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National Geographic : 1966 Jan
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In foreign affairs, Kennedy asserted ener getic, imaginative, and effective leadership though his administration began with a fiasco. He permitted a force of anti-Castro Cubans, armed and trained by the United States be fore his Inauguration, to land on the coast of Cuba in April, 1961, in a disastrous attempt to overthrow the dictator. In the aftermath of this setback, Kennedy pressed his Alliance for Progress program to eliminate the poverty that might lead to fur ther Castro-style revolutions. This was "a vast new ten-year plan for the Americas, a plan to transform the 1960's into an historic decade of democratic progress." The United States offered loans and grants to assist our hemi spheric neighbors in their development. Another Kennedy program was establish ment of the Peace Corps, which has trained thousands of idealistic Americans-mostly young people-and sent them to work in underdeveloped countries all over the world (page 106).* In June, 1961, Kennedy went to Vienna to talk with Soviet Premier Khrushchev, par ticularly in regard to Soviet pressure on Ber lin. But Khrushchev seemed to be set on driv ing the Western allies out of that city; he fixed an end-of-the-year deadline for settlement of the Berlin issue, and in July announced a one third increase in the Soviet military budget. Kennedy reacted firmly, requesting Congress to authorize strengthening of American forces. In August, Communist East Germany erected a wall of barbed wire and concrete blocks between East and West Berlin, and the Soviet Union announced a series of nuclear *Peace Corps Director Sargent Shriver and several of his Volunteers reported on "Ambassadors of Good Will," in the September, 1964, GEOGRAPHIC. 105
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