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hard to say because those were different times....
LBJ was just as much a "womanizer" and even got jealous of JFK's gossip (they still had gossip)
i am under the impression most of the military wanted to bomb and or invade Cuba and Kennedy held out and according to Robert McNamara there were already operational missiles with warheads attached in Cuba which the joint chiefs did not know so Kennedy action or non-action prevented ww3 as well as a soviet submarine commander who refused to fire nuclear missiles after being depth-charged by our navy
i am under the impression most of the military wanted to bomb and or invade Cuba and Kennedy held out and according to Robert McNamara there were already operational missiles with warheads attached in Cuba which the joint chiefs did not know so Kennedy action or non-action prevented ww3 as well as a soviet submarine commander who refused to fire nuclear missiles after being depth-charged by our navy
most of the military? did they did a referendum and secretly voted to bomb and invade Cuba? LOL
a President has all options on the table and tells his advisors to prepare for all of them depending on current events and actions on the other side and all options need to be ready at any given moment. Yes, invading or bombing Cuba targets was one of the options if it came down to that but it wasn't the first.
I don't think invading Cuba or bombing Cuba would have started WW 3. We have bombed and invaded and occupied many countries a lot bigger than Cuba during the Cold War and it never started WW 3. It would have been another military conflict that we would find a peace solution with the Soviets if it happened. Nobody is going to start WW 3 and kill millions of people and turn the world and its economy upside down for an island like Cuba.
A President always tells his military advisors to prepare a plan for the worst scenario under a crisis and be ready at any given moment but he also has other options that he uses first. When you let the other side know that military option is on the table it helps to negotiate better the other options with a sense of priority.
most of the military? did they did a referendum and secretly voted to bomb and invade Cuba? LOL
a President has all options on the table and tells his advisors to prepare for all of them depending on current events and actions on the other side and all options need to be ready at any given moment. Yes, invading or bombing Cuba targets was one of the options if it came down to that but it wasn't the first.
I don't think invading Cuba or bombing Cuba would have started WW 3. We have bombed and invaded and occupied many countries a lot bigger than Cuba during the Cold War and it never started WW 3. It would have been another military conflict that we would find a peace solution with the Soviets if it happened. Nobody is going to start WW 3 and kill millions of people and turn the world and its economy upside down for an island like Cuba.
A President always tells his military advisors to prepare a plan for the worst scenario under a crisis and be ready at any given moment but he also has other options that he uses first. When you let the other side know that military option is on the table it helps to negotiate better the other options with a sense of priority.
of course i meant the heads of the military as in JCS but mainly Curtis leMay (who was quoted as saying a nuclear war with two Americans and one Russian would be a victory).....The point was they assumed atomic weapons were not operational but McNamara in a 1990's visited found out they did indeed have some operational atomic weapons..they were very concerned that a battlefield tactical weapon not needing Kremlin approval may be launched by a jittery officer in the field....the same with the submarine officer the submarines political commissar ordered a missile launch and the captain refused....
it is said Castro wanted missiles launch and the Kremlin refused.....McNamara said people have no idea how close we came...
within the cabinet there was some different opinion that came up with quarantine/blockade ...Kennedy is said to have wanted to get a consciousness..and gave the Blockade a certain deadline before bombing
which seams to have worked! lol
and the bombing was to be in retaliation for Cuba shooting down one of our fly-over camera/spy planes
of course i meant the heads of the military as in JCS but mainly Curtis leMay (who was quoted as saying a nuclear war with two Americans and one Russian would be a victory).....The point was they assumed atomic weapons were not operational but McNamara in a 1990's visited found out they did indeed have some operational atomic weapons..they were very concerned that a battlefield tactical weapon not needing Kremlin approval may be launched by a jittery officer in the field....the same with the submarine officer the submarines political commissar ordered a missile launch and the captain refused....
McNamara was always full of $hit and you always take with a grain of salt whatever came out of his mouth. You should read his lies and B.S. during the Vietnam war.
