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thanks Tom..there may be something within these files on LEE HENRY OSWALD..THAT MAY PROVE INTERESTING..B

The Mary Ferrell Foundation has completed putting online the CIA's "201" (Personality) file on Lee Henry (sic) Oswald. This collection of roughly 50,000 pages of documents includes a small pre-assassination Oswald file, followed by a huge collection of post-assassination documents related to the Warren Commission and other investigations.

http://www.maryferrell.org/wiki/index.php/...201_File_Online

from ''the hidden history of the cia''

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...sPageId=1290642

out of the loop winston scott chapter 15

b

Edited by Bernice Moore
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  • 11 months later...

Here's a little more about the use of Lee Henry Oswald as a "marked card". The website below is the hyperlinked version:

http://www.opednews.com/Diary/THE-JFK-CASE-THE-TWELVE-W-by-Bill-Simpich-100918-692.html

THE JFK CASE: THE TWELVE WHO BUILT THE OSWALD LEGEND (Part 3: Counterintelligence goes molehunting with Oswald's file)

Third in the series. This chapter focuses on how Lee Harvey Oswald threatened to reveal military secrets to the Soviets about the U-2, and how US counterintelligence used his file as a "marked card" to capture supposed Communist spies who were trying to infiltrate the CIA.

Oswald threatened to reveal military secrets to the Soviets

The Warren Commission wrote many pages on Lee Harvey Oswald's visit to the American embassy in Moscow shortly after his defection to the USSR. However, the Warren Report says nothing about the U-2, much less about Oswald's work for the U-2 project as an aviation electronics operator.

The Commissioners were informed by CIA deputy director Richard Helms that Oswald only worked near the U-2 hangar in Japan, tap-danced around Oswald's access to the U-2 in the Philippines, and concluded that Oswald had no "information regarding the U-2 or its mission."

The Warren Report does mention that Oswald told legend maker #4 consul Richard Snyder that he had "already offered to tell a Soviet official what he had learned as a radar operator in the Marines" (p. 693). However, the Commission concluded that since neither the FBI or the Navy prosecuted Oswald, the State Department had no basis to conclude that Oswald's statement was "anything more than rash talk". (p. 775)

The CIA knew about Oswald's treasonous offer. In a memo written shortly after JFK's death, CIA officer John Whitten states that a list of "American defectors to the USSR list" was put together in November 1960. "From then on, we received a number of FBI and State Department reports on Oswald, detailing "his defiant threat to reveal to the Soviets all he knew about Navy radar installations in the Pacific."

Whitten makes it sound like the CIA heard about these threats after the U-2 went down on May 1, 1960. In fact, Snyder's report and Navy reports in early November 1959 describe Oswald's threat to provide radar secrets to the Soviets, and the CIA had copies of these reports in their files right after Oswald left the American embassy on October 31.

The CIA's position was that "Since Oswald was a former Marine and a U.S. citizen, his defection was of primary interest to the State Department, the FBI, and the Navy Department. CIA does not investigate U.S. citizens abroad unless we are specifically requested to do so by some other Government security agency. No such request was made in this case."

One CIA officer, however, shows extraordinary interest in Oswald.

This CIA officer is Ann Egerter, an analyst at the small, super-secret Counterintelligence Special Investigations Group (CI/SIG). Egerter called CI/SIG "the office that spied on spies". Her boss, legend maker #1 CI chief James Angleton, admitted that one of CI/SIG's purposes was to monitor defectors.

An FBI officer is also playing close attention - Marvin Gheesling, a supervisor at FBI Headquarters.

Oswald and the Moles

The October 31 and November 2 memos prepared by Snyder and his colleague Ed Freers about Oswald's defection are used by Ann Egerter, legend maker #5, to fill Oswald's file with items of false information known as "marked cards". "Marked cards" are designed to capture a mole who spreads the information to unauthorized individuals.

The "marked card" technique has been around for a long time. Peter Wright in Spycatcher refers to this method as a "barium meal". Tom Clancy in Patriot Games calls this trick a "canary trap". Author Peter Dale Scott mentions that the "marked card" was one of the methods used to try to catch the infamous CIA mole Aldrich Ames during the 1990s. The marked card didn't work because Ames himself was the chief of the CIA's Soviet Russia counterintelligence staff.

Freers and Snyder mentioned in their initial October 31 note about Oswald's visit that Oswald's mother's last address was at 4936 "Collinwood St.". Not only had Mrs. Oswald not lived on Collingwood since May 1957, but her address on September 4, 1959 was 3124 West Fifth Street, the very address Oswald had used on his passport application.

Keep in mind that when Snyder prepared his reports, he was a trained observer and reporter of minutiae that the average person would not notice. This "Collinwood St." entry was just one of several misspellings and errors that were purposeful and not accidental. This deliberate error was a "marked card" to see if a mole leaked this information elsewhere.

Two days later, the November 2 dispatch prepared by Freers and Snyder adds three more marked cards to the deck. One was that Oswald was "discharged" from the service. Another was that Oswald's highest grade was corporal. The third was that Oswald applied for his passport in San Francisco.

Peter Dale Scott, the author of the highly revealing essay "Oswald and the Search for Popov's Mole", carefully examined each of these marked cards. Oswald was not discharged, but received a dependency release and placed in the reserves with duties to perform until 1962. Oswald's highest grade was not corporal, but private first class. Finally, Oswald's passport states that it was issued in Los Angeles, not in San Francisco, as can be seen here:

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Scott focuses on the importance of these anomalies that fill Oswald's CIA file, stating that they are evidence of "a significant, sophisticated multi-agency counterintelligence operation." Scott advances the thesis that "Oswald himself was a low-level part of a CI search for a leak or mole", and that Oswald's unexplained talk of espionage right in front of the KGB microphones (the KGB had the US embassy thoroughly bugged) is a very poor way to convince the KGB of his bona fides but "makes perfect sense as a test for leaks in response to Popov's arrest fifteen days earlier".

The American and Soviet embassies have long and famous histories for placing bugs in each other's embassies, tapping each other's phones, and reading each other's mail. The KGB confirmed in 1959 that Freers was not CIA, and that the KGB maintained a microphone in Freers' office.

In "Popov's Mole", Scott points out that the errors detailed above, and others that we will soon discuss, was repeatedly circulated in the documentary history of Oswald's files by Jim Angleton's colleague Ann Egerter and other CI/SIG officials. By embedding these false statements within Oswald's file, and tracking who had access to the file information, Egerter could determine if this information had surfaced elsewhere, and that would be evidence of unauthorized access.

Angleton told the Church Committee that the role of CI/SIG was to prevent the penetration of spies into the CIA and the government, and that the "historical penetration cases are recruitment of U.S. officials in positions (of) code clerks." Angleton's search for a mole turned the CIA upside down by the time he was fired in 1974. Dozens of CIA officers were fired. By 1980, Congress was forced to pass a "Mole Relief Act" to compensate the unfairly accused victims.

Egerter used Oswald himself in what is called a "dangle". Angleton's biographer Tom Mangold wrote that the execution of Popov accelerated Angleton's belief that "Popov could only have been betrayed by a mole buried deep within Soviet Division.". Mangold found Angleton misguided, stating that "Popov was actually lost to the Soviets because of a slipshod CIA operation; there was no treachery." David Robarge, in a very thoughtful piece that should be read in its entirety, agrees that Popov's capture marked the time when Angleton became "fixed on the mole". Oswald's arrival was on the same date as Popov's arrest.

Nonetheless, if Angleton was convinced that there was a mole in the Soviet Division, it's a good bet that he believed that radar operator Oswald's sudden entry into the Soviet Union on the same day was no accident.

What is curious is that Egerter opened no 201 file for Oswald at this point. A 201 file is a CIA file that is created to profile any person "of active operational interest". For whatever reason, she did not want to admit that the CIA had any operational interest in Oswald.

The FBI had operational interest in Oswald, and let everybody know it. Headquarters supervisor Marvin Gheesling is described as having "considerable experience in espionage, intelligence and counterintelligence operations." Gheesling, legend maker #6, promptly opened a "watch list" file on Oswald within a week of his visit to the Embassy in late 1959 by creating what is called a FLASH card. As John Newman muses, "This combination of being on the Watch List without a 201 file makes Oswald special. Perhaps not unique, but certainly peculiar. It was as if someone wanted Oswald watched quietly."

At the same time, Oswald was added to the HT LINGUAL list, Angleton was effectively in charge of HT LINGUAL, a joint project of the CIA, FBI and US Postal Service in which Angleton was the titular head. Oswald was now one of the 300 Americans whose letters would be secretly opened as part of HT LINGUAL project monitoring mail coming from the USSR.

A quick glance at what happened three years later: Gheesling's role turned ominous when he took Oswald off the watch list in the month before the assassination. Gheesling's action took place just hours before Egerter helped write two separate messages that provided two different descriptions of Oswald. One message sent to third party agencies referred to him specifically as "Lee Henry Oswald", with an inaccurate physical description, apparently designed to mislead the national leadership of these agencies. The in-house message provided a more accurate description of Oswald - as we'll see later, still containing subtle mistakes - going only to the local agencies. These are further indications of the molehunt.

Gheesling's decision to take Oswald off the watch list effectively dimmed the lights around Oswald. It meant that Oswald would not be watched in Dallas with close scrutiny in situations involving national security, such as when JFK came to town in a motorcade. If Gheesling had waited another day, Oswald would have been in the spotlight. Dallas agents would have been on him like white on rice.

