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Dismantling the Single Bullet Theory Pt 5


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So if the Right Lung and Right Strap Muscle were not damaged by the Single Bullet, how were they damaged?

That is the “Sixty Four Thousand Dollar question.” I don’t have ready answers to this question. It is only right and proper to state that there is one argument as how this damage could have occurred. It was put forward by David Lifton in his book “Best Evidence”: his theory is that their damage were partly a consequence of the body being altered and bullets being removed. This argument is further explored by Douglas Horne in his books “Inside the ARRB.” In these books he suggests that Commander Hume’s was a more active participant in the cover-up.

Like the wound to the back, there are no easy explanations to this wound. No bullets were found in the body to explain these wounds, yet the wounds were there all the same.

One problem I see is that if you were shooting at the President from the north side of the plaza, in the “Grassy Knoll” area, you would normally expect that the left lung would be more likely to be damaged because of the trajectory and the position of JFK in the car. You would not expect the right lung to be damaged. Unless JFK were turned to his right, it is more logical that if any lung is to be injured it is more likely to be the left lung.

The natural position to injure the right side of JFK would be if you were shooting from the South Knoll, and the Post Office car park. In the program “Inside the Car”, Gary Mack dismissed this as a potential site for a shooter. Although I tend to agree with his overall decision, he did not position his gunman in the position that gunman would have been in had there been a gunman there. He has his gunman positioned outside the car park and a couple of feet lower than the car park. Had the gunman been in the Post Office car park he would have been in a higher location than Gary Mack has his gunman.

InsidetheCarPostOffice3.png

Had there been a gunman there he would most likely have been behind the fence rather than in front. Also there is no evidence that had a gunman been there he would have been lying down, as is suggested by the marksman Gary employed. True the Post Office Car Park did not have a wooden fence, like the railroad one, but there were a few trees, outside the car park, to hide behind. The east corner of the car park seems quite secluded. Also that area of the car park is hidden from windows in the front of the building. It would not be impossible for a gunman to be positioned there.

Cancellare.jpg

My model is not completed at the moment so I can’t judge exactly what kind of target such a gunman would have acquired. However, even though there are the above weaknesses in Gary’s argument, I tend to agree that a throat shot from this angle is probably out. Pity, because this position is the natural trajectory and angle to be able to wound the right lung and strap.

That means that the shot which caused this damage, however illogically, had to have come from the south of the plaza and the grassy knoll area there.

So what can we say about these wounds. Well:-

i) They occurred before Z 224

ii) They were not a consequence of the Single Bullet theory. Playing “devil’s advocate” it would be really convenient had they been a consequence of it. But they were not.

iii) They were not a consequence of the head shot, because that had yet to happen.

iv) And these two organs were damaged during the assassination. They are not figments of the imagination. Therefore they have to be explained.

The only suggestion I can offer and I will examine it when the model is up and running. Maybe the shot occurred at a point when Kennedy head was turned to his right. Thereby allowing a side on shot to the throat. The point has to be reasonable close to Z 224/225 otherwise we would have seen his reaction earlier. The only moment I can point to is around the Z 190 area.

As I said at the beginning I can offer no solutions here. All I am able to say is that their damage was not a consequence of the SBT. Yet they were damaged during the assassination. What needs to be done is to determine when they were damaged.

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So if the Right Lung and Right Strap Muscle were not damaged by the Single Bullet, how were they damaged?

That is the “Sixty Four Thousand Dollar question.” I don’t have ready answers to this question.

James, it seems to me you're making a mystery here where none need exist. Given a readily proven T3 back wound -- established by the bullet holes in JFK's shirt and jacket + the consensus eyewitness reports of at least 15 people + the wound location indicated in three properly prepared official documents -- isn't it obvious that the damage was caused by a shot to the throat from the front?

At Z190 JFK was turned to his right, waving his right arm -- a posture that would cause his tucked-in custom-made shirt to INDENT along his right shoulder-line. So wouldn't a shot from the right front explain the damage indicated on the x-ray?

