11 /26/9E3 Dear Gerry, Ore Thanks for the .ichlesinger defense of JFK from liorsh's unjustified did not know, some time ago 1 finished a attack on him. If you and th, 'others g KennedY; With Ilersh-It book-len/7th vianuacript that Carly retyped, Faldm journalism. gram and that it leads to some I hope Lill enjoyed being on tht.! Arnold pro ap,maraneen for him. Thanks f;rr your Boor wishes. gs is pant bet:ause the hospital liop, fully the blood problem in Lil's le n• well. has at her back in the p.fr. progr.in on which she'd been doin Saturday 1 go/ to Johns Hopidns where again I am a hemotolly patient for an operation for ac cuss for kidney dialysis. .Urdinaril, out-patient, v 4at;41:. the first two days, will they'll be getting the anti-congul.mt °tit of i operp.te Tuesday, and Wednesday cod all or part orlidreday swill be used to get enough anticoagulent back in the blood. Thanks and best to you all,

Vittoq 4C ?MM6, 11.1.MIMMIMEF

JFK REVISITED

A NOTED HISTORIAN AND KENNEDY ADMINISTRATION INSIDER REFUTES THE REVISIONIST VERSION OF JFK'S LEGACY BY ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR,

7

JOHN F. KENNEDY LIGHTS UP WHILE WATCHING

NAVAL MANEUVERS WITH CALIFORNIA GOV,

EDMUND G. BROWN FROM THE US$ KITTY,.

HAWK, OFF' THE COAT OF CALIFORNIA IN 1963.

PHOTO FROM UPliCORRiS-BETIMANN Thirty:five years after his death, John drama of a slain hero, a gallant career cut off little. In the darker side of the countermyth, Kennedy becomes a faithless husband and Fitgerald Kennedy remains a vivid presence in midstream, a life unfulfilled. incorrigible philanderer, a reckless risk-taker in the minds of his countrymen. In a way, Memory soon becomes entwined with in both private and public life, a bellicose it is odd that this should he so. Nearly myth. Kennedy devotees cherish the idea president who ordered the assassination of half the American people arrived on this of Camelot and its brief shining moments. foreign leaders, plunged the nation into the earth after his death; at least three-fifths Myth-making aside, many Americans remem- Vietnam morass, almost provoked a nuclear are too young to remember him in the ber Kennedy as the strong and purposeful White House. His presidency was one of president who saved the peace in the most war with the Soviet Union and, between needless international crises, turned the the shortest in American history. dangerous moment of the Cold War, assumed Yet Kennedy lives vigorously in memory. leadership in the battle for racial justice, White House into a bordello. Television is a help. JFK's face and wit and initiated the exploration of space, tapped the Myth versus countermyth? Public opinion polls show continuing popular eloquence are familiar even to schoolchild- republic's latent idealism and inspired a genera- ren. The dynastic effect is a help, too. The tion with a passion for public service. admiration for Kennedy. In June 1997, John impact On American politics of his brother Still, as Emerson said, "Every hero becomes Zogby, the pollster who came the closest to the 1996 elec- Robert in the 1960s and of his brother a bore at last." Myth breeds countermyth. forecasting the outcome of Edward in more recent times prolongs the Revisionist critics see Kennedy as charming tion, asked a broad sample of Americans to Kennedy mystique. And, of course—and but superficial, a triumph of style over sub- rate twentieth-century presidents. JFK came alas—the assassination also helps. Even stance, a politician more concerned with image in second, behind Franklin D. Roosevelt, but JFK's detractors cannot deny the awful than results, who talked big but accomplished ahead of Truman, Reagan and Eisenhower. Among historians, however, Kennedy's reputation has fluctuated madly since his death. When American Heritage magazine invited scholars in 1988 to name the single most overrated figure in American history, JFK got more votes than anyone else (Ronald Reagan came in second). One respondent summed up the revisionist case against Kennedy: "His public relations approach to the presidency was an almost total disaster for the nation....The revela- tions of his private life have added more tarnish to the once golden image." More recently, there seems to have been a mild Kennedy revival. In 1996, continuing a practice begun by my father in 1948, 1 asked a select group of historians and polittal scientists to rate the American presidents. Kennedy came in 12th out of 41, following Eisenhower and John Adams and followed by Cleveland and Lyndon Johnson. He received nine votes in the "near great" category, 21 as "high average" and only one as "below average." A much larger 1997 poll, conducted by William J. Ridings Jr. and Stuart B. Mclver, surveyed 719 scholars. In that poll Kennedy came in 15th, following Monroe and John Adams, and followed by Cleveland and McKinley (Eisenhower was ninth, Lyndon Johnson, 12th). Ridings and Mclver asked their group to make ratings in desig-

