This first book-length assessment of Ike's consummate skills as a communicator shows how, contrary to popular belief, he used language effectively as a weapon to achieve well-conceived strategic ends during the Cold War. Medhurst demonstrates how Eisenhower chose his audiences and times deliberately. This reference is an invaluable text and resource for students, scholars, and professionals in rhetorical studies, mass communications, public opinion, presidential studies, and Cold War history.

The critical analysis shows that, despite caricatures of Eisenhower as fuzzy, muddle-headed,...