Reached safety in the south. So, the people who get out now have formed there are enough of them that they are educating us about truth of our trivia and theres been several books published about life in north korea, and we now have a much better picture of what the truth of the existence is. You cant even mail a letter so the exiles created a black market in information. They hire chinese couriers to cross the border and deliver messages, or sometimes they deliver chinese cell phones to a north korean relative, tell the relative to go to an area near the border at a certain day and hour, turn on the phone, and receive a phone call from the relative who escaped to a different country. In south korea, north korean exiles formed organizations whose purpose is to get information into north korea, to give just one example, there are four radio stations run by north korean exiles that broadcast daily to north creigh north korea. The man tray of the kim family regime that north korea is the greatest, most prosperous nation on earth and that the north Korean People are the happiest is being exposed for the lie it is. Watch this and other programs online at booktv. Org. Up next on booktv, afterwords, with James Hershberg of the Cold War International history project. This week, David Coleman and his book the 14th day jfk and the aftermath of the cuban missile crisis, and in it, they detail the days following october 28th, 1962 and show that the public believed the crisis ended, president kennedy continued to walk a fine diplomatic line to secure the removal of Nuclear Weaponry from cuba. Host david, as you know, theres a ton of literature about the cuban missile crisis, most focusing on the 13 days as Bobby Kennedys memoir was called in 1969 and the hollywood version. What made you focus on the aftermath . Guest two things i wanted to talk about with this book, two tracks that end up dove tailing in the end. First of all, the books that cover the crisis end on the 13th day, october 28th once decided to back down, agreed via radio method to withdraw missiles from cuba. The question, no what . What happened . Interestingly, and this is back to what usually happens, we actually know what happened in the weeks and months happened better from russian and cuban sources rather than from the america side. I was lucky enough to work with the kennedy tapes during that period, and kennedy was taping intensively in that period, and i had a remarkable window in. I wanted to extend the story at the missile crisis to find out what happened then because on the 13th day, there were missiles in cuba, soviet troops in cuba, and weapons in cuba. Host to which the Americans Department really know about. Guest didnt really know about. The point is they said they would remove the missiles, but the soviets lied before. There was a deep skepticism that perhaps this was just a trick because perhaps the crisis was not over, perhaps it was going to get worse. Thats one thing i wanted to extend and deepen the crisis. Second, this is a remarkable period in kennedys presidency, a pivot point to turn the presidency around. If you do any poll today on the greatest president s since world war issue, kennedy ranks head and shoulders number one, and the primary reason is the handling of the cuban missile crisis i argue. I wanted to look at the period where kennedy took a presidency that was not going as well as he hoped, and he was able to turn things around and establish a legacy up to the months of 1963. These things dovetail. What we understand about the cuban missile crisis, that it was a kennedy victory, a proud moment for american history, i argue was not inevitable. Back to december, january, february of 1963, it was touch and go whether or not this was going to go down as a kennedy victory or failure because his political opponents were trying to paint it as a failure, and so i think this battle thats going on with kennedy trying to shake his presidency, define his presidency, and shape his legacy is going on at the same time, but also informs how we understand the missile crisis today. Host one of the ironies of history is with ford by written backwards, and written backwards, under the shadow of kennedys assassination a year later, and one the first books about the crisis across the cover, his finest hour, and they think that was just a try trium, but the book clarifies it was a dicey situation when the crisis seemingly ends, but there were a lot of issues left on the table. Your book deals with the question of trust in a way of inspection. Ronald reagan said trust but verify, and on the same day they agreed to remove the weapons, castro refused to allow the inspection of any missile dismantling and removal from cuba. What were some complications kennedy had to begin with starting october 29th on the issue of inspection and of dealing with the soviet weapons and forces leftover in cuba . Guest right, i think the context for this is important to remember that on october 18th, two days after kennedy was shown photographs, the soviet missiles in cuba, they came into the oval office, kennedy asked him flat out, are you installing offensive Nuclear Missiles in cuba, and they said, no, were not doing this. Unknown to him, kennedy had the 8 by 10 photos. He was lied to directly about the missiles. Fast forward two weeks. You got this issue where the soviet premier said well remove the missiles. Trust us, well do it, and for the members of the excon, the issue was not so much trust, but verify, it was verify first. There was not trust in the issue. Kennedys on tape talking about the soviet ambassador of the United States was not burned as a source because we cant believe him, not because necessarily he was lying, but there was concern they were not told about this. There were concerns about listening to any soviet diplomats. The thing about being brought to the country, and so kennedy and excom have a promise, but they really have to follow through and work out how to verify first. They talk about how