The Presidencies of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, from Milestones 1961-1968, comprises public domain material from the Office of the Historian, US Department of State.

The Presidencies of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson MILESTONES: 1961–1968

1961–1968: The Presidencies of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson

President John F. Kennedy assumed office on January 20, 1961, following an eight-year career in the Senate. The first Catholic president, Kennedy was also the second youngest to ever serve in the office. In his inaugural address, Kennedy proclaimed “Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” Kennedy came into the presidency determined to reenergize the foreign policy establishment. To that end, he assembled a team of young White House and National Security Council advisers—the so-called “best and the brightest”—which included McGeorge Bundy, Walt Rostow, Ted Sorensen and Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.

Kennedy selected Dean Rusk, a taciturn Southerner and president of the Rockefeller Foundation, as his Secretary of State. Respected within foreign policy circles, Rusk had served in several positions at the Department of State, including Deputy Under Secretary of State and Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs. Rusk believed that the Secretary of State served at the pleasure of the President and thus did not seek control of foreign policy. Kennedy selected Robert S. McNamara, the president of Ford Motor Company, as his Secretary of Defense. Harvard dean McGeorge Bundy served as his National Security Adviser. The Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Allen W. Dulles, continued in that position, which he had held since 1953.

The Kennedy administration inherited the containment doctrine of the 1940s and 1950s, and maintained the belief that Communism was a threat to the United States. However, the brinksmanship of the Eisenhower era seemed archaic to the Kennedy idealists in their new international vision. Kennedy implemented the “flexible response” defense strategy, one that relied on multiple options for responding to the Soviet Union, discouraged massive retaliation, and encouraged mutual deterrence.

In April 1961, a short few months into his administration, Kennedy authorized a clandestine invasion of Cuba by a brigade of Cuban exiles. The CIA covert operation had been formulated and approved under President Eisenhower. Relying on faulty intelligence, the operation collapsed in two days with the defeat and capture of anti-Castro forces at the Bay of Pigs. The spectacular failure of this Cold War confrontation was a setback for Kennedy, and one he became determined to overcome. Though he took full responsibility for the failed operation, the CIA’s reputation was tarnished and Kennedy soon replaced DCI Allen W. Dulles with John A. McCone. Similarly, the Bay of Pigs fiasco affected Kennedy’s respect for the advice of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, placing a strain on the civil-military relationship that would remain under stress throughout the administration. McNamara’s management reforms in the

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Pentagon, the administration’s focus on counterinsurgency warfare, and finally the policy toward the war in Vietnam all found the uniformed military leadership in disagreement with the administration.

Tensions with the Soviet Union dominated U.S. foreign policy. Kennedy first met formally with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev in June 1961 at the Vienna Summit to discuss Berlin, Laos, and disarmament. Ailing and unprepared, Kennedy came across as an inexperienced adversary to his Russian counterpart. The two continued a series of both formal and public exchanges as well as more informal and very confidential exchanges—the “pen pal” correspondence. The channel was intended to give the two men a chance to informally exchange ideas under the heightened pressure of the Cold War. Still, the construction of the Berlin Wall in late 1961 and the military standoff between U.S. and Soviet troops there kept both nations on high alert.

The Cold War reached a frightening apex when in late 1962 the Soviet Union gave the Cuban Government medium-range ballistic missiles to defend against another U.S. invasion. American intelligence photographed Cuban missile sites, leading to a naval blockade and quarantine of Cuba. The tense thirteen days of the Cuban Missile Crisis tested the mettle of the Kennedy administration and his team of trusted advisers. Khrushchev agreed to remove the missiles, averting nuclear war, but resolving little between the two nations.

Kennedy avoided war in Laos, rejecting a military proposal to send American troops to fend off a communist insurgency there. However, he authorized sending troops and military advisers to the U.S.-backed nation of South Vietnam and steadily increased their numbers throughout his presidency. The administration was determined not to lose either the nation of South Vietnam or the broader region of Southeast Asia to communism, cementing its military commitment to Vietnam.

Kennedy’s assassination in November 1963 brought his Vice President, Lyndon B. Johnson to the presidency. Dean Rusk continued to serve as Secretary of State and stressed to the new President the necessity of continuity in foreign policy. President Johnson vowed to the nation that it would keep its commitments “from South Vietnam to West Berlin.” Johnson retained Kennedy’s close group of advisers and the National Security Council under Bundy continued to prove vital to foreign policy decision-making. Walt Rostow replaced Bundy as National Security Advisor in 1966.

President Johnson continued the U.S. military commitment to South Vietnam. Escalation followed with the August 1964 Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which authorized Johnson to take any measures he believed were necessary to retaliate and to promote the maintenance of international peace and security in southeast Asia. Johnson won the landslide election shortly after. In early 1965, the U.S. military launched Operation Rolling Thunder, a bombing campaign against the North. Shortly after, Johnson introduced U.S. ground combat forces with the landing of Marines at Danang. By 1967, nearly 500,000 troops were in Vietnam. Following the surprise defeat of the Tet Offensive in 1968 and facing dwindling public support for the war, Johnson announced that he would not seek a second term as President.

Though preoccupied with Vietnam, the Johnson administration faced challenges elsewhere. In Latin America, riots in Panama in 1964 led to concessions that still preserved U.S. control of the Panama Canal. In an unpopular move, Johnson sent troops to the Dominican Republic in 1965 to intervene in

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their civil war and prevent another Cuba. Tensions flared in the Middle East in 1967 during the Arab-Israeli War. Johnson warned that the United States would oppose aggression by any state in the area but encouraged diplomatic negotiations. In 1968, the administration faced another major crisis when the Soviet Union led Warsaw Pact troops in an invasion of Czechoslovakia. The Soviet crackdown tested détente, but both powers avoided confrontation. Following the election of Republican Richard M. Nixon, Johnson left office on January 20, 1969.

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The Laos Crisis, 1960–1963

The first foreign policy crisis faced by President-elect John F. Kennedy was not centered in Berlin, nor in Cuba, nor in the islands off the Chinese mainland, nor in Vietnam, nor in any of the better-known hot spots of the Cold War, but in landlocked, poverty stricken Laos. This was the major issue Kennedy and his foreign policy team—Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, and National Security Advisor McGeorge Bundy—focused on during the days leading up to Kennedy’s inauguration on January 20, 1961.

Kennedy met with President Eisenhower the day before his inauguration with two goals in mind. He expected the meeting to “serve a specific purpose in reassuring the public as to the harmony of the transition. Therefore strengthening our hand.” His substantive focus was on Laos. “I was anxious,” he recounted to his secretary, “to get some commitment from the outgoing administration as to how they would deal with Laos which they were handing to us. I thought particularly it would be useful to have some idea as to how prepared they were for intervention.”

The Eisenhower administration was leaving Kennedy a confused, complex, and intractable situation. Laos was a victim of geography: a RAND study of the period summarized the nation as “Hardly a nation except in the legal sense, Laos lacked the ability to defend its recent independence. Its economy was undeveloped, its administrative capacity primitive, its population divided both ethnically and regionally, and its elite disunited, corrupt, and unfit to lead.” But this surpassingly weak state was the “cork in the bottle,” as Eisenhower summarized in his meeting with Kennedy; the outgoing President expected its loss to be “the beginning of the loss of most of the Far East.”

The Eisenhower administration had worked for years to create a strong anti-Communist bastion in Laos, a bulwark against Communist China and North Vietnam. While attractive on a map, this strategy was completely at odds with the characteristics of the Laotian state and people. By 1961, Laos was fragmented politically, with three factions vying for control. The United States had thrown its support behind General Nosavan Phoumi, whose forces were engaged in combat with a neutralist force under Kong Le. Soviet aircraft were conducting resupply missions for Kong Le’s forces. Neutralist leader and former Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma had gone into exile in Cambodia, but remained influential and active in Laotian politics. His half-brother, Souphanouverong, led the Communist-dominated Pathet Lao, which had established control over an extensive area along the Laos-North Vietnam border. Phoumi’s forces had little popular support, had proven ineffective in combat, and appeared to be well on their way to a military defeat.

