Read Online Killing Kennedy by Bill O’Reilly - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Bill O’Reilly
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perfect white teeth.
“I became suddenly aware,” Kennedy adviser Richard Goodwin will later write, “that Bobby’s harsh polemic reflected the president’s concealed emotions, privately communicated in some earlier, intimate conversation. I knew, even then, that there was an inner hardness, often volatile anger beneath the outwardly amiable, thoughtful, carefully controlled demeanor of John Kennedy.”
If Lyndon Johnson is the vice president, it will one day be written, then Bobby Kennedy is soon to become the assistant president—but only after the Bay of Pigs bonds the brothers and transforms the way JFK does business in the White House. From now on, when President Kennedy wants a contentious point made to his cabinet or advisers, he will rely on Bobby, who will then speak for the president and endure any subsequent criticism or argument so as not to weaken his big brother.
* * *
Amazingly, Kennedy’s approval ratings rise to 83 percent after the invasion, proving to the president that the American people firmly stand behind his actions against Castro. Behind the scenes, U.S. plots to overthrow the Cuban leader continue to be hatched, and Castro becomes openly defiant of Kennedy, further cementing the widespread belief that each man wants the other dead.
Meanwhile, even as Kennedy’s approval ratings temporarily make him one of the most popular presidents of the twentieth century, he knows that something must be done to restore America’s prestige among the international community. In an interview with James Reston of the New York Times , Kennedy sets aside the Cuban situation. Instead, he candidly admits that “we have a problem making our power credible and Vietnam looks like the place.”
Vietnam.
Small, and until now almost completely overlooked by America, the Asian nation is in the throes of its own Communist uprising. Now President Kennedy deems it vital to American security. In May 1961, JFK tasks Vice President Lyndon Johnson with a fact-finding trip to Vietnam, sending him farther away from the Oval Office than ever before.
The reasons have as much to do with national security as the president’s awareness of the toll that being powerless is taking on the vice president. “I cannot stand Johnson’s damn long face,” JFK confides to one senator. “He just comes in, sits at cabinet meetings with his face all screwed up. Never says anything. He looks so sad.”
When Kennedy’s good friend Senator George Smathers of Florida suggests Johnson go on an around-the-world trip, JFK is delighted, calling it “a damn good idea.”
Just to reinforce the journey’s importance, the vice president is allowed the use of a presidential airplane.
* * *
More than 110 men would not have died if JFK had canceled the Bay of Pigs invasion. And more than 1,200 freedom fighters would not have been captured and sentenced to Castro’s brutal prisons. The Bay of Pigs not only exposed flaws in Kennedy’s international policy, but it also eroded the power the voters had given him—even if this was unbeknownst to them at the time. Kennedy was indecisive at a time when he should have been resolute. He allowed himself to be misled. It is impossible to ascertain why. But there is no question that in the first major test of his administration, Kennedy’s leadership failed.
The harrowing days of April 1961 taught the Kennedy brothers an indelible lesson: they are on their own. Their advisers are not worth shoe polish. In order to restore America’s power position, the Kennedy brothers will have to find a way to defeat their enemies, both abroad and, especially, in Washington, D.C.
* * *
Meanwhile, in the Soviet Union, the U.S. State Department has decided to return Lee Harvey Oswald’s American passport and allow him to return home. But while Oswald is quite anxious to leave the Soviet Union, he is no longer the unattached nomad who defected nearly two years earlier. He delays his
“I became suddenly aware,” Kennedy adviser Richard Goodwin will later write, “that Bobby’s harsh polemic reflected the president’s concealed emotions, privately communicated in some earlier, intimate conversation. I knew, even then, that there was an inner hardness, often volatile anger beneath the outwardly amiable, thoughtful, carefully controlled demeanor of John Kennedy.”
If Lyndon Johnson is the vice president, it will one day be written, then Bobby Kennedy is soon to become the assistant president—but only after the Bay of Pigs bonds the brothers and transforms the way JFK does business in the White House. From now on, when President Kennedy wants a contentious point made to his cabinet or advisers, he will rely on Bobby, who will then speak for the president and endure any subsequent criticism or argument so as not to weaken his big brother.
* * *
Amazingly, Kennedy’s approval ratings rise to 83 percent after the invasion, proving to the president that the American people firmly stand behind his actions against Castro. Behind the scenes, U.S. plots to overthrow the Cuban leader continue to be hatched, and Castro becomes openly defiant of Kennedy, further cementing the widespread belief that each man wants the other dead.
Meanwhile, even as Kennedy’s approval ratings temporarily make him one of the most popular presidents of the twentieth century, he knows that something must be done to restore America’s prestige among the international community. In an interview with James Reston of the New York Times , Kennedy sets aside the Cuban situation. Instead, he candidly admits that “we have a problem making our power credible and Vietnam looks like the place.”
Vietnam.
Small, and until now almost completely overlooked by America, the Asian nation is in the throes of its own Communist uprising. Now President Kennedy deems it vital to American security. In May 1961, JFK tasks Vice President Lyndon Johnson with a fact-finding trip to Vietnam, sending him farther away from the Oval Office than ever before.
The reasons have as much to do with national security as the president’s awareness of the toll that being powerless is taking on the vice president. “I cannot stand Johnson’s damn long face,” JFK confides to one senator. “He just comes in, sits at cabinet meetings with his face all screwed up. Never says anything. He looks so sad.”
When Kennedy’s good friend Senator George Smathers of Florida suggests Johnson go on an around-the-world trip, JFK is delighted, calling it “a damn good idea.”
Just to reinforce the journey’s importance, the vice president is allowed the use of a presidential airplane.
* * *
More than 110 men would not have died if JFK had canceled the Bay of Pigs invasion. And more than 1,200 freedom fighters would not have been captured and sentenced to Castro’s brutal prisons. The Bay of Pigs not only exposed flaws in Kennedy’s international policy, but it also eroded the power the voters had given him—even if this was unbeknownst to them at the time. Kennedy was indecisive at a time when he should have been resolute. He allowed himself to be misled. It is impossible to ascertain why. But there is no question that in the first major test of his administration, Kennedy’s leadership failed.
The harrowing days of April 1961 taught the Kennedy brothers an indelible lesson: they are on their own. Their advisers are not worth shoe polish. In order to restore America’s power position, the Kennedy brothers will have to find a way to defeat their enemies, both abroad and, especially, in Washington, D.C.
* * *
Meanwhile, in the Soviet Union, the U.S. State Department has decided to return Lee Harvey Oswald’s American passport and allow him to return home. But while Oswald is quite anxious to leave the Soviet Union, he is no longer the unattached nomad who defected nearly two years earlier. He delays his
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