Eisenhower’s Military-Industrial Complex
The key to understanding the enduring relevance of the speech is to focus on what Ike actually said and to understand what motivated the general for much of his adult lifetime.
In a new book, Unwarranted Influence: Dwight D. Eisenhower and the Military Industrial Complex, James Ledbetter does an able job of drilling down on crucial episodes in Ike’s career that reveal a long-standing concern about militarism, and of maintaining a balance between a capable military and a healthy economy. Ledbetter also sheds some new light onto the drafting of the speech, a story that has since been fleshed out even more by the release of new documents discovered in the personal collection of presidential speechwriter, Malcolm Moos.
