Today is the 95th Birthday of President John F Kennedy. JFK was a kind and selfless leader every bit as great in substance as his strikingly good appearance and charming personality. Amongst his other achievements, JFK literally saved the world from devastation on no less than three occasions when he over-ruled the wishes of his military Joint Chiefs of staff to launch all-out nuclear war. Contrary to lies peddled by phony left wing intellectuals, he strived to end the Vietnam War, just as he had used his influence as a Senator in the 1950's to stop the French colonial war against Algeria.[1]
The world was enormously fortunate in the extraordinary turn of events, both lucky and unlucky, that enabled Kennedy to rise to power.
During the Second World War in spite of back injury that would have disqualified just about anyone else, Kennedy volunteered for military service. He became Commander of a Patrol Torpedo Boat, PT 109, in the Solomon Islands north of Australia during the Second World War. On 2 August 1943 PT 109 sank after being rammed by a Japanese destroyer. Two crew members were killed and two others badly injured. In spite of his injured back, Kennedy was able to pull one of the injured seamen to a nearby island. After the surviving crew were ashore, Kennedy swam back to where he hoped to draw the attention of passing US warships with a lamp in order to seek help in the middle of the night. He fell sleep at one stage and was lucky not to drown. The crew were eventually rescued.
Because Kennedy had shown such selfless heroism, the rise in his political fortunes were unstoppable after he launched his political career in the US House of Representatives upon his return in 1946. In 1961, after narrowly winning the 1960 Presidential election, he became the youngest US president ever to serve at the age of 43.
As president, he lived up to all the highest expectation that others had placed in him. Tragically, JFK's presidency ended with his murder on 22 November 1963. The conspiracy to murder him was covered up by the Warren Commission, set up to supposedly investigate his killing. Since then, the corporate as well as phony left and phony alternative newsmedia have upheld the lie that Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone assassin who murdered JFK. This lie was demolished by,
amongst things, Oliver Stone's movie JFK of 1991. However, the establishment gatekeepers have, so far, far been able to hold back the harm that would be done to vested interests by widespread public knowledge of the truth and significance of JFK.
Footnotes
[1] As examples see, from "A Savage War of Peace" of 1977 by Alistair
Horne:
Page 247 of in a section within Chapter 11 entitled "Support from Senator John F. Kennedy": "Then in July Abdelkader Chanderli's influential friend in the Democratic Party, Senator John F. Kennedy, rose to make an important pronouncement in the United States Senate. He challenged Eisenhower and Dulles 'to place the influence of the United States behind efforts ... to achieve a solution which will recognise the ndependent personality of Algeria and establish the basis for a settlement interdependent with France and the neighbouring nations.' He accused United States policy of representing 'a retreat from the principles of independence and anti-colonialism'; and, elsewhere, that it furnished powerful ammunition to anti-Western propagandists through Asia and the Middle East. No speech on foreign affairs by Senator Kennedy attracted more attention, both at home and abroad, and under such pressure United States official policy on Algeria began to shift. Henceforth, instead of backing France at the United Nations, the United States would abstain."
Page 417: "By November it was almost a positive relief to watch the struggle of young Senator Kennedy for the presidency of the United States; though even he had launched his campaign with some pointed remarks about the necessity for France to withdraw from Algeria."
Page 463: "Both at home and abroad the pressures had been mounting on de Gaulle to make peace. In the United States John F Kennedy, the avowed friend of Algerian Independence had become and was soon leaning heavily on de Gaulle."
As great as Hornes's historical works appears to be he, seemingly inexplicably, is former President George W. Bush's favorite historian.
Comments
Sheila Newman
Tue, 2012-05-29 13:24
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John Fitzgerald Kennedy
admin
Tue, 2012-05-29 21:08
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JFK had to work amidst the military-industrial complex
This is a response to a discussion on johnquiggin.com which began with a #comment-174356">post linking back to this article.
#comment-174357">@FB
the issues you raise are far too complex for me to fully respond to here (although you are welcome to discuss them on the page I linked to above). JFK had to work in the midst of the military-industrial complex against which his predecessor Dwight D Eisenhower warned in his departing speech of January 1961. This and other facts, put in "JFK and the unspeakable - Why he died and why it matters" of 2008 by James Douglass, explain why
Kennedy supported the Bay of Pigs invasion whilst absolutely refusing to provide any direct military assistance with warships near the Cuban coast at the time nor aircraft after a popular uprising against Castro did not result
from the establishment of the beachhead by the Cuban exiles.
I suggest you look at the speech to the American University given by JFK on 10 June 1963 at www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG2PwhT0TDc five months before his murder and ask yourself if the man who gave such a speech would have been capable of launching two illegal invasions of Iraq resulting in the deaths of
2 million Iraqis since 1991, the invasion of Libya in 2011 in which more than 50,000 Libyans died and the current destabilisation of Syria with terrorist proxies.
The post to which the above post is a response follows, - Ed;
#comment-174356">@Malthusista
Hmmm
1. Responsible for isolation of Cuba; numerous assassination plots against Castro, attempted disruption of Cuban economy through industrial and agricultural sabotage, swine flu etc ..
2. Responsible for October missile crisis through positioning of missiles in Turkey. Had the USSR not backed down, a nuclear exchange might have occurred
3. Responsible for support of Ngo Dinh Diem and then murderous coup against him in Vietnam; began escalation that led to Vietnam War
Like Obama, he was very intelligent, and on the surface, a genial fellow, but he was driven by exactly the same thing that all US imperialist leaders are driven by, and acted accordingly. Had he lived long enough, he’d not have acted much differently from LBJ.
The #comment-174356">post, to which the post immediately above is a response, follows, - Ed;
Sorry if this seems off-topic, but today happens to be JFK’s 95th birthday. Reading Alistair Horne’s “A savage war of Peace” of 1977 about the Algerian War of independence shows that in the 1950?s Senator Kennedy was an outspoken supporter of the Algerian Independence and was able to shift US policy from supporting French colonialism to neutrality even before he was elected to the office of President. Reading these excerpts show that it is not possible to exaggerate the good intentions and greatness of JFK. His example leaves to shame most of today’s warmongering world ‘leaders’.
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