Did you know John Kennedy ordered a withdrawal plan for Vietnam?

[blm]

Octafish's Journal is always a great read.

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Octafish

Exit Strategy

In 1963, JFK ordered a complete withdrawal from Vietnam

By James K. Galbraith

Forty years have passed since November 22, 1963, yet painful mysteries remain. What, at the moment of his death, was John F. Kennedy’s policy toward Vietnam?

It’s one of the big questions, alternately evaded and disputed over four decades of historical writing. It bears on Kennedy’s reputation, of course, though not in an unambiguous way.

And today, larger issues are at stake as the United States faces another indefinite military commitment that might have been avoided and that, perhaps, also cannot be won. The story of Vietnam in 1963 illustrates for us the struggle with policy failure. More deeply, appreciating those distant events tests our capacity as a country to look the reality of our own history in the eye.

SNIP…

A more thorough treatment appeared in 1992, with the publication of John M. Newman’s JFK and Vietnam.1 Until his retirement in 1994 Newman was a major in the U.S. Army, an intelligence officer last stationed at Fort Meade, headquarters of the National Security Agency. As an historian, his specialty is deciphering declassified records—a talent he later applied to the CIA’s long-hidden archives on Lee Harvey Oswald.

Newman’s argument was not a case of “counterfactual historical reasoning,” as Larry Berman described it in an early response.2 It was not about what might have happened had Kennedy lived. Newman’s argument was stronger: Kennedy, he claims, had decided to begin a phased withdrawal from Vietnam, that he had ordered this withdrawal to begin. Here is the chronology, according to Newman:

(1) On October 2, 1963, Kennedy received the report of a mission to Saigon by McNamara and Maxwell Taylor, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). The main recommendations, which appear in Section I(B) of the McNamara-Taylor report, were that a phased withdrawal be completed by the end of 1965 and that the “Defense Department should announce in the very near future presently prepared plans to withdraw 1,000 out of 17,000 U.S. military personnel stationed in Vietnam by the end of 1963.” At Kennedy’s instruction, Press Secretary Pierre Salinger made a public announcement that evening of McNamara’s recommended timetable for withdrawal.

(2) On October 5, Kennedy made his formal decision. Newman quotes the minutes of the meeting that day:

The President also said that our decision to remove 1,000 U.S. advisors by December of this year should not be raised formally with Diem. Instead the action should be carried out routinely as part of our general posture of withdrawing people when they are no longer needed. (Emphasis added.)
The passage illustrates two points: (a) that a decision was in fact made on that day, and (b) that despite the earlier announcement of McNamara’s recommendation, the October 5 decision was not a ruse or pressure tactic to win reforms from Diem (as Richard Reeves, among others, has contended3) but a decision to begin withdrawal irrespective of Diem or his reactions.

(3) On October 11, the White House issued NSAM 263, which states:

The President approved the military recommendations contained in section I B (1-3) of the report, but directed that no formal announcement be made of the implementation of plans to withdraw 1,000 U.S. military personnel by the end of 1963.

In other words, the withdrawal recommended by McNamara on October 2 was embraced in secret by Kennedy on October 5 and implemented by his order on October 11, also in secret. Newman argues that the secrecy after October 2 can be explained by a diplomatic reason. Kennedy did not want Diem or anyone else to interpret the withdrawal as part of any pressure tactic (other steps that were pressure tactics had also been approved). There was also a political reason: JFK had not decided whether he could get away with claiming that the withdrawal was a result of progress toward the goal of a self-sufficient South Vietnam.

CONTINUED…

http://bostonreview.net/BR28.5/galbraith...

live link at journal page
http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Octafish

[WhiteTara]

1. shortly thereafter he was murdered

and the war in Vietnam escalated

[dflprincess]

30. Johnson signed the order reversing Kennedy's literally before

JFK was in his grave. Either on November 24 or November 25.

[WhiteTara]

43. Johnson made a pot of money off the

Vietnamese people's misery. I believe it was titanium that he wanted. KBR was there too making a pot of money for him too.

I have never had any qualms about helping to drive that man from power. He of course tried to put the war off on McNamarra (I have no lost love for that POS either), but Johnson was in it up to his eyeballs. He did have the grace to sign each of the death letters by hand though.

[BrklynLiberal]

41. shortly thereFORE he was murdered.

[Xenotime]

59. What political party gained the most from the war?

[johnnie]

2. Yup

It's strange that Oswald got a job at the book depository that same month.

[shain from kane]

18. And did Oswald disagree with Kennedy's Viet Nam policy to the

extent that he decided to kill him?

[Dancing_Dave]

48. No.

Because Oswald clearly did NOT kill him. The evidence against that official propaganda is overwhelming.

[adwon]

3. This is a myth

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/context1.htm

[blm]

5. Theories go both ways.

.

[adwon]

9. ?

There's no theory here. Kennedy let Diem be killed. All his rhetoric up to his death suggests he was in Vietnam for the long haul. This one continually misinterpreted document doesn't nullify the fact that he was committed.

[Cell Whitman]

40. McNamara has little doubt Kennedy would not have stayed in Viet nam

I am not sure what you mean by "long haul" or any documents but McNamara says there is no doubt Kennedy would have not gone the route Johnson/Nixon did.


check out Fog of War

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4078170486868497405

[adwon]

51. McNamara, politely, is full of shit

As I recall, even his therapist believes his 'belief' that Kennedy would have gotten out was made up because of the guilt he carries.

[EVDebs]

65. JFK respected JK Galbraith's opinion immensely, who was against the war

http://www.johnkennethgalbraith.com/

JFK requested all Galbraith's cables be sent to him to read (he loved Galbraith's wit and way with words).

[adwon]

68. I know

LBJ and Galbraith got along famously as well, until their divergent views on Vietnam separated them. LBJ generally respected Galbraith's views on foreign policy, as evidenced by their tour of India while JKG was ambassador and LBJ vice-president.

