Kennedy finishes out the first year of his presidency as a very tired man – December 1961

Castro's Cuba remained a thorn in the American side, and despite the Bay of Pigs failure, Kennedy and the CIA remained intent on bringing Castro down.  But this made it very easy for Khrushchev to convince Castro in the summer of 1962 to accept the Soviet plan to place strategic nuclear-tipped ICBMs (Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles) in Cuba … able to reach most of the U.S.  That would not only protect Castro from a direct American military assault, it would neutralize the American ICBMs placed in Turkey aimed at the USSR … and it would give Khrushchev additional political leverage in conducting his Cold War against America on all fronts. Even then Khrushchev had to be very careful in undertaking this venture … first having to convince his fellow party leaders that there was nothing to fear in this – given the weak character of Kennedy – and much to gain in the way this would bring America under the nuclear gun. Also it would involve the development of considerable infrastructure … including the placing in Cuba of tactical missiles to protect the project in its developmental phase. American U-2 spy planes detected the placement of these tactical rockets … presuming them to be there to bring down more of their U-2 planes … and backed off a bit in their overflights.  Also a cloud cover moved in over Cuba … blocking any ability to see what was going on below.  In the meantime, a number of Soviet missiles were brought in to Cuba to the first 12 of 40 proposed launch sites. Then on 14 October the cloud cover cleared over Cuba … and America immediately knew what was underway there.  But what then to do about the situation?  Debate now got underway within the Kennedy cabinet about how this or that response would produce this or that result, politically as well as militarily.  Meanwhile, rumors about the Cuban situation were already hitting the American press.  Deep anxiety was building in America. When Soviet Foreign minister Andrei Gromyko was confronted over the matter, he continued to offer the Soviet excuse that all of this was just tactical weaponry … which of course he knew that the Americans already knew was not true.  In short, the Soviets were not really ready to engage in any serious diplomatic discussion over the matter. Finally, on the 21st, the decision was made to place a naval blockade around Cuba in order to block further shipment of missiles and material to Cuba from Russia.  This actually constituted an act of war … though the Kennedy team knew that it was not sufficiently provocative to initiate a nuclear war … with America having some 15 times the number of Soviet nuclear warheads – and an already operational delivery base in Turkey. The next day America's Latin American neighbors forming the Organization of American States (OAS) met … and decided to give full support to Kennedy's "quarantine" isolating Cuba – a severe blow to Castro diplomatically.  Then that evening, Kennedy went before the American people (and the world) to describe in detail the problem … and the decided American response. Things got very tense over the next days.  The American naval blockade was put in place immediately … and stopped some ships headed for Cuban ports – but let them pass when it was discovered that they were carrying no strategic materials.  But Soviet ships carrying the ICBMs were still headed toward Cuba … with the world watching nervously as they drew closer to Cuba.  Meanwhile, construction at the launch sites continued. Indeed, Castro became so convinced of a pending American military assault on Cuba that he called on Khrushchev to issue orders for a nuclear strike on America, even if conducted only by the smaller nuclear missiles presently in place, missiles which could probably reach no further than Miami.  That was truly a strange request – for it would have meant a full nuclear attack in response, one that would have completely destroyed Cuba … and one starting an all-out nuclear war between Russia and America.  There was no way that Khrushchev was willing to go down that road. Finally, on the 27th, Khrushchev came out with a diplomatic counter-offer:  he would remove his missile from Cuba if America did the same with its missiles in Turkey.   Castro was deeply angered that this offer had been made without prior consultation with him by Khrushchev … although there was little that Castro could do about the matter.  But clearly, he was ready to see Cuba destroyed … if it meant that America – and much of the rest of the world – were also destroyed in the process.1 Now the back-and-forth got very serious when on that same day a U-2 plane was shot down over Cuba … Khrushchev being quick to claim that it had been a Cuban action, not a Soviet action (although only the Soviets had the power to conduct such a strike).  