Throughout his life, John F. Kennedy was lucky–both personally and politically.

Part of the secret lay in his physical presence.  He was young and handsome, witty and articulate.

He appeared zestful and athletic despite a series of ailments, including Addison’s disease (a malfunction of the adrenal glands) and an injured back that required the use of a brace.

John F. Kennedy fired the imaginations and captured the hearts of Americans and foreign citizens as no President since the days of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Millions who voted for him–or against him or didn’t vote at all–still believe that, if only he had lived to be re-elected, America would have entered a truly Golden Age.

Kennedy certainly encouraged such belief.  Asked for his definition of happiness, he quoted the ancient Greeks: “The full use of your powers along lines of excellence.”

Almost 50 years after his death on November 22, 1963, he remains frozen in time.  Assassinated at age 46, he remains forever young, vigorous and charming.

But even if he had not been assassinated, his Presidency could have ended in disaster.

After his 1953 marriage to Jaqueline Bouvier, he continued to pursue both a married and a bachelor life.  Rumors of Kennedy’s extramarital affairs swirled throughout his Senatorial career and followed him into the White House.

His conquests included secretaries, wives of friends, strippers, movie stars (such as Marilyn Monroe and Marlene Dietrich) prostitutes and even a mobster’s mistress.

Various theories have been advanced for his taking such dangerous risks with his political career:

• As a victim of Addison’s Disease (insufficiency of the adrenal glands) he had been told by doctors he might not live beyond 35.
• As a result of the cortisone he took to control his Addison’s, his libido was greatly enhanced.
• After escaping death with the sinking of PT-109, he decided to cram as much excitement into his life as possible.
• His father, Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., a notorious womanizer, had encouraged him and his three other sons to sleep with as many women as possible.

During the 1960 Presidential campaign, Frank Sinatra–who had become smitten with Kennedy and was determined to see him elected–introduced him to a “good time girl” named Judith Campbell.

Judith Campbell

Whether Kennedy knew it or not, Campbell was also sleeping with Sam Giancana–the most-feared Mafia boss in Chicago.  And it wasn’t long before Giancana learned about her trysts with Kennedy.

As a favor to Sinatra, Giancana and his fellow mobsters used their powerful influence to ensure that JFK carried Illinois in 1960.

Sam Giancana

In turn, JFK’s father, Joseph P. Kennedy had promised Giancana that the Mob would get a free ride under a Kennedy Presidency.

When JFK appointed his brother, Robert, Attorney General, the latter declared war on organized crime.  Giancana and his fellow hoods felt betrayed.

Giancana often raged to Campbell: “If it wasn’t for me, your boyfriend wouldn’t be President.”  And having knowledge of her scandalous relationship with JFK, Giancana was in a position to expose Kennedy to what would be a shocked public.

And if Giancana didn’t do it, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover might.

John F. Kennedy, J. Edgar Hoover and Robert F. Kennedy

Hoover, under relentless pressure from Robert Kennedy to crack down on the Mob, had, through illegal electronic surveillance, discovered the Giancana-Campbell-Kennedy connection.

Always fearful that he might be replaced as FBI director, Hoover had quickly alerted the Attorney General to his latest discovery in February, 1962.  Neither RFK nor JFK could dare fire Hoover now.

White House telephone logs reveal that, from January, 1961 until February, 1962, Campbell phoned the White House 70 times.

After Hoover informed Robert Kennedy of Campbell’s status with the President, she made only one more call to Kennedy.  It was then that the President said the affair was over.

Similarly, the President’s on-and-off affair with Marilyn Monroe put him in an equally dangerous position.  Monroe’s behavior, fueled by emotional instability, alcohol and pills, became increasingly erratic.  And she grew convinced that Kennedy should divorce Jackie and make her the new First Lady.

Rumors still circulate that the President sent Robert Kennedy–who was by now an old hand at cleaning up JFK’s messes–to tell Monroe their relationship was over.

Whatever secrets Monroe may have been able to reveal about her relationship with Kennedy, she took them to the grave in an overdose of alcohol and sleeping pills on August 5, 1962.

In his 1995 bestseller, The Dark Side of Camelot, investigative reporter Seymour Hersh got several former members of Kennedy’s Secret Service detail to speak about JFK’s extramarital sex life.

They revealed that they had not been allowed to search any of the women Kennedy cavorted with.

Any of these women could have injected the President with a poisonous hypodermic.  Or secretly tape recorded their trysts with Kennedy for blackmail purposes.

Kennedy believed he would be re-elected in 1964–especially if his opponent was Barry Goldwater, the Republican Senator from Arizona.

And he almost certainly would have been re-elected; Lyndon Johnson scored a smashing victory over Goldwater that year.

But it’s also possible that Kennedy could have been forced to resign in disgrace over his affairs with Campbell, Monroe or any number of other women.