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James, it seems to me you're making a mystery here where none need exist. Given a readily proven T3 back wound -- established by the bullet holes in JFK's shirt and jacket + the consensus eyewitness reports of at least 15 people + the wound location indicated in three properly prepared official documents -- isn't it obvious that the damage was caused by a shot to the throat from the front?

Cliff, I am bitterly regretting the way I originally posted this. I will not do this again. It is clear to me that I have lost everyone or else, as you have pointed out, everyone thinks I am making a issue out of nothing.

What I tried to do, with parts 2 - 4 is attempt to dismantle the SBT. The SBT states that the bullet traversed the throat doing virtually no damage. My point is that, that is a complete impossibility. It was clear to me that had a bullet traveled through the neck major damage would have have had to be done. My logic was that if I could establish that this part of the theory is nonsense then, on its own, that is lethal to the SBT theory. If it could be established that major arteries and veins would have to be damaged had a bullet really traversed the neck, then on its own that would also destroy the SBT.

Although few go as low as T3 for the back entry for the SBT, most are looking at T2 or T1 like Myers does. However any one of them would, on its own, would kill the SBT. That is because anyone of those positions would require the bullet to go through the lung to get to the front and it would be bound to damage major vessels as it traveled through.

As you point out the only rational explanation for the back wound at T3 or maybe T2. is a shallow wound. Because of the position of the lung it can be nothing else. I favour T2 because Croft has clearly indicated that the jacket has risen a little.

At Z190 JFK was turned to his right, waving his right arm -- a posture that would cause his tucked-in custom-made shirt to INDENT along his right shoulder-line. So wouldn't a shot from the right front explain the damage indicated on the x-ray?

I agree that Z190 is the most logical moment for the throat wound, because any earlier and we would have seen reaction from JFK. At Z190 JFK's body is in the right position for the strap muscle and the top of the lung to be injured.

However, what on earth happened to the bullet that caused this damage???

James

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Gee James...

Where could it have possibly gone? :blink:

David,

I probably expressed myself badly. Sorry.

What I meant was that having entered the throat, where on earth did the bullet go to disappear completely.

If you agree with David Lifton, then we know what happened to it. However, if you don't, it is a real mystery.

Something created the wound, but there was nothing in the body to explain it.

With regard to the jacket.

When Humes saw the jacket for the first time on Monday March 16th 1964, there was a note attached to it from the FBI.

It stated that they had taken a sample of the jacket for testing. The upper hole is the sample they took WCH Vol2 P. 365

The lower hole is the damage the bullet made.

He is asked if the upper hole goes all the way through. He agrees it goes all the way through but then pauses and says

"it is not so clearly a puncture wound as the one below."

He is the asked whether the top hole goes all the way through in the way the lower one does. And he says no.

The lower hole is the bullet damage. the upper hole is the work of the FBI.

James

Edited by James R Gordon
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James, I think your work has tremendous potential -- but not as a critique of the SBT. I see no value in micro-analyzing a wound that never existed. I see tremendous value in micro-analyzing a wound that did exist -- the entrance wound in the throat.

What I tried to do, with parts 2 - 4 is attempt to dismantle the SBT. The SBT states that the bullet traversed the throat doing virtually no damage. My point is that, that is a complete impossibility. It was clear to me that had a bullet traveled through the neck major damage would have have had to be done.

Why not make this analysis in the context of the throat entrance wound?

I am in 100% agreement that the minor damage revealed on the neck x-ray is inconsistent with a typical bullet path -- bruised lung-tip, hair-line fracture of the right T1 transverse process, and an air-pocket overlaying the right C7 and T1 transverse processes.

And no exit.

Even if a .22 caliber bullet hit the windshield first before striking the neck it would do more damage than that -- or so I've been led to believe. Wouldn't a conventional round pass right through such soft tissue and exit from the back of the neck?

It seems quite likely that JFK was struck in the throat with a non-conventional round, just as the autopsists suspected the night of the autopsy.

From FBI SA Francis O'Neill's sworn affidavit for the HSCA:

Some discussion did occur concerning the disintegration of the bullet. A general feeling existed that a soft-nosed bullet struck JFK. There was discussion concerning the back wound that the bullet could have been a "plastic" type or an "Ice" bullet, one which dissolves after contact.

