1960s scribblings

January 7 - Following a 4-day conference in Casablanca, 5 African chiefs of state announce plans for a NATO-type African organization to ensure common defense. The Charter of Casablanca involves Morocco, the United Arab Republic, Ghana, Guinea, and Mali.  4.   Algeria, the Maghreb Union, and the Western Sahara Stalemate 

Journal article by Stephen Zunes; Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ), Vol. 17, 1995

Subjects: Algeria--Foreign relations, Morocco--Autonomy and independence movements, Polisario Front--Political activity, Western Sahara--Autonomy and independence movements

...been a period of indifference or hostility. Such prior efforts have included the Tangier meeting of 1958, the Casablanca conference of 1961, the functional cooperation of 1964-1969, and several efforts by Tunisia in 1984-85 to convene a pan...

http://www.questia.com/library/encyclopedia/casablanca_conference.jsp

Other events: The Sharpville Massacre in South Africa with around 70 killed, many in the back while running away. The ANC became a banned organisation. Up unitil then the ANC had had the non-violent policy Nelson Mandella wanted.

The CIA wasn’t just content to meddle in South American affairs. They were dabbling in Africa too. The CIA assassinated the democratically elected Patrice Lumumba in Congo-Zaire. However public support for Lumumba’s politics ran so high that the CIA could not clearly install his opponents in power. Four years of political turmoil followed.

The ANC in south africa were inspired by the Cuban example & they received Castro’s support.

The Sharpville massacre in South Africa 1960

Wolfie Kodesh in south African Communist Party

.

Middle East

Hereditary Shi ruling family of Yemen was deposed in a coup. Al Saud who sponsor Wahabi school of Islam that damns Shias as infidels gave military assistance to them.

Malaysia

British Malaya became Malaysia n 16th Sep 1963. 100,000 rioters and British embassy was burnt down. Britain lost most its influence and exports fell dramatically – US currently apply the failed philosophies of the British in Vietnam – but didn’t want to know about their failure: ‘hearts and minds’ didn’t work.

Iraq

April 1960 the CIA approved using a poisoning handkerchief  to kill Kassem. The “handkerchief was duly dispatched to Kassem,  but whether or not it ever reached him, it certainly had not killed him.”

Thomas Powers, “The man  Who Kept the Secrets: Richard Helms & The CIA”, New York: Knopf, 1979, page 130)

Yemen

MI6 supplied arms and aid to Royalist forces in Yemen to destabilise the republican government that took power in 1962.

PM Douglas-Home told parliament that “our policy towards Yemen is one of non-intervention in the affairs of that country.”

Britain arranged for a private company, AIRWORKS SERVICE, to train Saudi pilots and recruit RAF pilots as mercenaries to fly combat operations, for which Israel allowed its territory to be used.

Israel

Levi Eshkol became pm – 1963 to 1969.

Trivia

Michael Rockefeller disappeared in New Guinea while conducting anthropological research. He was never found.

Hugh Heffner opened the first Playboy Club in Chicago.

JDR III was leading fundraiser for NYC’s Lincoln Centre for performing arts. JDR, Jr died at age of 86.

Nelson Rockefeller married the former wife of a family friend – Margaretta ‘Happy’ Murphy.

Media reports of the Kennedys at play on Cape Cod.

Top Nazi murderer of Jews, Adolf Eichmann, captured by Israelis in Argentina (May 23)—executed in Israel in 1962.

Cuba begins confiscation of $770 million of U.S. property (Aug. 7 1960). There are 900 U.S. military advisers in South Vietnam.

National Strategy Information Center

ORGANIZATION

Right-wing think tank, funded by Richard Scaife, The Carthage Foundation, The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, and the John M. Olin Foundation, among others. It does not seem to have a web presence. Founded 1962 by Frank R. Barnett and Morris Liebman.

Name    Occupation         Birth      Death    Known for

William Casey

Spy         13-Mar-1913      29-Jan-1987        CIA Director, 1981-87

Joseph Coors, Sr.

Business              12-Nov-1917      15-Mar-2003      Ultraconservative beer baron

Frank Shakespeare

Diplomat              9-Apr-1925                         US Ambassador to the Vatican, 1986-89

Laurence H. Silberman

Judge    12-Oct-1935                       US Ambassador to Yugoslavia, 1975-77

http://www.nndb.com/org/596/000071383/

The National Strategy Information Center (NSIC), founded in 1962, was the first right-wing think tank to address such issues as national security strategy, low-intensity conflict, operations of intelligence agencies, political warfare, and the role of nongovernmental groups, especially labor unions, in furthering foreign and military policy goals. (1) Over the past four decades, NSIC has worked with the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies in studies of political and psychological warfare and in their collaboration with conservative labor union operations, especially in Europe and Latin America.

