consiliatory message and things were papered over, papered over.

[00:20:43]But still in through all the later years after the war, the two remained dead and Montgomery remained on the surface. uh quite friendly. I noticed that they went both both went back to be heads of their own services at home their respective armies and then uh both wound up at the NATO headquarters shape where Montgomery was again Eisenhower's subordinate. He was the senior land commander this time uh under the supreme commander. Always it seemed to me in their personal relations that my dad Joe Eisenhower deferred the uh relationship went on to through into the presidency.

[00:21:31]In 1957 Montgomery came to visit the White House. Well, no sooner does he arrived at the White House. But he looks around, says, "You know, my regiment burned this joint down back in 1814.

[00:21:44]Tact was not what he worked on hardest."

[00:21:48]So that was all just a laugh, though.

[00:21:51]And the two went to Gettysburg then to check out the battlefield. And they looked it over. They got to the place where Lee had ordered Pickicket to charge across this mile of open field to be mowed down. Pickicket's charge.

[00:22:05]And uh Montgomery uh you put a camera around and he was always performing. So he ran around and peeked and he said, "Oh, monstrous, monstrous."

[00:22:16]And finally uh I could visualize as Joe Eisenhower's son, I could visualize how the blood pressure was going up and he was reaching the breaking point. So Montgomery turned says, "What would you do to me if I did this?" And dad said, "I'd fire you." Well, immediately the newspapers all over the south. I could have fired Lee.

[00:22:40]Oh my gosh. He had more offenses to men for the next couple of weeks having his picture taken in front of Roberty Lee's picture and so forth. It was funny.

[00:22:49]But then the next year, next year though, Montgomery put out his memoirs in which he had said that the war would have been over six months earlier if if they hadn't had to bear the burden of Ike. And so that was the end of a beautiful friendship forever.

[00:23:06]>> That that was very good. Thank you for sharing that with us. I but I want to just go back very briefly to to to Freddy. Is it your opinion if you know you we we had Bradley very very angry at the press conference. We had Patton supporting Bradley and telling Eisenhower that. And if if Freddy hadn't done that in that blinding snowstorm what he did, the combined chiefs of staff would have had to have made a decision and certainly Monty would have been fired. Not not >> I think I should start. Well, I I just say that I if you feel that way based on our conversation that if it weren't for Freddy doing what he did, then there would have been this enormous crisis back at the Allied combined chiefs of staff or if I don't want to put words in your mouth, but that kind of uh view because it was you had Patton and Bradley and you had money and something had to happen and you had this small player nobody remembers today actually making a difference. It seems to me >> I believe that uh Freddy de Gangard was the absolute what he did was the absolute critical uh thing because if that message had gone I find it very difficult to uh visualize patching up.

[00:24:37]>> The way the way I look at it they had just gone through a terrible military crisis. they had survived it and if you were a military man and you said okay we've really we've really cut them off and you know things are going to look good but but again to a lay person having gone through this crisis and then having survived it and those who who made survival possible are all of a sudden saying hey we can't work together >> well um to give everybody the benefit benefit of the doubt. I think Montgomery thought that he was merely expressing a view frankly view expressing his views frankly to General Eistower. This was disloyalty.

[00:25:29]Now you could take only so much disloyalty whether it was actually disloyalty is up to somebody else to judge. But at any rate, he perceived it as disloyalty.

[00:25:41]And uh I believe that that episode of of switch of switching the northern shoulder of the bulge to Montgomery, it when you take into consideration the way Montgomery handled it caused a somewhat of a lasting of the warmth between Eisenhower and Bradley for the rest of the war. And I think that's borne out in Bradley's books.

[00:26:08]Uh not anything very serious, but a little bit of the lessing of the warmth.

[00:26:15]If it had been an American commander, he probably would not have minded. Or a a British commander with a modicum of tact, but it wasn't there.

[00:26:29]Well, let me um um let me ask you about again taking this somewhat chronologically post uh post bulge and so on and you and I talked about you your idea about the the prop all the propaganda had personalized Hitler. Hitler is the enemy and Berlin is where Hitler hangs his hat, you know, kind of. And that we were uh I would I would assume some of the propaganda movies were probably called on to Berlin or something like that. Um when the decision is made uh uh to stop at the Alp to have this definable border between the Allied armies that are linking up and Berlin is not taken. It is a tremendous shock to a lot of people, soldiers, journalists, the American public and so on. And the Eisenhower name has been associated with this controversy. There are those who believe that if we had taken Berlin, somehow the cold war would have been different. But could you um as a military man and as somebody who listened probably to your father talk about this, uh what about the whole Berlin business? Was it a huge mistake on the Americans part not to take Berlin? You were at the Alba. Is it pronounced Elba, isn't it?

