An Unfinished Life Part 19

The Na.s.sau Agreement made for additional difficulties. To appease French sensibilities, which would also have been offended by a follow-through on Skybolt, Kennedy offered de Gaulle the same deal he had made with London. But de Gaulle wanted no part of it. Unlike the British, the French still lacked the ability to make nuclear warheads, though successful nuclear detonations convinced de Gaulle that it was only a matter of time. De Gaulle still did not trust Washington to defend Europe with nuclear weapons, believing that the administration would rather let Western Europe fall under communist control than risk a Soviet nuclear attack on American cities. De Gaulle intended to build an independent nuclear arm that would be immune from any American coordination or restriction. He also wanted to keep the British, whom he saw as ciphers of the Americans, at a distance. To drive this point home, on January 14, 1963, in a well-prepared performance at a semi-annual press conference, de Gaulle announced a French veto of British membership in the European Economic Community (EEC). Less than two decades after World War II, he now saw Germany as a more reliable French ally.

Not surprisingly, the Germans were receptive to his overtures. Adenauer, like de Gaulle, distrusted U.S. determination to stand up to the Soviets in a European crisis and correctly understood that Washington might ultimately recognize East Germany and resist German reunification. In February 1963, Bonn signed a mutual defense pact with Paris that implied diminished Franco-German reliance on NATO and American power. De Gaulle was receptive to having Germany follow him into the family of nuclear nations, and Adenauer was interested, having long resented a Kennedy public declaration to the Russians in November 1961 that "if Germany developed an atomic capability of its own, if it developed many missiles, or a strong national army that threatened war, then I would understand your concern, and I would share it."

Kennedy feared that Adenauer and de Gaulle were putting NATO at risk and making Europe less, rather then more, secure. "What is your judgment about the course of events?" Kennedy asked Macmillan in a January telephone conversation. "I think this man's gone crazy," Macmillan replied. "Absolutely crazy." Macmillan added that de Gaulle wanted to be "the c.o.c.k on a small dung hill instead of having two c.o.c.ks on a larger one." Crazy or not, de Gaulle had to be dealt with. Franco-German independence defied Kennedy's plans for continuing American leadership of Europe's defense, which he considered essential to deter Soviet aggression on the continent. "There is always the argument in Europe that the United States might leave Europe, which is, of course, in my opinion, fallacious, because the United States can never leave Europe," he said at an off-the-record press conference on December 31. "We are too much bound together. If we left Europe, Europe would be more exposed to the Communists."

In January 1963, Kennedy decided that he would make a midyear visit to rally the allies. He told amba.s.sador to France James M. Gavin, "Well, I am going to see the General in the next few months, and I think that we will be able to get something done together." Kennedy shared Acheson's conviction that it was "not possible to persuade, bribe, or coerce General de Gaulle from following a course upon which he is set. But he can and does in time recognize the inevitable and adjust his conduct to it, as in Algeria. Years ago I asked Justice Brandeis whether a certain man was intelligent," Acheson related. "'Yes,' he said. 'He has the sort of intelligence which leads a man not to stand in front of a locomotive.'" Acheson believed that de Gaulle would come to his senses when he understood that France simply could not afford the cost of developing its own nuclear deterrent.

Sufficiently strong ties between Paris, Berlin, and Washington encouraged hopes that better relations were not out of reach. In early January, when Andre Malraux, French minister of cultural affairs, brought the Mona Lisa Mona Lisa to Washington for an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, he graciously marked the occasion by recalling the contribution of American fighting men to French victory and liberation in the two world wars. "[This] is a painting," Malraux said, "which he [the American soldier] has saved." Despite Kennedy's unhappiness with de Gaulle, who, he said privately, "relies on our power to protect him while he launches his policies based solely on the self-interest of France," he responded with good humor. "I want to make it clear that grateful as we are for this painting," he told Malraux, "we will continue to press ahead with the effort to develop an independent artistic force and power of our own." to Washington for an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, he graciously marked the occasion by recalling the contribution of American fighting men to French victory and liberation in the two world wars. "[This] is a painting," Malraux said, "which he [the American soldier] has saved." Despite Kennedy's unhappiness with de Gaulle, who, he said privately, "relies on our power to protect him while he launches his policies based solely on the self-interest of France," he responded with good humor. "I want to make it clear that grateful as we are for this painting," he told Malraux, "we will continue to press ahead with the effort to develop an independent artistic force and power of our own."

KENNEDY'S RESPONSE to European crosscurrents demonstrated his growing mastery of foreign affairs. He realized that America's European allies could not be taken for granted and that by traveling to Europe in 1963 he could sustain ties essential to future Western security. But more specifically, he saw the road to peace not through hectoring France and Germany into agreements they were resisting, but through broader arrangements on nuclear weapons and better relations with Moscow, which could make NATO less important. While the French and Germans busied themselves pointing fingers, he would leapfrog them and take care of the real business at hand. to European crosscurrents demonstrated his growing mastery of foreign affairs. He realized that America's European allies could not be taken for granted and that by traveling to Europe in 1963 he could sustain ties essential to future Western security. But more specifically, he saw the road to peace not through hectoring France and Germany into agreements they were resisting, but through broader arrangements on nuclear weapons and better relations with Moscow, which could make NATO less important. While the French and Germans busied themselves pointing fingers, he would leapfrog them and take care of the real business at hand.

That said, the United States had no intention of reducing its defense spending or determination to develop more effective weapons systems, Kennedy said in his State of the Union Message. But, he stated, "our commitment to national safety is not a commitment to expand our military establishment indefinitely." The fact that the British, French, and Germans devoted about 28 or 29 percent of their respective annual budgets to defense, which was about half the percentage spent by the United States, including s.p.a.ce costs, frustrated him. Public and congressional resistance to providing foreign aid also troubled him. Like Eisenhower, who had won appropriations for language and regional studies programs in universities by including them in a bill t.i.tled the National Defense Education Act, Kennedy urged his budget director to rename foreign aid "international security." Appropriations to "strengthen the security of the free world" or to combat communism would find greater receptivity than anything that seemed like a giveaway to dependent developing nations asking for American help.

In hopes of reducing America's heavy defense burdens and the unfavorable balance of payments roiling the dollar, Kennedy saw disarmament as something more than "an idle dream." He firmly believed that a test ban could significantly slow, if not halt, proliferation of nuclear weapons. His advisers had told him that continued U.S. and Soviet testing would make it cheaper and easier to produce bombs. "It might go down by a factor as large as ten or a hundred," Kennedy was told, "so that it will cost very little to produce nuclear weapons... . And furthermore, the diffusion of nuclear technology is to be antic.i.p.ated if both of us test this knowledge... . This does seep out." In twenty-five years, "in the absence of a test ban, the risk of diffusion would be very great indeed."

