Crusade in Europe

Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, Inc, 1948. First Trade Edition, presumed first printing. Hardcover. Good. Rafael Palacios (Maps) and Edward Steichen (Select. xiv, [2], 559, [1] pages. Endpaper map. Illustrations. Maps. Footnotes. Appendices, Glossary of Military Code Names. Index. Some wear and soiling to cover. Ink notation on the half-title. Dwight Eisenhower, during World War II, became a five-star general in the Army and served as Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in Europe. He was responsible for planning and supervising the invasion of North Africa in Operation Torch in 1942-43 and the successful invasion of Normandy in 1944-45 from the Western Front. After the war, he served as Army Chief of Staff (1945-1948), as president of Columbia University (1948-1953) and as the first Supreme Commander of NATO (1951-1952). Crusade in Europe is a book of wartime memoirs by General Dwight D. Eisenhower published by Doubleday in 1948. Maps were provided by Rafael Palacios. Crusade in Europe is a personal account by one of the senior military figures of World War II. It recounts his appointment by General George Marshall to plan the defense of the Philippines and continues to describe his appointment to, and execution of, the role of Supreme Allied Commander in Northern Europe. The book was dictated by Eisenhower to Kenneth McCormick of Doubleday and Joseph Fels Barnes, former foreign editor of the New York Herald Tribune. It was revised by Eisenhower's aide Kevin McCann. Derived from a Kirkus review: This stands head and shoulders above the other records of fighting men, in its simplicity, clarity, and the illumination it throws on the basic human relations of the men at the top. In his Normandy to the Baltic, Montgomery wrote:- "We are still too close to the events to attempt a critical analysis of the campaign." The same could be said of this book, but in spite of that General Eisenhower manages to convey a sense of objective surveying of the forging of victory over the Germans. This is the real inside story of the war in Europe, not in terms of jealousy and backbiting and gossip mongering, but in terms of its planning, its diplomacy, its action and its victorious ending. More than that, it is revealing of the greatness, the modesty, the statesmanship of one of America's truly great men. This is more than a soldier's story. It is the story of America's contribution to victory, of the splendid cooperation of the allies, of campaigns in Africa, Sicily, Italy, France and Germany. It is a tribute to the men who fought on various fronts under the most trying conditions. It is a picture of the destruction and horror of war. It is a plea for preparedness to forestall and prevent, if possible, a future war, or at least to be strong in case of war. It is an appraisal of what democracies can do when united. It is a fair analysis of the Russian colossus. It is the innermost story of a great Crusader and the book is worthy of the man.