ROBERT F. KENNEDY URGED LIFTING TRAVEL BAN TO CUBA IN '63

From GWU NSC Archives... Also, please sign the Petition to Lift the Travel Ban after article.

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Washington D.C. June 29, 2005 - Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy sought to lift the ban on U.S. citizens traveling to Cuba in December 1963, according to declassified records posted today by the National Security Archive. In a December 12, 1963, memorandum to Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Kennedy urged a quick decision "to withdraw the existing regulation prohibiting such trips."

Kennedy's memo, written less than a month after his brother's assassination in Dallas, communicated his position that the travel ban imposed by the Kennedy administration was a violation of American freedoms and impractical in terms of law enforcement. Among his "principal arguments" for removing the restrictions on travel to Cuba was that freedom to travel "is more consistent with our views as a free society and would contrast with such things as the Berlin Wall and Communist controls on such travel."

His memo prompted what senior National Security Council officials described as "an in-house fight to permit non-subversive Americans to travel to Cuba." Several State Department officials supported Kennedy's position that "the present travel restrictions are inconsistent with traditional American liberties," and that "it would be extremely difficult to enforce the present prohibitions on travel to Cuba without resorting to mass indictments." But in a December 13, 1963 meeting at the State Department, with no representatives present from the Attorney General's office, Undersecretary of State George Ball ruled out any relaxation of regulations on travel to Cuba.

A principal argument, as national security advisor McGeorge Bundy informed President Johnson in a subsequent memorandum on "Student Travel to Cuba" was that "a relaxation of U.S. restrictions would make it very difficult for us to urge Latin American governments to prevent their nationals from going to Cuba-where many would receive subversive training."

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB158/index.htm

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Sign the national petition on Cuba travel
Dear Members of Congress:

We, the undersigned, believe that it’s time NOW to lift the ban on legal travel by all Americans to Cuba.

We know that:

* The freedom to travel is a fundamental right of Americans.
* Restoring the freedom to travel will unite Cuban families on both sides of the Florida Straits.
* Allowing travel will also enable our scholars, students, and artists to share information and knowledge, which is consistent with our historic commitment to academic and cultural freedom.

more... http://www.lawg.org/tools/petition.htm

Links to your MOC

http://www.lawg.org/tools/contacting_congress2.htm

I vividly remember the night that RFK was assassinated in LA. One can only wonder how much better our country would be today if RFK had lived and served 8 years in the White House instead of Nixon.

Dave Powers, who was JFKs personal assistant and later curator for the JFK Library. My friend and I were having lunch at the Old Colony House Restaurant in Dorchester and he was there with his wife. I recognized him immediately and gave him a little wave. He came over to our table and we talked for a while about what might have been. He said "we'll never know what could have been had he lived". He was a warm and generous of heart human being. I saw him again a few years later in the North End and again we said hello and had pleasant conversation.

That era of politicians on both sides had some integrity and character. The war criminals running the country today are nothing but a bunch of corrupt, underhanded, thugs.

When RFK was assassinated I was crossing the border into Mexico. With all its assassinations, the 60s was a very tragic decade.

Peace!!

As he told it,one day JFK asked, in an offhanded fashion, "Dave, get my shoes for me will you?" Powers looked at him and said, "Get your own godamn shoes-you're not my Commander-In-Chief yet!" After a second of silence, JFK burst out laughing. That was a very telling story about JFK's character and his relationships.
Can you imagine anyone around Chimpy bringing him down a peg or two?

Powers came from Charlestown, I think JFK met him while campaigning door-to-door. I don't doubt that story for one second. The Bushistas couldn't shine their shoes.

I think the time has long since passed when Smirky Bin Laden should have been taken down a peg or two.

I heard this interview today with one of the moms who lost her son in Iraq who met with Shrub. She said he kept calling her *mom* and that he wouldn't look at any of the photos of her son that she had with her. To top it off, he said to the daughter/sister that he wished he could bring her loved-one back and she replied 'I wish you could to'. The mother said that he gave the daughter a very dirty look, turned on his heel and never spoke to her for the remainder to the time they were there. The mother said Dubya's eyes were empty--that nothing conveyed the words that he spoke--he was devoid of feeling. I think I heard it on Democracy Now--it's probably at their website.

Peace!!

/sigh/

Damn! I miss those guys.



david