A furious America then responded that if another plane were shot down, then the Americans would have to attack all the missile sites … killing numerous Soviet technicians as well as the missile infrastructure.  At this point Khrushchev realized that he was not up against just some young, weak American president.  This was serious business. But at the same time, the American threat was counterbalanced by America's acceptance of Khrushchev's offer to remove the Soviet missiles.  The Turkish removal was not mentioned specifically, but was implied as an exchange to be conducted "voluntarily."  The next day (the 28th) Khrushchev announced his approval of the deal ... including specifically the Turkey-missile removal in exchange. But still, Soviet ships with ICBMs continued to head toward Cuba … and the American blockade also continued.  Finally, as the Soviet ships approached the blockade, they were ordered to turn around.  The Soviet-American agreement was indeed now effectively in place. But what was not known to America was that smaller nuclear-armed rockets, not part of the accord, Castro wanted to have under his own command in case of the continuing possibility of an American assault on his regime.  This startled Khrushchev sufficiently to have even these removed on the 22nd! Also what was not known in America was how close America and the world had come to a full nuclear engagement … when an American ship dropped depth charges in Cuban waters – unknowingly nearly hitting a Soviet submarine located there.  The submarine had orders to launch its nuclear-tipped missiles if it came under attack … but an order that could be given only if all three commanding officers agreed to the attack.  Two did.  Thankfully, a third did not … sparing the world a nuclear attack that would most likely have quickly spun itself into a global nuclear holocaust. Anyway, with the Kennedy-Khrushchev agreement in place, now began the dismantling of the Soviet missile sites in Cuba and the 150 nuclear warheads based there.  Even Soviet bombers based in Cuba were flown home.  Thus by 20 November, Kennedy was able to announce to the world that the blockade was being lifted.  And at this point then began the more complicated removal of the American missiles based in Turkey … the project completed by the spring of the following year (1963).  Thus the Cuban Missile Crisis and its diplomatic outfall was over. Overall, the event played strongly in Kennedy's favor, strengthening his image as a very strong American president.  And it would likewise undercut Khrushchev's standing at the Kremlin, indeed being one of the reasons his fellow party members cited in demanding Khrushchev's retirement in 1964.   Khrushchev would be the first, however, to be retired from Soviet power alive – being allowed to live out his life comfortably (but sadly) at home and at his dacha resort … although politically and historically he would immediately become a "non-person" – carefully and fully forgotten by the society he once led. 1What is especially terrifying about this experience is that it makes clear the fact that such socially suicidal instincts as Castro’s are not unknown among self-important political leaders willing to bring down the rest of humanity rather than deal with the failure of their own leadership (Hitler being clearly a recent example, not to mention Castro).  With nuclear weapons in the hands of such individuals, the world would find its very survival quite problematic.  Hopefully the world will be able to keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of such individuals, although in the end only God can offer mankind such protection. The weak Kennedy response to Soviet challenges emboldens Khrushchev to try to plant deadly nuclear missibles in nearby Cuba – October 1962. Playing with nuclear-tipped missiles was a very deadly game at this point Green H-bomb cloud over Honolulu – July 19, 1962. 800 miles to the west another US H-bomb test had been set off (the first one - 500 times more powerful than the A-bomb - was tested in 1952).  By this time the Soviets had their own model of the H-bomb. