The History Book Club discussion

Matthew wrote: "Bentley wrote: "Were you a teacher first and then an attorney now? There is always the attitude or the argument of big versus small government. It is interesting that this is a segment from the deb..."

I am smiling Matthew - I don't know - I think that some Presidents can make their cases better than others and can articulate their ideas and programs. JFK could, Clinton could, FDR could, George W not so much and oddly enough I don't think that Obama - though a good prepared speaker is very accomplished at it either. As far as being fair or unfair - one was better with the television medium than the other and I think that Reagan was better at performances too than an LBJ. But then you have to look at execution and how these men actually did and what they accomplished and of course that is the ultimate benchmark isn't it. I think a lot of us would like to be inspired and that hasn't happened lately. This should be a great discussion and I hope you are enjoying the classroom - I think we need good teachers and glad that you are enjoying your profession.

Jill wrote: "I am sure that LBJ was the consummate politician and had a talent for one-on-one contact. But he didn't stand a chance since the majority of those who surrounded Kennedy disliked him. They continue..."

They just plain did not like the man but they also loved JFK and were filled with grief. Some act out overwhelming grief in different ways and probably did not want to see the JFK days end - and certainly not in the way they did.

Christopher wrote: "What I found interesting in the Prologue was the Political shift after LBJ won the Presidential election. I find that if one looks at the political shift today it parallels that of what happened to..."

Probably very true Christopher. How do you judge a person who has great charisma, brains and vision and is a golden boy versus one who is deliberate, steady and persevering with raw power who can execute but not with great charismatic charm - more from brute force but can get the job done.

Vince wrote: "I am Vince - 70 year old almost retired from a career in industry - mostly marketing and sale - mostly steel - mostly stainless. I am a hiker, reader, dad, husband, environmental activist etc. He..."

Vince - welcome - you bring up a lot of great points which I hope we will discuss in depth in the coming weeks - a lot to get into.

What was Lyndon's motivations for helping the blacks - could it have been his own upbringing and relationships and was he on both sides of the fence.

Here is an excerpt from an article:

"According to Caro, Robert Parker, Johnson’s sometime chauffer, described in his memoir Capitol Hill in Black and White a moment when Johnson asked Parker whether he’d prefer to be referred to by his name rather than “boy,” “nigger” or “chief.” When Parker said he would, Johnson grew angry and said, “As long as you are black, and you’re gonna be black till the day you die, no one’s gonna call you by your goddamn name. So no matter what you are called, nigger, you just let it roll off your back like water, and you’ll make it. Just pretend you’re a goddamn piece of furniture.”

That Johnson may seem hard to square with the public Johnson, the one who devoted his presidency to tearing down the “barriers of hatred and terror” between black and white.

In conservative quarters, Johnson’s racism – and the racist show he would put on for Southern segregationists – is presented as proof of the Democratic conspiracy to somehow trap black voters with, to use Mitt Romney’s terminology, “gifts” handed out through the social safety net. But if government assistance were all it took to earn the permanent loyalty of generations of voters then old white people on Medicare would be staunch Democrats.

So at best, that assessment is short sighted and at worst, it subscribes to the idea that blacks are predisposed to government dependency. That doesn’t just predate Johnson, it predates emancipation. As Eric Foner recounts in Reconstruction, the Civil War wasn’t yet over, but some Union generals believed blacks, having existed as a coerced labor class in America for more than a century, would nevertheless need to be taught to work “for a living rather than relying upon the government for support.”

Perhaps the simple explanation, which Johnson likely understood better than most, was that there is no magic formula through which people can emancipate themselves from prejudice, no finish line that when crossed, awards a person’s soul with a shining medal of purity in matters of race. All we can offer is a commitment to justice in word and deed, that must be honored but from which we will all occasionally fall short. Maybe when Johnson said “it is not just Negroes but all of us, who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry,” he really meant all of us, including himself.

Nor should Johnson’s racism overshadow what he did to push America toward the unfulfilled promise of its founding. When Republicans say they’re the Party of Lincoln, they don’t mean they’re the party of deporting black people to West Africa, or the party of opposing black suffrage, or the party of allowing states the authority to bar freedmen from migrating there, all options Lincoln considered. They mean they’re the party that crushed the slave empire of the Confederacy and helped free black Americans from bondage.

But we shouldn’t forget Johnson’s racism, either. After Johnson’s death, Parker would reflect on the Johnson who championed the landmark civil rights bills that formally ended American apartheid, and write, “I loved that Lyndon Johnson.” Then he remembered the president who called him a nigger, and he wrote, “I hated that Lyndon Johnson.”

That sounds about right."

Source - http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/lyndon-joh...

Vince - there is a video attached. Glad to have you with us.

by Robert Parker (no photo)

by Eric Foner

Vince wrote: "Bentley wrote: "Cary hello - welcome - I think that the men following FDR were influenced by his "big vision" and energetic approach despite his physical limitations. Reagan however loved the came..."

If you listen to the secret recordings - I am glad he maintained his cool and went for the blockade - believe me after listening to the tapes - things could have gone a lot worse.

Michael wrote: "Steve wrote: "Hi everyone, my name is Steve and I'm a high school teacher. I have just recently fallen in love with reading about American history. I am very much a beginner on the topic, and I t..."

Thanks Michael for your response to Steve. I like to see this kind of back and forth in the discussion - keep it up.

Hello to the group. My name is Michael I read almost every genre but lean mostly toward history and biography. I grew up in Montana but live and work in Alberta Canada. I have set a personal goal to read at least one bio of every US President and will add to that a bio of each Canadian Prime Minister after 1867 alongside the serving president of each PMs term.

I tend toward a conservative, republican viewpoint. I was in High School and starting college in the Reagan era. I remember the time prior to Reagan's administration as one of low moral in the United States. Post-Vietnam it was difficult to maintain and effective volunteer military. I remember the reinstatement of draft registration, the re-equipping of the National Guard and Air National Guard with front line equipment, and the establishment of rapid deployment forces as ways that the Reagan administration combated the Soviet Union in the later stages of the Cold War. I may be more pro-Reagan than most. Enough of that.

One of the things in our reading so far that I found disturbing and surprising is that there did not seem to be an effective protocol in place for Presidential succession. JFK is not the first President to be assassinated; nor is he the first to die in office. Why is it up to the JFK staffers or the LBJ staffers to determine when the Oval office is available to the new president? It seems to me that this is just something that needs to take place if the unthinkable happens.

I was disappointed as well with just how childish some of these people appeared even before the assassination. I am not sure it surprises me but it is disappointing. I look forward to learning more.

By the way one of my travel highlights was visiting the graveside of JFK at Arlington. Dallas was a significant game changer that will haunt the American people throughout our history.

Michael - welcome and you are right about the transition issues at the time of JFK's untimely demise - horrible part of our history and NOT a smooth transition either to make matters worse. JFK's gravesite - very powerful and it is OK to be pro-Reagan (smile). Glad to have you with us - and an admirable goal.