Khrushchev shared Kennedy's concern to find some way out of the escalating arms race. Because the Soviets were so far behind the United States in the development and building of intercontinental ballistic missiles, they intended to work toward parity as soon as possible, especially after the failure to reduce the missile gap by placing IRBMs and MRBMs in Cuba. But they hoped to slow the U.S. pace of building and possibly prevent Chinese advances by reaching a ban of some kind on nuclear tests. In a message to Kennedy on November 12, 1962, Khrushchev stated his belief that "conditions are emerging now for reaching an agreement on the prohibition of nuclear weapons, [and the] cessation of all types of nuclear weapons tests." Khrushchev also believed that such agreements could rein in Chinese development of nuclear arms, the prospect of which alarmed him as much as Russia's military inferiority to the United States. On December 19, he expressed a sense of urgency about ending nuclear tests "once and for all." The end of the Cuban crisis had "untied our hands to engage closely in other urgent international matters and, in particular, in such a problem which has been ripe for so long as cessation of nuclear tests."

Kennedy was eager for negotiations. A test ban could possibly inhibit France, Germany, China, and Israel from building bombs that seemed likely to increase the risks of a nuclear war. In addition, Kennedy was uncertain that the latest round of U.S. tests had contributed much, if anything, to America's strategic advantage over the Soviets. While the tests, Glenn Seaborg told the president, "achieved much in improving our weapons capability," their impact on the Soviet-American military balance was less certain. In November 1962, Kennedy instructed national security officials and science advisers to report to him on this matter. And when an a.s.sessment of the tests became available in December, it confirmed Kennedy's suspicions that they were of little value to America's national defense.

After announcing the Polaris agreement with Macmillan, Kennedy promptly a.s.sured Khrushchev that this was not a step on the road to proliferation; to the contrary, it was a way to inhibit it. He sent Khrushchev a message through Dobrynin that the British Polaris missiles "a.s.signed to NATO" would not become operational until 1969 or 1970. His objective "in making these missiles available was to prevent, or at least delay, the development of national nuclear capabilities." Without this commitment, the British would try "to create their own missile, not tied into NATO controls," and they might then cooperate with the French and the Germans in helping them build nuclear a.r.s.enals. The commitment to London, he said, was "[keeping] open the possibility of agreement on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons and has gained time for our further efforts in the field of disarmament." Kennedy a.s.sured Khrushchev that any disarmament pact "would take priority over any such arrangements which were made in the absence of a disarmament agreement."

Despite these expressions of goodwill, differences between the two sides on banning nuclear tests seemed too great to bridge. Khrushchev complained that while Kennedy might see the Polaris arrangement with Britain as a bar to greater proliferation, he could only view it as an expansion of nuclear armaments that would intensify rather than diminish the arms race. At the same time, they could not agree on the number and location of on-site inspections, which Washington still insisted be part of any test ban treaty. Khrushchev was under the impression that Kennedy would settle for three or four inspections a year as opposed to the twelve to twenty he had been asking for. In fact, Kennedy explained, he was ready to accept between eight and ten inspections, but three were too few.

Although Khrushchev agreed to talks in New York between Soviet and U.S. representatives to take place in the first four months of 1963, the discussions produced little progress. In late March, when a reporter asked Kennedy if he still had any hope of achieving a test ban agreement, he answered, "Well, my hopes are somewhat dimmed, but nevertheless, I still hope... . Now, the reason why we keep moving and working on this question ... is because personally I am haunted by the feeling that by 1970, unless we are successful, there may be 10 nuclear powers instead of 4, and by 1975, 15 or 20... . I regard that as the greatest possible danger and hazard."

Khrushchev shared Kennedy's concern, but his own political pressures kept him from reaching any agreement. During a meeting in Moscow with Sat.u.r.day Review Sat.u.r.day Review editor Norman Cousins in April, he claimed that false American promises to reduce the number of on-site inspections had embarra.s.sed him and stalled the talks. He said that he had convinced his council of ministers to accept three on-site inspections as the price of a treaty and that Kennedy had then upped the ante to eight. "And so once again I was made to look foolish," Khrushchev said. "But I can tell you this: it won't happen again." editor Norman Cousins in April, he claimed that false American promises to reduce the number of on-site inspections had embarra.s.sed him and stalled the talks. He said that he had convinced his council of ministers to accept three on-site inspections as the price of a treaty and that Kennedy had then upped the ante to eight. "And so once again I was made to look foolish," Khrushchev said. "But I can tell you this: it won't happen again."

In addition to this "misunderstanding" over on-site inspections, two other differences undermined the talks. Kennedy believed that a princ.i.p.al value of a test ban treaty could be its inhibition of Chinese nuclear development. "Any negotiations that can hold back the Chinese Communists are most important," he said [at an NSC meeting in January], "because they loom as our major antagonists of the late 60's and beyond." But because the Chinese understood that a treaty would be directed partly against them, they pressured Moscow to resist Washington's overtures. Though Khrushchev shared American hopes of inhibiting Peking's acquisition of nuclear weapons, he was also reluctant to open himself to Chinese attacks for signing a treaty that "betrayed" a communist comrade. On the American side, Senate opposition, fueled by warnings from the hawkish U.S. Joint Chiefs, to anything but an airtight agreement with Moscow on verification made it impossible for Kennedy to accept Soviet proposals that could be seen as giving them even the smallest leeway to cheat.

On April 1, Dobrynin handed Bobby a twenty-five-page message from his government that seemed to signal a collapse of hopes for a test ban agreement or accommodation on anything else. Bobby looked it over and returned it without pa.s.sing it on to Kennedy. As he summed it up for his brother, the U.S. insistence on more than two or three inspections showed U.S. contempt for Moscow: "Who did we think we were in the United States trying to dictate to the Soviet Union?" the message said. "The United States had better learn that the Soviet Union was as strong as the United States and did not enjoy being treated as a second-cla.s.s power." As he returned the doc.u.ment to Dobrynin, Bobby told him that Dobrynin "had never talked like this before." He considered the paper "so insulting and rude to the President of the United States that I would never accept it nor transmit its message."