JFK AND JACQUELINE KENNEDY GREET WELL-WISHERS UPON ARRIVAL IN DALLAS ON nated categories. Kennedy placed seventh

NOVEMBER 22, 1963, ABOVE. IART RICKERBWTIME WARNER INC.) OPPOSITE PAGE. KENNEDY in appointments, eighth in leadership

GREETS A THRONG OF SUPPORTERS AND JOURNALISTS BEFORE THE 1960 DEMOCRATIC qualities, 10th in political skill, 16th in

NATIONAL CONVENTION IN LOS ANGELES. (AP) accomplishments and crisis management,

CIGAR AFicioNaix.) 150 ••-

Ind pith in character and integrity treceni TOP 10 clOTTOkl: SENATORS BARRY

presidents did nor JO well in this careeory- GOLDWATER AND JFK IN WASHINGTON.

LRI was ;7th. Reigan WEN perhaps earlier D.0 . IN 1958 IUPI/CORGIS-9ETTMANNI.

residents benefit as character flaws fade JFK ADCRESSES THE NATION DURING THE

in memonl• 1962 CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS ;ARCHIVE

o the Kennedy argument goes on. The PHOTOS;, LYNDON JOHNSON WITH JFK AT

mystery remains. What kind of 3 president THE 1 960 DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION I UPI

was Kennedy: Was he an idealist or a cynic! CORGIS-BETTNIANN I. Was he an achiever or only a ralker! Did he really like people or did he exploit and dis- card them: Was he reckless or was he circum- spect! Was Camelot o reality or an illusion? In considering such questions, l make no great claim to impartiality. I served in JFK'; White House, and it was the most exhilarning experience of my life. Yet close observation .1 president need not he a disqualificition in writ- ing about him. I did. after all, know Kennedy, and I knew him for many years. When he was president, Isaw him in the daytime as a special assistant and in evenings as a friend. I saw him in good times and in had. I may nor be totally useless as a wirness. Let us first dispose of Camelot. JFK had gone to prep school and college with Akin Jay Lerner. and he liked the songs Lerner and Fredrick Loewe wrote for the popular 1960 musical. But no one when JFK was alive ever spoke of Washington as Clunelot—and if anyone had done so, no one would have been more derisive than JFK. Nor did those of us around him see ourselves fora moment, heav- en help us. :is knights of the Round Table. Camelot was Jacqueline Kennedy's grieving thought a week after her husband was killed. Later she told John Kenneth Galbraith chat she feared the idea had been overdone. For that matter, King Arthur's Camelot was hardly noted for marital constancy. and the Arthurian saga concluded in betrayal and death. Then a word about the 1960 election. A current myth is that the Kennedys stole the election in Illinois and rhat 's finest hour was his patriotic refusal to shake the republic to its foundarions by TOP TO BOTTDMIJFK WITH FBI DIRECTOR contesting the result. In fact, Illinois wits J. EDGAR HOOVER AT THE WHITE HOUSE nor crucial to Kennedy's victory. Had he lost IN FEBRUARY 1961 HENRY BURROUGHS' Illinois, Kennedy still would have won by AP PHOTO WITH FRANK 51NATRA AT 276 to 246 in the electoral college. And, if THE INAUGURAL BALL IN JANUARY :Ylayor Richard Daley's men sulk votes in

1961 .AP/WIDE WORLD PHOTOS;. AND Cook County, Republicans stole %sires down- WITH RICHARD Is4SON PRIOR TO THEIR state. The stare electoral board, 4-1 Repub- FIRST TV oEBArE IN 1960 I UPI/ lican. voted unanimously ro certify the CORR ANN I Kennedy electors.

l53 C.:KLAN Ark JOHN AND JACQUELINE KENNEDY ON THEIR WEDDING DAY IN NEWPORT, RHODE ISLAND. ON SEPTEMBER 12, 1953. PHOTO FROM THE MOLLY

THAYER COLLECTION/MAGNUM PHOTOS INC.

