Saturday-Sunday, June 3-4, 1961: Kennedy and Khrushchev

U.S. President Kennedy and Soviet leader Khrushchev meet for two days of informal talks in Vienna, Austria. The talks do not go well, particularly from the American point of view: "He just beat the hell out of me," Kennedy would later say. On a range of issues -- Laos, nuclear testing and particularly Berlin -- Khrushchev was the aggressor, trying to take advantage of what he saw as American weakness in the wake of the failed Bay of Pigs operation in Cuba.

* The Summit Conference at Vienna (from "Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963"): @

* Memo of June 3 talks (from JFK library): @

* Newsreel (from C-SPAN): @

* Transcript of Kennedy's televised speech, June 6: @

* Excerpt from "The Cold War: The essential readings": @

* Excerpt from "Khrushchev: The Man and His Era": @

* Excerpt from "Kennedy's Kitchen Cabinet and the Pursuit of Peace": @

* "Berlin 1961": @

---