After Egerter passes Oswald's marked cards to FBI's John Fain, Fain joins the molehunt

Going back to 1960...the marked cards begin to multiply a few months later. In February 1960, Oswald's mother is worrying about him. Marguerite told the Secret Service that SA John Fain recommends that she write Secretary of State Christian Herter and Congressmen Sam Rayburn and Jim Wright. Curiously, the FBI has no public paper trail of meeting with Fain at this early date. FBI files in 1959-60 and Oswald's Marine records remain classified and should be released.

Mrs. Oswald then sends one letter to Congressman Wright telling him that "according to the UPI Moscow press, he appeared at the US embassy renouncing his citizenship". The next day, she wrote Secretary Herter a letter saying that Oswald had not renounced his citizenship and "is still a U.S. citizen".

Why Mrs. Oswald would say two different things in two different letters one day apart is a longer discussion. Nonetheless, these two totally contradictory documents are a central part of this case. The inaccurate statement that Oswald had "renounced his citizenship" was central to SA Fain's report of May 12, 1960. This report also had the marked card of "Edward Lee Oswald" for the name of Oswald's deceased father, rather than his correct name of Robert Edward Lee Oswald.

Fain's inaccurate report about renunciation was the direct cause of Oswald's dishonorable discharge by the Marines on August 17, 1960. Oswald wrote the Secretary of the Navy trying to get this dishonorable discharge changed, not realizing that John Connally had resigned as navy secretary to run for Governor of Texas in 1962. Connally wrote back and said that he had forwarded Oswald's letter to the new secretary. John Fain is legend maker #7.

At a minimum, Ann Egerter's use of the Lee Oswald's file enabled CI to engage in some very clever molehunting, particularly when she decided to name his 201 file "Lee Henry Oswald". She claimed years later that "Henry" wasn't in her handwriting. Take a look for yourself. The name of the file itself was a "marked card". If anyone else referred to Lee Henry Oswald, a bright trail would be left behind. Egerter's form includes the terms "defected to the USSR" and "radar operator", but says nothing about Oswald's threat to pass "classified things" to the Soviets.

Next week, the series will continue with Part 4: When the U-2 Goes Down, Oswald is Ready to Return

Endnotes:

The Commissioners were informed by CIA deputy director Richard Helms... Richard Helms memo to Director, FBI; Warren Commission Document 931, 5/13/64.

The Warren Report does mention that Oswald told legend maker #4 consul Richard Snyder that he had "already offered to tell a Soviet official what he had learned as a radar operator in the Marines". Warren Report, p. 693.

However, the Commission concluded that since neither the FBI or the Navy prosecuted Oswald, the State Department had no basis to conclude that Oswald's statement was "anything more than rash talk". Warren Report, p. 775.

CIA officer John Whitten states in a memo written shortly after JFK's death that after an American defectors to the USSR list was put together in November 1960 "from then on, we received a number of FBI and State Department reports on Oswald, detailing"his defiant threat to reveal to the Soviets all he knew about Navy radar installations in the Pacific." memo by CIA officer John Whitten, "CIA Work on Lee Oswald and the Assassination of President Kennedy", p. 3, 12/20/63, Oswald 201 File, Vol 10B, NARA Record Number: 1993.06.14.15:56:02:000000

Angleton's search for a mole turned the CIA upside down by the time he was fired in 1974: See generally David C. Martin, Wilderness of Mirrors, (Guilford, CT, Lyons Press: revised edition, 2003).

Angleton admitted that one of CI/SIG's purposes was to monitor defectors: HSCA Security Classified Testimony, Angleton deposition, 10/5/78, p. 150.

The October 31 and November 2 memos of Snyder and Freers are used by Ann Egerter, Legend maker #5, to fill Oswald's file with items of false information known as "marked cards": Ed Freers memo to State Dept., 10/31/59; Warren Commission Exhibit 908, Snyder's report to State Department of 11/2/59, p. 2 (see fourth paragraph)

Author Peter Dale Scott mentions that the "marked card" was one of the methods used to catch the infamous CIA mole Aldrich Ames during the 1990s. The marked card trick didn't work because Ames himself was the chief of the Soviet Russia counterintelligence staff: Peter Dale Scott, "The Hunt for Popov's Mole", Fourth Decade, March 1996, p. 4.

Oswald's mother had not lived on Collinwood since May 1957: "Collingwood since May 1957", see Warren Commission Exhibit 822, SA John Fain's report of 7/3/61, p. 2. Also see Peter Dale Scott, The Hunt for Popov's Mole, p. 6.

The passport application: See Warren Commission Hearings, Volume 22, p. 77:

Freers' dispatch states that Oswald was "discharged" from the service, that the highest grade achieved was that of a corporal, and that he applied for his passport in San Francisco: Warren Commission Exhibit 908, Vol. 18, p. 97, Foreign Service dispatch from the American Embassy in Moscow to the Department of State, 11/2/59. Freers signs document, Snyder signs first page as the reporter:

Oswald received a "dependency release", with obligated service up until 1962, not a discharge. See Warren Commission Document 1, 12/6/63, p. 23,

Oswald was not discharged, but released from active duty: Warren Commission Document 1114, Navy message 22257, From: CNO To: ALUSNA, Moscow, 11/4/59.

His highest grade was not corporal, but private first class: Warren Report 687, 688; Warren Commission Exhibit 3099, Certificate of True Copies of Original Pay Records from 10/24/96 to 9/11/59 for PFC Oswald, dated 9/15/64, prepared by Major E.J. Rowe.

Also see: Warren Commission Document 1114, Navy message 22257, From: CNO To: ALUSNA, Moscow, 11/4/59.

The passport, which was not only examined by Snyder but retained by him:

Oswald had given his passport to Snyder at the Embassy when he said he wanted to renounce his American citizenship: Testimony of Richard Snyder, Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. 5, p. 269.

The passport indicates clearly that it was issued not in San Francisco, but in Los Angeles: Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. 18, p. 162, Warren Commission Exhibit 946, passport of Lee Harvey Oswald, issued September 10, 1959.

The KGB confirmed in 1959 that Freers was not CIA, and that the KGB had a microphone in his office: Diplomatic List, Moscow, 1 January 1959 (information obtained from defector Yuri Nosenko), HSCA Segregated CIA Collection, Box 14/NARA Record Number: 104-10070-10150

Historical penetration cases are recruitment of U.S. officials in positions code clerks:Deposition of James Angleton, 9/17/75, Church Committee, p. 17.

Angleton's search for a mole is well-known for having turned the CIA upside down by the time he was fired in 1974: See generally David C. Martin, Wilderness of Mirrors, (Guilford, CT, Lyons Press: revised edition, 2003).

By the time Angleton was fired in the midst of the Watergate era, he was accused of being a Soviet mole himself. By 1980, Congress was forced to pass a bill to compensate the unfairly accused officers in what became known as the Mole Relief Act: David Wise, Molehunt, Chapter 18

Popov was actually lost due to a slipshod CIA operation there was no treachery. John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, pp. 87-88

David Robarge, in a very thoughtful piece that should be read in its entirety, agrees that Popov's capture marked the time when Angleton became "fixed on the mole": David Robarge, Moles, Defectors and Deceptions: James Angleton and CIA Counterintelligence, p. 36.

A 201 file is a CIA file on any person "of active operational interest": Clandestine Services Handbook, 43-1-1, February 15, 1960, Chapter III, Annex B, "Personalities - 201 and IDN Numbers", RIF# 104-10213-10202. Cited by John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1995) at p. 47 and 537, note 2.

Headquarters supervisor Marvin Gheesling is described as having "considerable experience in espionage, intelligence and counterintelligence operations": HSCA Report, Volume XII, p. 566.

"This combination of being on the Watch List without a 201 file makes Oswald special. Perhaps not unique, but certainly peculiar. It was as if someone wanted Oswald watched quietly." John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, p. 422.

At the same time, Oswald was added to the HT LINGUAL list": John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, p. 56.

Egerter helped prepare two totally conflicting documents. One was a teletype to third party agencies such as the FBI, State Department and the Navy inaccurately describing Oswald as "approximately 35 years old, with an athletic build, about six feet tall, with receding hairline...believed that Oswald was identical to Lee Henry Oswald": CIA teletype 74673 to FBI, State Department, and Navy, October 10, 1963; NARA, JFK files, CIA 201 file on Oswald.

The in-house version with the more accurate description went only to the local agencies:

CIA headquarters teletype 74830 to Mexico City CIA station, p. 3, October 10, 1963; NARA Record Number: 104-10015-10048

SA John Fain recommends that she write Secretary of State Christian Herter and Congressmen Sam Rayburn and Jim Wright: "Popov's Mole", p. 8: 16 Warren Commission Hearings, p. 729.

Mrs. Oswald then sends one letter to Congressman Rayburn telling him that "according to the UPI Moscow press, he appeared at the US embassy renouncing his citizenship": Marguerite Oswald letter to Congressman Jim Wright, 3/6/60, Warren Commission Document 1115, p. 51

The next day, she wrote Secretary Herter a letter saying that Oswald had not renounced his citizenship: "All I know is what I read in the newspapers. He went to the U.S. Ambassy (sic) there and wanted to turn in his U.S. citizenship and had applied for Soviet citizenship. However the Russians refused his request but said he could remain in their country as a Resident Alien. As far as I know he is still a U.S. citizen." Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. 16, pp. 594-595; Commission Exhibit 206.

The statement that Oswald had renounced his citizenship was picked up in SA Fain's report of May 12, 1960: FBI report of 5/12/60 by SA John Fain; 17 Warren Commission Hearings 700, 702; Exhibit 821, p. 3.

