Recommended: JFK and the Unspeakable

James Douglass’ book JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters, is a complex book. President Kennedy’s assassination has spawned a number of conspiracy theories over the years, some wilder than others, but none have been as convincing, nor as meticulously documented, as this one. Douglass argues, quite persuasively, that Kennedy was assassinated by hard-line cold war elements of the US government who opposed his secret moves with Soviet Premier Khrushchev to de-escalate the cold war. This may sound far-fetched, but Douglass meticulously assembles his evidence, much of it in documents and testimony not available until recently, and when it is all assembled, I find it pretty convincing. Interestingly enough, this is not really a book about conspiracy theories, nor is it an anti-establishment book. Douglass is really dealing with a much subtler, deeper and more fundamental issue of morality and faith in a world with weapons that can destroy human civilization.

This is an important book at a time when America is mired in decades-long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that are bankrupting the nation, decimating our military preparedness elsewhere in the world, and breeding lasting enmity toward the US throughout the Middle East. If Douglass’ description of a military-industrial-government coalition grown so powerful that it can subvert and destroy a President who tried to limits its power is in any way accurate, one has to wonder how much of today’s difficulties are related.

Americans have a faith, perhaps naïve, that their government, while certainly sometimes inept, is not fundamentally sinister (though strangely enough, we are quite willing to believe that the governments of other nations, particularly those that oppose us, are sinister). This book makes one re-examine that belief. Humans, after all, are pretty much the same everywhere, and as Lord Acton famously remarked “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Why should we expect those in high places in our own government to be immune from this universal failing?

Not that Douglass thinks the primary movers in the tragedy were self-serving. Indeed, most of them apparently really believed they were saving the nation from a naïve, weak President who endangered the security of the nation. And I am sure the architects of our Iraq and Afghanistan adventures were equally sure they are doing what was in the best interests of the nation. But as the old saying goes “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”.

This is an important book to read. The reader can decide for her/himself whether in the end the evidence about Kennedy’s assassination is convincing or not. But irrespective of that issue, the documented trail of rogue elements within the government operating on their own, without the knowledge of the President and often in direct defiance of orders from the President, is sobering.