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Peter Dale Scott

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  1. In general, I not only agree with the role he gives to Angleton as assassination mastermind, I have just, quite independently, made much the same argument myself. I too have a new book out, The War Conspiracy: JFK, 9/11, and the Deep Politics of War (for details see my website, http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~pdscott/q.html). I raised a more tentative argument there about how CI/SIG’s lies about Oswald in October 1962 enabled him to be a patsy on 11/22 (pp. 387-91) but mentioned Angleton only in passing for his subsequent lies to the HSCA. But ten days ago I finished a long article, which in the course of discussing Angleton’s underworld contacts, has this to say: Moreover CI/SIG, the “inner sanctum” of Angleton’s “alternative CIA,” affected U.S. history significantly in 1963. Its so-called 201 or “personality” file on “Lee Henry Oswald” (the man known to the world as Lee Harvey Oswald), had been filled with false and falsified information since it was opened in December 1960. And two messages in the 201 file were falsified again in October 1963, in such a way as to allow Oswald to be a credible “designated suspect” in the assassination of John F. Kennedy one month later.[1] The falsification of Oswald’s 201 file may have originated as a legitimate counterintelligence operation. I have argued that the uniquely falsified messages were part of a so-called “marked card” or “barium meal” test to determine if and where leaks of sensitive information were occurring. This was a familiar technique, and was the responsibility of the CI/SIG, which was responsible for the 201 file.[2] But by October 1963 we see signs that CIA messages on Oswald were also being manipulated, in order to enable him to become a designated suspect in the November 22 assassination of President Kennedy. A CIA teletype to the FBI in October 1963 (drafted by a CI/SIG officer) withheld the obviously significant information that Oswald had reportedly met in Mexico City with a Soviet Vice-Consul, Valeriy Kostikov, believed by CIA officers to be an officer of the KGB. [3] This withholding helped ensure that Oswald would not be subjected to surveillance by the FBI after the alleged encounter, surveillance which presumably could have limited his ability to become a designated suspect by his presence at a particularly sensitive corner in Kennedy’s Dallas parade route. I have argued that similar CIA withholding from the FBI of information about two alleged 9/11 hijackers, Nawaz al-Hamzi and Khalid al-Mihdar, likewise made it possible for them to play the role of designated suspects by preventing FBI surveillance, as well. [4] I don’t agree with every word of what Newman writes. Our different approaches surface in his second sentence: “The plot required that Oswald be maneuvered into place in Mexico City.” I myself am not at all convinced that Oswald went to Mexico City; it is I think more likely that he was impersonated there. What really mattered was not what Oswald did, but what CIA documents said he did; and here I totally agree that the man in charge of controlling the information flow was Angleton. [1] For details see Scott, War Conspiracy, 387; Peter Dale Scott, Deep Politics II: The New Revelations in U.S. Government Files, 1994-1995 (Ipswich, MA: Mary Ferrell Foundation Press, 2007), 30-33. [2] See Scott, Deep Politics II, 17-18, 92; also Peter Dale Scott, “Oswald and the Hunt for Popov's Mole,” The Fourth Decade, III, 3 (March 1996), 3; www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?absPageId=519798. [3] Peter Dale Scott, Deep Politics II, 30-33. [4] See discussion in Peter Dale Scott, "The JFK Assassination and 9/11: the Designated Suspects in Both Cases," Global Research, July 5, 2008, http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?con...va&aid=9511.
  2. There shouldn't be. In my area journalists should think historically, and historians investigatively. Whatever is most in need of public criticism and exposure. As one of my close colleagues (Malcolm Caldwell) was murdered, and some of my sources also, yes, I try to be mindful of how much risk I should take. I was advised by friendly senior academic colleagues not to write about Vietnam, in one case almost threateningly (it ended a friendship). And for several years I could not get a merit increase. But all in all I have no complaints about my university. Both historians and especially journalists often depend on government cooperation in the advancement of their careers. This is a complex matter not reducible to a paragraph. I once taught a semester-long course in how to evaluate and compare sources, which is the key. Documents are very important too, but rarely "prove" something by themselves. Academic historians are housed in a bureaucratic hierarchy that is unfortunately less open than it advertises itself to be. So are most journalists. But journalists are more experienced than most historians in the possibilities of doing self-financing research.
  3. It was not a conscious decision. I just acted the part more and more in my efforts to educate Americans to the folly of fighting in Vietnam, which led into an investigation of NSAM 263, NSAM 273, and the murder of JFK. There shouldn't be. In my area journalists should think historically, and historians investigatively. Whatever is most in need of public criticism and exposure. As one of my close colleagues (Malcolm Caldwell) was murdered, and some of my sources also, yes, I try to be mindful of how much risk I should take. I was advised by friendly senior academic colleagues not to write about Vietnam, in one case almost threateningly (it ended a friendship). And for several years I could not get a merit increase. But all in all I have no complaints about my university. Both historians and especially journalists often depend on government cooperation in the advancement of their careers. This is a complex matter not reducible to a paragraph. I once taught a semester-long course in how to evaluate and compare sources, which is the key. Documents are very important too, but rarely "prove" something by thmselves. For starters more about Mexico and the culpable role of the CIA before and after the assassination, along with the rest of the material I cover in Deep Politics Two and Three. Academic historians are housed in a bureaucratic hierarchy that is unfortunately less open than it advertises itself to be. So are most journalists. But journalists are more experienced than most historians in the possibilities of doing self-financing research.
