I just watched "Seven Days in May," John Frankenheimer's film version of the Fletcher Knebel, Charles W. Bailey bestseller about an attempted military coup in the United States. The Kennedy administration cooperated fully with the producers, permitting the cast and crew, among other things, to stage a riot outside the White House gates. It seems, the administration was so cooperative because JFK was a big fan of the book. If only he heeded the book's warning....

The film's premise: The military plots to kill the President to effect a foreign policy change. Could something similar have happened to JFK? Watching the film, I was struck by the similarity between fact and fiction. In the fictional version of events, the impetus for the coup is the President's signing of a U.S.-Soviet nuclear disarmament treaty. The higher-ups in the US military naturally oppose the treaty, since the Soviets, they contend, can't be trusted. In reality, many would contend, JFK's Vietnam policy provided the impetus for his own overthrow. JFK's last witten foreign policy statement, referred to as a National Security Action Memorandum, or NSAM (pronounced ENSAM), NSAM 263, issued shortly before his death, called for a withdrawal of 1,000 soldiers from Vietnam, as part of a phased pull-out) whereas Johnson's first National Security Action Memorandum, NSAM 273, issued right after Kennedy's death, called for the war's escalation. The question must be asked: Was Kennedy killed to alter the United States' Vietnam policy?

In fiction, the President, helped by a loyal Colonel, foiled the plot. In reality, the President wasn't so lucky.