Because Fain printed this inaccurate information about renunciation in his report, the result was Oswald's dishonorable discharge by the Marines on August 17, 1960: John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, pp. 212-213.

Oswald even wrote John Connally from the USSR, not realizing that Connally had quit his job as Secretary of the Navy to run for governor of Texas in 1962: Memo by FBI SA James Hosty, 11/25/63, p. 2, Commission Document 75 - FBI DeBrueys Report of 02 Dec 1963 re: Oswald/Russia, p. 701.

"Edward Lee Oswald": John Fain's report, 6/12/60, p. 3, 17 Warren Commission Hearings 700, 702, Exhibit 821.

"Robert Edward Lee Oswald": FBI report of Donald C. Steinmeyer, 4/1/64, re marriage records for Robert Edward Lee Oswald; 11/27/63 report by SA Joseph G. Engelhardt re sister of Robert Edward Lee Oswald.

The 201 opening form filled out by Egerter includes the terms "defected to the USSR" and "radar operator" but says nothing about Oswald's threat to pass "classified things" about his work to the Soviets: 201 file request by Ann Egerter, 12/9/60, HSCA Segregated CIA Collection, Box 7/NARA Record Number: 104-10054-10204

Bill Simpich is a civil rights attorney and an antiwar activist in the San Francisco Bay Area.

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  • 1 month later...

Oswald meets Don Alejandro, a White Russian in the Soviet Union

Part 4

http://www.opednews....101001-277.html

When Oswald began working in Minsk at the Radio and TV factory as one of 5000 employees, he noticed that he was "being observed" by his supervisor. The supervisor was chief engineer Alexander Romanovich Ziger, a Polish Jew in his late forties who had supposedly relocated to Argentina in 1938 and returned to Belarus around 1955 or 1956. Mr. Ziger spoke English with an American accent, while his family spoke no English. Ziger claimed he had worked for an American company in Argentina. FAMILY: 'times new roman'">Sources describe Ziger as Alejandro or as Aleksandr. Oswald called himself "Alec" or "Alik" while in the USSR, and even obtained a hunting license under the name "Aleksey Harvey Oswald". Although the story is that "Lee" is difficult for Russians to pronounce, I suspect that his friendship with Don Alejandro was a major factor. Between 1959-1962, Oswald and "Don Alejandro" spent six days a week together at the factory and three or four nights at the Ziger home speaking in English over tea and cakes. Oswald enjoyed many Sunday drives into the country with the family. Don Alejandro is Legend Maker #8.

Most of the CIA's file cards and forms spell Alejandro's surname as "Zeger". The Moscow phone book spells it as "Ziger". The Warren Commission is partial to "Zieger". We do see a note stating that "Alexander Zeger...is probably identical with Alejandro Ziger, a Polish engineer and radiotelephonic expert. As his homeland was in a contested border region claimed by both Poland and the Ukraine, Ziger was what is known as a White Russian. Ziger had allegedly been taken in by Soviet propaganda, greatly disappointed with what he found in the USSR, while his family was living. The story is that by January 1957, Ziger had already applied at the Argentine Embassy in Moscow to return to Argentina.

Among the twelve who built the Oswald legend, Ziger is the one who we know the least about. This CIA document indicates that Ziger may have been an agent" and an "ardent Communist officer" born in 1908. Ziger not only spoke several languages (Russian, Polish, Spanish, and English), but he appears to be a man with leadership skills. It is apparent that he was a voice listened to at the sheet metal plant.

At a minimum, it looks like Ziger had a family member involved in CIA counterintelligence. There is a reference in Oswald's phone book to a "Debovy or Debooy". CIA analyst Marguerite Stevens wondered if it might be a reference to "David DeBoey Sagier". Born in 1908, David Zagier's memoir Botchki describes growing up in Poland and his work with the OSS and the CIA. David D. Zagier wrote an OSS paper on the devaluation of the Finnish mark. "D. Zagier" can be found among a list of the CIA's most famous counterintelligence officers of the 1960s.

Similarly, the history of Zeger's family is very odd. Alejandro Ziger's daughter "Lenora Zeger" is described as divorced and a singer. Lenora and Lee used to like to flirt together. The CIA's traces indicate that Lenora's birthdate is supposedly "1923". This would make Lenora old enough to be Lee's mother. Oswald's diary estimates that Lenora was born in 1934. The CIA's traces for the younger sister Anita indicate that her birth year is supposedly "1929". Regarding Mrs. Zeger, her traces are run for her apparent name, "Ana Dmitruk". The odds are strong that Ana is related to Pavel Dymitruk, whose ex-wife Lydia took in Marina Oswald after the Oswalds left the USSR and arrived in Texas virtually penniless.

An alleged ship manifest says that Ziger and his family left Argentina for the USSR in 1956, but the birth years don't track what we have previously seen - his birth year as approximately 1912, his wife Ana's as 1910, daughter Leonor as 1935, and daughter Anita as 1941.

While in the Soviet Union, Oswald spoke very little Russian in public In recent years, an astonishing revelation about Oswald has emerged. Oswald pretended to understand almost no Russian during his entire time in the Soviet Union. Author John Armstrong went to Argentina in 1998 and interviewed Anita Zeger. To Armstrong's astonishment, Anita Zeger told him that Oswald "didn't speak any Russian at all". She amended her statement to say "not much".

For spying purposes, an operative is much more valuable if people say things around him assuming that the operative does not understand what is being said. Zeger knew English, but the rest of his family did not. Oswald's male friends spoke English, and his female companions were from the foreign language institute who spoke English.

His Intourist guide Rimma Shirokova recalled that "he didn't seem to know a single word in Russian" when he arrived in the USSR. Angleton's aide Ray Rocca told the Church Committee that Shirakova was a KGB agent. Stanislav Shushkevich, who taught Oswald Russian, reported that Oswald found Russian difficult, but he eventually was able to understand with the aid of gestures, written notes, and a dictionary.

When Oswald was hospitalized for his alleged suicide attempt, the authorities thought that he understood the Russian spoken to him despite his verbal denials. "Sometimes he answers correctly, but immediately states that he does not understand what he was asked".

Oswald's Russian was considered good enough in the United States to qualify him as a professional translator, and for his wife Marina to mistake him as a native-born Russian with a Baltic accent when they first met. Russian is considered one of the most difficult languages to learn. No one can master Russian during the less than three years that Oswald was in the Soviet Union, particularly when that someone refuses to use Russian in most public settings. Credible witnesses say that Oswald mastered Russian before his trip to the USSR. He probably picked up the Baltic accent during his time with the Zegers.

The story behind the shootdown of the U-2, and how it played into Oswald's decision to return to the USA\

An NSA agent named Jack Dunlap now enters our story in a most dramatic fashion. "An extremely sensitive and reliable source" is quoted in an FBI letterhead memo that "Dunlap gave the Soviets important information regarding the U-2 flights over the USSR and that Dunlap's information provided the Soviet Union with the capability of shooting down the Powers U-2 aircraft...as a result of Dunlap's information, the Soviets were well aware of when the U-2 planes crossed over the Soviet Union. The Soviets always had their anti-aircraft guns trained on those planes." This source was known as TOPHAT. TOPHAT was Lt. General Dmitri Fedorovich Polyakov, exposed by Aldrich Ames - a real mole inside the CIA - whose motivation was money and not ideology.

The FBI memo that recounts TOPHAT's story then adds that "Khrushchev held back from allowing them to shoot down the planes, waiting for an appropriate political time to do this. Khrushchev eventually "gave the okay" to shoot down the Powers U-2 aircraft at a time when he thought it would do the most good for Soviet prestige and at a time when he was being pressed by China to show their hand." From the wording of the memo, it's unclear if TOPHAT was the source referring to Khrushchev's actions.

Dunlap succeeded in his mission even though CI chief James Angleton realized that Dunlap was a mole in 1959, a year before what is known as the U-2 affair. After Dunlap committed suicide in July 1963, and numerous classified documents turned up in his possession, his widow admitted to the FBI on August 20, 1963 that Dunlap told her before his suicide that he had been selling secrets to the Soviets.

Another piece of the puzzle is that Moscow had just recently obtained the ability to shoot down the U-2 with the development of the SA-2 Guideline surface-to-air missiles. By 1960, these missiles were installed around big cities and sensitive locations. All of the sites on Francis Gary Powers' flight path were protected by SA-2 missile sites.

When a U-2 flight was conducted on April 9, 1960, the plane's electronic intelligence (ELINT) collection unit indicated that the Soviets were tracking them early on. The CIA's Deputy Director of Plans Bissell was warned that "penetration without detection" was now a problem. When Powers went on that fateful flight on May 1, 1960, the CIA knew that he was in danger. There is no record that the CIA warned Eisenhower that the peace summit might blow up in his face.

DDP Bissell has said that the photographic capabilities of the U-2s provided "more than ninety percent of all its hard intelligence about the Soviet Union." during that era. During the early "60s, military surveillance satellites were in their infancy. Until the first satellite launch in August, 1960, the U-2 was the only way to obtain overhead photos of military test sites and similar sensitive installations.

Throughout the 1950s, the U-2 was able to defeat Soviet air defenses for two reasons: It could fly beyond the range of their missiles to an altitude of 90,000 feet, and it had ultra-secret radar-jamming equipment. Kelly Johnson, the legendary research engineer for Lockheed, designed the U-2 and many key US military planes at the largely autonomous "Lockheed Advanced Development Projects" (better known as the "Skunk Works") in Burbank, California, delivering the first U-2 in 1955 to the infamous top-secret base Area 51. Johnson said that the Soviets were "somehow able to isolate the (U-2's) radar-jamming signals and use their beams to guide the anti-aircraft missile...(this meant) either a penetration by Soviet intelligence of United States radar countermeasures or, by some other means, the ability to take precise measurements of the U-2's radar signals."

