John F. Kennedy

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the son of Joseph Patrick Kennedy and Rose Fitzgerald, was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, on 29th May, 1917. His great grandfather, Patrick Kennedy, had emigrated from Ireland in 1849 and his grandfathers, Patrick Joseph Kennedy and John Francis Fitzgerald, were important political figures in Boston. Kennedy's father was a highly successful businessman who later served as ambassador to Great Britain (1937-40).
In 1940 Kennedy graduated from Harvard University with a science degree. The same year saw the publication of Why England Slept (1940), a book on foreign policy. He joined the United States Navy in 1941 and became an intelligence officer. After the United States entered the Second World War, Kennedy was transferred to the Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron where he was given command of a PT boat.
Sent to the South Pacific, in August 1943, his boat was hit by a Japanese destroyer. Two of his crew were killed but the other six men managed to cling on to what remained of the boat. After a five hour struggle Kennedy, and what was left of his crew, managed to get to an island five miles from where the original incident took place.
Kennedy suffered a bad back injury and in December 1943 was sent back to the United States. When he recovered he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant and became a PT instructor in Florida. After a further operation on his back he returned to civilian life in March 1945. For the next twelve months he worked as a journalist covering the United Nations Conference in San Francisco and the 1945 General Election in Britain.
A member of the Democratic Party, Kennedy won election to the House of Representatives in 1946. Over the next couple of years he established himself as a loyal supporter of Harry S. Truman. In Congress he advocated progressive taxation, the extension of social welfare and more low-cost public housing. He was also a leading opponent of the Taft-Hartley Bill.
Kennedy took a strong interest in foreign policy and in 1951 toured Europe visiting Britain, France, Italy, Spain, Yugoslavia and West Germany. On his return he told the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations that the United States should maintain its policy of helping to defend Western Europe. However, he argued that the countries concerned should contribute more to the costs of the operation.
In the autumn of 1951 Kennedy visited the Middle East, India, Pakistan, Indochina, Malaya and Korea. An opponent of colonial empires, Kennedy urged that France should leave Algeria. He also argued for increased financial aid to underdeveloped countries.
Kennedy was elected to the Senate in 1952. The following year he married Jacqueline Bouvier, the daughter of a New York City financier. Over the next few years four children were born but only two, Caroline and John, survived infancy. Kennedy continued to suffer from back problems and had two operations in October 1954 and February 1955. While recovering in hospital he wrote the Pulitzer Prize winning Profiles in Courage (1956).
Kennedy was a strong advocate of social welfare and civil rights legislation in the Senate. Kennedy also sponsored bills for providing Federal financial aid to education, liberalizing United States immigration laws and a measure that required full disclosure of all employee pension and welfare funds.
In 1960 Kennedy entered the race to become the Democratic Party presidential candidate. Kennedy won Democratic primaries in New Hampshire, Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, Oregon, Maryland, Nebraska and West Virginia. At the national convention in July 1960, Kennedy was nominated on the first ballot. He selected Lyndon B. Johnson, as his running mate.
In 1960 Kennedy entered the race to become the Democratic Party presidential candidate. Kennedy won Democratic primaries in New Hampshire, Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, Oregon, Maryland, Nebraska and West Virginia. At the national convention in July 1960, Kennedy, defeated him main opponent, Lyndon B. Johnson, and was nominated on the first ballot.
Harris Wofford claims in his book, Of Kennedys and Kings (1980), that Sargent Shriver phoned him with the news that he had discovered from Johnson's camp that "Johnson will accept the vice-presidential nomination if Jack offers it to him." Shriver told Wofford to wake Kennedy up early so that we can "warn him before any move is made". Despite this, Kennedy did offer the post to Johnson. Kenneth O'Donnell told Kennedy: "This is the worst mistake you ever made. You came here... like a night on a white charger... promising to get rid of the old hack machine politicians. And now, in your first move after you get the nomination, you go against all the people who supported you." Kennedy replied: "I'm forty-three years old, and I'm not going to die in office. So the vice-presidency doesn't mean anything."
Kennedy's candidacy was controversial because no Roman Catholic had ever been elected president. It was generally believed that this had played an important factor in the defeat of Al Smith in 1928. Kennedy decided to tackle this issue head on and in a speech in Houston on 11th September, 1960, Kennedy attacked religious bigotry and he explained how he believed in the absolute separation of church and state.
If elected, Kennedy, at 43, would be the second youngest president in United States history (Theodore Roosevelt was only 42 when he replaced the assassinated William McKinley in 1901). In contrast, Richard Nixon, the Republican Party candidate, had served for eight years as vice president under Dwight Eisenhower.
As Richard D. Mahoney points out in Sons & Brothers: The Days of Jack and Bobby Kennedy, during the campaign, Kennedy used “Cuba as an illustration of Republican weakness against communism. In campaign speeches Kennedy would charge that the threat of communism was now only 'ninety miles from our shore’.” This upset some of his advisers. Harris Wofford, argues in Of Kennedys and Kings: Making Sense of the Sixties (1980) that “during the 1960 campaign, Kennedy seemed to relish taking rhetorical shots at Castro and competing with Republicans over who would take the strongest action against the new Cuban regime.” Wofford “was most disturbed” when Kennedy issued a statement calling for the United States “to strengthen the non-Batista democratic anti-Castro forces in exile, and in Cuba itself, who offer eventual hope of overthrowing Castro.” Kennedy then went onto say that “thus far these fighters for freedom have had virtually no support from our Government.”
Richard Helms claims in A Look Over My Shoulder (2003) that the leadership of the CIA favoured Kennedy over Richard Nixon. He admits that it was possible that CIA Director Allen Dulles leaked information to the Kennedy team via Stuart Symington, which allowed the “Democrats to blame the Eisenhower administration for the famous missile gap – that is, permitting the Soviets to outdo the United States in the production of long-range missiles.”During the campaign Nixon highlighted his opponent's lack of experience but when the votes were counted, Kennedy won by 34,226,925 votes to 34,108,662.
It has been argued that hardliners in the CIA were more impressed with Kennedy than they were with Nixon during the 1960 Presidential campaign. Richard Bissell commented in his book, Reflections of a Cold War Warrior (1996): “The inauguration of John F. Kennedy provided the prospect of a new beginning for the nation. His vision and message and the vigour with which he undertook his responsibilities created high expectations. While his hard-line rhetoric was inspiring, it also served to raise the stakes in America’s global confrontation with the Soviets.”