Will Fritz 2002 book, "The Kennedy Mutiny"

[Paul Trejo]

<snip>

Fiction and Drama

Don DeLillo, Libra (available from Amazon), from one of the finest literary stylists around, has a dénouement that comes as a surprise, not least for the main character.

Norman Mailer, Oswald’s Tale (available from Amazon), is a very long fictionalised biography of Lee Oswald. It is based on some dubious sources, so the art is better than the science.

Stephen King, 11.22.63 (published as 11/22/63 in the US), uses an established fictional device by sending its invented hero, Jake Epping, back in time to interact with a real historical event.King’s novel is almost as long as Mailer’s, but can probably be read in half the time.

Oliver Stone, director, JFK (Warner Brothers, 1991; available from Amazon), was probably the pivotal factor in the rejuvenation of public interest in the assassination, and in the consequent governmental activity that resulted in the establishment of the Assassination Records Review Board. Although very slick and professionally made...

<snip>

Gerald Posner’s Case Closed: ...With the Warren Report widely recognised to be the discredited product of a dishonest process, it was necessary to find a new holy book to which the media priesthood could defer. Gerald Posner, Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK (Random House, 1993; ISBN 0–4000–3462–0) filled the gap.

<snip>

Vincent Bugliosi, Reclaiming History (W.W. Norton, 2007; ISBN 0–393–04525–0), acknowledged some of the problems with Posner’s book, and endeavoured to replace it as the definitive lone–nut account.

<snip>

Bonar Menninger, Mortal Error: The Shot That Killed JFK (St. Martin’s Press, 1992; ISBN 0–312–08074–3; available in abridged form as an audio book), offers the most plausible accountof the assassination. Menninger is a journalist rather than a researcher. He reports the theory of a ballistics expert, Howard Donahue, that President Kennedy was killed accidentally by a Secret Service agent.

Yes, Steven, there are many, many CT's out there.

Yet the focus of this thread is the theory of the 2002 Will Fritz book, The Kennedy Mutiny, which tells of a CT to "miss" JFK from Dealey Plaza on 11/22/1963.

I thought this was a unique theory, until David Andrews correctly noted that Don DeLillo's 1988 book, LIBRA, also repeats the exact same theory.

Now my opinion is that only these two books and no others, ever repeated the JFK "miss" theory.

Now -- if (and only if) that is true, and since the Will Fritz book also names Ex-General Edwin Walker as the leader of that plot -- then (since I believe Edwin Walker was the JFK Kill-Team mastermind) I feel we are onto a major clue which has never before been discussed.

Do you have an opinion about that specific issue, Steven?

(Also, instead of hiding your light under a bushel of VOLUME, Steven, would you please show us some shorter posts that are focused on the issue at hand?)

Thanks,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 9, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

It seems to me today that only two books in the past 50 years have mentioned a plot to "miss" JFK at Dealey Plaza on 11/22/1963.

Those two books are: LIBRA, by Don DeLillo, 1988, and THE KENNEDY MUTINY, by Will Fritz, 2002.

When this sort of thing is encountered in other literary analysis, scholars rightly wonder if one of these books influenced the other.

Going by dates alone, we might conclude that whoever used the pen-name, "Will Fritz," was so impressed by DeLillo's story that he created his own CT based on the DeLillo invention.

However, the fact that the author used the name "Will Fritz" could also suggest that he actually got his ideas from an earlier manuscript written by DPD Captain Will Fritz who died in 1984.

If (and only if) that is the case, then we might switch the scenario, and claim that Don DeLillo got his ideas from the original manuscript by Will Fritz.

Insofar as Will Fritz named Ex-General Edwin Walker as the mastermind of this plot to "miss" JFK in Dealey Plaza on 11/22/1963, I am inclined to give this theory significant weight.

It is my current theory that DPD Captain Will Fritz wrote the original manuscript for, THE KENNEDY MUTINY (2002), sometime before he died, i.e. probably sometime during the HSCA investigations.

It is my current theory that Don DeLillo, because of his personal connections during the 1980's, was able to obtain this unpublished manuscript by Captain Will Fritz (which might have been circulating underground from 1980-1987) and got his idea for LIBRA in that way.

I should also thank David Andrews here, for pointing out the similarities between LIBRA and THE KENNEDY MUTINY to me.

The good news is that Don DeLillo is still living. Does anybody on the Forum have any idea how to contact him? I would like to ask him this simple question:

"Mr. DeLillo -- did you have access to Will Fritz' early manuscript for THE KENNEDY MUTINY before you wrote LIBRA?"

