Important book by Max Boot, "The Road Not Taken" about life of General Edward Lansdale

[Douglas Caddy]

Message I received today from Robert Morrow:

  I very strongly urge you all to buy and read Max Boot's book The Road Not Taken which is about the life of General Edward Lansdale, one of the top murderers of John Kennedy.

 

        Read this book and you will understand WHY Lansdale wanted to blow out JFK's brains. 1) JFK had approved of a coup in Vietnam which resulted in the death of Lansdale's good friend Ngo Dinh Diem, the leader/unpopular dictator/American puppet of Vietnam.2) The Kennedys kicked Lansdale out of the military on 10/31/1963 - which was quite a blow to a man who thought he had a proprietary interest in making Vietnam policy for years 3) Lansdale had an extremely unhappy experience running Operation Mongoose for the Kennedys in 1962 4) JFK had promised Lansdale the ambassadorship to Vietnam but had to rescind the offer after Secretary of State Dean Rusk said hell no this will not happen.

 

       This was all coming to a head in early November, 1963. Lansdale was fired from the military on 10/31/1963. His friend Diem was overthrown in Vietnam on November 1, 1963. The next day, Lansdale's friend Diem was murdered, along with his brother.

 

        Interestingly, on the next day, November 4, 1963 Lyndon Johnson was in Europe and an extremely agitated LBJ found out that the Kennedys had sent down a SWAT team of 40 national reporters, representing 4 to 5 major national media properties and they were all investigating Lyndon Johnson with the goal of destroying him with coordinated media exposes of the titanic corruption of Lyndon Johnson. Robert Kennedy had prepared a dossier on LBJ's corruption for this swarming hive of reporters to investigate LBJ.

 

          Years later Lansdale is identified in photos taken  at Dealey Plaza on 11-22-1963 by his peers Col. Fletcher Prouty, Gen. Victor Krulak and also by Lansdale's second wife, the Filipino who he married after cheating on his first wife.

 

         By Dec. 3, 1963, a mere eleven days after the JFK assassination, Gen. Edward Lansdale had a job on the White House grounds of the Lyndon Johnson Administration in the Food for Peace program. Lansdale's office is located on White House grounds in the Old Executive Office Building which is the same building that Lyndon Johnson had his Vice President's office.

 

         BOTTOM LINE: Buy Max Boot's book on Lansdale and you will know why Lansdale was a key part in the conspiracy to murder John Kennedy.

 

         You can find this book on Amazon or at AbeBooks (dot) com and you can get a used copy for the mere price of $7 which includes shipping. I highly, highly recommend this book. $7 is less than the combined amount of Valentine's Day flowers that Bill Clinton has sent Hillary over a two decade period. $7 costs less than Hunter Biden's crack pipe. $7 is less than what Donald Trump gives over a 10 year period to the Salvation Army.

 

Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize (Biography)

A New York Times bestseller, this “epic and elegant” biography (Wall Street Journal) profoundly recasts our understanding of the Vietnam War.

Praised as a “superb scholarly achievement” (Foreign Policy), The Road Not Taken confirms Max Boot’s role as a “master chronicler” (Washington Times) of American military affairs. Through dozens of interviews and never-before-seen documents, Boot rescues Edward Lansdale (1908–1987) from historical ignominy to “restore a sense of proportion” to this “political Svengali, or ‘Lawrence of Asia’ ”(The New Yorker). Boot demonstrates how Lansdale, the man said to be the fictional model for Graham Greene’s The Quiet American, pioneered a “hearts and minds” diplomacy, first in the Philippines and then in Vietnam. Bringing a tragic complexity to Lansdale and a nuanced analysis to his visionary foreign policy, Boot suggests Vietnam could have been different had we only listened.

With contemporary reverberations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria, The Road Not Taken is a “judicious and absorbing” (New York Times Book Review) biography of lasting historical consequence.

54 black and white photographs; 3 maps

 

Review

"The Road Not Taken is an impressive work, an epic and elegant biography based on voluminous archival sources. It belongs to a genre of books that takes a seemingly obscure hero and uses his story as a vehicle to capture a whole era... The Road Not Taken gives a vivid portrait of a remarkable man and intelligently challenges the lazy assumption that failed wars are destined to fail or that failure, if it comes, cannot be saved from the worst possible outcome."
― Robert D. Kaplan, Wall Street Journal

"Judicious and absorbing.... Boot, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, brings solid credentials to this enterprise. . . . Here he draws on a range of material, official and personal.... What emerges is a picture of a man who from an early point possessed an unusual ability to relate to other people, a stereotypically American can-do optimism, an impatience with bureaucracy and a fascination with psychological warfare."
― Fredrik Logevall, New York Times Book Review