[EVDebs]

83. James K. Galbraith...any relation to John Kenneth ? Just asking

This may be WHY the article was written in the first place, IMHO, titled

Exit Strategy -
In 1963, JFK ordered a complete withdrawal from Vietnam
By James K. Galbraith

the link is given in the Octafish journal mentioned at the beginning of this thread...

""James K. Galbraith, a 2003 Carnegie Scholar, holds the Lloyd M. Bentsen, Jr., Chair of Government/Business Relations at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, University of Texas at Austin."" This MUST be John Kenneth Galbraith's son...

[coalition_unwilling]

6. Frederick Logevall (professor of history at UCal-Santa Barbara) argues

in the book "Choosing War" that all the evidence suggests that JFK had neither determined to escalate nor to withdraw but had taken a stance of "keeping his options open" in October, 1963. I don't have book with me right now, so can't provide page citations. But Logevall deals with the issue in depth. It's worth reading, if only to get a sense of how the JFK foreign-policy establishment worked with the issue, and especially trenchant on how our allies' positions interacted with the JFK administration's.

[adwon]

16. I don't disagree

The decision to escalate wasn't taken until long after Kennedy was dead. I don't believe Kennedy would have acted any differently in 1964 than LBJ. I think, if anything, he'd have been more desperate to escalate after the downward spiral they saw in that year. Why? Diem's blood was on HIS hands, not Johnson's. There's a point no Kennedy conspiracy theorist is ever willing to touch.

[pitohui]

47. kind of agree w. adwon here

i don't know how anyone who was around at the time can take seriously the idea that jfk was going to withdraw from vietnam

[coalition_unwilling]

58. Galbraith's comments suggest that JFK was actively

considering the option of withdrawal after a victory in the '64 election, when he would no longer have to worry about the "Who lost China?" meme that transfixed US policymakers in the 50's and 60's.

Logevall's analysis is that JFK in October of '63 merely sought to keep all options open (withdrawal, status quo, escalation), while not doing anything to "rock the boat" too much in advance of the '64 elections.

[adwon]

67. One problem

If Kennedy had soldiers in harm's way for purely domestic political purposes, he should have been impeached and tried for murder. I'm no fan of him, but I really doubt he'd play that game.

[EVDebs]

73. "JFK" ?, apparently you didn't get the memo re Bay of Pigs...

JCS and Eisenhower admin holdovers, LeMay, Lemnitzer...and Operation Northwoods. C'mon adwon, you know better.

US Military Wanted To Provoke War With Cuba
http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=92662

pay special attention to the JFK-related FOIA that caused this information to become "public", most assuredly a cause of present day Bush admininstration clampdowns on FOIA releases.

The Secret Government really runs the show, just look at the related posting on today's DU

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1682386&mesg_id=1682386

[adwon]

75. Shotgun approach

You threw a lot at the wall, but not a ton is sticking. I'm quite familiar with Northwoods, as I read Bamford's book that, if I remember correctly, broke the story. It's not related to this issue. The desires or actions of government or military officials are irrelevant to discussing the duties of the president except where they intersect.

In my mind, Kennedy proceeded with the Bay of Pigs because, to contradict his cheerleaders, he was a novice when it came to foreign policy. It was undoubted the Iraq of its day, with its supporters claiming that they'd be welcomed as liberators. It is a different case from Vietnam because it differs in the intent. Deciding to change the air support on or about the day of the invasion is a different case from a policy where American soldiers will be in harm's way for the purpose of domestic credibility.

[EVDebs]

79. Subtitle to the ABC story re Op Mockingbird needs explaining, adwon

http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=92662
ABC News: U.S. Military Wanted to Provoke War With Cuba...

Read the subtitle to this ABC story SLOWLY. You're reading comprehension may need to improve.

[adwon]

85. Ok

1. Watch your tone. I don't appreciate you attempting to condescend when you didn't bother to read anything that I wrote.

2. I own the book. It's sitting about 10 feet from me at the moment. I read it when it came out 5 years ago. It's the sequel, of sorts, to The Puzzle Palace. I don't need to read an article when I've read the source material.

3. You're focusing on an irrelevant point. The issue is the argument that Kennedy would have kept soldiers in South Vietnam until after the 1964 elections for solely, or even primarily, domestic political purposes. All I ever said was that I doubt Kennedy would have done that. I made no comment on the Pentagon or anyone else. The crux of the issue are the duties of the president.

[EVDebs]

87. OK, was JFK a politician ?

In remarks attributed to both Stalin and Churchill

"In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies."

Voltaire's 'actions speak louder than words' comes to mind as to motive in offing JFK, as do the military's involvment in said murder...see Joan Mellen's A Farewell to Justice, Oswald was indeed a military intelligence "agent" of someone's.

A Farewell to Justice
Jim Garrison, JFK's Assassination, and the Case That Should Have Changed History
http://www.joanmellen.net/

""Building upon Garrison’s effort, Mellen uncovers decisive new evidence and clearly establishes the intelligence agencies’ roles in both a president’s assassination and its cover-up, set in motion well before the actual events of November 22, 1963.

This book will become a landmark. As Mellen explains in the Preface, on the 40th Anniversary of President Kennedy's death in 2003, a Gallup Poll verified that twice as many people believed that the CIA was responsible for the assassination as believed that Oswald, a man without a motive, acted alone. ""

[adwon]

90. We're done

1. You know, I didn't even make an argument to start. I stated a fact.

2. You ignore inconvenient facts, like everything I wrote, and focus on the irrelevant. Considering that, I guess it makes sense you'd trot out Jim Garrison.

3. By the way, have you read Bamford? Just curious, you know. My guess is no considering that you ignored the fact I mentioned his name in my first reply to you. Actually, I'm not curious.

4. Have a nice day.

[EVDebs]

97. You obviously didn't read Exit Strategy by James K. Galbraith

"irrelevent facts" such as what got JFK assassinated ? Yes, I've read Puzzle Palace AND Body of Secrets, thank you very much. YOU'RE tone needs some work so I guess we are done, since arguing a hypothetical allows you to go off in your huff; instead you go off in a huff and project "incovenient facts" onto ME when I've presented them on a platter to upset your little apple cart.