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 9, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Brancato]

Paul - take a dee breath. I have posted here, and discussed here, the theory that a plot to stage an assassination that failed, but could be blamed on Castro, a plot that was subsequently hijacked by a real assassination team. I cannot find my previous posts on this,nor is Bing yoelding any results yet. But I am solidly sure if you look hard enough you will find this theory elsewhere than the Delillo and Fritz books. What I argued previously is that if true, this theory would explain a lot, especially the willing participation beforehand by many, certainly the coverup that ensued, nearly better than any other theory.

[Paul Brancato]

'Fake assassination attempt' is the name of the education forum thread on this topic

[Mark Knight]

Here's a link: http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5973

[Paul Trejo]

Here's a link: http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5973

Thanks, Mark, for that link. I read it with interest. That link also recommended another link:

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=2861

These links show that there has been some interest in this before -- and the sources are well-discussed, and some are earlier than the 1988 book by novelist Don DeLillo, namely, LIBRA.

Two sources are of special interest:

(1) The 1/1974 (as I gather from Wade Frazier) self-published manuscript by Gary Wean who claims he got the story in December 1963 from Senator John Tower in a private meeting with Dallas Sheriff Bill Decker and war-hero Audie Murphy. Decker set up the meeting;

...and...

(2) The 9/1975 TATTLER Special Issue about Loran Hall, Edwin Walker and Gerry Patrick Hemming.

As for (1), Gary Wean is also famous for his "Jewish plot" of the JFK murder, imitated in 1995 by Michael Collins Piper in 1995, in his anti-Semitic book, "Final Judgment". This takes away some of the credibility from the source -- but at least the JFK "miss" theory seems to be in print starting in 1974. If that's true, then that's the earliest known written account that I now know of.

As for (2), it shook my memory from 2011, when I opened my first box of the personal papers of Edwin Walker at UT Austin. There in Walker's papers was the September 1975 TATTLER Special Issue about Loran Hall, Edwin Walker and Gerry Patrick Hemming, buried in stacks of newspaper clippings. This was a full issue special, intact.

Here are a couple of screenshots from that TATTLER:

http://www.pet880.com/images/19750909_Loren_Hall_01.JPG

http://www.pet880.com/images/19750909_Loren_Hall_02.JPG

And here are some excerpts:

"Assume the worst: The plot to kill Kennedy was a "fake" assassination plot, one that was infiltrated and became real. Is there anything to support such an assumption?

"...The first shots fired sounded like 'firecrackers.' According to most rational experts belief (and that excludes the Warren Commission Report), the first shot fired hit JFK in the back, barely penetrating his skin. The second shot flew over the open-topped car and struck the curb (apparently with so little force that it did not go on to insure anyone in the crowd). These first two shots could very well have been "downloaded" shells -- bullets that had a major portion of their gun powder removed. And those shots would have been fired by the gunman -- or 'sniper team' -- that believed it was involved in a "fake" assassination. Then the fatal shots were fired from in front of Kennedy's car.

"...Consequently, the entire concept of an infiltrated 'fake' assassination plot is very much in keeping with the facts, and such a 'fake' assassination plot would have depended on one key element: Providing the CIA through Oswald with 'misinformation.' "Thus it is that we come to the role of Loran Hall...General Edwin A. Walker met with both Hall and Gerry Patrick Hemming...The Warren Commission falsely concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald tried to kill Walker, which was probably part of the 'patsy' build up the intelligence operation conspirators designed for the eventual 'lone assassin' theory developed by the Warren Commission..." (TATTLER INVESTIGATIVE SPECIAL, 9/1975)

So, it looks like this story has been around the block, after all.

Yet, the sources always point to Dallas. So, one must give it an extra couple of points, IMHO. Also, there's a strange consistency to the story -- from version to version.

I don't buy the story at face value -- I believe it's a veil to hide the red-faces of the real Dallas plotters -- but IMHO it is closer to the Truth than any other JFK murder theory I've ever read. Here's why:

(1) It correctly names Edwin Walker as leader of a Dallas right-wing plot;

(2) It gives the correct motive -- the hasty invasion of Cuba and toppling of Fidel Castro;

(3) It correctly portrays Oswald as a right-wing collaborator and unsuspecting Patsy

Those elements, IMHO, are absolutely crucial to solving the JFK murder. So, this is the place to dig, IMHO.

Thanks, Mark, and also Paul B., for pointing out the 2006 thread on the FORUM. It jostled my memory.

That said, I still want to know Don DeLillo's sources. Could it have been Gary Wean's 1974 manuscript? Was it simply this tabloid sensationalism from the TATTLER? Or could it have actually been a direct contact with the living Will Fritz before 1984, when The Kennedy Mutiny was still in draft form?

Does anybody here know how to contact the famous American novelist Don DeLillo?

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 10, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

The man who uses the name, "Will Fritz," who published THE KENNEDY MUTINY in 2002, has named Dallas FBI Agent James Hosty, as well as Dallas Secret Service Agent Forrest Sorrels as subordinates to Ex-General Edwin Walker in the JFK murder.