In addition to the support it has received directly or indirectly from the U.S. government, NSIC depends on grants from right-wing foundations. Launched with start-up funding from the Coors family, NSIC has in recent years depended on the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation. (2)

Among NSIC's founding directors were such right-wing figures as Joseph Coors, Frank Barnett, William Casey, Frank Shakespeare, and Prescott Bush, Jr., brother of George H.W. Bush. Barnett, who was one of the most prominent members of the Committee on the Present Danger, became a leading advocate of political warfare, psychological operations, and low-intensity conflict strategy in the 1980s. Barnett co-edited a National Defense University report on the subject with Carnes Lord—who, like former NSIC associates Abram Shulsky and Gary Schmitt, is a disciple of Straussian political philosophy. (3)

Lord was a member of the working group convened by NSIC in preparation for its report The Future of U.S. Intelligence, which was coauthored by Shulsky and Schmitt. Lord also served as the top national security aid in the office of Vice President Dan Quayle, where he worked alongside William Kristol, codirector of the Project for the New American Century.

NSIC president Roy Godson served as a consultant to the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB) during the Reagan years, when Schmitt was PFIAB's executive director. At the same time, Godson served as one of the main intermediaries between the private Nicaraguan contra support network and the National Security Council. He has long been closely connected with neocon-directed organizations, such as the Coalition for the Democratic Majority and the League for Industrial Democracy. Moreover, Godson was the longtime director of the International Labor program at Georgetown University, where NSIC's own Consortium for the Study of Intelligence is also housed.

http://rightweb.irc-online.org/profile/1525

http://rightweb.irc-online.org/gw/?sort=title

Right Web connections

William Kristol

Dan Quayle

Gary Schmitt

Abram Shulsky

Coalition for the Democratic Majority

League for Industrial Democracy

Project for the New American Century

Funding Sources

Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation

Smith Richardson Foundation

Sarah Scaife Foundation

John M. Olin Foundation

Carthage Foundation

Earhart Foundation

Contact Information

1730 Rhode Island Avenue, NW

Suite 500

Washington, DC 20036

Phone: (202) 429-0129

 The NSIC is a right-wing think tank for military strategy. It has a history of working with hard-line, anti-Soviet groups promoting an aggressive U.S. foreign policy. (10)

In a 1961 article in the Military Review on the subject of political warfare, Frank Barnett wrote,"Political warfare in short, is warfare--not public relations. It is one part persuasion and two parts deception. It embraces diverse forms of coercion and violence including strikes and riots, economic sanctions, subsidies for guerrilla or proxy warfare and, when necessary, kidnapping or assassination of enemy elites.

"The aim of political warfare... is to discredit, displace, and neutralize an opponent, to destroy a competing ideology, and to reduce the adherents to political impotence. It is to make one's own values prevail by working the levers of power, as well as by using persuasion."(22)

In 1962, Frank Barnett founded NSIC. Among its founding directors, officers and advisers were such stalwart right-wing figures as beer baron and funder of many ultra-rightist organizations Joseph Coors; Prescott Bush, Jr. , brother of President George Bush; Frank Shakespeare, chairman of the conservative think tank, the Heritage Fdn; and William Casey, former director of the CIA. (1,11,29)

The stated purpose of NSIC is to "encourage a civilmilitary partnership" to keep the public informed on issues surrrounding national defense. A properly informed public, the NSIC believes, will support "A viable U.S. defense system capable of protecting the nation's vital interests and assisting allies and other free nations determined to maintain their core values of freedom and independence."(12) One of the goals of NSIC is "to train young American labor leaders in the critical issues--philosophy, military, and political--that divide the free world from the Communist States."(10) The group focuses its efforts on business, labor, professional and military groups; academic and mass media; governmental schools; and colleges and universities. (12)

http://rightweb.irc-online.org/gw/2806

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Operation Northwoods

Origins and public release

The main proposal was presented in a document entitled "Justification for US Military Intervention in Cuba (TS)," a collection of draft memoranda written by the Department of Defense (DoD) and the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) representative to the Caribbean Survey Group.[1] (The parenthetical "TS" in the title of the document is an initialism for "Top Secret.") The document was presented by the Joint Chiefs of Staff to Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara on March 13 with one paragraph approved, as a preliminary submission for planning purposes.

The previously secret document was originally made public on November 18, 1997 by the John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Review Board,[2] a U.S. federal agency overseeing the release of government records related to John F. Kennedy's assassination.[3][4][5][6][7] A total of about 1500 pages of once-secret military records covering 1962 to 1964 were concomitantly declassified by said Review Board.