The Eisenhower administration had led the creation of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization for precisely this sort of contingency. In this first major test, however, the United States was unable to secure the alliance’s support for intervention. Its major European powers, Great Britain and France, considered Phoumi an illegitimate ruler and supported Souvanna Phouma; they were adamantly opposed to taking military action in Laos. An interagency analysis prepared in January 1961 summarized, “Since SEATO was created to act in circumstances such as that now existing in Laos but has not acted, it casts doubt not only on its own credibility but on the reliability of the United States as its originator . . .

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SEATO becomes a means by which restraint is imposed on us by our allies.” As the Eisenhower administration reached its final days, the United States was faced with the prospect of unilateral military intervention in a desperate attempt to salvage the situation. Beyond the vast logistics issues associated with intervention, the insertion of U.S. forces raised the substantial risk of a U.S.-Soviet military confrontation.

Kennedy faced a choice between two unpromising strategies: pursue a military solution, very likely demanding a unilateral intervention by U.S. forces; or adapt a major shift in policy, seeking a cease-fire and a neutralization of Laos. He rejected the military option, though he encouraged an offensive by Phoumi designed to strengthen his negotiating position. It failed abjectly. Kennedy opened his press conference on March 23, 1961, with an extended discussion of Laos, calling for an end to hostilities and negotiations leading to a neutralized and independent Laos. The Pathet Lao accepted the ceasefire offer on May 3. This delay gave the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) the time to conduct an offensive in southern Laos, capturing the crossroad village of Tchepone and the terrain necessary to extend the Ho Chi Minh Trail to the western side of the Annamite Mountains on the border between Laos and South Vietnam. Laos was a major topic at the Vienna Summit on June 4, with Kennedy and Soviet Premier Nikita Khruschev agreeing on a common goal of a ceasefire, neutrality, and a coalition government; as Khruschev summarized, “the basic question is to bring about agreement among the three forces in Laos, so that the formation of a truly neutral government could be secured.” Kennedy considered Laos a test case for the prospects of U.S.-Soviet cooperation, in areas where the superpowers could reach common objectives and avoid confrontation.

Kennedy appointed W. Averell Harriman as Ambassador at Large in the first days of his administration, and then formalized Harriman’s policy role in appointing him Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs the following November. Harriman took the lead in orchestrating American policy toward Laos as an international conference on Laos convened in Geneva on May 16. The fourteen nations involved included the U.S.S.R., Laos, People’s Republic of China, North Vietnam, South Vietnam, Poland, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, India, Burma, Cambodia, Canada, and Thailand. Meanwhile the three Laotian factions conducted negotiations on the composition of a coalition government. By the following March Harriman had become disenchanted with Phoumi, and decisively shifted American policy toward a coalition government led by Souvanna Phouma. The Laotian groups reached agreement on the composition of the coalition government on June 12, 1962, and the Geneva conference reached agreement on the Declaration on the Neutrality of Laos on July 23.

These agreements provided for a coalition government in Laos under Souvanna Phouma, with cabinet positions distributed among the three factions. The Declaration on the Neutrality of Laos and its associated protocols called for the withdrawal of all “foreign regular and irregular troops, foreign para-military formations and foreign military personnel” under the supervision of the International Commission for Supervision and Control in Laos (ICC), comprised of representatives of India, Poland, and Canada. The ICC would operate on the principle of unanimity, a change from its practice from 1954 to 1958, when it operated under majority rules. Integration and demobilization of the three Laotian armies would be conducted by the coalition government, with neither the ICC nor other international parties overseeing or enforcing these critical activities.

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These agreements broke down quickly, with lasting consequences for Laos and its neighbors. The NVA conducted a symbolic withdrawal of 15 troops on August 27, and on October 9 North Vietnam notified the Laotian foreign ministry that their troops had been withdrawn in accordance with the Geneva agreement. However, North Vietnam continued its advisory, logistics, and combat in support of the Pathet Lao in violation of the accords. North Vietnam also continued to extend its territorial control in southern Laos to secure its logistics lines to the battle areas in South Vietnam. The United States withdrew its military advisory teams in compliance with the Geneva agreement, but in its aftermath responded to the North Vietnamese violation by supporting Meo and Thai forces, and by providing economic and military support to the Phouma government and its army.

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The Congo, Decolonization, and the Cold War, 1960–1965

The decolonization of Sub-Saharan Africa from the late 1950s to the mid-1970s resulted in several proxy Cold War confrontations between the United States and the Soviet Union over the dozens of newly independent, non-aligned nations. The first such confrontation occurred in the former Belgian Congo, which gained its independence on June 30, 1960.

In the months leading up to independence, the Congolese elected a president, Joseph Kasavubu, prime minister, Patrice Lumumba, a senate and assembly, and similar bodies in the Congo’s numerous provinces. The Eisenhower administration had high hopes that the Republic of the Congo would form a stable, pro-Western, central government. Those hopes vanished in a matter of days as the newly independent nation descended into chaos. On July 5, Congolese soldiers in the Force Publique mutinied against their white Belgian commanders at the Thysville military base, seeking higher pay as well as greater opportunity and authority. The mutiny quickly spread to other bases and violence soon broke out across the nation. Thousands of Europeans (primarily Belgians) fled, and stories of atrocities against whites surfaced in newspapers around the globe. Unable to control the indigenous army (renamed the Congolese National Army), the Belgians brought in troops to restore order without seeking permission to do so from either Kasavubu or Lumumba. In response, the Congolese government appealed directly to the United Nations to provide troops and demanded the removal of Belgian troops. On July 13, the United Nations approved a resolution which authorized the creation of an intervention force, the Organisations des Nations Unities au Congo (ONUC), and called for the withdrawal of all Belgian troops. Two days earlier, the wealthy Katanga province had declared its independence from the Republic of the Congo, followed in August by South Kasai province.

While the United States supported the U.N. effort, members of the Eisenhower administration, increasingly concerned that the Congo crisis would provide an opening for Soviet intervention, sought a diplomatic solution to the crisis. Lumumba was invited to visit Washington in late July, in the hopes that the United States could exert a moderating influence on the prime minister. The visit underscored the futility of that effort. Reports from Lawrence Devlin, the CIA Chief of Station in Leopoldville (Kinshasa), described the situation in the Congo as a classic Communist takeover. The reports, coupled with the arrival of Soviet bloc technicians and matériel, convinced members of the national security team that Lumumba had to be removed. A flurry of U.S. diplomatic activity in support of unseating Lumumba ensued. Plans were also developed to assassinate Lumumba if necessary. On September 5, Kasavubu dismissed Lumumba from the government. Lumumba ignored the decree and dismissed Kasavubu. Lumumba’s supporters in the Congo and abroad were outraged and pledged to support his return to office. In an attempt to avoid civil war, Colonel Joseph Mobutu of the Congolese National Army (CNA) orchestrated a coup d’état on September 14, and ordered the Soviets out of the country. Mobutu’s early efforts to support a pro-Western government and his ties to the military placed him in good stead with Devlin, who informed Mobutu of a plot to assassinate him on September 18. Lumumba, who was blamed for the plot, was arrested and ultimately killed on January 17, 1961.

Over the next four years, as the Republic of the Congo installed a series of prime ministers, the United States repeatedly attempted to create a stable, pro-Western regime through vote buying and financial

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support for pro-Western candidates. Mobutu also received funds to help him gain the loyalty of the CNA and avoid rebellion in the ranks. Neither effort succeeded in quelling the seemingly endless unrest in the volatile provinces. Concern over the instability that would occur following the departure of U.N. troops led the Kennedy administration to sign bilateral military agreements with the Republic of the Congo and resulted in a May 1963 visit to Washington by Mobutu, who met with President Kennedy on May 31.

