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John F. Kennedy: A Comprehe­nsive Biograph­y and Legacy

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John F. Kennedy


Life and family


John Fitzgerald Kennedy was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, on May 29, 1917. His father Joseph P. Kennedy was a combative businessman who became a multimillionaire, head of the Securities and Exchange Commission and ambassador to Great Britain. He and his wife, Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy, had nine children of whom John was the second son.

John F. Kennedy graduated from the Choate School in Conneticut in 1935. Then he went to Harvard University where he graduated in 1940. In the same year John wrote a best-selling book under the title Why England slept.

In 1941, shortly before the United States entered World War II, Kennedy joined the U.S. Navy and became the commander of a small boat named PT109.

One night, while they were on patrol, Kennedy’s boat was rammed by a large Japanese ship. The men who had survived were led by Lt. Kennedy to a nearby deserted island. They managed to survive, but Kennedy aggravated an old back injury and contracted malaria. He was discharged in early 1945.


Political career


After World War II John Kennedy decided to run for a political office. In 1946 he was elected in the U.S. Congress, representing a district in greater Boston. Kennedy, a Democrat, served three terms (6 years) in the House of Representatives, and in 1952 he was elected to the U.S. Senate.

In 1953 he married Jacqueline Lee Bouvier. The following year he had a serious operation on his back. While recovering from his surgery he wrote a book about several U.S. senators who had risked their careers to fight for the things in which they believed. With that book, which was called Profiles in Courage, John Kennedy won the Pulitzer Price for biography in 1957. That same year the Kennedy’s first child, Caroline, was born.

Soon after, in 1960, he began a long campaign to become President. On January 20, 1961 he was sworn in as the 35th President of the United States. In his Inaugural Address he spoke of the need for all Americans to be active citizens. “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country!” He also asked the nations of the world to join together to fight against what he called the “common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease and war itself.”

One of president Kennedy’s first important actions was creating the Peace Corp. Americans who join the Peace Corp go as volunteers to countries requesting assistance. They become teachers and provide help in areas such as farming, health care and construction.

During his time as President John F. Kennedy had to make a lot of difficult decisions. Since World War II there had been a lot of anger and suspicion between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, but there never had been any shooting between Russian and American troops. This “Cold War” was a struggle between the Soviet Union’s communist system of government and America’s democratic system.

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The two countries distrusted each other and because of that both nations spent enormous sums of money to build nuclear weapons to use them if war began.


Berlin


With the hope to build some trust between their countries President Kennedy and the Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev met in Vienna in June 1961. One important topic they discussed was the German city Berlin.

After World War II Germany had been divided in two parts: East and West Germany. West Germany, like the United States, was a democratic country where the people elected their leaders. In East Germany, a communist country, like the Soviet Union, the government owned all the farms and factories and made many decisions without the approval of the people.

The city of Berlin was also divided. Though surrounded by East Germany, half of Berlin was Part of West Germany.

During their meeting Kennedy and Khrushchev strongly disagreed about the future of Berlin. Later that summer the Soviets built a huge wall dividing the two parts of Berlin. For many Americans and the western Europeans the Berlin Wall became a symbol of communism. In the summer of 1963 JFK visited West Berlin and spoke to a large crowed near the wall.

He said that America would support democracy in Berlin and that he looked forward to the wall coming down one day.


Cuba


In 1958 Fidel Castro’s guerrillas overthrew the American-supported government of Batista, and attacked American-owned capitalist enterprises, which Castro blamed for the inequalities in Cuban life.

The USA refused to recognise Castro’s government. They refused to trade with Cuba from which they had bought most of the sugar crop. They also gave support to Anti-Castro refugees. Castro responded by taking over more American investments in Cuba. The Soviet Union bought the sugar crop and became Castro’s main supporter.

In April 1961 President Kennedy allowed the CIA-backed invasion by Cuban exiles (called the Bay of Pigs Invasion). This was a fiasco and worsened USA’s hostility and encouraged Castro’s supporters in Cuba.

In October 1962 there appeared photographs showing that there were Soviet missiles in Cuba. President Kennedy announced a naval blockade of Cuba until these missiles were removed. He threatened that if one missile were let off the US force would retaliate.

Khrushchev said that the missiles were to defend Cuba from the treat of an American-supported invasion by Anti-Castro forces. He also claimed that there was no difference between Soviet missiles and American missiles in Turkey.

Kennedy replied that Castro would not need those missiles to defend Cuba, but to threaten the USA. The US air force and Polaris nuclear-carrying submarines were put on a war footing. A Soviet convoy was approaching Cuba.


Cold War


The Cold War heated up in October 1962 when an American ‛spy plane’ secretly flew over Cuba and took photos of several military construction sites. These photos showed that the Soviets were building nuclear missile launchers in Cuba. Cuba’s communist government, led by Fidel Castro, was very friendly with the Soviet Union.