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, whose public comments in the spring of 1962 caused the Soviets to fear that the US might be planning a pre-emptive nuclear attack on the Soviet Union Khrushchev meeting with his advisers in the Kremlin to discuss the possibility of a US invasion of Cuba – and the Soviet Union's deterrent in the form of nuclear tipped ballistic missiles placed in Cuba - April 1962 McGeorge Bundy, National Security Adviser, who informed Kennedy early October 16, 1962, of the building of Soviet missile bases in Cuba Kennedy's televised announcement to America about the Cuban missile crisis – and the proposed American response – October 22, 1962 Build-up of Soviet missile sites in Cuba – 1962 Soviet missile bases in Cuba – October 15, 1962 An American warship inspecting the cargo of a Soviet ship near Cuba – 1962 An American warship escorting a Soviet tanker carrying missiles out of Cuba – summer of 1962 Departure of Soviet missiles from Cuba Kennedy at the Berlin Wall – June 1963 Kennedy delivering his "ich bin ein Berliner" speech – June 1963 Signing the Test Ban Treaty in Moscow – August 1963 There's a changing of the Soviet Guard in 1964 as the Central Committee forces the resignation of Khrushchev who, especially after the fiasco of the Cuban missile crisis and some wild and unsuccessful experimenting with new agricultural policies, as by this time convinced enough members of the Central Committee that he is too capricious to continue to be entrusted with leadership of the Soviet Union. This brings Brezhnev and Kosygin to co-lead the Soviets. Leonid Brezhnev (left) celebrating Khrushchev's 70th birthday – April 1964 – while secretly plotting Khrushchev's overthrow (in October his Party colleagues stripped him of all political positions, forcing him into retirement) Leonid Brezhnev – Communist Party General Secretary (1964-1982) Alexei Kosygin – Soviet Government Premier (1964-1980) CRISIS IN VIETNAM (NOVEMBER 1963) The withdrawal of France in 1954 from its Indochinese colony under the terms of the Geneva Peace Accords did not, however, change the ambitions of the local Indochinese powers-that-be … nor end the concerns of America that the area was about to come under Communist expansion … in accordance with Eisenhower's term "the falling domino principle" that he used in April of 1954 in explaining the dangers of not acting immediately in the matter of Communist expansion in Indochina.  Like a line of dominoes, if one falls, then so does the next one, and the one then next to that, etc.  Thus was born the "domino theory" – something that would become so very important in American foreign policy thinking.   And indeed, going into the 1960s, Indochina was experiencing considerable political-military disruption at the time.  For instance, there was no way that North Vietnam leader Hồ Chi Minh was going to give up on the idea of uniting both the northern and southern regions of Vietnam under his Communist rule.  Meanwhile, in the Vietnamese South, rather dictatorial President Ngô Đình Diệm had undertaken land reform in order to make himself more popular (his Roman Catholicism did not go over well with the largely Buddhist population) … limiting the size of the rice farms and allowing land to be purchased by the peasants.  But slowly over time, the farmlands basically fell into the hands of a number of Diệm's largest supporters – deeply alienating the peasants. Diệm's regime did however enjoy American support – even if lukewarm.  Eisenhower and his Secretary of State Dulles were not pleased by Diệm's presidential performance … but felt that they had no alternative candidate. Meanwhile, in terms of the domino effect, the first domino that looked as if it might fall was the Kingdom of Laos, not Vietnam.  There a civil war was building among the three sons of Laotian king Sisavang Vong:  Prince Boun Oum was leading the rather pro-French conservatives; Prince Souvanna Phouma was prime minister and leader of what was considered the "neutrals"; and Prince Souphanouvong was leading the left-wing Lao Patriotic Front and its Pathet Lao troops – supported strongly by Hồ Chi Minh, Mao, and Khrushchev. For a period of time, 1956-1959, something of a coalition government of the three groups was put in place.  But tensions were building as the North Vietnamese were doing everything possible to strengthen the Communist position in Laos, even sending some 30,000 to 40,000 of their troops into Laos. The situation only worsened in 1960 when "neutrals" in the contest attempted a political coup … but political confusion tended to move the outcome in favor of the Communist Pathet Lao.   A Communist outcome in Laos was very important to Hồ Chi Minh … for the "Ho Chi Minh Trail" that ran north and south through eastern Laos enabled Ho to move his army and supplies from the north all the way to the southern region of Vietnam.  In short, securing a friendly Laos was vital to Ho's effort to take over South Vietnam.  