this might, in fact, be a massive trick, a hoax of which history has no parallel so what they have to do is work out how they can do it, and what that involves is american eyes seeing whats happening on the ground. Their preference is to send americans weapons inspections into cuba. Castro said hes not going to allow that. Next best thing is sending american surveillance planes over. That, in itself, is a complicated decision. A surveillance plane was shot down. He was still threatening to shoot american planes. Low level planes came back with bullet holes. There was accounts after the days when flying over cuba, and so for kennedy, this is a decision do i send american pie lots in harms way . They had to decide it every day. They go through the decision whether or not its required we send these over today. The verification in this period is about sending american planes over, and that has its risks because what do you do if an american plane is shot down . There is, actually, a remarkable we can talk later about the value of the tapes, themselves, but theres a remarkable moment there, on the tapes, that doesnt show up in any other documents, and the date is november 5th, the day before the midterm election. Robert kennedy is meeting in his office with the soviet ambassador trying to work out the deals privately about this. Word just came to kennedy in the oval office that an american sur valance plane, the pentagon told him a surveillance plane may have been shot down. Kennedy has the recorder rolling, gets on phone, and talking to bobby kennedy, and kennedy, at this point, thinks, okay, we think a plane is shot down. Now, what do we do . Hes going through, you know, do air strikes . Thinking about all these things about the political pressure to be faced with when this comes out, and so its one of those remarkable moments you get to hear a president in realtime struggling through, okay, now what do we do . Do we, you know, retaliate . Send our planes over, nox out the airfields . Something like that . It would have reinflamed the crisis. It was a false alarm. They scrambled, but they had not shot down the plane. You get windows and remarkable sense of what kennedy is facing, and this is a week after the 13 days. You get a sense of how Close Military action was during this period. One thing thats clear through the years, kennedy was acutely airful of escalation and how future generations look if they lost control of the situation as it happenedded in 1914, but now with Nuclear Weapons, and, of course, on the 27th, the contingency plan was to shoot down the surface to air missile sites, and kennedy refused to authorize it because of isolation. One of the points your book brings out is it was not just a question whether or not to send planes, but what kind of planes . There were the high level planes, safer, less vulnerable to be shot down, at least by the cubans. The soviets were playing along. They, you know, were not shooting the surface to air missiles, but to get good quality photographs, you had to send low level, and those were vulnerable to the cubans. Guest thats right. Its worth explaning why they were under control of two systems. The soviets surface to air system was very sophisticated requiring six months of training for anyone to operate it. During the crisis and after, it was still operated by soviet personnel as you point out. The lower level ones, the standard antiaircraft was controlled, youre right, by the cubans. They had two leaders telling them essentially two different sets of instructions. Americans considered the soviets much more republican and trusted them not to shoot down a plane more than the cubans not to. Host that is a side issue thats focus of new research which is we remember the october crisis 50 years ago this month. Crisis shows theres a secret cube cubansoviet crisis in 1962, its a title of the new book for the anniversary, about how fidel castro is absolutely furious at the soviet. Did the americans suspect how bitter that disagreement was . In fact, one of the intense arguments that was had in leadership was castros insistence for the sake of cuban sovereignty and dignity. Firing on the reconnaissance planes, the soviets, youre right, ready to play along of bringing the crisis to resolution. Did the americans suspect how bitter the divide was between the soviets and cubans . Guest the americans did not have significant information about what was happening, they did not have anyone on the inside, but the cubans did a bad job of hiding how unhappy they were with the soviet. In the Intelligence Briefings that the president and advisers would get every day, there was updates about what the latest annoyance was, and so they certainly had a sense of it even if they didnt know the i want mat details. Host did that, at all, help to build renewed trust in khrushchev, and it was not a u. S. Official. In congress and american politics, people were saying its our chance to get rid of the regime. How do we know they wont hide missiles in cabs or anything like that. How did kennedy view khrushchev after he agreed to pull the missiles out . Guest im not sure. It took awhile. We talkedded about trusting before verifying. I think trusting game gradually again once the surveillance flights were showing the soviets, were, in fact, following through, dismantling things, they started to realize, yes, the soviets and khrushchev in particular was actually, you know, perhaps we can trust him, and later on and weeks later, theres moments where trust really comes again because the once we get through sort of the bookend of the missile crisis is the november 20 deal. Host right, when the quarantine ends. Guest right. Theres long range bombers in cuba, theres three weeks of negotiation about are these or are they not something to get rid of . Khrushchev says, dpien says, fine, well get rid of them. Its an issue of he said something that had not had the opportunity to follow through. He said, yes, well get rid of them within 30 days. At that