Such a fate overtook British Secretary of State for War John Profumo in 1962.  In 1961, he had begun an affair with Christine Keeler, an attractive model.  But Keeler was also bedding Yevgeney Ivanov, the senior naval attaché at the Soviet Embassy in Britain.

When the press learned about the threesome, Profumo was forced to resign, his 22-year political career destroyed.

President Kennedy’s untimely death has since fueled arguments over how, if he had lived, he would have dealt with Vietnam.

In his memoirs, former Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev wrote: “Kennedy would have never let his country get bogged down in Vietnam.”

But David Halberstam, who covered the early years of the war for The New York Times, came to a different conclusion.

David Halberstam in Vietnam

In his bestselling 1972 book, The Best and the Brightest, he wrote that although Kennedy questioned the wisdom of a combat commitment, he had never shown those doubts in public.

In public, he had expressed doubts only about the Diem regime–whether it held enough support among the Vietnamese to win the war.

His successor had to deal with Kennedy’s public statements, all supportive of the importance of Vietnam.

And it was that successor, newly-elevated President Lyndon B. Johnson, who decided, in 1965, to commit heavy military forces to protecting “freedom-loving” South Vietnam.

In short: Even if Kennedy had intended to withdraw American forces after winning re-election in 1964, he made a fatal mistake: He assumed there would always be time for him to do so.

Historian Thurston Clarke, in his 2013 book JFK’s Last Hundred Days, reached a totally diferent conclusion: That Kennedy planned to quietly remove American military advisors regardless of the military situation.

Like Halberstam, Clarke believes that Kennedy intended to gradually withdraw troops from Vietnam–but felt he could not afford to inflame the Right during an election year.

Essentially, the question, “What would  Kennedy have done?”–on Vietnam, civil rights, relations with the Soviet Union–lies at the heart of his continuing fascination among Americans.

For millions, the later turmoil of the 1960s remains such a traumatic memory that they assume: “America would have had to be better-off if Kennedy had lived.”

But much of Kennedy’s proposed legislation–such as his civil rights act–did not become law until President Johnson overcame conservative opposition to it.

Johnson had first been elected to the House of Representatives in 1937, where he gained influence as a protege of its speaker, Sam Rayburn.  In 1948, he was elected to the U.S. Senate and eventually became  one of its most powerful members–especially after becoming its Majority Leader in 1954.

Johnson knew the strengths and weaknesses of his political colleagues, and he ruthlessly exploited this knowledge to ensure the passage of legislation he supported.

Kennedy had served in the House from 1946 to 1952, and from 1952 to 1961 in the Senate.  But he had never been a major leader in either body.

It was as a Senator that he wrote his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Profiles in Courage.  But it was also as a Senator that he refused to vote on whether U.S. Senator Joseph R. McCarthy should be censured by his Senatorial colleagues.

In 1954, the Senate voted to condemn McCarthy, whose slanders of Communist subversion had bullied and frightened Americans for four years.  McCarthy’s influence as a political figure died overnight.

Joseph P. Kennedy, the family patriarch, was a strong McCarthy supporters   And Robert F. Kennedy had briefly worked for McCarthy’s Red-baiting Senate subcommitee.

JFK’s refusal to say how he would have voted on censuring McCarthy damaged his support among liberals during the 1960 election.

Eleanor Roosevelt famously said that Kennedy should show “more courage and less profile.”

Although Lyndon Johnson’s legislative achievements as Senator and President remain unprecedented, he has become a pariah figure among Democrats.

His 1965 decision to wage all-ou war in Vietnam ignited nationwide protests and elected Richard M. Nixon as President in 1968.

Like a doomed character in George Orwell’s novel, 1984, he has largely become an un-person.

Meanwhile, John F. Kennedy continues to endlessly fascinate Americans.  In poll after poll they continue to rate him highly–even though he served less than three years in the White House.

Hundreds of books and thousands of articles have been written about JFK.  On the big screen he’s been depicted by actors such as Cliff Robertson (PT 109), Bruce Greenwood (Thirteen Days) and James Marsden (The Butler).

Movie poster for PT-109

On TV, he’s been portrayed by William Devane (The Missiles of October), William Petersen (The Rat Pack), Martin Sheen (Kennedy), James Franciscus (Jaqueline Bouvier Kennedy) and Cliff De Young (Robert Kennedy and His Times).

William Devane as John F. Kennedy in The Missiles of October

Kennedy has even appeared on Saturday Night Live (perhaps most famously in a sketch where he chides then-President Clinton for his twadry choices as a womanizer).

He even figured in a 1986 episode of the revised Twilight Zone episode where a history professor travels back in time to prevent the JFK assassination.

The result: JFK is saved but Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev is murdered and World War III erupts.

In fact, the Internet Movie Database lists a total of 94 movies, mini-series. TV dramas and even comedies featuring the character of John F. Kennedy.

