I'm trying to think of a General's name....

[Malachi151]

I need help with this one.

What was the guy's name who was a General during the Cold War, who was an advocate of an all out nuclear first strike on Russia, who also tried to convince Kennedy to nuke Cuba and start WWIII during the Cuban Missile crisis?

I can't think of his name.

[arcticpenguin]

Was that Air Force general Buck Turgidson?

[Doubt]

Originally posted by Malachi151
I need help with this one.

What was the guy's name who was a General during the Cold War, who was an advocate of an all out nuclear first strike on Russia, who also tried to convince Kennedy to nuke Cuba and start WWIII during the Cuban Missile crisis?

I can't think of his name.

Curtis LeMay

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by Doubt


Curtis LeMay

Yes, LeMay, that's it.

Thanks

[subgenius]

In 1968 he ran for Vice President on George Wallace's ticket.

[peptoabysmal]

Damn! I was gonna say General Jack D. Ripper (see movie: Dr. Strangelove for references)

[subgenius]

Originally posted by peptoabysmal
Damn! I was gonna say General Jack D. Ripper (see movie: Dr. Strangelove for references)
He was constantly compared to the movie character during the campaign.

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Originally posted by Malachi151
I need help with this one.

What was the guy's name who was a General during the Cold War, who was an advocate of an all out nuclear first strike on Russia, who also tried to convince Kennedy to nuke Cuba and start WWIII during the Cuban Missile crisis?

I can't think of his name.

General Disarray?

[Silicon]

WOW!!!

What an incredibly immoral thing to do! My God, what a monster. What's up with that?!!?

What could possibly justify that?

I'm amazed we ever survived the Cold War. I really am.

[American]

Originally posted by Doubt
Curtis LeMay


LeMay was "Bomb 'em into the Stone Age", to which someone pointed out Vietnam is already in the Stone Age. I don't think he was a first-strike advocate. I don't think anything, considering who started this thread.

[EdipisReks]

Originally posted by American



LeMay was "Bomb 'em into the Stone Age", to which someone pointed out Vietnam is already in the Stone Age. I don't think he was a first-strike advocate. I don't think anything, considering who started this thread.

something as simple as a name can shut down your brain? neat!

[Skeptic]

Originally posted by peptoabysmal
Damn! I was gonna say General Jack D. Ripper (see movie: Dr. Strangelove for references)

Wasn't General Ripper based on the real-life LeMay?

[Dancing David]

Pepto, beat me to it.

I am sure he was not alone, but there wre many in the 'we should have let Patton go to Moscow camp, who were just beserk to kill people", fortunately Eisenhower had seen the devastation that modern war had wrecked on Europe.

[Doubt]

LeMay regarded the Cuban missile crises as a missed opportunity. He thought that a nuclear war was inevitable. LeMay believed the sooner it would have happened, the better for the US it would be.

From the Atlantic:

http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2003/06/dallek.htm


Kennedy's resistance to this pressure reached a climax during the Cuban Missile Crisis, in October of 1962. The blockade or quarantine of Cuba that he imposed to force the removal of nuclear weapons did not satisfy the Joint Chiefs. When Kennedy first proposed it, General LeMay said he saw direct military intervention as a necessity. "This blockade and political action I see leading into war," he told Kennedy in a conversation captured on tape by a White House recording device. "I don't see any other solution. It will lead right into war. This is almost as bad as the appeasement at Munich." LeMay indirectly threatened to make his dissent public. "I think that a blockade, and political talk, would be considered by a lot of our friends and neutrals as being a pretty weak response to this. And I'm sure a lot of our own citizens would feel that way too. In other words, you're in a pretty bad fix at the present time."

LeMay's words angered Kennedy, who asked, "What did you say?" LeMay repeated, "You're in a pretty bad fix." Kennedy responded with a hollow laugh, and said, "You're in there with me." Kenneth O'Donnell recalled in his memoirs that after the meeting Kennedy asked him, "Can you imagine LeMay saying a thing like that? These brass hats have one great advantage in their favor. If we listen to them, and do what they want us to do, none of us will be alive later to tell them that they were wrong."

[Ove]

Just goes to prove the old saying: "War is much to serious to be left to the millitary (to handle)".:D