I've argued here on this FORUM since 2011 that if (and only if) the FBI and Secret Service were in any way involved in the JFK murder, it would only be in the form of individual Rogues who secretly supported a Civilian Plot led by Ex-General Edwin Walker. (Walker gave segregationist speeches throughout the South, standing next to the Confederate Flag.)

In other words, I believe that the Confederate Flag killed JFK.

For the first time since 1991 when I saw Oliver Stone's movie and began reading JFK research (now well past 200 books and videos) I have encountered in "Will Fritz" a CT that finally coincides with my own -- that the Dallas FBI Agent and the Dallas Secret Service Agent were indeed working for none other than the infamous Ex-General Edwin Walker of Dallas, Texas.

James Hosty and Forrest Sorrels clearly join Robert Allen Surrey in this plot as described by "Will Fritz." We already knew that James Hosty was a long-time bridge partner with Robert Allen Surrey. This CT by "Will Fritz" makes their relationship into one of the most important relationships in the Dallas arm of the JFK murder.

Naturally, this suggests that Hosty and Sorrels were traitors to their FBI and SS oaths. In other words, they chose to be loyal to the Confederate Flag (as led by Edwin Walker) instead of to the Stars and Stripes -- according to "Will Fritz".

I see no other alternative, as distasteful as this research will now become. I propose to delve deeper into the CT of "Will Fritz" to decide how well he makes this case.

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 16, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[David Andrews]

Does anybody here know how to contact the famous American novelist Don DeLillo?

--Paul Trejo

+++

I strongly doubt DeLillo would answer, especially if he thought the question was connected to creating a new CT. He was more concerned with writing about how the assassination was affected by the American psyche and how it in turn affected the psyche for years after. (One of Libra's tropes is the researcher swamped in facts, disinformation, and unclassifiable minutiae.) It's a book DeLillo shies away from being pinned down on factually, citing the Warren Report and visits to Oswald-related locations. It's hard to prove him wrong. The false assassination theory may have been a lucky guess, or an element of the "plots working themselves out to their ultimate end" motif. However: I seem to remember reviews of Libra in the late 1980s that cited the pre-existence of a false assassination theory. And I myself have seen it discussed on the internet after Libra, certainly in the Audie Murphy/John Tower story resurrected in posts above. I hesitate to involve other researchers who haven't chimed in yet, but perhaps Bill Kelly, who has researched the assassination in reference to Operation Northwoods and the Valkyrie plot, knows of some false assassination lore.

+++

http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/03/16/lifetimes/del-r-libra.html

HAUNTED BY HIS BOOK (1998)

''In New Orleans, Lee and Marina lived on Magazine Street. The house is still there, and it looks very much the same as in photographs from the early 1960's. I can't compare it to visiting a famous place like a national monument - it's not at all like that. It's an eerie sense of getting close to the man himself. It's a sense of history, but of a peculiar kind -a history on the margins, a history that people don't really want to know.''

Speaking by telephone from his home in the New York City suburbs, Don DeLillo said he spent three years researching and writing ''Libra,'' a fictional biography of Lee Harvey Oswald, as a way of filling in the painful gaps in our knowledge of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. ''I invented scenes and dialogues, of course, but I tried to stay as close to what I understood to be the actual Oswald as I could,'' Mr. DeLillo said, noting that fiction permitted him to go where the facts could not. ''In this version, we know how it happened, so the novel, working within history, is also outside it, correcting, clearing up, finding balances and rhythms. I think readers are willing to take imaginative leaps if there's a kind of redemptive truth waiting at the other end.''

Like Nicholas Branch, the character who is compiling a secret C.I.A. account of the assassination, Mr. DeLillo was swamped with research material: ''I'm sure I'll carry the experience around with me for many years; it's certainly been the most haunting book I've ever worked on. Oswald was the focus, but of course the assassination itself sends out tributaries in a number of different directions, from the U-2 incident to the Bay of Pigs.''

Authenticating the research was another matter. ''It's legitimate in the sense that it appeared somewhere in print or on sound tapes or film. Beyond that, you're on your own,'' he said. (Thus the careful choice of words when asked if it's true, as the novel states, that President Kennedy's brain has been missing from the National Archives for more than 20 years: ''This, evidently, is fact.'') Mr. DeLillo relied heavily on the Warren Commission's 26 volumes of testimony and exhibits, which he described as ''an encyclopedia of daily life from that era -dental records, postcards, photographs of pieces of knotted string, report cards, the testimonies of hundreds of people, from nightclub comedians to workers in train yards to waitresses.'' He didn't try to interview the major surviving figures, nor was he very interested in the scores of conspiracy theories set forth in other, mostly nonfiction, books.