An associated myth is that Joseph P. repeal and entirely legal. During Prohibition, careful and critical 1964 biography, makes no Kennedy made a deal in the winter of 1959. he had worked first as a broker for Hayden such allegations, beyond noting that Joseph 1960 with a Chicago gangster named Sam Stone and thereafter as a Wall Street Kennedy produced Scotch for his classmates Giancana to use the Mafia and trade unions speculator on his own. In the mid-1920s, at their 10th Harvard reunion in 1922—hard- under Mafia control to turn out the Chicago he bought into a chain of movie theaters ly a damning incident. Professor Mark Haller vote for his son. The elder Kennedy, the and soon went into film production. When of Temple University recently took the trou- story goes, was well acquainted with Mafiosi would he have had time to be a bootlegger? ble of searching the comprehensive list of because he had been a bootlegger himself in Why would he have run the risk when he bootleggers in the intelligence files of the Prohibition days 30 years before. could make money easily and legally in Wall U.S. Coast Guard and found no mention of It is true that Kennedy was a whiskey Street and Hollywood! Joseph Kennedy. When Kennedy was up for importer in the 1930s, but that was after The Founding Father, Richard Whalen's Senate confirmation, first as a chairman of

157 CIGAR AFICIONADO KENNEDY'S MOTORCADE IS DOGGED SY A ZEALOUS NIXON SUPPORTER WHILE ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL IN LOS ANGELES IN 1960. PHOTO FROM

AP/WIDE WORLD PHOTOS the Securities and Exchange Commission, of all that a shrewd and experienced man Enemy Within, published in February 1960, then as chairman of the Maritime Com- like Joseph P. Kennedy should have regarded was portraying his father's supposed ally in mission, then as ambassador to the Court Sam Giancana and not Mayor Daley, the the most scorching and contemptuous way. of St. James, no one suggested that he was last of the great political bosses, as the key Fifteen months after Giancana giggled an ex-bootlegger. Had he been one, he to politics in Chicago. before the Rackets Committee, the Central would not have been appointed or confirmed. Giancana was hardly unknown to the Intelligence Agency in its wisdom signed him Yet the bootlegger myth has become a Kennedy family. As counsel for the Senate up in a plot to murder Fidel Castro. The Mafia staple of contemporary television shows Rackets Committee in 1958, Robert Kennedy had flourished in Havana under the indulgent and supermarket tabloids. had succinctly described Giancana as "chief dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, but Castro, There are other curiosities about the rale. gunman for the group that succeeded the when he came to power in 1959, closed its It is curious that the elder Kennedy should Capone mob." Called before the committee, gambling casinos and whorehouses and drove have asked the mob to work for his son Giancana declined to answer questions on the mobsters from Cuba. This gave the Mafia, months before John Kennedy had even won the grounds that his answers might tend to as the CIA necromancers saw it, the motives the nomination. It is still more curious that incriminate him—and giggled as he declined. and the contacts to do the dirty deed without the father should have done so when the only Robert Kennedy said bitingly, "I thought implicating the United States government. big union influenced by the mob was the only little girls giggled, Mr. Giancana." At Recruiting the Mafia was a decision made Teamsters Union—and the Teamsters, led the very time the elder Kennedy was suppos- by the Eisenhower administration, not, as it by Robert Kennedy's mortal enemy, Jimmy edly recruiting Giancuna for John Kennedy's is often said, by the Kennedy administration. Huffa, were for Nixon. And it is most curious campaign, Robert Kennedy, in his book The In Septem her 1960, a CIA operative met

Clt.;AR Ancitmwint) 158 with mobsters to work our the details. In pal of Giancana's, introduced John Kennedy press corps covered up for Kennedy because October, the CIA installed Giancana and to an attractive young woman named Judith newspapermen liked him and because, under another mobster, John Rossetti, in the Ken- Campbell. Though her later claims were con- the civilized rules of the day, a politician's nilworth Hotel in Miami, offering $150,000 tradictory and her story escalates with each private life was considered his own business. for Castro's assassination. All this took place telling, it seems that their affair extended into Vague rumors about JFK did waft about months before Kennedy was inaugurated. his presidency. She also had an affair with Washington from rime to time, but, as one There is no evidence that the gangsters Giancana. How much did she tell Giancana who worked in the White House, I never did much to earn their pay. Giancana bragged about Kennedy? Did the Mafia have the power saw anything untoward. Kennedy was a to a friend that they were "conning the hell to blackmail the president? hard-working fellow, concentrating intently out of the CIA." But working for the CIA, If Giancana ever had anything on the on the problems at hand. At no point in he no doubt believed, would insure him president, it did not save him from Robert my experience did his preoccupation with against federal prosecution. Up to a point he Kennedy's crusade against organized crime. women (apart from Caroline crawling around was right. While he was plotting away in Had Giancana really made that mythical the Oval Office) interfere with his conduct Miami, he feared that his girl, singer Phyllis secret deal with Joseph P. Kennedy, he would of the public business. McGuire, might be carrying on with certainly have used it on his own behalf when Lest this ignorance be attributed to the comedian Dan Rowan in faraway Las Vegas. the feds were hot on his trail. Instead, his invincible innocence of a college professor, He asked the CIA to put an illegal wiretap in future was round-the-clock FBI surveillance, let me call another witness, that hard-bitten Rowan's room. The CIA obliged; the wiretap federal indictments and a year in prison. reporter, Ben Bradlee, then head of the was discovered; the CIA, claiming that the A question remains about JFK and women. bureau in Washington, in later case involved national security, brought His sexual waywardness does not constitute years the brilliant editor of The Washington intense pressure on the Department of Justice John Kennedy's finest hour. But exaggeration is Post. Bradlee was not only at the center of to stop prosecution. possible. Some today believe that there was an Washington news gathering; he was also There is more to the Giancana story. In the unending procession of bimbos through Ken- Kennedy's closest friend in the press. "It is course of the 1960 campaign. Frank Sinatra, a nedy's White House and that the Washington now accepted history," Bradlee writes in his