From FBI SA James Sibert's sworn affidavit for the HSCA:

The doctors also discussed a possible deflection of the bullet in the body caused by striking bone. Consideration was also given to a type of bullet which fragments completely....Following discussion among the doctors relating to the back injury, I left the autopsy room to call the FBI Laboratory and spoke with Agent Chuch [sic] Killion. I asked if he could furnish any information regarding a type of bullet that would almost completely fragmentize.

Did such non-conventional weaponry exist, and is there any further reason to believe that JFK was a victim of such weaponry?

Yes and yes.

http://karws.gso.uri.edu/Marsh/New_Scans/flechette.txt

According to William Colby's Church Committee testimony the CIA tested weapons that fired blood soluble rounds which would paralyze a target in two seconds.

The Zapruder film show just such an event -- JFK struck in the throat and then seizing up paralyzed in roughly two seconds.

My logic was that if I could establish that this part of the theory is nonsense then, on its own, that is lethal to the SBT theory. If it could be established that major arteries and veins would have to be damaged had a bullet really traversed the neck, then on its own that would also destroy the SBT.

Sure. The SBT fails on lots of grounds. But why make the argument any more complex than it needs to be? The T3 back wound demolishes the SBT without any micro-analysis whatsoever.

James, if you want to dismantle the SBT I suggest you glance down upon your right shoulder-line and slowly raise your right arm to wave, like JFK in the motorcade. The fabric of your shirt along the top of your right shoulder-line will invariably indent as the fabric forms a series of vertical or vertical/diagonal folds.

This indentation of shirt fabric will occur every single time when you raise an arm. This is a universal phenomenon which occurs billions upon billions of times a day on this planet.

JFK's posture caused the fabric of his shirt to indent along his right shoulder-line from the moment he sat down in the limo and propped his right elbow up on top of the limo door. (His jacket was another matter given the fact that his jacket had padded shoulders.)

Although few go as low as T3 for the back entry for the SBT, most are looking at T2 or T1 like Myers does.

Few who? Self-elected JFK experts, arm-chair pet theorists, government-hired hacks? Maybe so, but the people who actually saw the wound report the wound in a location consistent with T3.

Among the T3 witnesses, most of whom were afforded a prolonged view of the body, are:

1) Dr. Admiral George Burkley, JFK's personal physician and the man who observed the body at both Parkland and Bethesda, wrote on the Death Certificate

that the back wound was "about the level of the third thoracic vertebra." The Death Certificate was signed off as "verified" and employed proper autopsy protocol

by using the spine as a fixed landmark.

2) Secret Service Agent Glen Bennett wrote in a note the afternoon of 11/22/63:

I saw a shot hit the Boss about four inches down from the right shoulder.

4 inches below the right shoulder. Fact: the bullet hole in JFK's shirt is 4" below the bottom of the collar. Glen Bennett nailed the back wound location.

3) Secret Service Agent Clint Hill, tasked with bearing witness to the location of JFK's wounds when the body was in the morgue, testified before the

Warren Commission:

...I saw an opening in the back, about 6 inches below the neckline to the right-hand side of the spinal column.

6 inches below the neckline. Fact: the bullet hole in JFK's shirt is 5 & 3/4" below the top of the collar. Clint Hill nailed the location of back wound.

4) Dr. John Ebersole attended the autopsy and told David Mantik in a 1992 interview that the back wound was at T4. (Harrison Livingstone's KILLING THE TRUTH pg 721)

5) James Curtis Jenkins was a lab tech at the autopsy and made this statement to David Lifton:

I remember looking inside the chest cavity and I could see the probe...through the pleura

[the lining of the chest cavity]...You could actually see where it was making an indentation...

where it was pushing the skin up...There was no entry into the chest cavity...it would have

been no way that that could have exited in the front because it was then low in the chest cavity...

somewhere around the junction of the descending aorta [the main artery carrying blood from the

heart] or the bronchus in the lungs.

6) Chester H. Boyers was the chief Petty Officer in charge of the Pathology Department at Bethesda November 1963. This is from Boyers signed affidavit:

Another wound was located near the right shoulder blade, more specifically just under the scapula

and next to it.

