"Seven days in May". A 1963 movie about a US coup.

[happydreams]

http://www.destgulch.com/movies/7days/

There have been reports that I can't confirm that President Kennedy wanted this movie made so badly that he allowed filming in the White House. These same reports claim that he feared a military overthrow of the United States Government. I don't know if this is true or merely hype or urban legend. In any case, he didn't live to see the movie completed.

[bmbmd]

1. This movie has been discussed before,

along with "Night of Camp David" and "The R Document" by Irving Wallace. Remarkably prescient, don't you think???

[niyad]

2. I used to get a chill every time I drove past Ft Bliss, thinking how easy

it would be to hide an entire installation out there.

[alfredo]

3. Read James Bamford's great book "Body of Secrets."

It is a history of the NSA, but it does do a whole chapter on events around JFK's inauguration. His recounting of the USS Liberty murders is right on the money. Trust me on that.

You will also learn about "Operation Northwoods."

[NYC]

4. From Arthur Schlesinger's The Imperial Presidency:

Professional Army vs. Citizen Army. (Otherwise known as enlisted vs. drafted.)

...A vast professional army, in addition, could provide dangerous temptations to the imperial Presidency at home. Tocqueville had long since pointed out the different consequences a citizen army and a professional army had for a democracy. When men were conscripted into an army, a few might acquire a taste for military life, "but the majority, being enlisted against their will and ever ready to go back to their homes," found military service not a chosen vocation but a vexatious duty. "They do not therefore imbibe the spirit of the army, or rather they infuse the spirit of the community at large into the army and retain it there." But a professional army "forms a small nation by itself, where the mind is less enlarged and habits are more rude than in the nation at large." Its officers in particular "contract tastes and wants wholly distinct from those of the nation." In consequence, "military revolutions, which are scarcely ever to be apprehended in aristocracies, are always to be dreaded among democratic nations."

It was not unkown for professional officers in the citizen army to complain about a want of discipline and patriotism in the nation. Nor was it inconceivable that the existence of an army professional in all its ranks might suggest things to a President who regarded dissent as a form of subversion or anarchy and wished to restore law and order in the name of national security. Seven Days in May might seem melodramatic fantasy, but President Kennedy, who knew the military, wanted it filmed as a warning to the nation. In any case, there seemed no advantage in compounding problems of an already volatile political society by introducing into it a "small nation by itself," united by professional prejudices, resentments and ambitions and possessing a monopoly of the weapons of war. Here, it would appear, was precisely the large and permanent military establishment which, as Hamilton had written in the Eighth Federalist, tended to destroy civil and political rights of the people and which, as Madison had said in 1812, was forbidden by the principles of our free government.

[H2O Man]

6. Well done, NYC !!

One of my favorite books.

[NYC]

7. It was well worth reading, wasn't it?

And I thought it would be boring. It just shows that you can't judge a book by it's cover. :)

[H2O Man]

8. I've read a number

of books and articles by Schlesinger. While I do not always agree with him, I've always enjoyed his work. I've read this particular book a half dozen times, and never find it boring.

[happydreams]

10. Thanks a million for digging that up!

:thumbsup:

[Catch22Dem]

5. Excellent movie, and may I also recommend

Fail Safe (1964)

[Colonel Bat Guano]

9. I made the massive mistake of watching 7 DAYS IN MAY...

...while waiitng for the Supreme Court to put out its ruling on Bush V. Gore in 2000. That night, I couldn't take the commentary and guessing from the news channels, so I was switching back and forth between CNN and 7 DAYS on laserdisc. Dialogue from that movie in today's context is incredibly chilling. The Senator who's trying to prevent the coup, saying that the entire democracy is teetering on a precipice, going this way, going that way...one little push and it's all over. Then I switched to CNN and got the Bush V. Gore result, watching the talking heads go slack while trying to take it in and cover for it at the same time. Once it was a paranoid fantasy, now it's absolutely devastating to see worse stuff every day on the news.

In terms of craft, it's a very underrated movie and has something for everyone. Burt Lancaster is playing Oliver North, basically (and who knows, maybe a young North saw the movie in 1963 and found his role model in Lancaster's character). Virtually every other major character is recognizable in today's terms. Even for non political junkies, you've got Kirk Douglas in a great, restrained role, and Ava Gardner, once gorgeous, shockingly looking awful (and essentially playing a Washington slut who's over the hill). Never read the novel, but the screenplay is by Rod Serling and it's got the same feel as a TWILIGHT ZONE (especially the senator's speech about the coming end of democracy). I think it's available on DVD, unless Warners pulled it. (They remade it with Forest Whittaker a few years ago for HBO...it was okay, but not nearly as compelling.)

Should I watch ADVISE AND CONSENT while waiting for the Alito results? Nah, I think I'll call Bill Nelson (my senator) a few more times...

[htuttle]

11. I always thought it was loosely based on Smedley Butler's experience

..With Kirk Douglas playing the part of the 'Smedley Butler' character stand-in.

Okay, so it would have to be VERY loosely based on it (since the coup that Butler was asked to undertake was sponsored more by capitalist interests versus the military ones in the movie), but the idea of someone getting approached to execute a coup against the US President, who turned around and snared the coup plotters is pretty much the same.