JFK HOLDS A WHITE MOUSE MEETING WITH THE U.S. DELEGATION TO THE DISARMAMENT CONFERENCE IN GENEVA. MARCH 1962. PHOTO FROM

UP I/CORB IS•SETT MA NN

161 ;all AFIC10Nantl JOHN SHARES A LAUGH WITH BROTHERS ROBERT AND EDWARD AT THE FAMILY'S COMPOUND IN HYANNIS PORT, MASSACHUSETTS, IN 1 962. PHOTO FROM AP

1995 memoir, A Good Life, "that Kennedy affairs. But history shows no connection Mr. Cleveland to the public office which he is jumped casually from bed to bed with a between private morality and public conduct. so well qualified to fill, and remand Mr. Blaine wide variety of women. It was not accepted Martin Luther King Jr., for example, had to the private station which he is admirably history then...[I was unaware of this proclivi- wayward sexual habits but was all the same a fitted to adorn." ty during his lifetime." tremendous moral force for his people and his In Kennedfs case, the argument that Who can really know about anyone else's nation, On the other hand, Pol Pot of private recklessness leads to public reckless- sex life? Unless one of the partners talks, or Cambodia was apparently a faithful family ness is invoked to explain the Bay of Pigs compromising letters turn up, or a third man. All he did was murder hiindreds of and the CIA assassination plots against person is in the bedroom (an unlikely circum- thousands of his countrymen. Fidel Castro. But these were initiatives of stance), no one can be certain what may have There is much merit in a suggestion the Eisenhower administration, not of the gone on between consenting adults—which made during the 1884 presidential election. Kennedy administration, and no one has does not prevent sensation-mongers writing Grover Cleveland, a reform mayor of Buffalo accused Ike of a reckless private life, at least with sublime certitude about the private and reform governor of New York, was since the Second World War. lives of famous people. exposed as the father of an illegitimate child, The Bay of Pigs is one of the celebrated Nor can outsiders ever pronounce on the while his opponent, James G. Blaine, though disasters of American history. One scholar inwardness of a marriage. My own impression, complicit in a railroad scandal—the once- called it "the perfect failure." In their last shared by others from the Kennedy White notorious Mulligan letters—was a devoted meeting, the day before Kennedy's inauguration, House, is that JFK, for all his adventures, family man and devout churchgoer. "We are Eisenhower urged the president-elect to go full always regarded Jacqueline with genuine affec- told," said one commentator, "that Mr. Blaine speed ahead against Cuba. Allen Dulles, then tion and pride. Their marriage never seemed has been delinquent in office but blameless in head of the CIA, told Kennedy that he was more solid than in the later months of 1963. private life, while Mr. Cleveland has been a much more confident about success than he had The argument is made that recklessness model of official integrity, but culpable in his been about the CIA overthrow of the Arbenz in private life leads to recklessness in public personal relations. We should therefore elect regime in Guatemala seven years earlier.

