Reportedly, he was so good at poker that he had to give it up, because his winnings from his fellow officers threatened to derail his career.
“Reportedly, he was so good at poker that he had to give it up, because his winnings from his fellow officers threatened to derail his career.”
Maybe so, but he made many serious errors. Eisenhower was probably wrong in recommending the abandonment of MacArthur’s command and the Philippine Defensive campaign. Eisenhower also made a series of major mistakes during the Battle of the Bulge and the campaign that preceded it. Eisenhower allowed Clark to use poor command judgment with the Fifth Army; failed to recognize the weaknesses in the positional warfare practiced by Hodges, Simpson, and Bradley; allowed the escape of the German Seventh Army; relied too heavily on MAGIC and thereby failed to respect and rely upon Third Army intelligence reports of the impending Ardennes Offensive; and denied Patton’s recommendation to purposefully allow the extension and then encirclement of the German the Ardennes salient. Those are just a few of Eisenhower’s serious mistakes.