Dwight D. Eisenhower Quotes

If a problem cannot be solved, enlarge it.

Statesmanship is developed in the hard knocks of general experience, private and public.

This is something, eh, that is the kind of thing that must be gone through with what I believe is best not talked about too much until we know whatever answers there will be.

Don't join the book burners. Don't think you're going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed. Don't be afraid to go in your library and read every book...

The free world knows, out of the bitter wisdom of experience, that vigilance and sacrifice are the price of liberty.

Occasional pages of history do record the faces of the "Great Destroyers" but the whole book of history reveals mankind's never-ending quest for peace, and mankind's God-given capacity to build. It is with the book of history, and not with isolated pages, that the United States will ever wish to be identified. My country wants to be constructive, not destructive. It wants agreement, not wars, among nations. It wants itself to live in freedom, and in the confidence that the people of every other nation enjoy equally the right of choosing their own way of life. So my country's purpose is to help us move out of the dark chamber of horrors into the light, to find a way by which the minds of men, the hopes of men, the souls of men every where, can move forward toward peace and happiness and well being.

The work of Dr. Salk is in the highest tradition of selfless and dedicated medical research. He has provided a means for the control of a dread disease. By helping scientists in other countries with technical information; by offering to them the strains of seed virus and professional aid so that the production of vaccine can be started by them everywhere; by welcoming them to his laboratory that they may gain a fuller knowledge, Dr. Salk is a benefactor of mankind. His achievement, a credit to our entire scientific community, does honor to all the people of the United States.

I don’t like the idea of something where you have to depend upon the integrity of the man and not the integrity of the institution.

The relief of a combat leader is something that is not to be lightly done in war. Its first effect is to indicate to troops dissatisfaction with their performance; otherwise the commander would be commended, not relieved. This probable effect must always be weighed against the hoped-for advantage of assigning to the post another, and possibly untried, commander. On the other hand, really inept leadership must be quickly detected and instantly removed. Lives of thousands are involved — the question is not one of academic justice for the leader, it is that of concern for the many and the objective of victory.

Neither a wise man nor a brave man lies down on the tracks of history to wait for the train of the future to run over him.

I believe that a political party, to be a useful agency in this country for the promotion of the happiness of our people, must be a progressive, dynamic force; it must have a doctrine, a program, legislative and otherwise, that is; moderate in its approach, avoiding extremes of right and left. As I have told you before, I think it must be liberal when it is talking about the relationship between the Government and the individual; conservative when talking about the national economy and the individual's pocketbook. That is my rough conception of progressivism, and I believe the Republican Party must be that or it won't be any force long in American life. I just don't believe that; Americans, 163 [million] intelligent Americans, are going to be satisfied either with the action or with such a distinct trend toward centralization and paternalism in our Government that it becomes difficult to detect it from a socialistic form. So I don't care when this occurs; I am not talking about conventions, I am not thinking of such things. I am thinking merely of where does a great party like the Republican Party, what direction does it have to take, if it is going to be a useful agency for America.

We were depending on considerable assistance from the insurrectionists in France. Throughout France the Free French had been of inestimable value in the campaign. ... Without their great assistance the liberation of France and the defeat of the enemy in Western Europe would have consumed a much longer time and meant greater losses to ourselves.

I have always found plans usless, but planning indispensible

We face a hostile ideology; global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose and insidious in method. Unhappily the danger it poses promises to be of indefinite duration. To meet it successfully there is call for not so much the emotional and transitory sacrifices of questions but rather those which enable us to carry forward steadily, surely and without complaint the burdens of a prolonged and complex struggle with liberty the stake. Only thus shall we remain despite every provocation on our charted course towards permanent peace and human betterment.

Don't join the book burners. Don't think you are going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed. Don't be afraid to go in your library and read every book, as long as that document does not offend our own ideas of decency. That should be the only censorship.