The U-2 pilot, Francis Gary Powers, wrote in his book Operation Overflight that he believed Oswald's defection was related to his being shot down: "Oswald's familiarity with MPS 16 height-finding radar gear and radio codes...are mentioned in the testimony of John E. Donovan, a former first lieutenant assigned to the same El Toro radar unit as OSWALD."

Lt. John Emmett Donovan had been Oswald's commanding officer in 1959, and had discussed more than radar gear and codes: "OSWALD has access to the location of all bases in the west coast area, all radio frequencies for all squadrons, all tactical call signs, and the relative strength of all squadrons, number and type of aircraft in each squadron, who was the commanding officer, the authentification code of entering and exiting the ADIZ, which stands for Air Defense Identification Zone. He knew the range of our radar. He knew the range of our radio. And he knew the range of the surrounding unit's radio and radar."

Donovan was an FBI agent from 1953-1956, and was a recent graduate from Georgetown University's Foreign Service school when interviewed by the Secret Service during December 1963. On the same day as this Secret Service interview, Donovan was contacted by Evening Star reporter Jeremiah O'Leary who was "also a Marine reservist". Donovan told the Warren Commission that the Marines spent thousands of hours changing all the tactical frequencies and verifying the destruction of codes.

No question that Oswald made the US government's security much more vulnerable by his threat to talk to the Soviets. But whether or not he did it, Oswald didn't know anything about how to unjam the U-2's radar-jamming signals, which was the Soviets' core problem as it made it very difficult for the Soviets to even find an overflying U-2. Nor was Oswald's knowledge of the height-finding radar gear all that helpful, if the U-2 could fly higher than the Soviet air defenses could reach and simultaneously jam Soviet radar.

What is fascinating is that there is no investigation in the CIA or FBI files dedicated to whether Oswald was handing U-2 information over to the Soviets. Nor is there anything in the military files that I am aware of, other than this complaint by his own lieutenant John Donovan. Incredibly, the Warren Commission did not ask Donovan or any of Oswald's military colleagues a single question about the U-2, even though the shootdown incident happened on the second overflight after Oswald's arrival to the USSR. Donovan said that "he did not know whether Oswald had actually turned over secrets to the Russians. But for security's sake it had to be assumed that he did.

"Eight days after Donovan testified to the Warren Commission, Richard Helms wrote a memo to the Warren Commission entitled, "Oswald's Access to Information About the U-2", which was classified as "Commission Document 931" and not released for thirty years. Francis Gary Powers discussed it at length in his book, as he really wanted to know what it said. Powers died in 1978. When Helms' memo was released in 1993, this was its conclusion:

"To summarize: There is no evidence or indication that OSWALD had any association with, or access to, the JTAG (Joint Technical Advisors Group) operation or its program in Japan. This applies also to information regarding the U-2 or its mission."

The gap between Helms' version and Donovan's version is vast. Donovan talks about how his unit provided U-2 support at Cubi Point in the Philippines, where Oswald once tracked a U-2 flying over China and showed it to him.

Whether or not Oswald actually provided U-2 secrets to the Soviets, it was certainly part of the legend created on his behalf. The best tip-off is right in Oswald's own diary, where he says that Don Alejandro advised him to go back to the USA on the night of May 1, 1960, the night that the Soviets shot down Powers' U-2.

It's the first voice of opposition I have heard. I respect Ziger, he has seen the world. He says many things, and relates many things I do not know about the USSR. I begin to feel uneasy inside, it's true!"

The CIA's memo says that Ziger "cautioned Oswald not to tell any Russians" .

Oswald's work in the Soviet Union was done. Both sides would take a long look at him, saying: "Whose man is he?"

Next time: Oswald returns home to join the White Russians in Texas

Endnotes:

The CIA cited Oswald's estimate of 5000 employees at the factory:

Oswald 201 file, Vol. 24, p. 143.

He noticed that he was "being observed" by his supervisor: Oswald 201 File, Vol 24 Bulky, Oswald Chronology Part 2 to Name Trace Appendix Draft, p. 26.

The supervisor was chief engineer Alexander Romanovich Ziger, a Polish Jew in his late forties who had supposedly relocated to Argentina in 1938 and returned to Belarus around 1955 or 1956: Oswald 201 File, Vol 38B/NARA Record Number: 1993.06.10.15:01:04:030000, Chronology of Oswald in the USSR.

Mr. Zeger spoke English with an American accent, while his family spoke no English. Zeger claimed he had worked for an American company in Argentina. Sources describe him as Alejandro or as Alexsandr: ARRB 1996 Releases/NARA Record Number: 104-10009-10068, Revised and Updated Version of List Forwarded to WC re Names. Also see John Armstrong, Harvey and Lee, p. 288 (interview with daughter Ana Evelina Ziger, 1998)

Oswald called himself "Alec" or "Alik" while in the USSR, and even obtained a hunting license under the name "Aleksey Harvey Oswald": Oswald 201 File, Volume 24, p. 8.

Oswald's diary states that he enjoyed many Sunday drives during 1960 with the Ziger family: Oswald 201 File, Vol 24 Bulky, Oswald Chronology Part 2 to Name Trace Appendix Draft, p. 32.

Tea and cakes with Don Alejandro: John Armstrong, Harvey and Lee, p. 287 (interview with daughter Anita Evelina Ziger, 1998) Photo of Don Alejandro: Warren Commission Exhibit 2624.

Most of the CIA's file cards spell Alejandro's surname as "Zeger": Name Check Request - Alexsandr Ziger, ARRB 1996 Releases/NARA Record Number: 104-10006-10226

The Moscow phone book has the listing as "Ziger":Commission Document 680 - CIA Appendix C to Chronology of Oswald in USSR, , p. 193.

http://www.opednews....101001-277.html

Edited by William Kelly
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  • 6 months later...

Here's a little more about the use of Lee Henry Oswald as a "marked card". The website below is the hyperlinked version:

http://www.opednews.com/Diary/THE-JFK-CASE-THE-TWELVE-W-by-Bill-Simpich-100918-692.html

THE JFK CASE: THE TWELVE WHO BUILT THE OSWALD LEGEND (Part 3: Counterintelligence goes molehunting with Oswald's file)

Third in the series. This chapter focuses on how Lee Harvey Oswald threatened to reveal military secrets to the Soviets about the U-2, and how US counterintelligence used his file as a "marked card" to capture supposed Communist spies who were trying to infiltrate the CIA.

Oswald threatened to reveal military secrets to the Soviets

The Warren Commission wrote many pages on Lee Harvey Oswald's visit to the American embassy in Moscow shortly after his defection to the USSR. However, the Warren Report says nothing about the U-2, much less about Oswald's work for the U-2 project as an aviation electronics operator.

The Commissioners were informed by CIA deputy director Richard Helms that Oswald only worked near the U-2 hangar in Japan, tap-danced around Oswald's access to the U-2 in the Philippines, and concluded that Oswald had no "information regarding the U-2 or its mission."

The Warren Report does mention that Oswald told legend maker #4 consul Richard Snyder that he had "already offered to tell a Soviet official what he had learned as a radar operator in the Marines" (p. 693). However, the Commission concluded that since neither the FBI or the Navy prosecuted Oswald, the State Department had no basis to conclude that Oswald's statement was "anything more than rash talk". (p. 775)

The CIA knew about Oswald's treasonous offer. In a memo written shortly after JFK's death, CIA officer John Whitten states that a list of "American defectors to the USSR list" was put together in November 1960. "From then on, we received a number of FBI and State Department reports on Oswald, detailing "his defiant threat to reveal to the Soviets all he knew about Navy radar installations in the Pacific."

Whitten makes it sound like the CIA heard about these threats after the U-2 went down on May 1, 1960. In fact, Snyder's report and Navy reports in early November 1959 describe Oswald's threat to provide radar secrets to the Soviets, and the CIA had copies of these reports in their files right after Oswald left the American embassy on October 31.

The CIA's position was that "Since Oswald was a former Marine and a U.S. citizen, his defection was of primary interest to the State Department, the FBI, and the Navy Department. CIA does not investigate U.S. citizens abroad unless we are specifically requested to do so by some other Government security agency. No such request was made in this case."

One CIA officer, however, shows extraordinary interest in Oswald.

This CIA officer is Ann Egerter, an analyst at the small, super-secret Counterintelligence Special Investigations Group (CI/SIG). Egerter called CI/SIG "the office that spied on spies". Her boss, legend maker #1 CI chief James Angleton, admitted that one of CI/SIG's purposes was to monitor defectors.

An FBI officer is also playing close attention - Marvin Gheesling, a supervisor at FBI Headquarters.

Oswald and the Moles

The October 31 and November 2 memos prepared by Snyder and his colleague Ed Freers about Oswald's defection are used by Ann Egerter, legend maker #5, to fill Oswald's file with items of false information known as "marked cards". "Marked cards" are designed to capture a mole who spreads the information to unauthorized individuals.

The "marked card" technique has been around for a long time. Peter Wright in Spycatcher refers to this method as a "barium meal". Tom Clancy in Patriot Games calls this trick a "canary trap". Author Peter Dale Scott mentions that the "marked card" was one of the methods used to try to catch the infamous CIA mole Aldrich Ames during the 1990s. The marked card didn't work because Ames himself was the chief of the CIA's Soviet Russia counterintelligence staff.

