Oswald in Mexico City

[Antti Hynonen]

John Simkin has kindly posted a series of photos related to the case. One set of photos is of Lee Oswald and his immediate family.

Many times I have come accross the Lee Oswald photo(s) taken in Mexico City. As I recall these photos were taken by officials of the Cuban or Russian Embassy in Mexico City.

Does anyone have an idea of who this Lee Oswald impersonator is?

Possibly a CIA agent?

---------------

Far fetched, but it would be interesting to find out a little more about Robert.

Robert E. Lee Oswald Jr.

=> Oswald, an ex marine who could shoot? Oswald who could drive. A man who was in the USA and Texas while LHO was in Minsk.

He was not impersonating his brother, was he?

Among the photos are a few photos of Robert. Not exactly an exact Lee Oswald look-alike, but...

Does anyone have any details of Robert's height, military records, shooting skills?

Just curious.

Antti

[James Richards]

Antti,

As far as the 'Mexico Oswald' is concerned, Gerry Hemming claims it is a guy named Saul Sage. I have a document from Raymond A. Warren suggesting it may be someone named Yuriy Ivanovich Moskalev.

The forum's attachment feature isn't operational at the moment but when it is, I will post the relevant document.

Cheers,

James

[Justin Martell]

I have also read in the book Coincidence or Conspiracy that a man named Hugh Mcdonald, a law enforcement guru claimed to have tracked down and talked to the man in the pictures and claims the he is "Saul" a contract assassin hired by the CIA during the bay of pigs. This man Saul claims to have been a shooter in Dealey Plaza that day. Is this the same Saul that you are referring to James? It only gives the first name Saul in the book I read. Thanks for any help. Justin(skydog) Martell.

[Antti Hynonen]

Amos Euins testified that the man he saw in the window of the TSBD on 11/22/1963 had a (white) bald spot on the top of his head. He could not say whether the man was negro or white.

I recall that the Mexico Oswald, thought to be Saul Sage had a (white) bald spot on his head. I know many other men have bald spots too, however, this could be an eye witness tying the Mexico Oswald to the TSBD on 11/22/63. As Euins an a DPD officer were returning to the TSBD a "construction worker" also told Euins and the DPD officer, that a man with a bald spot on his head had just fled the TSBD via the rear exit.

Any background information on Saul Sage? Was he a good shot?

This is Specter questioning Amos Euins:

Mr. SPECTER. What did you see in the building?

Mr. EUINS. I seen a bald spot on this man's head, trying to look out the window. He had a bald spot on his head. I was looking at the bald spot. I could see his hand, you know the rifle laying across in his hand. And I could see his hand sticking out on the trigger part. And after he got through, he just pulled it back in the window.

------

Mr. SPECTER. All right.

Let me ask you about a couple of specific things here, Amos.

In the statement you say here that he was a white man. By reading the statement, does that refresh your memory as to whether he was a white man or not?

Mr. EUINS. No, sir; I told the man that I could see a white spot on his head, but I didn't actually say it was a white man. I said I couldn't tell. But I saw a white spot in his head.

Mr. SPECTER. Your best recollection at this moment is you still don't know whether he was a white man or a Negro? All you can say is that you saw a white spot on his head?

Mr. EUINS. Yes, sir.

Antti Hynönen

Edited July 7, 2004 by Antti Hynonen

[Anthony Frank]

Oswald was definitely not in Mexico as he was alleged to be in early October.

On Monday, December 2, 1963, three days after the New York Times reportthat Oswald had taken a "mysterious trip to Mexico before returning to Dallas," the Washington Post reported that Mrs. Paine said Oswald phoned his wife on October 4, 1963, “and related that upon leaving New Orleans, he had scouted around Houston for a job without success and had been looking around in Dallas the last few days.” (Washington Post, 12-2-63, page 3)

No one was ever inclined to think that Oswald had actually been in Houston when he was supposedly taking “a mysterious trip to Mexico.”

Mrs. Paine’s statement that Oswald phoned his wife on October 4th and said that after leaving New Orleans he looked for a job in Houston before “looking around in Dallas the last few days,” was eclipsed by the intriguing allegation three days earlier that “Oswald returned to Dallas early in October after a mysterious trip to Mexico” and it was at that point that he allegedly “began looking for work.”

