 During the Cuban Missile Crisis, President John F. Kennedy called upon Acheson for advice, bringing him into the executive committee (ExComm), a strategic advisory group.In the late 1940s Acheson came under heavy attack for his defense of State Department employees accused during the anti-gay Lavender and Red Scare investigations by Senator Joseph McCarthy and others, and over Truman's policy toward China.Dean Gooderham Acheson was born in Middletown, Connecticut, on April 11, 1893.