John F. Kennedy

The most farcical was the one about J. Edgar Hoover, LBJ, and Richard Nixon in a Texas oilman’s house the night prior to the assassination, exchanging conspiratorial glances when the TV showed Kennedy being cheered. Norman Mailer, an extremely astute judge of character, commented back in 1960 on JFK’s detachment, coolness, and enigmatic lack of brusqueness. Jackie made sure the history police held firm, with Richard Goodwin, Arthur Schlesinger, and Ted Sorensen constructing the Camelot myth.

How good or bad was Kennedy as president? Let’s put it this way: He was a reader, which meant he knew history, and had read The Guns of August three months prior to the Cuban crisis. He told his brother Bobby that he wouldn’t be the one some historian would write a comparable book about, i.e., how things could get out of hand from nothing in October 1962. Pro-Kennedy historians insist he would never have gotten trapped in Vietnam. In the wake of his failure in the Bay of Pigs, Kennedy became weary of military advice. The great Greek historian Taki begs to differ.

JFK had won the closest election in history up to then by insisting on a missile gap with the Soviet Union. He evoked the War of 1812, the last time foreign enemy forces had attacked the continental United States. But that was balderdash. At the time of Kennedy’s inauguration, the Soviets had only 10 ICBM warheads instead of the rumored 500; Uncle Sam had 57.

Kennedy’s “pay any price, bear any burden” inaugural address put the world on notice that the good Uncle was ready to fight overseas for his empire. Kennedy was at the helm when the “Strategic Hamlets” program in Vietnam saw hundreds of thousands of peasants deracinated in return for cash in order to deprive safe havens to the Viet Cong. (Vietnamese rulers stole the cash.) Kennedy blamed Diem rather than himself, agreed to the coup that killed the Vietnamese strongman with a $40,000 payment, and was assassinated himself three weeks later. These are facts; the rest is guesswork. Kennedy installed Jupiter missiles in Turkey threatening the Soviet heartland. Then, when the Soviets did the same in Cuba, he cried foul. He was an insecure president with great charisma and personal courage, but he only appears great in comparison to the awfulness of LBJ and George W. Bush.