JFK's Revolutionary Foreign Policy

[Jim DiEugenio]

Thanks Michele.

That essay in Bob Parry's Consortium News--who I hope everyone tries to support--is a longer adaptation of what I spoke about at the Wecht Conference in Pittsburgh. Its a bit more inclusive of some other aspects of Kennedy's foreign policy. In Pittsburgh, I concentrated on areas besides Vietnam and Cuba to show that:

1.) People had concentrated on those two areas while ignoring other areas which are just as important in some ways

2.) To show that Kennedy's foreign policy was not really a matter of ad hoc instances. But it really had a gestalt overview behind it, one that had been formed prior to Kennedy becoming president.

Tracy, the Rakove book is pretty good. I have it and will review it. I don't think its quite as good as Betting on the Africans, which I already reviewed. And which I used in the essay. And which is coming out in paperback.

[Nathaniel Heidenheimer]

Jim did you get a chance to see my post about what JFK did in West Germany and NATO?

I mean basically reverse the policy that was set to give West Germany nukes?

Without that there is no breakthrough to the USSR and where THAT was going in the Fall of 1963.

It seems that this is an incredibly important breakthrough and reversal of Eisenhower's developing policy that has been overlooked.

It goes right to the heart of cold war issue #1: how should Germany be rebuilt and should it be rearmed. Germany was the keystone of the literal Cold War. There were those who wanted to use it in a more figurative sense as a fig leaf for US imperialism. JFK was literally threatening both in 1963. Without JFK 's flat out reversal in telling Audenauer no nukes, there is no breakthrough with Russia.

And yet on the fake left all we hear is how hawkish JFK sounded in Berlin in 1963! Of course there needed to be some reassurance for NATO after the right was so thoroughly smacked in the face by telling them no autonomous NATO nukes. Also note that this degree of NATO autonomy over nukes is perhaps the loudest point of disagreement in the whole Excom meeting, when JFK had it out with Nitze over Nato s ability to answer a perceived attack without checking with the White House first [see Averting The Final Failure] This Germany shift of JFK 's has been overlooked IMO.

[Jim DiEugenio]

No I did not see that Nathaniel. Where is it?

BTW, my review of Sabato is going up tomorrow. I thought his book was so bad it deserved to be panned twice.

God, just horrible.

But the part of his book about his polls was exactly what we needed. The people are still with us no matter how many Gary Mack specials come out.

[Nathaniel Heidenheimer]

Jim here is the thread I posted a while back. As usual, the point might have been expressed 507% more clearly.

However, if you read the books by this U Penn historian Trachtenberg, his stuff is great, and, IMO goes right to heart of JFK's uniqueness in foreign policy.

His most famous book is A Constructed Peace. He goes through the vulnerability of Western Europe, after the creation of the H bomb and how that opened up a division within NATO bc Western European countries were worried US might fall back and let WE get hit or invaded if US thought they could avoid a hit to US.

Then he traces the conflict through various mini-alliances and footsie playing between DeGual and everyone else. But he clearly states that by at least 58 it was a given that Germany would get a semi-autonomous degree of control over Nukes placed in Germany and under NATO command.

This is culminating in 1963 with everyone playing NATO footsie with everyone else and even some Eastern Germany getting into the mix, by trying to gain some leverage vis a vis USSR with the threat of German unification and also France and Germany doing the same with each other and with USSR in order to get more flexibility re US.

But then he makes it absolutely clear that JFK simply 180 degree reversed this German nuke policy within NATO, by saying "Um Conrad, Nein. Sie can't have em" Trachtenberg makes it very clear that this was a 180 degree turn.

Without that THERE IS NO DETENTE MOVES WITH USSR IN summer and Fall of 63, because, as you know, the rebuilding of Germany [how and armed with what] was issue #1 for the USSR from even before the Cold War began.

Ironically, the fake left, points to JFK s Berlin Speech of 63 as proof of his being a committed Cold Warrior. But after the 180 nuke turn he HAD to provide reassurance re conventional forces just in order to keep NATO together .