The location just below the upper margin of the scapula is consistent with T3:

back_diagram.gif

7) FBI SA Francis O'Neill said that the first location for the back wound that Humes gave was "below the shoulder." Here's O'Neill's HSCA wound diagram:

http://www.jfklancer.com/pub/md/oneill1.gif

8) FBI SA James Sibert also diagrammed a lower back wound:

http://www.jfklancer.com/pub/md/sibert1.gif

9) SSA Will Greer in his WC testimony (Vol 2 pg 127) placed the back wound “in the soft part of that shoulder,” consistent with the testimony of Boyers.

10) SSA Roy Kellerman testified before the WC (Vol. 2 pg 93) that the wound in the back was “the hole that was in his shoulder.” Kellerman expanded on

this for the HSCA with a diagram which placed the back wound in the vicinity of T-3.

11) Autopsy photographer Floyd Reibe stated that the back wound was a lower marking on the Fox 5 autopsy photo (Harrison Livingstone's Killing the Truth,

pg 721).

12) Parkland nurse Diana Bowron stated the same thing to Livingstone: the back wound was lower than the "official" wound in the autopsy photo (KTT, pg 183).

13) Bethesda lab assistant Jan Gail Rudnicki told Livingstone that he saw "what appeared to be an entry wound several inches down on the back." (Livingstone's High Treason 2, pg 206).

14) Bethesda x-ray tech Edward Reed reported seein a back wound "right between the scapula and the thoracic column," although he thought it was an exit (KTT, pg 720). This location is consistent with T3.

15) Mortician Thomas Robinson put the back wound 5 or 6 inches below the shoulder, according to James Fetzer's "Reasoning About Assassinations"

http://assassinationscience.com/ReasoningAboutAssassinations.pdf

16) And last but not least autopsist Dr. J. Thornton Boswell prepared the autopsy face sheet diagram which shows a wound location consistent with the holes in the clothes. The diagram was filled out in pencil and marked "verified," also in pencil, all in accordance to proper autopsy protocol. The "14cm from the mastoid" notation on the face sheet was written in pen, which was a violation of proper autopsy protocol.

autopdescript1.gif

Only in the JFK assassination would anyone insist that improperly prepared material trumps properly prepared material. But then, here we are...

However any one of them would, on its own, would kill the SBT. That is because anyone of those positions would require the bullet to go through the lung to get to the front and it would be bound to damage major vessels as it traveled through.

As you point out the only rational explanation for the back wound at T3 or maybe T2. is a shallow wound. Because of the position of the lung it can be nothing else. I favour T2 because Croft has clearly indicated that the jacket has risen a little.

James, the Croft photo is mis-leading and irrelevant. JFK was shot in the back more than five seconds after Croft was taken (Z161), as established by the contemporaneous notes of SS SA Glen Bennett. And JFK's posture guaranteed the indentation of the shirt along his right shoulder-line, which means

the shirt wasn't bunched up at all.

I suggest the following experiment: put on your finest shirt and have someone pull an inch of fabric up at the right base of your neck. Then lift your right arm and wave.

That one-inch bunch up WILL be knocked down in a matter of seconds.

I agree that Z190 is the most logical moment for the throat wound, because any earlier and we would have seen reaction from JFK. At Z190 JFK's body is in the right position for the strap muscle and the top of the lung to be injured.

However, what on earth happened to the bullet that caused this damage???

James

Two possibilities: either there was pre-autopsy removal of the round that caused minor damage and did not exit, or JFK was hit with a blood soluble round, a scenario far more consistent with the damage noted in the neck, consistent with JFK's evident paralysis in the limo, and consistent with the historical record of CIA testing of blood soluble paralytics and toxins.

Edited by Cliff Varnell
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James...

That is what they TELL us... Sorry, but the FBI's track record with regards to this case's physical evidence is pathetic.

Does that little crescent look as if anything was taken from there as opposed to the lower hole...

Shouldn't we have seen fibers from the jacket and shirt in his backwound and on the bullet?

And there are those that testify to a hole thru JFK right about at that spot on the jacket.

