David Talbot: Meeting in London

[John Simkin]

David Talbot will be speaking at a small meeting of JFK researchers on Sunday 10th June in the downstairs room of The Green Man (383 Euston Road) near Great Portland Street tube station. The room has been booked for our exclusive use from 12.00pm to 4.00pm and we will have our own private bar in the area. Several journalists have agreed to attend the meeting.

Hopefully members of the forum who live in the UK will attend the meeting. You will find details of the pub and a map of the area here.

http://www.allinlondon.co.uk/clubs_bars/venue-958.php

Here is a brief description of David’s proposed talk.

David Talbot will speak about his provocative new book, "Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years." In the book - which has been called "fearless, passionate and angry" by the New York Times and "brilliant journalism" by People magazine - Talbot argues that President Kennedy's own brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, was America's first assassination conspiracy theorist. Bobby Kennedy immediately suspected that his brother was the victim of a plot - and spent the rest of his life secretly investigating the crime. Though the younger Kennedy publicly accepted the Warren Report - the official government version of the JFK assassination - Bobby was determined to reopen the case if he became president. Bobby Kennedy's campaign for the White House ended in June 1968, when he too became the victim of an assassination about which many questions remain unanswered.

Talbot will also discuss another controversial theme of his book. In recent years, President Kennedy has been characterized as a Cold War hawk - by scholars of the left and right, as well as by U.S. politicians of both the Democratic and Republican parties who are eager to claim Kennedy's tough legacy. But Talbot argues that, despite his sometimes militant rhetoric, JFK was a man of peace who was bent on leading the U.S. away from the nuclear precipice and towards detente with the Soviet Union. President Kennedy made it clear that he rejected the idea of pre-emptive war, favoured patient diplomacy over military force, and believed that the United States had to learn to live peacefully with even its staunchest ideological enemies in a multi-polar world.

Kennedy's refusal to launch an all-out military assault on Cuba - or to militarily engage with Communist foes in Berlin and Southeast Asia - provoked a sharp reaction from hard-line national security elements within his own government. "The Kennedy presidency became a government at war with itself," Talbot contends. He believes that these violent tensions within the Kennedy administration exploded in Dallas on November 22, 1963. And Talbot writes that Robert Kennedy - the country's top lawman and his brother's devoted protector - immediately looked at the CIA and its secret war on Fidel Castro as the source of the plot against JFK.

[Francesca Akhtar]

Hi John,

thanks for helping to arrange this. I will be going. What journalists do you expect to be attending?

[John Simkin]

Hi John,

thanks for helping to arrange this. I will be going. What journalists do you expect to be attending?

So far three journalists have said they will be attending. Oliver Burkeman of the Guardian and two freelance journalists, Chris Lightbown and Francis Beckett. I am now working with David's publisher to contact other journalists who might be interested in attending.

[William Kelly]

Hi John,

thanks for helping to arrange this. I will be going. What journalists do you expect to be attending?

So far three journalists have said they will be attending. Oliver Burkeman of the Guardian and two freelance journalists, Chris Lightbown and Francis Beckett. I am now working with David's publisher to contact other journalists who might be interested in attending.

Hi John,

Well done.

I think John Geraghty is doing the same in Dublin.

BK

[John Simkin]

Hi John,

thanks for helping to arrange this. I will be going. What journalists do you expect to be attending?

So far three journalists have said they will be attending. Oliver Burkeman of the Guardian and two freelance journalists, Chris Lightbown and Francis Beckett. I am now working with David's publisher to contact other journalists who might be interested in attending.

Hi John,

Well done.

I think John Geraghty is doing the same in Dublin.

BK

I spoke to the person at Simon and Schuster this morning who is dealing with the book's publicity. She tells me that they have several things lined up for his visit to Dublin.

[John Geraghty]

Hopefully myself and David will meet up while he is here in Dublin. I'm trying to contact an Irish journalist named T.P. O'Mahony, who has a good rapport with the Kennedy's and wrote the book 'The Kennedy restoration' about the next generation of Kennedy's. David and T.P. may have a good deal of information to share. Having finished my undergraduate degree on Monday, I am now free to pursue historical topics of more personal interests. I look forward to meeting David and reading 'Brothers', though I have not seen it available in bookshops here yet.

John

[John Simkin]

Maybe members could let me know if they will be attending Sunday's meeting. Maybe we could use it as an opportunity to have a real-life forum meeting.