moment, kennedy trusts khrushchev again because he lifts the guarantee with a promise. In the weeks following, once they realize the soviets are following through, they are kind of sort of if for one of the better words, the responsible parties in this, because, frankly, they did not view the cubans as particularly responsible or stable, and so once they realize that khrushchev was the one playing ball, they ended up trusting more and trusted him on the promise to remove the weapons, promise to remove combat troops in due court, which he didnt in the end, but the element of trust did, actually, build again. Host now, as well discuss later, you know, many have seen this as a pivot in the entire cold war, that this could have been a moment who kennedy and khrushchev ending or moderating the war, and yet it was cut off by kennedys assassination a year later, and khrushchevs ousting a year after that. Are you saying this did not happen overnight when the crisis ended, but it was a gradual process . This was not a immediate sense this is a guy i can do business with and resolve problems all over the place . Guest right. The trust element took a blow. The americans and kennedy felt lied to. I think quite justifiably, but thats exactly right. It was a slow process to regain trust, but by the summer of 1963, things took a big step towards that, and kennedy, again, calls for the American University speech june 10th talking about world peace which sounds generic, but that resinated well in the times, and even khrushchev said was the best speech by an american president since roosevelt. You have this, sort of, coming together, trying to work through these difficult problems because at the shared experience of how close things came. Host you mentioned the long range bombers, and this is an aspect of what kennedy and the advisers had to wrestle with in the days immediately after to withdraw. Missiles. There was a loophole by withdrawing weapons you described as offensive meaning kennedy and the advisers could try to negotiate or the soviets to withdraw more than the missiles, and the il28 bombers were a point of contention. One thing your book brings out to some extent is its not entirely clear whether the preimminent consideration from the american stand point was military security, National Security, or whether domestic politics, Public Opinion began to enter into the considerations of kennedy and his advisers. How would you analyze that aspect of the issue of trying to resolve the crisis, and what became a real sticking point, not only between the americans and the soviets, but the soviets and the cubans. They were told they could stay, but was dealt another blow that the soviets were going to take them out too. Guest i think this comes down to how president kennedy went about the business of being president and how he made decisions, that there was no yard rule for any particular decisions for him. There was no particular doctrine that he felt con finded confined to. It was not a matter of just deciding that one was one type of weapon satisfied military security requirements or violated them or whatever. It was more of looking at particular issue on its merits, and the way i think about this is contrasting two different problems here. One of them was the il28s. Theres this discussion going on. Khrushchev said well remove the missiles you describe as offensive, the weapons, so the ecom, kennedy, trying to work out what does offensive mean . What can we live with and what is it we cant live with in cuba . There was different ideas on what offensive are and soviet doctrine, went get into all the details there. Theres a struggling of what the understanding is. Now, the long range bombers to the americans, these had about 750 mile range. They could hit a lot of the southeast United States, but they were also very old. They were obsolete, and not much match for the american the southeastern United States, but the problem was, and lets backtrack. Kennedy, himself, did not think that these were particularly big problems, and, actually, he comes through on the tapes as the one who is least worried about the il28s, and on tape saying things like, we dont want the deal hung up on these, i thought they were unreasonable getting these out. I mean, hes trying to put himself in khrushchevs position a lot of the time. Hes not particularly insistent in getting them out, but he has advisers around him who are. He says we have to get these out, even if they are not a military threat in a crin call sense tots clinical sense, to the American Public, these are not allowed to stay because we cant live with the American Public if we allow them to say. Kennedy is eventually persuaded that, okay, even if youre not looking at crin call, sort of mill clinical sorts of military assessments of what is and is not a threat, you have to get rid of these. Looking at the other weapons, there was a lot of other military equipment in cuba host and tens of thousands of soviet troops too. Guest exactly. The troops are the issue here. The americans thought there was around about 7,000 to 8,000 troops. It started at 8,000, and eventually went up. The top they realized there was about 17,000 troops. In fact, there were around about 42 ,000. They never understood how many were there. On the 23rd of october, so the day after kennedys speech to the nation, they started sending over low level surveillance planes getting in detail what was on the ground in cuba discovering, there were, in fact, combat troops in cuba. First time they were discovered, four groups around the island. They had sophisticated carrier weapons, sophisticated cannons, Nuclear Capable rockets. What they are trying to decide is in the weeks after the 13 days is, okay, First Priority is getting rid of the il28s, but do we want to insist on getting troops and weapons out . Do we have to go to the map to force khrushchev to pull them out . The decision there is different, and it drags on. Its a lower priority. One of the reasons its lower priority is they