"Appendix to Enclosure A" and "Annex to Appendix to Enclosure A" of the Northwoods document were first published online by the National Security Archive on November 6, 1998 in a joint venture with CNN as part of CNN's 1998 Cold War television documentary series[8][9]—specifically, as a documentation supplement to "Episode 10: Cuba," which aired on November 29, 1998.[10][11] "Annex to Appendix to Enclosure A" is the section of the document which contains the proposals to stage terrorist attacks.

The Northwoods document was published online in a more complete form (i.e., including cover memoranda) by the National Security Archive on April 30, 2001.[12]

[edit] Content

In response to a request for pretexts for military intervention by the Chief of Operations of the Cuba Project, Brig. Gen. Edward Lansdale, the document lists methods (with, in some cases, outlined plans) the authors believed would garner public and international support for U.S. military intervention in Cuba. These are staged attacks purporting to be of Cuban origin, with a number of them having real casualties. Central to the plan was the use of "friendly Cubans"—Cuban exiles seeking to oust Fidel Castro.

The proposals included:

Starting rumors about Cuba by using clandestine radios.

Staging mock attacks, sabotages and riots at Guantanamo Bay and blaming them on Cuban forces.

Blowing up a U.S. ship in Guantánamo Bay and blaming it on Cuba—reminiscent of the destruction of the USS Maine at Havana in 1898, which helped to precipitate the Spanish-American War. (The document's first suggestion regarding the sinking of a U.S. ship is to blow up a ship at sea and hence would result in U.S. Navy members being killed, with a secondary suggestion of possibly using an unmanned ship and fake funerals instead.)

"Harassment of civil air, attacks on surface shipping and destruction of US military drone aircraft by MIG type [sic] planes would be useful as complementary actions."

Destroying an unmanned drone masquerading as a commercial aircraft supposedly full of "college students off on a holiday". This proposal was the one supported by the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Staging a "terror campaign", including the "real or simulated" sinking of Cuban refugees:

"We could develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in other Florida cities and even in Washington. The terror campaign could be pointed at refugees seeking haven in the United States. We could sink a boatload of Cubans enroute [sic] to Florida (real or simulated). We could foster attempts on lives of Cuban refugees in the United States even to the extent of wounding in instances to be widely publicized. Exploding a few plastic bombs in carefully chosen spots, the arrest of Cuban agents and the release of prepared documents substantiating Cuban involvement, also would be helpful in projecting the idea of an irresponsible government."

Burning crops by dropping incendiary devices in Haiti, the Dominican Republic or elsewhere.

Journalist James Bamford summarized Operation Northwoods in his April 24, 2001 book Body of Secrets:

Operation Northwoods, which had the written approval of the Chairman and every member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called for innocent people to be shot on American streets; for boats carrying refugees fleeing Cuba to be sunk on the high seas; for a wave of violent terrorism to be launched in Washington, D.C., Miami, and elsewhere. People would be framed for bombings they did not commit; planes would be hijacked. Using phony evidence, all of it would be blamed on Castro, thus giving Lemnitzer and his cabal the excuse, as well as the public and international backing, they needed to launch their war.[13]

[edit] Related Operation Mongoose proposals

In addition to Operation Northwoods, under the Operation Mongoose program the Department of Defense had a number of similar proposals to be taken against the Cuban regime of Fidel Castro.

Twelve of these proposals come from a February 2, 1962 memorandum entitled "Possible Actions to Provoke, Harass or Disrupt Cuba," written by Brig. Gen. William H. Craig and submitted to Brig. Gen. Edward Lansdale, the commander of the Operation Mongoose project.[14][5][6][7]

The memorandum outlines Operation Bingo, a plan to, in its words, "create an incident which has the appearance of an attack on U.S. facilities (GMO) in Cuba, thus providing an excuse for use of U.S. military might to overthrow the current government of Cuba."

It also includes Operation Dirty Trick, a plot to blame Castro if the 1962 Mercury manned space flight carrying John Glenn crashed, saying "The objective is to provide irrevocable proof that, should the MERCURY manned orbit flight fail, the fault lies with the Communists et al Cuba [sic]." It continues, "This to be accomplished by manufacturing various pieces of evidence which would prove electronic interference on the part of the Cubans."

