British historian Joel Nelson — a former Kennedy Scholar and Foreign Affairs editor — joins the Chuck ToddCast to discuss Kennedy’s Only Hero, out this month, which argues JFK’s obsession with Winston Churchill shaped everything from his worldview to his speeches to his daily habits. Kennedy discovered Churchill’s books as a teenager, studied old newsreels to learn how he commanded a room, and used Churchill’s influence to break from his father Joe’s appeasement politics — a rupture that turned tragic when Joe’s deepest fear, losing a son to war, came true in 1944. Nelson traces how Kennedy took a “what would Churchill do” approach to the Cuban Missile Crisis, and reveals the painful asymmetry at the heart of it: Churchill never grasped how deeply he was admired, and privately worried Kennedy wasn’t ready for the job. 

Timeline:

01:15 Why write this book, and the depth of Kennedy’s obsession

03:30 Joe Kennedy, appeasement, and the break with his father

09:30 The loss of Joe Jr. and what it cost the family

12:00 Reaching out to Churchill from the White House

13:15 “What would Churchill do” and the Cuban Missile Crisis

16:15 Democracies, sacrifice, and preparing a country for the Cold War

19:30 What Kennedy and Churchill would make of this moment

27:00 Losing the generation that lived through the World Wars

33:15 How Kennedy actually prepared to be president

38:30 The admiration ran one way — Churchill’s private doubts

42:15 Fake Churchill quotes and tumultuous British politics