His own theory, while at odds with the Warren Commission's, nevertheless discounts conspiracy in favor of a motivation embedded in coincidence, intuition and astrology - hence the book's title. ''Certainly,'' he said, ''I don't think there was any orchestrated attempt by established offices in any intelligence agency.'' Still, he added, ''I don't know any more than you do what happened in Dealey Plaza that day. I purposely chose the most obvious possibility - that the assassination was engineered by anti-Castro elements - simply as a way of being faithful to what we know of history. Will we ever know the truth? I don't know. But if someday evidence of a conspiracy does emerge, I expect it will be much more interesting and fantastic than the novel.''

+++

http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1887/the-art-of-fiction-no-135-don-delillo

DeLILLO

—all plots lead toward death? I guess that’s possible. It happens in Libra, and it happens in White Noise, which doesn’t necessarily mean that these are highly plotted novels. Libra has many digressions and meditations, and Oswald’s life just meanders along for much of the book. It’s the original plotter, Win Everett, who wonders if his conspiracy might grow tentacles that will turn an assassination scare into an actual murder, and of course this is what happens. The plot extends its own logic to the ultimate point. And White Noise develops a trite adultery plot that enmeshes the hero, justifying his fears about the death energies contained in plots. When I think of highly plotted novels I think of detective fiction or mystery fiction, the kind of work that always produces a few dead bodies. But these bodies are basically plot points, not worked-out characters. The book’s plot either moves inexorably toward a dead body or flows directly from it, and the more artificial the situation the better. Readers can play off their fears by encountering the death experience in a superficial way. A mystery novel localizes the awesome force of the real death outside the book, winds it tightly in a plot, makes it less fearful by containing it in a kind of game format.

+++ ADDENDUM

Interviewer: Tell me about the research you did for Libra.

Don DeLillo: There were several levels of research—fiction writer’s research. I was looking for ghosts, not living people. I went to New Orleans, Dallas, Fort Worth, and Miami and looked at houses and streets and hospitals, schools and libraries—this is mainly Oswald I’m tracking but others as well—and after a while the characters in my mind and in my notebooks came out into the world.

Then there were books, old magazines, old photographs, scientific reports, material printed by obscure presses, material my wife turned up from relatives in Texas. And a guy in Canada with a garage full of amazing stuff—audiotapes of Oswald talking on a radio program, audiotapes of his mother reading from his letters. And I looked at film consisting of amateur footage shot in Dallas on the day of the assassination, crude powerful footage that included the Zapruder film. And there were times when I felt an eerie excitement, coming across an item that seemed to bear out my own theories. Anyone who enters this maze knows you have to become part scientist, novelist, biographer, historian and existential detective. The landscape was crawling with secrets, and this novel-in-progress was my own precious secret—I told very few people what I was doing.

Then there was The Warren Report, which is the Oxford English Dictionary of the assassination and also the Joycean novel. This is the one document that captures the full richness and madness and meaning of the event, despite the fact that it omits about a ton and a half of material. I’m not an obsessive researcher, and I think I read maybe half of The Warren Report, which totals twenty-six volumes. There are acres of FBI reports I barely touched. But for me the boring and meaningless stretches are part of the experience. This is what a life resembles in its starkest form—school records, lists of possessions, photographs of knotted string found in a kitchen drawer. It took seven seconds to kill the president, and we’re still collecting evidence and sifting documents and finding people to talk to and working through the trivia. The trivia is exceptional. When I came across the dental records of Jack Ruby’s mother I felt a surge of admiration. Did they really put this in? The testimony of witnesses was a great resource— period language, regional slang, the twisted syntax of Marguerite Oswald and others as a kind of improvised genius and the lives of trainmen and stripteasers and telephone clerks. I had to be practical about this, and so I resisted the urge to read everything.

Adam Begley, 'Don DeLillo, The Art of Fiction No. 135'

The Paris Review, Fall 1993, No. 128

Edited July 13, 2015 by David Andrews

[Paul Trejo]

Does anybody here know how to contact the famous American novelist Don DeLillo?

--Paul Trejo

+++

I strongly doubt DeLillo would answer, especially if he thought the question was connected to creating a new CT. He was more concerned with writing about how the assassination was affected by the American psyche and how it in turn affected the psyche for years after. (One of Libra's tropes is the researcher swamped in facts, disinformation, and unclassifiable minutiae.) It's a book DeLillo shies away from being pinned down on factually, citing the Warren Report and visits to Oswald-related locations. It's hard to prove him wrong. The false assassination theory may have been a lucky guess, or an element of the "plots working themselves out to their ultimate end" motif. However: I seem to remember reviews of Libra in the late 1980s that cited the pre-existence of a false assassination theory. And I myself have seen it discussed on the internet after Libra, certainly in the Audie Murphy/John Tower story resurrected in posts above. I hesitate to involve other researchers who haven't chimed in yet, but perhaps Bill Kelly, who has researched the assassination in reference to Operation Northwoods and the Valkyrie plot, knows of some false assassination lore.

