John Kerry’s Red Roots: Richard Kerry’s Left-Wing Legacy

Original FReeper research | 8/24/2004 | Fedora

[Fedora]

John Kerry’s Fellow Travellers*

A 5-part series exposing John Kerry’s Communist connections.

Part 1: John Kerry’s Red Roots: Richard Kerry’s Left-Wing Legacy

By Fedora

*NOTE: The term “fellow traveller” as used in this article series refers to someone who is not a member of the Communist Party (CP) but regularly engages in actions which advance the Party’s program. Some apparent fellow travellers may actually be “concealed party members”: members of the CP who conceal their membership. Which of these classifications is applicable to the Kerrys is a question this series leaves unresolved. This series does not argue for any direct evidence of Richard or John Kerry or other members of the Kerry family belonging to the CP. What this series does argue for is a consistent pattern of the Kerry family working with Communists and Communist fellow travellers in a way that advances the Communist program.

Introduction

Previous articles have drawn attention to the liberal foreign policy orientation of John Kerry’s father Richard Kerry. This article digs deeper into Richard Kerry’s background, exploring how his foreign policy views were influenced by Communist fellow travellers from Harvard Law School and the State Department, and how this influence was in turn passed on from Richard Kerry to his children.

Foreground: Richard Kerry’s Career in Brief

Summary of Richard Kerry’s Career

		Notes:
1915	Born
c.1930-1940	Educated at Andover, Yale, and Harvard Law School	Embraced legal teachings of Oliver Wendell Holmes and Louis Brandeis
c.1941-c.1943	Served in Army Air Corps
1944-1945	Taught at Groton School
1945-1949	Law partner at Palmer, Dodge, Chase & Davis
1949-1951	Office of General Counsel for the Navy
1951-1954	State Department: Bureau of United Nations Affairs	Worked under Dean Acheson
1954-1956	State Department: Legal advisor to U.S. Mission to Berlin and U.S. Attorney for Berlin	Worked for James Conant, met Jean Monnet
1956-1958	State Department: Special assistant to Walter F. George, special ambassador to NATO
1958-1962	State Department: Chief of political section of American embassy in Norway
1962-2000	Retired from State Department, worked 5 years as law partner of Ernest Sheldon at Sheldon & Kerry
2000	Died

Richard Kerry was educated during the 1930s at Andover, Yale, and Harvard Law School, from which he graduated in 1940. He specialized in international law and embraced the legal teachings of former Harvard Law School professors Oliver Wendell Holmes and Louis Brandeis. After his graduation from law school, he served in the Army Air Corps in World War II and taught at Groton School from 1944-1945 before taking a job with the Massachusetts law firm of Palmer, Dodge, Chase & Davis. In 1949 he moved to Washington to work for the Office of General Counsel for the Navy, in the hope that this would help him land a job in the State Department. From 1951 to 1954 he worked for the State Department as an attorney for the Bureau of United Nations Affairs, where he subscribed to a firm belief in the UN vision of a postwar global government. In late 1954 he accepted a post in Germany as a legal advisor to the U.S. Mission to Berlin and U.S. Attorney for Berlin, working under German High Commissioner James Conant. While working under Conant in Berlin he became involved in NATO diplomacy and European unification issues, and he established relationships with prominent European politicians involved in these issues, notably French politician Jean Monnet. In 1956 he was transferred to serve as special assistant to President Eisenhower’s special ambassador to NATO, Walter F. George. Then from 1958 to 1962 he served as the chief of the political section of the American embassy in Norway. After retiring from the State Department in 1962 he spent five years working as the law partner of Ernest Sheldon in the Pepperell, Massachusetts law firm of Sheldon & Kerry.

During his career with the State Department, Kerry adopted the view of diplomats in the Truman administration who saw the Soviet threat as primarily a political threat to Europe rather than a military or ideological threat to global capitalism and democracy. Accordingly, he advocated that NATO and European unification should be higher priorities for US foreign policy than containing or rolling back Communism. This position put him increasingly at odds with Eisenhower’s Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and later with the Kennedy administration. In 1962 he retired from diplomatic service because he felt that no one was listening to his views, and he became a disgruntled critic of US foreign policy. From 1965 on he opposed American involvement in Vietnam. In 1990, he wrote a book which attacked the premises of US foreign policy during the Cold War, particularly during the Eisenhower and Reagan administrations. Echoing Kennedy-Johnson administration advisor McGeorge Bundy, he characterized Dulles’ ideological opposition to the Soviet Union as an oversimplified “either/or” dualism, and advocated instead what in his eyes was a more sophisticated relativism. As he put it, “Casting issues in the form of polar choices (for example: isolationism vs. interventionism) readily leads to the conclusion that if one is wrong, the other must be right. In a more relative view of the issue, both are likely to be wrong.”¹

Background Part 1: Richard Kerry’s Alma Mater: Harvard Law School

The Brandeis-Frankfurter Apparatus (some select members)

Louis Brandeis	Supreme Court Justice 1916-1939	Covertly engaged in activism from the bench via Frankfurter	Influenced Richard Kerry’s legal philosophy
Felix Frankfurter	Harvard Law School professor 1914-1939; Supreme Court Justice 1939-1962	Staffed Judicial Branch and Franklin Roosevelt administration with Brandeis’ agents	Taught at Harvard Law School while Richard Kerry was a student
Jerome Frank	General Counsel to Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA), 1933-1935	Hired Brandeis’ and Frankfurter’s recommendations to Roosevelt administration
Alger Hiss, Lee Pressman, Nathan Witt, and others	Hired to AAA starting in 1933, went on to other government agencies	Recommended by Frankfurter and hired by Frank to AAA	In 1945 Hiss cofounded what would become the State Department’s Bureau of UN Affairs, where Richard Kerry began working in 1951
Benjamin Cohen and Thomas Corcoran	Key Roosevelt administration advisors, 1933-1941	Hosted nightly meetings of Frankfurter’s associates to promote pro-Communist legislation, pushed for Frankfurter’s appointment to the Supreme Court
Joseph Rauh, Edward Prichard, and Philip Graham	Worked with Office of Emergency Management, 1941-1942	Former law clerks for Frankfurter, spied on Roosevelt administration for Frankfurter
Niels Bohr	Physicist; consultant to Manhattan Project, 1943-1945	Traded classified information on the Manhattan Project with Frankfurter, joined Frankfurter in trying to persuade the Allies to share atomic secrets with the Soviets