Support for the Congo continued unabated during the Johnson administration. U.S. military assistance increased dramatically in response to the fall of Stanleyville (Kisangani) to rebel forces on August 4, 1964. Planes provided by the Department of Defense, flown by pilots supplied by the Central Intelligence Agency, augmented the CNA’s efforts against an increasingly robust rebel insurgency, which received support from neighboring African nations, the Soviet bloc and Chinese Communists. The United States also made diplomatic approaches to the Organization of African Unity (OAU) to secure support for the Republic of the Congo. By late October, the situation in Stanleyville was dire. On October 28, the rebel army commander placed all Westerners in the area (including a number of Americans) under house arrest. Smaller but significant numbers of hostages were seized in other cities under rebel control. A joint U.S.-Belgian effort to rescue the hostages in late November, Operation Dragon Rouge, succeeded but severely damaged Prime Minister Tshombe, who was viewed as ineffectual by both Kasavubu and Mobutu. He was dismissed in October 1965 and once again, the nation teetered on the brink of civil war. Mobutu orchestrated another coup d’état on November 25, 1965, removed both the President and Prime Minister, and took control of the government.

Despite periodic uprisings and unrest, Mobutu ruled the Congo (renamed Zaire in 1971) until the mid-1990s. Viewed as mercurial and occasionally irrational, Mobutu nonetheless proved to be a staunch ally against Communist encroachment in Africa. As such, he received extensive U.S. financial, matériel, and political support, which increased his stature in much of Sub-Saharan Africa where he often served the interests of administrations from Johnson through Reagan.

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USAID and PL–480, 1961–1969

The administrations of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson marked a revitalization of the U.S. foreign assistance program, signified a growing awareness of the importance of humanitarian aid as a form of diplomacy, and reinforced the belief that American security was linked to the economic progress and stability of other nations.

In the aftermath of World War II, the United States provided economic assistance to European nations to aid in their reconstruction, and extended security assistance to these and other nations as a bulwark against a perceived communist threat. The mechanisms for deploying this assistance were spread over several government agencies and, as a result, problems arose concerning the coordination of these efforts.

Kennedy sought both to improve the administration of U.S. assistance and refocus aid to meet the needs of the developing world. In September 1961, Kennedy signed into law the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (Public Law 87–195), which mandated the establishment of a single agency for the coordination of foreign assistance. The Agency for International Development (AID)—established under Executive Order 10973—assumed responsibility for the disbursement of capital and technical assistance to developing nations. AID symbolized Kennedy’s invigorated approach to fostering the economic, political, and social development of recipient nations.

Kennedy also turned his attention to food aid, particularly the Food for Peace program started during the Eisenhower administration. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed into law the Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act of 1954, commonly known as PL–480 or Food for Peace. Prior to that, the United States had extended food aid to countries experiencing natural disasters and provided aid in times of war, but no permanent program existed within the United States Government for the coordination and distribution of commodities. Public Law 480, administered at that time by the Departments of State and Agriculture and the International Cooperation Administration, permitted the president to authorize the shipment of surplus commodities to “friendly” nations, either on concessional or grant terms. It also allowed the federal government to donate stocks to religious and voluntary organizations for use in their overseas humanitarian programs. Public Law 480 established a broad basis for U.S. distribution of foreign food aid, although reduction of agricultural surpluses remained the key objective for the duration of the Eisenhower administration. Eisenhower remained sensitive to the foreign policy implications of a permanent program, as did Department of State officials who expressed concerns that PL–480 would disrupt the export markets of several allies, including Great Britain and Canada.

As with his overall efforts to streamline foreign assistance, Kennedy also intended to reinvigorate the Food for Peace program and redirect it away from surplus liquidation. Shortly after his inauguration, Kennedy issued Executive Order 10915, which affirmed the foreign policy dimension of PL–480. Kennedy also appointed George McGovern as his Food for Peace Director—a position located within the Executive Office of the President—and tasked him with supervising and coordinating the functions of the various agencies administering the program, including AID, the Department of State, and the

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Department of Agriculture. Kennedy directed McGovern to orient the program toward the use of “agricultural abundance” in combating malnutrition. Kennedy insisted that the United States must “narrow the gap between abundance here at home and near starvation abroad.”

Johnson emphasized the Food for Peace program as a cornerstone of U.S. foreign assistance, and intended to pursue revisions to the program to strengthen its foreign policy orientation. While Johnson believed that the United States should extend food aid for humanitarian reasons, he also favored conditioning food aid agreements on the recipient nation’s ability to implement necessary agricultural reforms. “Self-help” provisions, applied to both PL–480 agreements and other AID assistance, would contribute to the economic development of recipient nations by strengthening their agricultural sectors. The Food for Peace Act of 1966 (PL 89–808) required that PL–480 agreements contain language describing the steps a recipient had already made, or planned to make, toward increasing food production and improving storage and distribution. Johnson pursued these revisions at the same time he announced a “war on hunger,” designed to accelerate agricultural production, improve nutrition, eradicate disease, and curb population growth. It remained incumbent upon the United States to demonstrate leadership and recreate Johnson’s domestic Great Society reforms on a global scale.

Johnson also understood that food aid served diplomatic ends and bolstered U.S. strategic interests. To strengthen Food for Peace’s foreign policy orientation, he pursued the transfer of the Food for Peace director’s functions from the White House to the Department of State, where the director would serve as a special assistant to Secretary of State Dean Rusk. Although the Johnson administration programmed PL–480 commodities to meet critical hunger needs, in several instances Johnson authorized food aid shipments to nations in order to allow recipients to redirect spending for military equipment or for security purposes. The administration also negotiated PL–480 agreements with countries in an attempt to dissuade these leaders from accepting assistance from U.S. adversaries. Johnson used PL–480 agreements as leverage in securing support for U.S. foreign policy goals, even placing critical famine aid to India on a limited basis, until he received assurance that the Indian Government would implement agricultural reforms and temper criticism of U.S. policy regarding Vietnam. While PL–480 commodities continued to serve humanitarian aims, the program had limitations as a tool of U.S. foreign policy, especially given Congressional reductions in foreign aid outlays by the end of the decade.

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The Bay of Pigs Invasion and its Aftermath, April 1961–October 1962

A left-wing revolution in Cuba had ended in 1959 with the ouster of President Fulgencia Batista and the establishment of a new government under Premier Fidel Castro. The Castro regime quickly severed the country’s formerly strong ties with the United States by expropriating U.S. economic assets in Cuba and developing close links with the Soviet Union.

These developments proved a source of grave concern to the United States given Cuba’s geographical proximity to the United States and brought Cuba into play as a new and significant factor in the Cold War. In March 1960, President Dwight D. Eisenhower directed the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to develop a plan for the invasion of Cuba and overthrow of the Castro regime. The CIA organized an operation in which it trained and funded a force of exiled counter-revolutionary Cubans serving as the armed wing of the Democratic Revolutionary Front, known as Brigade 2506.

Following his election in November 1960, President John F. Kennedy learned of the invasion plan, concluded that Fidel Castro was a Soviet client posing a threat to all of Latin America and, after consultations with his advisors, gave his consent for the CIA-planned clandestine invasion of Cuba to proceed. Launched from Guatemala, the attack went wrong almost from the start. Components of Brigade 2506 landed at the Bay of Pigs on April 17, 1961 and were defeated within 2 days by Cuban armed forces under the direct command of Castro.

The failed invasion strengthened the position of Castro’s administration, which proceeded to openly proclaim its intention to adopt socialism and pursue closer ties with the Soviet Union. It also led to a reassessment of Cuba policy by the Kennedy administration. The President established a committee under former Army Chief of Staff General Maxwell Taylor and Attorney General Robert Kennedy to examine the causes of the defeat suffered at the Bay of Pigs.

This examination and policy assessment, initiated in May 1961, led in November of that year to a decision to implement a new covert program in Cuba, with the codename of Operation Mongoose. Oversight for Operation Mongoose was provided by the 5412/2 Special Group, under the auspices of the National Security Council, expanded to include General Taylor and Attorney General Kennedy.