+++

http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/03/16/lifetimes/del-r-libra.html

HAUNTED BY HIS BOOK (1998)

''In New Orleans, Lee and Marina lived on Magazine Street. The house is still there, and it looks very much the same as in photographs from the early 1960's. I can't compare it to visiting a famous place like a national monument - it's not at all like that. It's an eerie sense of getting close to the man himself. It's a sense of history, but of a peculiar kind -a history on the margins, a history that people don't really want to know.''

Speaking by telephone from his home in the New York City suburbs, Don DeLillo said he spent three years researching and writing ''Libra,'' a fictional biography of Lee Harvey Oswald, as a way of filling in the painful gaps in our knowledge of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. ''I invented scenes and dialogues, of course, but I tried to stay as close to what I understood to be the actual Oswald as I could,'' Mr. DeLillo said, noting that fiction permitted him to go where the facts could not. ''In this version, we know how it happened, so the novel, working within history, is also outside it, correcting, clearing up, finding balances and rhythms. I think readers are willing to take imaginative leaps if there's a kind of redemptive truth waiting at the other end.''

Like Nicholas Branch, the character who is compiling a secret C.I.A. account of the assassination, Mr. DeLillo was swamped with research material: ''I'm sure I'll carry the experience around with me for many years; it's certainly been the most haunting book I've ever worked on. Oswald was the focus, but of course the assassination itself sends out tributaries in a number of different directions, from the U-2 incident to the Bay of Pigs.''

Authenticating the research was another matter. ''It's legitimate in the sense that it appeared somewhere in print or on sound tapes or film. Beyond that, you're on your own,'' he said. (Thus the careful choice of words when asked if it's true, as the novel states, that President Kennedy's brain has been missing from the National Archives for more than 20 years: ''This, evidently, is fact.'') Mr. DeLillo relied heavily on the Warren Commission's 26 volumes of testimony and exhibits, which he described as ''an encyclopedia of daily life from that era -dental records, postcards, photographs of pieces of knotted string, report cards, the testimonies of hundreds of people, from nightclub comedians to workers in train yards to waitresses.'' He didn't try to interview the major surviving figures, nor was he very interested in the scores of conspiracy theories set forth in other, mostly nonfiction, books.

His own theory, while at odds with the Warren Commission's, nevertheless discounts conspiracy in favor of a motivation embedded in coincidence, intuition and astrology - hence the book's title. ''Certainly,'' he said, ''I don't think there was any orchestrated attempt by established offices in any intelligence agency.'' Still, he added, ''I don't know any more than you do what happened in Dealey Plaza that day. I purposely chose the most obvious possibility - that the assassination was engineered by anti-Castro elements - simply as a way of being faithful to what we know of history. Will we ever know the truth? I don't know. But if someday evidence of a conspiracy does emerge, I expect it will be much more interesting and fantastic than the novel.''

+++

http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1887/the-art-of-fiction-no-135-don-delillo

DeLILLO

—all plots lead toward death? I guess that’s possible. It happens in Libra, and it happens in White Noise, which doesn’t necessarily mean that these are highly plotted novels. Libra has many digressions and meditations, and Oswald’s life just meanders along for much of the book. It’s the original plotter, Win Everett, who wonders if his conspiracy might grow tentacles that will turn an assassination scare into an actual murder, and of course this is what happens. The plot extends its own logic to the ultimate point. And White Noise develops a trite adultery plot that enmeshes the hero, justifying his fears about the death energies contained in plots. When I think of highly plotted novels I think of detective fiction or mystery fiction, the kind of work that always produces a few dead bodies. But these bodies are basically plot points, not worked-out characters. The book’s plot either moves inexorably toward a dead body or flows directly from it, and the more artificial the situation the better. Readers can play off their fears by encountering the death experience in a superficial way. A mystery novel localizes the awesome force of the real death outside the book, winds it tightly in a plot, makes it less fearful by containing it in a kind of game format.

+++ ADDENDUM

Interviewer: Tell me about the research you did for Libra.

Don DeLillo: There were several levels of research—fiction writer’s research. I was looking for ghosts, not living people. I went to New Orleans, Dallas, Fort Worth, and Miami and looked at houses and streets and hospitals, schools and libraries—this is mainly Oswald I’m tracking but others as well—and after a while the characters in my mind and in my notebooks came out into the world.

Then there were books, old magazines, old photographs, scientific reports, material printed by obscure presses, material my wife turned up from relatives in Texas. And a guy in Canada with a garage full of amazing stuff—audiotapes of Oswald talking on a radio program, audiotapes of his mother reading from his letters. And I looked at film consisting of amateur footage shot in Dallas on the day of the assassination, crude powerful footage that included the Zapruder film. And there were times when I felt an eerie excitement, coming across an item that seemed to bear out my own theories. Anyone who enters this maze knows you have to become part scientist, novelist, biographer, historian and existential detective. The landscape was crawling with secrets, and this novel-in-progress was my own precious secret—I told very few people what I was doing.