To set Richard Kerry’s career in context, it is informative to begin with his law school career and his enthusiasm for the teachings of former Harvard Law School professor Louis Brandeis. Prior to Kerry’s entrance into law school, Brandeis and his associate Felix Frankfurter were two of the most prominent Communist fellow travellers in the United States, and had used Harvard Law School as a base to place political allies in the US government.

Brandeis had been a political activist before President Wilson appointed him to the Supreme Court in 1916. After his appointment he continued his political activity by covertly using Frankfurter as his chief agent, setting up what may be called “the Brandeis-Frankfurter apparatus”. Among other functions Frankfurter performed for Brandeis’ apparatus, a key one was recommending Harvard Law graduates to work for Brandeis, his fellow Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, and the Executive Branch of the federal government. Frankfurter continued to perform this and other functions on Brandeis’ behalf until 1937, after which he branched off to form his own apparatus in the Roosevelt and Truman administrations and the Supreme Court. ²

The Brandeis-Frankfurter apparatus engaged in various covert activities supportive of domestic subversives and Soviet agents. These included advising the Wilson administration to aid the Bolshevik government,³ using Harvard Law Review to oppose anti-espionage laws, organizing Harvard Law professors to petition clemency for convicted subversives, ,⁴ and recommending Harvard Law graduates who were later exposed as Soviet agents for government jobs in the Roosevelt administration. Among the Harvard Law graduates recommended to the Roosevelt administration by Frankfurter and hired by his agent Jerome Frank were Soviet spies Alger Hiss, Lee Pressman, and Nathan Witt. Hiss went on to become prominent in the State Department, cofounding the State Department’s UN branch before he was exposed as a spy in 1948.⁵

Through agents such as Hiss, the Brandeis-Frankfurter apparatus branched out into all departments of the Roosevelt administration. In 1934 Congressman Frederick Britten observed that a group of 10 to 18 Frankfurter associates met nightly in the home of Benjamin Cohen and Thomas Corcoran to "promote Communistic legislation".⁶ During World War II, Frankfurter used his former law clerks Joseph Rauh, Edward Prichard, and Philip Graham to coordinate spying on various agencies of the Roosevelt administration through what Rauh and Prichard called “the Goon Squad”: a group of 15 to 20 second-line bureaucrats which included White House aide Laughlin Currie, a Soviet spy.⁷ Meanwhile Frankfurter and physicist Niels Bohr conspired in trading top-secret information with each other about the Manhattan Project, as part of an effort to try to persuade the Allies to share the secrets of the atomic bomb with the Soviet Union. Some top-secret Manhattan Project papers that passed between Frankfurter and the military supervisor of the Manhattan Project, General Leslie Groves, were later found in the private papers of Manhattan Project consultant Robert Oppenheimer, whose security clearance was later revoked after he was charged with being a security risk.⁸

US intelligence regarded Brandeis and Frankfurter’s political activity as suspicious. Several Army intelligence informants and analysts identified Brandeis and Frankfurter as key leaders of US Communism. 1920 Army intelligence reports described Brandeis and Frankfurter as Soviet propagandists, noting that Brandeis had been in contact with Soviet agent Santeri Nuorteva.⁹ In 1921 future FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover noted Frankfurter’s links to the radical labor group Amalgamated Clothing Workers and described Frankfurter as engaging in "communistic propaganda activities".¹⁰ A 1945 FBI wiretap investigation of leaks from the Soviet ambassador to journalist Drew Pearson revealed that Frankfurter was colluding with Pearson. Follow-up wiretaps on Pearson and Brandeis-Frankfurter apparatus member Thomas Corcoran revealed that Corcoran and Rauh-Prichard-Graham Goon Squad member Laughlin Currie had conspired to protect State Department official John Stewart Service from being prosecuted in connection with the leaking of classified government documents to the pro-Communist publication Amerasia.¹¹

Richard Kerry entered Harvard Law School in 1937, two years before Frankfurter left Harvard Law for the Supreme Court. When Kerry arrived at Harvard he was “enamored of the legal teachings of Oliver Wendell Holmes and Louis Brandeis”¹², who had looked to Frankfurter to recommend Harvard Law School graduates to be their law clerks.¹³ After Kerry graduated from Harvard Law, he went on to the State Department, where he worked under one of Frankfurter’s most prominent political allies.

Background Part 2: Kerry and the Frankfurter Apparatus in the State Department

Frankfurter’s Apparatus in the Truman State Department and the Eisenhower and Kennedy Eras (select members)