But at the same time, America was doing what it could to support financially the Royal Lao Government, some of it directly, some of its through French advisors in Laos. By 1961, Soviet-American involvement was running deep in Laos, the Soviets supplying the Pathet Lao with arms, Americans doing the same for the Laotian Royal Army … plus for a growing Hmong2 militia that had joined the action. But by 1962 the Royal Army, despite direct American military aid, was constantly failing in its encounters with the Pathet Lao … and thus Kennedy pressured the Royalists and the Neutrals into a political coalition with the Pathet Lao … under the International Agreement on the Neutrality of Laos (23 July 1962).  According to the Agreement, all non-Laotian parties were to withdraw from Laos.  Thus America took its men out of Laos … but the North Vietnamese did not. Next door in South Vietnam, not much had changed.  Diệm was still in power … and not doing well.  Kennedy was not as focused on Vietnam as he was on Laos … and in 1961 merely put forward a simple program in South Vietnam that hopefully would protect – actually isolate – the Vietnamese peasants from the Communist insurgents operating in the South, the Viet Cong … by relocating the peasants to fortified villages.  But by 1963 the program was clearly achieving little strategically. The South Vietnamese army (the ARVN – Army of the Republic of Vietnam) was not doing well … losing an important battle in January of 1963 to a much smaller group of Viet Cong.  Morale in the ARVN was low.  And tensions between the small but governing Catholic regime and the Buddhist populace was also rising ... with the ARVN under Diệm's brother (who was also serving as Vietnam's Archbishop) attacking Buddhist pagodas around the country.  The situation was becoming so bad that a Buddhist monk even publicly torched himself in Saigon in June of 1963. Thus it was beginning to look in the eyes of the Kennedy administration like it was time for a regime change! Consequently, CIA instructions went out to some of ARVN's generals to remove both Diệm brothers from power … which they did on 2 November 1963 – executing both brothers in the process.  Kennedy was shocked by the killings, but rebounded in having his Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge congratulate the coup leaders. But leaderless, the situation in South Vietnam quickly grew chaotic.  But what Kennedy was planning to do at this point will never be known. 2A distinct ethnic group – made up of many competing clans – not part of the surrounding Laotian, Vietnamese, or Chinese peoples.  America enlisted and trained many Hmong to fight the Pathet Lao – though many others of the Hmong decided to join the Pathet Lao. A Buddhist monk, Thich Quang Duc sets himself on fire in protest against Diem's Western cultural assault on Vietnamese Buddhist traditionalism – June 11, 1963 US Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge visiting South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem – October 1963 (while encouraging the military coup that would assassinate Diem in November)  The bloodied body of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem.  The military coup started on November 1st; Diem and his brother were killed on the 2nd ... supposedly "opening the door for democracy" in South Vietnam.  But only chaos resulted.  South Vietnam would never again acquire a stabilizing government. The Ho Chi Minh Trail from the North to the South through Laos and Cambodia KENNEDY IS ASSASSINATED (NOVEMBER 1961) A mere three weeks after Diệm's murder, Kennedy would experience the same tragedy (November 22nd).  On a visit to Dallas to repair political relations with the Texas Democrats, Kennedy was shot and killed riding in an open convertible through the streets lined with cheering crowds with his wife – and with Texas Governor John Connally (who was also wounded).  The presumed assassin, who shot from the upper story of a building along the route, was Lee Harvey Oswald.  He was tracked to a movie theater, was arrested … and then two days later was assassinated by Jack Ruby as Oswald was being transferred at the Dallas police headquarters to the county sheriff. The matter was not only shocking in the extreme, it all made little sense.  Oswald was known to have Cuban political connections.  Was this then a Communist plot?  What about Jack Ruby … known to have mob connections?  Was Oswald's killing a move of the mob (or some other source) to silence Oswald before he could reveal what was actually behind the whole affair? Ultimately an investigation into the matter directed by Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren concluded ten months later that it all seemed to have been merely the personal acts of those two individuals.  But the Warren Commission's report did not really answer a lot of conspiracy theories abounding everywhere.  