"Actually, I'm not curious" applies to your entire line of thinking so good riddance. If JFK was viewed as having blown the Bay of Pigs operation and those in the M/I complex wanted him out, since he was viewed as about to blow the SEAsian Vietnam situation AGAIN, THAT my friend is very relevent. And obvious.

[EVDebs]

99. Related DU post this thread post #74 by Octafish nt

[coalition_unwilling]

78. I'm not sure whether you're suggesting there's a "problem" with

my post or with someone else's post. Do remember that JFK inherited the puppet regime in South Vietnam from Eisenhower's administration.

I tend to think of JFK as going through this awesome growth process during his presidency, from knee-jerk Cold Warrior to prospective Man of Detente.

[adwon]

82. The problem

The suggestion that Kennedy would have kept soldiers in South Vietnam until after the 1964 election solely, or even primarily, for domestic political purposes. That's one of the worst things a president can do in terms of playing political games with people's lives.

[coalition_unwilling]

84. I'm not suggesting it (at least I don't think I implied it, much less

suggested it). What I was trying to suggest is that JFK, according to Logevall, sought maximum flexibility for policy. At the time of the coup that deposed Diem and Ngu, JFK was slowly gaining awareness that, after the election, he would probably have to choose between escalating or withdrawing, as maintaining the status quo was proving increasingly untenable. Trying to speculate about what JFK "would have" done had he lived, to my mind, is about as fruitful as speculating about what might have happened had the German generals succeeded in their various attempts to assassinate Hitler.

[adwon]

86. You didn't suggest it

You mentioned that someone else, forgive but I didn't check the post I responded to for the details, had suggested that he was doing it to prevent a similar round of accusations like those that accompanied Mao's win in China.

I don't disagree with the flexibility analysis regarding late 1963. I simply think he'd have been forced to withdraw completely, and suffer extremely bad consequences, or escalate based on the events of 1964. He'd have had Johnson's choice.

[coalition_unwilling]

88. But withdrawal after a November '64 re-election wouldn't have

carried the same political costs as withdrawal before November '64, esp. if JFK had won re-election by a landslide. (Then he really would have had some "political capital" to spend and could easily have spent some on withdrawal.)

It's just so fascinating to consider whether JFK was "growing into the office" of the Presidency (as I believe) or whether he was in thrall to his Cold War antecedents (as those who think he would have escalated tend to believe).

Actually it wasn't only JFK who had been worried about the "Who lost China?" syndrome. The issue in general had hobbled American politics since 1947, helping usher in among other monstrosities Joseph McCarthy, and may explain why Truman went after Korea to his own political detriment.

[adwon]

91. You're missing the point

If Kennedy kept soldiers in Vietnam for domestic political purposes, he was unfit to be president. It's conspiracy to commit murder, at the least. Why? It would mean he committed forces not for actual foreign policy objectives, but for his own gain. This is not so different from Nixon having the CIA tell the FBI to lay off the initial Watergate investigation because of 'national security.'

Truman went after Korea because he viewed as a test of the UN. He was a true believer in multilateralism and sought to make it work.

Kennedy would have had to face the issue that he approved the removal of Diem. He would have borne reponsibility for Diem's inevitable death, as well.

[coalition_unwilling]

95. I totally understand your point, I think, and I heartily concur. I would

add that in October '63, the U.S. forces in South Vietnam were "military advisors," as opposed to "combat troops." While I agree that keeping advisors in-country for domestic political purposes would constitute a crime of the gravest magnitude, I think that JFK came into office actually believing that South Vietnam was a legitimate ally deserving of our military advice. In October '63, I don't believe JFK had concluded that all was lost in Vietnam. He knew the situation was serious and bad (much more so than the average American at the time), but still thought that, if only the right mix of Vietnamese military, religious and administrative people could be found, the situation could still be salvaged. (If he had indeed concluded that all was lost but kept U.S. forces there to help his electoral prospects in '64, then that is indeed a crime of the worst sort.)

NB: Even though U.S. forces in South Vietnam at that time were 'advisors,' many had already been killed or wounded, if I remember correctly. So it may be a bit of a false distinction I'm drawing between "advisor" and "combat troop."

[adwon]

96. Oh ok

We're in substantial agreement. Maybe I'm the one who was missing the point. :P

[EVDebs]

89. He realized that real estate in Berlin was worth more than in SEAsia...nt

[adwon]

92. Worth more?

Just more tense, I would say. Southeast Asia was important because it was on the periphery. It offered the Soviets and Chinese a chance to test their theory of 'wars of national liberation.' The assassination of Diem assured them of one success.

[coalition_unwilling]

60. According to Logevall, decision to escalate was made

by LBJ, McNamara, et. al. in August of '64, when the alternative was a complete collapse of South Vietnamese government. LBJ and his administration made strenuous efforts to keep the decision to escalate secret, so that it would not screw up the election in Nov. 64, and LBJ could run as a "dove" to Goldwater's "hawk" on Vietnam. Irony is that LBJ had already decided on exactly the policy Goldwater was campaigning for.

[ngant17]

10. not so sure about that

You also need to take NSAM 271 and NSAM 273, both issued in approx. the same time frame in 1963. One was a direct order for NASA to begin a cooperative lunar landing with the Soviet Union. The other one was, of course, the order of a pullout for SE Asia.

LBJ was a hawk, and he didn't follow up on either of these two NSAM directives which were issued in the Kennedy Administration. Both would have lead to a more peaceful world of cooperation and non-violent diplomacy. LBJ reneged on both.

All this is historical record, and I have yet to see anything substantial from McAdams which would refute these 2 tendencies coming from JFK in the last few months of his life as the President.

This in not a theory. It is a historical record that needs little interpretation outside of an understanding of basic English language.

