Freedman provides a balanced view of four hot spots which President John F. Kennedy managed and faced during his presidency; Berlin, Cuba, Laos, and Vietnam. Freedman makes a fair assessment without either glorifying his subject or accusing him of being a failure at his handling, but rather offers candid insights from former cabinet members, associates of Kennedy, and thorough research of documents made available at the time of the writing. He offers up the assessment that Kennedy was trying to find a feasible way out of Vietnam upon the time of his assassination, lending weight to the thinking as the years have passed that Vietnam would have gone on a much different trajectory than it did under the presidency of Lyndon Johnson. A good addition to anyone's collection on or interest in the Kennedy presidency. ( )

Kennedy's Wars: Berlin, Cuba, Laos, and Vietnam by Lawrence Freedman

JFK was assassinated six years before I was born. I have been fascinated by JFK since I don't know when. One of my interests in JFK was his foreign policy agenda. Kennedy came to power at the height of the Cold War when nuclear armageddon seemed imminent. Freedman tells a story of how JFK and his closest advisers kept the world intact for future generations.

Berlin had been a problem for many years for many presidents. Cuba had recently become more of an issue for the United States. Laos and Vietnam were related concerns for the United States in their conflict in Southeast Asia. Freedman uses exiting scholarship and newly released government documents o draw a detailed picture of a very complex puzzle. Every step the US made was carefully scrutinized to ensure they did nor misstep and cause more problems than they already had.

This book does get into some heavy details which a general reader might find tiring; a reader with more than a passing fancy would appreciate the finer details included from some of the most important documents to come out of that era. Also including personalities such as McNamara, Rusk, Rostow, Bobby Kennedy, and Acheson, helps the reader understand what Kennedy was faced with in regards to his advisers. I think this information adds so much more to the story.

I liked this book because the reader gets wrapped up in the issues of the day and is made to feel like they are part of the situation they are reading about. Freedman does a great job in getting the reader interested in the topic material.

Happy Reading, ( )

For those who were born after the period in question (that is, at the early beginning of the Cold War period), this book described in stark and great details the crucial leadership role played by JFK and how very close the world had been to Armageddon and nuclear annihilation. ( )