dont look bad to the American Public in the sense these weapons and troops cannot reach american soil. They are a threat to guantanamo. The marine corp. Come daunt has a line about, well, these weapons can deal bloody hell with guantanamo. Host the base at guantanamo . Guest exactly right. Which is on the island of cuba, of course. They couldnt reach the United States, itself, and so these were not considered as urgent a threat. What actually happened is they dropped off the top tier, and they by the end of november, after the november 20 deal, by november 29th, kennedy actually, khrushchev says hell probably remove them in due course, which is the phrase he used, but he really has no incentive to do that anymore, and we dont have any leverage, and the only leverage we can offer is formalize a no invasion guarantee. Thats too high a price. Essentially, maybe we have to live with it. What happened in the end, the soviets for their own arguments with the cubans decided to pull out Tactical Nuclear weapons. The americans did not force that. The americans also did not force them to pull out the combat troops, although they kept raising it in 1963, still talking about it in weeks before the assassination. A group ended up staying and resurfaced a decade and a half later when nixon is hitting the brigade crisis. Host it had been forgotten about. Guest it all dates back to the decision in november 1962 that were not going to make these a top tier priority of forcing them out that the troops end up host the mind set in aseesing weapons as offensive rather than defensive. Some said to kennedy and around the table that, you know, these could be a threat to the hemisphere, cuban subversion, which was greatly feared. In fact, the big fear was that not so much that cuba was a threat, but it was spreading to other countries, and brazil, was feared, would be a second cuba. Kennedy and the advisers, tell me, the tapes you studied carefully in the aftermath, and i should mention, of course, david is going to be publishing, been editing volumes of the transfers come back to these later never accepted khrushchevs public rationale to deploy them, which was to detour an american invasion, detour another bay of pigs, but with the american forces, not cubans. They always put the worst Case Analysis and why all of these materials were there. Is that fair to say that that view never shifted even though some of them were aware of the overt american operations against castro and intended to overthrow castro . Guest ill get the first part of the question there too because i think its interesting. Theres an aspect that came through in recent years. First of all, recently, theres been brought out is that talking about the frogs and lunas short range, battlefield weapons, a nuclear warhead. Soviets sent some around about 98 or so to cuba. Now, the original plan the soviets had was to hand, at least, some of these over to the cubans themselves which would have made cuba a nuclear power. When you talk about, you know, kennedys fear about subversion, there was an aspect of this they did not understand which was, okay, perhaps cuba might, in fact, get Nuclear Weapons and this is only something we learned more recently. If case castro is inclined to share weapons or resources with fellow revolutionaries in latin america, there was a sense, hold on he was close to getting these weapons, and things could have got out of control. Americans did not know this. Kennedy thought thed why of handing weapons was absolutely not possible, absurd. He didnt think they would do that. He had no idea that was the plan. That as pelgt of the subversion, i think, is actually was much more dangerous than i think they even thought at the time because they didnt realize the aspect that cubans might, in fact, have Nuclear Tactical weapons. Host some did have nuclear payloads they could have delivered. Guest a lot they didnt know, but theres military assumptions. Host did they understand this dynamic, that came out in the sovietcuban tensions in november, which is that in order to sort of rescue, salvage, the soviet ewen ban alliance knowing castro was so furious at moscow for removing the missiles, they reassured him, the commitment to protecting cuba still existed, and the soviets were desperate to keep as much other than the Nuclear Weapons, turned out, under cuban control, and to essentially re have a trip wire that the americans could not simply invade cuba with impunity, and did the americans understand that, you know, this alliance was in jeopardy . Guest well, i think this comes back to the second part of the previous question is that why did khrushchev do this . Historians argue why he did it. Khrushchev said a few Different Things why he did it that shifted over time, but settled on the idea that the idea was to defend cuba, and if you go back to the period of the time and look at what kennedy was thinking, this was not really his what he thought khrushchev was up to. Kennedy looked at a much more global game. He did not think, that, you know, khrushchev first of all, why would you send long range missiles to protect cuba . It didnt make sense at the time. Kennedy is trying to think through why is khrushchev doing this . The idea of defending cuba doesnt come a because kennedy knows full well hes not planning a full invasion anyway. Theres other covert going things on against castro, but full invasion is not really probably what hes going to do. He doesnt jump to the defense of cuba idea. He jumps to a global view, and looks halfway around the world where he feels vulnerable, which is west berlin, and he thinks khrushchev has been trying to force the bill in issue since 1968, and that dates back to the blockaid, and this is a festering cold war flash point. Kennedy feels vulnerable there as eisenhower had and truman had. He thinks maybe its about west berlin and khrushchev is trying to leverage something here in some way to solve the problem. Khrushchev had actually been giving him some evidence this might, in