Yet Kennedy, who was determined to do all he could to salvage the test ban talks, saw some indications of Soviet receptivity to additional negotiations. At the end of 1962, the American physicist Leo Szilard received encouragement from Khrushchev to hold "an unofficial Soviet-American meeting at a non-governmental level to exchange views and examine the possibility of coming to an agreement on disarmament." In addition, Macmillan urged Kennedy not to give up on test ban talks, describing himself in a long letter to the president in March as having a "very deep personal obligation" to ban nuclear explosions "before it is too late." Kennedy also took hope from Khrushchev's statement through Dobrynin that past confidential exchanges with the president "had been helpful," and he would be glad to reopen "this area of contact." He also obliquely suggested that another summit meeting "might be helpful." In addition, Kennedy saw something positive in Soviet acceptance on April 5 of discussions to create a Teletype "hot line" between Moscow and Washington for use during a crisis.

Taking Khrushchev at his word and seizing upon a suggestion from Macmillan that they jointly propose additional negotiations, Kennedy wrote Khrushchev on April 11 apologizing for any misunderstanding on the number of on-site inspections, promising to offer new suggestions on the matter from himself and Macmillan in the near future, and emphasizing how eager he and the prime minister were to head off "the spread of national nuclear forces." Kennedy also followed a Macmillan suggestion that he ask whether Khrushchev would be interested in "a fully frank, informal exchange of views" with a Kennedy personal representative. Following up on April 15 with another letter, Kennedy and Macmillan suggested that there be private tripart.i.te discussions either at Geneva or between their representatives meeting in Moscow. If these negotiations came close to an agreement, the three of them could meet to conclude a treaty.

Kennedy and Macmillan's renewed efforts at negotiations-a tedious, stubborn slog of requests and oblique promises-brought only grudging acknowledgment from Khrushchev of the need for further talks. When the new U.S. amba.s.sador, Foy Kohler, and British amba.s.sador Sir Humphrey Trevelyan gave Khrushchev the JFK-Macmillan letter, Khrushchev's reaction was "almost entirely negative." His att.i.tude "was almost one of disinterest," and after reading the letter, he dismissed it as containing "nothing ... positive or constructive." He saw "no basis for agreement." Kohler and Trevelyan could not budge him with oral arguments. Instead, resurrecting differences over Germany, Khrushchev emphasized them as the "key to everything," and said that the nuclear test ban "really had no importance." It would be of no benefit to either the U.S. or USSR; nor would it "deter others from testing and developing nuclear capabilities and would not relieve tensions."

Khrushchev gave formal response to the Kennedy-Macmillan letter in lengthy written replies on April 29 and May 8. With the United States apparently intent on allowing other NATO states to acquire nuclear weapons and still insistent on inspections, which he continued to describe as an espionage cover, Khrushchev saw little reason to hope for a breakthrough in test ban talks. However, he did announce that he was willing nevertheless to receive Kennedy's personal envoy, who would be given a full and respectful hearing. Kennedy replied that he took little encouragement from Khrushchev's messages, which continued to demonstrate "the gaps which separate us on these problems." In another follow-up letter from him and Macmillan, they confirmed their eagerness to send personal envoys for discussions during the summer but emphasized that they disagreed with Khrushchev's a.s.sessment of the need for on-site inspections and their purpose, which they categorically and honestly affirmed had no hidden espionage design.

It is indeed difficult to believe that Khrushchev saw espionage as the prime motive behind the U.S. insistence on inspections. Instead, it was a convenient excuse to hold up any sort of agreement. Llewellyn Thompson saw Khrushchev's resistance to a test ban treaty as princ.i.p.ally motivated by an eagerness to buy time for additional nuclear tests that could make Soviet nuclear forces more compet.i.tive with the United States'. Khrushchev's "quarrel with the ChiComs," Thompson said, was also apparently "taking precedence at the present time over other issues... . It is important to him at this juncture not to do anything which exposes him to further Chinese attack, both for internal reasons and in connection with the struggle for control of other communist parties." Averell Harriman, who spent three days in Moscow at the end of April, underscored Khrushchev's difficulties with Peking. "This challenge by the ChiComs of Kremlin leadership of the Communist International is causing the gravest concern."

KENNEDY SAW LITTLE HOPE for a breakthrough unless there were some new departure or fresh impetus to get the genie back in the bottle, as he put it at two May press conferences. He still believed that a failure to ban nuclear testing "would be a great disaster for the interests of all concerned," and promised to push "very hard in May and June and July in every forum to see if we can get an agreement." for a breakthrough unless there were some new departure or fresh impetus to get the genie back in the bottle, as he put it at two May press conferences. He still believed that a failure to ban nuclear testing "would be a great disaster for the interests of all concerned," and promised to push "very hard in May and June and July in every forum to see if we can get an agreement."

Kennedy now decided to embrace a suggestion Norman Cousins had made to him on April 22 after returning from his meeting with Khrushchev in Moscow. When Cousins told the president that Khrushchev was under pressure from others in his government to take a hard line, Kennedy responded that he and Khrushchev "occupy approximately the same political positions inside our governments. He would like to prevent a nuclear war but is under severe pressure from his hard-line crowd." Kennedy said he had "similar problems... . The hard-liners in the Soviet Union and the United States feed on one another, each using the actions of the other to justify his own position." Cousins urged the president to overcome both groups of militants by a "breathtaking new approach toward the Russian people, calling for an end to the cold war and a fresh start in American-Russian relations." In a follow-up letter on April 30, Cousins pressed Kennedy to make "the most important speech of your presidency ... [including] breathtaking proposals for genuine peace ... [a] tone of friendliness for the Soviet people and ... [an] understanding of their ordeal during the last war."

Kennedy saw risks in publicly urging a transformation in Soviet-American relations and pressing Moscow for a test ban agreement. He would almost certainly confront forceful opposition from his military chiefs and national security advisers, who would see him as letting idealism eclipse sensible realism. There was some logic, at least some political logic, to this. When Cousins told Kennedy that Americans wanted the nuclear powers to stop poisoning the atmosphere with nuclear tests, Kennedy pointed out that in fact the public did not seem to care; recent White House mail had shown more interest in daughter Caroline's horse than in negotiating a treaty. And those who wrote about nuclear testing were fifteen to one against a ban.

But Kennedy saw more reasons to try a speech than not. Most important, he believed a plea for better Soviet-American relations and a test ban treaty was right. With his credibility as a foreign policy leader at new highs, he believed that a forceful speech could have an impact on American public opinion and might persuade Khrushchev to take negotiations for a ban more seriously. Kennedy also had an encouraging report from Glenn Seaborg, who had spent two weeks at the end of May in Russia leading a delegation of U.S. scientists in discussing peaceful uses of atomic energy with their Soviet counterparts. Seaborg described a meeting with Soviet president Leonid Brezhnev in which Brezhnev had said that Khrushchev was genuinely interested in peaceful coexistence: "'This is not propaganda,' Brezhnev had added. 'It is the sincere desire of our government, of our people, and of our party, which leads the country. I can't say more than that.'"