Quote:
Originally Posted by elvis44102
it is said Castro wanted missiles launch and the Kremlin refused.....McNamara said people have no idea how close we came...
explain to me why Castro wanted to commit suicide and have his little island destroyed? Fidel Castro was a smart man and he wasn't a crazy martyr. The missiles that Cuba had wouldn't destroy the United States or our war capability, so why would Castro missiles launch at the U.S. to get destroyed in return? and the Soviets weren't going to let a 3rd world dictator of a small island start WW 3 and have their country destroy because of Fidel Castro.
After the Invasion of the Bay of Pigs under JFK, you knew invading Cuba and bombing Cuba out of the map was his last resort. Under that Invasion, JFK refused to give air support to overthrow Fidel. That tells you everything you needed to know about JFK and what he thought of Cuba. JFK wasn't going to start WW 3 with the Soviets because Soviets had missiles pointed at us while the United States had missiles pointed at them from many countries very close to the Soviet Union....so JFK did what any President would have done, do a secret agreement to take the missiles out of Cuba and we would do the same thing in Turkey and Italy.....the rest was just drama.
in every conflict with a hostile country, there is always a military plan to take them out. We have one for Iran and North Korea right now but is only an option if everything else fails.
McNamara was always full of $hit and you always take with a grain of salt whatever came out of his mouth. You should read his lies and B.S. during the Vietnam war.
explain to me why Castro wanted to commit suicide and have his little island destroyed? Fidel Castro was a smart man and he wasn't a crazy martyr. The missiles that Cuba had wouldn't destroy the United States or our war capability, so why would Castro missiles launch at the U.S. to get destroyed in return? and the Soviets weren't going to let a 3rd world dictator of a small island start WW 3 and have their country destroy because of Fidel Castro.
After the Invasion of the Bay of Pigs under JFK, you knew invading Cuba and bombing Cuba out of the map was his last resort. Under that Invasion, JFK refused to give air support to overthrow Fidel. That tells you everything you needed to know about JFK and what he thought of Cuba. JFK wasn't going to start WW 3 with the Soviets because Soviets had missiles pointed at us while the United States had missiles pointed at them from many countries very close to the Soviet Union....so JFK did what any President would have done, do a secret agreement to take the missiles out of Cuba and we would do the same thing in Turkey and Italy.....the rest was just drama.
in every conflict with a hostile country, there is always a military plan to take them out. We have one for Iran and North Korea right now but is only an option if everything else fails.
i am not a fan of McNamara the Castro claim is from the documentary "Fog of War" and Johnson would have done well to replace McNamara..But then the missiles were always going to be in Soviet Control and Castro being the smart man that i agree he was as well was probably posturing..
But all these carefully laid plans of both sides disregard what Kennedy referred to as "some poor bastard who doesn't get the message"..
and it was the submarine captain virtually unknown to history who stopped what surely would have been an escalation of the Cuban missile crisis, when he countermanded the order to launch a ten kilo- ton nuclear torpedo given by the political officer onboard. (an example of not being totally in control)
i am not a fan of McNamara the Castro claim is from the documentary "Fog of War" and Johnson would have done well to replace McNamara..But then the missiles were always going to be in Soviet Control and Castro being the smart man that i agree he was as well was probably posturing..
But all these carefully laid plans of both sides disregard what Kennedy referred to as "some poor bastard who doesn't get the message"..
and it was the submarine captain virtually unknown to history who stopped what surely would have been an escalation of the Cuban missile crisis, when he countermanded the order to launch a ten kilo- ton nuclear torpedo given by the political officer onboard. (an example of not being totally in control)
I think the real risk was that had we invaded Cuba, the Soviet troops on their own would have decided to use the tactical nuclear weapons to defend themselves. Even very disciplined soldiers might not be able to refrain from use of such weapons under the full impact of a bombardment and invasion from American armed forces.
Its easy for me to believe when Castro told McNamara that he had demanded use of the nuclear weapons on the island that he was indeed posturing--as you put it. Castro was consistent in his hatred of the USA for his entire life. Even at the very end, he made public statements discouraging his brother Raul from becoming more friendly with America. I could see him telling McNamara that he had advocated for the use of those weapons when he had not.
