Any history buffs out here want to help with a JFK assassination question?

The History Channel has an entertaining new series called "investigating History".
It questions the accepted version of historical figures like Al Capone, Billy the Kid, etc.
And one episode is a rehash of the Kennedy Assassination.

In the documentary, a very strong case is made by two different historians, that Kennedy and his brother Bobby despised LBJ from the day they ever first heard of him. And LBJ despised them as bad as they did him.
Also, that Kennedy was scared to death if Johnson was given any authority, that Johnson would conspire to parlay that power into challenging Kennedy.
So Kennedy NEVER gave any responsibility whatever to Johnson. And instead the entire Kennedy White House mocked Johnson and made him the butt of jokes. And at some point to keep Johnson out of Washington as much as possibly could, Kennedy started sending Johnson on overseas trips which had no mission or point. It just got Johnson out of his way.
And it all made Johnson go insane. Because the documentary also maintains that, before he got to the White House when he was a Senator, that "nothing was ever able to happen in Washington without LBJ's approval". In other words he had the power of a king.

So here's the question. I'm not knowledgable about that aspect of all this.
Is it your understanding that all this is true? Specifically the part about the hatred between the Kennedys and Johnson? And that LBJ had enormous power as a Senator?

The Great Society gotstuck in the mud of Vietnam.

The great society has gone exactly as it was designed to go. Results matter.

Johnson was out ok the ticket for one reason ... Southern Protestant votes for the Catholic candidate (Kennedy). It was a smart idea by JFK and his brother Robert.

If you ever watch 13 Days in October, you get a bird's eye view of who was in the inner circle of the Kennedy WH. It sure wasn't LBJ.... It was JFK, Bobby Kennedy and ODonnell when decisions were made and even then it would often fall to just the two brothers weighing things out themselves. The Kennedy's didn't trust much of anyone really.

I guess they didn't trust anyone and with good reason.

Don't forget that the election of 1960 was decided by less than 120k in popular vote. JFK didnt have a mandate.

Lyndon Johnson was my grandfather's cousin. My grandparents went to the LBJ Ranch for a family reunion after Johnson announced that he wouldn't run again and retired from office. I don't believe he was complicit in the murder of JFK. I'm sure many would disagree with me. Many hate him because of the war, which actually was begun under Eisenhower and continued under JFK. I believe JFK was killed, in part, because of the Bay of Pigs fiasco (and I think that was done behind his back)...and because he also wanted to end the "conflict" (as it was then called) in Vietnam. I also believe he received bad advice from the MIC that Eisenhower warned about. If you will recall, the economy was slowing down after the boom postwar years...some of the decisions about Vietnam were designed to fill the coffers of the MIC and the usual well placed financiers of that time.

One thing about my grandfather (maternal)...he was 6'4", a little deaf from the noise of the rigs and very gruff in demeanor, but he was extremely honest and hard working. I rode many places around the state with "Mamaw and Papaw"...and I lived with them for six months in 1971 when I was recovering from Hep A. I don't remember what year the reunion was (it was after that); just that they brought back one of those old ashtrays on a stand with a ten-gallon hat on top...and that's when he told me he was LBJ's cousin. I wasn't thrilled at the time...was extremely anti-war...in retrospect, I understand more than I did then. I know the fact that my grandfather was a good guy doesn't necessarily mean LBJ was the same...but I think a lot of the blame for the turn of events is misplaced.






Here's a fairly recent article:

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/22124-does-nixons-treason-boost-lbjs-legacy

Does Nixon's 'Treason' Boost LBJ's Legacy

By Robert Parry, Consortium News
17 February 14


"The Vietnam War has doomed President Lyndon Johnson to a lowly status among presidents, overshadowing his domestic successes. But LBJ’s ranking might change if the new evidence on Richard Nixon sabotaging LBJ’s Vietnam peace talks were factored in, writes Robert Parry.

front-page article in Sunday’s New York Times cited complaints from Lyndon Johnson’s daughter, Luci Baines Johnson, and veterans of LBJ’s administration that the late president’s legacy was excessively tarnished by the Vietnam War, obscuring his landmark social legislation advancing civil rights, medical care for the elderly, and environmental protections.