In May, Kennedy decided to turn a June 10 commencement address at American University in Washington into a "peace speech" arguing the case to Americans and Soviets for a test ban treaty. The June date reflected a concern that the speech precede a Sino-Soviet meeting in Moscow in July; Kennedy hoped his remarks could be a counterweight to whatever pressure Peking would put on Khrushchev to avoid any agreement with Washington. Because he wanted to avoid counterpressures from Defense and State Department officials and hackneyed "threats of destruction, boasts of nuclear stockpiles and lectures on Soviet treachery," Kennedy confined his preparation of the speech to an inner circle of White House advisers-Sorensen, Bundy, Schlesinger, Rostow, Bundy's deputy, Carl Kaysen, and Thomas Sorensen, Ted's brother, who was a deputy director at the United States Information Agency. McNamara, Rusk, and Taylor were not told of the speech until June 8, after the president had already left on a speaking tour that would last until the morning of the tenth.

The speech was one of the great state papers of any twentieth-century American presidency. Kennedy's topic was the "most important ... on earth: world peace. What kind of peace do I mean? What kind of peace do we seek? Not a Pax Americana Pax Americana enforced on the world by American weapons of war," he said, with the Soviets and China particularly in mind. "Not the peace of the grave or the security of the slave." In that one brief sentence, he dismissed both the kind of peace that would follow a cataclysmic nuclear war, which "hard-liners" in Moscow, Peking, and Washington seemed ready to fight, and the sort of peace a generation reared on memories of appeas.e.m.e.nt feared might come out of negotiations limiting American armaments. This was to be "not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women-not merely peace in our time but peace for all time"-the realization of Woodrow Wilson's ideal, announced in response to the century's first great war. enforced on the world by American weapons of war," he said, with the Soviets and China particularly in mind. "Not the peace of the grave or the security of the slave." In that one brief sentence, he dismissed both the kind of peace that would follow a cataclysmic nuclear war, which "hard-liners" in Moscow, Peking, and Washington seemed ready to fight, and the sort of peace a generation reared on memories of appeas.e.m.e.nt feared might come out of negotiations limiting American armaments. This was to be "not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women-not merely peace in our time but peace for all time"-the realization of Woodrow Wilson's ideal, announced in response to the century's first great war.

To fulfill so bold a vision, it would not be enough for the Soviet Union to adopt a more enlightened att.i.tude. It was also essential that "[we] reexamine our own att.i.tude-as individuals and as a Nation-for our att.i.tude is as essential as theirs." There was too much defeatism about peace in the United States, too much inclination to see war as inevitable and mankind as doomed. "We need not accept that view," Kennedy a.s.serted. "Our problems are manmade-therefore, they can be solved by man." This would not require a change in human nature, only a change in outlook that leads to "a series of concrete actions and effective agreements which are in the interest of all concerned." The goal was not a world without tensions but a kind of community peace in which "mutual tolerance" eased quarrels and conflicting interests.

Specifically, Kennedy urged a reexamination of our att.i.tude toward the Soviet Union. "As Americans, we find communism profoundly repugnant as a negation of personal freedom and dignity. But we can still hail the Russian people for their many achievements-in science and s.p.a.ce, in economic and industrial growth, in culture and in acts of courage." Americans needed to remember the terrible suffering of the Russian people in World War II and understand that a Soviet-American conflict would within twenty-four hours destroy "all we have built [and] all we have worked for."

To avert such a disaster, it seemed essential to improve communications and understanding between Moscow and Washington. One step toward that end was the creation of a "hot line"; another was mutual commitments to arms control, and a test ban in particular, which could discourage the spread of nuclear weapons. An agreement was in sight, but a fresh start was badly needed, Kennedy said. To this end, he announced the agreement to begin high-level talks in Moscow and a pledge not to resume "nuclear tests in the atmosphere so long as other states do not do so." With an eye on the U.S. Senate, which would have to ratify any treaty, Kennedy declared that no agreement could "provide absolute security against the risks of deception and evasion. But it can-if it is sufficiently effective in its enforcement and if it is sufficiently in the interests of its signers-offer far more security and far fewer risks than an unabated, uncontrolled, unpredictable arms race."

Like Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, Kennedy's peace speech did not have much initial resonance. As historian Lawrence Freedman has pointed out, Kennedy's bold address "hardly electrified the American people. It received barely a mention in the press, and the White House mailbag failed to bulge." In the seventeen days after June 10, Kennedy received 1,677 letters about the speech; only 30 of them were negative. But at the same time, almost 52,000 letters flooded in about a freight rate bill. Disgusted, Kennedy said, "That is why I tell people in Congress that they're crazy if they take their mail seriously." Predictably, unbending congressional Republicans denounced the speech as "a soft line that can accomplish nothing ... a shot from the hip ... a dreadful mistake."

The Soviet reaction was much more encouraging. The Soviet press published uncensored copies of the speech, and the government broke precedent by allowing the Voice of America to broadcast the speech in Russian with only one paragraph deleted, and in its entirety in a rebroadcast. The Soviets then suspended all jamming of the VOA, which the State Department believed showed their desire for "an atmosphere of detente with the West in order to deal as effectively as possible with pressing intra-bloc problems and Chinese rivalry in the international communist movement." Khrushchev initially told British Labour Party leader Harold Wilson that Kennedy's willingness to say what he had in public deeply impressed him. Later in the summer, Khrushchev described the speech to Harriman as "the best statement made by any President since Roosevelt." Glenn Seaborg said, "It was as though Khrushchev had been looking for a weapon to use against Chinese criticism of his policies toward the United States and Kennedy had provided it."

Though the peaceful end of the Cold War makes it difficult to understand now, public cant about communist dangers in the fifties and sixties made it almost impossible for an American politician to make the sort of speech Kennedy gave. It was a tremendously bold address that carried substantial risks. By taking advantage of his recent success in facing down Khrushchev in Cuba, Kennedy gave voice to his own and the country's best hopes for rational exchange between adversaries that could turn the East-West compet.i.tion away from the growing arms race.

On June 20, Moscow gave Kennedy additional reason to believe that something might now come of test ban talks. The Soviets signed an agreement in Geneva establishing "a direct communications link between their respective capitals... . Both Governments," the White House announced, "have taken a first step to help reduce the risk of war ... by accident or miscalculation... . We hope agreement on other more encompa.s.sing measures will follow. We shall bend every effort to go on from this first step." An American test message-"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog"-puzzled Kremlin recipients, who must have wondered whether the device would increase or reduce misunderstanding between the two sides.