fact, been happening through the summer. Khrushchev kept talking to american visitors and west german visitors who visited moscow, and they brought out berlin, that were going to bring this up in november at the United Nations after the midterm elections, and so this, he was broadcasting this through the summer. Kennedy read about this, read all the reports, and so their conditioned going into this country sice crisis that they were going to force the bill at issue. Kennedy keeps coming back to cuba. If you ask kennedy whats khrushchev up to here, and, you know, kennedy, himself, was talk about this on tapes, kennedy says west berlin, and would not say defense of cuba. The defense of cuba angle really doesnt come through a lot from the americans. They are not really thinking this through because it doesnt make sense to them or sound like the way you defend cuba is to do this. The way an american suspected in 1962 to defend cuba would be to have a mutual treaty, a warsaw pactlike treaty or send conventional weapons, but not long range weapons to offend the United States. Host its funny, if khrushchev only sent the battlefield weapons, i think kennedy would have had a harder time convincing the world they were offensive weapons. Guest absolutely, it was a harder time convincing them they were a threat to the United States. That deterrence angle only works if you announce it, and, of course, host what good is a doomsday machine if you dont tell the world . Guest exactly. So at the point that the crisis broke, almost everything about this was still secret. Now, who knows what he would have done, whether he would have gone to the United Nations, saying this is done, but deterrence works if the only the other person knows about it. The americans were not told about the missiles, short range or long range ones. Host the other aspect behind khrushchevs decision was the nuclear balance, you know, a year before the u. S. Revealed that u. S. Actually had extreme superiority in strategic striking power assumed this was the way for khrushchev to recoop that on the cheek. Lets move to another subject dealt with interestingly in the book. Of course, kennedys concerned about the domestic political ramifications in the week, and its certainly those even in uniform chiefs of staff that warned if kennedy did not act strongly, he was told this is apiecement. The issue of managing Public Opinion is something you bring out interesting, not just during the crisis because its wellknown that when the excom met before kennedys speech, there were efforts by kennedy to contact publishers to hold off, but the news management angle in the aftermath, talk about that. Guest this dates back to the summer of 1962, and kennedy is concerned about leaks of National Security information turning up on the front page of the new york times. Theres estimates that are very high level intelligence estimates that are actuallily fairly widely distributed, several hundred people get them, but fairly highly classified at the same time. President s dont like it when estimates end up on the front page of the new york times. Kennedy is trying to crack down on leaks and a way to stop leaks from happening. He entertains ideas. The fbi is investigating these, and he brings in a group of advisers who are not very widely known. They are the president s foreign intelligence advisory board. This is a group that does not have its own power like the cia. All they do, as you get from the name, is advise the president. The president says has complete control over who is on this board. Now, he asked this group to come up with a recommendation. They came back and said what you need is get the cia to do this. The fbi can try it, but they are not particularly good at it because the agents dont have the clearances. They are not schooled in the back round issues. You need the cia to do this. They recommended having the cia spy on american journalists, directly against the National Security act that forms the cia. The cia is supposed to operate extermly, not internally. Kennedy authorizes the program, the program thats called project mocking bird. We know little about it because its still classified, but it was one of the items in the cia family jewels that the full set was released in 2006 or 2007 so this program in the summer of 1962 is when kennedys starting to crack down drastically on leaks. During the crisis, fast forward a little bit, the white house had intense control over information, and you would expect that. It was a moment of crisis. You dont want to broadcast whats happening to your enemies, but after the missile crisis, the administration continued to control the information. Now, that has two effects. One of them is you have a specific story coming out, you have control of the story. If the press is clam moriing at this point, i mean, think about in the place of a reporter or journalist or editor at this point, youve just had this massive close call with nuclear annihilation. You want to know what happened, you want the scoop. Reporters were clammoring to see what happened. Kennedy said, all right, were not going to sort of open the top on this. Were going to very cayfully control the information that gets out there. That controls the story thats hitting the press, but it also annoys the press because the press doesnt want to be spoon fed information and consider itself propaganda messages. You end up with a massive backlash there reporters that drags on for months, and its sparked by an assistant secretary of defense by the name of arthur, and he was the chief spokesman for the pentagon. Hes on record, perhaps he was too tired, i dont know, but he told the reporter, of course, government uses information as a weapon in times of crisis, which everyone knew as selfevident, but no one wanted anyone to say it. A pentagon spokesperson was on record sparking massive outcry from the press about news management that the Kennedy Administration manipulated the news. Host its in press leaks and Foreign Affairs are