Hi, I am Holly. I am a violinist and a teacher. I feel lucky to be in this group of folks with such a wide variety of backgrounds, sharing impressions of this reading. I have never participated in a book discussion group, and look forward to this, getting everyone’s thoughts and reactions makes the reading a deeper experience.
I am especially drawn to the complexity of politics, government, and how we got to where we are today in the U.S.
I was also a young child during LBJ's presidency and a young adult during Reagan's.
I am finding the back story of the characters portrayed fascinating.
The prologue was interesting to me as the parallels were drawn between two presidents that I never imagined had anything in common. I took away the idea that they each identified with a myth, an idea that would save America from it’s troubles. Two myths from opposite ideologies.
I am taken back by details about the drama in LBJ’s relationship with President Kennedy, as well as RFK. I don’t know if it was common knowledge that JFK offered LBJ the VP position, expecting him to refuse, but I find that surprising. Does that happen today? Or was that a typical expectation in the past only? Maybe I am naive, and it is a common occurrence. The idea that one would offer the VP to a person one doesn’t like is difficult to process.
The awkward transition (to put it simply) into the White House after the sudden death of JFK, was less surprising, being that LBJ felt the urge to step up immediately and show the country that they had a strong leader during the crisis, yet while the Kennedys were slow on the transition, and I can understand that as well. It seems difficult for families to transition out of the White House under normal circumstances, so in this case, when everything changes in an instant, and the family is grieving, nobody has an immediate plan in response.
I wish I could go to the LBJ Library. I did go the the Reagan Library a couple of years ago (and the Nixon Library the year before).
I admit I come to this with some preconceived notions about both LBJ and Reagan. I understood that LBJ was an incredible deal maker and I wish that his skill was transferable to all that govern. I also have an impression of Reagan that he was more of a figure-head, with his advisor’s running the show, using him with his acting skills to communicate to the people. But my biases are based on lack of knowledge, I am sure. So I am looking forward to reading more of the book!

Part of my background is an MA in Leadership and Management. Holly mentions that she has an: "impression of Reagan that he was more of a figure-head, with his advisors running the show, using him with his acting skills to communicate to the people." Others have made similar comments. Out of my background in leadership I would like to offer that perhaps this was the strategy going into leadership of a nation suffering morale problems. I see Reagan appointing strong, capable persons to advisory roles and then letting them do the job that he appointed them to do. This is what I believe we need in a strong, effective President today someone who will pick the best women and men for the job and then listen to them. The job, in my humble opinion, is far to big for any one man. By the way those advisers need to be picked regardless of party membership Lincoln style.

I admire any person who willingly takes on leadership of a nation such as the United States. It is no easy task and is not without its risks. These men right or wrong do their best to serve us and the needs of the nation.

Holly wrote: " Does that happen today? Or was that a typical expectation in the past only? Maybe I am naive, and it is a common occurrence. The idea that one would offer the VP to a person one doesn’t like is difficult to process..."

Welcome all, great comments and many of them, lol.

Today's procedures to pick a VP are a little more formal today than 50 years ago. Usually this is a committee of advisors that work with the candidate to vet and discuss candidates in length. They meet the potential veeps and then one is chosen.

Back in the day, presidential candidates usually allowed the convention to pick the VP. For JFK, it seemed rather rushed. I think LBJ took the post thinking it will give him a chance to run for president and advise JFK on Congress. We know this did not happen, which is a real shame.

Michael wrote: "Part of my background is an MA in Leadership and Management. Holly mentions that she has an: "impression of Reagan that he was more of a figure-head, with his advisors running the show, using him ..."

I agree, Michael, I am interested to see how Reagan comes out of this book. Part of the problem is that Reagan was a hard man to know, even for his wife and close friends like Mike Deaver and Ed Meese.

Reagan is pretty polarizing: you either love him or hate him. He is a buffoon or a brilliant leader. Well, I think there is a middle ground. Reagan was not book smart, a policy wonk, but he was smart in politics and had great instincts. He had a vision of government and did not waiver from that. When he had great advisors around him, he made an impact. On the flip side, he made mistakes.

LBJ is also a great person to study, too. Anyway, it will be interesting to see what Darman does here.

Hello everyone, and thank you for the really interesting observations and comments so far. Seems like it will be a great discussion!

My name is Ulla and I am a social anthropologist from Denmark. Outside Denmark, I have also studied in Germany, Norway and the UK (my MA) and I have lived a substantial part of my life in South Asia. I have a daughter aged 11.

I am not usually a reader of political biographies (a lack I know) but have always followed politics, including American elections and politics, closely ... even if from afar (Europe that is).

The reason that I because interested in 'Landslide' is that, by portraying the presidencies of Lyndon B. Johnson and Ronald Reagan, it seeks to explore the 'dismantling of the American tradition of consensus politics' and the creation of a 'new era of fracture', as well as the emergence of the big vs. small government debate in America.

I hope this will give me a better understanding of some of the issues I do NOT understand when following American politics from abroad ... mostly the rhetoric of the more conservative parts of the Republican Party, Tea party, etc..

I guess that what is hard for me to really grasp is the deep split / hostility between the two big American political parties and the extent to which it can paralyse political decision-making, the anti-government rhetoric, etc..

Then again, mine is a country defined by consensus politics to a large extent and where no matter their political standpoint, almost all political parties are united behind a strong government and the welfare state ... as well as consensus politics. The political debate is about political decisions and policies ... the form of government and not government per se.

(Perhaps this is the reason why many Americans have termed the Scandinavian countries 'socialist', no matter how conservative the government at the time????)

Reading the introduction to the book made me think that reading it I would understand a little more :)

I have thoroughly enjoyed the introduction + first chapter. It is wonderfully written and really brings the two presidents and political / historical events to life. It is hard to put down.

Probably I will be asking more questions than making intelligent comments in this discussion, but I look forward to following the debate closely ... on top of enjoying this well-written book.

Bentley wrote: "Teri wrote: "Hi! I am a lover of history and genealogy and enjoy finding out what makes people tick. My day to day work is in the technology sector, but when I'm not working I'm in the garden or ..."

Bentley wrote: "Matthew wrote: "I am 41, a high English and Social Studies teacher, and recently a practicing attorney for 14 years. I did not sign up for the free book, because I didn't want all the responsibili..."

Bentley, thank you so much for making Kennedy's position clear in relation to Reagan and LB Johnson ... very interesting to read.

Hi, I'm Francie. I'm a court reporter and a proud military brat. I'm happy to be involved in this book read. In 1964, while campaigning against Goldwater, Johnson landed at the Air Force Base my father was stationed at, and my fourth grade class was lucky enough to go to the flight line and greet him. This was my first real encounter into the election of a president, and I thought Johnson was larger than life. Also, on the civil rights topic, I was in my first year of high school in Montgomery, Alabama, when all the schools were first desegregated. I look forward to all the discussions. I'd like to thank Bentley for this great opportunity.

Ulla - it seems to me, half-blind though I am, that Darman's framework - a thousand day period from which two conflicting visions of America emerged - actually is a dynamic very much a part of America's DNA.

