Evening star., 1945-12-02
Soldier of Democracy
BY Kenneth S. DaUis. Double
day, Dordn; $500

-1 HERE have been several quick
Jobs on the life of Gen. Eisen-
Il hover to date. This Is the
first full-length study Of the fa-
NOUS soldier. 1t is SIS pages long
and only half of 1t is given to the
World War. It is, however, quite
rs eulogistic in tone as the shorter
works have been. II the author
examines Gen. Eisenhower's record
!. more extensively than the others
have done, it Is not to question his
greatness, but only to try to dis
cover what made him the hero that
he Is.
To put it briefly the conclusion is
that the general was gifted with
an extraordinary capacity for learn
ing. and that that capacity was
shaped by the play of two great
historic American forces on his life
democracy and puritanism. The
Eisenhowers Originally Eisen-
hauers) came from long line OF
German American Protestants.
They emigrated before the Revo-
luton, in order to find religious
liberty, and even before that they
had left Germany for Switzerland
for their religions sake. In the
new land they adhered to their
faith and kept puritanical tradl-
ton in their home life. AS for
the democracy, it was that of the
American West. The family lived
in Pennsylvania-which was west
from the Colonial point Of view
until the mid 10th century, when
the, West moved on to Kansas.
Then they migrated again. The
general, as the world now knows,
had village childhood, without
consciousness of class or social dis
tinctions.
That would seem to dispose of the
environmental factors which worked
ON him. They worked on millions
Of other boys, Of course, without
producing any such genius. Yet
when Mr.. Davis comes to his an
alysis of the generals personal
qualities he is far less specific.
At West Point, as he dutifully, i,
reports, the future Allied COM
mander Jagged well down toward
the bottom of his class. Ten years
later, however, when he. attended
the Command School at Leaven-
worth, he finished first. MIR. Davis
attributes the changed attitude
largely to the influence of Gen.
Fox Connor, who, he says, brought
the young officer new concept of
the profession of arms. Yet, per-
haps from trying too hard, he does
not make the transformation very
real to his readers. The fact seems
to be that until the general reached
the great climax Of his career his
life was marked consistently by the
impersonality of Army. There are
few incidents in Mr..
Davis book, at any rate, which have
the ingredient known as color.
When he comes to the war years,
however, Mr.. Davis plunges into
controversy. He goes into the polit-
ical factors with which Gen. Eisen-
hover had to cope quite as fully as
the military. He blames the State
Department for the comedy (or
tragedy Of errors" which was played
out in the Giraud affair, asserting
that Eisenhower was made the
scapegoat for departmental mis-
takes. He traces the tangled diff
culties which the general encoun-
tered in building up his staff. He is
explicit about hasty planning and
overOptimism. He retells the his
tory Of the war, in short, in terms
Of the generals enormous and COM
plicated job. And from the retelling
emerges something which is not SO
much portrait of a great soldier
rs an outline for the education of
= great soldier. For it is the story
Of constant ability to learn being
put to action. So the work gets
back finally to the generals essence,
as far as Mr.. Davis has been able to
dnd it--a genius for assimilating and
knowledge.
The book Is nearly unique in being
, full biography of a great hero
written in the hero's lifetime. 1t
does not make Gen. Eisenhower a
figure for romantic tradition. But
when such books are written-later-
It will probably serve for the source
Irom which they are drawn.
Outside Eden
One Of the cutest tricks that
ever turned out to be an author
8 Isabel Scott Rorick. She is
lot like the Mrs. Cugat" in her
Rt0r1eS and "Oultsido Tdono 10 tho