John F. Kennedy lives

[Futurist]

What would have been the effects had John F. Kennedy (JFK) lived and gotten reelected in 1964? I know that there is VERY serious speculation that JFK would have pulled the United States out of Vietnam by 1965 like he planned to do at the time of his death:

http://bostonreview.net/us/galbraith-ex ... gy-vietnam

https://www.thenation.com/article/archi ... eculation/

https://whowhatwhy.org/2017/09/26/jfk-o ... -evidence/

https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/3446

Anyway, just how else would JFK have been different from Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ) had he lived on domestic and/or foreign policy? For instance, I know that JFK adopted a more hardline position on Israel's nuclear program than LBJ did, fearing that it would spark a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. I also wonder how JFK would have handled African-American civil and voting rights at home, immigration reform, and both Khrushchev's 1964 ouster and the 1968 Prague Spring abroad. In addition, I wonder if the United States would have still accepted anywhere near as many Vietnamese refugees as it did in real life had South Vietnam fallen to the Vietnamese Communists a decade earlier than it did in real life.

Thoughts on all of this?

[maltesefalcon]

Well for one thing Ari Onassis would have been single in 1968.

[Futurist]

Yep.

[T. A. Gardner]

The US and Soviet Union have a nuclear war and Europe turns into an irradiated slag heap. We all end up in The Postman movie...

[Futurist]

But JFK successfully prevented nuclear war in 1962 during the Cuban Missile Crisis!

[maltesefalcon]

But JFK successfully prevented nuclear war in 1962 during the Cuban Missile Crisis!

Not really. He actually used the implied threat of starting a nuclear war, unless USSR moved their own missiles from Cuba.
Kruschev blinked, so we will never (thankfully) know if he would really carry out his threat.

It was also the height of hypocrisy, for his administration to cry foul about missiles being so close the the US, since the US had missiles staged in Turkey for years prior.

[ljadw]

JFK would not leave SVN,as LBJ he was an interventionist at home and abroad in 1965 ,as were almost all US politicians : to leave SVN would mean the Vietcong/the NVA in Saigon ,and even if Kennedy was willing to accept this,which he was not, it could not be done : Congress would impeach him .Liberal capitalist US could not and would not give up a country to the Communists .

[T. A. Gardner]

But JFK successfully prevented nuclear war in 1962 during the Cuban Missile Crisis!

Twice during JFK's time in office we came within a hair's breath of a nuclear conflict. It is singularly the most dangerous period in US history for a nuclear war. Had JFK not been assassinated, I could see additional situations like those that occurred historically. One mistake by one person in a position to use a nuclear weapon and it would be on.

During the Cuban Missile Crisis, at one point the Soviet submarine B-59 was being hounded by a US ASW hunter-killer group centered on the carrier Randolph. Had the Admiral in charge of the four boat flotilla not been aboard that particular submarine the Randolph would likely have disappeared in a mushroom cloud as both the boat's Captain and Political Officer wanted to launch their nuclear torpedo at it to stop the hounding. That would have been an It's on! situation.
SAC was on their go line, nuclear missiles in the US an Europe were on high alert. The US would have retaliated and that would have been a nuclear war...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasily_Ar ... ear%20Cuba.

The Berlin Crisis of 61 is another. The US deployed to the field troops with Davy Crockett nuclear "hand grenades" so-to-speak. Any one of the three -man teams might have accidently launched one of these on Soviet forces. Same thing. It'd be on.

I don't know what the next crisis would have been, but it's likely that there would be one and if it were like the previous two, it only takes one mistake by one person and it's all over. How many rolls of the dice before your luck runs out?

[Futurist]

JFK would not leave SVN,as LBJ he was an interventionist at home and abroad in 1965 ,as were almost all US politicians : to leave SVN would mean the Vietcong/the NVA in Saigon ,and even if Kennedy was willing to accept this,which he was not, it could not be done : Congress would impeach him .Liberal capitalist US could not and would not give up a country to the Communists .

Harry Truman wasn't impeached over the loss of mainland China to the Communists.