The dynamic tension between visions based on a centralized community, or a society that emphasizes individual freedoms, can be traced back to Jamestown, when the individualized approach almost led to starvation until Captain John Smith laid down the law: if you don't work, you don't eat.

A little later, up north, on Plymouth rock, there were requirements, including education, to be members of the community.

When the former colonists got around to writing and ratifying a constitution, one of the sales pitches authored by James Madison in a federalist paper emphasized sacrificing some freedoms to be part of a national government that would address the inefficiencies of a confederation.

And, of course, FDR recognized that to address the ravages of an under regulated marketplace, a strong federal government was required.

It seems to the half-blind here that the visions manifested in Darman's Johnson and Reagan are expressions of the dynamic that is a key characteristic of this country, especially in contrast to Europe, or even Asia, where central governments are more widely accepted than in the good ol' U.S.ofA.

That dynamic is a part of our DNA.

That said, so is pragmatism. And you'll notice that one of our political parties recognizes that the federal government is the entity with the resources to deliver solutions to a large and complex nation. For all of Reagan's blather about the need for a smaller government, it's important to keep in mind that the federal government expanded substantially during his administration. So, it's not as if we have a real choice.

The choice is really in which story we wish to believe.

Michael wrote: "Part of my background is an MA in Leadership and Management. Holly mentions that she has an: "impression of Reagan that he was more of a figure-head, with his advisors running the show, using him ..."

I agree with your comments re: Reagan as a figurehead. The most important strength of any leader is to surround him/herself with strong staffers and advisers.
The man "out front" has to have the ability to reach the people through his personality and style. As in most jobs, it is the people behind the scenes who set the agenda and for the most part, carry it out. Reagan was the face of the presidency but not the brains As you note, one man can't do it all and needs the help of learned staff. Unfortunately, that can backfire as in the case of Warren Harding.

Jill wrote: "Michael wrote: "Part of my background is an MA in Leadership and Management. Holly mentions that she has an: "impression of Reagan that he was more of a figure-head, with his advisors running the ..."

I think part of the tragedy of Johnson and Vietnam was that he listened to JFK's advisors and was unwilling, for various reasons, to buck them.

If I recall, Doris Kearns (Goodwin) got at some of this in her book

by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Which advisers were those, Peter?

Martin wrote: "Which advisers were those, Peter?"

McGeorge Bundy, John Foster Dulles, Dean Acheson, Robert McNamara, the whole "best and the brightest" group.

Ok. Now I see where you're coming from. The interesting gap in that recounting is what emissary Maxwell Taylor - on his way back from Vietnam to report to Kennedy on the feasibility of committing military support to South Vietnam when Kennedy was assassinated - would have advised. The Best and the Brightest, assuming I remember correctly, doesn't touch upon that.

Does anyone know anything about Taylor's findings?

It's my understanding that prior to that assignment he advised Kennedy to commit 8,000 troops to Vietnam. Kennedy was opposed to getting into Vietnam at the time.

by David Halberstam

Ulla wrote: "Hello everyone, and thank you for the really interesting observations and comments so far. Seems like it will be a great discussion!

My name is Ulla and I am a social anthropologist from Denmark. ..."

Hi Ulla

I would like to comment on your remarks, not withstanding Martin in his msg 66.

I have lived all my life within 100 miles of Manhattan but have a German wife and some of my best friends are European and I worked for some 20+ years for a Luxembourg based firm active in many nations.

Denmark is a country with about 5 million people as I recall. The other European countries you mention have maybe a maximum of 80 million in the combined Germany. So I believe that to have a national attitude that you are in in together so to say to socialistically or progressively if you wish is easier to accomplish than in a country of 300 million. (Maybe we got closest during the depression and likely that contributed to the success that FDR could have with his progressive legislation during that period.

Also in most western European countries, until the last couple of decades, populations were more uniform in terms of cultures, heritages and races. And you had fewer immigrants, as a percentage of overall population, that the States.

Also I think going through WW II solidified the unity of the people to know they were all in it together. I would assume there is not much of a greater possible equalizer than sitting together in a shelter during an air raid for a banker and a laborer. This was much of Western Europe - both sides of the conflict by the end.

And a further emphasis would be that since the end of our Civil War in 1865 no American civilian on American soil has died in a war (I am pretty sure)

The US has also had through our history more opprotunity to succeed - especially through the first half of the last century - as one could always go west to less densely populated areas so Americans often feel they can do it on their own. (I don't really agree as they depend upon the security provided by the overall country to succeed - national highways - etc etc.)

Anyway this is just to give you my perspective on some of why there are the big differences between the States and much of the countries you mentioned.

And I would say to Martin that I feel that "dynamic DNA" was able to develop by the expansive land we had. A Dane or German could not have kept moving west the way Abe Lincoln's family did. The opportunity was a critical catalyst for dynamism in America. I think.

Francie wrote: "Hi, I'm Francie. I'm a court reporter and a proud military brat. I'm happy to be involved in this book read. In 1964, while campaigning against Goldwater, Johnson landed at the Air Force Base my..."

Welcome Francie, glad to have you with us. What a great opportunity to have met LBJ and thank you for your kind words.

Ulla wrote: "Bentley wrote: "Teri wrote: "Hi! I am a lover of history and genealogy and enjoy finding out what makes people tick. My day to day work is in the technology sector, but when I'm not working I'm i..."

You are welcome Ulla. Feel free to ask as many questions as you like.

Michael wrote: "Part of my background is an MA in Leadership and Management. Holly mentions that she has an: "impression of Reagan that he was more of a figure-head, with his advisors running the show, using him ..."

Very well put Michael

Holly wrote: "Hi, I am Holly. I am a violinist and a teacher. I feel lucky to be in this group of folks with such a wide variety of backgrounds, sharing impressions of this reading. I have never participated in ..."


Holly thank for your initial impressions and welcome.

Peter wrote: "Martin wrote: "Which advisers were those, Peter?"

McGeorge Bundy, John Foster Dulles, Dean Acheson, Robert McNamara, the whole "best and the brightest" group."

In the case of McNamara I wonder how different the Vietnam situation may have played out had he been replaced in the transition from JFK to LBJ?

McNamara was a smart man but was misguided about the war.

Here is an article which is interesting:

July 7, 2009
Robert S. McNamara, Architect of a Futile War, Dies at 93

By TIM WEINER
Robert S. McNamara, the forceful and cerebral defense secretary who helped lead the nation into the maelstrom of Vietnam and spent the rest of his life wrestling with the war’s moral consequences, died Monday at his home in Washington. He was 93.

His wife, Diana, said Mr. McNamara died in his sleep at 5:30 a.m., adding that he had been in failing health for some time.

Mr. McNamara was the most influential defense secretary of the 20th century. Serving Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson from 1961 to 1968, he oversaw hundreds of military missions, thousands of nuclear weapons and billions of dollars in military spending and foreign arms sales. He also enlarged the defense secretary’s role, handling foreign diplomacy and the dispatch of troops to enforce civil rights in the South.