Dean Acheson	State Department, 1941-1953; Secretary of State, 1949-1953; Democratic Party senior statesman on foreign policy issues, 1953-1971	Recommended by Frankfurter to Roosevelt administration; defended Frankfurter from charges of Communism during Supreme Court confirmation hearings; advised Frankfurter of daily developments in Truman administration; recommended appointments to Kennedy cabinet and advised Kennedy administration	Secretary of State when Richard Kerry joined State Department in 1951; influenced Kerry’s views on NATO and European unification
Paul Nitze	Director of Acheson State Department’s Policy Planning Staff, 1950-1953; Acheson’s chief political ally, 1953-1960; recommended by Acheson to Kennedy State Department for possible promotion to Secretary of State	Joined Acheson in forming Democratic government-in-exile during Eisenhower administration and developing foreign policy platform for Kennedy administration	Influenced Richard Kerry’s foreign policy views
John McCloy	High Commissioner for Occupied Germany, 1949-1952; Chairman of Council on Foreign Relations, 1953-1970	Acheson and Nitze’s favored alternative to Eisenhower’s Secretary of State John Foster Dulles	Recommended next High Commisioner for Occupied Germany to be James Conant, for whom Richard Kerry would work
William Bundy	Acheson’s son-in-law; law partner at Acheson’s law firm, Covington & Burling, c.1947-1951; CIA agent, 1951-1960	Career promoted by Frankfurter and Acheson; contributed to Alger Hiss’ defense fund	Influenced Richard Kerry’s foreign policy views; uncle of John Kerry’s college roommate; influenced John Kerry’s decision to enlist in officer corps
McGeorge Bundy	William Bundy’s brother; recommended by Frankfurter for job at Harvard University; Dean of Faculty of Arts & Sciences at Harvard University, 1953-1960	Career promoted by Frankfurter	Influenced Richard Kerry’s foreign policy views; uncle of John Kerry’s college roommate

By the time Richard Kerry began his career at the State Department in 1951, Frankfurter’s apparatus in the Executive Branch had become centered around Dean Acheson, who was then the Truman administration’s Secretary of State. Acheson’s relationship to the Brandeis-Frankfurter apparatus dated back to 1920, when Frankfurter had sent Acheson from Harvard to clerk for Brandeis in Washington.¹⁴ Acheson originally entered government service in 1933 as part of the same pool of Frankfurter recommendations as Jerome Frank, the Brandeis-Frankfurter agent who hired Alger Hiss to the Roosevelt administration.¹⁵ After a temporary return to a civilian legal career, he made a favorable impression on President Roosevelt by helping Frankfurter defend himself during his Supreme Court confirmation hearings from questions about his Communist associations, and he was recruited back to government service.¹⁶ Joining Roosevelt's State Department in 1941, Acheson was assigned projects where he worked closely with Soviet spy Harold Glasser, who was the Treasury Department's representative to the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA),¹⁷ and Soviet spy Harry Dexter White, who was the Assistant Secretary of the Treasury.¹⁸ After Roosevelt's death in 1945, he was promoted to serve as Undersecretary of State under Truman’s new Secretary of State James Byrnes,¹⁹ another of Frankfurter's associates. ²⁰ While serving under Byrnes and his successor George Marshall, and later while serving as Secretary of State himself, Acheson maintained an intimate relationship with Frankfurter, strolling with him on a daily basis to discuss developments in the Executive Branch.²¹

Acheson's promotion to Undersecretary of State had been part of a reorganization of the State Department which removed an anti-Communist faction led by Adolf Berle and Joseph Grew and installed a new hierarchy under Byrnes. This new hierarchy included Alger Hiss and others who were later accused of Soviet espionage, which later raised suspicions of Acheson.²² Acheson initially shared the Roosevelt administration's optimistic attitude towards US-Soviet cooperation. He was described as "friendly to the Soviet Union" in a 1945 endorsement for his appointment as Under Secretary of State written by pro-Communist journalist I.F. Stone,²³ who was recently accused of having been an undercover KGB agent. ²⁴ From late 1945 through early 1946, Acheson and another Brandeis-Frankfurter apparatus member, David Lilienthal,²⁵ drafted a proposal for sharing nuclear technology with the Soviet Union, working with input from Stimson, Frankfurter’s associate John McCloy,²⁶ and Soviet spy Robert Oppenheimer.²⁷ During this period, in May 1946, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover warned President Truman that Acheson, Acheson’s assistant Herbert Marks, and McCloy were members of a Soviet atomic spy ring.²⁸

Acheson seems to have gradually and reluctantly changed his optimistic attitude towards US-Soviet cooperation over the course of November 1945 to August 1946, as Stalin's imperialistic intentions became increasingly evident even to most of his former supporters.²⁹ However, Acheson joined the growing opposition to the Soviet Union with the qualification that he was endorsing limited intervention against Stalin in certain strategic areas, not global containment of the Soviets and not an ideological war against Communism.³⁰ Ideologically he remained a committed liberal and political partisan, and he took a leading role in the defense of accused spies Alger Hiss,³¹ Laughlin Currie, ³² John Stewart Service,³³ and John Carter Vincent. ³⁴ His defense of Hiss prompted Senator Joseph McCarthy to scrutinize his background.³⁵ When McCarthy fell out of favor he was preparing an investigation of Acheson’s son-in-law William Bundy for Bundy’s contribution to Alger Hiss’ defense.³⁶

The victory of Dwight Eisenhower in the 1952 Presidential election repudiated Acheson’s foreign policy, and Acheson resigned in disgrace from his position as Secretary of State, to be replaced by a man he despised, John Foster Dulles. Out of power, Acheson and his former assistant Paul Nitze sought to regain influence by forming a Democratic government-in-exile aligned with Dulles’ critics. Dulles’ critics spent much of the Eisenhower administration trying to get Dulles replaced by John McCloy and otherwise attempting to influence Eisenhower through McCloy and the Council on Foreign Relations, an influential foreign policy think tank which McCloy then chaired. Acheson’s critique of Dulles included an argument against Dulles’ emphasis on nuclear deterrence and in favor of strengthening NATO’s conventional capability as a non-nuclear deterrent. Acheson and Nitze’s foreign policy ideas were adopted into Adlai Stevenson’s 1956 Presidential campaign and John Kennedy’s 1960 Presidential campaign. With Kennedy’s election Acheson regained his former influence for the course of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. He recommended several of Kennedy’s cabinet appointments, and attempted unsuccessfully to convince Kennedy to appoint Nitze Undersecretary of State to groom him for eventual promotion to Secretary of State.³⁷