Freers and Snyder mentioned in their initial October 31 note about Oswald's visit that Oswald's mother's last address was at 4936 "Collinwood St.". Not only had Mrs. Oswald not lived on Collingwood since May 1957, but her address on September 4, 1959 was 3124 West Fifth Street, the very address Oswald had used on his passport application.

Keep in mind that when Snyder prepared his reports, he was a trained observer and reporter of minutiae that the average person would not notice. This "Collinwood St." entry was just one of several misspellings and errors that were purposeful and not accidental. This deliberate error was a "marked card" to see if a mole leaked this information elsewhere.

Two days later, the November 2 dispatch prepared by Freers and Snyder adds three more marked cards to the deck. One was that Oswald was "discharged" from the service. Another was that Oswald's highest grade was corporal. The third was that Oswald applied for his passport in San Francisco.

Peter Dale Scott, the author of the highly revealing essay "Oswald and the Search for Popov's Mole", carefully examined each of these marked cards. Oswald was not discharged, but received a dependency release and placed in the reserves with duties to perform until 1962. Oswald's highest grade was not corporal, but private first class. Finally, Oswald's passport states that it was issued in Los Angeles, not in San Francisco, as can be seen here:

48.gif

Scott focuses on the importance of these anomalies that fill Oswald's CIA file, stating that they are evidence of "a significant, sophisticated multi-agency counterintelligence operation." Scott advances the thesis that "Oswald himself was a low-level part of a CI search for a leak or mole", and that Oswald's unexplained talk of espionage right in front of the KGB microphones (the KGB had the US embassy thoroughly bugged) is a very poor way to convince the KGB of his bona fides but "makes perfect sense as a test for leaks in response to Popov's arrest fifteen days earlier".

The American and Soviet embassies have long and famous histories for placing bugs in each other's embassies, tapping each other's phones, and reading each other's mail. The KGB confirmed in 1959 that Freers was not CIA, and that the KGB maintained a microphone in Freers' office.

In "Popov's Mole", Scott points out that the errors detailed above, and others that we will soon discuss, was repeatedly circulated in the documentary history of Oswald's files by Jim Angleton's colleague Ann Egerter and other CI/SIG officials. By embedding these false statements within Oswald's file, and tracking who had access to the file information, Egerter could determine if this information had surfaced elsewhere, and that would be evidence of unauthorized access.

Angleton told the Church Committee that the role of CI/SIG was to prevent the penetration of spies into the CIA and the government, and that the "historical penetration cases are recruitment of U.S. officials in positions (of) code clerks." Angleton's search for a mole turned the CIA upside down by the time he was fired in 1974. Dozens of CIA officers were fired. By 1980, Congress was forced to pass a "Mole Relief Act" to compensate the unfairly accused victims.

Egerter used Oswald himself in what is called a "dangle". Angleton's biographer Tom Mangold wrote that the execution of Popov accelerated Angleton's belief that "Popov could only have been betrayed by a mole buried deep within Soviet Division.". Mangold found Angleton misguided, stating that "Popov was actually lost to the Soviets because of a slipshod CIA operation; there was no treachery." David Robarge, in a very thoughtful piece that should be read in its entirety, agrees that Popov's capture marked the time when Angleton became "fixed on the mole". Oswald's arrival was on the same date as Popov's arrest.

Nonetheless, if Angleton was convinced that there was a mole in the Soviet Division, it's a good bet that he believed that radar operator Oswald's sudden entry into the Soviet Union on the same day was no accident.

What is curious is that Egerter opened no 201 file for Oswald at this point. A 201 file is a CIA file that is created to profile any person "of active operational interest". For whatever reason, she did not want to admit that the CIA had any operational interest in Oswald.

The FBI had operational interest in Oswald, and let everybody know it. Headquarters supervisor Marvin Gheesling is described as having "considerable experience in espionage, intelligence and counterintelligence operations." Gheesling, legend maker #6, promptly opened a "watch list" file on Oswald within a week of his visit to the Embassy in late 1959 by creating what is called a FLASH card. As John Newman muses, "This combination of being on the Watch List without a 201 file makes Oswald special. Perhaps not unique, but certainly peculiar. It was as if someone wanted Oswald watched quietly."

At the same time, Oswald was added to the HT LINGUAL list, Angleton was effectively in charge of HT LINGUAL, a joint project of the CIA, FBI and US Postal Service in which Angleton was the titular head. Oswald was now one of the 300 Americans whose letters would be secretly opened as part of HT LINGUAL project monitoring mail coming from the USSR.

A quick glance at what happened three years later: Gheesling's role turned ominous when he took Oswald off the watch list in the month before the assassination. Gheesling's action took place just hours before Egerter helped write two separate messages that provided two different descriptions of Oswald. One message sent to third party agencies referred to him specifically as "Lee Henry Oswald", with an inaccurate physical description, apparently designed to mislead the national leadership of these agencies. The in-house message provided a more accurate description of Oswald - as we'll see later, still containing subtle mistakes - going only to the local agencies. These are further indications of the molehunt.

Gheesling's decision to take Oswald off the watch list effectively dimmed the lights around Oswald. It meant that Oswald would not be watched in Dallas with close scrutiny in situations involving national security, such as when JFK came to town in a motorcade. If Gheesling had waited another day, Oswald would have been in the spotlight. Dallas agents would have been on him like white on rice.

After Egerter passes Oswald's marked cards to FBI's John Fain, Fain joins the molehunt

Going back to 1960...the marked cards begin to multiply a few months later. In February 1960, Oswald's mother is worrying about him. Marguerite told the Secret Service that SA John Fain recommends that she write Secretary of State Christian Herter and Congressmen Sam Rayburn and Jim Wright. Curiously, the FBI has no public paper trail of meeting with Fain at this early date. FBI files in 1959-60 and Oswald's Marine records remain classified and should be released.

Mrs. Oswald then sends one letter to Congressman Wright telling him that "according to the UPI Moscow press, he appeared at the US embassy renouncing his citizenship". The next day, she wrote Secretary Herter a letter saying that Oswald had not renounced his citizenship and "is still a U.S. citizen".

Why Mrs. Oswald would say two different things in two different letters one day apart is a longer discussion. Nonetheless, these two totally contradictory documents are a central part of this case. The inaccurate statement that Oswald had "renounced his citizenship" was central to SA Fain's report of May 12, 1960. This report also had the marked card of "Edward Lee Oswald" for the name of Oswald's deceased father, rather than his correct name of Robert Edward Lee Oswald.

Fain's inaccurate report about renunciation was the direct cause of Oswald's dishonorable discharge by the Marines on August 17, 1960. Oswald wrote the Secretary of the Navy trying to get this dishonorable discharge changed, not realizing that John Connally had resigned as navy secretary to run for Governor of Texas in 1962. Connally wrote back and said that he had forwarded Oswald's letter to the new secretary. John Fain is legend maker #7.

At a minimum, Ann Egerter's use of the Lee Oswald's file enabled CI to engage in some very clever molehunting, particularly when she decided to name his 201 file "Lee Henry Oswald". She claimed years later that "Henry" wasn't in her handwriting. Take a look for yourself. The name of the file itself was a "marked card". If anyone else referred to Lee Henry Oswald, a bright trail would be left behind. Egerter's form includes the terms "defected to the USSR" and "radar operator", but says nothing about Oswald's threat to pass "classified things" to the Soviets.

Next week, the series will continue with Part 4: When the U-2 Goes Down, Oswald is Ready to Return

Endnotes:

The Commissioners were informed by CIA deputy director Richard Helms... Richard Helms memo to Director, FBI; Warren Commission Document 931, 5/13/64.

The Warren Report does mention that Oswald told legend maker #4 consul Richard Snyder that he had "already offered to tell a Soviet official what he had learned as a radar operator in the Marines". Warren Report, p. 693.

However, the Commission concluded that since neither the FBI or the Navy prosecuted Oswald, the State Department had no basis to conclude that Oswald's statement was "anything more than rash talk". Warren Report, p. 775.

CIA officer John Whitten states in a memo written shortly after JFK's death that after an American defectors to the USSR list was put together in November 1960 "from then on, we received a number of FBI and State Department reports on Oswald, detailing"his defiant threat to reveal to the Soviets all he knew about Navy radar installations in the Pacific." memo by CIA officer John Whitten, "CIA Work on Lee Oswald and the Assassination of President Kennedy", p. 3, 12/20/63, Oswald 201 File, Vol 10B, NARA Record Number: 1993.06.14.15:56:02:000000

Angleton's search for a mole turned the CIA upside down by the time he was fired in 1974: See generally David C. Martin, Wilderness of Mirrors, (Guilford, CT, Lyons Press: revised edition, 2003).

Angleton admitted that one of CI/SIG's purposes was to monitor defectors: HSCA Security Classified Testimony, Angleton deposition, 10/5/78, p. 150.

The October 31 and November 2 memos of Snyder and Freers are used by Ann Egerter, Legend maker #5, to fill Oswald's file with items of false information known as "marked cards": Ed Freers memo to State Dept., 10/31/59; Warren Commission Exhibit 908, Snyder's report to State Department of 11/2/59, p. 2 (see fourth paragraph)

Author Peter Dale Scott mentions that the "marked card" was one of the methods used to catch the infamous CIA mole Aldrich Ames during the 1990s. The marked card trick didn't work because Ames himself was the chief of the Soviet Russia counterintelligence staff: Peter Dale Scott, "The Hunt for Popov's Mole", Fourth Decade, March 1996, p. 4.

Oswald's mother had not lived on Collinwood since May 1957: "Collingwood since May 1957", see Warren Commission Exhibit 822, SA John Fain's report of 7/3/61, p. 2. Also see Peter Dale Scott, The Hunt for Popov's Mole, p. 6.