important. We have to take a quick break, and well come back to this in a few moments. Thank you. Guest thanks. Host david, we talked about kennedys news management and relations with the press. One of the fascinating things about the book is it surprise z those looking back at this point, they think of lin Lyndon Johnsons paranoia, the press against him, and press secretaries who dealt with it, and then, of course, richard nixon, the plumbers, and the slippery slope to what it is. Has jfk gotten a free ride because he is usually remembered as being buddy buddy with some reporters, and he actually had reported younger in his life, and had good relations with some of the press. Guest thats right. Yeah, theres a general perception that kennedys press coverage was quite fawning, and it was in the beginning, but as you point out, kennedy knew this wort very well. He had been a reporter. He had a fascination with how the media world worked, not just about how reporters did their job, but how newspapers stayed in business and everything else. He had very Close Friends who were reporters and editors who he invited to dinner, invited to the white house for dinner and stuff like that. He knew this world very, very well, but at the beginning of his presidency, he had close to fawning press coverage, frankly, but it soured quite badly, again, in the summer of 1962 where things get more difficult for him, and you start seeing some stories in the press around that time about the honeymoon is over essentially. You know, this often happens with a new president. Kennedy came that as an unknown quantity. This is not the press starting to sour. This is 58s reflected in the poll this is also reflected in the polls at the time. When he came into office, he had very high polls, but he also had high undecided numbers. People out there had not yet formed an opinion. Now, as his presidency continued, a lot of the people who started out without an opinion actually started forming more of a negative opinion. He had started sort of sour souring on the polls, the American Public, and the press. By the summer of 1962, the press relationship is getting more prickly, and this cuban missile crisis ends up being this sort of spark for a much more confrontational relationship with the press because as we were talking about before, the press theres a massive press backlash about kennedys press policies, and some of the things the white house was doing, for instance, was before this moment, there was basically open season on any white house staffer could essentially talk to reporters, and charming, you go to lunch, talk about it, and there was not a whole lot of oversight about what was happening. On october 31st, i believe it was, kennedy and the meeting complaining about another press leak, and he says, all right, this is it. Were going to clamp down. Im not going to talk to the press, and theres only a couple people here allowedded to talk to the press about this. His White House Press secretary does something fairly unusual. He goes immediately from that meeting, writes out a meme toe, types out a memo saying you understand that you will not be talking to the press, and if you do, you have to write, submit in writing who you spoke to them, when you spoke to them, and what you spoke to them. This is the White House Press secretary. He takes the memo, and rather than circulating it, he walked around the office and got every person in staff to sign this. Theres just one copy of this with the signatures saying they agree to do this. After that, each member of the white house staff, if they spoke to a reporter, they actually had to document what the conversation was and who it was about, who it was with, and when it was. This has the effect of essentially chilling press policy. The pentagon is doing something similar, making people more accountable, and the cia was doing it for quite a while. This, again, has two effects. One of them that it is clamping down on the flow of information, and that sort of is good for the white house because they can control things better, but its not necessarily as good for the American Public or good for reporters. The odd thing about this, though, it actually its a very interesting thing for a historian because what you end up having is all of the memos about who was talking to what reporters. If you want to work out, you know, the carlses the reporters used for particular stories, go back to the memos and find out when they told them certain things. This is very interesting in the wake of the crisis, there were a number of article les coming out, some fawning about what happened, and some of them more critical, and one that was critical well, not so much, but with adalay stevenson, and one with Charles Bartlett host saturday evening post guest exactly. What happened in the coming days. He was a friend of kennedys, responsible for introducing jack and jackie originally, and so this article came out, and one of the items in there was that stevenson had been soft with the implication he was willing to appease the soviets. He wanted a mew nick, and this munich, and stevenson was definitely one of the dogs amongst the advisers, but it was an unfair accusation that he was not alone in recommending this. This article comes out, skewing stevenson, who had a wonderful presentation of the United Nations, but the implication comes out then that kennedy authorized this himself, that he is the source for the bartlett article. What you can do now as a historian is we can go back and work out who charlie talked to in the white house, when he talked to them. We can look at the memos host that presumes people honestly abided by this. Guest its interesting. They generally did. I mean, this is, you know, they are telling everyone this is from the president , its unusual. They got to do it for awhile. It faded off a bit, but in those initial days, they were playing ball about writing the memos, and you can go in and worked out who he talked to, when they talked to them, when the source