"Max Boot capably and readably tracks the fascinating but ultimately depressing trajectory of this shadowy figure, who, as a murky undercover operative and a literary and cinematic avatar, looms over or lurks behind some of the crucial moments in U.S. foreign policy in the decades following World War II, culminating in its greatest disaster."
― James G. Hershberg, Washington Post

"Max Boot has now put Lansdale back where he belongs, at the center of the story of the war.... [H]is book is the product of serious scholarship, not ideology. Boot has scoured the archives and found intriguing new material.... The Road Not Taken is an admiring but also critical biography; it invites many quibbles but rewards the reader with an engrossing portrait of a unique figure who defied the bureaucratic values of the institutions in which he served."
― Robert G. Kaiser, New York Review of Books

"A brilliant, extremely well-written book about a forgotten figure who was one of the most extraordinary and utterly unorthodox espionage agents in history."
― Steve Forbes, Forbes

"The Road Not Taken... is expansive and detailed, it is well written, and it sheds light on a good deal about U.S. covert activities in postwar Southeast Asia.... [Boot] believes that Lansdale’s approach was the wiser one, but he is cautious in his analysis of what went wrong."
― Louis Menand, The New Yorker

"Edward Lansdale is probably the greatest cold warrior that most Americans have never heard of. Max Boot has written a fascinating account of how this California college humorist, frat boy and advertising executive evolved into a counterinsurgency expert before the term was even coined. . . . This book should be read in Baghdad and Kabul, not only by Americans, but by local leaders."
― Gary Anderson, Washington Times

"Deeply researched and evenhanded, The Road Not Taken: Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam is a superb scholarly achievement.... [Boot] comes at Lansdale having already written two major books of small wars and counterinsurgency, a solid foundation that he takes to a new level here with rigorous research and dogged investigation into little-known corners of Lansdale’s life."
― Carter Malkasian, Foreign Policy

"In this fine portrait of Edward Lansdale, Max Boot adds to his well-deserved reputation as being among the most insightful and productive of contemporary historians. This is a superb book."
― Lewis Sorley, National Review

"A brilliant biography of the life―and a riveting description of the times―of Edward Lansdale, one of the most significant figures in post-World War II Philippines and then in Vietnam.... The Road Not Taken not only tells Edward Lansdale’s story with novelistic verve but also situates it wonderfully in the context of his tumultuous experiences―and offers important lessons for the present day."
― General David Petraeus

About the Author

Max Boot is a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, a columnist for the Washington Post, and a global affairs analyst for CNN. His most recent book is the New York Times bestseller The Road Not Taken: Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam.

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Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Liveright; Reprint edition (April 2, 2019)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 768 pages

Edited August 20, 2023 by Douglas Caddy

[W. Niederhut]

I've never been a Max Boot fan, but I wonder if Michael Griffith and the Prouty defamers around here have read Boot's book on Lansdale.

If I recall correctly, Griffith or one of the other Prouty bashers claimed that Lansdale had no motive for participating in the JFK assassination op.

[Robert Morrow]

There are 3 people who knew Gen. Edward Lansdale very intimately who identified him in a photo taken about 5 feet west of the Texas School Book Depository on 11-22-1963: 1) Col. Fletcher Prouty 2) Gen. Victor "Brute" Krulak and 3) Lansdale's second wife (!!) Patrocino Yapcinco Lansdale.

Fletcher Prouty gives his insights: http://www.prouty.org/letter.html Here is a 3/14/85 letter by Gen. Victor H. Krulak also identifying Edward Lansdale at the TSBD on 11/22/63: http://www.ratical.com/ratville/JFK/USO/appD.html  Here is a web archive of Krulak’s identification of Lansdale: https://web.archive.org/web/20101128210811/http://www.ratical.com/ratville/JFK/USO/appD.html

Background material on Gen. Victor Krulak-JFK connection from WWII

[“’Brute’ Krulak commemorated,” Steve Liewer, The San Diego Union-Tribune, Jan. 2, 2009, https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-1m9krulak002036-brute-krulak-commemorated-2009jan09-htmlstory.html ]

QUOTE

Krulak earned the Navy Cross for a 1943 battle in which he promised a young Lt. John F. Kennedy a bottle of whiskey for evacuating some of his men. He delivered on his promise nearly two decades later, when Kennedy was in the White House.

Krulak later commanded the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego, a place that would remain close to his heart for the rest of his life. He served his final tour, from 1964 to 1968, as commander of Marine forces in the Pacific.

Throughout his career, Krulak's unflinching honesty was legendary.

 

Patrocinio Yapcinco Lansdale, the former wife of Gen. Edward Lansdale, has identified Lansdale in that photo taken at the TSBD on 11-22-63:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiRqNiG19dg

 – Danny Sheehan, on May 23, 2016, says that Patrocinio Yapcinco Lansdale has definitively identified Lansdale in that photo taken at the TSBD on 11-23-63

Patrocinio Yapcinco Lansdale (3-13-1915 to 11-11-2006) died in 2006 https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Yapcinco-1 :

QUOTE

"Philippines Marriages, 1723-1957", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:HB3Q-83PZ : 15 February 2020), Patrocinio Yapcinco in entry for Jaime Kelly, 1943.