During June and early July, the administration struggled to produce a realistic agenda for the talks. Before the White House could even settle on a set of instructions, it had to ensure that the Joint Chiefs, who were scheduled to testify in July before the Senate Armed Services Committee, would not foreclose approval in the Upper House if and when an agreement arrived there. "I regard the Chiefs as key to this thing," Kennedy told Mike Mansfield. "If we don't get the Chiefs just right, we can ... get blown." The Chiefs have "always been our problem," Kennedy added. The Chiefs did in fact oppose both a comprehensive and a more limited test ban. In their view, a prohibition on all testing without sufficient surveillance would allow the Soviets to cheat and work toward parity with America's nuclear a.r.s.enal. They further believed that a more limited agreement, which did not bar underground tests, would still permit Moscow to gain ground on the United States. To head off any discussion of divisions within the administration, which could become a rallying cry for treaty opponents, Kennedy instructed McNamara not to ask the Chiefs for their collective judgment or for a formal statement of their position. In addition, he excluded any military officers from the American delegation to the talks and made sure that cables coming from Moscow describing the progress of the negotiations did not go to the Defense Department.

Warnings that a limited ban would produce public pressure for a moratorium on underground tests did not dissuade Kennedy from the attractions of a limited treaty. Nor did he believe that Soviet underground testing would bring them up to par with the United States as a nuclear power or change the existing strategic balance. When Khrushchev announced on July 2 that he preferred a comprehensive treaty without inspections-Moscow would not "open its doors to NATO spies"-but would agree to more limited test bans above ground and underwater, Kennedy instructed Harriman-whom he had chosen, despite objections from the State Department, to be the leader of the negotiating team-to accept such a proposal.

Kennedy also directed Harriman to seek an agreement with Khrushchev on inhibiting Chinese testing and development of a nuclear a.r.s.enal. Although Harriman doubted that Khrushchev would be willing to talk about joint pressure on China, Kennedy was eager for him to pursue the matter nevertheless. At the start of the talks, after Khrushchev confirmed this prediction, the president cabled Harriman: "I remain convinced that Chinese problem is more serious than Khrushchev comments in first meeting suggest, and believe you should press question in private meeting with him... . Relatively small forces in hands of Chicoms could be very dangerous to us all... . You should try to elicit Khrushchev's view of means of limiting or preventing Chinese nuclear development and his willingness either to take Soviet action or to accept US action aimed in this direction." Kennedy did not make clear what "US action" meant-a preemptive strike against Chinese nuclear facilities, diplomatic pressure, or an exchange of prohibitions on German and Chinese nuclear arms.

BEFORE HARRIMAN WENT to Moscow, Kennedy followed through on his promise to visit Europe to build support for the negotiations and provide rea.s.surance of U.S. determination to defend NATO allies against Soviet aggression. A Soviet proposal to make a nonaggression pact between Eastern- and Western-bloc countries part of a test ban treaty had further chilled the West Germans, who saw it as consolidating existing European boundaries and conditions. The White House viewed the trip partly as a chance to have the president bypa.s.s or speak over the heads of state and reach out to ordinary Europeans, many of whom seemed to share Kennedy's preference for nonproliferation over Franco-German acquisition of nuclear arms. to Moscow, Kennedy followed through on his promise to visit Europe to build support for the negotiations and provide rea.s.surance of U.S. determination to defend NATO allies against Soviet aggression. A Soviet proposal to make a nonaggression pact between Eastern- and Western-bloc countries part of a test ban treaty had further chilled the West Germans, who saw it as consolidating existing European boundaries and conditions. The White House viewed the trip partly as a chance to have the president bypa.s.s or speak over the heads of state and reach out to ordinary Europeans, many of whom seemed to share Kennedy's preference for nonproliferation over Franco-German acquisition of nuclear arms.

The trip from June 23 to July 2 was a grand triumph of public diplomacy. Pointedly avoiding a visit to Paris and de Gaulle and stopping for only one day in England (in Suss.e.x, at the prime minister's country home, rather than in London, where a s.e.x scandal had put Macmillan's government in jeopardy and might tarnish Kennedy), JFK spent four days each in Germany and Ireland and two in Italy. Though the visits to Ireland and Italy deepened impressions of Kennedy as an exceptionally popular world leader who inspired worshipful support for himself and American values, it was in Germany that he received his greatest ovations and effectively demonstrated that no German government could tie itself too closely to France at the expense of good relations with Washington.

Kennedy a.s.sured a Bonn audience that just as Germany had freed itself from "the forces of tyranny and aggression," so the United States had freed itself from "the long process of isolation... . The United States is here on this continent to stay. So long as our presence is desired and required, our forces and commitments will remain." Americans, he said, did not see their part "in the great fight for freedom all around the globe ... as a burden. They regard it as a privilege to play their part in these great days." In fact, Kennedy had privately complained that "Europe is getting a 'free ride' and that on both the political and defense side, this situation with our NATO allies had to be changed this year." As he had told the Joint Chiefs, his administration had "put more money in defense in the past two years than any other previous Administration... . We had gone from $44 billion up to $49 billion and ... are now at $52 billion." In urging Europe's full partnership in the alliance, Kennedy was thinking not only of its independence but also of its contributions that could reduce U.S. budget and balance-of-payment deficits.

At a press conference in Bonn, Kennedy was asked if he saw "any chance of overcoming the division of Germany." Although he could not mark out a date when this might happen, he replied that it was very likely and urged Germans not to despair. He denied that any consideration was being given to an exchange of nonaggression statements with Moscow, which would amount to recognition of East Germany. As the negotiations in Moscow would shortly demonstrate, however, Kennedy had not ruled out this concession to Khrushchev as a way to advance detente with the Soviets.

In Berlin, where three-fifths of the city turned out to greet him, "clapping, waving, crying, cheering, as if it were the second coming," Schlesinger recalled, Kennedy gave his most heartfelt statements of support. After visiting the Berlin Wall, which "shocked and appalled" him, he spoke to a million people gathered in front of the city hall, "a sea of human faces," Sorensen remembers, "chanting 'Kenne-dy,' 'Kenne-dy.'" His speech was an uncharacteristically pa.s.sionate recitation that stirred the crowd to something resembling the communal outbursts at n.a.z.i rallies. (The crowd's vigorous response was so extreme as to upset Adenauer, who said to Rusk, "Does this mean Germany can one day have another Hitler?" It also troubled Kennedy, who said to his military aide General McHugh, "If I told them to go tear down the Berlin Wall, they would do it."

