Since WWII, which US President was closest to making the world a safer place?

Question

I think the question begs more of a response than just the name ... some sort of explanation for you choice would be appropriate..

and Reagan ?? WTF - not only did he escalate the arms race, backed the right wing rebels in El Salvador and invade Grenada but he ARMED SADDAM HUSSEIN !!!!!

Muse - a thoughtful answer.. but I had referred to mking the WORLD a safer place, not making things better for America...

Arming Saddam, funding the Contras and leading the largest single arms production increase in presidential history did nothing to make the world safer..

Answer 1

Dwight Eisenhower. He's the only sitting president in the 20th century where there was no major war just the cold war but nobody died.

Answer 2

It would seem like Regan, and I'm okay with someone saying that, but it's a false sense of security. One could argue that the void of a major enemy post-Cold War is being filled by thousands of smaller enemies that are harder to track, thus making us less safe. Of course it was under Regan that bin Laden was armed and funded. Of course, Rumsfeld went to meet with Saddam at the time and we thought of him as a friend.

I think in the end, not one of them should get too much credit. Credit Reagan for the end of the Cold War, but at what price?

Answer 3

Depends: safer from whom?

Clinton and Carter did the most to bring about peace in the Middle East (although neither fully succeeded. But they made us "safer.")

Reagan and Truman did the most to defend us against threats from Communist countries (although that involved propping up warlord dictators like Saddam Hussein and others. But the detente' kept full-scale international wars from occurring.)

The only thing I'm sure of: Our current president comes in last place.

Answer 4

How about Lyndon Johnson?
"I shall not seek and I will not accept the nomination of my party".
Just think if George Bush had adopted this same campaign slogan in 2000. I certainly believe that would have made the world a safer place.
Also, I think his Great Society program made the world a little safer too.
I'll cast my vote for Lyndon Johnson.

Answer 5

Reagan did loads to beef up the US defenses, and helped bring about the end of the Cold War. But Clinton and JFK were the best diplomats and did a lot to strengthen our relationships with other countries and create new allies.

Answer 6

Reagan

Answer 7

Despite your objection, it was Ronald Reagan, hands down. After WWII, the Soviets learned how to play the USA like a violin. Even after the close of the war, the USSR continued to spend 60% of their gross national product on weapons. They developed weapons that were far superior to ours and built a vast nuclear arsenal.
With so much of the USSR's productivity dedicated to the sword, they couldn't produce enough food to feed themselves. Their solution to the problem was to set off a nuclear test and rattle sabers any time the food stores dwindled. The USA's response to all the saber rattling was always to placate the threat with boat loads of food. For decades, the USSR stole our lunch money in this manner.
Reagan put a stop to that. He stopped the shipments of grain going to Russia and spent tons of money on a new bred of weaponry. The weapons developed during that time rendered every weapon in the Soviet arsenel obsolete. The USSR went bankrupt trying to keep up with the arms race.
The first President Bush unveiled these new weapons on the battlefield during the first Gulf war. Their performance was amazing. What followed throughtout the 1990s was the most prosperous era in American history. For the first time since the Korean War, America felt at total ease. The Soviet threath was gone, and we had the most sophisticated weapons on the planet. Life was great.
Then came 9/11, and our sense of security came crashing down with the World Trade Towers. All our weapons cannot protect us from this new threat. We now have a new problem to solve.
At least, thanks to Dutch Reagan, we enjoyed those ten years of Camelot.

Answer 8

A gun won't keep you from cholera. No, human beings weren't safer interior the previous... a million/2 of all toddlers died of ailment and malnutrition. think of all your adolescence buddies... image your self at a birthday social gathering and all their smiling faces as you get waiting to blow out the candles... are you able to work out them on your minds eye? Now image a million/2 of them long previous. Have a brother or sister? think of how your loved ones could have reacted had they died while they have been approximately 7 years previous. Or what if it have been you..... cholera is a poor thank you to die. initiate off with diarrhea and vomiting.... that leads into dehydration and seizures... interior the tip you're left to in threat of bypass till finally your coronary heart merely stops. a sprint chlorine and fluoride interior the water supply isn't this manner of undesirable ingredient even with each and every little thing. yet ok, particular you have chose to talk approximately violence... no, you nonetheless weren't safer. Violence develop right into a each and daily occurrence... yet shooting one yet another WASN'T fairly common because of the fact weapons have been high priced and no... no longer every physique owned one. Take Billy the youngster case in point... his wide-unfold weapon, a winchester rifle, fee very almost $a hundred while new.... it relatively is amazingly allot of money while a solid job purely paid $10 a week.... 10 weeks pay for a gun. to place that into attitude.... that must be the equivalent of $6000 in in the present day's money. Even a used gun could be too high priced for many folk. Sorry... yet i do unlike finding at historic previous with rose tinted glasses. existence interior the previous sucked, winters have been chilly, summers have been warm, the nutrition develop into undesirable and unreliable in its availability, scientific care develop into primitive, the vast majority of folk have been uneducated and grimy (many times a man or woman could purely bathe as quickly as a week) and finally alcoholism develop into rampant.

Answer 9

Ronald Reagan.

Answer 10

William Jefferson Clinton. The bombing of the Twin Towers probably would never have happened if he would have been allowed to serve another term.

Clinton had great relationships with the leaders of the world and knew how to make good foreign policy.