was, and theres interesting information we have not quite got the smoking gun, but you can see its coming from the military advisers, the white house, and kennedy told bartlett to talk to wheeler in the pentagon, and so for historians, you have an oddly, compelling, and very useful source you wouldnt have otherwise got. At the time any way, but back to the story, the press responded very negatively to the clamp down and chill to press coverage host kennedy was one of those president s who could be the chief himself, and, you know, its clear that while there was this negative backlash which you document in the press, there were certainly some select reporters who were spoonfed tidbits to put the administration in the best light, and in that article you mentioned, theres the famous quote, we were eyeball to eyeball and the other fellow just blinked creating the image of kennedy as the cool, calculating poker player who outplayed khrushchev. Despite the backlash, do you think kennedy was fairly successful in creating the first draft of history in the public impressions of how the crisis was handled . Guest absolutely. Two things going on here. The press is responding negatively to this, but the other is the white house controls the message. They didnt stop the message. Kennedy knew better than to completely cut off stories to the press, but what they did was control it and siphon off bits of information to reporters, and they really were trying to control the story. Theres no question about that if you go back and do it, but that part of the problem is that they were siphoning off to reporters that they liked, bits of information, and getting bits of the story out there trying to clamp down on anything negative. Host looking back, retrospectively, what they were doing is taken for granted now, but then there was the outrage. Guest 1962, after watergate, off vietnam, we are cynical about White House Press relations, but this is 196263, much more naive in that sense. Host moving to a related aspect, although this press and news Management Campaign continued beyond the election in november, talk about the domestic political aspect of the missile crisis and aftermath because in the context of the kennedy presidency, you know, this was really a crucial moment if he was going to be able to improve his record, his legislative record. Tell me about how politics fit into kennedys handling of the crisis and the aftermath. Guest right. Kennedy was first shown photos of the missile sites on october 16th. On october 16th, kennedys presidency had not been going especially well. That was especially true of the cuban issue. Go back to the previous issue, his handling on the bay of pigs, got a boost in the poll, but it was nos a great moment of his presidency to say the least. After the bay of pigs, heading into the elections of 1962, america identified cuba a weakness of kennedy, and it was a campaign strategy, attack the administration on cuba. They had been doing that through the summer. On october 16th, kennedy is on the defensive about cuba. This is not an issue he wants to talk to with the lexes, but talk about medicare, anything other than cuba because hes weak on this, and then by implication thought they would lose more seats, but he was not on the ballot because of the midterm election. Republicans had been aiming to use this. Senator keating from new york, most vocal, on the senate floor about every day saying, you know, theres missiles going to florida, refugee reports, administration turning a blind eye, attacking them for months on this. The issue had been sort of percolating for a long time, come up in september, kennedy had to put out press statements saying we know about the build up, but its not a threat to us so its fine. Host tougher because kennedy, himself, attacked nixon for being insufficient against castro two years earlier. Republicans were happy to bring it up years later. Guest its a public moment suddenly. The critics silence themselves. This is a moment to rally around the flag, and keating said the president has our full support, were not going to, in this moment of crisis, jeopardize the United States chance of victory here, but once khrushchev breaks, that cease fire breaks immediately because its nine to ten days out from election. Republicans start asking good questions about why didnt we find out about hes earlier . Was the Kennedy Administration negligent about sending surveillance flights over cuba . Why the gaps . Why didnt we know about it . Is it a massive intelligence failure . Some go further. Is the Kennedy Administration covering up here . Did the Kennedy Administration even manufacture this october surprise in order for political gain . This breaks when khrushchev breaks down. Theres an intense period of political attacks coming. In the leadup to the election, but actually dragged on through the middle of fab 1963. They drag on for months because theres questions here. Its a good question. Why didnt the u. S. Find out about these earlier . Host for the audience, this is taped in the middle of october 2012, very comparable to republican accusations about obama and libya. Guest contactually right. Host its a perennial thing. When theres an issue of an attack, you go with it. Guest theres a strong attack from the right, lead up to the midterm election, and it endures after that. This is what part of what kennedys facing with trying to control the message. Its not just about making kennedy look good. Any president is going to want to want good press, anyone wants good press. Part of it is just trying to get good press, but in controlling the message, is also trying to not let critics define him. Now, if we think that through a little bit, what would have happened if the republicans had turned this into a kennedy failure, if, instead of us now remembering this as a kennedy victory, a great moment in the cold war battle, but instead talk about like it was another bay of pigs for kennedy, another weakened moment he should have known he was