US election candidates' sons don't belong in combat zone, says John Eisenhower
Republican presidential nominee John McCain's son Jimmy, a Marine, could be sent back to Iraq for a second stint while another son Jack may be deployed there after he graduates from the Naval Academy.
Now the only man to have been in this position before says that the unusual family mix of presidential politics and combat service is so dangerous that Pentagon chief Robert Gates should reassign the candidates' children.
"I do not believe that the children of presidents or vice-presidents should be assigned to combat zones," John Eisenhower, who served in Korea while his father Dwight was president, told The Sunday Telegraph. "They have no place there."
Mr Eisenhower, 86, drew parallels with the recent aborted deployment of Prince Harry to Afghanistan. "The British government had sense enough to keep the prince's unit secret and then remove him when it was identified," he said. "We have advertised the units."
In an opinion piece in The New York Times, the retired army officer and author of several books on military history recalled a conversation in summer 1952 with his father, the Second World War hero who led the D-Day landings.
Major Eisenhower, then 30, had been assigned to an infantry unit in Korea while Gen Eisenhower was by then the Republican nominee for the White House.
Read entire article at Telegraph (UK)
Now the only man to have been in this position before says that the unusual family mix of presidential politics and combat service is so dangerous that Pentagon chief Robert Gates should reassign the candidates' children.
"I do not believe that the children of presidents or vice-presidents should be assigned to combat zones," John Eisenhower, who served in Korea while his father Dwight was president, told The Sunday Telegraph. "They have no place there."
Mr Eisenhower, 86, drew parallels with the recent aborted deployment of Prince Harry to Afghanistan. "The British government had sense enough to keep the prince's unit secret and then remove him when it was identified," he said. "We have advertised the units."
In an opinion piece in The New York Times, the retired army officer and author of several books on military history recalled a conversation in summer 1952 with his father, the Second World War hero who led the D-Day landings.
Major Eisenhower, then 30, had been assigned to an infantry unit in Korea while Gen Eisenhower was by then the Republican nominee for the White House.