“He’s like a jackhammer,” Johnson said. “No human being can take what he takes. He drives too hard. He is too perfect.”

As early as April 1964, Senator Wayne Morse, Democrat of Oregon, called Vietnam “McNamara’s War.” Mr. McNamara did not object. “I am pleased to be identified with it,” he said, “and do whatever I can to win it.”

Half a million American soldiers went to war on his watch. More than 16,000 died; 42,000 more would fall in the seven years to come.

The war became his personal nightmare. Nothing he did, none of the tools at his command — the power of American weapons, the forces of technology and logic, or the strength of American soldiers — could stop the armies of North Vietnam and their South Vietnamese allies, the Vietcong. He concluded well before leaving the Pentagon that the war was futile, but he did not share that insight with the public until late in life.

In 1995, he took a stand against his own conduct of the war, confessing in a memoir that it was “wrong, terribly wrong.” In return, he faced a firestorm of scorn.

“Mr. McNamara must not escape the lasting moral condemnation of his countrymen,” The New York Times said in a widely discussed editorial, written by the page’s editor at the time, Howell Raines. “Surely he must in every quiet and prosperous moment hear the ceaseless whispers of those poor boys in the infantry, dying in the tall grass, platoon by platoon, for no purpose. What he took from them cannot be repaid by prime-time apology and stale tears, three decades late.”

By then he wore the expression of a haunted man. He could be seen in the streets of Washington — stooped, his shirttail flapping in the wind — walking to and from his office a few blocks from the White House, wearing frayed running shoes and a thousand-yard stare.

He had spent decades thinking through the lessons of the war. The greatest of these was to know one’s enemy — and to “empathize with him,” as Mr. McNamara explained in Errol Morris’s 2003 documentary, “The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara.”

“We must try to put ourselves inside their skin and look at us through their eyes,” he said. The American failure in Vietnam, he said, was seeing the enemy through the prism of the cold war, as a domino that would topple the nations of Asia if it fell.

In the film, Mr. McNamara described the American firebombing of Japan’s cities in World War II. He had played a supporting role in those attacks, running statistical analysis for Gen. Curtis E. LeMay of the Army’s Air Forces.

“We burned to death 100,000 Japanese civilians in Tokyo — men, women and children,” Mr. McNamara recalled; some 900,000 Japanese civilians died in all. “LeMay said, ‘If we’d lost the war, we’d all have been prosecuted as war criminals.’ And I think he’s right. He — and I’d say I — were behaving as war criminals.”

“What makes it immoral if you lose and not immoral if you win?” he asked. He found the question impossible to answer.

From Detroit to Washington

The idea of the United States’ losing a war seemed impossible when Mr. McNamara came to the Pentagon in January 1961 as the nation’s eighth defense secretary. He was 44 and had been named president of the Ford Motor Company only 10 weeks before. He later said, half-seriously, that he could barely tell a nuclear warhead from a station wagon when he arrived in Washington.

“Mr. President, it’s absurd; I’m not qualified,” he remembered protesting when asked to serve. He said that Kennedy had replied, “Look, Bob, I don’t think there’s any school for presidents, either.”

Kennedy called him the smartest man he had ever met. Mr. McNamara looked steely-eyed and supremely rational behind his wire-rimmed glasses, his brown hair slicked back precisely and crisply parted on top. Mr. McNamara had risen by his mastery of systems analysis, the business of making sense of large organizations — taking on a big problem, studying every facet, finding simplicity in the complexity.

His first mission was to defuse the myth of the missile gap. Kennedy had argued in his 1960 presidential campaign that the strategic nuclear arsenal of the United States was less powerful than the Soviet Union’s, and that the gap was growing. His predecessor as president, Dwight D. Eisenhower, called the missile gap a fiction in his final State of the Union address, on Jan. 12, 1961.

Mr. McNamara took office nine days later. He recalled that “my first responsibility as secretary of defense was to determine the degree of the gap and initiate action to close it.”

“It took us about three weeks to determine, yes, there was a gap,” he told an oral historian at his alma mater, the University of California, Berkeley. “But the gap was in our favor. It was a totally erroneous charge that Eisenhower had allowed the Soviets to develop a superior missile force.”

The problem was a lack of accurate intelligence; the estimate of Soviet forces had been a product of politics and guesswork.

By year’s end, new American spy satellites had determined that the Soviets had as few as 10 launchers from which missiles could be fired at the United States, while the United States could strike with more than 3,200 nuclear weapons.

At the same time, Mr. McNamara was enmeshed in plans for the Bay of Pigs invasion, in which some 1,500 Cubans, trained and equipped by the Central Intelligence Agency, were badly defeated by Fidel Castro’s forces in a bloody battle in April 1961. Mr. McNamara doubted that the C.I.A.’s Cubans could overthrow Mr. Castro, who had taken power in 1959, but he asked few questions beforehand and gave his go-ahead to the plan, which had been conceived under the Eisenhower administration.

Kennedy’s first order to Mr. McNamara after the invasion of Cuba collapsed was to develop a proposal for overthrowing the Castro government with American military force. Ten days later, he submitted a plan of attack that included 60,000 American troops, excluding naval and air forces. The plan proved impossible to fulfill.

One lesson of the Bay of Pigs, Mr. McNamara told the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was that “the government should never start anything unless it could be finished, or the government was willing to face the consequences of failure,” according to the State Department’s official record of American foreign policy, “The Foreign Relations of the United States.”

At a White House meeting on Nov. 3, 1961, Kennedy authorized a program designed to undermine the Castro government, code-named Operation Mongoose. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy’s handwritten notes on the meeting say Mr. McNamara was assigned to survey the situation and help him devise ways “to stir things up on island with espionage, sabotage, general disorder.” This operation also failed.

By 1962, the White House and the Pentagon had devised a new strategy of counterinsurgency to combat what Mr. McNamara called the tactics of “terror, extortion and assassination” by communist guerrillas. The call led to the creation of American special forces like the Green Berets and secret paramilitary operations throughout Asia and Latin America.

“Counterinsurgency became an almost ridiculous battle cry,” said Robert Amory, who in 1962 stepped down after nine years as the C.I.A.’s deputy director of intelligence to become the White House budget officer for classified programs.

While the United States flailed at Cuba, the Soviet Union decided, in the words of its leader, Nikita S. Khrushchev, “to throw a hedgehog at Uncle Sam’s pants.” It began sending nuclear missiles to Cuba, establishing a direct threat that evened up the balance of power with the United States, which had placed its own missiles near the Soviet border in Turkey.

At the height of the missile crisis, on Oct. 27, 1962, the Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended that Cuba be invaded within 36 hours. As the secret White House taping system installed by Kennedy recorded his words, Mr. McNamara laid out the prospects for war.

“The military plan is basically invasion,” he said. “When we attack Cuba, we are going to have to attack with an all-out attack.”

He continued, “The Soviet Union may, and, I think, probably will, attack the Turkish missiles.” The United States would then have to attack Soviet ships or bases in the Black Sea, he said. The chances of an uncontrolled escalation were high.