165 CIGAR AFICIONAIE .When Dulles detected inadequate the means ro nv their lucks Allen Dulles enthusiasm on Kennedy's part, he emphasc.ed bad assured him rhut the invasion would set what he called "the disposal problem." What off uprisings behind the line and defections would happen ro the 1,2.00 Cubans whom the from Castro's militia and that, if things CIA had been training for months in Central went badly, the invaders could easily escape America! They would wander about the into the Escambray Nlountains. Kennedy hemisphere, saying that the great United made it clear, however, that the Cuban States. after prepanne an expedition against brigade could not expect the Marines to Castro. had lost its nerve under a new intervene if the invasion Mitered. president. Kennedy well understood that Much has been made of Kennedy's

Dulles was warning him against the political cancellation of 1I second air strike—nx) fallout in the United Stares as well should a much; for a second strike would still have Mrmer naval lieutenant j.g. dare to veto an left 1,200 anti-Castro Cubans facing operation organi:ed and recommended by 200,000 of Castro's men. Richard Bissell, the supreme commander of the greatest the CIA planner, later wrote that "even in amphibious landing in history. the best scenario"—even if the second Kennedy was trapped. He also may have strike had not been canceled and Castro's felt, after his recent victory, that he was on a planes had not been free to sink the supply roll. If brave Cuban exiles wanted to free ships—"the brigade might not necessarily their land from a dictator, why not give them have established and held the beachhead."

CLOCKWISE FROM ABOVE: THE PRESIDENT

AND FIRST LADY WITH JOHN F. KENNEDY JR.

AT THE WHITE HOUSE IN 1963 (ARCHIVE

PHOTOS(: JFK WITH HIS NAVAL AIDE, CmOR, TAZEWELL SHEPARD. AND JOHN-JOHN DUR-

ING A VISIT TO ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY ON VETERAN'S DAY IN 1963

(ARCHIVE PHOTOS); JFK AND JACKIE STROLL

WITH JOHN-JOHN AND CAROLINE. NOVEM- BER 14, 1963. (UPVcoRais-BerrmANNI

CICAR AFICIONADO 166

Instead he pursued—and achieved--a diplo- There were none of Dulles's uprisings or Far from being reckless in foreign matic solution. defections, and impassable swamps and affairs, Kennedy was a cautious president, Last year, two hooks came out unveiling jungles, it turned out, cut off the Escambray notable for his capacity to refuse escalation. the secrets of the Cuban missile crisis. Mountains from die beachhead, When the appeared to Alexsandr Fursenko and Timothy Naftali's The Bay of Pigs was indeed a perfect be failing, though under pressure from the One Hell of a Gamble is the Soviet record, failure, It was also an effective, if expensive, military and the CIA to send in American education. Having supposed that the CIA forces, Kennedy declined to do so—as he hitherto undisclosed, of the deliberations leading Nikita Khrushchev first to send and the Joint Chiefs of Staff knew their busi- later declined escalation in the Berlin crisis ness, the president now understood that they of 1961, the missile crisis of 1962 and the and then to withdraw the nuclear missiles. Tapes by Ernest May and Philip didn't. Thereafter he had no hesitation in Vietnam crisis of 1963. The Kennedy rejecting their advice. "If it hadn't been for The missile crisis was the hour of maxi- Zelikow is the American record, hitherto Cuba," Kennedy told me a month after the mum danger in the Cold War. Confronted undisclosed, of the debates in the White Bay of Pigs, we might be about to intervene by the deployment of Soviet nuclear missiles House following the discovery of the missiles! in Laos." Flourishing a sheaf of cables that the in Cuba, the Joint Chiefs advocated a sneak The nearly universal reaction has been JCS chairman had sent from Laos, he added, air strike to be followed by an invasion. praise for Kennedy's cool, sober and effective "I might have taken this advice seriously." We know now that the Soviet forces on the leadership in expelling the missiles without The first advice I'm going to give my island had tactical missiles equipped with going to war. successor," he told Ben Bradlee, "is to watch nuclear warheads and the authority to use There are those who claim that the the generals and to avoid feeling that just them in case of an American invasion. Had Kennedys had an "obsession" with Castro because they were military men their opin- Kennedy taken the advice of the hawks, the and Cuba. They'cite the assassination ions on military matters were worth a damn." result would probably have been nuclear war. plots, though they were inherited from the

4 I la POSTMASTER ) BUDGET LABOR JOHN KENNEDY

LYNDON JOHNSON

Herter Flemming Mitchell Summerfield Nixon Rogers Eisenhower

YIII PRISIDENT FR/SID,Pil

Anderson

Cabinet Secretory

Deputy Assistant Presidential Assistant TREASURY DEFENSE AGRICULTURE INTIRIDR •

ROIERT MsNAMARA ADIAI STEVENSON ST/WART UDALL C. DOUGLAS DILLON ORVILLE FREEMAN

OUT-GOING PRESIDENT DWIGHT EISENHOWER'S CABINET 15 PICTURED WITH INCOMING PRESIDENT KENNEDY'S, INSETS.