Pegged to Presidents’ Day weekend – and the upcoming half-century anniversary of many LBJ accomplishments – the article cites a recent CNN/ORC poll asking Americans how they rated the last nine presidents and putting Johnson at number seven behind Jimmy Carter and ahead of only George W. Bush and Richard Nixon.

But what isn’t addressed in the article is how Americans might have assessed Johnson if his plan for ending the Vietnam War in 1968 had not been sabotaged by Nixon’s presidential campaign, a reality now well established by documents and tape-recordings declassified by the National Archives but still outside the frame of most mainstream journalists and ignored by conventional historians.

I encountered this “lost history” when doing research at the Lyndon Johnson Library in Austin, Texas, in 2012 and published a lengthy story at Consortiumnews.com and in my latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative. After my reporting, the BBC published an account in 2013 recognizing the significance of the new evidence.

But there appears to be a stubborn refusal at places like the New York Times and among establishment historians, like Doris Kearns Goodwin, to acknowledge this new material. Perhaps they’re waiting for the ponderous LBJ authority Robert Caro to bless the information in his final volume on the 36th President.

Or perhaps it would embarrass them too much for having missed this crucial material in their own writings about Johnson. Or maybe they think the evidence seems too conspiratorial, including the fact that many of the documents are contained in a file that LBJ’s national security adviser Walt Rostow labeled “The ‘X’ Envelope” and that archivists at the library privately call their “X-File.”

Whatever the reason, the failure to address this remarkable cache of evidence has distorted how Americans regard Johnson. It would seem to me that if the people knew that Johnson really was committed to bringing the war to an end before he left office, they might view him more charitably and regard Nixon with even greater contempt..."

PACEDOG#1 wrote:Don't forget that the election of 1960 was decided by less than 120k in popular vote. JFK didnt have a mandate.

JFK was lucky to be elected because he was Catholic. There was a lot of animosity at that time between Southern Baptists and Catholics...and many thought JFK couldn't carry the South. As for the trust issues between the Kennedy's and Johnson, they had good reason to fear him in the context of the Texas oilmen he was associated with.

I cannot agree with you on the ideas of the Nam war. Gulf of Tonkin was a red flag event set up to draw us into the conflict.  The USS Maddox has no business being where they were.... Much like the USS Liberty in 1967. Johnson started the first combat deployments to nam in march 1965 sending the Marines. He supported corrupt south Vietnamese govt who was doing just as bad of things to the people as was the communists. Did you know Ho Chi Mihn was an ally against the Japanese in wwIi?

Johnson didnt get bad info from the MIC. He sent combat troops into combat and like Obama tied their hands with piss poor ROE. He has to take blame for Nam nobody else approved orders for 500k+ troops in country at one time but him. You and he cannot pass thst buck.

I was 18 in 1968. Do you remember that year? Because I sure do. I am not to blame for the war; I actively opposed it and wrote about it that year. You don't know what intel Johnson was given. You just want to divert the blame onto a Democrat. Nixon campaigned on a promise to end the war, when he had no intention of doing so and in fact kept it going until 1973...and there is proof he sabotaged LBJ's efforts to end the war that year, in the face of massive protests. How old are you, anyway? Were you there? And how in the world would you know the inside story on LBJ?

Floridatexan wrote:
I was 18 in 1968.  Do you remember that year?  Because I sure do.  I am not to blame for the war; I actively opposed it and wrote about it that year.  You don't know what intel Johnson was given.  You just want to divert the blame onto a Democrat.  Nixon campaigned on a promise to end the war, when he had no intention of doing so and in fact kept it going until 1973...and there is proof he sabotaged LBJ's efforts to end the war that year, in the face of massive protests.  How old are you, anyway?  Were you there?  And how in the world would you know the inside story on LBJ?  

Oh so Johnson was not to blame for the intel he got, but "W" was??? Hmmm wasn't that the same intel sources? CIA? Military? Oh by gosh, it was!!!!!!!!!

Nixon did end the war. Johnson would have kept pouring more souls into a war that the only indigenous personnel didn't want to or care to fight. Nixon was bombing the HELL out of N Vietnam, something your cousin would not do. Nixon used Operation Linebacker I and II to bring the Vietnamese to the peace table. Unlike the Dirka Dirkas today, Vietnam did care about making sure they were not bombed back to the stone age...