“And I would say that it is damn dangerous,” he said. “Now, I’m not sure we can avoid anything like that if we attack Cuba. But I think we should make every effort to avoid it. And one way to avoid it is to defuse the Turkish missiles before we attack Cuba.”

That idea — a secret deal in which Kennedy offered to withdraw his missiles in Turkey if Khrushchev removed his warheads from Cuba — resolved the crisis. “In the end, we lucked out — it was luck that prevented nuclear war,” Mr. McNamara said in “The Fog of War,” 40 years after the fact.

Mr. McNamara spent countless hours as secretary of defense trying to fine-tune American plans for nuclear war, turning what had been a hair-trigger, all-or-nothing strategy into a series of more limited options. The underlying principle of nuclear deterrence became known as “mutual assured destruction” — meaning that Washington and Moscow each knew it could destroy the other even if the other struck first.

In retirement, Mr. McNamara argued that planning for nuclear war was futile. “Nuclear weapons serve no military purposes whatsoever,” he wrote. “They are totally useless — except only to deter one’s opponent from using them.”

He had come close to that conclusion after the Cuban missile crisis. “In wars prior to the advent of nuclear weapons, damage was reparable and victory attainable,” Mr. McNamara said on Dec. 14, 1962, in a speech to NATO foreign ministers in Paris. “But after a full nuclear exchange such as the Soviet bloc and the NATO alliance are now able to carry out, the fatalities might well exceed 150 million.”

“The devastation would be complete and victory a meaningless term,” he said.

Remaking the Pentagon

“This place is a jungle, a jungle,” Mr. McNamara said after a few weeks at his desk at the Pentagon. He sent teams of bright young civilians — the whiz kids, as they were known — out across the Pentagon to tame it.

They set out to make sense of a cacophony of war strategies, weapons systems and budgets among the Army, the Navy and the Air Force. The office of the secretary of defense had been established in 1947 for precisely that purpose, but the task had defeated everyone who held the job before Mr. McNamara. He applied the tools of systems analysis and succeeded in clearing some swaths through the jungle. But he alienated key members of Congress and military commanders in battles over choosing weapons and closing bases.

Continued:

The Pentagon consumed nearly half the national budget when he took office. He had 3.5 million employees — including 2.5 million in uniform, a number that increased by a million during his tenure. He said his goal was “to bring efficiency to a $40 billion enterprise beset by jealousies and political pressures.”

Under Mr. McNamara, the Pentagon’s budget increased to $74.9 billion in fiscal 1968, from $48.4 billion in 1962. The 1968 figure is equal to $457 billion in today’s dollars.

That was largely the cost of the war that erupted in Southeast Asia.

“Every quantitative measurement we have shows we are winning this war,” Mr. McNamara said after returning from his first trip to South Vietnam in April 1962. His statistical analysis showed that the military mission could be wrapped up in three or four years.

After Kennedy was assassinated on Nov. 22, 1963, Mr. McNamara found that Johnson depended on him to win the war, which became a full-fledged conflict for the United States the following year. The new president thought so highly of Mr. McNamara that he asked him to be his running mate in 1964.

“I said no,” Mr. McNamara recounted in his Berkeley oral history. “You shouldn’t start your elective career running for the vice presidency.” (Johnson chose Senator Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota.)

Johnson relied on Mr. McNamara in other sensitive matters, including negotiations over weapons sales to Israel and the full racial integration of the armed services, the reserves and the National Guard after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. When Johnson, early in his presidency, announced he wanted to keep the federal budget below $100 billion, Mr. McNamara ordered weapons programs canceled and military bases closed in a matter of days.

But by the fall of 1964, Vietnam was the all-consuming obsession.

Congress authorized the war after Johnson contended that American warships had been attacked by North Vietnamese patrol boats in the Gulf of Tonkin on Aug. 4, 1964. The attack never happened, as a report declassified by the National Security Agency in 2005 made clear. The American ships had been firing at radar shadows on a dark night.

At the time, however, the agency’s experts in signals intelligence, or sigint, told Mr. McNamara that the evidence of an attack was iron-clad. “McNamara had taken over raw sigint and shown the president what they thought was evidence,” said Ray Cline, then the C.I.A.’s deputy director of intelligence. He added, “It was just what Johnson was looking for.”

Nor was this the only case of faulty intelligence underlying American military action under Mr. McNamara. In April 1965, Johnson ordered 24,000 American troops to the Dominican Republic after a revolt against the government; it was the first large-scale American landing in Latin America since 1928.

In public, Mr. McNamara said the deployment had showed the “readiness and capabilities of the U.S. defense establishment to support our foreign policy.” In private, he voiced dismay. The C.I.A. had told the White House and the Pentagon that the rebels were controlled by Cuban revolutionaries. But Mr. McNamara had deep doubts.

“You don’t think C.I.A. can document it?” Johnson asked him, according to tapes of White House telephone conversations recorded on April 30, 1965.

“I don’t think so, Mr. President,” McNamara replied. “I just don’t believe the story.”

Johnson nonetheless insisted in a speech to the American people that he would not allow “Communist conspirators” to establish “another Communist government in the Western Hemisphere.” This led some newspapers to assert that the president and the Pentagon had a “credibility gap.” The phrase stuck when applied to Vietnam.

Turning on Vietnam

In 1965, tens of thousands of American combat troops were arriving in Vietnam and American warplanes were pounding the enemy in a bombing campaign code-named Rolling Thunder, which sent 55,000 flights with 33,000 tons of bombs over North Vietnam; the next year, it was 148,000 flights with 128,000 tons. The number of aircraft lost went from 171 in 1965 to 318 the next year; the costs soared to $1.2 billion, from $460 million.

Rolling Thunder never stopped the flow of enemy arms and soldiers into South Vietnam.

When Mr. McNamara held a rare private briefing for reporters in Honolulu in February 1966, he no longer possessed the radiant confidence he had always displayed in public. Mr. McNamara said with conviction, “No amount of bombing can end the war.”

By 1966, Mr. McNamara was planning to build an electronic barrier across the demilitarized zone that separated North and South Vietnam. Soldiers called it the McNamara Line, after the Maginot Line, a futile French defense against Germany built before World War II. The barrier proved to be worthless.

On Aug. 26, 1966, Mr. McNamara read a book-length C.I.A. study called “The Vietnamese Communists’ Will to Persist,” which concluded that nothing the United States was doing could defeat the enemy. He called in a C.I.A. analyst, George Allen, who had spent 17 years working on the question of Vietnam.

“He wanted to know what I would do if I were sitting in his place,” Mr. Allen wrote in his 2001 memoir of Vietnam, “None So Blind.” “I decided to respond candidly.”

“Stop the buildup of American forces,” he said he told Mr. McNamara. “Halt the bombing of the North, and negotiate a cease-fire with Hanoi.”

After that moment of truth, Mr. McNamara told his aides to begin compiling a top-secret history of the war — later known as the Pentagon Papers — and he began asking himself what the United States was doing in Vietnam. Many Americans were asking the same, giving rise to a growing antiwar movement that even Mr. McNamara’s own son participated in as a student protester at Stanford.