Operation Mongoose was designed to do what the Bay of Pigs invasion failed to do: remove the Communist Castro regime from power in Cuba. Orchestrated by the CIA and Department of Defense under the direction of Edward Lansdale, Operation Mongoose constituted a multiplicity of plans with wide-ranging purpose and scope. Lansdale presented the Project’s six-phase schedule to Attorney General Kennedy on February 20, 1962, and President Kennedy received a briefing on the operation’s components on March 16, 1962. Lansdale outlined the coordinated program of political, psychological, military, sabotage, and intelligence operations, as well as proposed assassination attempts on key political leaders, including Castro. Monthly components of the operation were to be set in place to destabilize the communist regime, including the publication of Anti-Castro propaganda, provision of armaments for militant opposition groups, and establishment of guerilla bases throughout the country, all leading up to preparations for an October 1962 military intervention in Cuba. Some (though not all)

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of the planned Operation Mongoose actions were deployed during 1962, but the military intervention did not occur, and the Castro regime remained in power.

Although not considered as significant a U.S. foreign policy failure and embarrassment as the Bay of Pigs invasion, Operation Mongoose failed to achieve its most important goals. Meanwhile, throughout the spring and summer of 1962, U.S. intelligence reports indicated expanded arms shipments from the Soviet Union to Cuba. Amidst growing concern in Washington over whether the Soviet weapons being introduced into Cuba included ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads, in October 1962 the Kennedy administration suspended Operation Mongoose in the face of this far more serious threat—one that resulted in the most dangerous confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

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The Cuban Missile Crisis, October 1962

The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 was a direct and dangerous confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War and was the moment when the two superpowers came closest to nuclear conflict. The crisis was unique in a number of ways, featuring calculations and miscalculations as well as direct and secret communications and miscommunications between the two sides. The dramatic crisis was also characterized by the fact that it was primarily played out at the White House and the Kremlin level with relatively little input from the respective bureaucracies typically involved in the foreign policy process.

After the failed U.S. attempt to overthrow the Castro regime in Cuba with the Bay of Pigs invasion, and while the Kennedy administration planned Operation Mongoose, in July 1962 Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev reached a secret agreement with Cuban premier Fidel Castro to place Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba to deter any future invasion attempt. Construction of several missile sites began in the late summer, but U.S. intelligence discovered evidence of a general Soviet arms build-up on Cuba, including Soviet IL–28 bombers, during routine surveillance flights, and on September 4, 1962, President Kennedy issued a public warning against the introduction of offensive weapons into Cuba. Despite the warning, on October 14 a U.S. U–2 aircraft took several pictures clearly showing sites for medium-range and intermediate-range ballistic nuclear missiles (MRBMs and IRBMs) under construction in Cuba. These images were processed and presented to the White House the next day, thus precipitating the onset of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Kennedy summoned his closest advisers to consider options and direct a course of action for the United States that would resolve the crisis. Some advisers—including all the Joint Chiefs of Staff—argued for an air strike to destroy the missiles, followed by a U.S. invasion of Cuba; others favored stern warnings to Cuba and the Soviet Union. The President decided upon a middle course. On October 22, he ordered a naval “quarantine” of Cuba. The use of “quarantine” legally distinguished this action from a blockade, which assumed a state of war existed; the use of “quarantine” instead of “blockade” also enabled the Unites States to receive the support of the Organization of American States.

That same day, Kennedy sent a letter to Khrushchev declaring that the United States would not permit offensive weapons to be delivered to Cuba, and demanded that the Soviets dismantle the missile bases already under construction or completed, and return all offensive weapons to the U.S.S.R. The letter was the first in a series of direct and indirect communications between the White House and the Kremlin throughout the remainder of the crisis.

The President also went on national television that evening to inform the public of the developments in Cuba, his decision to initiate and enforce a “quarantine,” and the potential global consequences if the crisis continued to escalate. The tone of the President’s remarks was stern, and the message unmistakable and evocative of the Monroe Doctrine: “It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union.” The Joint

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Chiefs of Staff announced a military readiness status of DEFCON 3 as U.S. naval forces began implementation of the quarantine and plans accelerated for a military strike on Cuba.

On October 24, Khrushchev responded to Kennedy’s message with a statement that the U.S. “blockade” was an “act of aggression” and that Soviet ships bound for Cuba would be ordered to proceed. Nevertheless, during October 24 and 25, some ships turned back from the quarantine line; others were stopped by U.S. naval forces, but they contained no offensive weapons and so were allowed to proceed. Meanwhile, U.S. reconnaissance flights over Cuba indicated the Soviet missile sites were nearing operational readiness. With no apparent end to the crisis in sight, U.S. forces were placed at DEFCON 2—meaning war involving the Strategic Air Command was imminent. On October 26, Kennedy told his advisors it appeared that only a U.S. attack on Cuba would remove the missiles, but he insisted on giving the diplomatic channel a little more time. The crisis had reached a virtual stalemate.

That afternoon, however, the crisis took a dramatic turn. ABC News correspondent John Scali reported to the White House that he had been approached by a Soviet agent suggesting that an agreement could be reached in which the Soviets would remove their missiles from Cuba if the United States promised not to invade the island. While White House staff scrambled to assess the validity of this “back channel” offer, Khrushchev sent Kennedy a message the evening of October 26, which meant it was sent in the middle of the night Moscow time. It was a long, emotional message that raised the specter of nuclear holocaust, and presented a proposed resolution that remarkably resembled what Scali reported earlier that day. “If there is no intention,” he said, “to doom the world to the catastrophe of thermonuclear war, then let us not only relax the forces pulling on the ends of the rope, let us take measures to untie that knot. We are ready for this.”

Although U.S. experts were convinced the message from Khrushchev was authentic, hope for a resolution was short-lived. The next day, October 27, Khrushchev sent another message indicating that any proposed deal must include the removal of U.S. Jupiter missiles from Turkey. That same day a U.S. U–2 reconnaissance jet was shot down over Cuba. Kennedy and his advisors prepared for an attack on Cuba within days as they searched for any remaining diplomatic resolution. It was determined that Kennedy would ignore the second Khrushchev message and respond to the first one. That night, Kennedy set forth in his message to the Soviet leader proposed steps for the removal of Soviet missiles from Cuba under supervision of the United Nations, and a guarantee that the United States would not attack Cuba.

It was a risky move to ignore the second Khrushchev message. Attorney General Robert Kennedy then met secretly with Soviet Ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Dobrynin, and indicated that the United States was planning to remove the Jupiter missiles from Turkey anyway, and that it would do so soon, but this could not be part of any public resolution of the missile crisis. The next morning, October 28, Khrushchev issued a public statement that Soviet missiles would be dismantled and removed from Cuba.

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The crisis was over but the naval quarantine continued until the Soviets agreed to remove their IL–28 bombers from Cuba and, on November 20, 1962, the United States ended its quarantine. U.S. Jupiter missiles were removed from Turkey in April 1963.

The Cuban missile crisis stands as a singular event during the Cold War and strengthened Kennedy’s image domestically and internationally. It also may have helped mitigate negative world opinion regarding the failed Bay of Pigs invasion. Two other important results of the crisis came in unique forms. First, despite the flurry of direct and indirect communications between the White House and the Kremlin—perhaps because of it—Kennedy and Khrushchev, and their advisers, struggled throughout the crisis to clearly understand each others’ true intentions, while the world hung on the brink of possible nuclear war. In an effort to prevent this from happening again, a direct telephone link between the White House and the Kremlin was established; it became known as the “Hotline.” Second, having approached the brink of nuclear conflict, both superpowers began to reconsider the nuclear arms race and took the first steps in agreeing to a nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

Last modified: October 31, 2013

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Alliance for Progress and Peace Corps, 1961–1969

Growing out of the fear of increased Soviet and Cuban influence in Latin America, the 1961–1969 Alliance for Progress was in essence a Marshall Plan for Latin America. The United States pledged $20 billion in assistance (grants and loans) and called upon the Latin American governments to provide $80 billion in investment funds for their economies. It was the biggest U.S. aid program toward the developing world up to that point—and called for substantial reform of Latin American institutions.