Richard Kerry joined the State Department in 1951 while Acheson was still Secretary of State. He began his State Department career as attorney for the Bureau of United Nations Affairs, an area of the State Department where Acheson and Hiss had previously worked.³⁸ The foreign policy views he developed while working in the State Department, as expressed in his later book, reflect the influence of Acheson and such associates of Acheson as Paul Nitze, William Bundy, and William’s brother McGeorge Bundy.³⁹ William and McGeorge’s nephew Harvey H. Bundy III later became John Kerry’s roommate. Harvey introduced John to William, who discussed the Vietnam War with John and influenced his decision to enlist in the officer corps.⁴⁰ In 2004 Harvey’s son Hollister Bundy, who is Kerry’s godson, helped raise funds for Kerry’s campaign by emailing out an endorsement titled “’Uncle Johnny’ Kerry for President”.⁴¹

Background Part 3: Kerry, Conant, and Monnet’s “Atlantic Partnership”

Richard Kerry’s Atlantic partners

James Conant	Chemist; President of Harvard University, 1933-1953; consultant to Manhattan Project and Atomic Energy Commission, 1942-1953; High Commissioner for Occupied Germany, 1953-1955; US Ambassador to West Germany, 1955-1957	Political ally of Frankfurter, Acheson, Harvey Bundy, and Robert Oppenheimer; recommended by McCloy to be High Commissioner for Occupied Germany	Served by Richard Kerry as legal counsel
Jean Monnet	Businessman representing French interests in US; financial advisor to Allies on war mobilization, 1940-1945; promoted European unification after 1945 through means such as the European Coal and Steel Community, European Defense Community, and Bilderberg Group	Worked with Frankfurter, McCloy, and Acheson during World War II; joined Acheson and George Ball in promoting “Atlantic Partnership” model of US-European relations after war	Met Richard Kerry and influenced his foreign policy views on NATO and European unification

After the State Department transferred Kerry to Europe, he went on to work with other associates of Frankfurter and Acheson there. In 1954 the State Department sent Richard Kerry to Germany to serve as legal advisor to German High Commissioner James Conant. Conant, a former chemist, had previously served as Dean of Harvard, where he had developed a relationship with Felix Frankfurter and close Frankfurter associates such as Dean Acheson and Harvey Bundy (father of William and McGeorge).⁴² While at Harvard he had also served as a consultant to the Manhattan Project and later, at Acheson’s invitation,⁴³ to the nascent Atomic Energy Commission, where he worked with Robert Oppenheimer to encourage sharing of US nuclear technology with the Soviet Union.⁴⁴ Conant was later recommended to Acheson for the post of German High Commissioner by his predecessor in that position, John McCloy.⁴⁵ When Conant left Harvard for Germany to replace McCloy, McGeorge Bundy became Dean of Faculty of Arts & Sciences at Harvard.⁴⁶

Conant’s activity at Harvard had come under FBI surveillance for his protection of Communist professors, leading J. Edgar Hoover to complain that Conant “had more or less condoned the employment of professors who might have communist backgrounds.”⁴⁷ The FBI also monitored Conant’s relationship with Robert Oppenheimer, whom Conant had approved for the Manhattan Project even after being warned that Oppenheimer was a security risk due to his Communist background. In February 1947 an FBI wiretap picked up a call where Oppenheimer urged Conant to influence Congress in the Atomic Energy Commission nomination of David Lilienthal,⁴⁸, a Frankfurter apparatus member.⁴⁹ Several of Conant’s scientific colleagues informed the FBI that they viewed Conant as a political ally of a pro-Oppenheimer clique at Los Alamos which opposed US atomic weapons programs such as the H-bomb program.⁵⁰ Conant’s appointment as German High Commissioner in February 1953 was opposed by conservative politicians, including Joseph McCarthy.⁵¹ During 1953 McCarthy’s investigations led the State Department to request the resignation of five members of Conant’s staff, which Conant resisted, appealing for help to McCloy.⁵² Then from March through June 1954, Conant became involved in the defense of Oppenheimer when Oppenheimer’s security clearance was under review for revocation.⁵³

It was shortly after this in late 1954 that Richard Kerry became Conant’s legal counsel. Conant proved unsupportive of CIA operations in Germany and uncooperative with German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer. Adenauer and the CIA came to distrust him, and John Foster Dulles eventually had him replaced in 1957.⁵⁴ Meanwhile in 1956, Kerry was transferred to a new post as special assistant to President Eisenhower’s special ambassador to NATO, Walter F. George, a conservative Southern Democrat, who soon died in August 1957.⁵⁵

While working for Conant, Kerry’s interest in NATO diplomacy and European unification issues led him to develop a relationship with French politician Jean Monnet, a European associate of Frankfurter, Acheson, and McCloy. Monnet had become friends with McCloy while working on Wall Street with him in the 1930s.⁵⁶ He became friends with Frankfurter while taking refuge in the United States after France fell in 1940, and Frankfurter introduced him to Washington political circles.⁵⁷ Monnet relied on Frankfurter and McCloy to rally US support for Charles de Gaulle’s French Resistance movement,⁵⁸ and he joined Frankfurter, Acheson, and McCloy in promoting the Lend-Lease program.⁵⁹ After the war Monnet and Acheson promoted an “Atlantic Partnership” policy of US-European relations centered around NATO and a unified Europe, and opposed to the nationalistic vision of postwar Europe promoted by de Gaulle.⁶⁰

Richard Kerry shared Monnet and Acheson’s enthusiasm for NATO and European unification. While attending conferences on European unification issues Kerry met Monnet, and he later introduced his son John to Monnet. In his book he developed a view of US-European relations echoing Monnet and Acheson’s view, and he chided fellow diplomat George Ball for not learning from his relationship with Monnet, writing, “It is particularly difficult to account for Ball’s delusion in the perspective of his accomplishments and his exposure to French politics from his years of collaboration with Jean Monnet . . .”⁶¹