Virginia, Marriage Certificates, 1936-1988," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVBT-VMK5 : 10 January 2019), Edward Geary Lansdale and Patrocinio Matilde Yapcinco Kelly, 04 Jul 1973; from "Virginia, Marriage Records, 1700-1850," database and images, Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com : 2012); citing Alexandria, , Virginia, United States, certificate 73-030691, Virginia Department of Health, Richmond.

UNQUOTE

 

 

[Sandy Larsen]

While I believe that Ed Lansdale was likely in Dealey Plaza, I wouldn't trust anything written by Max Boot. He wrote this regarding the ARRB:

What has come out so far has done nothing to shake the conclusion reached by all credible investigators that Oswald was the lone gunman.

All credible investigators? Who the hell is he talking about?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/12/21/oliver-stone-just-cant-stop-spreading-lies-about-jfks-assassination/

 

 

[Kirk Gallaway]

Yes, Boot is a  neocon. But it's a sure bet he didn't say Lansdale was behind  the JFKA. These are conclusions drawn by Morrow.

I don't know a lot about Lansdale, but I have never heard the story about Lansdale's leaving his wife for a Phillipino girl whose now fingered the back photo in Dealey Plaza as him.

But go for it!, and Good Luck!

 

 

[Sean Coleman]

 

Possibly enough viz info for a positive id? To his nearest & dearest maybe….

 

without the class ring…

 

Pat & Ed 1975

Edited March 19 by Sean Coleman

[Robert Morrow]

Sean Coleman: please let me give you my "opinion:" I am 99% sure that Gen. Edward Lansdale was up to his bloody eyeballs in the JFK assassination. Lansdale did this because he was enraged that his pal Diem had been overthrown in a Kennedy-endorsed coup and then murdered (which Kennedy did not approve of). Secondly, Lansdale after 10 years thought he had a proprietary interest in running Vietnam policy and on October 31, 1963 he had pretty much been kicked out of the military by the Kennedy Administration. Then with all these same people in the Kennedy Administration who hated Lansdale (McNamara, McGeorge Bundy, Dean Rusk) still being present, Lyndon Johnson immediately resurrects the career of Gen. Edward Lansdale and sends him to Vietnam by 1965.

Lyndon Johnson would be reviving Lansdale as "payback" for participation in the JFK assassination.

 

[Sean Coleman]

1 hour ago, Robert Morrow said:

Sean Coleman: please let me give you my "opinion:" I am 99% sure that Gen. Edward Lansdale was up to his bloody eyeballs in the JFK assassination. Lansdale did this because he was enraged that his pal Diem had been overthrown in a Kennedy-endorsed coup and then murdered (which Kennedy did not approve of). Secondly, Lansdale after 10 years thought he had a proprietary interest in running Vietnam policy and on October 31, 1963 he had pretty much been kicked out of the military by the Kennedy Administration. Then with all these same people in the Kennedy Administration who hated Lansdale (McNamara, McGeorge Bundy, Dean Rusk) still being present, Lyndon Johnson immediately resurrects the career of Gen. Edward Lansdale and sends him to Vietnam by 1965.

Lyndon Johnson would be reviving Lansdale as "payback" for participation in the JFK assassination.

 

Good theory, I’ll have it unless it’s proven otherwise-a lot of bad apples in that Dallas basket.

[Michael Griffith]

On 8/20/2023 at 3:46 PM, Douglas Caddy said:

 

Holy cow, you must have a read a drastically misprinted version of Boot's book. You could not have read the same version I read. I cannot fathom how you could conclude that Boot's book explains why Lansdale would have wanted JFK dead. Boot just does the opposite and explains why the far-left fantasies about Lansdale as a JFKA conspirator are downright obscene. We could not have read the same book. 

I, too, recommend Boot's book, but not for the same reasons you do. 

Edited December 21, 2023 by Michael Griffith

[Douglas Caddy]

7 minutes ago, Michael Griffith said:

Holy cow, you must have a read a drastically misprinted version of Boot's book. You could not have read the same version I read. I cannot fathom how you could conclude that Boot's book explains why Lansdale would have wanted JFK dead. Boot just does the opposite and explains why the far-left fantasies about Lansdale as a JFKA conspirator are downright obscene. We could not have read the same book. 

I, too, recommend Boot's book, but not for the same reasons you do. 

I have never read Boot's book. If you read what I posted on 8/20/23, it starts with "Message I received today from Robert Morrow:" Robert has a new posting not far above in this topic. Your conversation should be with him, not with me.