Decision Making in the White House: The Olive Branch or the Arrows (Hardcover)

Faced with divided advisers, limited options, contradictory evidence, and the profound global consequences of their choices, how do presidents reach a decision in a time of crisis? As a speechwriter and close adviser to John F. Kennedy, Ted Sorensen, whom the New York Times referred to as Kennedy's "brilliant alter ego," drafted many of the president's key public statements and was a participant in some of the toughest decisions made by an American president. In the shadow of potential nuclear war, John F. Kennedy had to weigh, with extreme, sometimes excruciating delicacy, his options as he responded to the Cuban Missile Crisis, the construction of the Berlin Wall, and other domestic and foreign crises. In these famous lectures, Sorensen draws on his firsthand experiences in the Kennedy White House to analyze the political and