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CLASS OF 1936
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Commissioned in the cavalry after graduation, Abrams switched to armor in 1940.
In 1943 he assumed command of the 37th Tank Battalion of the 4th Armored Division,
which landed in Normandy a month after D-Day. His battalion spearheaded General Patton’s
Third Army across Europe. Abrams emerged from World War II a much-decorated colonel,
regarded as one of the army’s best tank commanders.
Largely unknown outside the army, Abrams rose through increasingly responsible positions
to four-star rank. His greatest challenge came when he took command of American forces
in Vietnam in 1968. For four years he oversaw Vietnamization, a policy of arming, training,
and strengthening the South Vietnamese army to assume full responsibility for national defense
as U.S. forces gradually withdrew. The process was incomplete when Abrams left in 1972 to
become the army’s chief of staff. The army Abrams (M1) battle tank is named for him.
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