[00:27:52]>> Is it?

[00:27:53]>> Well, I mean, in German, isn't it Elba?

[00:27:55]>> Oh, I I suppose we call it the Ela.

[00:27:57]>> Yeah, the the EL. Okay.

[00:28:00]>> Well, I uh feel very strongly that that what was done had to be done.

[00:28:08]Uh Eisenhower's name is more than associated with it. He gave the order and unless he was counterbatted by the combined chiefs of staff uh to uh go on and and cross the El River, he wouldn't do it.

[00:28:24]Now, the reasons for it were essentially twofold. There's all sorts of minor reasons, but essentially the Russians were our allies. That's one thing that we have to realize that the Cold War had not set in. Everything was cooperating with the allies. You know, Time magazine made Joe Stalin the man of the year twice during that war.

[00:28:46]Uh we knew what kind of casualties they were taking. We knew the contribution they were making. They were definitely our allies. Now uh that was essential that we cooperate with them. The other thing is that when you have two armies, especially armies in the heat of battle approaching each other, you have got to have a defined uh defined debarcation line between how far they go. You can't just say, "Well, you go up to 10th Street and stop and the other side go up 10th Street because whoever gets there first probably going to go across. You're going to have a melee." And the Russians were so riled up and so enthusiastic they would have ground to pieces any few US soldiers we'd gotten a couple of divisions into to Berlin. So the uh I think those two things that the Russians were our allies and the uh need for demarcation line uh were was critical.

[00:29:41]Of course another little detail is the Russians were at Berlin and we weren't.

[00:29:45]Our center of gravity was way back actually west of the Rine at that time.

[00:29:50]But I don't want to be a lady who protests too much.

[00:29:54]U people have said since then remarkably that uh Ike showed political naivity by not going into Berlin. Well, at that particular moment he was hired as a soldier as a general and the political decisions were to be made by his superiors. Now, if he'd gotten into fighting wars for political reasons as a general, uh you haven't heard anything like the noise you would have heard about that. He sent a message about the 12th of April saying, "If you wish me to if you wish to change my directive and wish me to fight a political war rather than a military war, tell me."

[00:30:38]That's in the records that that message.

[00:30:40]President Roosevelt died the next day, so no directive.

[00:30:44]But I not only don't feel apologetic about his stopping at the Yelp, I think that anybody who really thinks it through uh has to come to the same conclusion.

[00:31:00]How is that for tact you you said yesterday I think of that that you were there and with General It's not Weedmire, General >> Simpson. Simpson. Simpson.

[00:31:16]>> I wasn't I was up with him. I was up I was my paragrinations took me to the Elb River at that point. And I can see why.

[00:31:25]My gosh, the buildup. We made more of a objective I think of terrain Berlin and Tokyo than we did of Hitler and Hirohilo. I think we did our music our rallying cries route onto Berlin like on to Richmond onto Tokyo.

[00:31:42]Uh I heard a song on the radio yesterday. Frank Sinatra singing it'll be a hot time in the town of Berlin when the Angs come marching in. Everything was all our training at Fort Benning. So it was all to Berlin. So of course there was a feeling about that. And of course the press press people wanted to be the first ones in something to tell their grandchildren uh something to report on big big news.

[00:32:07]Of course it was disappointment but just didn't make sense.

[00:32:14]Okay. Um, I wanted to um ask you about the uh the the relation when the linkup takes place and the uh in the the early the weeks after the war. if you could talk about the relationship between Eisenhower and the Soviets and particularly Zukov and you know what you you saw of that um uh there's been much made of it and much made of it up until the time of the 55 summit uh you know in terms of that they they head it off somehow and so on. I wonder if you could provide any insights into that relationship and to the Eisenhower attitude toward the Russian allies and what they contributed.

[00:33:08]>> I was not present when my dad went to Berlin for the first meetings with Jukov. I think he uh in the early stages I was on the I actually went up the war in Czechoslovakia uh where we were in reasonably close contact with the Russians and uh even though we were all sort of suspicious of each other there was very good feeling camaraderie uh but uh I cannot give you very much from a personal view of that. But uh as soon as the war was over, the heads of the respective armies uh Eisenhower for the Americans, Montgomery for the British, Shukov for the Russians, and later on I guess or Delatra, I forget which one for the French met on the four power control commission in Berlin.

