Vito Genovese was around so long cause he was a ruthless killer and at the time of him being boss, he had about eight crews that had reputations of being stoned cold killers. Bonanno and Profaci did not mind Genovese as long as he did not interfere with their families. Gambino and Lucchese backed Vito up. Genovese and Lucchese relationship can be traced all the way back to the Castellammarese war. Genovese ordered the meeting, but it was Magaddino who tapped Barbara to have it at his place against the protest of some of his underlings as well as Barbara himself and a few other bosses such as John Alito of Milwaukee, the California bay area bosses, so you have to lay most of the blame at Magaddino for damaging LCN.

Near the end of Genovese time as boss, many of his top men in the crime family and capo's were disfranchised by Vito's orders from inside the prison, and were secretly recorded by the FBI planning on have Genovese killed once he was out of prison. The Apalachin meeting and his handling of Valachi had made Vito lose a lot of face to the other LCN bosses.