How Robert Caro Missed LBJ’s End Run Around JFK’s Rejection of his Power Grab over National Security

[Douglas Caddy]

How Robert Caro Missed LBJ’s End Run Around JFK’s Rejection of his Power Grab over National Security

 

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2019/05/phillip-f-nelson/how-lyndon-johnson-expropriated-control-over-the-pentagon-and-cia-soon-after-the-inauguration-of-the-kennedy-johnson-administration/

 

[Paul Jolliffe]

4 hours ago, Douglas Caddy said:

How Robert Caro Missed LBJ’s End Run Around JFK’s Rejection of his Power Grab over National Security

 

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2019/05/phillip-f-nelson/how-lyndon-johnson-expropriated-control-over-the-pentagon-and-cia-soon-after-the-inauguration-of-the-kennedy-johnson-administration/

 

Thanks, Douglas, for posting this fascinating article by Phillip Nelson. I have long suspected that "mainstream" biographers of any of the major figures of postwar America have little interest in deviating from the generally received narrative of events,  especially as those events may relate to 11/22/63. Robert Caro's work, painstaking in detail as it may be in many areas of LBJ's life, has little relevance to those of us on this forum, simply because Caro chose to ignore anything that "didn't fit."

Having said that, it is a stretch to argue that because LBJ had established a backchannel to the JCS (via his aide, Col. Howard Burris - unbeknownst to JFK) that therefore LBJ was actually in on the plot prior to 11/22/63. Nor does Nelson offer any evidence for it. Sure, LBJ knew and interacted with many shady characters; yes LBJ was a manipulative, ruthless operator; no doubt LBJ's vaulting ambition propelled him toward the White House in ways that would have seemed Machiavellian to lesser mortals.

But there is no evidence that the ultimate sponsors of the plot came from LBJ's immediate circle. If anything, Don Gibson's work on the creation of the Warren Commission shows that enormous pressure came from private sources, outside the government, to create the Warren Commission, the legal body that made the cover-up possible and submitted a false solution to the world. In Gibson's view  (one with which I agree completely),  LBJ was a victim of this pressure. 

We don't know for certain why LBJ acquiesced in creating the Warren Commission. We know he resisted it initially on November 24 and 25. We also know that something happened around the 26th or the 27th, because by the 29th, LBJ was "on board" with its creation. 

My guess?

Someone outside the government, privy to the skeletons in LBJ's closet, made a very subtle but very effective offer to LBJ, one that he could not refuse: create the Warren Commission, or (???) would be revealed.

He authorized its creation, and with it, no proper investigation of the president's murder was undertaken. 

Nor has one ever since.

Edited May 8, 2019 by Paul Jolliffe

[Douglas Caddy]

19 minutes ago, Paul Jolliffe said:

Thanks, Douglas, for posting this fascinating article by Phillip Nelson. I have long suspected that "mainstream" biographers of any of the major figures of postwar America have little interest in deviating from the generally received narrative of events,  especially as those events may relate to 11/22/63. Robert Caro's work, painstaking in detail as it may be in many areas of LBJ's life, has little relevance to those of us on this forum, simply because Caro chose to ignore anything that "didn't fit."

Having said that, it is a stretch to argue that because LBJ had established a backchannel to the JCS (via his aide, Col. Howard Burris - unbeknownst to JFK) that therefore LBJ was actually in on the plot prior to 11/22/63. Nor does Nelson offer any evidence for it. Sure, LBJ knew and interacted with many shady characters; yes LBJ was a manipulative, ruthless operator; no doubt LBJ's vaulting ambition propelled him toward the White House in ways that would have seemed Machiavellian to lesser mortals.

But there is no evidence that the ultimate sponsors of the plot came from LBJ's immediate circle. If anything, Don Gibson's work on the creation of the Warren Commission shows that enormous pressure came from private sources, outside the government, to create the Warren Commission, the legal body that made the cover-up possible and submitted a false solution to the world. In Gibson's view  (one with which I agree completely),  LBJ was a victim of this pressure. 

We don't know for certain why LBJ acquiesced in creating the Warren Commission. We know he resisted it initially on November 24 and 25. We also know that something happened around the 26th or the 27th, because by the 29th, LBJ was "on board" with its creation. 

My guess?

Someone outside the government, privy to the skeletons in LBJ's closet, made a very subtle but very effective offer to LBJ, one that he could not refuse: create the Warren Commission, or (???) would be revealed.

He authorized its creation, and with it, no proper investigation of the president's murder was undertaken. 

Nor has one ever since.

Thank you, Paul, for your enlightening and perceptive commentary prompted by Phil Nelson's article. You are a natural born writer, a rare talent that the reader recognizes immediately.