One possible explanation includes the finding of the Bell bullet, the finding of the bullet in JFK's clothes at Bethesda, the two bullets discussed in two separate SS reports as posted and the Murray photos of out favorite blond man taking something from where Foster says a bullet lodged.

Let's make this plain as Day - the FBI and SS made evidence disappear. Pieces of the jigsaw puzzle are gone forever so that we will never see the whole picture. That there was a conspiracy if no longer an issue. Why it is continuing to this day to be glossed over is a different subject entirely... one that NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY will help you understand.

CLIFF:

It is also possible that Rankin was correct when he said he was looking at an autopsy report....

There is little if any reason to shoot JFK in the throat from the front with such a small round.

It is MUCH MORE LIKELY that a fragment of bullet or bone exited there (the embalmers notes include 2-3 small holes in the cheeks where "shrapnel" is said to have exited.

Sadly, since the evidence with which we are given to work is such crap... completely inauthentic, proving what happened is futile.

Mr. Rankin:

Then there‘s a great range of material in

regards to the wound and the autopsy and this point of exit

or entrance of the bullet in the front of the neck, and that all

has to be developed much more than we have at the present time.

We have an explanation there in the autopsy that probably

a fragment came out the front of the neck, but with the elevation

the shot must have come from, and the angle, it seems quite apparent,

since we have the picture of where the bullet entered in

the back, that the bullet entered below the shoulder blade to the

right of the backbone, which is below the place where the

picture shows the bullet came out in the neckband of the shirt

in front, and the bullet, according to the autopsy didn't strike

any bone at all, that particular bullet, and go through.

So that how it could turn, and --

Rep. Boggs. I thought I read that bullet just went.in a

finger's length.

Mr. Rankin. That is what they first said

What was said FIRST, and later corrected to implicate Oswald more completely... MAY be the real clues to the mystery... If a bullet worked its way out AND a fragment exited the throat...

we have very simple answers for very strange happenings.... While I still think ANYTHING is possible including the ice bullet idea... our disagreement does not detract at all from the conclusion...

Cheers

DJ

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And there are those that testify to a hole thru JFK right about at that spot on the jacket.

Who testified to a "wound thru JFK" at the base of his neck? How is it, David, that everyone who saw

JFK's low back wound and everyone who saw his throat entrance wound got it wrong in the same way?

Mass hallucination?

Gimme a break...

CLIFF:

It is also possible that Rankin was correct when he said he was looking at an autopsy report....

There is little if any reason to shoot JFK in the throat from the front with such a small round.

I disagree most vigorously.

They had the capacity to paralyze a target before the kill shot -- to insure a kill shot, to avoid the

possibility that a non-lethal first shot might cause JFK to duck down. JFK seized up paralyzed in about 2 seconds,

utterly consistent with known testing by the CIA.

They had the capacity to fire a blood soluble toxin with the second shot.

These capacities existed. It's a fact. Why do you think they wouldn't use the technology available to them?

It is MUCH MORE LIKELY that a fragment of bullet or bone exited there (the embalmers notes include 2-3 small holes in the cheeks where "shrapnel" is said to have exited.

So JFK started reacting to a wound in his throat before he suffered a wound in his throat? And all the people

at Parkland who spoke of a throat entrance wound suffered the same mis-impression?

No, I don't find either of those scenarios likely at all, to put it mildly.

Sadly, since the evidence with which we are given to work is such crap... completely inauthentic, proving what happened is futile.

There is nothing inauthentic about the statements of the witnesses to the low back wound and the throat entrance wound.

You're throwing the baby out with the bathwater -- and indirectly engaging in the same witness bashing we get from LNers.

Mr. Rankin:

Then there‘s a great range of material in

regards to the wound and the autopsy and this point of exit

or entrance of the bullet in the front of the neck, and that all

has to be developed much more than we have at the present time.

We have an explanation there in the autopsy that probably

a fragment came out the front of the neck, but with the elevation

the shot must have come from, and the angle, it seems quite apparent,

since we have the picture of where the bullet entered in

the back, that the bullet entered below the shoulder blade to the

right of the backbone, which is below the place where the

picture shows the bullet came out in the neckband of the shirt

in front, and the bullet, according to the autopsy didn't strike

any bone at all, that particular bullet, and go through.

