What was needed was a “dynamic” and “active” approach, combining nuclear deterrence—he spoke of hitting the enemy with “shattering effectiveness,” if necessary—with a determined effort to “liberate” the enslaved peoples behind the Iron Curtain. Eisenhower himself echoed these sentiments in his State of the Union address on February 2, 1953. The president declared, “The free world cannot indefinitely remain in a posture of paralyzed tension, leaving forever to the aggressor the choice of time and place and means to cause greatest hurt to us at least cost to himself.” It was time for a “new,
...more
