30-06-2012, 05:04 PM
Albert Doyle Wrote:Greg Burnham Wrote:I'd say this: JFK was the same. But, "JFK", the character was a work in progress. He was evolving in profound ways on a deep level. He was beginning to mold his public persona to fit
his actual person...and it got him killed.
Which is why I like The Unspeakable because it shows this process attracted Sponsors in the metaphysical realm of good and evil that usually mark such persons for assassination.
I disagree. ANd I thought this was a flaw in Jim's book. I noted it in just one sentence at the end because I though the rest of the book was quite good. And also,relatively speaking, his book was an oasis since there are so many bad books out there--Janney's pile of crap being an example--even in the wake of the ARRB.
Kennedy is saying in that interview, and he says it repeatedly, that he did have an established program ready to go in 1961. Significantly, note how he specifically mentions Congo, which was a special interest of his. (See the books, JFK: Ordeal in Africa, and Betting on the Africans) But he is explaining how its one thing to have a program. It is another thing to shepherd it through congress and a bureaucracy when established interests are waiting to undermine you.
In Congo, Kennedy was being opposed by Sen. Thomas Dodd, his own foreign service, and the CIA inside the government. In my opinion, the CIA assassinated Kennedy's ally on Congo, Dag Hammarkskjold (although I did not put that in my book, Lisa made a good argument for that in Probe.) He was opposed by William F. Buckley in the press who was raising nutty fears of a commie takeover. And abroad he was being opposed by the Belgians and the British who wanted to split off Katanga from Congo and plunder its riches for themselves and not the people of Congo. Kennedy, who knew the history of the Belgian colonization of the country, was opposed to that. Which is why Allen Dulles had Lumumba killed before Kennedy was inaugurated.
The other thing is this: Kennedy had a very narrow tightrope to walk. Because he also knew that if it was shown there WAS a Russian, or Chinese inspired attempt to take over the country, he would lose the little support he had. If one reads the masterful Richard Mahoney book (disgracefully neglected in the critical community, which is more interested in Janney's childhood fantasies about Mary Meyer) one understands this paradigm Kennedy was trying to fulfill.
What JFK is talking about here is on the eve of the UN military expedition to stop Katanga from splitting off. George Ball opposed military intervention. Kennedy had to talk him into supporting it, since he was one of the two point men he had working on it (the other being his Third World tutor Ed Gullion.)
My point is this: Kennedy did not start his Congo reversal of Eisenhower/Dulles in 1963. It started two weeks after he was inaugurated! But Dulles anticipated what Kennedy would do because of his Algeria speech in 1957. So he had Lumumba killed three days before his inauguration. Because he knew Kennedy would back him. And that would be the end of imperialism there, because of Lumumba's charismatic appeal and dynamic personality.
The "spiritual journey" was completed by the time he was president. No one can read the Algeria speech and not understand that. It was a matter of then obstructing him as much as possible. And when they realized he was not going to stop, it was a matter of killing him.
Let us never forget what Sukarno said about this: "Why did they kill my friend John Kennedy."