But there was nothing of substance that could be found to truly challenge the Commission's findings. In any case, Kennedy's death meant that America was about to enter a whole new world politically under a new national leader – a new world that would change America deeply.  John and Jacqueline Kennedy arrive in Dallas John and Jacqueline Kennedy in Dallas limousine with Texas Governor John Connally (who would also be wounded in the shooting) Frame from the Zapruder film showing John Kennedy being shot JFK shot – November 22, 1963 Dealey Plaza and the Texas School Book Depository, Dallas, Texas, U.S.A., in November 1969, site of the assassination of John F. Kennedy on 22 November 1963, its appearance little changed in the intervening six years Howard Leslie Brennan sitting across the street from the Texas School Book Depository in the same position in Dealey Plaza in Dallas where he saw a man shooting a rifle at U.S. President John F. Kennedy from the corner window of the sixth floor, on November 22, 1963. Circle "A" indicates where he saw a man fire a rifle at the motorcade and the window (B) on the fifth floor in which he saw people watching the motorcade Warren Commission Hearings and Evidence Lyndon Johnson takes the Presidential oath of office aboard Air Force One two hours after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy Bobby and Jackie Kennedy return to Washington after JFK's assassination – November 1963 Lee Harvey Oswald, accused assassin of President John Kennedy – 1963 Lee Harverty Oswald being shot by Jack Ruby – 1963 Kennedy casket in the Capitol Rotunda – 1963 Kennedy's funeral cortege moving down Connecticut Ave. in Washington – November 25, 1963 John F. Kennedy's funeral cortege in Washington, D.C. - November 25, 1963 John-John salutes his father's coffin at the JFK funeral – November 1963 Jacqueline and Caroline Kennedy at John Kennedy's coffin – 1963 Jackie Kennedy receiving the flag from her husband's coffin – 1963 Jackie in mourning The Warren Commision presents its report to President Johnson - 24 September 1964. Despite many conspiracy theories which proposed otherwise, the Commission concluded that both Oswald and Ruby were acting alone, on their own personal initiatives DEEP SOCIAL-SPIRITUAL CHANGE UNDERWAY IN AMERICA The struggle to end racism America understood itself not only as the supreme power called by God to protect Western civilization from the evil powers of authoritarianism (Communism specifically at that point) … but also as having the responsibility of serving as a social model designed specifically to inspire and guide other societies in their quest for "democratic modernization." In this modeling role, America knew itself to be far from perfect.  Highly embarrassing was the place that American Blacks found in American society … something that certainly darkened America's image in Africa (to the extent that Africans even cared about the matter).  The horrible Civil War of 1861-1865 had ended the horror of slavery … but had not changed substantially the miserable place Blacks occupied at the very bottom of the social status system of the American South.  But racism ran almost as deep in the North, especially in the slums of Northern cities.  Indeed, Blacks found themselves quite generally unwanted by the White world as friends or neighbors. But key American leaders knew deeply that this all had to change … and change deeply.  And understanding the American political process as the heart of social reform, social reformers began to push forward the process of getting members of the Black community out to vote … vote for a better world for themselves. But even beyond the political process was the one of moral-spiritual change in the hearts of the American people themselves.  And there to lead that campaign (when not also involved in voting rights actions) was the Baptist minister, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  And truly powerful was his challenge to America, offered in August of 1963 before a massive gathering and a widely TV-viewing America from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in DC … to bring to reality his dream of an America where all its citizens, Blacks and Whites, lived and worked together as equals … even as brothers and sisters.  And why not.  It all seemed not only so reasonable as a challenge, it seemed by most Americans to be a necessity.  Birmingham Alabama firemen using a firehose in an effort to disperse Blacks protesting segregation - 1963 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the March on Washington – August 28, 1963 The slow move from Christianity to Humanism as America’s guiding religion or worldview But there were also other changes underway at the time … ones arising from America's now long-standing contest between Middle America's Christianity and Intellectual America's Humanism.  