The passport application: See Warren Commission Hearings, Volume 22, p. 77:

Freers' dispatch states that Oswald was "discharged" from the service, that the highest grade achieved was that of a corporal, and that he applied for his passport in San Francisco: Warren Commission Exhibit 908, Vol. 18, p. 97, Foreign Service dispatch from the American Embassy in Moscow to the Department of State, 11/2/59. Freers signs document, Snyder signs first page as the reporter:

Oswald received a "dependency release", with obligated service up until 1962, not a discharge. See Warren Commission Document 1, 12/6/63, p. 23,

Oswald was not discharged, but released from active duty: Warren Commission Document 1114, Navy message 22257, From: CNO To: ALUSNA, Moscow, 11/4/59.

His highest grade was not corporal, but private first class: Warren Report 687, 688; Warren Commission Exhibit 3099, Certificate of True Copies of Original Pay Records from 10/24/96 to 9/11/59 for PFC Oswald, dated 9/15/64, prepared by Major E.J. Rowe.

Also see: Warren Commission Document 1114, Navy message 22257, From: CNO To: ALUSNA, Moscow, 11/4/59.

The passport, which was not only examined by Snyder but retained by him:

Oswald had given his passport to Snyder at the Embassy when he said he wanted to renounce his American citizenship: Testimony of Richard Snyder, Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. 5, p. 269.

The passport indicates clearly that it was issued not in San Francisco, but in Los Angeles: Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. 18, p. 162, Warren Commission Exhibit 946, passport of Lee Harvey Oswald, issued September 10, 1959.

The KGB confirmed in 1959 that Freers was not CIA, and that the KGB had a microphone in his office: Diplomatic List, Moscow, 1 January 1959 (information obtained from defector Yuri Nosenko), HSCA Segregated CIA Collection, Box 14/NARA Record Number: 104-10070-10150

Historical penetration cases are recruitment of U.S. officials in positions code clerks:Deposition of James Angleton, 9/17/75, Church Committee, p. 17.

Angleton's search for a mole is well-known for having turned the CIA upside down by the time he was fired in 1974: See generally David C. Martin, Wilderness of Mirrors, (Guilford, CT, Lyons Press: revised edition, 2003).

By the time Angleton was fired in the midst of the Watergate era, he was accused of being a Soviet mole himself. By 1980, Congress was forced to pass a bill to compensate the unfairly accused officers in what became known as the Mole Relief Act: David Wise, Molehunt, Chapter 18

Popov was actually lost due to a slipshod CIA operation there was no treachery. John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, pp. 87-88

David Robarge, in a very thoughtful piece that should be read in its entirety, agrees that Popov's capture marked the time when Angleton became "fixed on the mole": David Robarge, Moles, Defectors and Deceptions: James Angleton and CIA Counterintelligence, p. 36.

A 201 file is a CIA file on any person "of active operational interest": Clandestine Services Handbook, 43-1-1, February 15, 1960, Chapter III, Annex B, "Personalities - 201 and IDN Numbers", RIF# 104-10213-10202. Cited by John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1995) at p. 47 and 537, note 2.

Headquarters supervisor Marvin Gheesling is described as having "considerable experience in espionage, intelligence and counterintelligence operations": HSCA Report, Volume XII, p. 566.

"This combination of being on the Watch List without a 201 file makes Oswald special. Perhaps not unique, but certainly peculiar. It was as if someone wanted Oswald watched quietly." John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, p. 422.

At the same time, Oswald was added to the HT LINGUAL list": John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, p. 56.

Egerter helped prepare two totally conflicting documents. One was a teletype to third party agencies such as the FBI, State Department and the Navy inaccurately describing Oswald as "approximately 35 years old, with an athletic build, about six feet tall, with receding hairline...believed that Oswald was identical to Lee Henry Oswald": CIA teletype 74673 to FBI, State Department, and Navy, October 10, 1963; NARA, JFK files, CIA 201 file on Oswald.

The in-house version with the more accurate description went only to the local agencies:

CIA headquarters teletype 74830 to Mexico City CIA station, p. 3, October 10, 1963; NARA Record Number: 104-10015-10048

SA John Fain recommends that she write Secretary of State Christian Herter and Congressmen Sam Rayburn and Jim Wright: "Popov's Mole", p. 8: 16 Warren Commission Hearings, p. 729.

Mrs. Oswald then sends one letter to Congressman Rayburn telling him that "according to the UPI Moscow press, he appeared at the US embassy renouncing his citizenship": Marguerite Oswald letter to Congressman Jim Wright, 3/6/60, Warren Commission Document 1115, p. 51

The next day, she wrote Secretary Herter a letter saying that Oswald had not renounced his citizenship: "All I know is what I read in the newspapers. He went to the U.S. Ambassy (sic) there and wanted to turn in his U.S. citizenship and had applied for Soviet citizenship. However the Russians refused his request but said he could remain in their country as a Resident Alien. As far as I know he is still a U.S. citizen." Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. 16, pp. 594-595; Commission Exhibit 206.

The statement that Oswald had renounced his citizenship was picked up in SA Fain's report of May 12, 1960: FBI report of 5/12/60 by SA John Fain; 17 Warren Commission Hearings 700, 702; Exhibit 821, p. 3.

Because Fain printed this inaccurate information about renunciation in his report, the result was Oswald's dishonorable discharge by the Marines on August 17, 1960: John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, pp. 212-213.

Oswald even wrote John Connally from the USSR, not realizing that Connally had quit his job as Secretary of the Navy to run for governor of Texas in 1962: Memo by FBI SA James Hosty, 11/25/63, p. 2, Commission Document 75 - FBI DeBrueys Report of 02 Dec 1963 re: Oswald/Russia, p. 701.

"Edward Lee Oswald": John Fain's report, 6/12/60, p. 3, 17 Warren Commission Hearings 700, 702, Exhibit 821.

"Robert Edward Lee Oswald": FBI report of Donald C. Steinmeyer, 4/1/64, re marriage records for Robert Edward Lee Oswald; 11/27/63 report by SA Joseph G. Engelhardt re sister of Robert Edward Lee Oswald.

The 201 opening form filled out by Egerter includes the terms "defected to the USSR" and "radar operator" but says nothing about Oswald's threat to pass "classified things" about his work to the Soviets: 201 file request by Ann Egerter, 12/9/60, HSCA Segregated CIA Collection, Box 7/NARA Record Number: 104-10054-10204

Bill Simpich is a civil rights attorney and an antiwar activist in the San Francisco Bay Area.

worthy of a bump

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  • 5 years later...
On 6/10/2005 at 9:09 PM, Ron Ecker said:

Pat,

A memo from Win Scott to the U.S. Ambassador in Mexico City dated 10/16/63 provides information on “Lee Henry Oswald”:

http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/fbi/...10418_0002a.htm

Two days later, a cable from FBI headquarters to the FBI legal attaché in Mexico City corrects the name to Lee Harvey Oswald:

http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/fbi/...10419_0002a.htm

Ron

Bumped due to current Forum interest in the October 1, 1963, (M.C. CIA?, M.C. FBI?) "Lee Henry Oswald" cable and the responses it elicited from various intelligence and law enforcement agencies.

Edited by Thomas Graves
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On 10/11/2009 at 5:03 PM, Bill Simpich said:

I wanted to see if I could revive this thread, because I think that the "Lee Henry Oswald" story leads to better understanding of how Oswald was used by James

Angleton's CI-SIG (counter-intelligence, special investigations group) and David Phillips of the SAS. Angleton's assistant Ann Egerter was the one who named the 201 file "Lee Henry Oswald" and denied to the HSCA that the word "Henry" was in her handwriting. More than 30 years later, her deposition is one of the only ones that has not been declassified. The October 1 transcripts and much more are now on-line and readily available. I hope we can keep pushing to have more documents released by the Congressional oversight committees in the coming year.

CI-SIG treated "Lee Henry Oswald" as an intelligence asset

Here are some indications that that Oswald was used wittingly or unwittingly for a molehunt by Angleton:

In “Oswald and the Search for Popov’s Mole”, Peter Dale Scott focuses on the importance of the numerous anomalies that fill Oswald’s 201 file. One important one is Angleton's assistant Ann Egerter opening a 201 file for Oswald more than a year after his defection to the Soviet Union and only after inquiries were made about his defector status by the State Department, and entitling the file “Lee Henry Oswald”.

In "Popov's Mole" Scott argues that inaccurate information was repeatedly planted in the documentary history of Oswald’s files by officials such as Egerter and FBI Special Agent John Fain, specifically to find out if this information leaked somewhere else. If it did, this was evidence that a “mole” had access to it. Jim Angleton’s search for a mole is well-known for having turned the CIA upside down.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...amp;relPageId=3

The CIA's top "defector-in-place" (an agent who not only defects, but remains in and feigns loyalty to the target country), Peter Popov. code-named ATTIC, had passed on a leak in 1958 that the Soviets knew a lot more about the U-2 than the US thought. The very day that LHO arrived in the Soviet Union - October 16, 1959 - Popov was arrested. Angleton's biographer Tom Mangold wrote that this event accelerated Angleton's molehunt, believing that "Popov could only have been betrayed by a mole buried deep within

Soviet Division." Mangold also wrote that "Popov was actually lost to the Soviets because of a slipshod CIA operation; there was no treachery."

(John Newman, Oswald and the CIA, pp. 87-88)

Nonetheless, if Angleton was convinced that there was a mole in the Soviet Division, he may have believed that radar operator Oswald's presence in the Soviet Union that day had something to do with it. At a minimum, it is reasonable to believe that Angleton wanted LHO carefully watched, and that intelligence decisions would be made based on LHO's actions. That is a good working definition of an intelligence "asset". As David Phillips told the HSCA, "We covered this man all the time."