Washington policymakers saw the Alliance as a means of bulwarking capitalist economic growth, funding social reforms to help the poorest Latin Americans, promoting democracy—and strengthening ties between the United States and its neighbors. A key element of the Alliance was U.S. military assistance to friendly regimes in the region, an aspect that gained prominence with the ascension of President Lyndon B. Johnson to power in late 1963 (as the other components of the Alliance were downplayed). The Alliance did not achieve all its lofty goals. According to one study, only 2 percent of economic growth in 1960s Latin America directly benefited the poor; and there was a general deterioration of United States-Latin American relations by the end of the 1960s.

Although derided as “Kennedy’s Kiddie Corps” by some when it was established in 1961, the Peace Corps proved over time to be an important foreign policymaking institution. By sending intelligent, hard-working, and idealistic young Americans to do economic and social development work (on 2-year tours) in the areas of greatest need in the Third World, the Peace Corps provided a means by which young Americans could not only learn about the world, but promote positive change. A significant number of Peace Corps Volunteers went on to work as officials in the U.S. Government.

The Peace Corps remains an important, vibrant foreign policy institution. Since the Peace Corps’ founding, more than 187,000 men and women have joined the Peace Corps and served in 139 countries. There are 7,749 Peace Corps Volunteers currently serving 73 countries around the world.

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The Limited Test Ban Treaty, 1963

In the early 1960s, U.S. President John F. Kennedy and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev each expressed deep concern about the strength of their respective nations’ nuclear arms forces. This concern led them to complete the first arms control agreement of the Cold War, the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963.

This treaty did not have much practical effect on the development and proliferation of nuclear weapons, but it established an important precedent for future arms control. Both superpowers entered the 1960s determined to build or maintain nuclear superiority. The Soviet Union had led the way in the development of intercontinental ballistic missiles after its launch of the first man-made satellite,Sputnik, in 1957. In just a few years, it had developed an arsenal of long and medium range missiles that had raised alarm in Washington. President Kennedy had even campaigned for office on a claim that President Dwight Eisenhower had allowed the Soviet Union to far out-produce the United States in nuclear technology, creating a “missile gap.” However, soon after he took office, the Kennedy Administration determined that the balance of nuclear power remained in favor of the United States.

With both sides working to develop new and better nuclear technology over the course of the late 1950s and early 1960s, each engaged in a series of test explosions. These nuclear tests received worldwide scrutiny, not only for what they meant for the arms race but also for what they meant for human life. As the United States, Soviet Union and United Kingdom tested new nuclear technologies in the earth’s atmosphere, concerns emerged worldwide about the potential effects of radioactive fallout on the people exposed to it. This led to the formation of activist groups and public discussion of the issue.

The three countries entered into negotiations for a comprehensive test ban treaty in 1958. Having recently completed rounds of tests, at that time all three entered into a voluntary moratorium on all forms of testing, initiated first by the Soviet Union but later adhered to by the United States and Great Britain. In spite of this willingness to self-restrict testing, one of the most difficult issues preventing the conclusion of a formal treaty was the question of verification. The United States and Great Britain, in particular, pushed for on-site inspections of Soviet facilities as without them, it was impossible to determine whether the Soviets were continuing underground nuclear tests or just experiencing the frequent seismic activity to which its geographic area was prone. However, the Soviets were hesitant to permit such onsite inspections of its nuclear facilities, interpreting U.S. insistence on these inspections as a ruse to facilitate U.S. efforts to spy on Soviet advancements. After the Soviet military shot down an American U-2 spy plane over Russia in 1960, the prospects for reaching an agreement on the inspections issue all but disappeared. Khrushchev also rejected the idea of having the United Nations conduct inspections after observing what he believed was the organization’s mishandling of the Congo crisis. Instead, in the wake of these incidents both the United States and the Soviet Union resumed testing.

In 1961, Kennedy established an Arms Control and Disarmament Agency within the U.S. Department of State, and the new organization reopened talks with the Soviet Union. That year, however, neither side was ready to make major concessions. As long as it remained difficult to verify that the other side was not engaging in clandestine testing, there was little incentive to form an agreement.

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Over the course of the next year, however, the situation changed dramatically for a number of reasons. Concerns about nuclear proliferation increased interest in the testing ban, as France exploded its first weapon in 1960 and the People’s Republic of China appeared close to successfully building its own atom bomb. However, it was the rapid escalation of the Cuban Missile Crisis in October of 1962 that compelled leaders in both the United States and the Soviet Union to pursue more aggressively an agreement that could help them avoid the devastating destruction that nuclear warfare would bring. Although the crisis provided the impetus for an agreement, its final negotiation was made possible by the decision to step back from the original idea of a comprehensive test ban treaty and work instead on a more limited arrangement. Atmospheric and underground tests proved equally effective for scientific purposes, so there was no reason to insist that access to both types of testing remain available. In past negotiations, the inability to detect underground explosions and agree on provisions for inspections to ensure such explosions were not taking place became a problem that prevented an agreement. Once the Soviet Union and the United States decided that underground testing would not be included in this first treaty, the two sides very quickly reached terms they could agree upon.

The Limited Test Ban Treaty was signed by the United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain in 1963, and it banned all nuclear tests in the atmosphere, in space, or underwater. Because it stopped the spread of radioactive nuclear material through atmospheric testing and set the precedent for a new wave of arms control agreements, the Treaty was hailed as a success. The Treaty was the first of several Cold War agreements on nuclear arms, including the Non-Proliferation Treaty that was signed in 1968 and the SALT I agreements of 1972. In 1974, the Threshold Test Ban Treaty returned to the question of nuclear testing by limiting underground testing of bombs with a yield greater than 150 kilotons.

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U.S. Involvement in the Vietnam War: the Gulf of Tonkin and Escalation, 1964

In early August 1964, two U.S. destroyers stationed in the Gulf of Tonkin in Vietnam radioed that they had been fired upon by North Vietnamese forces. In response to these reported incidents, President Lyndon B. Johnson requested permission from the U.S. Congress to increase the U.S. military presence in Indochina. On August 7, 1964, Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorizing President Johnson to take any measures he believed were necessary to retaliate and to promote the maintenance of international peace and security in southeast Asia. This resolution became the legal basis for the Johnson and Nixon Administrations prosecution of the Vietnam War.

After the end of the First Indochina War and the Viet Minh defeat of the French at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, the countries meeting at the Geneva Conference divided Vietnam into northern and southern halves, ruled by separate regimes, and scheduled elections to reunite the country under a unified government. The communists seemed likely to win those elections, thanks mostly to their superior organization and greater appeal in the countryside. The United States, however, was dedicated to containing the spread of communist regimes and, invoking the charter of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (1954), supported the South Vietnamese leader, Ngo Dinh Diem, when he refused to hold the elections. Diem held control of the South Vietnamese Government, but he could not halt the communist infiltration of the South. By 1959, the Viet Cong, South Vietnamese communist guerillas, and the Viet Minh, began a large scale insurgency in the South that marked the opening of the Second Indochina War.

Ngo Dinh Diem failed to capture the loyalties of the people of South Vietnam the way that Ho Chi Minh had done among the population of North Vietnam. Despite U.S. support, Diem’s rural policies and ambivalent attitude toward necessary changes like land reform only bolstered support for the Viet Cong in the southern countryside. By 1963, Diem’s rule had so deteriorated that he was overthrown and assassinated by several of his generals with the tacit approval of the Kennedy Administration. Three weeks later, U.S. President John F. Kennedy was also assassinated, and the war continued under new leadership in both countries. Before his death, Kennedy had increased the U.S. advisory presence in South Vietnam in the hopes that a U.S.-supported program of “nation-building” would strengthen the new South Vietnamese government. However, South Vietnam continued to experience political instability and military losses to North Vietnam.

