This article discusses the role of U.S. Senate and its Foreign Relations Committee in shaping U.S. policy towards China in the Kennedy administration. The article holds that in spite of the fact that Kennedy, after assuming power, intended to modify the existing policy towards China and was supported by most of the members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in this regard, the Senates hostility towards China was still too strong on the whole. If Kennedy had raised the issue of detente with China, he would have been running grave political risks. The author challenges the hypothesis that “if Kennedy had not been assassinated and had been reelected, American policy towards China might have seen significant changes.”