PHOTO FROM ARCHIVE PHOTOS

CIGAR AFICIONADO 168 JFK INHERITED VIETNAM AND THE BAY OF PIGS INVASION FROM EISENHOWER'S ADMINISTRATION. PHOTO BY ELLIOTT ERwITT/MAGNum PHOTOS

Eisenhower administration, and they cite Robert Kennedy kept trying to spur on— And then came Vietnam. This was the Kennedy administration's own Operation not his finest hour—this was not an a problem Kennedy approached with Mongoose. But there is no direct evidence assassination project but a foolish, futile well-ingrained doubts. As a young congress- that either Eisenhower or Kennedy autho- and costly intelligence-gathering and man in 1951, he had visited Indochina rized or knew of the assassination plots. sabotage effort. As of the and watched a crack French army fail to CIA officials testified that they had not CIA testified before the Senate committee subdue Vietnamese nationalists. He left even informed John McCune, the man investigating assassination plots in 1975, with the conviction that the dispatch of Kennedy brought in to clean up the agency "Mongoose was not intended to apply to non-Asir troops to decide the future of after the Bay of Pigs. If they informed assassination activity." Vietnam would only rouse nationalist Kennedy, they would have had to stipulate, Those who are themselves obsessed emotions against the intruder and would, "But you can't mention this to McCone." with the theory of the Kertnedys' alleged as he said in a radio address on his —a bureaucratic improbability. anti-Castro obsession must deal with the return to the United States, mean "fore- What is far more likely Is that the stubborn fact that, given by the Soviet doomed failure." CIA, like intelligence agencies in other missiles the best possible excuse for invading By the time, a decade later, that countries, believed that it knew the require- Cuba and smashing Castro forever, an Kennedy came to the White House, a ments of national security better than excuse that would have been accepted around commitment to save South Vietnam from transient elected officials, like presidents, the world, it was Robert Kennedy who led communism had crystallized in the and invoked the excuse of "plausible deniabil- the fight against military action and John Eisenhower years. Kennedy thought it an ity" to act as it deemed hest without telling Kennedy who made the decision against it. overcommitment. But the commitment those to whom the agency was nominally A year after the missile crisis, Kennedy having been made, it could not be abandoned accountable. As John Le Carre, who was exploring through Ambassador William except at a price; and he was prepared to should know, has said, "Scrutiny of intelli- Attwood (United Stares) and Ambassador give the government in Saigon a run for gence services is largely an illusory concept. Carlos Lechuga (Cuba) and through the its money. He offered Saigon economic If they're good, they fool the outsiders—and French journalist Jean Daniel the possibility assistance and increased the number of if they're had they foul themselves." of normalizing relations with Cuba. Some American military advisers attached to As for Operation Monguuse, which anti-Castro obsessions the South Vietnamese army (though at his

CIGAR AFICIONADO 170 VICE PRESIDENT LYNDON JOHNSON, PRESIDENTIAL AIDE ARTHUR SCHLESINGER JR.. CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS ADM. ARLEIGH BURKE AND

PRESIDENT AND MRS KENNEDY WATCH TELEVISION COVERAGE OF ASTRONAUT ALAN SHEPARD'S SPACE FLIGHT IN 1961. PHOTO FROM AF

death there were far fewer American troops of the American military advisers in 1965. He had a realistic sense of the limitations in Vietnam than Soviet troops in Cuba The plan was approved in May 1963, with of American power. "We must face the during the missile crisis or American troops the first 1,000 men to return at the end fact," he said in 1962, "that the United States in the Dominican Republic in 1965). of the year. is neither omnipotent nor omniscient— But he rejected every proposal to send No one knows what a dead president that we are only six percent of the world's American combat units to Vietnam and, in might do about problems that become acute population—that we cannot impose our effect, Americanize the war. If the United after his death. It is hard enough to know will upon the other 94 percent of mankind— States convened the Vietnam fighting into what living presidents will do about anything. that we cannot right every wrong or reverse an American war, he believed, we would But it Is difficult to suppose that Kennedy each adversity—and that therefore there lose—as the French had lost a decade before. would ever have reversed himself and sent cannot be an American solution to every "The last thing he wanted," Gen. Maxwell ground forces into Vietnam. Both Robert world problem." Taylor, chairman of the Joint Chiefs and later McNamara, his secretary of defense, and Kennedy believed that in the end Lyndon Johnson's ambassador to Vietnam, McGeorge Bundy, his national security America's influence in the world depended later said, "was to put in ground forces." adviser, have latterly said that in their less on American arms than on American Kennedy was remforced in this view by a judgment Kennedy would never have ideals. Undertakings such as the Peace talk with Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who told Americanized the war—though, ironically, Corps and the Alliance for Progress were him it would be foolish to fight in Southeast they advised Johnson to do exactly that, closest to his heart. The Peace Corps, still Asia; the future of Vietnam should be decided and he, with misgivings, followed that going strong 35 years later, sent young at the diplomatic table. Thereafter, when the advice, thinking that that was what Kennedy Americans ro the far corners of the earth Pentagon called for the commitment of would have done. to work with local people in improving American ground forces, Kennedy would Kennedy believed in military strength. education, public health and agricultural say, "Well, now, you gentlemen, you go back But he valued military strength as a means productivity. The Alliance for Progress and convince General MacArthur, then I'll not to war but to peace. "Let us never negoti- was designed to promote economic be convinced." In 1962, he directed the ate our of fear," he had said in his inaugural growth and democratic institutions in Pentagon to draw up plans for the withdrawal address. "But let us never fear to negotiate." Latin America.