The Kennedy administration’s unprecedented attack on organized crime has led some law enforcement experts to believe the Mob engineered President Kennedy’s assassination.

One of these is G. Robert Blakey, father of the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO).   As the former Chief Counsel and Staff Director to the U.S. House Select Committee on Assassinations (1977 – 1979) he oversaw the second official inquiry into the Kennedy assassination.

As a result, he believes the Mob had ample means, motive and opportunity to arrange for a “nut” to kill the President.

In his 1980 book, The Plot to Kill the President, Blakey asserted:

• Lee Harvey Oswald shot and killed President Kennedy.
• An unknown confederate of Oswald’s, firing from the “grassy knoll,” also shot at Kennedy but missed.
• The conspiracy was rooted in organized crime and involved Mafia boss Santos Trafficante of Miami and/or Mafia boss Carlos Marcello of New Orleans.

The 1983 drama, “Blood Feud,” clearly implied that the Mob was responsible.  At the heart of the mini-series lay the 10-year conflict between Robert F. Kennedy and James R. Hoffa, then president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Union.

This was also the plot of American Tabloid, a 1995 novel by James Ellroy.

But investigative reporter Seymour Hersh wrote that during the five years he researched The Dark Side of Camelot, his expose of the hidden life of President Kennedy, he didn’t uncover any evidence of such a plot.

After Robert Kennedy left the Justice Department in 1964 to run for the post of U.S. Senator from New York, the Justice Department slacked off its push against the crime syndicates.

But the war was resurrected during the Nixon administration and has remained a top priority ever since.

Perhaps the most controversial legacy of the Kennedy administration remains the President’s dealings with the South Vietnamese regime of Ngo Dinh Diem.,

In 1954, the French–who had controlled Vietnam for 80 years–were forced to withdraw their military forces from the country.  Their army had suffered a humiliating defeat at Dienbenphu and the French citizenry–still recovering from defeat and Nazi occupation during World War II–demanded an end to the disastrous conflict.

Into this political vacumn stepped the victorious North Vietnamese communist Ho Chi Minh.

Kennedy–then U.S. Senator from Massachussets–had visited Vietnam while the French were still trying to hold onto one of their last colonial possessions.  And he had urged them to withdraw and allow the Vietnamese to govern themselves.

But President Dwight D. Eisenhower was aware of Ho’s overhwleming popularity throughout Vietnam due to his battles against Japanese and French colonialists.  In any nationwide election, Ho was certain to win the presidency.

But Eisenhower felt he couldn’t allow an avowed Communist to rule Vietnam.  With the North under firm Communist control, America focused its attention on the South.

earching for an acceptable alternative, Eisenhower found hm in Ngo Dinh Diem–a mandarin in a nation swept by revolution, a Catholic in a nation with an 80% Buddhist population.

Ngo Dinh Diem

In 1954, America began backing Diem.  Although his first years were marked by social progress, he later became increasingly oppressive toward the Buddhist majority.  Corruption flourished among government and army officials.

In 1960, North Vietnam launched an aggressive campaign of infiltration and assassination across South Vietnam.

In 1961, President Kennedy sent 400 Green Berets and 100 other military advisors to South Vietnam to offer support.

Diem requested American financing of a 100,000-man increase in his army.  Kennedy agreed to an increase of 30,000.  Meanwhile, the Joint Chiefs of Staff estimated that 40,000 U.S. troops would be needed to “clean up the Vietcong threat.”

Kennedy underestimated the reaction of North Vietnam, whose forces were fighting what they believed was a crusade.  As American troop strength increased, the North escalated its own commitment.

From 1961 to 1963, the number of U.S. troops in Vietnam steadily rose from 685 to 16,732.  American minesweepers patrolled the coasts while their aircraft engaged in surveillance.

For the first time, Americans became casualties of the war–especially those in helicopter combat-support missions.

Meanwhile, Diem–urged by his influential brother, Nhu, who ran the secret police–cracked down on the Buddhists.

Government troops fired on a peaceful demonstration in May, 1963.  In protest, Buddhist monks burned themselves to death before TV cameras.

Nhu’s beautiful and powerful wife led growing world outrage by her ridicule of “monk barbeque shows.”

American efforts to stop Diem’s anti-Budhist campaign failed.  On August 21, 1963, Diem’s police shot their way into Buddhist pagodas, killing scores and arresting hundreds.

This finally convinced the Kennedy administration that Diem would never gain the popular support he needed to win the war against the Communist North.

As a result, the administration offered support to South Vietnamese military officers planning a coup against Diem.

On November 1, 1963, South Vietnamese army units stormed the presidential palace.  Diem and Nhu fled, but were caught and shot.  Madame Nhu, visiting the U.S. at the time, escaped death, accusing  Kennedy of supporting the coup.

The administration issued a flat denial.