On Sept. 19, 1966, Mr. McNamara telephoned Johnson.

“I myself am more and more convinced that we ought definitely to plan on termination of bombing in the North,” Mr. McNamara said, according to White House tapes.

He also suggested establishing a ceiling on the number of troops to be sent to Vietnam. “I don’t think we ought to just look ahead to the future and say we’re going to go higher and higher and higher and higher — 600,000; 700,000; whatever it takes.”

The president’s only response was an unintelligible grunt.

Departure and Guilt

The turning point came on May 19, 1967, when Mr. McNamara sent a long and carefully argued paper to Johnson, urging him to negotiate a peace rather than escalate the war.

The war, the paper began, “is becoming increasingly unpopular as it escalates — causing more American casualties, more fear of its growing into a wider war, more privation of the domestic sector, and more distress at the amount of suffering being visited on the noncombatants in Vietnam, South and North.”

“Most Americans,” Mr. McNamara continued, “are convinced that somehow we should not have gotten this deeply in. All want the war ended and expect their president to end it. Successfully. Or else.”

That was the last straw for Johnson, who came to believe that Mr. McNamara was secretly plotting to help Robert Kennedy, then a Democratic senator from New York, run on a peace ticket in the 1968 election. The president announced on Nov. 29, 1967, that Mr. McNamara would give up his defense post to run the World Bank. Mr. McNamara left the Pentagon two months later, never comprehending, in his words, “whether I quit or was fired.” It was clearly the latter.

Mr. McNamara had sought to transform the armed services. But his often aloof and occasionally arrogant conduct left him with few allies inside the Pentagon when the war began to go wrong. At a going-away luncheon given by Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Mr. McNamara wept as he spoke of the futility of the air war in Vietnam. Many of his colleagues were appalled as he condemned the bombing, aghast at the weight of his guilt.

He had thought for a long time that the United States could not win the war. In retirement, he listed reasons: a failure to understand the enemy, a failure to see the limits of high-tech weapons, a failure to tell the truth to the American people and a failure to grasp the nature of the threat of communism.

“What went wrong was a basic misunderstanding or misevaluation of the threat to our security represented by the North Vietnamese,” he said in his Berkeley oral history. “It led President Eisenhower in 1954 to say that if Vietnam were lost, or if Laos and Vietnam were lost, the dominoes would fall.”

He continued, “I am certain we exaggerated the threat.”

“We didn’t know our opposition,” he said. “We didn’t understand the Chinese; we didn’t understand the Vietnamese, particularly the North Vietnamese. So the first lesson is know your opponents. I want to suggest to you that we don’t know our potential opponents today.”

An Analytical Mind

Robert Strange McNamara — Strange was his mother’s maiden name — was born June 9, 1916, in San Francisco to Robert and Clara Nell McNamara. His father, the son of Irish immigrants, managed a wholesale shoe company.

“My earliest memory is of a city exploding with joy,” he said in “The Fog of War.” It was Nov. 11, 1918 — the end of World War I. He remembered the tops of the streetcars crowded with people cheering and kissing.

In 1937, Mr. McNamara graduated with honors in economics from the University of California, Berkeley, where he also studied philosophy. After two years at Harvard Business School, he spent a year with Price, Waterhouse & Company, the accounting firm. He returned to Harvard in 1940 as an assistant professor of business administration.

That year, he married his college sweetheart, Margaret Craig. She created Reading Is Fundamental, a literacy program for poor children, while he was at the Pentagon. By the time she died in 1981, the program served three million children.

Mr. McNamara and his second wife, the former Diana Masieri Byfield, were married in 2004 in San Francisco.

Besides his wife, Mr. McNamara is survived by his son, Robert Craig, of Winters, Calif.; two daughters, Margaret Elizabeth Pastor and Kathleen McNamara, both of Washington, and six grandchildren.

When World War II came, Mr. McNamara taught young air officers the statistical methods he had learned at Harvard, with the aim of orchestrating the air war in Europe by determining how many planes could fly each day in every theater. He served in England, then India, and held the rank of lieutenant colonel at war’s end in 1945.

“After the war, my wife and I both came down with polio, if you can imagine, infantile paralysis,” Mr. McNamara remembered in his memoir. “My case was relatively light; I was out of the hospital in a couple of months. But she was in the hospital for nine months, and they thought she’d never lift an arm or a leg off the bed again.”

Unable to pay the hospital bills on a Harvard salary, he accepted a job offer from the Ford Motor Company.

He and nine other air-war statisticians, none older than 30, were hired by Henry Ford II to reorganize a mismanaged company.

“He wanted some individuals who he could feel were his men, if you will, because the company was staffed with old-line executives who had been associated with his father and grandfather,” Mr. McNamara recalled.

The company lost $85 million in the first eight months after Mr. McNamara’s arrival, the equivalent of about $925 million adjusted for inflation today. But Mr. McNamara and his young team turned Ford around. He rose swiftly — comptroller, general manager of the Ford division, vice president for all car and truck divisions.

In November 1960, one day after Kennedy’s election, Mr. McNamara was named president of the company, the No. 2 position under Mr. Ford, who was chairman and chief executive. Five weeks later, Kennedy asked him to run the Pentagon.

Continued:

The World Bank Years

Mr. McNamara’s time at the Pentagon came close to breaking his spirit. But he immediately followed that ordeal with 13 years as president of the World Bank. He set out to expand the bank’s power and to attack global poverty. He succeeded in part, but with unintended consequences.

The industrialized nations created the bank at the end of World War II to help rebuild Western Europe, but it later expanded its membership and shifted its focus to lending in the third world to increase economic growth and forestall war. In 1973 Mr. McNamara dedicated himself to the reduction of what he called “absolute poverty — utter degradation” in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

As he had done at the Pentagon and Ford, Mr. McNamara sought to remake the bank. When he arrived on April 1, 1968, the bank was lending about $1 billion a year. That figure grew until it stood at $12 billion when he left in 1981. By that time the bank oversaw some 1,600 projects valued at $100 billion in 100 nations, including hydroelectric dams, superhighways and steel factories.

The ecological effects of these developments, however, had not been taken into account. In some cases, corruption in the governments that the bank sought to help undid its good intentions. Many poor nations, overwhelmed by their debts to the bank, were not able to repay loans.

The costs of Mr. McNamara’s work thus sometimes outweighed the benefits, and that led to a concerted political attack on the bank itself during the 1980s.

Mr. McNamara saw some of these problems as they developed and shifted the emphasis of the bank’s lending toward smaller projects — irrigation, seeds and fertilizer, paving farm-to-market roads. But progress was often hard to measure. At the end of his tenure, the bank estimated that the world’s poorest numbered 800 million, an increase of 200 million over the decade.

Public Contrition

Mr. McNamara left the bank when he turned 65, after his wife died, and for a time he tried to unwind and get away, taking a 140-mile hike up to the 18,000-foot level of Mount Everest. But within two years, he began to speak out against the nuclear arms race. In 1995, 14 years after leaving public life, he published his denunciation of the Vietnam War and his role in it, “In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam” (Times Books/Random House), for which he was denounced in turn.

