The Politics of Deception
JFK's Secret Decisions on Vietnam, Civil Rights, and Cuba
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
Investigative reporter Patrick J. Sloyan, a former member of the White House Press Corps, revisits the last years of John F. Kennedy's presidency, his fateful involvement with Diem's assassination, the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Civil Rights Movement. Using recently released White House tape recordings and interviews with key inside players, The Politics of Deception reveals:
Kennedy's secret behind-the-scenes deals to resolve the Cuban Missile Crisis.The overthrow and assassination of President Diem.Kennedy's hostile interactions with and attempts to undermine Martin Luther King, Jr. Kennedy's secret and fascinating dealings with Diem, General Curtis LeMay, King and Fidel Castro. Kennedy's last year in office, and his preparation for the election that never was.
The Politics of Deception is a fresh and revealing look at an iconic president and the way he attempted to manage public opinion and forge his legacy, sure to appeal to both history buffs and those who were alive during his presidency.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
President Kennedy regularly misled the American public, writes veteran journalist Sloyan in this collection of painful, well-documented, and no longer controversial incidents from his last year in office. Dissatisfied with the heavy-handed leadership of South Vietnam President Ngo Dinh Diem, J.F.K secretly approved the 1963 coup, and Sloyan agrees with most observers that "Kennedy's order to get rid of Diem was the real beginning of the American war in Vietnam." His hostility to the civil rights movement included smearing Martin Luther King Jr. by circulating FBI wiretaps of his sexual encounters. By comparison, his ongoing efforts to murder Fidel Castro may seem silly but only because they failed. Nevertheless, Sloyan points out that J.F.K.'s deception may have saved the world in 1962. Infuriated at American missiles in Turkey, Soviet Premier Krushchev installed his own in Cuba and then offered to withdraw them if Kennedy did the same. Since many Americans would have preferred war to "capitulating" to Communism, they were fed the story of a courageous J.F.K. going "eyeball to eyeball" with Krushchev. Dogged by crises, Kennedy often took advantage of a traditional but disreputable presidential tactic, and Sloyan delivers an engrossing, squirm-inducing account.
Customer Reviews
1 in 4 combat deaths?
The authors bogus statistics on black combat deaths in Vietnam cast a lot of doubt on your interpretation of all the other events in the Kennedy administration.