"Two thousand years ago," Kennedy proclaimed, "the proudest boast was 'civis Roma.n.u.s sum.' Today, in the world of freedom, the proudest boast is 'Ich bin ein Berliner.' ... There are many people in the world who really don't understand, or say they don't, what is the great issue between the free world and the communist world. Let them come to Berlin. There are some who say that communism is the wave of the future. Let them come to Berlin. And there are some who say in Europe and elsewhere we can work with the Communists. Let them come to Berlin. And there are even a few who say that it is true that communism is an evil system, but it permits us to make economic progress. La.s.s' sie nach Berlin kommen. La.s.s' sie nach Berlin kommen. Let them come to Berlin." In the midst of so tumultuous a reception, no one was ready to complain that Kennedy should have said, Let them come to Berlin." In the midst of so tumultuous a reception, no one was ready to complain that Kennedy should have said, "Ich bin Berliner" "Ich bin Berliner" instead of instead of "ein Berliner," "ein Berliner," which was colloquial German for a jelly doughnut. Nor did anyone compare his American University appeal for rational exchange with Moscow to his dismissive "some who say ... we can work with the Communists." (Later that day, in more measured remarks at the Free University of Berlin, he declared that "when the possibilities of reconciliation appear, we in the West will make it clear that we are not hostile to any people or system providing they choose their own destiny without interfering with the free choice of others.") Instead, the crowd roared in approval. which was colloquial German for a jelly doughnut. Nor did anyone compare his American University appeal for rational exchange with Moscow to his dismissive "some who say ... we can work with the Communists." (Later that day, in more measured remarks at the Free University of Berlin, he declared that "when the possibilities of reconciliation appear, we in the West will make it clear that we are not hostile to any people or system providing they choose their own destiny without interfering with the free choice of others.") Instead, the crowd roared in approval.

Kennedy departed Germany with a sense of exhilaration. He told the crowd bidding him farewell at Berlin's Tegel Airport that he planned "to leave a note for my successor which would say, 'To be opened at a time of some discouragement,' and in it would be written three words: 'Go to Germany.' I may open that note myself someday." On the plane flying to Dublin, he told Sorensen, who had crafted most of the words he had spoken to the Germans, "We'll never have another day like this one as long as we live."

The visit to Ireland was supposedly a vacation that Kennedy had insisted on. Kenny O'Donnell told him, "It would be a waste of time. It wouldn't do you much good politically. You've got all the Irish votes in this country that you'll ever get. If you go to Ireland, people will say it's just a pleasure trip." But a "pleasure trip" was just what Kennedy wanted.

Still, the stop in Ireland was more than a sentimental journey to the land of his origins. It also allowed him to emphasize the interconnectedness of all peoples and the importance of small nations in holding to ideals that influenced the entire world. In a brilliant speech full of literary references before the Irish Parliament, he declared, "Modern economics, weaponry and communications have made us realize more than ever that we are one human family and this one planet is our home." Kennedy quoted George Bernard Shaw on the influence of the Irish: "Speaking as an Irishman, [Shaw] summed up an approach to life: Other people ... 'see things and ... say: Why? ... But I dream things that never were-and I say: Why not?'" A small nation like Ireland, Kennedy said, would continue to play a significant part in advancing the cause of liberty around the globe.

KENNEDY'S TRIUMPHANT TOUR of Europe increased his freedom to have Harriman negotiate a test ban treaty. The opening conversations in Moscow made clear to the U.S. delegation that the Soviets were eager for an agreement. Khrushchev's remarks to Harriman and Lord Hailsham, his British counterpart, "on desirability of relaxation of tensions and protection against risk of nuclear war" was only one signal of Soviet receptivity. In a discussion between lower-level officials about forthcoming negotiations on cultural exchanges, the Soviet representative suggested that the United States "make a 'big thing' out of them." He explained that after both sides had felt "the breath of death" in the missile crisis, it was time for them to cooperate. "He was particularly hopeful that a test ban would be reached." of Europe increased his freedom to have Harriman negotiate a test ban treaty. The opening conversations in Moscow made clear to the U.S. delegation that the Soviets were eager for an agreement. Khrushchev's remarks to Harriman and Lord Hailsham, his British counterpart, "on desirability of relaxation of tensions and protection against risk of nuclear war" was only one signal of Soviet receptivity. In a discussion between lower-level officials about forthcoming negotiations on cultural exchanges, the Soviet representative suggested that the United States "make a 'big thing' out of them." He explained that after both sides had felt "the breath of death" in the missile crisis, it was time for them to cooperate. "He was particularly hopeful that a test ban would be reached."

Khrushchev still considered inspections unacceptable, which precluded U.S. acceptance of a ban on underground tests, but he was ready to embrace a limited agreement covering the atmosphere, outer s.p.a.ce, and underwater. He wished to tie such a treaty to a nonaggression pact, but-believing it would be a long time before Peking could build nuclear weapons and before Paris could acc.u.mulate stockpiles comparable to those of the U.S. and USSR-saw no need to include France and China in the arms control agreement. He also expected a treaty would isolate China and put it under pressure from developing countries to sign a test ban. Harriman declared a U.S. preference for a comprehensive treaty and for excluding nonaggression clauses from any test ban accord but stated American willingness to accept limited bans and to leave talks on nonaggression arrangements for a later time. One essential ingredient Kennedy saw in an agreement was a clause allowing the United States to escape from the treaty if a nonsignatory exploded a nuclear weapon that seemed to jeopardize American national security. The provision was a prerequisite for getting a test ban through the U.S. Senate.

As Harriman antic.i.p.ated, negotiations "[ran] into heavy weather in attempting to get reasonable treaty language," but Khrushchev's desire for a U.S.-Soviet accommodation made him willing to sign a limited test ban agreement "without commitment on other subjects." Reciprocal American eagerness for a treaty led to completion of a test ban pact only ten days after Harriman went to Moscow.

Thoughts of an agreement with the United States, which would improve relations with Washington and Europe and free Moscow to focus more on an emerging threat from Peking, exhilarated Khrushchev. As Harriman reported to Kennedy, Khrushchev was jovial in his exchanges. At a large reception on July twentieth attended by the diplomatic corps and numerous Soviet officials, Khrushchev asked where Harriman was. When he appeared, Khrushchev said he was "glad to see the 'imperialist.'" Harriman replied, "When you came to my house in New York you called me a capitalist. Is this a promotion or a demotion-or did we have to consult the protocol officer?" "No," he said, "it must be a promotion because there are many capitalists who only deal with matters in their own country, whereas an imperialist is a capitalist who interferes in other countries, for example, as you are in South Viet-Nam." Harriman, amid much laughter, said he "was very much flattered" at the promotion. After Harriman explained that he was going to a track meet, Khrushchev exclaimed, "It is better to have this kind of race than the arms race."