The alleged mysterious trip before the alleged return to Dallas was attributed to “persons who saw him daily at that time,” but the fact is, persons who saw him daily at that time were planning to kill President Kennedy after having Oswald take a job at the Texas School Book Depository, after which they would blame Oswald and then kill him too.

After Kennedy was assassinated, Federal interest in David Ferrie had “waned” when the FBI determined that he “had gone to Houston rather than Dallas.” (New York Times, 2-23-67, page 22)

When Jim Garrison’s investigation became public on February 17, 1967, David Ferrie, identified as the focus of the investigation, stated, “Supposedly I have been pegged as the getaway pilot in an elaborate plot to kill Kennedy.” (New York Times, 2-23-67, page 22)

Four days after Garrison’s investigation was publicized, David Ferrie was dead and Jim Garrison stated, “Evidence developed by our office had long since confirmed that he was involved in events culminating in the assassination of President Kennedy.”

When Jim Garrison arrested New Orleans businessman Clay Shaw on March 1, 1967, he said that Shaw, Ferrie, and Oswald had been part of a plot to kill Kennedy. (New York Times, 3-3-67, page 22)

Eighty-one days later, Jim Garrison stated categorically that Oswald did not kill President Kennedy and that the CIA knows who did.

Ferrie and Oswald, who had both gone to Houston, were dead and they wouldn’t be giving anyone details that would show there was an elaborate plot to kill Kennedy. Neither of them would saying who else had played a role in the fact that they had each gone to Houston.

Houston was a key part of the plan to kill Kennedy.

Edited July 7, 2004 by Anthony Frank

[Lee Forman]

GARRISON: Let me finish and you can decide for yourself. When Oswald went to Mexico City in an effort to obtain a visa for travel to Cuba, this CIA agent accompanied him. Now, at this particular time, Mexico was the only Latin-American nation maintaining diplomatic ties with Cuba, and leftists and Communists from all over the hemisphere traveled to the Cuban Embassy in Mexico City for visas to Cuba. The CIA, quite properly, had placed a hidden movie camera in a building across the street from the embassy and filmed everyone coming and going. The Warren Commission, knowing this, had an assistant legal counsel ask the FBI for a picture of Oswald and his companion on the steps of the embassy, and the FBI, in turn, filed an affidavit saying they had obtained the photo in question from the CIA. The only trouble is that the CIA supplied the Warren Commission with a phony photograph. The photograph of an "unidentified man" published in the 26 volumes is not the man who was filmed with Oswald on the steps of the Cuban Embassy, as alleged by the CIA. It's perfectly clear that the actual picture of Oswald and his companion was suppressed and a fake photo substituted because the second man in the picture was working for the CIA in 1963, and his identification as a CIA agent would have opened up a whole can of worms about Oswald's ties with the Agency. To prevent this, the CIA presented the Warren Commission with fraudulent evidence --- a pattern that repeats itself whenever the CIA submits evidence relating to Oswald's possible connection with any U.S. intelligence agency. The CIA lied to the Commission right down the line; and since the Warren Commission had no investigative staff of its own but had to rely on the FBI, the Secret Service and the CIA for its evidence, it's understandable why the Commission concluded that Oswald had no ties with American intelligence agencies.

From Jim Garrison's Playboy interview. Adds an interesting slant.

[Anthony Frank]

On May 22, 1967, when Jim Garrison said that Oswald did not kill anyone and that the CIA knows who did, he also made the following statements;

"Purely and simply it’s a case of former employees of the CIA, a large number of them Cubans, having a venomous reaction from the 1961 Bay of Pigs episode. Certain individuals with a fusion of interests in regaining Cuba assassinated the President."

"The CIA knows the name of every man involved and the name of the individuals who pulled the triggers."

"It would take only 60 minutes for the CIA to give us the name of every last Cuban involved in this and that’s how close we have been to the end for some time, but we are blocked by this glass wall of this totalitarian, powerful agency which is worried about its power."