Unlike any other secretary of defense, Mr. McNamara struggled in public with the morality of war and the uses of American power.

“We are the strongest nation in the world today,” Mr. McNamara said in “The Fog of War,” released at the time of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. “I do not believe that we should ever apply that economic, political, and military power unilaterally. If we had followed that rule in Vietnam, we wouldn’t have been there. None of our allies supported us. Not Japan, not Germany, not Britain or France. If we can’t persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we’d better re-examine our reasoning.”

“War is so complex it’s beyond the ability of the human mind to comprehend,” he concluded. “Our judgment, our understanding, are not adequate. And we kill people unnecessarily.”


Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/07/us/...

The Prologue begins with a quote:

"There is but one way to get the cattle out of the swamp. And that is for the man on the horse to take the lead."
-- Lyndon Johnson

Discussion Question:

What did you think of the analogy that after Kennedy's death that the American people were like a bunch of cattle caught in the swamp?

How many of our members remember the time period of Kennedy's assassination and the aftermath? Where were you and how old were you when you first heard the news? Many folks remember vividly what they were doing when they first heard the news. It was extremely traumatic for the country. Does anybody remember JFK personally and what were their impressions of him, of his young family and how they made the country feel? It would be interesting to travel back to that time period and discuss the atmosphere of the country when this event happened because that is the event that catapulted Lyndon Baines Johnson to the presidency.

Hello! I am 41, married with two children, and work in the insurance industry. I have always been very interested in both history and politics, even at the young age of 7 when Reagan was first elected. I was particularly interested in this book because LBJ and Reagan represent the worst and best of presidents, in my opinion. I have always seen LBJ as a bully and a usurper that got his comeuppance with Vietnam. Reagan, by contrast, I always saw as a president underestimated, misunderstood, and vilified unfairly, but one that history is bearing out to be vastly correct on the big issues of the age.

I saw the Prologue and Chapter One as a major dichotomy for LBJ. The Prologue painted the picture of him that I have always assumed to be closest to the truth: the arrogant bully who was power-hungry to the point of bloodthirst. Chapter One, however, almost made me feel bad for the man, especially the way he was shunned and battered for only doing what the Constitution, of all things, required of him. It left me with the impression that he was thrust into something that he always *thought* he was ready for, but in reality, probably was ill-equipped for. As he came to see in those first few days after Dallas, you cannot browbeat everyone to your will.

I'm looking forward to continuing this read. It will be interesting to see if the book makes me rethink any of my positions on Reagan as it has LBJ.

Al welcome and thank you for your introduction. I think a great many of us are looking forward to reading this book so that we can re-evaluate some of our preconceived ideas about both men and see if we change our minds and hearts.

I appreciated your input so far and I can see that you have thought a great deal about the beginning of this book. As traumatic and grief stricken the Kennedy family happened to be - they really needed to allow the designated President into the Oval Office. It was really shocking to see how Lyndon Johnson was treated despite the Kennedy's grief and that this was allowed to happen.

The country needed to be protected and Kennedy's papers could certainly have been taken care of at the same time. Lyndon had a lot of warts - there was no doubt about it and he was arrogant but I have to agree with you that he endured a lot during this period of time and he was not treated well and it could have affected the country adversely. It is remarkable the things that the country did not know was going on - isn't it?

Bentley wrote: "Christopher wrote: "What I found interesting in the Prologue was the Political shift after LBJ won the Presidential election. I find that if one looks at the political shift today it parallels that..."

We should not judge a person at all. That is what I find so disheartening in politics today. What was the cause for the Democratic loss during LBJ's rain his progressive ideas. Though I myself am Conservative I do believe LBJ's heart was in the right place when he created the Great Society. I think he did a poor job trying to sell it to the nation. That is the same with Obama and the ACA so I see the parallels in the two different times.

An excerpt from Bentley's posted article:

"July 7, 2009
Robert S. McNamara, Architect of a Futile War, Dies at 93

By TIM WEINER

“He had thought for a long time that the United States could not win the war. In retirement, he listed reasons: a failure to understand the enemy, a failure to see the limits of high-tech weapons, a failure to tell the truth to the American people and a failure to grasp the nature of the threat of communism.”

...break...

“War is so complex it’s beyond the ability of the human mind to comprehend,” he concluded. “Our judgment, our understanding, are not adequate. And we kill people unnecessarily.”


Some things never change. Too bad we have still not learned from his "Eleven Lessons"

The idea that Kennedy appointed a corporate CEO to lead the Pentagon, makes me wonder how we ever find the trust we need to allow our presidents so much power.

I was in school when I found out about Kennedy's assassination. In the 2nd grade. My parents were visibly depressed, our home was quiet and solemn for days. It was unforgettable, even for a 7 year-old child. "A bunch of cattle in a swamp" is aprospos.

Bentley wrote: "The Prologue begins with a quote:

"There is but one way to get the cattle out of the swamp. And that is for the man on the horse to take the lead."
-- Lyndon Johnson

Discussion Question:

What did you think of the analogy that after Kennedy's death that the American people were like a bunch of cattle caught in the swamp?

LBJ was fond of this sort of crude imagery. However, from what I have read, it is fairly accurate. Pretty much all that I have read about the JFK assassination describes a nation in shock.

In addition, LBJ intended to lead on civil rights, a longer term swamp.



How many of our members remember the time period of Kennedy's assassination and the aftermath? Where were you and how old were you when you first heard the news?


My mother sometimes said she was the last person to hear about the assassination. I was in the hospital with croup and she was sitting beside me.

I was born in 1959 so I don't remember JFK at all but I do remember LBJ.

Martin wrote: "Ulla - it seems to me, half-blind though I am, that Darman's framework - a thousand day period from which two conflicting visions of America emerged - actually is a dynamic very much a part of Amer..."

Thank you so much, Martin. Very interesting reference to America's early history. I have decided to read up on US history over the next couple of years, starting with the American Independence War and thoughts behind it. I do get that part of the American DNA, I think ... :)

Interesting that the Federal government expanded during the Reagan years.

Vince wrote: "Ulla wrote: "Hello everyone, and thank you for the really interesting observations and comments so far. Seems like it will be a great discussion!

My name is Ulla and I am a social anthropologist f..."

Thank you so much, Vince! I totally agree that part of the reason for the differences between European countries and the US has to do with the homogeneity of it's populations, shared history and, YES, we are small! This does enable a strong government in MOST European countries, that few of us would question.

I think that part of my lack of understanding or recent American political debates have been more rhetorical ... such as equating government or Obama with 'socialism' (which in my mind equates Russia during the cold war or Cuba), just as Nordic countries are termed 'socialist' even at times when our governments saw themselves as closely aligned with the US ideologically and in foreign policy :-)

I think most were also surprised by the deep split that became visible during the Obama election.