Then there was The Warren Report, which is the Oxford English Dictionary of the assassination and also the Joycean novel. This is the one document that captures the full richness and madness and meaning of the event, despite the fact that it omits about a ton and a half of material. I’m not an obsessive researcher, and I think I read maybe half of The Warren Report, which totals twenty-six volumes. There are acres of FBI reports I barely touched. But for me the boring and meaningless stretches are part of the experience. This is what a life resembles in its starkest form—school records, lists of possessions, photographs of knotted string found in a kitchen drawer. It took seven seconds to kill the president, and we’re still collecting evidence and sifting documents and finding people to talk to and working through the trivia. The trivia is exceptional. When I came across the dental records of Jack Ruby’s mother I felt a surge of admiration. Did they really put this in? The testimony of witnesses was a great resource— period language, regional slang, the twisted syntax of Marguerite Oswald and others as a kind of improvised genius and the lives of trainmen and stripteasers and telephone clerks. I had to be practical about this, and so I resisted the urge to read everything.

Adam Begley, 'Don DeLillo, The Art of Fiction No. 135'

The Paris Review, Fall 1993, No. 128

Wow, David!

If we can't get Don DeLillo himself to speak about his 1988 JFK murder book (LIBRA), we at least have an able reviewer like yourself to fill in the blanks. Many thanks for these interviews of DeLillo about LIBRA in past years.

Since we have the TATTLER SPECIAL INVESTIGATIVE ISSUE of September 1975 as our earliest verified model of a "Simulated Assassination" plot led by Edwin Walker and the Dallas right-wing, we need not imagine that Don DeLillo invented this scenario out of his fertile imagination.

Also, insofar as the TATTLER was known to operate from secret sources, we may justly surmise that the "Simulated Assassination" theory was already circulating in Dallas before the TATTLER got ahold of it.

The names that the TATTLER associated with those early Dallas stories are all familiar -- they involve people who were living and working between Dallas, LA and New Orleans at the time, e.g. Edwin Walker, Loran Hall, Gerry Patrick Hemming, Larry Howard, William Seymour, John Masen, Harry Dean, Richard Case Nagell, Jim Braden, David Ferrie, etc.

The names that "Will Fritz" associated with those early Dallas stories are also familiar -- they involve people who were living in Dallas at the time, and who were politically active. "Will Fritz" names Edwin Walker, James Hosty and Forrest Sorrels.

On the other hand, back in the world of the great American novel, Don DeLillo combines real names with his own fictional characters. For real names, DeLillo uses Jim Garrison's characters (without naming Jim Garrison himself) and adds George De Mohrenschildt.

For fictional names, DeLillo has quite a cast. Nicholas Branch (CIA); Win and Mary Everett (CIA); Laurence and Beryl Parmenter (CIA; plotter); T.J. Mackey (ex-CIA; plotter); and various underlings in prison, in paramilitary camps, and in the Mafia.

So -- we don't need to wonder if DeLillo felt free to add his own fiction to this comprehensive model of the JFK murder. Yet insofar as DeLillo portrayed the JFK assassination as a "Simulated Assassination" that was hi-jacked by the CIA, we are reminded sharply of the main theme of THE KENNEDY MUTINY by "Will Fritz".

It's exactly the same scenario -- except that "Will Fritz" includes no fictional characters in his version.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 16, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

Here are a few pages from THE KENNEDY MUTINY (2002) by mysterious author "Will Fritz". This excerpt is from pages 290-291 of this 701 page book:

------------- BEGIN EXCERPT FROM "The Kennedy Mutiny" BY WILL FRITZ ---------------------------------

The plan he [Walker] was considering was as big as it could get. It was bold and audacious. And it was risky. It would involve a large number of people. Pondering the new approach he was taking, a general operational principle occurred to him. He would borrow a page used by Intelligence agencies. To prevent anything from leaking, he would run the operation in a compartmentalized fashion. Everything would be on a need to know fashion. But his followers were dedicated. They would understand this. They had followed similar operational principles before in their other activities devoted to the cause. Only a small group would know the entire plan.

They would do what they would be required to do and not ask questions. And why? Walker had a way to get Castro out of Cuba. He could stop the pernicious integration of the races. The basic concept of his plan was simple. They would stage a failed assassination attempt on the President. The trail to find the would-be assassin would lead to a Castro communist. Public outrage would be so severe that the United States would be forced into invading Cuba.