Even after General Lyman Lemnitzer lost his job as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Joint Chiefs of Staff still planned false-flag pretext operations at least into 1963. A different Department of Defense policy paper created in 1963 discussed a plan to make it appear that Cuba had attacked a member of the Organization of American States (OAS) so that the United States could retaliate. The Pentagon document says of one of the scenarios, "A contrived 'Cuban' attack on an OAS member could be set up, and the attacked state could be urged to take measures of self-defense and request assistance from the U.S. and OAS." The plan expresses confidence that by this action "the U.S. could almost certainly obtain the necessary two-thirds support among OAS members for collective action against Cuba."[15][13]

Included in the nations the Joint Chiefs suggested as targets for covert attacks were Jamaica and Trinidad-Tobago. Since both were members of the British Commonwealth, the Joint Chiefs hoped that by secretly attacking them and then falsely blaming Cuba, the United States could incite the people of the United Kingdom into supporting a war against Castro.[13] As the Pentagon report noted,

Any of the contrived situations described above are inherently, extremely risky in our democratic system in which security can be maintained, after the fact, with very great difficulty. If the decision should be made to set up a contrived situation it should be one in which participation by U.S. personnel is limited only to the most highly trusted covert personnel. This suggests the infeasibility of the use of military units for any aspect of the contrived situation.[13]

The Pentagon report even suggested covertly paying a person in the Castro government to attack the United States: "The only area remaining for consideration then would be to bribe one of Castro's subordinate commanders to initiate an attack on [the U.S. Navy base at] Guantanamo."[13]

[edit] Reaction

It has been reported that John F. Kennedy personally rejected the Northwoods proposal, but no official record of this exists. The proposal was sent for approval to the Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, but was not implemented. President Kennedy removed General Lyman Lemnitzer as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff shortly afterward, although he became Supreme Allied Commander of NATO in January 1963.

The continuing push against the Cuban government by internal elements of the U.S. military and intelligence community (the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion, the Cuban Project, etc.) prompted President John F. Kennedy to attempt to rein in burgeoning hardline anti-Communist sentiment that was intent on proactive, aggressive action against communist movements around the globe. After the Bay of Pigs, John F. Kennedy fired then CIA director Allen W. Dulles, Deputy Director Charles P. Cabell, as well as Deputy Director Richard Bissell, and turned his attention towards Vietnam.

Kennedy also took steps to bring discipline to the CIA's Cold War and paramilitary operations by drafting a National Security Action Memorandum (NSAM) which called for the shift of Cold War operations to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Pentagon as well as a major change in the role of the CIA to exclusively deal in intelligence gathering.

On August 3, 2001, the National Assembly of People's Power of Cuba (the main legislative body of the Republic of Cuba) issued a statement referring to Operation Northwoods and Operation Mongoose wherein it condemned such U.S. government plans.[16]

[edit] See also

 Cuba Portal

Bay of Pigs Invasion

Body of Secrets

CIA Family Jewels

The Cuban Project (Operation Mongoose)

Cuba-United States relations

Operation WASHTUB, a plan to plant a phony Soviet arms cache in Nicaragua to demonstrate Guatemalan ties to Moscow.[17]

Proactive, Preemptive Operations Group (P2OG)

9/11 conspiracy theories, which sometimes invoke the operation

[edit] Further reading

Jon Elliston, editor, Psywar on Cuba: The Declassified History of U.S. Anti-Castro Propaganda (Melbourne, Australia and New York: Ocean Press, 1999), ISBN 1-876175-09-5.

James Bamford, Body of Secrets: Anatomy of the Ultra-Secret National Security Agency From the Cold War Through the Dawn of a New Century (New York: Doubleday, first edition, April 24, 2001), ISBN 0-385-49907-8. Here is an excerpt from Chapter 4: "Fists" of this book.

[edit] References

^ a b U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, "Justification for US Military Intervention in Cuba (TS)," U.S. Department of Defense, March 13, 1962. The Operation Northwoods document in PDF format on the website of the independent, non-governmental research institute the National Security Archive at the George Washington University Gelman Library, Washington, D.C. Direct PDF links: here and here.

^ "The Records of the Assassination Records Review Board," National Archives and Records Administration.

^ "Media Advisory: National Archives Releases Additional Materials Reviewed by the Assassination Records Review Board," Assassination Records Review Board (a division of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration), November 17, 1997. A U.S. government press-release announcing the declassification of some 1500 pages of U.S. government documents from 1962-64 relating to U.S. policy towards Cuba, among which declassified documents included the Operation Northwoods document.

^ Jim Wolf, "Pentagon Planned 1960s Cuban 'Terror Campaign'," Reuters, November 18, 1997.

^ a b Mike Feinsilber, "At a tense time, plots abounded to humiliate Castro," Associated Press (AP), November 18, 1997; also available here.

^ a b Tim Weiner, "Documents Show Pentagon's Anti-Castro Plots During Kennedy Years," New York Times, November 19, 1997; appeared on the same date and by the same author in the New York Times itself as "Declassified Papers Show Anti-Castro Ideas Proposed to Kennedy," late edition—final, section A, pg. 25, column 1.

^ a b Jon Elliston, "Operation Mongoose: The PSYOP Papers," ParaScope, Inc., 1998.

^ "National Security Archive: COLD WAR: Documents," National Security Archive, September 27, 1998-January 24, 1999.