Perhaps reading this book will bring me a little closer to understanding American politics. This year has seen several JFK documentaries in Danish television, and this book about LBJ and RR will be an interesting continuation.

Bentley wrote: "The Prologue begins with a quote:

"There is but one way to get the cattle out of the swamp. And that is for the man on the horse to take the lead."
-- Lyndon Johnson

Discussion Question:

What d..."

Thank you so much, Bentley, for the interesting article about Robert McNamara and other background information useful to reading the book.

My first remembered American presidents were Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. JFK is much remembered in this part of the world. Adoration with a high degree of mixed feeling concerning how frighteningly close we came to nuclear war during his presidency.

The metaphor of leading people like leading cattle is really telling. However, not only America but the entire world was in shock at the time, so LBJ was right in his assessment that strong leadership was necessary. I was shocked by how badly he was treated by the Kennedy administration as the national interest should be placed first. I look forward to the next chapters :)

Ulla - when you get US politics sorted out, please report back.

A couple of thoughts. The story on McNamara is excellent. However, it has a credibility gap of its own. Nowhere in it does it bring into its scope intelligence generated by the Department of State, which at the time was our preeminent intelligence operation, assuming intelligence is the production of actionable information.

And Kennedy did recognize the importance of State's work. For instance, early in his administration, Kennedy presented to his cabinet work from State predicting that the Soviets would militarily challenge the US in a third world nation; but if we stood our ground firmly the Soviets would back down.

This work, of course, was the anticipation of the Cuban missile crisis.

State's work was based on an analysis of internal political affairs of the Soviet's ruling body, the Politburo. (See McNamara's admonition upthread to know your enemy.)

State's analysts received citations for their work and worked round the clock at the White House for the duration of the Cuban missile crisis.

I'm not sure of the intimate details of what transpired on the Asian desk at State during the Vietnam war. I do know that a number of those on the Asian desk were frustrated that their work fell on stone ears. Johnson was president at the time.

Essentially, their frustration built up around the failure to recognize that in South Vietnam there was no there, there. This is brilliantly spelled out in Neil Sheehan's A Bright Shining Lie.

Other histories on the Vietnam War (The Best and the Brightest, especially) reflect the same finding.

I get the impression that LBJ was the wrong guy to be president during Vietnam. Darmman's book points to Johnson's inflexibility (p.26) in processing information in stark contrast to Kennedy's perspective of seeing the world as it was.

by Neil Sheehan

by David Halberstam

Bentley - not sure about the cattle in the swamp metaphor. My estimation is that it's probably a slight to cattle all around the world.

Martin wrote

I get the impression that LBJ was the wrong guy to be president during Vietnam. Darmman's book points to Johnson's inflexibility (p.26) in processing information in stark contrast to Kennedy's perspective of seeing the world as it was.

I think LBJ was the wrong guy for Vietnam and JFK was the wrong guy for civil rights.

Kennedy was much more used to the sort of atmosphere and analysis needed to judge what people were telling him about the war.

But no one (and certainly not Kennedy) was nearly as good at getting things through congress as LBJ.

Interesting, Peter. I think you're right.

Bentley, I was born after JFK, but my parents remember JFK well and the assassination.

I thought it was interesting how Darman talks about how the news was constant after the assassination.

He writes, "Every second of airtime across three networks belongs to the news divisions." (p. 6).

This moment probably was the first taste of the 24/7 news cycle we have today. Can you image if something like this happened today?!

Bryan wrote: "This moment probably was the first taste of the 24/7 news cycle we have today. Can you image if something like this happened today?!

Think of what was on TV on 9/11 and 9/12

Christopher wrote: "Bentley wrote: "Christopher wrote: "What I found interesting in the Prologue was the Political shift after LBJ won the Presidential election. I find that if one looks at the political shift today i..."

Interesting analogy Christopher - I think his heart was in the right place.

I am Mark, I am interested in politics, specifically political theory, and early american history. This is more modern than most of my historical interest, but i find the topic interesting. I haven't finished the first chapter yet, but I figured i would post my thoughts on the prologue.

My first thought reading the prologue was that it is very clear this author has a much different world view than I do. I will be honest, the way that he writes irritates me and it was difficult for me to get through the prologue. In short, I would not have finish reading the book or even the prologue if I had not received the book for free.

Some of what bothered me was resolved as a read, and I anticipate several more things will be as he as time to make and defend his arguments/statements.

One example is on page xx. "Then the thousand days began, America was still ruled by the same consensus politics that both parties had used to govern since the time of Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal. That consensus was optimistic intent..." I am not willing to take his word for this and expect good support as I read through the book. I am not well versed in this time period, but I am initially skeptical of the way he describes this and expect to be convinced, especially since this sets up to be a key portion of his argument.

Later in the page "But the consensus was also deeply realistic... by the end of the thousand days, the consensus was forever fractured and the tradition of realism and humility in mainstream politics was gone." This seems like a fantastic "grass is greener on the other side statement longing for a time of FDR again.

I fear there will be poor support for the argument and he will make it by painting the earlier period while wearing rose colored glasses, thus making the end appear to meet his argument.

Overall, the Prologue significantly raised my expectations for what the book needs to accomplish to be considered a good book.

Holly wrote: "An excerpt from Bentley's posted article:

"July 7, 2009
Robert S. McNamara, Architect of a Futile War, Dies at 93

By TIM WEINER

“He had thought for a long time that the United States could not ..."

We have to find trust in someone but the trust is so often misplaced that some find it hard to trust again which is what we must do - someone has to be president. And the office has to have the power to run the country - I guess that is why the founding fathers instituted checks and balances.

Peter wrote: "Bentley wrote: "The Prologue begins with a quote:

"There is but one way to get the cattle out of the swamp. And that is for the man on the horse to take the lead."
-- Lyndon Johnson

Discussion Q..."

It was a tough time Peter by all reports. Glad you recovered from the croup - I use to get that too.

Ulla wrote: "Vince wrote: "Ulla wrote: "Hello everyone, and thank you for the really interesting observations and comments so far. Seems like it will be a great discussion!

My name is Ulla and I am a social an..."

Ulla, Republicans use the word - "socialist" as a dirty word - akin to communism and the old Red scare. And of course socialism does not mean that at all in terms of European countries - the UK, etc.

Nor are social problems bad either - many folks depend upon Social Security and Medicare in this country.

I just answered a robocall with an automated voice message from Newt Gingrich at my poor elderly father's house and you should have heard the message - about the socialistic policies of the president and how he was reaching out to true conservatives like my elderly father.

I had a good smile while listening - it was pure propaganda. It is unfortunate that in the US the politicians want to use labels which are supposed to connote bad things when in fact "social programs" like Social Security and Medicare as well as some of the farm programs are not bad at all and have helped many many people in all social stratifications.

If we just stuck to the issues and the problems that needed to be solved - we would all be better off. I am not surprised you are confused by the rhetoric here in the US. It confuses us too but it is mainly political.

You are welcome Ulla about the article on McNamara. It was rather an obituary article written by Tim Weiner who has hosted some of his books here at the History Book Club.

Tim Weiner