Jim Garrison "repeatedly accused the agency of blocking and attempting to block his investigation, begun last fall."

(New York Times, 5-23-67, page 20)

The CIA undoubtedly manufactured information for Jim Garrison in order to put a damper on his investigation and his accusations against the CIA.

Garrison not only fell for the Cuban connection that the CIA had manufactured, he fell for the disinformation they manufactured after his pointed accusations against them.

Edited July 7, 2004 by Anthony Frank

[James Richards]

I have also read in the book Coincidence or Conspiracy that a man named Hugh Mcdonald, a law enforcement guru claimed to have tracked down and talked to the man in the pictures and claims the he is "Saul" a contract assassin hired by the CIA during the bay of pigs.  This man Saul claims to have been a shooter in Dealey Plaza that day.  Is this the same Saul that you are referring to James?

Hi Justin,

I'm not 100% sure but it could well be. Gerry didn't go into any great detail regarding Saul Sage.

You have probably already seen it, but there is a photo showing Roscoe White and a few Marine buddies. One of the guys is supposedly named Saul and bears some resemblance to our Mexico Oswald. Unfortunately I can not post it due to some technical difficulties with the forum but if you send me your email address through the personal messenger, I will email it to you. I have no idea how to attach photos using the personal messenger feature. I'm just not that bright.

James

[Lee Forman]

http://www.jfklancer.com/Sprague.html

From Lancer. I found it interesting, as it coincides well with the previous quote from the Playboy interview concerning Jim Garrison's claims, that the photo was a false substitution - perhaps to cover the identity of LHO's associates.

Let's not forget that it was David Atlee Phillips who was in charge of handling such a request. What if the man in the photo was simply a tourist? Phillips again puts the blame on an underling.

"Shortly after he returned from Acapulco, he was interviewed by Robert Sam Anson of New Times magazine. Sprague admitted that, with the barrages flying at him from all directions, he and the staff had little time to actually investigate. By his reckoning, he said, he spent "point zero one percent" of his time examining the actual evidence. Yet, he told Anson, if he had it to do over again, he would begin his investigation of the Kennedy assassination by probing "Oswald's ties to the Central Intelligence Agency." Recently, I asked Sprague why he had come to that conclusion. "Well," he said, "when I first thought about it I decided that the House leadership really hadn't intended for there to be an investigation. The Committee was set up to appease the Black Caucus in an election year. I still believe that was a factor. But when I looked back at what happened, it suddenly became very clear that the problems began only after I ran up against the CIA. That's when my troubles really started."

In the early months of the Committee's life, Sprague's critics both in Congress and in the press were not only keeping him busy dodging the shots, they were also demanding that the Committee produce some sensational new evidence to justify its continuance. Sprague, therefore, was forced to take some wild swings at what appeared to be a few obvious targets. One area that very apparently needed closer examination was the CIA's handling of the initial investigation of Lee Harvey Oswald's activities in Mexico City.

According to the information supplied to the Warren Commission by the CIA, a man who identified himself as Lee Harvey Oswald visited the Cuban consulate in Mexico City on September 27th, 1963. (That, by the way, the House Assassinations Committee would later conflictingly conclude, was possibly one of the dates Oswald appeared at Silvia Odio's door in Dallas.) The Agency told the Commission that Oswald had been in Mexico City from September 26th to October 3rd. During the time, said the Agency, Oswald made a number of visits to both the Cuban Embassy and the Russian Embassy attempting to get an in-transit visa to Russia by way of Cuba. The CIA also claimed that when Oswald visited the Russian Embassy he spoke with a Soviet consul who was really a KGB intelligence officer. It was later learned, however, that CIA headquarters in Washington was not informed of the incident until October 9th, and then told only that Oswald had contacted the Soviet Embassy on October 1st. The CIA station in Mexico City told headquarters that it had obtained a photograph of Oswald visited the Embassy and described the man in the photo as approximately 35 years old, six feet tall, with an athletic build, a balding top and receding hairline.

