Fifty years after John F. Kennedy’s assassination, presidential historian Robert Dallek, whom The New York Times calls “Kennedy’s leading biographer,” delivers a riveting new portrait of this president and his inner circle of advisors—their rivalries, personality clashes, and political battles. In Camelot’s Court, Dallek analyzes the brain trust whose contributions to the successes and failures of Kennedy’s administration—including the Bay of Pigs, civil rights, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and Vietnam—were indelible.
Kennedy purposefully put together a dynamic team of advisors noted for their brilliance and acumen, including Attorney General Robert Kennedy, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, Secretary of State Dean Rusk, National Security Advisor McGeorge Bundy, and trusted aides Ted Sorensen and Arthur Schlesinger. Yet the very traits these men shared also created sharp divisions. Far from being unified, this was an uneasy band of rivals whose ambitions and clashing beliefs ignited fiery internal debates.
Robert Dallek illuminates a president deeply determined to surround himself with the best and the brightest, who often found himself disappointed with their recommendations. The result, Camelot's Court: Inside the Kennedy White House, is a striking portrait of a leader whose wise resistance to pressure and adherence to principle offers a cautionary tale for our own time.
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“The author of An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917–1963 returns with
descriptions and assessments of the fallen president’s principal advisers…Dallek
examines each of JFK’s crises in detail, focusing on what the advisers were (or
were not) telling him, and he notes several times that their failure to reach
consensus was a serious problem. The author spares no one. He chides JFK for
his womanizing, LBJ for his ego, and McNamara for his credulousness. Here is
perhaps the only account of the 1963 March on Washington that does not mention
King’s speech. More than a little admiring of Arthur, but there's clear-eyed
criticism of his Round Table.”
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Kirkus Reviews