[adwon]

14. Ok

LBJ the hawk: http://www.jfk-online.com/jfk100lbjnam.html

Consider the assassination of Diem as well. That hugely destabilizing act is what caused the morass of Vietnam, not LBJ reneging. Blame the damn Kennedys for being dilettantes when it came to foreign policy, not LBJ for inheriting their screwups. Oh, bear in mind, LBJ retained all of Kennedy's advisors who would stay. They were mostly for escalation.

[ngant17]

23. But look also at NSAM 271

By Sept./Oct 1963, Pres. Kennedy was preparing for a joint cooperative space mission with the Soviet Union. This was what NSAM 271 was all about. It's been largely ignored in the history books.

How could you issue NSAM 271 which was about co-operation with the communists, and then issue something like NSAM 273, which was soon (after the assassination) to be re-interpreted by LBJ as a belligerent policy of anti-communist war-mongering in SE Asia? My guess is that Pres. Kennedy would have made the latter NSAM 273 conform to his need for peaceful co-existence with the USSR. Also, don't forget that NSAM 271 was classified secret for almost 20 years and we didn't even realize what it was about until the early 80's when it was de-classified under Reagan. Also, Kennedy was preparing for normalization with Cuba and Fidel Castro at this time. That has been documented, too.

And about 10 years after that fact, Pres. Nixon allowed the Apollo-Soyuz missions to happen with the Soviet communists on his watch, so why didn't something similar happen with LBJ? Why didn't he continue with JFK's policy of peaceful cooperation in space with the Soviet Union? Simply because LBJ was a reactionary, not at all like Nixon. He was a stupid Texas country hick, like Bush. Probably worse than Bush, except I'd considered him a re-habilitated Dixiecrat for at least championing the civil rights issues. At least Nixon was more intelligent and pragmatic in foreign policy. LBJ was nothing like that. Kennedy only needed him for the Southern votes.

I would hardly blame Kennedy for being a "dilettante" wrt foreign policy.

You can read some of my research in this regard at this link:

http://geocities.com/ngant17/jfk1.htm

[Gabi Hayes]

11. funny stuff! I wondered how long it would take that VERY suspect

source to come up

do some checking on this so called unbiased authority before you go citing his work

who's next?

Posner?

[adwon]

15. Ok

1. I didn't claim anyone was unbiased. There is no such thing as an unbiased source.

2. What's your idea of an unbiased source? Fletcher Prouty?

[Gabi Hayes]

19. sigh....you don't even know what you're talking about

have you ever heard of PRIMARY sources, like those cited in this link:

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB101/index.htm

I'll take the National Security Archive as one of the least biased of sources, as most (if not all) of what they "archive" is primary source material, and any 'bias' I perceive therein is designed to combat that lack of govermental transparency

are you one of those who feel that "truth has a liberal bias?"

nice tactic, though, bringing up two of the most untrustworthy human sources.

you're such an expert on Prouty; you should know about McAdams and his background. if you do, why do you cite him as your source? nobody who isn't a coincidence theorist takes him seriously. you buy the Warren Report Mythology? big fan of Specter, are ya?

[Gabi Hayes]

20. here's a biased source, no doubt, and it contains biased photos, too!

photos of JFK's coat, shirt, the magic bullet, autopsy drawings, done at the time, quotes from doctors on the scene, things like that

read it; see what you think, because the flight of that bullet is the key to the entire assassination. without the bullet maneuvering in the way Sen. Specter claims it did, there HAS to have been more than one shooter...simple as that

http://assassinationresearch.com/v1n1/lonenutter.html

[blm]

21. National Security Archives is the best source of actual facts - bar none

.

[ngant17]

24. agreed here, as long as the public can read them!

The only problem is that some things are classified and we don't get an accurate perspective of historical events until NSA documents can be de-classified. This was what really impressed me when I ran into NSAM 271, which was classified for 20 years!!!

God only knows about our secret history these days, with a national security state in place, instead of a real, bona-fide democracy.

[EVDebs]

80. Bush busy trying to rewrite history

http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=92662
ABC News: U.S. Military Wanted to Provoke War With Cuba

this story re Operation Mockingbird and military plans to terrorize US CITIES to trigger a war with Cuba only became public knowledge due to a JFK related Freedom of Information Act request. Bushco is now busy trying to suppress any more such embarrassing disclosures.

[adwon]

52. ?

I'm sorry, what's the problem? From what you write, the problem seems to be with the source's conclusions. I'd say it's a reasonable inference that you dislike my initial source because it doesn't fit into a conspiracy mindset.

Personally, I find the conspiracy theories of the assassination to be bad history at its worst. If one is to examine the players and their motives, it's necessary to do so with regard to the knowledge they had at the time. I'd say it's pretty key to examine what they were saying at the time, as well. It would be pretty odd for Kennedy to be out cheering on 'staying the course' in Vietnam (Brinkley interview, Sep. 1963) and then mystically changing course.

[H2O Man]

38. Right.

You know when a person claims that JFK wasn' moving towards withdrawal, and then brings up the lie that he "allowed" Diem to be killed, that they are using some cheesy "sources."

[adwon]

53. Curious

Would Arthur Schlesinger be a cheesy source?

[nguoihue]

55. A Bright Shining Lie, Sheehan's book

discusses this in some detail. It's been a while but I don't recall any definite plans JFK had toward withdrawal. He had consented to Diem's forcible removal but he was also shocked to learn that he had been assassinated.

[EVDebs]

81. And papers re the Diem assassination were stolen by Graham A. Martin

and now ensconced in the Gerald Ford library in TX.

""In January 1978, the North Carolina State Police found a cache of classified documents in the trunk of a car that had been stolen from former U.S. ambassador to South Vietnam Graham A. Martin. They turned the documents over to the FBI. The documents were embassy files Martin had taken with him when he evacuated Saigon on April 29, 1975, just hours before the city fell to the Communists. The Justice Department, in considering prosecuting Martin for misuse of classified documents, sent copies of the files to the National Security Council for a damage assessment. The copies remained in NSC files until 1982, when the NSC determined that they should have been considered presidential papers and sent them to the Ford Library.""