By August, 1964, the Johnson Administration believed that escalation of the U.S. presence in Vietnam was the only solution. The post-Diem South proved no more stable than it had been before his ouster, and South Vietnamese troops were generally ineffective. In addition to supporting on-going South Vietnamese raids in the countryside and implementing a U.S. program of bombing the Lao border to disrupt supply lines, the U.S. military began backing South Vietnamese raids of the North Vietnamese coast. The U.S. Navy stationed two destroyers, the Maddox and the Turner Joy, in the Gulf of Tonkin to bolster these actions. They reported an attack by North Vietnamese patrol boats on August 2, and a second attack on August 4. Doubts later emerged as to whether or not the attack against the Turner Joy had taken place.

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Immediately after reports of the second attack, Johnson asked the U.S. Congress for permission to defend U.S. forces in Southeast Asia. The Senate passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution with only two opposing votes, and the House of Representatives passed it unanimously. Congress supported the resolution with the assumption that the president would return and seek their support before engaging in additional escalations of the war.

The Gulf of Tonkin incident and the subsequent Gulf of Tonkin resolution provided the justification for further U.S. escalation of the conflict in Vietnam. Acting on the belief that Hanoi would eventually weaken when faced with stepped up bombing raids, Johnson and his advisers ordered the U.S. military to launch Operation Rolling Thunder, a bombing campaign against the North. Operation Rolling Thunder commenced on February 13, 1965 and continued through the spring of 1967. Johnson also authorized the first of many deployments of regular ground combat troops to Vietnam to fight the Viet Cong in the countryside.

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The India-Pakistan War of 1965

The 1965 war between India and Pakistan was the second conflict between the two countries over the status of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. The clash did not resolve this dispute, but it did engage the United States and the Soviet Union in ways that would have important implications for subsequent superpower involvement in the region.

The dispute over this region originated in the process of decolonization in South Asia. When the British colony of India gained its independence in 1947, it was partitioned into two separate entities: the secular nation of India and the predominantly Muslim nation of Pakistan. Pakistan was composed of two noncontiguous regions, East Pakistan and West Pakistan, separated by Indian territory. The state of Jammu and Kashmir, which had a predominantly Muslim population but a Hindu leader, shared borders with both India and West Pakistan. The argument over which nation would incorporate the state led to the first India-Pakistan War in 1947–48 and ended with UN mediation. Jammu and Kashmir, also known as “Indian Kashmir” or just “Kashmir,” joined the Republic of India, but the Pakistani Government continued to believe that the majority Muslim state rightfully belonged to Pakistan.

Conflict resumed again in early 1965, when Pakistani and Indian forces clashed over disputed territory along the border between the two nations. Hostilities intensified that August when the Pakistani army attempted to take Kashmir by force. The attempt to seize the state was unsuccessful, and the second India-Pakistan War reached a stalemate. This time, the international politics of the Cold War affected the nature of the conflict.

The United States had a history of ambivalent relations with India. During the 1950s, U.S. officials regarded Indian leadership with some caution due to India’s involvement in the nonaligned movement, particularly its prominent role at theBandung Conference of 1955. The United States hoped to maintain a regional balance of power, which meant not allowing India to influence the political development of other states. However, a 1962 border conflict between India and China ended with a decisive Chinese victory, which motivated the United States and the United Kingdom to provide military supplies to the Indian army. After the clash with China, India also turned to the Soviet Union for assistance, which placed some strains on U.S.-Indian relations. However, the United States also provided India with considerable development assistance throughout the 1960s and 1970s.

U.S.-Pakistani relations had been more consistently positive. The U.S. Government looked to Pakistan as an example of a moderate Muslim state and appreciated Pakistani assistance in holding the line against communist expansion by joining theSoutheast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) in 1954 and the Baghdad Pact (later renamed the Central Treaty Organization, or CENTO) in 1955. Pakistan’s interest in these pacts stemmed from its desire to develop its military and defensive capabilities, which were substantially weaker than those of India. Both the United States and the United Kingdom supplied arms to Pakistan in these years.

After Pakistani troops invaded Kashmir, India moved quickly to internationalize the regional dispute. It asked the United Nations to reprise its role in the First India-Pakistan War and end the current conflict. The Security Council passed Resolution 211 on September 20 calling for an end to the fighting and

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negotiations on the settlement of the Kashmir problem, and the United States and the United Kingdom supported the UN decision by cutting off arms supplies to both belligerents. This ban affected both belligerents, but Pakistan felt the effects more keenly since it had a much weaker military in caparison to India. The UN resolution and the halting of arms sales had an immediate impact. India accepted the ceasefire on September 21 and Pakistan on September 22.

The ceasefire alone did not resolve the status of Kashmir, and both sides accepted the Soviet Union as a third-party mediator. Negotiations in Tashkent concluded in January 1966, with both sides giving up territorial claims, withdrawing their armies from the disputed territory. Nevertheless, although the Tashkent agreement achieved its short-term aims, conflict in South Asia would reignite a few years later.

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The 1967 Arab-Israeli War

The 1967 Arab-Israeli War marked the failure of the Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson administrations’ efforts to prevent renewed Arab-Israeli conflict following the 1956 Suez War. Unwilling to return to what National Security Advisor Walter Rostow called the “tenuous chewing gum and string arrangements” established after Suez, the Johnson administration sought Israel’s withdrawal from the territories it had occupied in exchange for peace settlements with its Arab neighbors. This formula has remained the basis of all U.S. Middle East peacemaking efforts into the present.

The Johnson Administration and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1963–1967

Lyndon Johnson’s presidency witnessed the transformation of the American role in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Until the early 1960s, the United States had adhered to the terms of the Tripartite Declaration of 1950, wherein the United States, United Kingdom, and France had pledged to prevent aggression by Middle Eastern states and oppose a regional arms race. The United States had pressed Israel to withdraw from the Sinai Peninsula and Gaza Strip after Suez, and rejected Israeli requests for all but limited quantities of defensive weapons. By the time Johnson took office, however, U.S. policymakers concluded that this policy was no longer sustainable. Soviet arms sales to left-leaning Arab states, especially Egypt, threatened to erode Israel’s military superiority. Johnson’s advisors worried that if the United States did not offset this shift in the balance of power, Israel’s leaders might launch a preventive war or develop nuclear weapons.

Initially, the Johnson administration sought to convince Egyptian President Gamal Abdul Nasser and the Soviet leadership to work toward a regional arms control regime, but neither party proved receptive. Thus, in 1965, Johnson agreed to sell Israel M48A3 tanks, followed by A–4 Skyhawk aircraft in 1966. The rationale behind these sales, as National Security Council staffer Robert Komer put it, was that “Arab knowledge that they could not win an arms race against Israel should contribute long-term to the damping down of the Arab-Israeli dispute.”

However, U.S. efforts to preserve the regional balance of power were soon undermined by Fatah and other Palestinian guerilla organizations, which began attacking targets inside Israel. The Johnson administration tried to intercede with Fatah’s Syrian patrons and to prevent Israeli retaliation against Jordan, from which most Palestinian raids were launched. U.S. officials worried that Israeli reprisals could undermine Jordan’s King Hussein, who had secretly agreed to keep Jordan’s strategically crucial West Bank a buffer zone. In November 1966, when the Israelis attacked the West Bank town of Samu‘ , the Johnson administration voted for a United Nations Resolution condemning Israel, admonished Israeli officials, and authorized an emergency airlift of military equipment to Jordan.

While the administration’s response to Samu‘ helped prevent further Israeli reprisals against Jordan, it failed to address the underlying problem of Palestinian cross-border attacks. By the spring of 1967, the Israelis were retaliating forcefully against Syria, whose leaders demanded that Egypt intervene on their behalf.

