JFK Growth Under Fire
Forty-three-year-old John F. Kennedy entered the presidency in 1961 untested and immediately confronted with crises that could trigger global catastrophe.
It was the height of the Cold War, as the United States faced Communist powers led by Nikita Khrushchev and Mao Zedong. The principal flashpoints-Southeast Asia, Berlin, and Cuba-tested American resolve and presidential judgment.
In Cuba, Kennedy inherited a flawed invasion plan that collapsed at the Bay of Pigs. At home, he faced intensifying civil rights demands and a fragile economy emerging from recession.
JFK: Growth Under Fire traces how Kennedy stumbled early, then adapted-reshaping his decision-making process and ultimately confronting Khrushchev in a manner that helped steer the world away from nuclear war.
A book about the Kennedy presidency is also, in many ways, a book about Robert F. Kennedy, appointed attorney general at the insistence of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr.
From the outset, Robert Kennedy led an aggressive campaign against organized crime, pressing a resistant J. Edgar Hoover, and played a central role in enforcing federal civil rights orders against entrenched Southern opposition.
Drawing on extensive archival research, Douglas Smock revisits the major decisions of the Kennedy years, challenging long-held assumptions through a close reading of national security and contemporaneous records.
The result is a sharper, more grounded account of power, conflict, and leadership at a pivotal moment in American history.
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