...It was exceedingly difficult. But he had a large membership to assist him. These people were from a wide swath of society. However, they held one thing in common. They finally believed in the social and political tenets held by General Edwin Walker. Who were some of these people? There was one of Walker's top aides, Robert Surrey, and his bridge-playing partner, FBI Agent James Hosty. There was the Dallas Postal Inspector Harry Holmes, the local Secret Service agent Forrest Sorrels, Assistant DA Bill Alexander and DPD officer Gerald Hill. And there were others.

Walker's plan and how these people and others fit into the scenario is discussed in the following.

...The plan required a person with Communist credentials to be the frustrated assassin. And this was their biggest dilemma. Who could this person be? And where could they find him? When they first considered the plan, they decided to somehow find a "bona fide communist and then manipulate him into attempting the impossible." ...They realized they just didn't have the time to develop such an agent provocateur. And, even if they could find and develop such as person, there was still a second major problem. After the failed assassination attempt, the United States government would mount an all out investigative effort to find the assassin. It had to be assumed that the person would be caught. Consequently, even if they could find someone in their group to pose as the assassin, he would be apprehended. And he would be looking at a long time in jail. This was assuming he wouldn't detail their involvement during the incessant interrogation that was sure to follow.

Assuming he naturally would, they would be spending some time in jail. So this approach was no good.

Of course, they could add a twist on this approach. If somehow the assassin was killed in his escape, then the search would end. But where would they find someone from their group willing to be killed for the cause. Maybe he didn't really have to die. They could stage the death of the fleeing assassin. The plan was starting to look better. But, whoever from their group was the assassin would have to "disappear" after his staged death. And that could be for a long time. And there was always the risk of discovery.

Walker considered the next level in his plan. For it to be executable, they were going to have to get more imaginative. What if the assassin didn't really exist at all? What if he was completely fictitious? Then his death would he easy. And there would be no risk of discovery. He didn't exist. All they would have to do is build a paper trail creating his existence.

While the plan was looking better, the concern was a paper trail might be too thin. All the public scrutiny might puncture the illusion. No, somehow they needed to have a flesh and blood person as their assassin. Or, al least, a real person as a witness to their assassin. Building on this, they considered the possibility of their fictitious assassin having a colleague. This would be someone who actually knew him.

Then, after the attempted assassination, the colleague could step forward and put flesh and blood on their assassin. They could create a series of events to link the colleague to their assassin. Then, create a series of events lo separate them. The first series would allow the colleague to step forward to identify the fictitious assassin. The second set of events would allow the colleague to distance himself, so that he would not he blamed for taking part in the failed assassination attempt. (by Will Fritz, pub. 2002)

------------- END EXCERPT FROM "The Kennedy Mutiny" BY WILL FRITZ ---------------------------------

Interesting?

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 16, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Brancato]

Any theories on who actually wrote the book and why they chose Will Fritz as a pseudonym?

Any of the co-conspirators mentioned such as Bill Alexander, Harry Holmes, Gerald Hill, Forrest Sorrels have associations with Walker, or other pro Walker credentials to your knowledge?

[Paul Trejo]

Any theories on who actually wrote the book and why they chose Will Fritz as a pseudonym?

Any of the co-conspirators mentioned such as Bill Alexander, Harry Holmes, Gerald Hill, Forrest Sorrels have associations with Walker, or other pro Walker credentials to your knowledge?

Well, Paul B., in this huge 701 page book, there is NOTHING AT ALL about the author. Nothing. I was disappointed. Also, there is no Bibliography. It is that sort of a self-published work.

If you want my theory, however, IMHO we don't have the ORIGINAL version of this book. IMHO, the ORIGINAL version was actually written by Captain Will Fritz himself, sometime before he died in 1984.

Also, the version to which I have limited access from the Library of Congress is the Single-Volume version. An EARLIER version was TWO VOLUMES.

Yet Captain Will Fritz was not a writer. So, I have trouble imagining that he wrote two 700 page volumes.

So, IMHO, the ORIGINAL version written by Captain Will Fritz circa 1980, was only 50 pages long.

Then, somebody got ahold of the original version, sometime in the late 1980's, probably a family member of Will Fritz. This second person was a writer, and he wrote the ELABORATED, 1,400 page TWO-VOLUME set, elaborating upon the ORIGINAL.

Then, possibly because sales were so low, this second person decided to make ONE-VOLUME out of it.

I cannot tell if the "Simulated Assassination" theory is part of the (now-lost) 50-page ORIGINAL, or if it was added by the second author.

The theory seems to be so ingrained, that I can easily imagine that it was part of the ORIGINAL version.

This is just a hunch today -- but my hunches have brought me this far. I think Captain Will Fritz was the original author.

If (and only if) I'm even partially right, then the co-conspirators named by the original author are probably honest and solid.

I have no further information on them at this time, since I have never suspected these people of being on the JFK-Kill Team until just this month.