The Prewar Crisis

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On May 13, 1967, Soviet officials informed the Syrian and Egyptian Governments that Israel had massed troops on Syria’s border. Though the report was false, Nasser sent large numbers of Egyptian soldiers into the Sinai anyway. On May 16, Egypt demanded that the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF), which had been deployed in the Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip since 1957, withdraw from Israel’s border. Secretary-General U Thant replied that he would have to withdraw UNEF from all its positions, including Sharm al-Shaykh, which would put political pressure on Nasser to close the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping. Nasser remained adamant, and on May 22, after UNEF withdrew, he announced that he would close the Straits. In 1957, President Dwight D. Eisenhower had promised that the United States would treat the closure of the Straits as an act of war. Johnson now had three unwelcome options: to renege on Eisenhower’s promise, acquiesce in an Israeli attack on Egypt, or order U.S. forces to reopen the waterway.

Instead, the President played for time. He sought international and Congressional support for Operation Red Sea Regatta, which called for a coalition of maritime nations to send a “probing force” through the Straits if Egypt refused to grant all nations free passage through them. Simultaneously, Johnson implored the Soviets to intercede with Nasser and urged Israeli restraint. “Israel,” Johnson told Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban on May 26, “will not be alone unless it decides to go it alone.” Yet over the following week, the administration failed to gain domestic or foreign backing for “Regatta.” Meanwhile, Jordan joined the Arab coalition, heightening the pressure for an Israeli strike. Though Johnson continued to caution Israel against preemption, a number of the President’s advisors had concluded that U.S. interests would be best served by Israel “going it alone” by the time the Israelis actually did so.

The War and its Aftermath

Between June 5 and June 10, Israel defeated Egypt, Jordan, and Syria and occupied the Sinai Peninsula, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights. From the beginning, the United States sought a ceasefire in order to prevent an Arab defeat bad enough to force the Soviet Union to intervene. U.S. officials were also concerned about alienating pro-Western Arab regimes, especially after Egypt and several other Arab states accused the United States of helping Israel and broke diplomatic relations. Yet after June 5, the administration did not also demand an immediate Israeli pullback from the territories it had occupied. U.S. officials believed that in light of the tenuous nature of the prewar armistice regime, they should not force Israel to withdraw unless peace settlements were put into place.

The administration’s concept of “land-for-peace” solidified following the war. “Certainly,” Johnson proclaimed, “troops must be withdrawn; but there must also be recognized rights of national life, progress in solving the refugee problem, freedom of innocent maritime passage, limitation of the arms race, and respect for political independence and territorial integrity.” Yet after the Arab states rejected a Latin American UN resolution calling for full withdrawal in exchange for recognition of “the right of all states in the area to live in peace and security” and a similar U.S.-Soviet draft, the Johnson administration scaled back its efforts to promote a settlement. Though alarmed by Israeli decisions to absorb East Jerusalem and establish Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, U.S. officials believed that the Arabs remained too inflexible to justify pressing Israel to withdraw.

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The Johnson administration did not re-enter the diplomatic fray until October, when the Soviets began to circulate a new version of the resolution that they had promoted that summer. Knowing that Israel would reject the Soviet draft, the administration encouraged the United Kingdom to introduce an alternative resolution devised by UN Ambassador Arthur Goldberg. Security Council Resolution 242, adopted on November 22, called for Israel’s withdrawal from “territories occupied in the recent conflict” in exchange for “termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgment of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force.” Interpreted differently by Israelis and Arabs, this resolution would nonetheless remain the bedrock of all subsequent U.S. efforts to resolve the Arab-Israeli dispute.

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U.S. Involvement in the Vietnam War: The Tet Offensive, 1968

In late January, 1968, during the lunar new year (or “Tet”) holiday, North Vietnamese and communist Viet Cong forces launched a coordinated attack against a number of targets in South Vietnam. The U.S. and South Vietnamese militaries sustained heavy losses before finally repelling the communist assault. The Tet Offensive played an important role in weakening U.S. public support for the war in Vietnam.

Ho Chi Minh and leaders in Hanoi planned the Tet Offensive in the hopes of achieving a decisive victory that would end the grinding conflict that frustrated military leaders on both sides. A successful attack on major cities might force the United States to negotiate or perhaps even to withdraw. At the very least, the North Vietnamese hoped it would serve to stop the ongoing escalation of guerilla attacks and bombing in the North. Hanoi selected the Tet holiday to strike because it was traditionally a time of truce, and because Vietnamese traveling to spend the festival with their relatives provided cover for the movement of South Vietnamese National Liberation Forces (NLF) who supported the communist forces.

The first phase of the assault began on January 30 and 31, when NLF forces simultaneously attacked a number of targets, mostly populated areas and places with heavy U.S. troop presence. The strikes on the major cities of Huế and Saigon had a strong psychological impact, as they showed that the NLF troops were not as weak as the Johnson Administration had previously claimed. The NLF even managed to breach the outer walls of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon. Although the first phase of the offensive became the most famous, a second phase also launched simultaneous assaults on smaller cities and towns on May 4 and stretched into June. A third phase began in August and lasted six weeks. In the months that followed, U.S. and South Vietnamese forces retook the towns that the NLF had secured over the course of the offensive, but they incurred heavy military and civilian casualties in the process.

At the end of the Tet Offensive, both sides had endured losses, and both sides claimed victory. The U.S. and South Vietnamese military response almost completely eliminated the NLF forces and regained all of the lost territory. At the same time, the Tet Offensive weakened domestic support for the Johnson Administration as the vivid reporting on the Tet Offensive by the U.S. media made clear to the American public that an overall victory in Vietnam was not imminent.

The aftermath of Tet brought public discussions about de-escalation, but not before U.S. generals asked for additional troops for a wide-scale “accelerated pacification program.” Believing that the U.S. was in a position to defeat the North, these military leaders sought to press for a U.S.-South Vietnam offensive. Johnson and others, however, read the situation differently. Johnson announced that the bombing of North Vietnam would cease above the 20th parallel and placed a limit on U.S. troops in South Vietnam. Johnson also attempted to set parameters for peace talks, but it would be several more years before these came to fruition. Within the United States, protests against continued involvement in Vietnam intensified. On March 31, 1968, Johnson announced that he would not seek a second term as president. The job of finding a way out of Vietnam was left to the next U.S. president, Richard Nixon.

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Soviet Invasion of Czechoslovakia, 1968

On August 20, 1968, the Soviet Union led Warsaw Pact troops in an invasion of Czechoslovakia to crack down on reformist trends in Prague. Although the Soviet Union’s action successfully halted the pace of reform in Czechoslovakia, it had unintended consequences for the unity of the communist bloc.

Before the Second World War, the nation of Czechoslovakia had been a strong democracy in Central Europe, but beginning in the mid 1930s it faced challenges from both the West and the East. In 1938, the leadership in Great Britain and France conceded the German right to takeover the Sudetenland in the Munich Agreement, but the Czech government condemned this German occupation of its western-most territory as a betrayal. In 1948, Czech attempts to join the U.S.-sponsored Marshall Plan to aid postwar rebuilding were thwarted by Soviet takeover and the installation of a new communist government in Prague. For the next twenty years, Czechoslovakia remained a stable state within the Soviet sphere of influence; unlike in Hungary or Poland, even the rise of de-Stalinization after 1953 did not lead to liberalization by the fundamentally conservative Czech government.

In the 1960s, however, changes in the leadership in Prague led to a series of reforms to soften or humanize the application of communist doctrines within Czech borders. The Czech economy had been slowing since the early 1960s, and cracks were emerging in the communist consensus as workers struggled against new challenges. The government responded with reforms designed to improve the economy. In early 1968, conservative leader Antonin Novotny was ousted as the head of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, and he was replaced by Alexander Dubcek. The Dubcek government ended censorship in early 1968, and the acquisition of this freedom resulted in a public expression of broad-based support for reform and a public sphere in which government and party policies could be debated openly. In April, the Czech Government issued a formal plan for further reforms, although it tried to liberalize within the existing framework of the Marxist-Leninist State and did not propose a revolutionary overhaul of the political and economic systems. As conflicts emerged between those calling for further reforms and conservatives alarmed by how far the liberalization process had gone, Dubcek struggled to maintain control.

