E. Bruce Geelhoed - Böcker

Under the leadership of head coach Bump Elliott, the 1964 Wolverines won Michigan's first Big Ten championship since 1950 and their first Rose Bowl since 1951, and finished fourth in the national college football polls. They defeated four top-ten ranked teams: Navy, Michigan State, Ohio State, and Oregon State, their Rose Bowl opponent. The Wolverines also defeated Minnesota for the first time since 1960, and reclaimed the prized Little Brown Jug.Despite its impressive record, the 1964 team failed to attract the national attention it deserved. At the beginning of the season, few football observers expected Michigan to contend for the Big Ten championship. But by the end of the season it was clear that the Wolverines were one of America's elite teams--perhaps the best in the country.This book chronicles for the first time the exploits of Michigan's 1964 team and gives them long-overdue recognition.

An ordinary soldier's day-by-day account of the Great WarVernon E. Kniptash, an Indiana national guardsman who served in the Rainbow Division during World War I, observed firsthand some of the Great War's fiercest fighting. As a radio operator with the Headquarters Company of the 150th Field Artillery, he was in constant contact with French and British forces as well as with American troops, and thus gained a broad perspective on the hostilities. Editor E. Bruce Geelhoed introduces and annotates Kniptash's war diaries, published here for the first time.With clarity and compelling detail, Kniptash describes the experiences of an ordinary soldier thrust into the most violent conflict the world had seen. He tells of his enthusiasm upon enlistment and of the horrors of combat that followed, as well as the drudgery of daily routine. He renders unforgettable profiles of his fellow soldiers and commanders, and manages despite the strains of warfare to leaven his writing with humor.Readers will share Kniptash's ordeals as he participates in the furious effort to stem a major German offensive, followed by six months of violent combat and the massive Allied counteroffensive that ended the war. Because Kniptash was called to remain with the Army of Occupation in Germany after his unit was shipped home, his diaries cover the full extent of American participation in the war.

The history of the Cold War is littered with what-ifs, and in Diplomacy Shot Down, E. Bruce Geelhoed explores one of the most intriguing: What if the Soviets had not shot down the American U-2 spy plane and President Dwight D. Eisenhower had visited the Soviet Union in 1960 as planned?In August 1959, with his second term nearing its end, Eisenhower made the surprise announcement that he and Soviet premier Nikita S. Khrushchev would visit each other's countries as a means of ""thawing some of the ice"" of the Cold War. Khrushchev's trip to the United States in September 1959 resulted in plans for a four-power summit involving Great Britain and France, and for Eisenhower's visit to Russia in early summer 1960. Then, in May 1960, the Soviet Union shot down an American U-2 surveillance plane piloted by Francis Gary Powers.The downing of Powers's plane was, in Geelhoed's recounting of this episode in Cold War history, not just a diplomatic crisis. The ensuing collapse of the summit and the subsequent cancelation of Eisenhower's trip to the Soviet Union amounted to a critical missed opportunity for improved US-Soviet relations at a crucial juncture in the Cold War. In a blow-by-blow description of the diplomatic overtures, the U-2 incident, and the aftermath, Diplomacy Shot Down draws upon Eisenhower's projected itinerary and unmade speeches and statements, as well as the American and international press corps' preparations for covering the aborted visit, to give readers a sense of what might have been. Eisenhower's prestige within the Soviet Union was so great, Geelhoed observes, that the trip, if it had happened, could well have led to a détente in the increasingly dangerous US-Soviet relationship.Instead, the cancelation of Ike's visit led to an escalation in hostilities that played out around the globe and nearly guaranteed that the ""missile gap"" would reemerge as an issue in the 1960 presidential campaign. A detailed account of an episode that defined the Cold War for a generation, Diplomacy Shot Down is, in its insights and revelations, something rarer still - a behind-the-scenes look at history in the unmaking.

Vernon E. Kniptash, an Indiana national guardsman who served in the Rainbow Division during World War I, observed firsthand some of the Great War’s fiercest fighting. As a radio operator with the Headquarters Company of the 150th Field Artillery, he was in constant contact with French and British forces as well as with American troops, and thus gained a broad perspective on the hostilities. Editor E. Bruce Geelhoed introduces and annotates Kniptash’s war diaries, published here for the first time.With clarity and compelling detail, Kniptash describes the experiences of an ordinary soldier thrust into the most violent conflict the world had seen. He tells of his enthusiasm upon enlistment and of the horrors of combat that followed, as well as the drudgery of daily routine. He renders unforgettable profiles of his fellow soldiers and commanders, and manages despite the strains of warfare to leaven his writing with humor.Readers will share Kniptash’s ordeals as he participates in the furious effort to stem a major German offensive, followed by six months of violent combat and the massive Allied counteroffensive that ended the war. Because Kniptash was called to remain with the Army of Occupation in Germany after his unit was shipped home, his diaries cover the full extent of American participation in the war.

The history of the Cold War is littered with what-ifs, and in Diplomacy Shot Down, E. Bruce Geelhoed explores one of the most intriguing: What if the Soviets had not shot down the American U-2 spy plane and President Dwight D. Eisenhower had visited the Soviet Union in 1960 as planned?In August 1959, with his second term nearing its end, Eisenhower made the surprise announcement that he and Soviet premier Nikita S. Khrushchev would visit each other’s countries as a means of “thawing some of the ice” of the Cold War. Khrushchev’s trip to the United States in September 1959 resulted in plans for a four-power summit involving Great Britain and France, and for Eisenhower’s visit to Russia in early summer 1960. Then, in May 1960, the Soviet Union shot down an American U-2 surveillance plane piloted by Francis Gary Powers.The downing of Powers’s plane was, in Geelhoed’s recounting of this episode in Cold War history, not just a diplomatic crisis. The ensuing collapse of the summit and the subsequent cancelation of Eisenhower’s trip to the Soviet Union amounted to a critical missed opportunity for improved US-Soviet relations at a crucial juncture in the Cold War. In a blow-by-blow description of the diplomatic overtures, the U-2 incident, and the aftermath, Diplomacy Shot Down draws upon Eisenhower’s projected itinerary and unmade speeches and statements, as well as the American and international press corps’ preparations for covering the aborted visit, to give readers a sense of what might have been. Eisenhower’s prestige within the Soviet Union was so great, Geelhoed observes, that the trip, if it had happened, could well have led to a dÉtente in the increasingly dangerous US-Soviet relationship.Instead, the cancelation of Ike’s visit led to an escalation in hostilities that played out around the globe and nearly guaranteed that the “missile gap” would reemerge as an issue in the 1960 presidential campaign. A detailed account of an episode that defined the Cold War for a generation, Diplomacy Shot Down is, in its insights and revelations, something rarer still—a behind-the-scenes look at history in the unmaking.

The United States Liaison Office (USLO) served as the diplomatic contact for Sino-American relations between the time of the Nixon-Kissinger opening of China in 1971-1972 and the achievement of full normalization in 1979. This book presents the importance of the USLO to American foreign policy in the 1970s.