Center Stage: Richard Kerry’s Legacy: Peggy and John

The Kerry family’s foreign policy views

Richard Kerry	Advocated UN global government; regarded NATO and European unification as higher priorities than containing Communism	Opposed Vietnam War 1965+	Opposed aid to Contras in 1980s
Peggy Kerry	Worked at UN	Opposed Vietnam War 1967+
John Kerry	Described Western colonialism as bigger threat to Third World than Communism	Opposed Vietnam War 1965+	Opposed aid to Contras 1984+

Through his echoing of Acheson and Monnet’s foreign policy views, Richard Kerry represented the legacy of the Acheson State Department within the Eisenhower administration.. Kerry in turn passed this legacy on to his children. His daughter Peggy as well as his son John adopted his liberal foreign policy views, including his opposition to the Vietnam War.

Peggy was John’s older sister and political mentor. In 1952 when she was in fifth grade and John was in third grade, she joined a club at school supporting Democratic Presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson, and John helped her sell Stevenson campaign buttons. Later in 1968, after graduating from Smith College and moving to Greenwich Village, she joined the Village Independent Democrats (VID),⁶² an activist group which had been formed by Stevenson’s supporters following his unsuccessful 1956 Presidential campaign and came to be known as “the most liberal Democratic club in the state”.⁶³ While working with VID, Peggy became involved in the antiwar movement, which led antiwar feminist Bella Abzug to introduce her to Sheldon Ramsdell of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) in order to recruit her help in organizing 1969 antiwar rallies for the Vietnam Moratorium Committee (VMC). Peggy in turn recruited her brother John to help fly antiwar speaker Adam Walinsky to VMC rallies, introducing John to the antiwar movement.⁶⁴ Peggy went on to work for the ACLU, the New York Civil Liberties Union, Planned Parenthood, and the State Department’s UN mission. She currently works as the nongovernmental organization (NGO) liaison at the State Department’s UN mission, as meanwhile she works for her brother’s campaign.⁶⁵

Like Peggy, John also adopted Richard’s foreign policy views and opposition to the Vietnam War. During the 1950s John argued during a debate that the United States should open relations with Communist China,⁶⁶ a foreign policy position Acheson had originally introduced to the State Department in 1949 following the advice of John Stewart Service and John Carter Vincent.⁶⁷, two political allies of Soviet spy Laughlin Currie.⁶⁸ In 1965, John echoed his father’s opposition to John Foster Dulles’ anti-Communism by arguing, “It is the specter of Western Imperialism that causes more fear among Africans and Asians than communism, and thus it is self-defeating.” In 1966 John gave a speech opposing the Vietnam War in words which echoed his father’s criticism of the “polar choices” of “isolationism vs. interventionism”, saying, “What was an excess of isolationism has become an excess of interventionism.” After John returned from Vietnam in 1969, his father challenged him to become more outspoken in his opposition to the war.⁶⁹ Richard would also advise John during his Senate career as he opposed the Reagan administration’s support of the Contras.⁷⁰

Conclusion

The influence of Felix Frankfurter’s apparatus in the Acheson State Department was reflected in Richard Kerry’s enthusiasm for the UN, his relationship with Jean Monnet, his advocacy of European unification, and his opposition to John Foster Dulles’ Cold War policies, which underlaid his opposition to the Vietnam War and the Contras. From these roots sprang John Kerry’s foreign policy views, which would lead him to fake his way out of Vietnam and join Communist front groups in opposing the Vietnam War.

Next: “Part 2: Forging a Paper Hero: The Mystery of Kerry’s Medals”

Notes

¹Richard J. Kerry, Star-Spangled Mirror: A Father’s Legacy Shapes John Kerry’s Worldview, with foreword by Franklin Foer, Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. 2004 (1990); “In Memoriam: 1940-1949: Richard J. Kerry ‘40”, Harvard Law School, http://www.law.harvard.edu/alumni/bulletin/2001/spring/memoriam_main.html; Douglas Brinkley, Tour of Duty: John Kerry and the Vietnam War, New York: William Morrow, 2004, 19-30; Elizabeth Shelburne, “The Thoughtful Soldier: Douglas Brinkley, the author of Tour of Duty, on John Kerry’s conflicted but heroic service in Vietnam”, Atlantic Unbound, http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/interviews/int2004-03-10.htm, March 10, 2004; Franklin Foer, “Kerry’s World: Father Knows Best”, CBS News, http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/03/02/opinion/main603542.shtml, March 2, 2004; Don Eriksson, “John Kerry’s roots come close to home—Groton”, Pepperell Free Press, http://www.pepperellfreepress.com/Stories/0,1413,109~5521~2162728,00.html, May 21, 2004.

²For details on Brandeis and Frankfurter’s relationship, see Bruce Allen Murphy, The Brandeis/Frankfurter Connection: The Secret Political Activities of Two Supreme Court Justices, Oxford University Press, 1982; Garden City: Anchor Books, 1983.

³Murphy, 50-51.

⁴ Murphy, 54; James Chace, Acheson: The Secretary of State Who Created the American World, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1998, 45, 48-49; Kai Bird, The Chairman: John J. McCloy and the Making of the American Establishment, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992, 53; Athan Theoharis and John Stuart Cox, The Boss: J. Edgar Hoover and the Great American Inquisition, Temple University, 1988; New York: Bantam Books, 1990, 72.

⁵On the role of Brandeis, Frankfurter, and Frank in the appointments of Hiss, Pressman, and Witt, see Murphy, 33, 113-116 (cf. Roosevelt and Frankfurter: Their Correspondence, 1928-1945, annotator Max Freedman, Little, Brown and Company, 1967, 7-9); John Chabot Smith, Alger Hiss: The True Story, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1976, 10-12; Joseph P. Lash, Dealers and Dreamers: A New Look at the New Deal, New York: Doubleday, 1985, 111, 217-218; Kenneth S. Davis, FDR: The New Deal Years, 1933-1937, A History,, New York: Random House, 1986, 275-281.