[00:34:16]And we're talking uh late May or early June at that time to to begin to administer a a flattened out country, a defeated country and to feed them, discipline them, get the DPS, the displaced persons, give them something by way of homes. Besides moving all the Germans out of Sisia to give to Poland and place him some Oh, the the the problems were terrible.

[00:34:45]And uh General Eisenhower found himself overnight having the Germans enemies one day and as wards to be fed the next day. And of course all the countries did all the all countries that had occupation zones.

[00:34:59]Now, at that stage, Marshall Zhukov was riding pretty high with the with the Russians, that's presumably with Stalin.

[00:35:10]And uh he showed a cockiness that later turned out to be unwise. He treated his commasar who's supposed to tell him what to do, Vashinsky. he treated him was sort of short shrift.

[00:35:27]Uh for a while there, I'm sure that my dad felt that uh if all the Russians could be made to follow the Zhukov, be like Zhukov, we could get along fine in the post world war postwar world.

[00:35:46]He hoped that and I think he had an inkling of of expectation.

[00:35:53]That good feeling went on at least at his level through August.

[00:36:02]And on August 12th, he went to Moscow as the guest of Marshall Zhukov for a a just a PR visit, just a visit of old soldiers together. I was able to go along with my dad's aid. So I was sort of the reporter of the whole thing.

[00:36:20]Uh the big impression that we got from that of course was the the immensity of the parade they put on the physical culture parade on the 12th of August but was the exceeding goodwill.

[00:36:32]General Eisar was invited up on top of Lenin's tomb to watch the parade by Stalin.

[00:36:40]uh the first American ever been up there.

[00:36:43]Uh great brilliance, great elation. Of course, the war is just over.

[00:36:48]Uh the two went out to a soccer game and the crowd cheered. Then my dad put his arm around Zukov and oh my gosh, they all went wild. They took us around to see collective farms, to see the Sturmovic aircraft factories, subways, everything. Three days worth of real sightseeing, presumably open, but obviously not. But nevertheless, the objective of being friendly was, I believe, at that time genuine.

[00:37:18]Had dinner in the Kremlin.

[00:37:21]After dinner, this great big light room and all the the Russians in white coats and we just dropped the atomic bomb.

[00:37:28]That was something of a topic of conversation.

[00:37:33]uh went into a movie in the next room, a little dark room, showed movies of the Russian armies taking Berlin.

[00:37:41]And there's Marshall Zhukov up there.

[00:37:43]Half the pictures, of course, were of him.

[00:37:47]And uh my dad turned to Stell and says, "Well, Marshall Zukov is so handsome that if he's ever out of a job, we'll get him a job in Hollywood." And Zukov says, "Marshall Zukov will never be out of a job." Well, a week, a month later, they I guess they were taking the rubber hoses to him. I don't know. Uh the whole point of all this long- winded talk is that I believe the goodwill was genuine.

[00:38:21]something happened whether whether reality set in whether uh Stalin got impatient with Zhukov or other things uh I don't know oh incidentally I forgot to mention that while we were there the uh on the last night of the visit came in word that at we were at the embassy American embassy that uh Japan had surrendered that made even more goodwill than ever really quite something.

[00:38:52]But a month later, I was scheduled to go back as the aid to Zhukov, who's going to make a return visit to the United States. And Zukov was pretty frank about it. He says, "Well, if John's on the plane, I guess it'll won't go into the Atlantic." And I think he meant it.

[00:39:08]Uh, I was looking forward to it. The day of the trip canled, Zukov had gotten a diplomatic illness. I think from that time on I felt the chill winds come over us and that's where I place the beginning of the what later became the cold water cold war that's all very subjective you understand >> could you you know Eisenhower goes home as the man who beat Hitler and so on could you give us you've told us about how the Russians respond to him and you know there was goodwill touring the guild Hall speech which was so favorably received in the crowds. Could you give a a little idea of how in the United States people responded to him at the at the close of war? You went on the Goodwill tour. Yes. With him. So could any just any personal responses uh that it must have been for him quite amazing to to see that the war's victory had been personalized in himself.

[00:40:15]I believe it was a surprise to him.

[00:40:20]We came home about the oh somewhere around the 15th of June I believe and maybe a little later than that because the guild hall speech was the 12th of June which incidentally was the best speech he ever made. My god, some of those phrases in there. Humility must be the portion of any man who wins a claim through the blood sacrifice of his compatriots.