[maltesefalcon]

JFK would not leave SVN,as LBJ he was an interventionist at home and abroad in 1965 ,as were almost all US politicians : to leave SVN would mean the Vietcong/the NVA in Saigon ,and even if Kennedy was willing to accept this,which he was not, it could not be done : Congress would impeach him .Liberal capitalist US could not and would not give up a country to the Communists .

Harry Truman wasn't impeached over the loss of mainland China to the Communists.

And Gerald Ford was not impeached when South Vietnam fell to the Communists...

[Futurist]

JFK would not leave SVN,as LBJ he was an interventionist at home and abroad in 1965 ,as were almost all US politicians : to leave SVN would mean the Vietcong/the NVA in Saigon ,and even if Kennedy was willing to accept this,which he was not, it could not be done : Congress would impeach him .Liberal capitalist US could not and would not give up a country to the Communists .

Harry Truman wasn't impeached over the loss of mainland China to the Communists.

And Gerald Ford was not impeached when South Vietnam fell to the Communists...

Yep. Kennedy might become unpopular as a result of the fall of South Vietnam, but he wouldn't get impeached over this.

[ljadw]

JFK would not leave SVN,as LBJ he was an interventionist at home and abroad in 1965 ,as were almost all US politicians : to leave SVN would mean the Vietcong/the NVA in Saigon ,and even if Kennedy was willing to accept this,which he was not, it could not be done : Congress would impeach him .Liberal capitalist US could not and would not give up a country to the Communists .

Harry Truman wasn't impeached over the loss of mainland China to the Communists.

Big difference was that there were no US forces in China in 1949 ,and that no one wanted US forces in China . But the loss of mainland China was the mean reason why US became involved in Indochina .
And after the failure of the Bay of Pigs no American president could afford the loss of an other country to the communists .

[ljadw]

JFK would not leave SVN,as LBJ he was an interventionist at home and abroad in 1965 ,as were almost all US politicians : to leave SVN would mean the Vietcong/the NVA in Saigon ,and even if Kennedy was willing to accept this,which he was not, it could not be done : Congress would impeach him .Liberal capitalist US could not and would not give up a country to the Communists .

Harry Truman wasn't impeached over the loss of mainland China to the Communists.

And Gerald Ford was not impeached when South Vietnam fell to the Communists...

SV was already abandoned and lost before Ford became president and no one in the US in 1975 wanted to intervene in Indochina.
In 1961 the hawks were ruling in the US .
In 1975 the hawks were discredited.
It would take 5 years for the US to recover from the Indochina defeat .

[ljadw]

What would have been the effects had John F. Kennedy (JFK) lived and gotten reelected in 1964? I know that there is VERY serious speculation that JFK would have pulled the United States out of Vietnam by 1965 like he planned to do at the time of his death:

http://bostonreview.net/us/galbraith-ex ... gy-vietnam

https://www.thenation.com/article/archi ... eculation/

https://whowhatwhy.org/2017/09/26/jfk-o ... -evidence/

https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/3446

Anyway, just how else would JFK have been different from Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ) had he lived on domestic and/or foreign policy? For instance, I know that JFK adopted a more hardline position on Israel's nuclear program than LBJ did, fearing that it would spark a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. I also wonder how JFK would have handled African-American civil and voting rights at home, immigration reform, and both Khrushchev's 1964 ouster and the 1968 Prague Spring abroad. In addition, I wonder if the United States would have still accepted anywhere near as many Vietnamese refugees as it did in real life had South Vietnam fallen to the Vietnamese Communists a decade earlier than it did in real life.

Thoughts on all of this?

1 This is starting from the very questionable assumption that JFK would have defeated Goldwater in 1964 .
2 The speculation that JFK would have pulled US out of Vietnam is not serious at all :
Galbraith worked for Kennedy and it was thus in his interest to say that there would be no Vietnam defeat with JFK and that everything was the fault of Johnson and I am not convinced of the seriousness of The Nation and of History news .The Nation is a left,liberal,Democratic magazine that has does all interests to absolve JFK from the responsibility of the Vietnam debacle .The same for the History News network .
And : do you have a source for JFK's hard line attitude on Israel's nuclear program ?

[ljadw]

I am also not impressed by whowhatwhy.