Saigon Embassy Files Kept by Ambassador Graham Martin
http://www.ford.utexas.edu/library/guides/Finding%20Aids/Saigon%20Embassy%20Files%20Kept%20by%20Ambassador%20Graham%20Martin.htm

Nixon's crew tried to discredit JFK with Diem's assassination (remember, JFK appointed Martin amb. to Thailand in Nov '63 and Nixon appointed Martin amb to S.Vietnam in '73), and either Martin was trying to maintain JFK's credibility OR was aiding Nixon's people -- E. Howard Hunt was busy trying to forge cables regarding this matter... if you recall.

[H2O Man]

36. No. It is not. n/t

[rman]

44. dude, it's on tape:

http://www.whitehousetapes.org/clips/1963_1104_jfk_vietnam_memoir.html

[Octafish]

72. That's the SECOND Biggest Lie. JFK said "NO!" to the War Party.

After the Warren Commission's conclusion that LHO acted alone, the second biggest lie foisted upon America is that President Kennedy would have acted like LBJ and commited US combat troops to support Vietnam.

Even though it's been almost 43 years since the Kennedy Administration, we Democrats should know, remember and keep:

THE SECOND BIGGEST LIE

by Michael Morrissey

The biggest lie of our time, after the Warren Report, is the notion that Johnson
merely continued or expanded Kennedy's policy in Vietnam after the
assassination.

1. JFK's policy

In late 1962, Kennedy was still fully committed to supporting the Diem regime,
though he had some doubts even then. When Senator Mike Mansfield advised
withdrawal at that early date:

The President was too disturbed by the Senator's unexpected argument to reply to
it. He said to me later when we talked about the discussion, "I got angry with
Mike for disagreeing with our policy so completely, and I got angry with myself
because I found myself agreeing with him (Kenneth O'Donnell and Dave Powers,
Johnny, We Hardly Knew Ye, Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1970, p. 15).

By the spring of 1963, Kennedy had reversed course completely and agreed with
Mansfield:

"The President told Mansfield that he had been having serious second thoughts
about Mansfield's argument and that he now agreed with the Senator's thinking on
the need for a complete military withdrawal from Vietnam.

'But I can't do it until 1965--after I'm reelected,' Kennedy told Mansfield....

After Mansfield left the office, the President said to me, 'In 1965 I'll become
one of the most unpopular Presidents in history. I'll be damned everywhere as a
Communist appeaser. But I don't care. If I tried to pull out completely now from
Vietnam, we would have another Joe McCarthy red scare on our hands, but I can do
it after I'm reelected. So we had better make damned sure that I am reelected'
(O'Donnell, p. 16)."

Sometime after that Kennedy told O'Donnell again that

"...he had made up his mind that after his reelection he would take the risk of
unpopularity and make a complete withdrawal of American military forces from
Vietnam. He had decided that our military involvement in Vietnam's civil war
would only grow steadily bigger and more costly without making a dent in the
larger political problem of Communist expansion in Southeast Asia" (p. 13).

Just before he was killed he repeated this commitment:

"'They keep telling me to send combat units over there,' the President said to
us one day in October (1963). 'That means sending draftees, along with volunteer
regular Army advisers, into Vietnam. I'll never send draftees over there to
fight'." (O'Donnell, p. 383).

CONTINUED...

http://eserver.org/govt/gulf-war/jfk-lbj-and-vietnam.txt

O'Donnell worked with Kennedy. I take the word of an eyewitness -- a credible one -- over the word of people like J Edgar Hoover and Allen Dulles.

TREASONOUS SON
OF A TRAITOR

[adwon]

93. He said that in 1963

He did not say it in 1964. If he'd abandoned South Vietnam, after acquiesing in the murder of Diem, the North Vietnamese victory would have come much sooner. You'd have seen a massive sea change in American politics with Democrats being thrown out of office en masse. Why? Truman suffered heavily over China, but at least he didn't KILL Chiang. Kennedy would have presided over the death of the Democratic party had he been alive at that time.

[H2O Man]

98. Silly.

You cling to nonsense ("after acquiesing in the murder of Diem") that has been absolutely discredited.

[EVDebs]

100. Also see post #81 re E Howard Hunt's attempts to forge cables by JFK

and Amb Graham Martin's stealing those cables and then having those same cables stolen from him...but now ensconsced 'safely' in the Ford Library on the UTexas campus.

[adwon]

101. Discredited by whom?

Here's a source that disagrees with you. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB101/index.htm

Hell, even RFK, in his 1964 oral history, admitted that they'd acquiesced in the coup to get "somebody that can win the war." (from Chomsky's Rethinking Camelot)

How is it nonsense?

[Crankie Avalon]

4. So, he would have cut and run instead of doing the manly thing and...

...kept on pointlessly feeding 58,000 Americans into a meat grinder??? Should have known that's what we'd get from one of those smartypants Eastern liberals!!! :sarcasm:

[misternormal]

7. The same person that authored...

... the presidential order to have all U.S. Military personnel and advisors out of South East Asia by Christmas of 1964, authored the presidential order for Johnson that escalated the war.

[shain from kane]

8. Election year bullshit, is what I call it. Start withdrawing troops

during late 1963 and into 1964, until the Fall 1964 elections are held, then reverse policy in 1965. After the Fall of 1964, Kennedy wouldn't have to run for office again, and the previous "plan" would have been modified to the actual plan. Kennedy would have done the same thing as Johnson, after he ran against Goldwater. These people in power don't do anything in a straightforward fashion. There is always subterfuge involved. Woodrow Wilson's second term and FDR's claims while supplying the British before our entry into WWII are other examples. In fact, we the people had to put up with this bullshit for the entire 20th Century. It's called imperialism under its old name.

