 "Abraham Lincoln | Photo: Wikimedia Commons")
PRESIDENTS OF WAR
Michael Beschloss
Crown
739 pages; $35
The most agonising decisions presidents make are invariably during wartime, especially when battles are lost and body counts pile up. During one of the bloodiest campaigns of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln paced the corridors of the White House, his head bowed, hands behind his back, muttering over and over, “I must have some relief from this terrible anxiety or it will kill me.” It practically did. The Korean War was almost equally taxing for Harry Truman, who in a moment of candour admitted that under the strain, “I lost
Michael Beschloss
Crown
739 pages; $35
The most agonising decisions presidents make are invariably during wartime, especially when battles are lost and body counts pile up. During one of the bloodiest campaigns of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln paced the corridors of the White House, his head bowed, hands behind his back, muttering over and over, “I must have some relief from this terrible anxiety or it will kill me.” It practically did. The Korean War was almost equally taxing for Harry Truman, who in a moment of candour admitted that under the strain, “I lost