Soviet leaders were concerned over these recent developments in Czechoslovakia. Recalling the 1956 uprising in Hungary, leaders in Moscow worried that if Czechoslovakia carried reforms too far, other satellite states in Eastern Europe might follow, leading to a widespread rebellion against Moscow’s leadership of the Eastern Bloc. There was also a danger that the Soviet Republics in the East, such as the Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia might make their own demands for more liberal policies. After much debate, the Communist Party leadership in Moscow decided to intervene to establish a more conservative and pro-Soviet government in Prague.

The Warsaw Pact invasion of August 20–21 caught Czechoslovakia and much of the Western world by surprise. In anticipation of the invasion, the Soviet Union had moved troops from the Soviet Union, along with limited numbers of troops from Hungary, Poland, East Germany and Bulgaria into place by announcing Warsaw Pact military exercises. When these forces did invade, they swiftly took control of Prague, other major cities, and communication and transportation links. Given the escalating U.S.

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involvement in the conflict in Vietnam as well as past U.S. pronouncements on non-intervention in the East Bloc, the Soviets guessed correctly that the United States would condemn the invasion but refrain from intervening. Although the Soviet crackdown on Czechoslovakia was swift and successful, small-scale resistance continued throughout early 1969 while the Soviets struggled to install a stable government. Finally, in April of 1969, the Soviets forced Dubcek from power in favor of a more conservative administrator. In the years that followed, the new leadership reestablished government censorship and controls preventing freedom of movement, but it also improved economic conditions, eliminating one of the sources for revolutionary fervor. Czechoslovakia once again became a cooperative member of the Warsaw Pact.

The Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia was significant in the sense that it delayed the splintering of Eastern European Communism and was concluded without provoking any direct intervention from the West. Repeated efforts in the UN Security Council to pass a resolution condemning the attacks met with opposition from the Soviet Union, and the effort finally died away. The invasion did, however, temporarily derail progress toward détente between the Soviet Union and the United States. The NATO allies valued the idea of a lessening of tensions, and as a result they were determined not to intervene. Still, the invasion forced U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson to cancel a summit meeting with Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev. Although Brezhnev knew this was the most likely outcome of the invasion, he considered maintaining Soviet control in the East Bloc a higher priority in the short-term than pursuing détente with the West. As it turned out, the progress on arms control agreements were only delayed by a few years in the aftermath of the Prague Spring.

There were also long-term consequences. After the invasion, the Soviet leadership justified the use of force in Prague under what would become known as the Brezhnev Doctrine, which stated that Moscow had the right to intervene in any country where a communist government had been threatened. This doctrine, established to justify Soviet action in Czechoslovakia, also became the primary justification for the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and even before that it helped to finalize the Sino-Soviet split, as Beijing feared that the Soviet Union would use the doctrine as a justification to invade or interfere with Chinese communism. Because the United States interpreted the Brezhnev Doctrine and the history of Soviet interventions in Europe as defending established territory, not expanding Soviet power, the aftermath of the Czech crisis also lent support to voices in the U.S. Congress calling for a reduction in U.S. military forces in Europe.

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The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), 1968

The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was an agreement signed in 1968 by several of the major nuclear and non-nuclear powers that pledged their cooperation in stemming the spread of nuclear technology. Although the NPT did not ultimately prevent nuclear proliferation, in the context of the Cold War arms race and mounting international concern about the consequences of nuclear war, the treaty was a major success for advocates of arms control because it set a precedent for international cooperation between nuclear and non-nuclear states to prevent proliferation.

After the United States and the Soviet Union signed the Limited Test Ban Treaty in 1963, leaders of both nations hoped that other, more comprehensive agreements on arms control would be forthcoming. Given the excessive costs involved in the development and deployment of new and more technologically advanced nuclear weapons, both powers had an interest in negotiating agreements that would help to slow the pace of the arms race and limit competition in strategic weapons development. Four years after the first treaty, the two sides agreed to an Outer Space Treaty that prevented the deployment of nuclear weapons systems as satellites in space. Of far greater import, Soviet and U.S. negotiators also reached a settlement on concluding an international non-proliferation treaty.

By the beginning of the 1960s, nuclear weapons technology had the potential to become widespread. The science of exploding and fusing atoms had entered into public literature via academic journals, and nuclear technology was no longer pursued only by governments, but by private companies as well. Plutonium, the core of nuclear weapons, was becoming easier to obtain and cheaper to process. As a result of these changes, by 1964 there were five nuclear powers in the world: in addition to the United States, the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom, all of which obtained nuclear capability during or shortly after the Second World War, France exploded its first nuclear bomb in 1960, and the People’s Republic of China was not far behind in 1964. There were many other countries that had not yet tested weapons, but which were technologically advanced enough that should they decide to build them, it was likely that they could do so before long.

The spread of nuclear weapons technology meant several things for international lawmakers. While the only countries that were capable of nuclear strike were the United States, its close ally Britain, and the Soviet Union, the doctrine of deterrence could be reasonably maintained. Because both sides of the Cold War had vast stocks of weapons and the capability of striking back after being attacked, any strike would likely have led to mutually assured destruction, and thus there remained a strong incentive for any power to avoid starting a nuclear war. However, if more nations, particularly developing nations that lay on the periphery of the balance of power between the two Cold War superpowers, achieved nuclear capability, this balance risked being disrupted and the system of deterrence would be threatened. Moreover, if countries with volatile border disputes became capable of attacking with nuclear weapons, then the odds of a nuclear war with truly global repercussions increased. This also caused the nuclear states to hesitate in sharing nuclear technology with developing nations, even technology that could be used for peaceful applications. All of these concerns led to international interest in a nuclear non-proliferation treaty that would help prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.

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Although the benefits to be derived from such a treaty were clear, its development was not without controversy. A ban on the distribution of nuclear technology was first proposed by Ireland in a meeting of the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1961. Although the members approved the resolution, it took until 1965 for negotiations to begin in earnest at the Geneva disarmament conference. At that time, U.S. negotiators worked to strike a delicate balance between the interest in preventing further transfer of the technology that it shared with the Soviet Union and the desire to strengthen its NATO allies by giving several Western European nations some measure of control over nuclear weapons. The plan for a nuclear NATO threatened to scuttle the talks altogether, and the United States eventually abandoned it in favor of reaching a workable treaty. A more difficult problem involved the question of bringing non-nuclear nations into line with the planned treaty. Nations that had not yet developed nuclear weapons technology were essentially being asked to give up all intentions to ever develop the weapons. Without this agreement on the part of the non-nuclear powers, having the nuclear powers vow never to transfer the technology would likely not result in any real limitation on the number of worldwide nuclear powers. After two years of negotiations, the nuclear powers managed to make enough concessions to induce many non-nuclear powers to sign.

The final treaty involved a number of provisions all aimed at limiting the spread of nuclear weapons technology. First, the nuclear signatories agreed not to transfer either nuclear weapons or nuclear weapons technology to any other state. Second, the non-nuclear states agreed that they would not receive, develop or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons. All of the signatories agreed to submit to the safeguards against proliferation established by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Parties to the treaty also agreed to cooperate in the development of peaceful nuclear technology and to continue negotiations to help end the nuclear arms race and limit the spread of the technology. The treaty was given a 25-year time limit, with the agreement that it would be reviewed every 5 years.

The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was, and continues to be, heralded as an important step in the ongoing efforts to reduce or prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. Still, it had one major drawback in that two nuclear powers, France and the People’s Republic of China, did not sign the agreement, nor did a number of non-nuclear states. Of the non-nuclear states refusing to adhere, and thereby limit their own future nuclear programs, of particular importance were Argentina, Brazil, India, Israel, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and South Africa, because these powers were close to being capable of the technology. In fact, in 1974, India joined the “nuclear club” by exploding its first weapon. Pakistan tested its first atomic bomb in 1983.

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