^ U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, "Appendix to Enclosure A: Memorandum for Chief of Operations, Cuba Project" and "Annex to Appendix to Enclosure A: Pretexts to Justify US Military Intervention in Cuba," U.S. Department of Defense, circa March 1962. First published online by the National Security Archive on November 6, 1998 as part of CNN's Cold War documentary series. "Annex to Appendix to Enclosure A" is the section of the Operation Northwoods document which contains the proposals to stage terrorist attacks.

^ "Episode 10: Cuba; Cuba: 1959-1968," CNN (Cable News Network LP, LLLP).

^ "Cold War Teacher Materials: Episodes," and "Educator Guide to CNN's COLD WAR Episode 10: Cuba," Turner Learning (Turner Broadcasting System, Inc.).

^ "Pentagon Proposed Pretexts for Cuba Invasion in 1962," National Security Archive, April 30, 2001.

^ a b c d e James Bamford, Chapter 4: "Fists" of Body of Secrets: Anatomy of the Ultra-Secret National Security Agency From the Cold War Through the Dawn of a New Century (New York: Doubleday, first edition, April 24, 2001), ISBN 0-385-49907-8. Here is an excerpt from Chapter 4: "Fists" of this book.

^ Memo from Brig. Gen. William Craig to Brig. Gen. Edward Lansdale, "Possible Actions to Provoke, Harass, or Disrupt Cuba," U.S. Department of Defense, February 2, 1962. The following are photoscans of this document in JPEG format: Page 1, Page 2, Page 3, Page 4. (Note: the foregoing links to Brig. Gen. Craig's memo are at this time offline. The following are backup links: text in HTML; JPEG photoscans: Page 1, Page 2, Page 3, Page 4.)

^ Mike Feinsilber, "Records Show Plan To Provoke Castro," Associated Press (AP), January 29, 1998.

^ "Statement by the National Assembly of People's Power of the Republic of Cuba," National Assembly of People's Power of Cuba, August 3, 2001; also available here.

^ Matthew Ward, COHA Research Fellow, "Appendix A: Timeline of Events" from "Washington Unmakes Guatemala, 1954," Council on Hemispheric Affairs, 2004. Accessed February 2006.

[edit] External links

See the above "References" section for documents cited in the body of this article.

Full text of the Operation Northwoods document in searchable HTML format.

The Operation Northwoods document in JPEG format.

Scott Shane and Tom Bowman with contribution from Laura Sullivan, "New book on NSA sheds light on secrets: U.S. terror plan was Cuba invasion pretext," Baltimore Sun, April 24, 2001.

Ron Kampeas, "Memo: U.S. Mulled Fake Cuba Pretext," Associated Press (AP), April 25, 2001.

Bruce Schneier, "'Body of Secrets' by James Bamford: The author of a pioneering work on the NSA delivers a new book of revelations about the mysterious agency's coverups, eavesdropping and secret missions," Salon.com, April 25, 2001.

David Ruppe, "U.S. Military Wanted to Provoke War With Cuba; Book: U.S. Military Drafted Plans to Terrorize U.S. Cities to Provoke War With Cuba," ABC News, May 1, 2001.

"The Truth Is Out There—1962 memo from National Security Agency," Harper's Magazine, July 2001.

Chris Floyd, "Head Cases," Moscow Times, December 21, 2001, pg. VIII; also appeared in St. Petersburg Times, Issue 733 (100), December 25, 2001.

"Operation Northwoods," SourceWatch.

Thierry Meyssan, "Operation Northwoods: The Terrorist Attacks Planned by the American Joint Chief of Staff against its Population," Voltaire Network, November 5, 2001. Wikipedia

What was LBJ up to?

LBJ as V-P was described as “unusually active”.

“He accepted special assignments, such as the chairmanship of the President’s committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, an agency that enlarged job opportunities for blacks.” The man who was to refer to “niggers” demonstrated that he was “free from racial prejudice”.

“Johnson made many trips for the administration – several trips abroad.” LBJ went on a “tour of SE Asia in May 1961”.

LBJ was frustrated with lack of responsibility.

But he had received “assurances from the president that he planned to have Johnson on the ticket in 1964.”

Johnson’s Criminal Past

LBJ’s position as V-P at that time shielded him from possible criminal indictments on charges ranging from the acceptance of political graft to conspiracy to commit murder. His association with Bobby Baker had exposed his Mafia connections and ongoing friendships with those individuals targeted by the Attorney General as key criminal figures in his war on organised crime. “First Hand Knowledge” Robert D Marrow.