Bush is pulling the same bullshit, and he would have been out-Murthaing Murtha in the Fall, except for this Israeli/Lebanon thing. Right now, he's figuring how strongly he should support Israel's effort to get maximum mileage out of it. Caught him somewhat unawares, since he was drunk as a skunk at G8.

[tetedur]

12. NSAM 263 and NSAM 273

In his book JFK Col. Fletcher Prouty explained what was happening at that time. It was JFK's policy Oct 2, 1963 (as per NSAM 263) to withdraw from Vietnam after the election in 1965. JFK knew it was the South Vietnamese's war to win or to lose. In fact, 1000 "advisors" came home in Dec. 1963. The Diem's were assassinated around Nov. 1 1963.

Someone began drafting a reversal of JFK's policy (NSAM 273) on Nov 21, 1963 and it was signed by Johnson Nov 26, 1963. Therein lay the Vietnam War.

[shain from kane]

17. So why didn't McNamara and other Cabinet members resign, since

their supposed reason for staying was to preserve Kennedy's policies? Well, they sure blew this one, which turned out to be one of the most important of his policies. I can only assume that Kennedy's real policy was to continue in Viet Nam.

What "election in 1965" are you referring to?

By the way, I have read Prouty's extremely padded book. Like most such books, one little nugget blown completely out of proportion.

[EVDebs]

62. Also see John Newman's book on JFK and Vietnam

http://www.namebase.org/sources/RO.html

[Octafish]

74. IMFO, Newman's book SAVED the USA.

I also believe that everybody who's anybody in the national security establishment has read it. Of them, those who took their oath to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic" seriously have sided with Newman and concluded that JFK was doing all he could to avoid committing U.S. combat troops to support Vietnam. Newman's book doesn't say so, but the logical extension is that Kennedy was assassinated by a cabal representing powerful interests in order to make that war. Those who made that war, and those who still support them 43 years later, are traitors to the United States.


Here's a searchable database of documents Newman uncovered:

http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Archives+and+Manuscripts/fa_newman.htm


Another researcher we must acknowledge is Peter Dale Scott:

http://www.history-matters.com/pds/dp3.htm


Also,Mae Brussell:

http://www.maebrussell.com/Mae%20Brussell%20Articles/Nazi%20Connection%20to%20JFK%20Assass.html


Before I discovered their work, I feared our country was going to lose to these bastards. We may still, but without their work we wouldn't have much of a shot.

[ngant17]

13. JFK and LBJ were fundamentally different politicians

I think there is plenty of evidence to establish that these two presidents had a fundamentally different agenda for America. I am not convinced that "Kennedy would have done the same thing as Johnson". Just examine JFK's last speech to the UN, in Sept. 1963, and compare it to LBJ's first speech to the UN, which was only a few months apart. Quite a dissimilarity here! I see a coup in just that part, if nothing else.

I wish I could find a way to compare Bush and JFK, but that is quite impossible, it's the difference between night and day.

[Humor_In_Cuneiform]

22. Also Robert F. Kennedy, Attorney General at the time, was

known to have opposed the war in Vietnam.

[shain from kane]

25. In 1963? Re-writing history on this one. RFK was dragged, kicking and

screaming, into opposition to the Viet Nam War by Eugene McCarthy's success in Democrat primaries in 1968. Do you have any earlier references that he opposed the War before 1968?

Internet search, Robert Kennedy, Viet Nam --- first listing, from a town hall interview or debate with Ronald Reagan ---- May 1967 ----

"ANNA FORD: I believe the war in Viet Nam is illegal, immoral, politically unjustifiable, and economically motivated. Could either of you agree with this?

COLLINGWOOD: Who wants to start? Senator Kennedy?

KENNEDY: I don't agree with that. I have some reservations as I've stated them before about some aspects of the war, but I think that the United States is making every effort to try to make it possible for the people of South Viet Nam to determine their own destiny. I think that's all we want - no matter how - how we - what reservations we have about the conduct of the war. I think that we're all agreed in the United States that if the war can be settled and the people of South Viet Nam can determine their own destiny and determine their own future, that we want to leave South Viet Nam. That's the stated governmental policy, certainly what I would like to see, and I think that's backed by the vast majority of American people. The fact is that the insurgency against - that's taking place in South Viet Nam is being supported by North Viet Nam. If both of us withdraw and let the people of South Viet Nam determine and decide what they want, what kind of government they want, what kind of future they want, what kind of economic system they want to establish, I think that's all we're interested in, that's all we're interested in accomplishing. So I think it's quite different than you've described it."


Does that sound like he opposed the War, even as late as May 1967?

[Humor_In_Cuneiform]

26. I have no citation, but I was a reader of stuff like Schlesinger's

One Thousand Days and other things related to the Presidency.

I remember encountering something that made me believe that.

BTW, I'm not into revisionism.

[shain from kane]

29. Have you ever heard of "hagiography"? From Wikipedia ---

"The term "hagiography" has come to refer to the works of contemporary biographers and historians that critics perceive to be uncritical and even "reverential". Critics of historian (and John F. Kennedy associate) Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. often call him a "Kennedy hagiographer." When former U.S. President Ronald Reagan died in 2004, many commentaries complained that his reverential treatment in the media, and a tendency to ignore scandals in his administration, constituted hagiography."


He also wrote Robert Kennedy and His Times
He, more or less, created Camelot. It was never used as a description of the administration while JFK was living.

Eugene McCarthy referred to RFK as an "opportunist", who grabbed the anti-war issue as his own, when Johnson decided to withdraw from the primaries.

[Humor_In_Cuneiform]

31. Oh please. "Ruthless" was a term applied to Robert Kennedy by

various opponents.

I'm not going to argue with you any further.

I was a grade school child during the Kennedy years and there was a feeling at the time that hasn't been seen since, IMO.

