Final_Judgment

88 No Love Lost [27]
Joe, Jr., as a student at Harvard, served on the Harvard Committee
Against Military Intervention in Europe, described as "a reactionary group
that petitioned influential government officials and held rallies opposing
American entry in the European war effort." 37
More significantly, however, it appears that JFK himself was under
steady surveillance by J. Edgar Hoover's FBI because of his anti-war
activities. JFK was accused by the FBI of voicing "anti-British and defeatist
sentiments and blaming Winston Churchill for getting the United States
into the war . . . It also appears," charged the FBI, "that Kennedy had
prepared for his father at least one of the speeches which his father had made,
or was intending to make, in answer to criticism of his alleged appeasement
policies . . . In addition Jack Kennedy stated that in his opinion England
was through, and his father's greatest mistake was not talking enough, that
he stopped talking too soon." 38
Young Jack Kennedy, as a Harvard student, was more than neutral
toward Hitler, it seems. Having visited Mussolini's Italy, Stalin's Russia
and Hitler's Germany, JFK recorded in his diary, according to Time
magazine, that he had come "to the decision that Facism [sic] is the thing
for Germany and Italy, Communism for Russia and Democracy for America
and England." 39 Youthful musings, but interesting, to say the least.
KENNEDY AND THE 'FASCIST'
After the war was underway, JFK's father, Ambassador Kennedy,
actively considered involvement in a scheme to cut the war short—in
opposition to President Roosevelt.
Kennedy's biographer, Richard Whalen, has written of a secret meeting
between Kennedy and a prominent critic of the Roosevelt administration, the
controversial publicist, Lawrence Dennis. Often described (inaccurately) as
"America's leading fascist," Dennis was a former diplomat himself and one of
the early leaders in the effort to block American intervention in what evolved
into World War II. Consequently, he and Kennedy had much in common.
Kennedy's biographer outlined the circumstances of that secret
meeting—a meeting which says much about Kennedy's line of thinking:
"In October 1943, Lawrence Dennis received a telephone call from his
friend, Paul Palmer, then a senior editor of The Reader's Digest. Before the
war, Dennis had contributed to the Digest, but the author of The Coming
American Fascism since had become too controversial for his byline to
appear in the nation's largest magazine. Now he received a $500-a-month
retainer as an editorial consultant.
"One of his recent efforts had been a memorandum sharply critical of
unconditional surrender and the rumored plans to break up Germany. Palmer
invited Dennis to lunch in his suite in Manhattan's St. Regis Hotel, saying
he would meet someone there who was thinking along similar lines.
"It turned out to be Joe Kennedy. Over lunch, Kennedy said he had been
seeing Archbishop Spellman almost daily. He said the Archbishop had