Because he didn’t want to let Cuba and the Soviet Union know that he knew about the missiles Kennedy met in secret with his advisers for several days to discuss the problem. After many long and difficult meetings Kennedy decided to place a naval blockade around Cuba to prevent the Soviets from bringing in more military supplies.

During the next year President Kennedy and Premier Khrushchev set up a “Hot Line”, a special telephone connection between the President’s office in the White House and the Soviet leader’s office at the Kremlin in Moscow. They hoped this “Hot Line” would prevent a war which would begin because of mistakes.

In August 1963 the United States and the Soviet Union signed a treaty that outlawed nuclear bomb tests in the air, under water and in outer space. The treaty didn’t prevent the two countries from building more weapons, but it did protect the world from the harmful effects of nuclear tests. Kennedy also asked the American people to think more about making peace with the Soviet Union. “We all inhabit this small planet.


Vietnam


It was under President Kennedy that the USA became totally involved in Vietnam. Laos was divided between rival factions and the northern part of the kingdom fell under the control of the communist Pathet Lao.

Cambodia’s Prime Minister Prince Sihanouk became increasingly critical of the US involvement in Indo-China. He hoped to put off a communist take over by his Anti-US policy. South Vietnam was involved in a civil war with 20,000 Viet Cong rebels getting aid from the North and from the Soviet Union.

Kennedy sent an increasing number of ‛advisers’ to help Diem, who was the first President of South Vietnam.

The unpopularity of the Diem government led Kennedy to agree to a CIA plot to overthrow Diem, who was assassinated to make way for a military administration. US military aid and the number of military and technical ‛advisers’ was increased. However, the Viet Cong had the support of the majority of the peasants.


Internal affairs


While international issues demanded a lot of attention, Kennedy also had to deal with serious problems in the United States. In most southern states schools, buses, restaurants and other public places were racially segregated. There were separate schools, separate seats on buses and separate areas in restaurants for blacks and for whites. State and local laws also prevented black Americans from voting.

Since the 1950’s many people – black and white – had been working to change these laws. During the 1960’s presidential campaign Martin Luther King, Jr., one of the most famous leaders of civil rights movement, had been jailed for leading protests in Georgia. Kennedy called his wife, Coretta Scott King, and offered his help. Many African Americans then decided to vote for Kennedy.


Some events forced Kennedy to change his views. In May 1961 a group of white and black people ignored the segregation laws and travelled together by bus through the south of America. In several cities crowds of angry white people beat these ‛freedom riders’ and burned their buses. Attorney General Robert Kennedy, JFK’s brother, had to send US marshals to protect the ‛freedom riders’.

Their actions eventually led to the desegregation of all busses and waiting rooms used for travel between states.


In September 1962 the nation faced the treat of violence in the State of Mississippi. James Meredith, an African American and Air Force veteran, applied and was admitted to the University of Mississippi. However, when he arrived on campus university officials didn’t want to let him go to class because he was black.

However, segregation had not ended everywhere. Almost a year later Alabama’s governor, George Wallace, who had promised to support segregation “today, tomorrow and forever” didn’t want to allow African American students to attend the University of Alabama.

After President Kennedy once again was forced to send soldiers to protect students who wanted nothing than education, he decided to speak to the nation on television about civil rights. He said that Americans had a legal and moral responsibility to provide equal access to education and to guarantee voting rights for all citizens.


In addition to all the problems and challenges of being President John F. Kennedy also had to fulfil the role of America’s head of state. He and his wife Jacqueline hosted dinners and parties in Washington for the leaders of other nations. They also travelled to Latin America and Europe. Because Mrs. Kennedy believed that the nation’s capital should be the centre for arts and culture as well as the centre of government and law, she invited many musicians, writers and dancers to the White House to perform.



On November 21, 1963, President Kennedy flew to Texas to give several political speeches. The next day, as his car drove slowly past cheering crowds in Dallas, shots rang out. Kennedy was seriously wounded and died a short time later. Within two hours after shooting police arrested Lee Harvey Oswald and charged him with the murder.

On November 24 a man from Dallas, Jack Ruby, shot and killed Oswald before there was a chance to put him on trial. Although Oswald denied that he had shot Kennedy most of the evidences indicated that he really did. To this day many people disagree about the facts of JFK’s assassination. Some people insist, for example, that there was a second gunman firing at Kennedy, and that he and Ruby were part of a conspiracy.


President Kennedy’s assassination caused enormous sadness and grief among all Americans. Most people still remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news of the murder. Hundreds of thousands of people gathered in Washington for the President’s funeral, and millions throughout the world watched it on television.


As the years have gone by and other Presidents have written their chapters in history, John F. Kennedy’s brief time in office stands out in the people’s memories – for his leadership, personality and accomplishment. Many respect his coolness when faced with difficult decisions – like what to do about the missiles in Cuba.


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