  Recent observations of the white dwarf (WD) populations in the Galactic
globular cluster NGC 6397 suggest that WDs receive a kick of a few km/s shortly
before they are born. Using our Monte Carlo cluster evolution code, which
includes accurate treatments of all relevant physical processes operating in
globular clusters, we study the effects of the kicks on their host cluster and
on the WD population itself. We find that in clusters whose velocity dispersion
is comparable to the kick speed, WD kicks are a significant energy source for
the cluster, prolonging the initial cluster core contraction phase
significantly so that at late times the cluster core to half-mass radius ratio
is a factor of up to ~ 10 larger than in the no-kick case. WD kicks thus
represent a possible resolution of the large discrepancy between observed and
theoretically predicted values of this key structural parameter. Our modeling
also reproduces the observed trend for younger WDs to be more extended in their
radial distribution in the cluster than older WDs.