[00:40:45]It's not exactly quoted, but it's terrific.

[00:40:48]But uh we went out, we thought we could go out to dinner at Cirros in London.

[00:40:55]Well, the crowds heard that he was there and he couldn't he couldn't get from the car to the to the restaurant. We finally got there, but it it took a long time.

[00:41:03]mobbed. Absolutely mobbed. He didn't expect that because after all, he'd gone into this into this war as a simple soldier. He'd been uh living on under austere conditions all through the war.

[00:41:17]No crowds, no who's at the end to see it personalized so much in himself, he realized that there was a lot of artificiality in that.

[00:41:28]He realized it full well and that's why he said humility must be the portion but it came as a surprise to him. He took it very much in stride. I remember being astonished. We left New York on a DC4 aircraft and we got on this 1-hour flight and he said, "Give me a minute. I've got to think of what I'm going to say when I get to New York.

[00:41:58]Okay, that's a certain bit of a plum, I thought.

[00:42:03]But, uh, he handle he handled it well and I think he always never ceased to think of himself as a symbol.

[00:42:14]uh certain times in the much later on when he was being offered uh fees for doing programs, television programs and things like that. He would accept a fee but not too much because I as the devil's advocate was always trying to get more and he said uh no says when you've earned your fame the way I have you don't drive too hard a bargain. he always felt never ceased to feel the rest of his life.

[00:42:50]>> One thing I I wanted to ask you about earlier when we were talking about the Supreme Command headquarters and uh was and you talked about handling tension and that I wonder if you could share with us some idea of how in that pressure cooker a a person managed to relax. He didn't. You were at West Point. Maybe my was in New York.

[00:43:15]He had a circle of friends. He He liked bridge. He liked golf. He rode horses.

[00:43:19]He had dinner. But I wonder if you could just share with us how does someone come down and relax. Did you see any of the in his circle of friends, his household, his uh working staff? If you give some insight, how does a supreme commander take it easy?

[00:43:39]He never did take it very easy. He played no golf during the war. He did do some horseback riding.

[00:43:47]He had a small group of friends he would play bridge with.

[00:43:53]He had a rather small contingent of officers that lived in the house with him. He was on friendly terms with Jimmy Galt, the British uh the Scottish uh military assistant.

[00:44:07]He gave small dinner parties occasionally, but they were always over in the home by 9:00, I suppose.

[00:44:18]Uh he always had an aid or somebody to have a couple of drinks of scotch before dinner, but uh he relaxed better than most would, I think, because he was always always in his life left his work at the at the office when he came home. And he was able to do that, too. I I've seen him in at times of relative crisis in the White House sitting talking about the upcoming Kentucky Derby and which horse was going to win and whatnot. He he was very very good astonishing at his ability to compartmentalize his life.

[00:45:00]But what he what he was working at he was a terror.

[00:45:04]when he was when he was concentrating >> in terms of number of hours he slept at night or the cigarettes or the number of books he read or anything. Is there any you talk you already have sketched it out I think pretty adequately but I just as a way um uh did he come home and uh uh did he did he read what did he sleep four hours did he sleep 10 hours did he sleep he I know he smoked a lot of cigarettes uh and but is there any other aspect that that you can think of I'm just doing this as a reminder >> I think he slept a good eight hours uh a night.

[00:45:48]He slept very easily.

[00:45:51]He smoked heavily when he's working.

[00:45:55]Uh we know when we're writing desk work, you always want something oral. Well, some people eat chocolates and so forth.

[00:46:00]Well, he he he would look up and and find four or five lit cigarettes. None of them spoke through, but he lit them all. Uh just not thinking. It was a it was a habit.

[00:46:14]uh he woke up uh very early in the morning.

[00:46:21]He read and of course uh it gives some people pleasure to say he read nothing but westerns. He read westerns like somebody plays solitire or I do crossword puzzles. He did a lot of serious reading.

[00:46:33]But in the case of a real crisis out in the field, he would read a western because it was relaxing and it was that Papy wouldn't know whether he'd read it or not.

[00:46:43]But uh uh he read biography and he read history.

[00:46:53]Uh not very big on romance novels.

[00:46:55]Obviously I I think the abnormal thing about him was his normaly for being under conditions of extreme pressure.

[00:47:09]>> That's all quite amazing what you say.

[00:47:12]One thing I I I wanted to mention to you. I I interviewed Johnny Henderson. I don't know if you ever met him on Montgomery's staff. He was an young aid at the time. Was with Montgomery the whole war.