So that how it could turn, and --

Rep. Boggs. I thought I read that bullet just went.in a

finger's length.

Mr. Rankin. That is what they first said

What was said FIRST, and later corrected to implicate Oswald more completely... MAY be the real clues to the mystery... If a bullet worked its way out AND a fragment exited the throat...

we have very simple answers for very strange happenings.... While I still think ANYTHING is possible including the ice bullet idea... our disagreement does not detract at all from the conclusion...

Cheers

DJ

Rankin struggling to put the evidence into a 3-shot scenario is amusing. And ridiculous. The witnesses

with the best view of JFK describe him reacting to throat trauma from the first shot, which is what the

Zapruder film also shows.

Do you really think JFK started reacting to throat trauma before he was struck in the throat?

I don't.

And I see no reason to impeach the testimony of the throat and back witnesses in favor of such capricious scenarios.

Edited by Cliff Varnell
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Cliff Varnell:

"They had the capacity to paralyze a target before the kill shot -- to insure a kill shot, to avoid the

possibility that a non-lethal first shot might cause JFK to duck down. JFK seized up paralyzed in about 2 seconds, utterly consistent with known testing by the CIA.

They had the capacity to fire a blood soluble toxin with the second shot.

These capacities existed. It's a fact. Why do you think they wouldn't use the technology available to them?"

Cliff,

I'll give you two reasons which I find very convincing.

1) Why try to shoot the President in the neck - purposely - with something that will not kill him? If someone was going to take a shot at JFK, why not just aim for the President's head with a standard bullet and the likelihood is very strong that it would all be game over?

Because they wanted no shots from in front to be visible? Come on, Cliff? This couldn't be the reason?

Furthermore, the neck is a smaller target and thus more difficult to hit, right? Especially on a moving target. Why risk this?

Because I take it you don't expect those two seconds to still be that short amount of time (which as I understand your theory, is an absolute requirement) if this toxin originated in, say, his chest?

2) I also find it extremely hard to believe that if there were more than a single shooter, one of them would be taking all those enormous risks involved in an endevour like this one - without having the capacity to actually to do the job, which was to kill JFK?

You've got to admit that this idea is somewhat far fetched...?

Edited by Glenn Viklund
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James...

That is what they TELL us... Sorry, but the FBI's track record with regards to this case's physical evidence is pathetic.

Does that little crescent look as if anything was taken from there as opposed to the lower hole...

Shouldn't we have seen fibers from the jacket and shirt in his backwound and on the bullet?

And there are those that testify to a hole thru JFK right about at that spot on the jacket.

David I have never examined the jacket, however Humes did examine it on Monday March 16th before he went on to testify. On P. 365 it appears that Specter wanted Humes to say that this upper hole is the back entrance wound through the jacket. There is a superb moment when asked by Specter does this hole go all the way through the jacket, Humes initially says yes. Then he pauses for a moment and says this hole is not quite as clear as the damage to the lower hole. Then, when asked directly by Specter does this hole go all the way through the jacket, Humes says no. The damage does not go all the way through.

However it is not just the appearance of a hole in this region of the jacket, it is that there is no corresponding hole in the body that coincides with this damage to the jacket. I may argue that the back hole seen in the autopsy image is unlikely to be around T3, I feel it may be nearer T2. But what is certain is that this hole is also nowhere near where you believe this damage to the jacket is. Let alone the fact that Humes, who did examine the jacket, is on record stating that it is not a through hole through the complete jacket.

There is little if any reason to shoot JFK in the throat from the front with such a small round.

It is MUCH MORE LIKELY that a fragment of bullet or bone exited there (the embalmers notes include 2-3 small holes in the cheeks where "shrapnel" is said to have exited.

There is a logic to this idea, but it does not stack up. Aside from the fact that the embalmers note refers to small damage to the cheek and not inside the mouth. Putting aside that this happens too early in the assassination it is not possible. It is not just that damage has to be inside the mouth the following have also to be damaged.

a) there has to be a hole in the roof of the mouth to allow these fragments into the mouth.

