Vietnam: JFK's stance

Peter Boyle dismisses the argument that President Kennedy would have escalated the war in Vietnam in the manner of his successor Lyndon Johnson, agreeing with the analysis provided by David Kaiser in his book American Tragedy: Kennedy, Johnson and the Origins of the Vietnam War (Books, THES, June 16).

Yet the idea that LBJ could be browbeaten by Robert McNamara, Dean Rusk, George Ball and others of the Washington foreign policy cabal active at that time underestimates the Texan's strong personality. In fact, if anybody was likely to pursue an activist foreign policy it was JFK, precisely because he lacked Johnson's commitment to domestic change and his ability to work with Congress.

Significantly, there were no major changes in that cabal after JFK's death, suggesting a uniformity of purpose in US foreign policy outlook.

Kennedy expressed his fears about abandoning Vietnam to the American public on TV in September 1963, just two months before his assassination, because, as he put it, "China is so large, looms so high".

We should also recall that in a taped interview with John B. Martin in 1964, Bobby Kennedy was asked directly if any thought was given to a US withdrawal from Vietnam when his brother was alive. RFK gave a single-word answer: "No."

Tony Martin

London SE15