[Francesca Akhtar]

I hope to attend. Not sure yet as have been ill the last week but fingers crossed I can make it. Well done on getting those journalists to come. Will the Guardian be doing a piece on the assassination then?

[John Geraghty]

There is still a slim chance that I might attend. Flights are too expensive at this stage, but I might take an overnight boat and coach from Dublin to London Victoria.

That options would mean that I would have to leave the Green man at about 6pm.

John

[John Simkin]

One can buy reasonably priced food at the Green Man pub so if you want to have some lunch beforehand that would be fine. The range of beers is also normally good. David will probably start his talk at some time between 1.45pm and 2.00pm. Please let me know if you can make it.

[John Simkin]

Matthew Smith, journalist, scriptwriter, television producer will be at the meeting on Sunday. Matthew was a consultant on Central Television's The Men Who Killed Kennedy. He is also the author of JFK: The Second Plot (1992), Vendetta: The Kennedys, (1993), Say Goodbye to America: New Perspectives on the JFK Assassination (2002), Victim: The Secret Tapes of Marilyn Monroe (2003) and The Kennedys: The Conspiracy to Destroy a Dynasy (2005).

[pierre]

I'll attend the meeting, may be the lone "Frenchie" living in England.

[Francesca Akhtar]

Matthew Smith, journalist, scriptwriter, television producer will be at the meeting on Sunday. Matthew was a consultant on Central Television's The Men Who Killed Kennedy. He is also the author of JFK: The Second Plot (1992), Vendetta: The Kennedys, (1993), Say Goodbye to America: New Perspectives on the JFK Assassination (2002), Victim: The Secret Tapes of Marilyn Monroe (2003) and The Kennedys: The Conspiracy to Destroy a Dynasy (2005).

Good to hear! I look forward to meeting him. I'm almost 100% I can make it tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

[John Simkin]

Hannah Corbett of Simon & Schuster will be at the meeting with copies of David’s book. I believe the Sunday Telegraph Magazine will be doing something on “Brothers: Hidden History of the Kennedy Years” tomorrow.

[William Kelly]

John,

Do you think that you or someone can videotape David Talbot's London talk and post it on YourTube or a website that we can watch it later?

Thanks,

BK

David Talbot will be speaking at a small meeting of JFK researchers on Sunday 10th June in the downstairs room of The Green Man (383 Euston Road) near Great Portland Street tube station. The room has been booked for our exclusive use from 12.00pm to 4.00pm and we will have our own private bar in the area. Several journalists have agreed to attend the meeting.

Hopefully members of the forum who live in the UK will attend the meeting. You will find details of the pub and a map of the area here.

http://www.allinlondon.co.uk/clubs_bars/venue-958.php

Here is a brief description of David's proposed talk.

David Talbot will speak about his provocative new book, "Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years." In the book - which has been called "fearless, passionate and angry" by the New York Times and "brilliant journalism" by People magazine - Talbot argues that President Kennedy's own brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, was America's first assassination conspiracy theorist. Bobby Kennedy immediately suspected that his brother was the victim of a plot - and spent the rest of his life secretly investigating the crime. Though the younger Kennedy publicly accepted the Warren Report - the official government version of the JFK assassination - Bobby was determined to reopen the case if he became president. Bobby Kennedy's campaign for the White House ended in June 1968, when he too became the victim of an assassination about which many questions remain unanswered.

Talbot will also discuss another controversial theme of his book. In recent years, President Kennedy has been characterized as a Cold War hawk - by scholars of the left and right, as well as by U.S. politicians of both the Democratic and Republican parties who are eager to claim Kennedy's tough legacy. But Talbot argues that, despite his sometimes militant rhetoric, JFK was a man of peace who was bent on leading the U.S. away from the nuclear precipice and towards detente with the Soviet Union. President Kennedy made it clear that he rejected the idea of pre-emptive war, favoured patient diplomacy over military force, and believed that the United States had to learn to live peacefully with even its staunchest ideological enemies in a multi-polar world.

Kennedy's refusal to launch an all-out military assault on Cuba - or to militarily engage with Communist foes in Berlin and Southeast Asia - provoked a sharp reaction from hard-line national security elements within his own government. "The Kennedy presidency became a government at war with itself," Talbot contends. He believes that these violent tensions within the Kennedy administration exploded in Dallas on November 22, 1963. And Talbot writes that Robert Kennedy - the country's top lawman and his brother's devoted protector - immediately looked at the CIA and its secret war on Fidel Castro as the source of the plot against JFK.