The horror of a general nuclear war so great that I don't think chances should have been taken. Perhaps, Cuba could have been invaded and occupied without the war breaking out. However, it wasn't worth it to find out. If JFK did nothing else as President his avoiding war over Cuba was a sufficient act for me to consider him at the very least a decent president. Its this kind of thing that makes me laugh when someone wants to talk about his sexual exploits and suggest he was morally unfit to be president. Its simply unimportant compared to an achievement of the magnitude of peacefully resolving the Cuban Missile Crisis peacefully.
I think the real risk was that had we invaded Cuba, the Soviet troops on their own would have decided to use the tactical nuclear weapons to defend themselves. Even very disciplined soldiers might not be able to refrain from use of such weapons under the full impact of a bombardment and invasion from American armed forces.
Its easy for me to believe when Castro told McNamara that he had demanded use of the nuclear weapons on the island that he was indeed posturing--as you put it. Castro was consistent in his hatred of the USA for his entire life. Even at the very end, he made public statements discouraging his brother Raul from becoming more friendly with America. I could see him telling McNamara that he had advocated for the use of those weapons when he had not.
The horror of a general nuclear war so great that I don't think chances should have been taken. Perhaps, Cuba could have been invaded and occupied without the war breaking out. However, it wasn't worth it to find out. If JFK did nothing else as President his avoiding war over Cuba was a sufficient act for me to consider him at the very least a decent president. Its this kind of thing that makes me laugh when someone wants to talk about his sexual exploits and suggest he was morally unfit to be president. Its simply unimportant compared to an achievement of the magnitude of peacefully resolving the Cuban Missile Crisis peacefully.
with all due respect, JFK didn't do anything special or new that any other President wouldn't do. Every President since Truman all the way to Reagan has avoided direct nuclear war with the Soviets and China during the cold war.
You think Nixon if he would have won in 1960 would have started WW 3 with the Soviets over Cuba? or Ike?
As a matter of fact, JFK escalated the situation that led to the Cuban crisis when he became President by invading Cuba in the Bay of Pigs brain fart and giving CIA the green to kill Fidel Castro. Then JFK secretly deployed in Okinawa missiles virtually identical to those the Russians later sent to Cuba.
so NO!, JFK doesn't get credit for escalating the situation to later backed down in secret when Nikita called his bluff with the U.S. missiles pointed at the Soviets and China from different locations......that's like somebody setting fired to your garage and putting it out before it spread and then taking credit that the whole house and neighbors didn't burn down.
His biggest problem today would be with 24/7 his image would be tarnished. We all knew he was a womanizer but today it would have, possibly ruined his career. Yes, Trump is known for the same thing, but he isn't in your face with it and he doesn't bring women to the White house as far as we know anyway.
Would he be considered too conservative even for the GOP? Absolutely not, but he certainly would have had problems identifying with the progressive party.
I think one of us is missing the point; I am thinking the OP meant with the country being what it is in 2019. Were you even old enough to vote in 1964? Yes, had he run for a second term in 64, he would have been re-elected I think but we still have to remember how close the 60 election was. He barely carried several states: almost like Trump in 2016. .
This is how disengenous historians are on JFK and the Cuban missile crisis for a crisis he secretly created and then he gets credit for avoiding WW 3 when in reality he backed down when Nikita called his bluff.
JFK within 2 years in office invades Cuba (ilegal invasion) and then secretly has plans to overthrow Castro after the failed invasion and puts nuclear missiles in Turkey, Italy and Japan pointing at China and the Soviet Union. The same missiles the Soviets put in Cuba later.
you think if JFK didn't do those things we would have missiles in Cuba and Fidel Castro be so defensive of future invasions from a Super Power 90 miles away who wanted to overthrow his goverment?
Then JFK escalates the situation further with the blockade that by international law is an act of war. This is how reckeless and a war hawk JFK was and he was the instigator here and the agressor but historians write a totally completly myth about Camelot boy and ignores all the facts and create this lie that JFK saved the world from WW3 when he did the opposite.
When Nikita called his bluff, in secret JFK had to withdraw missiles from Turkey and Italy and not invade Cuba. So bascially, none of this mess would have happened if JFK didn't do the things in the first place. If this would have comeout before the 1964 election, it wouldn't look good on JFK.
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