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=99

Egerter told the HSCA that the 201 file for a CIA asset "would be a restricted 201 file and it might even be a false 201 file, not having anything in it. Everything would be held by the case officer...operational material is not filed in 201 files...It would be held by the operations officer, case officer." (DiEugenio & Pease, eds., The Assassinations, p. 157, citing Egerter's 5/27/78 deposition, pp. 31-38; was it reclassified?)

Even the transcript of Oswald's October 1 call to the Soviet embassy may not be authentic

The last time “Lee Henry Oswald” was seen in the files was when the CIA generated twin messages with very different descriptions of Oswald on October 10, 1963, stating that he had contacted the Soviet embassy in Mexico City on October 1. The transcript of the October 1, 1963 visit do exist. Although "Lee Henry Oswald" is not invoked there, everyone from J. Edgar Hoover on down seems to agree that LHO was impersonated during the calls that day. You can read them here...

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...amp;relPageId=8

There is a dispute about the authenticity of the October 1 transcript. Win Scott and David Phillips prepared a cable to CIA HQ on October 8 stating that Oswald spoke in

"broken Russian".

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...amp;relPageId=2

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=66

Not only does the transcript reflect that Oswald spoke in English, but Oswald's Russian in 1963 was very good.

Another discrepency is that Anita Tarasoff (she and her husband transcribed the tapes) remembered that Oswald was asking for financial aid in the October 1 transcript.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=96

Amazingly, both Win Scott and David Phillips appear to agree with her:

Win Scott: http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=101

David Phillips: http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=54

When Phillips tried to get around it, Chief Counsel Sprague angrily said to Phillips that "you have slithered around" recent disparaging claims he had made to the media that Oswald had been seeking financial aid. Even Phillips had to agree!

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=94

As the tapes no longer exist, there is no way to test the transcript against the tapes, only against the documentary record.

Ann Egerter's deposition testimony about the October 10 messages from the CIA is not credible, and should be released in full

Moving to the twin October 10 messages with very different descriptions of Oswald: One message was in-house, while the other went to third party agencies (FBI, State Dept., and Navy). The latter message stated that “Lee Henry Oswald” was 35 years old and balding. Egerter checked both of these messages for accuracy.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=157

These October 10 messages went out just hours after FBI official Marvin Gheesling took Oswald off the FBI’s Watchlist, claiming that it should have been done upon Oswald’s return from the Soviet Union the previous year. As stated by author James Douglass, the upshot was that Oswald’s “staged Soviet connection could then be documented for scapegoating purposes after Dallas, but without sounding a national security alarm that would have put a spotlight on Oswald and prevented Dallas from happening."

When Ann Egerter was interviewed by HSCA investigators on 3/31/78, she asked to use an alias. She said that CI-SIG was known as the “office known for spying on spies” and that its main work was infiltration of the CIA. (pages 1 and 3 of memo) She also said that the words “Henry”, “Marine Corps” and “Navy” on the 201 document did not look like her handwriting and that she did “not recognize 2nd writing”. (pages 9 and 10 of memo; other numbered pages unreadable)

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...amp;relPageId=2

To see Egerter’s handwriting on the document that opened the 201 file:

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=113

Egerter complained to the CIA after the deposition was over that she had not done well, citing her problem with the “Lee Henry” handwriting, among a host of other issues.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...bsPageId=740779

Her deposition of 5/17/78 remains one of the only depositions - if not the only deposition - still classified more than thirty years later.

Are the twin messages of October 10 related to the CIA-FBI deception program in foreign countries to counter the FPCC?

As Peter Dale Scott has said, it is important to analyze intelligence operations prior to the assassination, the assassination itself, and the cover-up. The events we have looked at so far appear to focus on a molehunt and possibly an FPCC deception program.

On 9/16/63, John Tilton of the CIA made two requests. One was for the FBI to help obtain FPCC stationery and any existing foreign mailing list in order to have a sample “to produce large quantities of propaganda in the name of the (FPCC)” in order to “counter” their activities in foreign countries. Tilton also said that the CIA was considering planting “deceptive information” which might “embarrass” the FPCC in areas where it has some support. Tilton assured the FBI that no "fabrication" would take place without advance notice and agreement. David Phillips with the SAS was in charge of Cuban affairs during this period, and specialized in actions of deception.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...bsPageId=377132

LHO's subsequent visit to Mexico City on September 25 may have been an effort to plant "deceptive information". Pursuant to Tilton's other request, the FBI asked FPCC activist Victor Vicente, NY 3245-S* to provide them with FPCC stationery and the foreign mailing lists.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...bsPageId=438314

Tilton did it, and included within the package correspondence to the FPCC, that included a typed copy of a letter from Lee Oswald to V.T. Lee that Vicente had already provided in a previous break-in in April 1963. In this typed version, prepared under the guidance of experienced Oswald investigator FBI agent Robert P. Gemberling, VT Lee was described as "Henry Lee", a phrase that was not used in Oswald's letter. Was this just a mistake, or a conscious effort to link these two men in the documentary record in some way?

The handwritten version of the VT Lee exhibit: http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/w...Vol20_0269b.htm

The typed version of the VT Lee exhibit referring to "Henry Lee": http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=676

Tilton was no Boy Scout. He reported to Edward Lansdale in 1962-63 as part of the Psychological Operations Group, a psy-op team designed to destabilize Cuba.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=73

Tilton was the CIA La Paz station chief involved in the capture and assassination of Che Guevara.

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB5/

Tilton was the last chief of the Phoenix Program in Vietnam, a program estimated to have killed 20,000 alleged Viet Cong.

http://www.naderlibrary.com/phoenixprog26.htm

A final anomaly brought out in "Popov's Mole" is a crucial key to the assassination itself

A false physical description of Oswald as 5 feet, 10 inches and 165 pounds can be found in three crucial places:

1. This description originated in a memo written by FBI Special John Fain in May, 1960, supposedly based from talking to Oswald’s mother, although Oswald’s weight never varied any more than 130-150 and was 150 at the time of his death. LHO's height was generally described as 5 feet, 9 inches, though the Marines reported Oswald as 5 feet, 11 inches.

LHO seemed to favor the 5'11" description when dealing with government officials, for some still-unknown purpose.

http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/w...eport_0084b.htm

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=10

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...bsPageId=792581

2. The last known pre-assassination use of this physical description was in the second of the twin October 10 messages was a cable sent two hours later to the station in Mexico: "Oswald is five feet ten inches, one hundred sixty five pounds..." Although Egerter checked it for accuracy, "accuracy" is not the issue. The issue is how this particular description was chosen from all the descriptions out there.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=157

3. Finally, the broadcast over the Dallas police radio fifteen minutes after JFK was shot was that the unidentified assassin was “5/10, 165 pounds...”

http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/w...Vol23_0438a.htm

Although confused commentators have claimed that Howard Brennan was the source, it's well documented that an "unidentified citizen" gave the above description to Inspector Sawyer after he saw someone looking like Oswald running from the Book Depository immediately after the assassination. The citizen did not comply with the sheriff's request to come to the office later to fill out a report, and Hoover said that the "sheriff's office can locate no record on this citizen".

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=109

Even after the Warren Report was published, Hoover responded to general counsel J. Lee Rankin's request that according to the Dallas police the information came from an ‘unidentified citizen’.” (There is no record of Hoover re-contacting the sheriff's department).

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=72 - also see Gerald McKnight's (Breach of Trust, p. 109)

Rankin repeated his request to Hoover for more information on this incident, but apparently to no avail.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...mp;relPageId=33

- Bill Simpich

bumped

 

In 2009 post, above, Bill Simpich pointed out that Ann Egerter's 5/17/78 deposition was still classified -- "Her deposition of 5/17/78 remains one of the only depositions - if not the only deposition - still classified more than thirty years later."

Question:  Has it been declassified yet?

Edited by Thomas Graves
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On 6/13/2005 at 7:39 PM, Robert Charles-Dunne said:
Pat Speer said:
While I haven't studied the CIA behavior in Mexico as much as I would like, I did stumble upon something which may or may not be well-known.  I certainly found it interesting. Here's my train of thought..

I believe the CIA created a file on Lee Henry Oswald long before the assassination.

More than a year after Oswald's appearance at the US Embassy in Moscow, CIA opened a file on "Lee Henry Oswald."  One might think that a guy threatening to betray US military secrets to the Soviets would catch the CIA's attention in a more timely fashion, and that they'd at least get his name right.

However, there is an alternate explanation that I think explains both the time and name lapses, though entirely my pure unadulterated speculation:

When Oswald appeared at the Embassy, a file was opened in Langley, in his proper name, that was subsequently segregated from the central files.  This was not an unusual practice, and there may have been a fairly legitimate reason for such segregation, per below.

Later, a file was opened on "Lee Henry Oswald," that was placed into the Agency's central files.  This would have been a "marked card" or "barium meal" operation that would allow "somebody" within CIA to scrutinize where that information went within CIA, and watch from where within the Soviet infrastructure that false-name data was reflected back to Langley [via CIA moles within GRU or KGB,]

Further to the marked card speculation, we've known for some time who that "somebody" was; that it was Angleton's CI/SIG who marked the "Lee Henry Oswald" file so that anyone requesting data on him from within CIA would have to identify themselves before being allowed access to the material.  It was via this trip-wire method that Angleton could watch to see whom within CIA had an interest in him.  And, ultimately, how it might bounce back from the Soviets.