Diem’s assassination was followed 21 days later by Kennedy’s own.

By October, 1962, the Soviet Union had sent more than 40,000 soldiers, 1,300 field pieces, 700 anti-aircraft guns, 350 tanks and 150 jets to Cuba to deter another invasion.

Nikita Khrushchev, the premier of the Soviet Union, also began supplying Castro with nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles–whose discovery, in October, 1962, ignited the single most dangerous confrontation of the Cold War.

John F. Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis

On October 16, Kennedy was shown photographs of nuclear missile sites under construction on the island.  The pictures had been taken on the previous day by a high-altitude U-2 spy plane.

Suddenly, the two most powerful nuclear countries–the United States and the Soviet Union–found themselves on the brink of nuclear war.

At the time, Kennedy officials claimed they couldn’t understand why Khrushchev had placed nuclear missiles in Cuba. “Maybe Khrushchev’s gone mad” was a typical musing.

None of these officials admitted that JFK had been waging a no-holds-barred campaign to overthrow the Cuban government and assassinate its leader.

After being informed of the missile installations, Kennedy convened a group of his 12 most important advisors, which became known as Ex-Comm, for Executive Committee.

Then followed seven days of guarded and intense debate by Kennedy and his advisors. Some of the participants-–such as Air Force General Curtis LeMay-–urged an all-out air strike against the missile sites.

Robert Kennedy, the Attorney General (and the President’s brother) opposed initial calls for an air strike.

It would be, he said, “a Pearl Harbor in reverse.”  And, he added: “I don’t want my brother to go down in history as the Tojo of the 1960s.”

Robert F. and John F. Kennedy

Others-–such as Adlai Stevenson, the United States delegate to the United Nations–urged a reliance on quiet diplomacy.

It was Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara who suggested a middle course: A naval blockade–-a “quarantine” in Kennedy’s softened term–around Cuba. This would hopefully prevent the arrival of more Soviet offensive weapons on the island.

The President insisted that the missiles had to go–by peaceful means, if possible, but through the use of military force if necessary.

Kennedy finally settled on a maval blockade of Cuba.  This would prevent additional missiles from coming in and give Khrushchev time to negotiate and save face.

On October 22, President Kennedy appeared on nationwide TV to denounce the presence of Russian nuclealr missiles in Cuba.

He demanded their withdrawal, and warned that any missile launched against any nation in the Western hemisphere would be answered with “a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union.”

Kennedy ordered American military readiness raised to a level of Defcom-2–the step just short of total war.

The United States had about 27,000 nuclear weapons; the Soviets had about 3,000. In a first salvo of a nuclear exchange, the United States could have launched about 3,000 nuclear weapons and the Soviets about 250.

Nuclear missile in silo

On October 28, Khrushchev announced that the missile sites would be destroyed and the missiles crated and shipped back to the Soiet Union.

In return, Kennedy gave his promise–publicly–to lift the blockade and not invade Cuba

Privately, he also promised to remove obsolte Jupiter II nuclear missiles from Turkey, which bordered the Soviet Union.  Those missiles were, in effect, the American version of the Russian missiles that had been shipped to Cuba.

The world escaped nuclear disaster by a hair’s-breath.

Khrushchev didn’t know that Kennedy had intended to order a full-scale invasion of Cuba in just another 24 hours if an agreement couldn’t be reached.

And Kennedy and his military advisors didn’t know that Russian soldiers defending Cuba had been armed with tactical nuclear weapons.

If warfare of any type had broken out, the temptation to go nuclear would have been overwhelming.

The Cuban Missile Crisis marked the only time the world came to the brink of nuclear war.

To the Right, it was a sell-out: Kennedy had refused to “take out” Castro when he had the chance, thus allowing Cuba to remain a Communist bastion only 90 miles from Florida.

To the Left, it was a needless confrontation that risked the destruction of humanity.

For Kennedy, forcing the Soviets to remove their misssiles from Cuba re-won the confidence he had lost among so many Americans following the Bay of Pigs fiasco.

It also brought him face-to-face with the brutal truth that a miscalculation during a nuclear crisis could destroy all life on the planet.

He felt he could now move–cautiously–toward better relations between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Ironically, the crisis had the same effects on Khrushchev–who had witnessed the horrors of Germany’s 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union and the subsequent loss of at least 22 million Soviet citizens.

Slowly and carefully, Kennedy and Khrushchev negotiated the details of what would become the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which banned nuclear testing in the atmosphere.

Underground tests would continue, but the amounts of deadly strontonium-90 radiation polluting the atmosphere would be vastly reduced.

The treaty was signed between the United States and the Soviet Union on July 25, 1963.

Kennedy considered it his greatest achievement as President, saying in a speech: “According to a Chinese proverb, a jouney of a thousand miles begins with a single step.  My fellow Americans, let us take that first step.”