⁶ Lash, 7.

⁷Murphy, 204-245, esp. 224. On Currie’s espionage activity, see John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999; New Haven: Yale Nota Bene, 2000, 145-150.

⁸ Murphy, 296-302; James G. Hershberg, James B. Conant: Harvard to Hiroshima and the Making of the Nuclear Age, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993, 195-200, 812n16; Haynes and Klehr, 327-330; Herbert Romerstein and Eric Breindel, The Venona Secrets: Exposing Soviet Espionage and America's Traitors, Washington: Regnery Publishing, Inc., 2000, 203, 264-277. Cf. Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB, New York: Basic Books, 1999, 116-118; Bird, The Chairman, 417, 422-426; Chace, 125. Cf. “SPY CASES—UNITED STATES: Atomic Bomb Spies: Pavel Sudoplatov”, The Literature of Intelligence: A Bibliography of Materials, with Essays, Reviews, and Comments, http://intellit.muskingum.edu/spycases_folder/bomb_folder/bombsudoplatov.html (cached at http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:6FwW_NohBFIJ:intellit.muskingum.edu/spycases_folder/bomb_folder/bombsudoplatov.html+niels+bohr+spy&hl=en) (August 23, 2004).

⁹B-1, Report 5, November 25, 27, 1918, U.S. National Archives, College Park, MD (hereafter NACP), RG 165, Military Intelligence Division (hereafter MID) 10110-920; B-1, Report 11, December 17, 1918, NACP, RG 165, MID 10110-920; Captain John B. Trevor to MID Director, February 19, 1919, NACP, RG 165, MID 10110-920, 245-18 (6); “Judaism and the Present World Movement—A Study,” September 29, 1919, NACP, RG 165, MID 10110-920, 245-15 (1), 6, 15-16; Captain W.L. Moffat to MID Director, March 8, 1920, NACP, RG 165, MID 10565-115; August 19, 1919, NACP, RG 165, MID 10110-1194 (157-159); Captain W.L. Moffat to Captain Robert Snow, March 1920, NACP, RG 165, MID 10565-115; Major H.A Strauss, September 13, 1919, NACP, RG 165, MID 245-18 (3-8); Captain Henry Frothingham to MID Director, February 19, 1920, NACP, RG 165, MID 10110-1727; “Bolshevik Activities”, February 5, 1920, U.S. NACP, RG 165, MID 10110-1194 (300).

¹⁰L. Lanier Winslow to William L. Hurley, March 7, 1921 and Hurley to J. Edgar Hoover, March 15, 1921, NACP, RG 59, 000-1612; Department of Justice, General Intelligence Bulletin 44, April 2, 1921, 6, NACP, RG 165, MID 10110-4283; Colonel Gordon Johnston to MID Director, April 17, 1920, MID 10110-1534; J. Edgar Hoover to William L. Hurley, June 10, 1920, NACP, RG 59, 800.11-97; J. Edgar Hoover to Marlborough Churchill, June 15, 1922 and Colonel Sherman Miles to military attaché London, June 22, 1922, NACP, RG 165, MID 245-26 (1-2); J. Edgar Hoover to General Dennis E. Nolan, November 18, 1920, NACP, RG 165, MID 245-18; Theoharis and Cox, 76n-77n (cf. 166n).

¹¹Theoharis and Cox, 258-269, esp. 266; John Earl Haynes, Red Scare or Red Menace? American Communism and Anticommunism in the Cold War Era, Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 1996, 52-55; Romerstein and Breindel, 168.

¹²Brinkley, Tour of Duty, 21.

¹³Murphy, 186.

¹⁴ Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas, The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986, 87-90, 125-126; Chace, 38-52, 59-61.

¹⁵Chace, 61-62; Murphy, 111-112, 115-117.

¹⁶Chace, 74-76; Isaacson and Thomas, 137-139.

¹⁷Report, USS Internal Security Subcommittee, April 14, 1953, cited in Archibald E. Roberts, Major, Victory Denied, 1966, http://www.republicusa.org/research/unfiles/communist_godfathers.html#reffive (July 21, 2001). Cf. Chace, 94-97. On UNRAA and Glasser, cf. Haynes and Klehr, 118, 125-128, 203-205.

¹⁸ Chace, 97-102. On White, cf. Haynes and Klehr, 138-145.

¹⁹Chace, 108-109.

²⁰Murphy, 240-241 245, 254-255, 276, 320-321.

²¹ Chace, 197, 200-201, 227, 357-358.

²² Chace, 130-131; Robert P. Newman, Owen Lattimore and the "Loss" of China, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992, 139-140; William F. Buckley, Jr. and L. Brent Bozell, McCarthy and His Enemies: The Record and Its Meaning, Washington, D.C.: Regnery Publishing, Inc., 1995 (1954), 9-17; Arthur Herman, Joseph McCarthy: Reexamining the Life and Legacy of America's Most Hated Senator, New York: The Free Press, 2000, 94.

²³ Isaacson and Thomas, 322.

²⁴Romerstein and Breindel, 432-439.

²⁵On Frankfurter and Lilienthal, see Murphy, 117; Davis, 93-94.

²⁶On Frankfurter and McCloy, see Bird, The Chairman, 47-50, 53-56, 121, 125, 130-131, 170, 425, 482-483.

²⁷ Chace, 117-129; Bird, The Chairman, 237-238, 260-264, 275-282; Isaacson and Thomas, 314-346, 350-351, 356-362; Hershberg, 258-278.