Nixon had to go into Cambodia after the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese who were using that as a sanctuary and it did add to the war...but I guess you give a pass on that to Obama when he violated the sovereignty of Pakistan with drone attacks and a wholesale military black op to kill Bin Laden? I don't believe that you see the double standard you have created. It's family (as you say) so I understand and don't hold it against you. Still, the fact is that LBJ committed the first offensive combat troops to Vietnam in 1965 with the Marines. You do know their mission don't you? It wasn't to walk mamasan to the bar and back after some "short time." Nixon's addition to the war helped to ensure that Comrade Ho was ready to negotiate. I guess Obama might figure this out before he leaves office, but our enemies respect our strength and nothing else.

It's understandable that you would defend a family member. Just don't let those ties blind you to the truth. I have studied a lot of American History, particularly conflicts. I don't have to have been there to understand piss poor decisions were made. Some of the same piss poor decisions you criticize regarding Bush 41 in Southwest Asia were made in Southeast Asia beginning with the Tonkin Gulf Incident. LBJ was owned lock, stock and barrel by the MIC. Ike and Kennedy only sent Spec Ops folks into Vietnam. There's a difference between advisors not participating in combat and full scale Marine landing forces going on the offensive. Philip Caputo wrote a great book called Rumor of War that came out in 1979 or 1980. I suggest you read it and learn from a grunt Infantry Officer's perspective what the COWH then was making our troops have to do.

From your cousin as he ran for reelection in 1964-

We are not about to send American boys 9 or 10 thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.

Lyndon B. Johnson

Nov 3, 1964 Lyndon B. Johnson defeats Barry Goldwater, and is elected to the Presidency. There are just over 15,000 American troops in Vietnam.

February 13, 1965 President Johnson authorizes Operation Rolling Thunder, a campaign of bombing North Vietnam to force it to cease supporting guerrillas in the south. The raids would persist continually for nearly three years.

April 7, 1965 North Vietnam rejects an American offer of economic aid in exchange for peace.

April 20, 1965 The President's top officials conclude that bombing alone is insufficient. Defense Secretary McNamara explains to President Johnson that the military leaders are requesting additional combat brigades.

 

June 5, 1965 The American ambassador has called Washington with news that the Saigon government is again in crisis. The Vietcong have launched a new offensive during the monsoon season, making it harder to defend ground forces from the air. The cable is blunt: "It will probably be necessary to commit U.S. ground forces to action." An anxious President calls his secretary of defense:

   

June 8, 1965 President Johnson calls Senate Majority Leader Mansfield, who has written the president to urge him not to bomb Hanoi, the capital of North Vietnam. Wanting to keep Mansfield aboard, he asks him how he should approach Congress:

   

June 10, 1965 Another cable has arrived from Saigon, this one from General Westmoreland. He wants 41,000 combat troops in Vietnam and 52,000 more later. And he will need "even greater forces" later to "take the war to the enemy." McNamara says "We're in a hell of a mess."

   

July 2, 1965 In a June 18 coup, South Vietnam formed its l0th government in 20 months. A few days later Vietcong mortars destroy three U.S. aircraft at Danang. During a conversation with Defense Secretary McNamara, Johnson begins to consider what has to happen to get the troops they will need to stay the course:

   

July 28, 1965 In a press conference, the president announces his decision to commit more troops to the conflict in Vietnam.
I have asked the Commanding General, General [William C.] Westmoreland, what more he needs to meet this mounting aggression. He has told me. We will meet his needs.

I have today ordered to Vietnam the Air Mobile Division and certain other forces which will raise our fighting strength from 75,000 to 125,000 men almost immediately. Additional forces will be needed later, and they will be sent as requested. This will make it necessary to increase our active fighting forces by raising the monthly draft call from 17,000 over a period of time to 35,000 per month, and for us to step up our campaign for voluntary enlistments.

I do not find it easy to send the flower of our youth, our finest young men, into battle. I have spoken to you today of the divisions and the forces and the battalions and the units. But I know them all, every one. I have seen them in thousand streets, of a hundred towns, in every State in this Union - working and laughing and building, and filled with hope and life. I think that I know, too, how their mothers weep and how their families sorrow. This is the most agonizing and the most painful duty of your President.

1965 to 1973
By year's end (1965) there would be 184,000 troops in Vietnam, even as 90,000 South Vietnamese soldiers deserted. In response to the deployment of U.S. ground troops in 1965, North Vietnamese army combat units officially entered the war in support of the Vietcong. By the war's end in 1975, 2.5 million Americans would serve in Vietnam.