Other political manoeuvres against JFK – William P Bundy (S&B 1939) was a CIA officer from 1951 to 1961. He was the son of Harvey Hollister Bundy (S&B 1909), Henry Stimson’s assistant Secretary of State and BBH agent. William P Bundy, as a 1960s defence officer pushed the Harriman-Dulles scheme for a Vietnam War. Harvey’s other son, McGeroge Bundy (S&B 1940) co-authored Stimson’s memoirs in 1948. McGeorge Bundy went on to organise the whitewash of the Kennedy assassinations and immediately switched policy from JFK’s pullout back to war in Vietnam. Research

LBJ was frustrated by lack of responsibility. But he had received “assurances from he president that he planned to have Johnson on the ticket in 1964.

Extra bits on JFK

On Vietnam

Eisenhower told him “I think you’re going to have to send troops” to south east Asia. But Kennedy’s plan was to conduct a limited war in order to force a political settlement. But the time for a compromise had long gone.  1964, JFK’s cabinet.

NSAM273 reversed this. It was issued after Kennedys death by LBJ on 26th November 1963 – withdrawal was put into reverse.

But JFK let on to his secretary in August 1963 that LBJ wasn’t going to his running mate in 1964.

NSAM III - ?

Dean Acheson

When JFK made it clear he would not strictly follow Acheson’s advice – Acheson said “Gentlemen, you might as well face it. This nation is without leadership.”

 55% -  60% of Americans believed they were heading for a war with Russia. The press appeared to be pressuring JFK into military action. He resisted.

New Freedom

JFK’s New Frontier of ‘unknown opportunities and perils’ to complete the New Freedom and the New Deals. Congressional opposition; aid for education; higher minimum wage; free health care for old people; he only won a federal housing bill, a large defense budget, and room to negotiate tariff cuts.

Steel Indusry

He went on a head-on battle with the large steel companies.

Took on the steel industry – to stop them raising prices and ended up bugging their phones – going thorough their accounts and steel executives backed off, did what JFK wanted, but under duress. Bobby and Jack acted together to do this. They must have pissed off plenty in Wall Street.

JFK opposed steel price increases – US steel Corp. backed down but criticised President as “hostile”.

JFK was also going to remove the 27.5% oil-depletion loophole. This certainly upset oil business – particularly the southern businessmen who’d backed LBJ. Dallas oil billionaire HL Hunt – a rightish fanatic who had his own intelligence network had spent millions backing LBJ, Nixon and ford, as well as McCarthy.

Race

JFK already had a track record on race. He’d intervened when King was arrested in Atlanta – Nixon hadn’t. At his inauguration JFK was angered that there were no black faces in the Coast Guard Unit marching past his stand. He had made Black Rights a central plank of his electoral campaign. JFK ordered an investigation of racism in every branch of government and authorised desegregation in the Guard.

He increased blacks working in the Justice Department by 700% and he was the first president to appoint black Ambassadors to Europe.

Federal troops were used to protect a black student at University of Mississippi.

Poor Health

After winning the election JFK’s health remained a major problem for him. “Kennedy was gambling that his health problems would not prevent him handling the job.” – Dallek.

Foreign Aid

JFK got congress to increase foreign aid around the globe and formed the peace corps.

The shocking risk of nuclear power/ weapons

First Nuclear Accident ?

At the National Reactor Testing Station in Idaho, on January 3rd, SL-1, an atomic reactor exploded. Three military technicians were killed.

An experimental reactor called SL-1 (Stationary Low-Power Plant Number 1) was destroyed when a control rod was removed incorrectly leading to core meltdown and explosion. All three men working in the reactor were killed. Due to the extensive radioactive isotope contamination, all three had to be buried in lead coffins. See “Idaho Falls: The untold story of America's first nuclear accident”.

NRTS was originally set up to develop nuclear energy in the immediate post-war years. In 1951, it was at the NRTS that the first harnessing of atomic energy for generating electric power occurred. On July 17, 1955, reactors at the NRTS made Arco, Idaho, the first town in the world to be powered by atomic energy.

Source: Wikipedia

Another one

January 24 - A U.S. B-52 Stratofortress, with two roughly 2.4 megaton nuclear bombs, crashed near Goldsboro, North Carolina.

culture

Music

Rock was eclipsed by pop. Ricky Nelson, Fabian, Bobby Vee, boy bands of their day. Rock’n’Roll suddenly became domnated by Bobbys.

Elvis had sold out. Berry was in jail. Buddy holly and Cochran were dead. Gene Vincent was in exile in UK and France. Johnny Kidd was the only new rocker – “Shakin all over” and “please don’t touch”.

In the UK Cliff Richard had gone pop too.