The change in German nuke policy was gigantic; without it, no detente and the peace scare that we see in the US business press in 1963.

Also Trachtenbergs books with their focus on US NATO tensions REALLY provide a lot of context for the huge rif JFK had with NITZE over the question of whether or not NATO could respond immediately to Soviet provocation without checking with the White House first, during the Cuban Missile Crisis.[ See Stern, Averting the Final Failure for this showdown btw, JFK and Nitze, which I m pretty sure he writes was the most tense of the entire Excom meetings]

Also great is the Trachtenberg's book History and Strategy. He emphasized the extend to which nuclear policy effected ALL the other foreing policies including Vietnam and Laos. He makes a very interesting comment about "Nuclear Amnesia" in which he says the left and right have BOTH agreed not to talk about how nuclear policy effected the other foreign policies , each for their own reasons. Will post soon.

Noam chomsky, john foster dulles and conrad adenauer vs jfk and khrushchev: Whose side are us """""l""""LEFT"""""""""""""" PUBLICATIONS REALLY ON?

https://deeppoliticsforum.com/forums/sho...r89WWRDtU0

[Tracy Riddle]

Yes, Russia's primary worry since WWII was (and still is) a reunited, rearmed and aggressive Germany. There is the same fear of Japan by China, Korea, the Philippines, etc.

[Nathaniel Heidenheimer]

JFK VS CIA ON WEST GERMAN NUKES: THE OPENING OF A DETENTE THAT THE CIA HAD TO SHOOT TO DEATH IN DALLAS….
"If they chose cooperation, moreover, it would have to be on American term. The Americans had made it clear, even in 1962, that they intended to lead Europe, but the tow major events of January 1963, the De Gaulle veto and the Franco-German treaty,led to an even more assertive American policy.(98) The time had come for the United States to play hardball with the Europeans. 'We have been very generous to Europe," the president told the NSC on January 22, the very day the Franco-German treaty was signed, "and it is now time for us to look out for ourselves, knowing full well that the Europeans will not do anything for us simply because we have in the past helped them."(99) Top American officials mad it clear that they intended to take the lead and that Europe and especially Germany, would have to follow. In particular, if SOviet policy softened to the pint where there was a real chance of a general settlement, the United States would not be held back by the allies. [This directly countered the policy of Dulleses. Three of 'em--N.H.]

The new tough line led to a major American intervention in internal German politics. Key political figures in Germany were urged to oppose Adenauer's foreign policy…..The SPD also asked the Americans for advice about the line they would take on the treaty. ….And Adenauer was removed from office-- in effect (as he himself said) dismissed by his own party. The Key decisions were made by the CDU in April, and Erhard replaced him as chancellor six months later" -- Trachtenberg, A Constructed Peace: The Making of The European Settlement 1945-63, Princeton University Press, 1999.

The Dulles supported Adenauer's policy of "nuclear sharing" within NATO forces in Europe, where the CIA had strong influence {see the conflict between JFK and Paul Nitze over whether NATO can react immediately to a Soviet "provocation" (or perceived provocation) during the Cuban Missile Crisis in Sheldon Stern's book Averting The Final Failure: the Cuban Missile Crisis White House Tapes) Stanford Nuclear Age series, 2003} On Dulles supporting West German control of nukes see Trachtenberg, The Cold War and After,p. 152, Princeton University Press, 2012.

Again, without this 180 degree change on West German nukes, there was no test ban treaty with USSR and no evolving detente in 1963.

Then the CIA preserved the permanent War State. In Nuclear policy, not merely Vietnam, Cuba, Laos, Brazil, Indonesia and Congo. LETS JUST CONTINUE IGNORING POLITICAL ASSASSINATIONS WITHOUT LOOKING AT THE HISTORY BEHIND THEM. IT'S REALLY WORKING SO GREAT!! For some.

[Jim DiEugenio]

Thanks Nathaniel.

Very informative.