negligent or any of those aspects, if you think about that, the implications for kennedy at the time were enormous. He was having a hard enough time getting legislation through congress then anyway, and if he was further weakened by the massive, this perceived he would have had more difficulty through 1963, especially going into the 1964 election. He has a vested interest in trying to get the program passed by fending off attacks. He possibly, he wouldnt have had the Political Capital to do things like the University Speech and get a day taunt happening in 1963. He might not have had the Political Capital to get the Test Ban Treaty through. Theres practical reasons why he wanted to control the message and the attacks going on during this period. Host i want to challenge you on one thing you write about in the book. You had the domestic political angle which is pretty much have actions in the crisis, and, yet, its clear that jfk had an interest in not looking weak or providing openings to give into nuclear power, and do you believe political terms were giving way . The refusal to consider a public trade of the american jupiter missiles in turkey where the soviet missiles in cuba. Critics said he didnt want to risk looking weak, and we get into the crisis in the first place, what they said, this is not a military problem, but a military problem. What extent is domestic politics contributing to jfks Decision Making during an after the crisis . Guest the way i tried to handle this in the book is that the way you framed, did domestic Political Considerations influence his policy . I say absolutely, but i would form a distinction here about partisan Political Considerations in the sense that this is trying to help, you know, his reelection, trying to help democrats and trying to attack republicans. You do not get to be president without thinking about Political Considerations in everything you do. Not just sort of making a decision, but this is part of who you are as president. You have to think on behalf of how this will be perceived in the broader American Public. He is constantly thinking about that in the 13 days over after. How is this going to play out in the public . The distinction there, and i would call that sort of political awareness, and that is constant part of who he is, and not just during the missile crisis, but in everything he does, whether its vietnam policy, tax policy, civil rights, constantly thinking about how will this play out and how is this going to look . I would very carefully draw the distinction between that and partisan politics in a superficial sense. I do not believe he was partisan in the superficial sense that we like to talk about that was a political decision and things like that, and a lot of the time we mean that superficially as a partisan way, but in a much deeper way, i think he was absolutely aware of the political ramifications, but it just wasnt he was careful, for instance, to brief dwight eisenhower, at that point, one the leading republican figures, gave him special briefings in the crisis, called him on the tfn, we have those recordings. He sent the cia director, director of central intelligence, john mccohen, tight in Republican Party politics at this point, sent him to brief eisenhower. Whenever there were he was briefing congressional leaders, it was a bipartisan affair, not getting Democratic Leaders on the phone giving them privileged information. He was carriful to be bipartisan in the political awareness. Host the recordings suggested that jfk and the advisers were not so much fearful or at least not so unfearful that if they accepted a public trade if that would appear weak to american domestic political audiences, but appear weak to nato they betrayed aen ally or sacrificed an allys interest, and, you know, but the net result was the same that the deal was kept secret in the end. Guest exactly, yeah, thats right. If youre in a moment of crisis like this trying to negotiate things like how to get out of the crisis, whether to trade missiles or anything like that, you, naturally, want to be in the strongest possible position, and you dont do that by volunteering information or volunteering things that are potentially going to invite attacks or invite i mean, its just natural. Its how you govern essentially. As i said, go back, and part of this, too, is that kennedy had around him a very closeknit group, often called the boston mafia or kennedy mafia or whatever. There were people back in the political career very left leaning, generally very deep into democratic politics, but in the excom and cabinet in particular, he was surrounding himself with a remarkably centris range of people and several republicans. John mccain, robert, secretary of the treasury, a republican. He made sure a lot of the advisers were actually very central. He was not getting very left leaning partisan people around him when he was making a lot of the very important decisions. Host just a couple minutes left. Let me ask one last question about the tapes, and you dedicated many years of your life to the project of the university of virginia and recording project. Talk a little bit both about the value of the tapes antepitfalls. You relied on them heavily, and because of the tapes are so wonderful, we can focus too much on them, and there could be a danger to that. Displg absolutely. As you guest absolutely. Weve been working on these tapes, all six presidencies taped in the white house, since about 1998 when the program was formed, and its not just me wok working on this, of course, colleagues, students, scholars work on this. Were trying to work through this remarken resource, but they do have to be used with care, and ive tried to do be careful about doing that in the book. Its very tempting to write a book thats essentially a list of transcripts, and theres a lot of use for historical reference in doing that, and we do that as part of the work. What i wanted to do with this story is kind
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