After the treaty-which outlawed atmospheric but not underground testing of nuclear weapons-was initialed, Khrushchev and Harriman walked across Cathedral Square on their way to dinner in Catherine the Great's palace. Khrushchev stopped to chat with a crowd of people who applauded him. He introduced Harriman as "Gospodin Garriman," saying, "He has just signed a test ban treaty and I am going to take him to dinner. Do you think he deserves dinner?" The crowd responded enthusiastically. Harriman, who had clear memories of Stalin during World War II, saw a "fantastic contrast [in Khrushchev] to the way Stalin used to behave. Stalin never appeared in public. He lived in the Kremlin where no one was allowed to enter. When he went to his dacha from the Kremlin, he traveled at high speeds ... with the blinds of his car windows drawn." Whatever the consequences for the arms race and long-term U.S.-Soviet relations, the agreement was a public relations triumph for Khrushchev, who seemed to be giving socialism a human face.

Kennedy was happy, too, but there was still much to be done. Remembering Woodrow Wilson's League of Nations defeat at the hands of the Senate and fearful that a coalition of southern conservative Democrats and Republicans would find the thirty-four votes needed to block the treaty, he mounted a determined campaign to ensure approval. During the negotiations, he had kept all senators abreast of developments and asked five of them-three Democrats and two Republicans-to attend a treaty-signing ceremony in Moscow. The reluctance of any Republican senator to accept, joined by private expressions of doubts by the Joint Chiefs and public warnings by conservatives and newspapers that the United States might be courting disaster, deepened the president's concern about ratification.

As he had done so well before, Kennedy decided to play to his greatest strengths: He would speak directly to the country in behalf of the treaty. His speech on July 26 avoided any suggestion that he was trying to dodge the concerns of skeptical military chiefs and senators. But his address presented an apocalyptic vision of a world teetering on the brink of universal disaster. In the eighteen years since World War II, he said, the United States and USSR had talked past each other, producing "only darkness, discord, or disillusion." This fog of gloom threatened to turn into a conflict unlike any before in history-a war that, in less than sixty minutes, "could wipe out more than 300 million Americans, Europeans, and Russians, as well as untold numbers elsewhere. And the survivors, as Chairman Khrushchev warned the Communist Chinese, 'the survivors would envy the dead.'" But now, he said, "a shaft of light [has] cut into the darkness... . For the first time, an agreement has been reached on bringing the forces of nuclear destruction under international control." The test ban agreement was no panacea, Kennedy conceded, but it was a step away from war: It reduced world tensions; limited the dangers from radioactive fallout; raised the likelihood of nuclear nonproliferation; and promised to rein in the arms race between East and West.

Kennedy worked hard behind the scenes, too. The military and senators were told that this was not a "ban the bomb" treaty; it would in no way inhibit the United States from using nuclear weapons in a war, and it allowed the United States to withdraw from the treaty if national safety dictated. They were also a.s.sured that the United States would be free to hold underground tests, maintain laboratories for upgrading nuclear weapons, and design plans for renewed atmospheric testing if it seemed essential. a.s.sertions that a treaty served the United States by driving a wedge between Russia and China scored additional points with skeptics.

Ultimately, Kennedy's fear that the Senate would reject the treaty and repudiate his administration was overdrawn. His courting of clear opponents as well as potential supporters had obviously helped. But the treaty was so transparently a step in the direction of better Soviet-American relations and away from the brinksmanship of the Cuban missile crisis that it is difficult to imagine the public and the Senate turning it aside. "Maybe we can save a total war" with the agreement, Truman told Kennedy. Fulbright had worried that the physicist Edward Teller, the architect of the hydrogen bomb and an anti-Soviet evangelist, might weaken support for the agreement, but he could not believe that "these fellows [a majority of senators] [would be] so stupid as to vote against this treaty." A Harris poll published on September 1 showed 81 percent approval for the pact. Moreover, as one Republican senator predicting Senate approval candidly told Newsweek Newsweek in August, "I don't see any political mileage in opposing the treaty." He predicted Senate approval. He was right. On September 24, the Upper House overwhelmingly endorsed the agreement by an 80 to 19 vote. in August, "I don't see any political mileage in opposing the treaty." He predicted Senate approval. He was right. On September 24, the Upper House overwhelmingly endorsed the agreement by an 80 to 19 vote.

Of course, there would be second-guessing. Could Kennedy have had a more comprehensive ban if he had agreed to the limit of three annual inspections Khrushchev had proposed? Perhaps, though Khrushchev's determination to use underground testing to catch up with the United States probably put a broader agreement out of reach. And the conviction in the United States that three inspections would be an insufficient bar to Soviet cheating made Kennedy's reluctance to accept Moscow's limit understandable. Did the treaty inhibit proliferation and slow the arms race? Clearly not. The agreement did not deter China, France, India, Israel, or Pakistan from developing nuclear weapons. Nor did it prevent the building of additional and more devastating nuclear bombs and delivery systems. Yet Kennedy, Macmillan, and Khrushchev took great and understandable satisfaction from the treaty. The agreement, as millions of people appreciated, marked a pause in Cold War tensions that, in the early sixties, seemed to make a global conflict all too likely.

In March 1963, 60 percent of a poll expected the Soviets to use a hydrogen bomb against the United States in a war. In June, before the completion of the test ban treaty, 37 percent of Americans believed it "impossible to reach a peaceful settlement of differences with Russia." In September, after the successful negotiations for a ban, only 25 percent of a survey saw a threat of war as the greatest problem facing the country. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which features a doomsday clock on its cover, moved the clock back from seven minutes before midnight to twelve minutes before midnight. which features a doomsday clock on its cover, moved the clock back from seven minutes before midnight to twelve minutes before midnight.

The treaty, as Kennedy publicly acknowledged, "will not resolve all conflicts, or cause the Communists to forego their ambitions, or eliminate the dangers of war. It will not reduce our need for arms or allies... . But it is an important first step-a step towards peace-a step towards reason-a step away from war." In this, he was correct. The treaty-the first significant arms control agreement between the United States and USSR-was a milestone in the successful forty-five-year struggle to prevent the Cold War from turning into an all-out conflict that would have devastated the planet. It raised the possibility of detente, of a belief that Moscow and Washington were not strictly in the grip of militant cold warriors who saw safety only in the ability of their military establishments to outbuild their adversaries. And it gave hope to millions of people who believed, with Kennedy, that mankind must do away with nuclear war or war would do away with mankind. The treaty, which was universally recognized as Kennedy's handiwork, created an imperishable conviction that he might bring the Cold War to a peaceful conclusion.