[shain from kane]

33. Denial is a river in Egypt. We have another frat boy in office, and

I'm seeing the same mistakes that I saw in Viet Nam.
Remember that we need to learn from history or we are condemned to repeat it.
Hillary Clinton is following the same course as RFK. When will she become anti-war? When the opportunity arises?

[Humor_In_Cuneiform]

37. The Saying (quotation) is actually Denial ain't JUST a river in Egypt.

Can't imagine why you're trying to turn this thread into an argument for or against Hillary Clinton.

:boring:

[shain from kane]

54. Well, I'll certainly concede that you are the expert on denial. n/t

[Humor_In_Cuneiform]

64. I know you meant I'm more an expert on quotations or sayings ABOUT denial.

Another way to look at it would be that I am careful to be accurate in what I post, which can't be said for everyone.

[shain from kane]

71. Admirable goal in life, but it's a narrow field. You may have to make

something up to become more relevant. There are other rivers, you know. Enough to keep you busy.

[Humor_In_Cuneiform]

35. 1967 after his brother's assassination and the nation still in

Vietnam is a very different time for the young Robert Kennedy than when he was AG in his brother's cabinet.

[H2O Man]

39. silly n/t

[Dancing_Dave]

49. It sounds like he didn't understand very well at that point

What was really going on in Vietnam. I could agree with the self-determination ideals he's expressing...but he doesn't seem to have clearly grasped at that point that there was no real nation of "South Vietnam"...the vast majority of Vietnamese never wanted a divided Vietnam, that was decided by external powers in the 1950's. And the goverment of this artificially created "South Vietnam" was nothing but a neo-colonial remnant without any broad popular support at all. As of May 1967, RFK didn't quite get that yet...though you can also hear that he was already looking for a way to get U.S. troops out of Vietnam.

RFK was not especially foreign policy oriented to begin with...that wasn't his job as Attorney General. He did near the end of his brothers life become somewhat involved in monitering the faction of the CIA trying to mobilize covert operations against Cuba... but that may well have come out of the fact that the CIA's Miami covert operations branch was also connected to organized crime in Florida. That would have been RFK's buisness as attorney general.

[Phrogman]

27. You guys ever seen the photograph of Lee Harvey Oswald with John Wayne?

Weirdest picture I've ever seen, it was taken on Corrigidor in the Philippines when Wayne visited Oswald's marine unit.

Way creepy picture.

[ngant17]

32. probably not as outlandish as some cross-dressing gay Hoover picts

I thought there were some picts of "Jane" Edgar Hoover dressed up in drag, or at least I thought it was in the "JFK" movie script. Maybe they were used to blackmail him by the mob.

[Greeby]

28. Lets get it straight from the horses's mouth

The following are recordings from October 2nd and October 5th 1963. They are of President Kennedy, Secretary of Defense Macnamara and General Maxwell Taylor discussing pulling out from Vietnam.

http://www.whitehousetapes.org/clips/1963_1002_vietnam_am/
http://www.whitehousetapes.org/clips/1963_1002_vietnam_pm/index.htm
http://www.whitehousetapes.org/clips/1963_1005_vietnam/index.htm


And this also may be of interest. November 4th 1963, three weeks before his own assassination, JFK records his thoughts on the assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem:

http://www.whitehousetapes.org/clips/1963_1104_jfk_vietnam_memoir.html

[me b zola]

34. The war machine will not tolerate someone coming between them and their $$

I feel ill for what the hate/war mongers have done to the Kennedy family.

[EVDebs]

63. "Just get me elected and you can have your goddam war"...LBJ

www.jfk-online.com/jfk100lbjnam.html

and in the prologue to Stanley Karnow's Vietnam: A History

[Octafish]

42. What hump?

Thanks for remembering, blm.

President Kennedy was the last time someone other than the War Party had a chance to get stuff done in America.

He said, "Let's go to the moon and do the other thing. Not because they are easy, but because they are hard."

Eight years later and our nation had accomplished the impossible. And at the time, anything seemed possible.

Imagine what we as a nation with a can-do attitude could have done to the seemingly impossible problems on earth?

We could conquer hunger.

We could conquer disease.

We could conquer homelessness.

We could conquer poverty.

We could conquer ignorance.

We could conquer want.

We could conquer war.

Since November 22, 1963, Hate has been winning.



John-John had a lot of promise, too.

SOME COMMENTS ON JOHN MCADAMS' KENNEDY ASSASSINATION HOME PAGE

Michael T. Griffith
2001
@All Rights Reserved
Revised and Expanded on 1/27/02

From time to time visitors to my JFK web page ask me about John McAdams' Kennedy Assassination Home Page. In this article I will respond to some of the claims that are presented on McAdams' site. It is my contention that most of McAdams' claims are wrong and that in some cases McAdams presents information that is badly outdated.

John McAdams is a university professor who believes strongly that Lee Harvey Oswald, acting alone, shot President Kennedy. McAdams doesn't believe a conspiracy of any kind was involved. McAdams believes the Warren Commission (WC) was correct in all its essential conclusions.

In McAdams' opinion, anyone who defends the conspiracy position is a "conspiracy buff." McAdams frequently refers to those who reject the lone-gunman theory as "buffs." McAdams even applies this label to experts who speak about aspects of the assassination that involve their field of expertise. For example, when McAdams learned that a professor of neuroscience at a Canadian university rejected the lone-gunman view that Kennedy's backward head snap was the result of a neuromuscular reaction, he opined that the professor was either a "buff" or had been spoon fed erroneous information by a critic of the lone-gunman theory.

McAdams' attitude toward virtually anyone who disagrees with him about the assassination is somewhat surprising, given the fact that for the last three decades surveys have consistently shown that anywhere from 65-90 percent of the American people believe Kennedy was killed as a result of a conspiracy (with about 5 percent undecided).

SNIP...

It might be worthwhile at this point to mention some of the experts and public figures who have said they believe a conspiracy killed President Kennedy or who have said they reject the single-bullet theory, which is the foundation of the lone-gunman theory:

* Dr. Joseph Dolce, an Army wound ballistics expert who played a leading role in the WC's wound ballistics tests.