Yet knowing the culture of Dallas in 1963 -- the headquarters for the USA Right-wing -- I cannot be surprised that all these Dallas Officials would join Edwin Walker in their last ditch bid to keep the values of the Confederate Flag waving high in Dallas.

It was very easy to join the "Friends of Walker" in 1962-1964 in Dallas. However, they never published their membership list. Perhaps this was scrubbed out of Edwin Walker's personal papers -- I found no membership lists in his 90 boxes at UT Austin.

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 16, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

Here are a few more pages from THE KENNEDY MUTINY (2002) by mysterious author "Will Fritz". This excerpt is from pages 292-293 of this 701 page book:

------------- BEGIN EXCERPT FROM "The Kennedy Mutiny" BY WILL FRITZ ---------------------------------

The more they considered the plan, the more they realized they would probably have to obtain some sort of real person for the fictitious-assassin. But this person only had to exist. There would eventually be an extensive search into the assassin's background.

They considered the next level. They thought about having someone they knew pose as a communist...But the idea was quickly dismissed as being nearly impossible. They considered the next level. They thought about having someone they knew pose as a communist...But if they could find someone from the fringe of society, someone with limited intelligence, someone who had no family and no friends, they would have a real person. And, being the type of person he was, no one would really know any thing about him. They could make up any story they wanted.

They could hide this person prior to the assassination and build up his persona as a communist through his links to the colleague. Then, they would fake his death and hide him after the assassination. And with the kind of person they were looking for, it probably wouldn't be too hard to maneuver him as they wanted. Then, through the colleague, tell the story they created. A check on the assassin's background would only show that the person really existed. But what he was really like would only come from the colleague. Assuming the series of events to link and then disassociate the colleague from their assassin, the colleague could speak with Impunity because, while he knew the assassin, he was not part of !he assassination.

General Walker had worked out the first part of his plan. He had It. The problem now was where to find these two individuals, Their fictitious assassin wasn't going to be too difficult to locate. They only needed a body for that. It would be somebody who possessed just enough background that it would be believable that he could be a communist and could attempt to assassinate the President. But for the most part, he could be anybody. They would tell the story for their assassin.

Well, really, the colleague would tell the story, supported by the events they created. The colleague was the critical per•on. And where were they going to find this person. He had to be articulate. He had to be believable. He had to be calm under pressure and able to handle interrogation. And for him to have known the communist assassin, it would have to be believed that the colleague was a communist too.

But General Edwin Walker had a problem. While Walker and his right wing entourage abhorred the communist proliferation of American society, were fanatical about its extinction, were dedicated to the removal of its pernicious influence on the boys and girls of this great country, there was one problem. They didn't know where to find a communist. Or, in this case, someone posing as a communist. At least, initially they didn't.

They were aware of a young ex-Marine who had defected to the Soviet Union and had just returned to the Dallas area. His name was Lee Harvey Oswald. Hosty told them he had been placed in charge of checking up on this individual's Russian wife. The FBI agent noted there were some strange incidents behind Oswald's defection. And, in fact, he might not be as he appeared, a real communist. But, he wasn't sure. However, in checking up on Oswald, the Walker group determined that George De Mohrenschildt had become friends with this former Marine and defector. They knew De Mohrenschildt was familiar with people who worked for intelligence agencies. If Oswald was indeed an agent provocateur, then surely the former baron would know.

An oil geologist in their group, Everett Glover, contacted De Mohrenschildt. Glover was circumspect in his approach and eventually steered their discussion to the subject of Oswald. De Mohrenschildt seemed to indicate that the former Marine was not as he appeared. And this was exactly what the Walker people wanted to hear. This was exactly the type of person they were seeking to be their assassin's colleague.

This was a fortunate break, as finding the right person could have been the most difficult part of their task. They had just started the planning and now it appeared they might have already found the key person they needed. Noting Glover's interest in Oswald, De Mohrenschildt offered to have a dinner party so that he could actually meet the young defector.

Glover discussed this with the Walker people. They decided it was an excellent opportunity to determine if Oswald was indeed the individual they were seeking for inclusion in their plan. Glover brought along his roommate, Volkmar Schmidt, for assistance. The party was held on February 13 at De Mohrenschildt's house.

(By Will Fritz, pub. 2002)

------------- END EXCERPT FROM "The Kennedy Mutiny" BY WILL FRITZ ---------------------------------

Still interesting?

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 16, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Brancato]

The history of the book is the most interesting part for now. Maybe someone reading this has an original.

[Paul Trejo]

The history of the book is the most interesting part for now. Maybe someone reading this has an original.

I totally agree, Paul B.

I gather that Robert Howard once had a copy -- perhaps the two-volume version -- is that correct, Robert?

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited July 16, 2015 by Paul Trejo