And the Supreme Court was already in the process of becoming the most important scene of battle between the two parties … with Congress itself trying (not very successfully) to keep up with the game. And the reason for the Supreme Court taking the lead in the matter of social-cultural "progress" was because of the action of the leading legal instrument of Intellectual America, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).  As we have already noted, the ACLU was already long committed to removing Christianity as America's foundational worldview and culture … and replacing that with Humanism.  And since the late 1950s, the ACLU was finding willing support for its program among the body of justices making up the Earl Warren Court.  In the case of Engel v. Vitale (1962), originated in the lower courts in 1959, and finally reaching the Warren Court in 1962, the ACLU got the Supreme Court to rule that public schools have no right to authorize a school prayer for the children to recite.  Then the next year the Warren Court went further in two more cases in 1963, (one brought by the ACLU the other by the atheist Madalyn Murray O’Hair and her young son William3) reaffirming the rule of no school prayer, adding also that Bible reading is likewise forbidden.4 Thus, according to the Supreme Court, Jefferson's proclaimed "wall of separation" (1802) between America's religions and America's federal government was designed not to protect religion from government action, but instead to protect government action (which, by the 1960s, was a process undergoing rapid expansion through the efforts of Intellectual America) from the realm of religion.  That meant that Christianity should have no place in the public world of America. Thus effectively, the ACLU got the Supreme Court to reinterpret America's religious protections – clearly stated in the 1st Amendment of the American Constitution – to now read as religious restrictions!  However … the ACLU’s Humanism was quite happy to take over Christianity's traditional role in American society … because it was not "religion."  It was Truth itself … scientific truth! Congress, supposedly America's only Federal body authorized by the Constitution to make or revise the law,5 tried to take action to counter this move taken by the Supreme Court.  Congressman  Frank Becker in 1963 undertook the nearly impossible task of amending the Constitution in order to make the matter of religious freedom (allowing prayer and Bible-reading in the public schools) quite clear … but had the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee hold up hearings on the matter for a year until all momentum was effectively lost.  Then in 1966, Republican Senate Minority Leader Everett Dirksen took on the same challenge … which was supported by nearly all Republicans and Southern Democrats – but opposed by the "Liberal" Democrats – thus failing to get the required 2/3rds vote necessary to move it along.  No further efforts would be undertaken until the early 1980s when President Reagan would undertake – and fail at – a similar attempt. 3A chilling irony in the story of the life of Madalyn Murray O’Hair and her children was that in 1995 she, and another of her sons Jon, and granddaughter Robin disappeared, and only six years later their bodies found buried – after having been executed by their murderers, one of them an officer in her American Atheists organization.  Also ironic was that earlier (in 1980) her son William (Bill) became a Christian (Baptist), eventually becoming even an evangelist and Christian writer – and today chairman of the Washington-D.C.-based Religious Freedom Coalition, lobbying Congress for aid to Christians persecuted in Communist and Islamic countries! 4The First Amendment actually reads:  "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." 5According to the Constitution, the President is authorized only to execute or apply the written law … and the Judiciary (the Supreme Court and the Circuit and District Courts) is authorized only to judge cases of its violation or contested execution.  Neither the President nor the Judiciary have Constitutional authorization to make or revise the law itself … or read it in such a way that it creates new legal principles.  In America's democracy, only the people's elected representatives to Congress have that right … something which often goes unobserved by the Executive and Judicial branches of American government ... which have a tendency to want to do "democracy from above." US Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren (center) and the liberal court of the 1960s Go on to the next section:  The Johnson (LBJ) Era   Miles H. Hodges