* G. Robert Blakey, a professor of law at Notre Dame University and the former chief counsel for the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA).

* The late Senator Richard Schweiker.

* Senator Christopher Dodd, who served on the HSCA when he was a member of the House of Representatives.

* The late Senator Richard Russell, who served on the WC.

* Dr. Roger McCarthy, a ballistics expert with Failure Analysis, which assisted with the American Bar Association's mock Oswald trials in the 1990s.

* Robert MacNeil, formerly of the McNeil-Lehrer News Hour on PBS.

* Ambassador William Atwood, former Special Assistant to the U.S. delegation to the United Nations.

* Vice President Al Gore.

* President Lyndon Johnson. (We now know from the Johnson White House tapes that Johnson rejected the single-bullet theory. We also know from former Johnson aides and associates that privately Johnson said he believed Kennedy was killed by a conspiracy.)

* The late Dr. Milton Helpern, a renowned forensic pathologist and formerly the medical examiner for New York City.

* The late Dr. John Nichols, a forensic pathologist and formerly a professor of pathology at the University of Kansas.

* The late Carlos Hathcock, a Marine sniper who was widely regarded as the greatest sniper of the 20th century.

* The late Evelyn Lincoln, who was Kennedy's White House secretary.

* The late Dr. George Burkley, Kennedy's personal physician.

CONTINUED...

http://ourworld.cs.com/mikegriffith1/id151.htm

Torpedoes, blm. Torpedoes.

[rman]

45. evidence:

http://www.whitehousetapes.org/clips/1963_1104_jfk_vietnam_memoir.html

[pitohui]

46. yes as i'm sure he ordered any number of plans for any number of things

but i believe people who think jfk had the tiniest intention of withdrawing from vietnam are v. naive and not in tune w. the spirit of the day

he could not withdraw at that time and place, cold war, bay of pigs, etc. it would have been fatal to show any weakness to the soviets toward communism or so the domino theory held

he could not have withdrawn and he would not have withdrawn

there were many wild studies and plans issued in those colorful days, they weren't all going to be acted on, it was the era when "brainstorming" was considered a valuable technique

oliver stone is just wrong abt this one, altho -- great movie!

[ConsAreLiars]

50. At the time of his murder, Vietnam was nothing at all as far as most

Americans (99%) were concerned. It was not a "central front" in the war against "communism" and nobody had said anything about the "Domino Theory." That was Nixon's blather. It was nothing until the "advisors" turned were into invaders. You are quite right in suggesting that the powers that be, at that time (and again now), were determined to extend multinational capitalism into that region, but that is not evidence that JFK was inb agreement. Indeed, the facts supporting the view that he was seen as an obstacle to those goals are also consistent with the known facts about his assassination.

[robcon]

56. Utter propaganda (selective quotes)

Kennedy reaffirmed his commitment to vietnam two weeks before he died.

Oliver Stone included a speech by Kennedy that suggested that he didn't want to escalate in Vietnam in the beginning of his movie JFK. When Stone was asked about the later Kennedy speech showing a firm commitment to Vietnam, Stone's response was that he knew about it, but it didn't fit with the narrative. In other words, the movie was propaganda, not a documentary.

The same is true of this thread.

[Octafish]

66. Who said anything about Oliver Stone? Read what JFK was doing...

Here are more than a few sources that demonstrate President Kennedy's plans for withdrawal from Vietnam:

http://www.history-matters.com/vietnam1963.htm

Those who take the time to read Scott, Newman and Galbraith will have a very different picture from what is espoused by Zinn, Chomsky and Cockburn. The former reflect the facts. The latter reflect Allen Dulles.

[Joe Fields]

57. Yes. I've known this for decades.

[dailykoff]

61. Absolutely.

Contrary to the GOP/NeoCon/PNAC spin, this is the guy who started his presidency by calling for a halt to the MIC arms bonanza:

Finally, to those nations who would make themselves our adversary, we offer not a pledge but a request: that both sides begin anew the quest for peace, before the dark powers of destruction unleashed by science engulf all humanity in planned or accidental self-destruction.

--Inaugural Address, Washington, D.C., January 20, 1961

[Hekate]

69. I heard about it in late 1967 or early 1968

I remember exactly what I was doing and who I was with.

My friend Bob was attending Long Beach State College, majoring in Poli Sci -- these were the darkest days of the Vietnam War, and every young man we knew was "feeling the draft" -- so this bit of information that he brought to us from his classes went deep into my heart and stayed there. It felt awful to know that all of that carnage could have been prevented, and wasn't.

Not long after that conversation, it was Bob who brought us news of an anti-war Senator's presidential campaign, and we all began working on Gene McCarthy's campaign.

Hekate

[Cleita]

77. Yep, I remember those dark days.

I still don't understand why McCarthy didn't win.

[Hekate]

94. It was Bobby Kennedy stepping in; then the Dem convention in Chicago

Bobby Kennedy just had so much charisma. Those of us who were already working for Gene McCarthy resented that RFK came in after the waters had already been tested, but there you have it.

It was a horrid blow when RFK was assassinated; I think the peace candidacy was doomed after that. The Chicago convention afterward was a nightmare. I think the delegates went with a "safe" candidate, but poor Hubert Humphrey was too tainted by association with LBJ.

So Nixon won. At least we knew it was the voters who chose the bastard, and not Diebold.

Hekate

[flyarm]

70. yes! n/t

[Cleita]

76. Also, we weren't very entrenched in Vietnam then. Mostly

we were acting as a security force advising and backing the Vietnamese government. It was Pres. Johnson who staged the Gulf of Tonkin incident that gave him the ability to order a full scale police action. It was never called a war officially because Congress didn't declare war.

Unfortunately a precedent had been set for this kind of police action in the previous Korean "police action" where a President of the United States can send the military to a country without having to get a declaration of war from Congress. Sadly, it was Harry Truman who did this, a Democrat.