Presidency

Pentagon history documents hostility to JFK in 1963

June 17, 2013 Assassination, Presidency, Review 9 comments

Michael Swanson, an investment adviser turned JFK researcher, called my attention to “Council of War,” a fascinating official history of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, which documents the Pentagon’s resistance to, and resentment of, President Kennedy’s foreign policy, especially on Cuba and Vietnam.

Published last year by the JCS, the study presents an unvarnished view of an unprecedented mistrust between White House and Pentagon in the year before Kennedy was violently removed from power.

“Read this book and you are reading a real history of the American empire and defense establishment written for future leaders of the Pentagon and armed forces,” writes Swanson, who plans to publish his own study of the Cold War from 1945-1963 in the fall.

Some highlights from “Council of War:”

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Is Max Holland right about JFK and Cuba?

March 19, 2013 Assassination, News, Presidency 9 comments

Max Holland unearths a JFK-related document recently found in Bobby Kennedy’s papers. The story it tells provides a granular look at the workings of President Kennedy’s Cuba policy on the eve of the disaster in Dallas. Read more

What was Operation Northwoods? Was it connected to JFK’s assassination?

December 12, 2012 Assassination, Experts, From the Files, Presidency, Question 15 comments

Operation Northwoods was a Pentagon plan to provoke a U.S. invasion of Cuba in 1963 through the use of deception operations. First disclosed by the Assassination Records Review Board in 1997, the  Northwoods plans are among the most significant new JFK documents to emerge since Oliver Stone’s “JFK” movie.

Operation Northwoods envisioned U.S. intelligence operatives staging violent attacks on U.S. targets  and arranging for the blame for the mayhem to fall on Fidel Castro and his communist government. The idea, wrote one planner, was to creates a “justification for U.S. intervention in Cuba,” by orchestrating a crime that placed the U.S. government “in the apparent position of suffering defensible grievances from a rash and irresponsible government” in Cuba.

These plans included the use of violence on American soil against American citizens.

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When JFK wooed Latinos

November 28, 2012 Assassination, Presidency One comment

AP reported a genuinely new JFK story on Sunday. It turns out that JFK met informally with members of Mexican-American civil rights group in Houston the day before his death. It was the first time an American president had ever recognized Latinos as a voting bloc. First Lady Jackie Kennedy spoke Read more

Was JFK a hawk or a dove?

November 10, 2012 Presidency, Question One comment

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable:”

In this well-edited YouTube piece, Eytmon reminds us that President Kennedy was a “dove,” a leader more inclined to restrain U.S. military power than to unleash it. While JFK was often aggressive in rhetoric, he also emphasized peace was “necessary and rational.” It was his experience as a Navy lieutenant in World War II who repeatedly faced death in battle that made the cause of peace personally urgent to him. It also distinguished him from the hawks of his day

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JFK Library announces program for 2013

November 8, 2012 News, Presidency, Upcoming No comments

Coming events at the JFK Library and Museum in Boston will highlight key moments of the Kennedy presidency.

From the Files: The Church Committee Report

November 4, 2012 From the Files, Presidency No comments

Want to read the original 1975 U.S. Senate report that blew the lid on CIA plots to assassinate Fidel Castro and other foreign leaders?

Don’t settle for lame theories. Get the facts. Click here: Alleged Assassination Plots Involving Foreign Leaders Read more