When the Warren Commission asked the CIA for photos of Oswald taken in Mexico City, the ones it produced depicted the man described in the original teletype -- obviously not Oswald. Notified of this discrepancy, the CIA said simply it had made a mistake and that there were no photographs of Oswald taken in Mexico City. It never identified the man in the photos. In fact, the CIA was able to produce very little hard evidence regarding Oswald's activities in Mexico City. "For example," Commission Counsel J. Lee Ranking complained, "they had no record of Oswald's daily movements while in Mexico City, nor could they confirm the date of his departure or his mode of travels."

Some Warren Commission critics would later interpret the incident as an attempt by certain CIA personnel to falsely link Oswald to Communist connections even before the Kennedy assassination. When Sprague first approached this area, he discovered that the CIA officer in charge of reporting such information from Mexico City at the time of Oswald's visit was former Bay of Pigs propaganda chief David Atlee Phillips.

In the biography, The Night Watch: 25 Years of Peculiar Service (published in 1977), David Phillips spends just a few pages on the Kennedy assassination and the Mexico City incident. He blames the cable discrepancy on a mistake by an underling. He explains the lack of an Oswald photography on the CIA's inability to maintain camera coverage of the Cuban and Russian embassies on an around-the-clock and weekend basis. A seemingly strange deficiency at a period so close to the Cuban missile crisis)

Sprague called David Phillips to testify before the Assassinations Committee in November, 1976. According to Sprague, Phillips said that the CIA had monitored and tape recorded Oswald's conversations with the Soviet Embassy. The tape was then transcribed by a CIA employee who then mistakenly coupled it with a photograph of a person who was not Oswald. Phillips said that the actual recording was routinely destroyed or re-used about a week after it was received.

Sprague subsequently discovered an FBI memorandum to the Secret Service dated November 23rd, 1963. It referred to the CIA notification of the man who visited the Russian Embassy. The memo noted that "Special Agents of this Bureau who have conversed with Oswald in Dallas, Tex., have observed photographs of the individual referred to above and have listened to a recording of his voice. These Special Agents are of the opinion that the above-referred-to individual was not Lee Harvey Oswald."

Sprague was intrigued: How could the FBI agents have listened to a tape recording in November when Phillips said it had been destroyed in October? Sprague decided to push the CIA for an answer. He wanted complete information about the CIA's operation in Mexico City and total access to all its employees who may have had anything to do with the photographs, tape recordings and transcripts. The Agency balked. Sprague pushed harder. Finally the Agency agreed that Sprague could have access to the information if he agreed to sign a CIA Secrecy Agreement. Sprague refused. He contended that would be in direct conflict with House Resolution 222 which established the Assassination Committee and authorized it investigate the agencies of the United States Government. "How," he asked, "can I possible sign an agreement with an agency I'm supposed to be investigating?" He indicated he would subpoena the CIA's records.

Shortly afterwards, the first attempt to get the Assassinations Committee reconstituted was blocked."

[Ron Ecker]

Amos Euins stated at the scene that the man he saw in the window was black. No one should be surprised if the kid's story changed by the time Arlen Specter got him in front of the commission.

[John Simkin]

I am aware that this subject has been discussed on several threads. My research into John Moss Whitten has convinced me that this subject is of great importance.

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=7940

First, here are two photographs of the man who was photographed by the CIA in Mexico City in early October 1959.

[John Simkin]

Interesting passage in John Newman's, Oswald and the CIA (1995) on John M. Whitten and Mexico City:

On December 11, 1963, John Scelso (John M. Whitten), chief of Western Hemisphere Branch 3, wrote an alarming memo to Richard Helms, deputy director of Plans. In bold handwriting at the top of the memo are the words "not sent." Below this is written "Questions put orally to Mr. Helms. 11 Nov. 63." In smaller handwriting under this are the words "Dec. presumably," reflecting the obvious fact that the Helms oral briefing was December 11, not November 11. Scelso wasted no time in throwing this stone into the pond: " It looks like the FBI report may even be released to the public. This would compromise our [13 spaces redacted] operations in Mexico, because the Soviets would see that the FBI had advance information on the reason for Oswald's visit to the Soviet Embassy."

