Lyndon Johnson and Vietnam

[erpowers]

I am not trying to take any blame away from Johnson in terms of the Vietnam War; however, I wonder if Johnson just relied on his advisors too much.

I read a portion of the book "One Thousand Days". It was to part in which Kennedy had received the Democratic nomination and offered Johnson the Vice Presidency. It seems that Johnson relied very heavily on his advisors to decided whether or not to take the position of Vice President. Kennedy seemed much less relient on his advisors in order to decide whether to ask Johnson to be the Vice President. Is it possible that part of the problem with Johnson in terms of the Vietnam War was the fact that he relied too heavily on his advisors in order to decided what to do about the war? Did Johnson's deep need for his advisors in deciding whether to be Vice President carry on into his presidency?

[H2O Man]

1. Johnson's strength

was that he understood how congress ran. He had little interest in international politics during his congressional career.

His method of deciding if he would accept JFK's offer was, in large part, his way of evaluating his options for maintaining a position of power in Washington. Could Kennedy win? If he did, would LBJ have more power if he was in the Senate or OVP? The truth is that, even without other's advice, LBJ would have reached the same decision. He had eclipsed his mentors by that time, and knew more about the concept of power in Washington than anyone else in the country.

As VP, he was exposed to international politics, and he recognized that he had to rely upon other's opinions. His persepectives on dealing with people from other countries was almost entirely rooted in the stories his family told about his grandfather and Indians, and on his experiences with Mexicans. Neither served him well in his attempts to deal with the Vietnamese.

[UTUSN]

2. Uh, he inherited Vietnam. Plus, unlike Shrub, he had his own knowledge base outside advisors.

Before the flames toast me to a crisp about his having "inherited Vietnam," the course was set, the commitment was made, starting with EISENHOWER. Plus, in the larger sense, the U.S. seems to be trudging along behind England and France and picking up their failed colonial pieces, even to this day. LBJ *kept* the same *JFK* advisors. Some Camelotters are convinced JFK would have gotten out, who knows. I believe RFK only turned against it because of the trauma of JFK's death and hatred for LBJ. JFK and RFK had their own reckless history with wingnutism. Yeah, I know this is not popular to say here.

[bryant69]

3. This is a theme in Halberstroms The Best and the Brightest

As best as I can remember, anyway. Kennedy surrounded himself with can do people and relied on himself to be the skeptic of the group, to put the brakes on when necessary. When he was assassinated, Johnson inherited the same group, and, unlike Kennedy, he was also a can-do person. So instead of asking the skeptical questions and putting the brakes on, he jammed his foot down on the gas.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[texanshatingbush]

4. Remember that Arthur Schlesinger was a Kennedy insider.....

.....who published "A Thousand Days" just 18 months after Kennedy's assassination. Kennedy was canonized by most of his early biographer/historians, and certainly by those who had been part of his entourage (as Schlesinger was). The "bad" things about Kennedy were either left out, or were perhaps not known by the early biographers. If you want a more clear view of Kennedy and how he handled things, I urge you to read "The Dark Side of Camelot" by Seymour Hersh, published in 1997 (I picked it up at a garage sale this week for one dollar!).

With regard to the Vietnam War, I think Johnson DID rely on his advisers a great deal. And his advisers were by-and-large Kennedy men who stayed over in the new administration. One of them was Robert McNamara, who served as Secretary of Defense. See Wikipedia for an interesting and useful discussion of McNamara.

In 1996, he published a book--"In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam". The Wikipedia overview includes the following statement: "McNamara's book 'In Retrospect' was seen by many as ironic for the quantitative approach the author took to explaining the mistakes of the Vietnam War. McNamara is still seen as largely the chief architect for the failed policies of Vietnam." I haven't read this book, but I heard when it came out that McNamara placed much of the blame for Vietnam on Lyndon Johnson, while recanting his own role and decisions. For perspective, the Wikipedia entry contains this statement:

"In 1993, the respected Washington journalist Deborah Shapley published a 615-page biography of Robert McNamara, called 'Promise and Power: the Life and Times of Robert McNamara'. The last pages of her book made clear that while Ms. Shapley deeply admired certain aspects of McNamara the man, and the public servant, she had seen first-hand his need to manipulate the truth, as well as to tell it.

Shapley concluded her book with these words: "For better and worse McNamara shaped much in today's world -- and imprisoned himself. A little-known nineteenth century writer, P.W. Bornum, offers a summation: `We make our decisions. And then our decisions turn around and make us.'"