Eisenhower also expected his officers to engage in open debate. He respected well-founded criticisms and readily acknowledged mistakes. In 1954, when Eisenhower was president, the army chief of staff, Matthew Ridgway, advised against intervening in Vietnam, saying it would take a massive effort of more than half a million soldiers. Eisenhower respected Ridgway’s judgment because in 1943 Ridgeway had resisted Eisenhower’s order to drop an airborne division on Rome and Eisenhower later decided Ridgeway had been right.