  4. It was not a conscious decision. I just acted the part more and more in my efforts to educate Americans to the folly of fighting in Vietnam, which led into an investigation of NSAM 263, NSAM 273, and the murder of JFK. There shouldn't be. In my area journalists should think historically, and historians investigatively. Whatever is most in need of public criticism and exposure. As one of my close colleagues (Malcolm Caldwell) was murdered, and some of my sources also, yes, I try to be mindful of how much risk I should take. I was advised by friendly senior academic colleagues not to write about Vietnam, in one case almost threateningly (it ended a friendship). And for several years I could not get a merit increase. But all in all I have no complaints about my university. Both historians and especially journalists often depend on government cooperation in the advancement of their careers. This is a complex matter not reducible to a paragraph. I once taught a semester-long course in how to evaluate and compare sources, which is the key. Documents are very important too, but rarely "prove" something by thmselves. For starters more about Mexico and the culpable role of the CIA before and after the assassination, along with the rest of the material I cover in Deep Politics Two and Three. Academic historians are housed in a bureaucratic hierarchy that is unfortunately less open than it advertises itself to be. So are most journalists. But journalists are more experienced than most historians in the possibilities of doing self-financing research.
  5. I don't know enough to prove or disprove what Webster claims. I have made notes on his State Department bio. This lists him as "Dept of Army" (code for CIA) from 1951-1964, which would cover the period in question. On the other hand, most of his known experience is with the Far East. He was posted to Rangoon (!) on May 27, 1964, and later served in Tokyo and Vietnam. Long ago I made a handwritten note that he was in Japan from 1953 to 1963, and also that he "worked directly with the Japanese police." But I can't decipher the source I wrote down. You might try the article in CounterSpy, December 1976, p. 37. It is relevant that starting in the year 1964 they gradually dismantled JM/WAVE and many of its vets went to Asia. But we can't deduce anything from that.
  6. I don't believe Murgado, and hadn't heard of him before Mellen and Waldron. de Torres is a heavy, as indeed he is described by Fonzi (using a pseudonym for him). In Cocaine Politics (p. 35) we describe his links to Miguel Nazar Haro and the DFS.
  7. McClellan adjouned the session of 11/20/63, saying he would "resume hearings next week." They did not meet again until 1969, after LBJ left the White House. It's in Deep Politics, p. 221, along with more stuff about Reynolds and Korth.
  8. Thanks for the McCone-Bechtel-Corcoran material. It's great stuff.
  9. I have read your review of Prelude to Terror, which I hadn't heard about, and must get. My own book on which I am working will cover some of the same material, including Prince Turki's quote about the Safari Club. Helliwell figures in at least four of my prose books, including my last; and I believe I may have been the first to "out" him, back in 1972 in The War Conspiracy. In Cocaine Politics (p. 92) I talk about him and Castle Bank, and how Castle was succeeded by Nugan Hand. How important Shackley was to that succession I do not know. Your own views are interesting. They are also a little conjectural in places. On only one point do I consider you demonstrably wrong: when you claim that Wheaton was Sheehan's main source. The heart of the Christic affidavit and case was the bomb attack in Costa Rica which injured Tony Avirgan, and about this I believe Wheaton said exactly nothing. The main source was Jack Terrell, as I describe at length in Cocaine Politics; and the initial Christic case collapsed when the courts ruled, I think outrageously, that Terrell's tstimony in a Costa Rica court could not be considered.
  10. I have read your review of Prelude to Terror, which I hadn't heard about, and must get. My own book on which I am working will cover some of the same material, including Prince Turki's quote about the Safari Club. Helliwell figures in at least four of my prose books, including my last; and I believe I may have been the first to "out" him, back in 1972 in The War Conspiracy. In Cocaine Politics (p. 92) I talk about him and Castle Bank, and how Castle was succeeded by Nugan Hand. How important Shackley was to that succession I do not know. Your own views are interesting. They are also a little conjectural in places. On only one point do I consider you demonstrably wrong: when you claim that Wheaton was Sheehan's main source. The heart of the Christic affidavit and case was the bomb attack in Costa Rica which injured Tony Avirgan, and about this I believe Wheaton said exactly nothing. The main source was Jack Terrell, as I describe at length in Cocaine Politics; and the initial Christic case collapsed when the courts ruled, I think outrageously, that Terrell's tstimony in a Costa Rica court could not be considered.
  11. My advice to Sheehan years ago, was that material from Carl Jenkins was the weakest part of the Christic case, and perhaps even deliberately planted to poison it. Even if my fears are correct, there would be no reason to suspect that Wheaton was worse than just plain gullible.
  12. My advice to Sheehan years ago, was that material from Carl Jenkins was the weakest part of the Christic case, and perhaps even deliberately planted to poison it. Even if my fears are correct, there would be no reason to suspect that Wheaton was worse than just plain gullible.
  13. My advice to Sheehan years ago, was that material from Carl Jenkins was the weakest part of the Christic case, and perhaps even deliberately planted to poison it. Even if my fears are correct, there would be no reason to suspect that Wheaton was worse than just plain gullible.
  14. Peter Dale Scott is the author of The War Conspiracy: The Secret Road to the Second Indochina War (1972), Crime and Cover-Up: The CIA, the Mafia, and the Dallas-Watergate Connection (1977), Deep Politics and the Death of JFK (1993), Deep Politics II: Essays on Oswald, Mexico, and Cuba (1996), Cocaine Politics: Drugs, Armies, and the CIA in Central America (1998) and Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina (2003).
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