[00:47:24]>> Yeah. I think there's I think his pictures in the memoirs I think.

[00:47:29]>> Well, but he was saying how Montgomery when Eisenhower came to visit Montgomery would always go to bed. He said the boys will give you a drink and you know talk to you and so on. Henderson was uh Henderson always said that how amazed they were at his knowledge of British history. He said he knew he said General Eisenard knew a heck of a lot more than we did in our school boy history and so on. So I just I mentioned it to you because they were they were amazed and and he always stayed up with them and talked after you know Monty went out to his what do they call it? caravan out to his caravan to sleep with Raml's picture.

[00:48:09]>> Uh dad was very proud of fact the standard bearer of William the Conqueror's army was named Talia Pharaoh which the southerners called Tolliver which is a translation of Eisenhower and the battle was also fought on October 14th which is his birthday. So he felt a great affinity toward that piece of English history.

[00:48:31]Well, I I wanted to move on to uh into the post-war period now and and the question I when I talk about our program too and so on, I always say after the war, what does a hero uh on that elevated um platform, what what does a hero do after the war is over? How did he take um the end of the war and becoming I think you say um an ordinary guy again? How how do you handle it? He was never going to be an ordinary guy once he discovered how uh uh how he had been personally made the symbol of the victory in Europe. Uh very rarely in the United States. Other countries, yes, but not in the United States could he ever go into a restaurant without being mobbed. In France, he could and his his privacy would be respected, but he was never going to be an ordinary guy. But his I think that he was doing what he thought was most advantageous to go to Columbia University, be the president of a great university and then he hoped to be an elder statesman. He didn't. He had no stomach for the demobilization of the army the in the chief of staff job.

[00:49:48]Uh I think he was a little unrealistic there. at the age of 55 to be considered an elder statesman, you're you're usually thought of have to have quite a bit of work left in you at that point.

[00:49:59]And so I think he was unrealistic, but he he really had had seen so much of politics and politicians in Washington during the 30s.

[00:50:09]He had no real personal desire to join that scene.

[00:50:14]He didn't care for Washington as a place to live. So I don't think he really He was not being disingenuous when he said, "I'm not interested in running for president." He was not. He meant it.

[00:50:28]But I think that the Columbia University, if that worked out, would have been uh very good for him.

[00:50:35]Still, no matter the fact that he was a eight-year president and other things happened to him, the NATO experience, the high point was always the surrender of Germany. at uh on May 8th, 1945. Reeves.

[00:50:54]>> Well, let let me uh let me go back and and uh talk a little bit or ask you to talk a little bit about the the job as chief of staff. Um after the war and what it entailed. I think you you said it was not a happy time or something to that effect, but he did the job because and that was demobilization and it was dealing with Washington and budgets and all the rest of it. But if you could talk about why he did it, how he handled it and why he chose to get out.

[00:51:30]Well, uh I think a lot of people especially the army strangely uh the army they they felt that in spite of what he had done that the job of chief of staff of the army is still the acme of the uh army. And so I everybody wanted him to come home and be chief of staff just like Persian was chief of staff after World War I.

[00:51:57]Uh my dad wanted no part of it. didn't like the idea of uh demobilizing the army that he'd fought. But after all, his prime characteristic is good soldier.

[00:52:09]And good soldier means that you do your stuff. And out of loyalty to Marshall, who wanted to leave the job very badly and out of loyalty to President Truman, I think he was willing to go and take the job. But he he did specify really only three years. Let's not overdo this.

[00:52:29]Actually, I think he was only there about two and a half years from November of 45 to May of 48. But then he went on to do things he wanted to do, which was to get out, start a new life at Columbia University.

[00:52:43]Uh, one of the terrible things about uh the chief de chiefs of staff job is that he was made almost personally responsible for for redeploying all the troops home and the panic in this country to get everybody back. You would after all they'd been overseas for three or four years. You'd think that another month getting home they could stand it. It was panic.

[00:53:08]a bunch of wives chased him down this the hall of the Pentagon one day uh screaming about their husbands coming home. This this country went nuts for a while. Well, he had to put up with that.

[00:53:20]Well, that was no great inspiration after the position he'd held before.

[00:53:26]Uh there there could be a lot written about the uh emotions and the problems of downgrading coming back to the world of reality after you've been in lofty positions.

[00:53:43]>> Firsthand accounts from those who knew and worked with Dwight D. Eisenhower. To watch more from the Eisenhower Legacy Collection, go