In the early 60s, rock spawned several subgenres, beginning with surf. Surf was an instrumental guitar genre characterized by a distorted sound, associated with the Southern California surfing youth culture.[86] Inspired by the lyrical focus of surf, The Beach Boys began recording in 1961 with an elaborate, pop-friendly and harmonic sound.[87] As their fame grew, The Beach Boys' songwriter Brian Wilson experimented with new studio techniques and became associated with the counterculture. The counterculture was a movement that embraced political activism, was closely connected to the hippie subculture. The hippies were associated with folk rock, country rock, and psychedelic rock. Folk and country rock were associated with the rise of politicized folk music, led by Pete Seeger and others, especially at the Greenwich Village music scene in New York. Folk Rock entered the mainstream in the middle of the 1960s, when the singer-songwriter Bob Dylan began his career. He was followed by a number of country-rock bands and soft, folky singer-songwriters. Psychedelic rock was a hard-driving kind of guitar-based rock, closely associated with the city of San Francisco. Though Jefferson Airplane was the only local band to have a major national hit, the Grateful Dead, a country and bluegrass-flavored jam band, became an iconic part of the psychedelic counterculture, associated with hippies, LSD and other symbols of that era.[88]

Dylan and Baez

PIC FROM WIKIPEDIA

Bob Dylan

On January 24 he reportedly makes his way to New York City He later finds fame in the Greenwich Village protest folk music scene.

1960 - Folk music was in. Rock’n’Roll was on its way out. Even a young Elvis imitator called Zimmerman had changed tack. Now called Dylan, he arrived in NYC on January 24th, after bumming a ride in Madison, Wisconsin. Dylan is likely on his way to visit his idol Woody Guthrie. He “took the coffee-house circuit in Greenwich Village by storm.” Supported by John Lee Hooker “he had learned to churn up exciting, bluesy, hard-driving harmonica and guitar music.” His big influences were Big Joe Williams, Guthrie, Leadbelly, Lightnin’ Hopkins. Bob Dylan’s debut album “Bob Dylan” was to appear later that year.

Bob Dylan: “Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan” 1962; Bob Dylan, “The Times They are a-changing” 1963;

Early Soul

Soul music, a combination of rhythm and blues and gospel which began in the late 1950s, is characterized by its use of gospel-music devices, with a greater emphasis on vocalists and the use of secular themes. The 1950s recordings of Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, and James Brown are commonly considered the beginnings of soul. The Motown Record Corporation of Detroit, Michigan became highly successful during the early and mid 1960s by releasing soul recordings with heavy pop influences to make them palatable to white audiences, allowing black artists to more easily crossover to white audiences.[77]

Pure soul was popularized by Otis Redding and the other artists of Stax Records in Memphis, Tennessee. By the late 1960s, Atlantic recording artist Aretha Franklin had emerged as the most popular female soul star in the country[78]. Also by this time, soul had splintered into several genres,[79] influenced by psychedelic rock and other styles. The social and political ferment of the 1960s inspired artists like Marvin Gaye and Curtis Mayfield to release albums with hard-hitting social commentary, while another variety became more dance-oriented music, evolving into funk. - wikipedia

Motown’s first number one in the US came in December 1961 – “Please Mr Postman” the Marvelettes. Hitsville USA – in a converted house on 2648 West Grand Boulevard, Detroit, Michigan. “Postman” was soon covered by the beatles and the miracles.’ “You really got a hold on me” and barrett strong’s “money”.

In 1963 James Brown released his seminal “Live at the Apollo”, against the wishes of his label boss, Syd Nathan, so Brown paid for the release himself. It went to number 2 and proved that blacks couls be self sufficient. ROUGH GUIDE TO MUSIC.

Martha and The Vandellas “Heatwave” by Hollander Dozier Hollander – Martha’s church gospel voice was very powerful.

Marvin Gaye “Can I Get A Witness” – when did he live in Kensal Green? Then Netherlands? Gaye was a versatile singer – Motown’s best.

Blues?

Country

By the early part of the 1960s…the Nashville sound had become perceived as too watered-down by many more traditionalist performers and fans, resulting in a number of local scenes like the Lubbock sound and the Bakersfield sound. A few performers retained popularity, however, such as the long-standing cultural icon Johnny Cash.[68] The Bakersfield sound began in the mid to late 1950s when performers like Wynn Stewart and Buck Owens began using elements of Western swing and rock, such as the breakbeat, in their music.[69] In the '60s performers like Merle Haggard popularized the sound. - Wikipedia

Woody Guthrie, Elvis, surf music, jazz

Wiki years 1961/ 62/ 63

Bukowski, Warhol,

Joseph Losey fled McCarthy trials – went to England. – “The Damned”  based on Lawrence’s “The Children Of The Light”.

Britain’s first ever US number 1 “Telstar” by Joe Meek expected 6 figure royalties that never arrived. A costly writ held up his cash for over four years – by then he was dead.

US airplay was refused to “Please Please Me” as producers were convinced it was about oral sex.

Elizabeth Taylor in “Cleopatra” – costume extravaganza.