How could the FBI have known Oswald's reason in advance? Next to this piece of text was a handwritten clue: "Mr. Helms phoned Mr. Angleton this warning." Perhaps "this morning" was meant, but in either case this may mean that CIA counterintelligence operations were involved.

It is intriguing that anyone in U.S. intelligence would have had advance notice of Oswald's visit to the Soviet Embassy. Evidently the FBI report that was mentioned was worded so that its readers might conclude that the FBI had been the source of information, but from Scelso's report, it is not hard to guess that it was the CIA's operations in Mexico that had yielded "advance information on the reason for Oswald's visit to the Soviet Embassy." But just what exactly does this phrase mean?

Oswald had told the Soviet Consulate in Mexico City that he corresponded with the Soviet Embassy in Washington about returning to the U.S.S.R. As previously discussed, the FBI would have learned of the contents of this correspondence. But this would not have compromised CIA operations in Mexico City. The CIA station monthly operational report for October 1963 did mention Oswald's visit to the Soviet Consulate, and did so under the subtitle "Exploitation of [7 letters redacted] Information." The same seven-letter cryptonym is redacted in the line beneath this subtitle, but the last letter is partially visible, enough to see that it is the letter Y In another CIA document from the Mexico City station the cryptonym LIENVOY has been left in the clear, and it was apparently used for the photo surveillance operation against the Soviet Embassy and Consulate." If this is true, the point of the Scelso memo above might have been this: Publication of the October 9-10 cables would show the telephone intercept had been linked to the photo surveillance, and that since the phone call came first, the cable showed the Agency had advance knowledge of the reason for Oswald's (the impostor) visit to the Soviet Consulate.

It appears that the CIA had advance knowledge about more than Oswald's October 1 visit to the Soviet Embassy. There is circumstantial evidence that the CIA Mexico City station might have been watching Oswald since his arrival on September 27. This evidence, according to the Lopez Report, was the Agency's decision to investigate the transcripts back to September 27, before they had learned of that date through post-assassination investigation:" This Committee has not been able to determine how the CIA Headquarters knew, on 23 November 1963, that a review of the [redacted] material should begin with the production from 27 September, the day Oswald first appeared at the Soviet and Cuban Embassies".

This was an incisive point. So was the direction in which the Lopez Report then headed: what headquarters knew about Oswald's visits to the Cuban Consulate.

[Thomas Graves]

I am aware that this subject has been discussed on several threads. My research into John Moss Whitten has convinced me that this subject is of great importance.

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=7940

First, here are two photographs of the man who was photographed by the CIA in Mexico City in early October 1959.

(emphasis added by Thomas Graves)

____________________________

I think that the Mexico City "Mystery Man," shown in the two photos in post #11 could very well be the same person as the guy who seems to be the subject of the photo referred to by James Richards in post #8. He is standing in the very near foreground of said photo, wearing a white T-shirt and a fatigue cap. He's looking at the camera and pointing at himself. (Roscoe White is standing behind him.)

Does anyone know this guy's name?

Thanks,

--Thomas

____________________________

Edited July 31, 2013 by Thomas Graves

[Antti Hynonen]

The man in the photo's here is probably in his early-mid forties. If these photos were taken in 1963, the man would have been roughly 35-40, in 1958-1959 or around that time, when LHO was in Atsugi, Japan. However, the man from the Marine Corps photos looks more like he'd be 20-25.

Edited October 1, 2007 by Antti Hynonen

[Thomas Graves]

The man in the photo's here is probably in his early-mid forties. If these photos were taken in 1963, the man would have been roughly 35-40, in 1958-1959 or around that time, when LHO was in Atsugi, Japan. However, the man from the Marine Corps photos looks more like he'd be 20-25.

__________________

Antti,

Sometimes a person looks younger in a photograph than he or she really is. Look at my photo, for example. I was 53 when it was taken and in it I don't look a day over 52 LOL.

Also, take into consideration the fact that in the photo of the Marine he's wearing a fatigue cap which might be hiding a receding hairline and a bald spot which is visible in the Mexico City photos. That could make the Marine look younger than he really was, couldn't it?

--Thomas

_________________ Edited July 30, 2013 by Thomas Graves