Johnson would not seek reelection in 1968.

American Troop Levels in Vietnam by year under Kennedy/Johnson/Nixon-

1961 3205         (Kennedy)
1962 11300        (Kennedy)
1963 16300        (Kennedy)
1964 23300        (LBJ)
1965 184300      (LBJ)
1966 385300      (LBJ)
1967 485600      (LBJ)
1968 536100      (LBJ)
1969 475200      (Tricky Dick)
1970 334600      (Tricky Dick)
1971 156800      (Tricky Dick)
1972   24200      (Tricky Dick)
1973         50     (Tricky Dick)

http://www.americanwarlibrary.com/vietnam/vwatl.htm

So the escalation of the conflict was all on LBJs watch. Facts are facts. I am sorry. This shows that under Democrats escalation was the word of the day and the conflict wound down under Tricky Dick.

So you're not old enough to remember...just did research. Sorry, not the same. Those were turbulent times. You're forgetting McNamara, Westmoreland, Kissinger, and George H W Bush. You're also ignoring the revelation in the article by Robert Parry that Nixon purposely stalled the peace talks in 1968...in order to get elected. That 5 years earlier, our President had been assassinated, and that his brother was killed that same year...and the shameless war profiteering...the Bay of Pigs, the constant threat of nuclear war, the demonization of my generation...either for going to war or for opposing war.



http://consortiumnews.com/2012/03/04/profiting-off-nixons-vietnam-treason/

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http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtID=2&psid=3462

"Numerous factors contributed to the U.S. involvement in Vietnam: the Cold War fears of communist domination of Indochina; a mistaken belief that North Vietnam was a pawn of Moscow; overconfidence in the ability of U.S. troops to prevent the communist takeover of an ally; and anxiety that withdrawal from Vietnam would result in domestic political criticism. So, too, did a series of events in 1961, including the disastrous attack on Cuba at the Bay of Pigs, the erection of the Berlin Wall, and the threat made by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to sponsor national liberation movements around the world.
The architects of the Vietnam War overestimated the political costs of allowing South Vietnam to fall to communism. Presidents Kennedy and Johnson feared that losing South Vietnam would damage their chances for re-election, weaken support for domestic social programs, and make Democrats vulnerable to the charge of being soft on communism. The North Vietnamese strategy was to drag out the war and make it increasingly costly to the United States.

American leaders also grossly underestimated the tenacity of their North Vietnamese and Viet Cong foes. Misunderstanding the commitment of our adversaries, U.S. General William C. Westmoreland said that Asians "don't think about death the way we do." In fact, the Vietnamese Communists and Nationalists were willing to sustain extraordinarily high casualties in order to overthrow the South Vietnamese government. The United States intervened in Vietnam without appreciating the fact that the Vietnamese people had a strong nationalistic spirit rooted in centuries of resisting colonial powers. In a predominantly Buddhist country, the French-speaking Catholic leaders of South Vietnam were generally viewed as representatives of France, the former colonial power. Communists were able to capitalize on nationalistic, anti-Western sentiment."

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Chick, I am old enough to remember my dad and uncle going to Nam 5 times between themselves.

My research and personal knowledge from those who served in the conflict taints your LBJ Cousin Colored glasses from which your perspective is biased. Nothing I have posted to you is a lie. It has all been researched and verified. If you choose to live in an alternative universe to blame others, well that is your liberalism to fall back on.....nothing you guys do is your fault. It's always someone else's fault. Great.

LBJ bears the blame for Vietnam. As he ascended to the COWH status, there weren't even 20k troops in office. He took the ball and ran with it past 500k plus troops to almost 600k. It's funny how you want to give LBJ a pass on bad intel, but give Bush 43 none. Both had the same set of intel sources. Hell, at least Bush 43 wasn't the architect of 58k KIA in Vietnam unlike Johnson. The number killed in the GWOT is just over 10% for a longer war. My numbers point out the facts. The only person sending troops into a combat zone is the President. Congress doesn't do it. McNamara didn't do it. Westmoreland didn't do it. The COWH did. He signed off on that paperwork. So obviously, in your own words, someone must be a war criminal right? Hmmmm. Go ahead and fill in the blank for me, I know you can.

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