CHAPTER 19

An Unfinished Presidency

Countless individuals have noted that the President's death affected them even more deeply than the death of their own parents. The reason, I believe, is that the latter situation most often represented a loss of the past-while the a.s.sa.s.sination of President Kennedy represented an incalculable loss of the future.

- Theodore C. Sorensen, December 1963

BY 1963 IT WAS CLEAR to all who saw him in the White House that Kennedy enjoyed being president. One of the first things visitors to the Oval Office noticed was how much he had put his stamp on the decor; a naval motif expressed his love of the sea, and his desk, which had belonged to President Hayes, was constructed from timbers of the H.M.S. to all who saw him in the White House that Kennedy enjoyed being president. One of the first things visitors to the Oval Office noticed was how much he had put his stamp on the decor; a naval motif expressed his love of the sea, and his desk, which had belonged to President Hayes, was constructed from timbers of the H.M.S. Resolute Resolute. Aside from an alligator desk set, a gift from de Gaulle, naval artifacts covered the desk: the coconut sh.e.l.l with the message that helped rescue the PT-109 crew, two whale teeth engraved with sailing ships and a third with the presidential seal, a ten-inch gla.s.s ornament etched with a likeness of PT-109, and bookends with replicas of bra.s.s cannons on the U.S.S. Const.i.tution Const.i.tution. The walls flanking the fireplace held pictures of the famous naval engagement in 1812 between the Const.i.tution Const.i.tution and the British frigate and the British frigate Guerriere Guerriere. Above the mantel was a picture of the September 1779 engagement between the Bonhomme Richard Bonhomme Richard and the British ships and the British ships Serapis Serapis and and Countess of Scarborough Countess of Scarborough. The sword of naval hero John Barry, crossed with a boarding saber, hung on another wall.

Kennedy "loved being President," Schlesinger said, "and at times he could hardly remember that he had ever been anything else. He never complained about the 'terrible loneliness' of the office or its 'awesome burdens.'" Dave Powers echoed Schlesinger's recollection: "John F. Kennedy enjoyed being President. He loved being where the action was. He was always at his best under pressure. He became more determined after each disappointment." This att.i.tude partly explains why Kennedy saw his health problems not as a deterrent to becoming president but as a challenge he enjoyed overcoming.

Yet, not everything was dandy. In July 1963, O'Donnell and Powers recalled that Kennedy was frustrated over the tax cut, civil rights, and problems with Vietnam. His inability to win congressional approval for education and Medicare bills also troubled him. "We will probably get our jocks knocked off on this aid to education," he told Sorensen earlier in the year. Nor did he always find the compulsory socializing at the White House appealing. One evening in January, when Jackie and her sister, Lee Radziwill, had arranged a dinner party with several Hollywood entertainers, Kennedy asked, "Are they all coming to dinner?" When told yes, he said, "You girls must be crazy, but I guess there isn't anything I can do now." Yet in spite of these occasional annoyances, O'Donnell and Powers remember Kennedy at this time as "more forceful and sure of himself, and more relaxed and happier than we had ever seen him."

In April 1963, when Newsweek Newsweek journalist James M. Cannon interviewed the president for an article about his brother Joe, Cannon "was struck first by the serenity of the [Oval Office] surroundings and the self-possession of the princ.i.p.al." Cannon recorded in some notes he made on the meeting, "In this man, at this moment, there was no evidence that he was worn with the cares of office. He was casual. He was affable. He was unhurried, unbadgered ... .'How are you doing?' I said. 'I must say you journalist James M. Cannon interviewed the president for an article about his brother Joe, Cannon "was struck first by the serenity of the [Oval Office] surroundings and the self-possession of the princ.i.p.al." Cannon recorded in some notes he made on the meeting, "In this man, at this moment, there was no evidence that he was worn with the cares of office. He was casual. He was affable. He was unhurried, unbadgered ... .'How are you doing?' I said. 'I must say you look look fine. From all appearances, the job seems to be agreeing with you.' 'Well,' he said, with a big smile, 'I think it's going well. As you know we do have our ups and downs, the tides ebb and flow... . [But] in general, I think things are going well.'" fine. From all appearances, the job seems to be agreeing with you.' 'Well,' he said, with a big smile, 'I think it's going well. As you know we do have our ups and downs, the tides ebb and flow... . [But] in general, I think things are going well.'"

Kennedy's self-a.s.surance registered not only on White House insiders and Americans more generally but also on Western Europeans. His popularity with them, Time Time magazine journalist John Steele privately told the White House, was "at an exceedingly high, really inspired level." The British were ready to consider Kennedy the initiator of a family dynasty: They expected the president to have a second term, followed by the attorney general for eight years and then the senator from Ma.s.sachusetts. ("Whatever other deficiencies the family may have, it is abundantly supplied with heirs," one English writer observed.) Pressed to provide some philosophical wisdom about the position, Kennedy joked, "I have a nice home, the office is close by and the pay is good." His quick wit about his family and politics was on display at a 1963 gala: "I was proud of the Attorney General's first appearance before the Supreme Court yesterday," he solemnly declared. "He did a very good job, according to everyone I talked to: Ethel, Jackie, Teddy." Bobby's performance showed that "he does have broader interests-that he isn't limited to the slogan: 'Stop the world-I want to get Hoffa.'" Kennedy also made light of the resistance to his legislative proposals: "With all our contacts in show business and culture," he said, "the Democrats should make some progress. I'm trying to get [television series doctors] Dr. Kildare and Ben Casey to support my Medicare bill. And Kirk Douglas said he would support my proposals to strengthen the nation's economy with a tax cut. In fact, he said he's willing to go all the way and pay no taxes at all." During a presidential briefing breakfast with economic advisers, Kennedy turned aside criticism with good humor. When a favorable review for right-wing columnist Victor Lasky's book magazine journalist John Steele privately told the White House, was "at an exceedingly high, really inspired level." The British were ready to consider Kennedy the initiator of a family dynasty: They expected the president to have a second term, followed by the attorney general for eight years and then the senator from Ma.s.sachusetts. ("Whatever other deficiencies the family may have, it is abundantly supplied with heirs," one English writer observed.) Pressed to provide some philosophical wisdom about the position, Kennedy joked, "I have a nice home, the office is close by and the pay is good." His quick wit about his family and politics was on display at a 1963 gala: "I was proud of the Attorney General's first appearance before the Supreme Court yesterday," he solemnly declared. "He did a very good job, according to everyone I talked to: Ethel, Jackie, Teddy." Bobby's performance showed that "he does have broader interests-that he isn't limited to the slogan: 'Stop the world-I want to get Hoffa.'" K