Would America’s transatlantic partners make the commitments necessary to stand up to Soviet pressure? Kennedy left the answer disconcertingly open: “The firmness and quality of Europe’s will to resist is not an easy subject of analysis. Besides the war-weariness of her peoples, there are the conflicting political ambitions of her nations. There is the precariousness of her hard-won economic recovery that could be overthrown by the heavy drain of rearmament, while waiting for just such an opportunity are the millions of disloyal Communists within her own borders.”42

Yet this was no time for undue alarmism, Jack cautioned when he appeared before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on February 22. (Presiding during the session and calling Jack to the stand was his potential election foe Henry Cabot Lodge.) His conversations with European leaders as well as U.S. representatives had convinced him, he told the lawmakers, that the Soviets were not about to invade Western Europe. Why should they, “when the best that they could get would be a stalemate during which they would be subjected to atomic bombing?” And even if they could somehow succeed with such an invasion, how would they cope with ruling over the conquered peoples? Even feeding them would be an immense challenge. Jack saw no reason why the Soviets would take such a huge gamble when they didn’t need to—“especially when things are going well in the Far East. In addition, Stalin is an old man, and old men are traditionally cautious.” The congressman had no objection to adding four new U.S. divisions to the two already in Europe, but he stressed that the Europeans had to step up and contribute more to their defense.

Inevitably, the senators asked Kennedy to account for his father’s Virginia speech, in which the older man had urged withdrawal from Europe. He calmly replied that he and his father viewed the situation differently: whereas Ambassador Kennedy, like many other Americans, saw the creation of a viable European defense posture as a nearly hopeless endeavor, he himself felt certain that losing the “productive facilities” of Western Europe would be potentially catastrophic for U.S. security, which meant “we should do our utmost to save it….That is my position,” he said firmly. “I think you should ask my father directly as to his position.”43

It was the perfect ending to Jack Kennedy’s European expedition of 1951. He had indulged his love of visiting the Continent, whose culture and politics and history had so defined his early adulthood years. He had met interesting and important people in six countries and deepened his understanding of the issues facing the Western alliance at this fulcrum of the century. He had returned to an attentive and appreciative American audience and received a respectful hearing in the Senate, whose halls he hoped soon to walk himself. And he had demonstrated that he was no puppet of his controversial father. Small wonder that Boston’s Political Times ran a flattering front-page article headlined “Kennedy Acquiring Title, ‘America’s Younger Statesman.’ ”44

Encouraged by the burst of attention provided by the trip, Jack laid the groundwork for another overseas journey, this time starting in the Middle East and winding up in the Far East, to take place in the late summer or autumn. In his Senate testimony he had noted the growing danger of Soviet expansion in Asia, and he elaborated the point in remarks at a meeting of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation in Boston in April. He also sensed growing agitation throughout the colonial world, telling the Boston audience that “nationalistic passions” were stirring against the European imperial powers, with major implications for American security. Military techniques would not be enough to keep the Communists from taking control in these areas, Jack continued, which meant it would be vital for Washington and the West to stand for something that these oppressed peoples would find appealing. If Communism prevailed in Asia, it would be because the democracies failed to offer a compelling alternative. Yet U.S. policy seemed to consist mostly of rushing to support anyone and everyone who professed to be anti-Communist. “That puts us in partnership with the corrupt and reactionary groups whose policies breed the discontent on which Soviet Communism feeds and prospers—groups which might have long ago collapsed if it had not been for our assistance. In short, we even support and sustain corruption and tyranny to maintain a status-quo wherever we find existing regimes anti-communistic.”45