Given that Angleton's chief raison d'etre within CIA was finding enemy moles inside the Agency, this may have been a perfectly legitimate exercise.

However, after the assassination, by keeping the original true name file sequestered from others, this left the first CIA notice of Oswald in memo form as something citing the wrong name and coming more than a year after it should have done.

The fact that the false name was still being bruited about within CIA - four years after the defection, three years after the file was opened and 16 months after his repatriation - is hard to rationalize, unless the marked card operation was maintained throughout.  CIA had ample opportunity in the interim to fix the error, unless it was maintained intentionally.

It's theorized that Oswald was impersonated in Mexico shortly before the assassination. I believe the real Oswald was there, and was observed by a mole (or caught on a bug) in the Soviet Embassy, and that a false record was put into the files to protect this mole's identity (or the existence of the bug). This false record included fake phone calls made to the embassy--the transcribers couldn't be trusted to merely create fake transcripts from whole cloth, perhaps they were even being tested. I believe this is what Helms meant by citing "sources and methods" as a reason for the CIA's lies. It should be remembered here that tapping phone lines in Mexico was not illegal for the CIA,

It was a joint venture with Mexico's DFS, in order to ensure there's be no international flap in the event it was discovered.

and that the existence of these taps would have to have been  suspected by the KGB, but that having actual bugs within the walls of the embassy would have to have been considered of the utmost secrecy.

The Lopez Report (the HSCA report on Oswald in Mexico) reflects that on one of the transcripts Oswald called the Soviet Embassy and identified himself as Lee Oswald, and went on to tell his story, spelling out everyone he spoke to inside the embassy, etc.  I believe this was planted information, that is, information derived from the mole, or the bug--but put into the record in such a way that a mole within the CIA would not know the CIA had a spy of its own (or a bug) within the Embassy.

Probe Magazine Interviews with HSCA Deputy Counsel Robert Tannenbaum in 1996 and former HSCA Counsel Richard Sprague in 2000, however, indepently report that the transcripts said the caller in Mexico identified himself as "Lee Henry Oswald." If so, since the Lee Henry Oswald file at the CIA preceded this incident, it would indicate the impersonator is working off flawed CIA information.  They have thus left their fingerprints on their charade.

No doubt Angleton would have been pleased to watch this use of deliberately-tainted 'marked card' information, if the above speculation is correct.

Are the actual transcripts available?  While it's possible Sprague and Tannenbaum have maintained contact, and jointly remembered the story incorrectly, if they haven't, the chances of them both remembering this story incorrectly in the same way would have to be considered miniscule.

Or perhaps I'm simply wrong that the Lee Henry Oswald file preceded this incident.  I'd appreciate some help sorting this out.

You're quite right about this, Pat.  You'll note that various government agencies also had a penchant for referring to our boy as "Harvey Lee Oswald," which may be a similar marked card gambit, or just a mistake that recurred from one file to the next like a virus.

 

 

 

"Later, a file was opened on "Lee Henry Oswald," that was placed into the Agency's central files.  This would have been a "marked card" or "barium meal" operation that would allow "somebody" within CIA to scrutinize where that information went within CIA, and watch from where within the Soviet infrastructure that false-name data was reflected back to Langley [via CIA moles within GRU or KGB,]"

According to the above speculation, LHO was of great interest to the CIA, even beyond that which his sabbatical to the USSR, would appear to warrant. Or, planting information markers was a matter of routine for Angleton, or the CIA in general.

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  • 11 months later...
On 3/16/2017 at 12:58 PM, Thomas Graves said:

bumped

 

In his 2009 post, above, Bill Simpich pointed out that Ann Egerter's 5/17/78 deposition was still classified -- "Her deposition of 5/17/78 remains one of the only depositions - if not the only deposition - still classified more than thirty years later."

Question:  Has it been declassified yet?

bumped

--  Tommy  :sun

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Tommy,

I did something I rarely do a few years back - when I heard it was released, I wrote the Archives, ordered a copy of Egerter's depo, and then asked Rex to post it at MFF - here it is:  https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=146600&relPageId=52&search=egerter_AND DEPOSITION

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26 minutes ago, Bill Simpich said:

Tommy,

I did something I rarely do a few years back - when I heard it was released, I wrote the Archives, ordered a copy of Egerter's depo, and then asked Rex to post it at MFF - here it is:  https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=146600&relPageId=52&search=egerter_AND DEPOSITION

 

Bill,

With all due respect (and with you I really do mean that)...  Thanks!

--  Tommy  :sun

Initial comment:  Isn't it logical to assume that the "SR" they're talking about was, in reality, the separate division in the CIA known at that time as "Soviet Russia Division," the name of which was later changed to "Soviet Block Division"?

Which separate division had its own Counterintelligence Department or Section (think my personal hero Tennent H. Bagley, et al.)?

Edited by Thomas Graves
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On 2/18/2018 at 7:03 PM, Bill Simpich said:

...I did something I rarely do a few years back - when I heard it was released, I wrote the Archives, ordered a copy of Egerter's depo, and then asked Rex to post it at MFF - here it is:  

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=146600&relPageId=52&search=egerter_AND DEPOSITION

Bill,

This 83 page document refers to the top secret CIA Mole Hunt to determine who Impersonated Lee Harvey Oswald on October 1, 1963.

On pages 75-79 we learn that Ann Egerter was not a part of that CIA Mole Hunt -- it went over her head.   She was left out of the loop.   She sent out a cable on October 10, 1963, with data from LHO's modified 201 file, without knowing that the 201 data was modified.   In this document, Ann Egerter was still embarrassed that the cable data was incorrect, because it was her job to ensure the correctness of the cables.

So -- again Mr. Simpich -- your "CIA Mole Hunt" discovery obtains fresh reinforcement today.    I'm not surprised.    I think the ignorance of the vast majority of CIA agents and clerks in 1963 with regard to the Mexico City Impersonation of Lee Harvey Oswald is a profound discovery in your unique JFK Research.   Very well done.

In my opinion, this specific "CIA Mole Hunt" must be included in any JFK CT going forward after your discovery -- or that CT is obsolete.

Best regards,
--Paul Trejo, MA

Edited by Paul Trejo
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14 minutes ago, Paul Trejo said:

Bill,

This 83 page document refers to the top secret CIA Mole Hunt to determine who Impersonated Lee Harvey Oswald on October 1, 1963.

On pages 75-79 we learn that Ann Egerter was not a part of that CIA Mole Hunt -- it went over her head.   She was left out of the loop.   She sent out a cable on October 10, 1963, with data from LHO's modified 201 file, without knowing that the 201 data was modified.   In this document, Ann Egerter was still embarrassed that the cable data was incorrect, because it was her job to ensure the correctness of the cables.

So -- again Mr. Simpich -- your "CIA Mole Hunt" discovery obtains fresh reinforcement today.    I'm not surprised.    I think the ignorance of the vast majority of CIA agents and clerks in 1963 with regard to the Mexico City Impersonation of Lee Harvey Oswald is a profound discovery in your unique JFK Research.   Very well done.

In my opinion, this specific "CIA Mole Hunt" must be included in any JFK CT going forward after your discovery -- or that CT is obsolete.

Best regards,
--Paul Trejo, MA

Paul,

With all due respect, if it is really that simple (and it may very well be, for all I know), then aren't  the sixty-four thousand dollar questions -- "Who altered the information in the 201 file?," and "Did the person who made that file available to her know that it had been altered?"

--  Tommy  :sun

Edited by Thomas Graves
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21 minutes ago, Thomas Graves said:

Paul,

With all due respect, if it is really that simple (and it may very well be, for all I know), then aren't  the sixty-four thousand dollar questions -- "Who altered the information in the 201 file?,"

and

"Did the person who made that file available to her know that it had been altered?"

--  Tommy  :sun

Tommy,

Bill Simpich also answered that question in 2014.   Lee Harvey Oswald's CIA 201 File was modified approximately ONE HOUR after the Impersonation itself, by the CIA high-command at the Mexico City station on the premises, immediately following the urgent English translation by the expert linguists on site.

The English translators at the CIA Mexico City station knew within minutes that this was an Impersonation.

I opine that the person who handed Ann Egerter the modified LHO 201 file was also ignorant that it was modified.    A Mole Hunt is always conducted ONLY at the very tippy-top highest levels of any organization -- otherwise it is ineffective.

In my opinion, the most important question is how FBI agent James Hosty came to see the October 10, 1963 cable that Ann Egerter sent out.    Hosty describes it in chapter one of his book, Assignment Oswald (1996), claiming that this is when he first heard about Valeriy Kostikov, KGB killer, who had met Lee Harvey Oswald in Mexico City on September 27 and 28, 1963.

All best,
--Paul 

Edited by Paul Trejo
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16 minutes ago, Paul Trejo said:

Tommy,

Bill Simpich also answered that question in 2014.   Lee Harvey Oswald's CIA 201 File was modified approximately ONE HOUR after the Impersonation itself, by the CIA high-command at the Mexico City station on the premises, immediately following the urgent English translation by the expert linguists on site.

The English translators at the CIA Mexico City station knew within minutes that this was an Impersonation.

I opine that the person who handed Ann Egerter the modified LHO 201 file was also ignorant that it was modified.    A Mole Hunt is always conducted ONLY at the very tippy-top highest levels of any organization -- otherwise it is ineffective.

All best,
--Paul 

Paul,

So, does this exonerate Angleton from the charge that he was the mastermind of the assassination and / or coverup, or could it be seen to implicate him even more so in a paranoiac-thinking kind of way?

--  Tommy  :sun

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