175 AFICIONADO

Mostimpormnt of all was the effort to on the other, and new weapons beget so much time on foreign policy; "each stop the nuclear arms race. During the tense counterweapons." day was a new crisis." In his second term, days of the missile crisis, Kennedy and The first step in slowing up the arms he planned to concentrate on domestic Khrushchev had looked down the nuclear race, a test ban treaty with the Soviet Union, affairs, especially on combating poverty, abyss together. Both came away consumed was consummated in September 1963. spreading economic opportunity and promot- with a passion to rescue the planet from the Contrasting the two American presidents ing racial justice. overhanging horror of nuclear holocaust. he had known, Khrushchev later wrote in Racism is historically the great failure Determined to banish the clichés his memoirs, "The comparison would not be of the American experiment, the glaring and rigidities of the Cold War, Kennedy, in favor of Eisenhower.. At quickly became contradiction of American ideals and the in a notable speech at clear [Kennedy] understood better than still crippling disease of American society. in June 1963, called for a change in Eisenhower that an improvement in relations Kennedy was an OK civil rights man when American, as well as Soviet, attitudes. was the only rational course." elected president. But it was rather an abstract "No government or social system," he said, In the fall of 196.3, Kennedy told problem for him, as it was then for most white "is so evil that its people must be considered Robert that his greatest disappointment Americans: someone should do something as lacking in virtue. ...We are both caught was that he had not accomplished more on about it some time, but not just now. up in a vicious and dangerous cycle in nuclear disarmament. The second disappoint- Black Americans were not prepared ro which suspicion on one side breeds suspicion ment, he said, was that he had had to spend wait any longer. They had already begun to

KENNEDY PUFFS ON A CIGAR AT THE OPENING DAY GAME BETWEEN THE WASHINGTON SENATORS AND THE DETROIT TIGERS IN 1962.