²⁸J. Edgar Hoover to George E. Allen (to be passed to HST), May 29, 1946, President’s Secretary Files—Subject File, Box 167, “Subject File—FBI—Atomic Bomb” folder, Harry S. Truman Library, Independence, Mo.; Hershberg, 394, 856n10; Bird, The Chairman, 280-281, 412; Peter Grose, Operation Rollback: America's Secret War Behind the Iron Curtain, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2000, 82.

²⁹ Chace, 135-136, 151-155, 180, 439-440; Isaacson and Thomas, 321-323, 338-340, 350-351, 362-369.

³⁰ Chace, 168-169; Isaacson and Thomas, 364-365.

³¹ Chace, 193-196, 225-229, 237-240.

³²Acheson represented Currie when he was accused of beng a Communist in 1948: Newman, 74. On Currie's espionage activity, see Haynes and Klehr, 145-150.

³³ Chace, 238; Newman, 362.

³⁴Chace, 359-360; Isaacson and Thomas, 557; Bird, The Chairman, 392.

³⁵ Chace, 226-229, 237-240, 311-312.

³⁶ Herman, 228; Kai Bird, The Color of Truth: McGeorge Bundy and William Bundy: Brothers in Arms: A Biography, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1998, 106-107, 155-157, 163-169; Bird, The Chairman, 413. On Frankfurter and the Bundy family, see Murphy, 201-202; Bird, The Color of Truth, 30-32, 66, 73, 99-101, 104, 188. Cf. Godfrey Hodgson, The Colonel: The Life and Wars of Henry Stimson, 1867-1950, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1990, 246-247; Bird, The Chairman, 121, 182.

³⁷On Acheson political activity during the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations and its relation to Nitze and McCloy’s activity, see Douglas Brinkley, Dean Acheson: The Cold War Years, 1953-1971, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992, 6-202; Isaacson and Thomas, 563-564, 570-572, 580-583; 589-641; Paul H. Nitze, Tension Between Opposites: Reflections on the Practice and Theory of Politics, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1993, 144-148; Strobe Talbott, The Master of the Game: Paul Nitze and the Nuclear Peace, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988, 59-88; Bird, The Chairman, 389-544, esp. 386-388, 446-447, 450, 473-475.

³⁸See Note 17; Sam Tanenhaus, Whittaker Chambers: A Biography, New York: Random House, 1997, 225-226; Herman, 110; Romerstein and Breindel, 48-50.

³⁹Cf. Kerry, 17-19, 25, 46-48, 52, 55n, 125, 161, and esp. Kerry’s critique of US “bad manners” towards Europe on 73-85 (cf. Acheson’s similar critique of Dulles recorded in Brinkley, Dean Acheson, 23, 31-32, 45-46, 67).

⁴⁰Brinkley, Tour of Duty, , 40-42, 57-58.

⁴¹Email from Hollister Bundy, “From Hollister: ‘Uncle Johnny” Kerry for President”, January 30, 2004, forwarded by Alexander Wood to NY4Kerry – New Yorkers for John Kerry, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NY4Kerry/message/840, January 30, 2004 (August 18, 2004).

⁴²On Conant and Frankfurter, see Hershberg, 72-73, 78, 87-88, 90, 99, 107, 196-198. On Conant and Acheson, see Hershberg, 264. On Conant and the Bundy family, see Hershberg, 127-128, 294-304.

⁴³Hershberg, 263; cf. Isaacson and Thomas, 357.

⁴⁴Hershberg, 165-168, 194-207, 306, 308, 313-319, 322-348, 357-358, 470-478, 487-490, 599, 601-605, 676-682.

⁴⁵Hershberg, 642-647.

⁴⁶Bird, The Color of Truth, 117-153.

⁴⁷Personal Letter, J. Edgar Hoover to Francis Walter, February 16, 1959, FBI 61-7582-4053; Theoharis and Cox, 356-357; Hershberg, 392, 416, 623, 625.

⁴⁸J. Robert Oppenheimer to James B. Conant telephone conversation, February 17, 1947, FBI JRO File Serial 100-17828-148; Hershberg, 313-319.

⁴⁹ Murphy, 117; Davis, 93-94; cf. Hershberg 308, 473, 477-478.

⁵⁰Hershberg, 487-490, 596-597; cf. 599.

⁵¹Hershberg, 650-651.

⁵²Hershberg, 655-657.

⁵³Hershberg, 676-682.

⁵⁴Hershberg, 653, 660-667, 668-673, 688-689, 692, 695.

⁵⁵See “George, Walter Franklin, 1878-1957”, Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=G000131 (June 9, 2004).

⁵⁶Bird, The Chairman, 97. Cf. 104-106, 183, 336-337, 344, 405.

⁵⁷Murphy, 212-215, 227-233.

⁵⁸ Bird, The Chairman, 182-183.

⁵⁹Murphy, 214-215; Brinkley, Dean Acheson, 1-2; Bird, The Chairman, 120-125; Isaacson and Thomas, 195. Cf. Thomas E. Mahl, Desperate Deception: British Covert Operations in the United States, 1939-1944, Washington: Brassey’s, 1998, 166 on Frankfurter and Acheson’s role in the Destroyer Deal.

⁶⁰Brinkley, Dean Acheson, 102-103, 131, 186-196.

⁶¹Kerry, x, xii, 83.

⁶²Ed Gold, ”Kerry’s big sister lending a hand in her own way”, The Villager, http://www.thevillager.com/villager_42/kerrysbigsister.html, Volume 73, Number 42, February 18-24, 2004 (June 18, 2004); ”Kerry’s Elder Sister is New York Delegate”, http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/president/2004-07-28-peggy-kerry_x.htm?POE=NEWISVA, July 28, 2004 (August 22, 2004).

⁶³Village Independent Democrats, http://www.villagedemocrats.com/vid_story.htm (August 22, 2004).

