McGeorge Bundy

McGeorge Bundy (1919-1996) was Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs in the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations between 1961-1966. He was intensely involved in the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam War.

Bundy was very much of the sort of academic personality that Kennedy liked. In the 1960 campaign, while he considered himself a Republican, while Harvard Dean of Faculty, he was "disillusioned with Nixon and organized support for Kennedy among academics and scientists"

In an oral history interview, Bundy described his understanding of Johnson, while still Vice President, as "...a man of formidable intelligence;...he's a loner; ... when he asks for help, we try and give it to him, but the kind of help he seems to want is more surface than substance." Robert McNamara, who, as Secretary of Defense, said Johnson considered Bundy one of his "Wise Men" advisors, even after he left the White House.