Director Joseph L Mankiewcz “on the beach” aftermath of a limited nuclear war.

Kubrick’s “Dr Strangelove” ;

“Seven Days in May” in May - JFK said that [a US army coup] is what would happen to me if I ever tried such a deal

LouisArmstrong began a new career as a MOR singer – “Hello Dolly”.

United States Information agency - ?

Hugh Heffner opened the first plaboy club in Chicago

Jdr III was leading fundraiser for NYC’s Lincoln Centre for performing arts. Jr died aged 86.

Operation northwoods

Africa

November 1963

Hoover’s excitement at JFK’s death and his rush to tell Bobby – and ingraciating letter to Johnson. Summers p.314

Johnson a manic paranoid – summers page 339

Who was new VP?

Hoover was senile already in 1964 according to historian William Madester – summer p 334

Sacking hoover – everyone expected this, but it was out of the question – p 275 summers

P 276 in summers for early days.

Suggestion that hoover was insane p 279.

After 1964 Hoover was to turn 70 – a chance for Kennedy to get rid of him. All they had to do was to hang on till after the election.

Johnson waived the compulsory retirement rule – executive order 10682 – hoover could continue.

The New Government

LBJ had been the democrat majority leader able to wield votes to block or support the president, so upon becoming president “quickly broke the legislative deadlock between president and congress.” – Enc. Americana.

He didn’t immediately change the JFK cabinet, except for Bobby, who he really hated, who was sacked in 64, replaced by Nicholas Katzenbach ; and Luther H Hodges (Commerce, replaced by John T Conor. In 65 Grenouski (Postmaster General) went too. RFK, after his brother’s death, “found himself quietly edged out by the new president” – JFK on line.

RFK moved on to the Senate.

LBJ was facing election this year.

Nelson Rockefeller decided to run for President in up-coming Election campaign.

Tax Reduction Act passed – to stimulate economic growth with federal spending.

Warren Commission

Johnson consulted with various government officials. His consultations, many by telephone, resulted in the decision to form an official enquiry investigation into the assassination. Further pressure was brought to bear on President Johnson on November 26, 1963, when The Washington Post published an editorial advocating the formation of an investigative commission.

President Johnson, by Executive Order 11130 on November 29, 1963, created an investigatory commission to be headed by Earl Warren. He also appointed the following political figures as members of the commission:

•             Congressman Hale Boggs (D-LA)

•             Senator John Sherman Cooper (R-KY)

•             Former CIA Director Allen Dulles

•             Congressman Gerald Ford (R-MI), a future Vice President and U.S. President

•             Former World Bank president and diplomat John J. McCloy

•             Senator Richard Russell, Jr. (D-GA)

•             J. Lee Rankin served as the commission's general counsel. Future Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter, Iowa attorney David Belin, and New York University Law Professor Norman Redlich worked as assistant counsel for the commission.

The Commission first met in February 1964 and returned its final report in September. Wikipedia

Gerald Ford – a member of the Warren Commission investigation into Kennedy’s murder, “an intimate and furtive relationship between Ford and the FBI”. Released documents showed Ford fed top secret information to the FBI while he was a member of the Warren Commission. “Plausible Denial” MARK LANE

The Invisible Government

Suddenly the naivety of the ‘50s had been replaced by cynicism and paranoia. The shock of the death of Kennedy – made worse by there being no easy culprit to string up. UFOs, fears of nuclear war joined to together with stories of CIA, FBI, and government conspiracies to create this climate of distrust .

“The invisible Government” ISBN 0-394-71993-X, by Ross and Wise, reprinted in 1974. About the Bay of Pigs, Burma, Indonesia, Laos, Vietnam, Guatemala, Iran, Egypt, Costa Rica and Gehlen Organisation. It included chapters on NSA and DIA. A landmark book – the US public knew very little of all this. CIA director John McClone called Wise and Ross in to demand deletions. They refused, so the CIA formed a special group to deal with the book and tried to secure bad reviews.

The Outsider literary magazine published by Jon and Gypsy Lou Webb featured some of Charles Bukowski's poetry. Under the Loujon Press, they published Bukowski's It Catches My Heart In Its Hands (1963), and Crucifix in a Deathhand, in 1965. Jon Webb bankrolled his printing ventures with his Vegas winnings. It was at this point that Bukowski and Franz Douskey began their friendship. They argued and often got into fights. Douskey was a friend of the Webbs, and was often a guest at their small E. Elm Street house that also served as a publishing venue. The Webbs, Bukowski and Douskey spent time together in New Orleans, where Gypsy Lou eventually returned after the passing of Jon Webb.

Bukowski had returned to the post office in Los Angeles in 1960, and continued to work there as a clerk for over a decade. 

Based on Wikipedia article