⁶⁴Gerald Nicosia, Home to War: A History of the Vietnam Veterans’ Movement, New York: Crown Publishers, 2001, 49; Brinkley, 337; Gold; ”Kerry’s Elder Sister is New York Delegate”.

⁶⁵Gold; ”Kerry’s Elder Sister is New York Delegate”.

⁶⁶Brinkley, Tour of Duty, 34; Foer; Kerry, xii.

⁶⁷Herman, 121-128, 168; Chace, 168, 210-224.

⁶⁸Cf. Theoharis and Cox, 258-269; John Earl Haynes, Red Scare or Red Menace? American Communism and Anticommunism in the Cold War Era, Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 1996, 52-55; Romerstein and Breindel, 168; Newman, 89-90.

⁶⁹ Brinkley, Tour of Duty, 61-62; Jacob Leibenluft, “Kerry '66: 'He was going to be president': In JFK's shadow, a headstrong Kerry makes his run for the White House”, YaleDailyNews.com, http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=21803, February 14, 2003 (June 18, 2004); Foer; Kerry, xii-xiii.

⁷⁰Kerry, xi, xiii; cf. 109-112, 117n22, 155-159.

[Fedora]

I've constructed a ping list from previous threads where related subjects have been discussed. Please let me know if you want on or off the ping list for Part 2.

[sonofatpatcher2]

Print out and wear as a Campaign Button or go HERE to print.

[Fedora]

Ping.

[Chieftain]

Freeper N. Theknow says:
"It’s faster than a checkbook, more powerful than a Democratic demagogue, able to lay waste to a liar Kerry with the single click of a mouse. It's a little bird of truth, it's plain to see Kerry's unfit... it's... it's...SuperFReep!

Want to join in the fun?
Click the logo to donate to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth!

[ArmyBratproud]

Somewhere I have saved a, I think, newsmax article that talks about the book or writings that Kerrys dad wrote.

In said writing, RKerry blasts America for going out and warning about how bad communism was. It seems Kerry's father may have thought communism was a good idea.

I will look for the article.

[68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub]

GREAT RESEARCH! Please keep me on your ping list!

[Fedora]

There's some discussion of that in this article, which reproduces Franklin Foer's introduction to Richard Kerry's book:

Kerry's World: Father Knows Best

"Americans," he writes, "are inclined to see the world and foreign affairs in black and white." They celebrate their own form of government and denigrate all others, making them guilty of what he calls "ethnocentric accommodation -- everyone ought to be like us." As a result, America has committed the "fatal error" of "propagating democracy" and fallen prey to "the siren's song of promoting human rights," falsely assuming that our values and institutions are a good fit in the Third World. And, just as Americans exaggerate their own goodness, they exaggerate their enemies' badness. The Soviet Union wasn't nearly as imperialistic as American politicians warned, Kerry argues. "Seeing the Soviet Union as the aggressor in every instance, and the U.S. as only reacting defensively, relieves an American observer from the need to see any parallel between our use of military power in distant parts of the world, and the Soviet use of military power outside the Soviet Union," he writes. He further claims that "Third world Marxist movements were autonomous national movements" -- outside Moscow's orbit. The book culminates in a plea for a hardheaded, realist foreign policy that removes any pretense of U.S. moral superiority.

[Fedora]

Thanks! Will do.

[Just mythoughts]

Thank you, read part of this and had to stop, this makes the picture of JFKerry so much more focused. I will complete reading after the knots in my stomach relax.

[nopardons]

Many thanks for the ping and the articles!

I have come up with a new term,which applies to John Kerry and his sister Peggy and probably many more people.They are PINK DIAPER BABIES...not REDS,but awfully close.

We all must do EVERYTHING on our power,to make certain that this man (and I use the word very loosely!) is NEVER elected president!

[Just mythoughts]

Check out what and who JFKerry was brought up under.

[Fedora]

Thanks, I'm glad to hear it helps focus the picture. I had a hard time focusing the article because there was *so* much information to summarize.

[Fedora]

Useful term! Who knows for sure if his diapers were pink or red, but one thing's for sure: they stink!

[Just mythoughts]

"Thanks, I'm glad to hear it helps focus the picture. I had a hard time focusing the article because there was *so* much information to summarize."


We may well end up with a "commie" president, these people are playing for real and they do not care what it takes to get what they have been after all these years.

[nopardons]

Unless Richard Kerry was a card carrying member of the American ( or other) Communist Party,then Jon's diapers are pink AND smelly! :-)

[Fedora]

They got Clinton in there, and they came within inches with Gore in 2000. My sense is that with how close Gore came, they feel like it's time to go for broke, which is reflected in how Kerry is running his campaign.

[Fedora]

Unless Richard Kerry was a card carrying member of the American ( or other) Communist Party

Only he and the FBI would know! :) If I'd had more time to write this I would've done an FOIA on Richard Kerry's FBI files.

[ArmyBratproud]

Thanks Fedora,
That is indeed the writing to which the newsmax article was listing.

It is very telling about Kerry, and many other modern democrats.

Kerry claims that his father was a giant impression for his views. The question must be raised...does John Kerry respect communism like his father did. His actions and statements since he started college seem to indicate that he does share that respect.

He has constantly taken the side of evil leaders. Whether be done by supporting and meeting with communist North Vietnam leaders, or supporting despots from places like Haiti where the leader brags about putting buring tires around the necks of people who speak out about atrocities.

[Just mythoughts]

"They got Clinton in there, and they came within inches with Gore in 2000. My sense is that with how close Gore came, they feel like it's time to go for broke, which is reflected in how Kerry is running his campaign."



This is true but neither of the Clintons nor Gore have this kind of pedigree.

JFKerry using "Vietnam" is very sinister given who it was that was funding North Vietnam, and how he with education and knowledge makes no bones about who he is allied with.

[Fedora]

And then there's also his long-time support of the pro-Castro/pro-Sandinista lobby. Pt. 4 of the series will get into that.