PHOTO FROM AP

CIGAR A FICIONACV 176

demand constitutional rights with righteous Keynesian tax cut of 1964—indeed, for most community organization, in their own determination and unflinching courage. of President Johnson's Great Society. hearts and souls. His irreverence toward Kennedy for a while underestimated the Johnson was better than Kennedy in conventional ideas and institutions provoked moral urgency behind the crusade for racial cajoling and bullying Congress. And the a discharge of critical energy throughout justice. But he was educated by bitter events. 1964 election, by giving LBJ an extra 37 American society. He gave the country Angry resistance by Southern officials to Democrats in the House, nearly all liberals back to its own best self and taught the world federal court orders at the Universities of from the north, made him the only Demo- that the process of rediscovering America Mississippi and Alabama and growling police cratic president since FDR's first term to was not over. dogs unleashed in Southern cities against have a working Democratic majority in both One is bound to speculate how America peaceful demonstrators shocked the country houses. It was this political arithmetic more and the world would have been different and at last made congressional action than Johnson's parliamentary wizardry that if Kennedy had lived. For individuals do feasible. In June 1963, Kennedy went on made possible the impressive array of social indeed make a difference to history. In national television. His eloquent words bear programs enacted in 1964 and 1965. December 1931, a British politician crossing repetition—and still carry meaning—today. Kennedy made his share of mistakes. Fifth Avenue in New York City was struck In that speech, 35 years ago, Kennedy In addition to the excesses of private life and by an automobile and nearly killed. In called on every American to examine his the fatuity of the Bay of Pigs and Operation February 1933, an American politician sitting conscience. "If art American, because his skin Mongoose, there was his 1961 decision, in an open car in Miami was fired upon by is dark... cannot enjoy the full and free life before the "missile gap" was disproved, to an assassin; the mayor of Chicago, sitting which all of us want," he asked, "then who call for a build-up of the American nuclear beside him, was killed. Would the history among us would be content to have the color missile force. This ended any hope of freezing of the twentieth century have been the same of his skin changed and stand in his place? the rival forces at lower levels, and set off the if the New York automobile had killed Who among us would then be content with nuclear arms race. There was the reappoint- Winston Churchill and the Miami assassin the counsels of patience and delay? ment of J. Edgar Hoover and Allen Dulles. had killed Franklin Roosevelt? "We are confronted," he continued, There was the crazy 1961 call for fallout shel- Had John F Kennedy lived, his New 'primarily with a moral issue. It is as old as ters to protect against nuclear attack. There Frontier program would have been enacted, the Scriptures and is as clear as the American was the 1962 enthusiasm for counterinsur- he would have pressed the attack on Constitution—It is a time to act in the gency in the Third World. There was the poverty and racism in America, would have Congress, in our states and local legislative deepening of the inherited U.S. commitment pursued détente in Europe, would most bodies and, above all, in all of our daily to Vietnam. And there was throughout an probably have withdrawn from Vietnam, lives." And he set forth a program for the excessive New Frontier faith in activism, a and would have urged on the global crusade integration of black Americans into the conviction that, if there was a problem, there against nuclear proliferation. The republic national community. MUSE be a solution, and let's do it tomorrow. would have been spared much of the Critics call Kennedy dilatory and oppor- But Kennedy never lost the capacity to learn trauma, disorder and violence that disfigured tunistic on civil rights and wonder at his from his mistakes. Each year he became a the raging 1960s. abiding popularity among black Americans. better president. But, as Prof. Thomas Brown comments, Perhaps most important of all was the "Though one may legitimately ask whether impact Kennedy had on a new generation Kennedy did enough to justify such wide sup- of Americans. He liked to quote the Scottish port among blacks, one somehow suspects author John Buchan: "Politics is still the that they were better judges" than the critics. greatest and most honorable adventure." Actually, despite each day's new interna- At Kennedy's behest, bright, idealistic and tional crisis (and despite the revisionist capable young men and women, asking not critique), Kennedy compiled a pretty good what their country could do for them but record in domestic policy, as Prof. Irving what they could do for their country, flocked Bernstein of UCLA shows in his book, to Washington. They brought new ideas, Promises Kept: John F. Kennedy's New Frontier hopes, vision, generosity and vitality to the (1991). During the Kennedy years, overall national life. There had been nothing like it economic growth averaged 5.6 percent, since the early days of FDR's New Deal. unemployment fell from 7 to 5.7 percent JFK touched and remolded lives and and inflation was held at 1.2 percent. In his gave young people the faith that individuals thousand days, JFK laid the groundwork can make a difference to history. Inspired for federal aid to education and the arts, by his words, they dedicated themselves Medicare, increases in the minimum wage, thereafter to public service, whether in the redevelopment of Appalachia and other government, in civil rights and human JFK AND JACKIE SAIL OFF CAPE COO IN 1955. rural areas, the war on poverty and the rights movements, in nonprofit sectors, in MY PESKIN, LIFE MAGAZINE 0 TIME INC.

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THE DEMOCRATIC NOMINEE AND HIS WIFE WAVE TO A JUBILANT CROWD IN NEW YORK CITY'S

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And there remain memories of the a moment to imperil his nomination. He was easy, accessible, witty, candid, private man. He was not, as some claim. Nor was he, as claimed, a spoiled rich enjoying the clash of ideas and the ripples a bearer of grudges—the "don't get mad, man who used and discarded people and of gossip, never more relaxed than when get even" idea. He made Lyndon Johnson treated his associates as if they were indentured sitting in his rocking chair and puffing away his vice president after Johnson had said servants. He was one of the most unfailingly on a fine Havana cigar. He was, in his self- unforgivable things about his father. courteous and considerate men I have ever description, an "idealist without illusions." He took most of the Stevenson-for-President known. I did my share of creating trouble for He was the best of my generation. It is good crowd--George Ball, Willard Wirtz. Thomas his administration; and a couple of times, after for the country that he remains so vivid a K. Finletter, William Blair, Newton Mi now, one scrape or another made headlines, I told presence in our minds and hearts. + J. Edward Day, William A rtwood, Clayton him that maybe the time had come for me to Fritchey—into his administration though resign. He would laugh and dismiss the Arthur Schlesinger Jr. is a writer, historian and the Stevenson campaign had seemed for "Better that you're the target than me." fanner special assistant to President Kennedy.

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