B) there also has to be hole in the floor of the mouth to allow these fragments to move into the trachea

c) there also has to be a means whereby these same fragments can now exit the trachea.

d) there is no evidence that this kind of damage was discovered at Bethesda.

AND all this has to be done in such a way as to fool experienced Parkland doctors into thinking what they are seeing is a bullet wound of entrance.

The problems involved for this to happen are so complex, they make it an impossibility.

I concur that there is a logic to your idea but practically speaking the requirements for it to happen far outweigh the possibilities.

James

Edited by James R Gordon
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Cliff,

I'll give you two reasons which I find very convincing.

1) Why try to shoot the President in the neck - purposely - with something that will not kill him? If someone was going to take a shot at JFK, why not just aim for the President's head with a standard bullet and the likelihood is very strong that it would all be game over?

Because they wanted no shots from in front to be visible? Come on, Cliff? This couldn't be the reason?

Furthermore, the neck is a smaller target and thus more difficult to hit, right? Especially on a moving target. Why risk this?

Because I take it you don't expect those two seconds to still be that short amount of time (which as I understand your theory, is an absolute requirement) if this toxin originated in, say, his chest?

2) I also find it extremely hard to believe that if there were more than a single shooter, one of them would be taking all those enormous risks involved in an endevour like this one - without having the capacity to actually to do the job, which was to kill JFK?

You've got to admit that this idea is somewhat far fetched...?

Glenn,

There is much merit to what you say. It is a serious point to question why a gunman would take such a risk to make a shot for the neck in order just to paralyse.

However Cliff's point, if I understand him correctly, is that any shot from the North Knoll from a distance of around 200 feet would surely pass all the way through the body. And I feel there is not much argument with that. And there lies the problem, there is no exit point for this shot. It is that conundrum that gives rise to question what else could account for this wound, if it was not a bullet. Although it was a much maligned program, Inside the Car demonstrated what could happen to the head from a shot from about 100 feet away. Even 200 feet away, surely with that kind of weapon there would be an exit point? Why someone would be looking at solutions such as these kinds of weapons is because it appears whatever did cause the damage to the neck, it was not a standard rifle shot.

James

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...

However Cliff's point, if I understand him correctly, is that any shot from the North Knoll from a distance of around 200 feet would surely pass all the way through the body. And I feel there is not much argument with that. ....

Without knowing the weapon that was used, and the type of ammo that was used, this is all speculation.

Another observation: James feels that analysis of the internal damage and trajectory is sufficient by itself to disprove the SBT. Cliff feels that the location of the bullet hole in the shirt and Jacket combined with the testimony of 16 witnesses is sufficient by itself to disprove the SBT.

My feeling is that both of these arguments have merit, but that they are pieces of a puzzle. There have also been several

"external" analysis that focus on the angles, trajectories, location of the limo, and positions of the occupants, combined with witness testimony and the Z Film, that punch holes in the SBT.

As a group of arguments, they reinforce the main theme.

One last item: Next time you are in the presence of a Doctor or Nurse, place one finger on the WC "bullet entry" point on the back of your neck, and one finger on the WC "bullet exit" point on your throat. Then ask them if a bullet transiting between those two points would strike the top of the right lung. You will get the same answer every time.

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Cliff Varnell:

"They had the capacity to paralyze a target before the kill shot -- to insure a kill shot, to avoid the

possibility that a non-lethal first shot might cause JFK to duck down. JFK seized up paralyzed in about 2 seconds, utterly consistent with known testing by the CIA.

They had the capacity to fire a blood soluble toxin with the second shot.

These capacities existed. It's a fact. Why do you think they wouldn't use the technology available to them?"

Cliff,

I'll give you two reasons which I find very convincing.

1) Why try to shoot the President in the neck - purposely - with something that will not kill him?

Glenn, he was shot in the throat with something that didn't kill him!

If someone was going to take a shot at JFK, why not just aim for the President's head with a standard bullet and the likelihood is very strong that it would all be game over?

They didn't want to go to the gas chamber if the first shot failed to kill JFK.

Glenn, would you risk your life on a "very strong likelihood" that the first shot was a kill shot when you had the capacity to paralyze the target first?

First-shot/kill shot was not a 100% proposition. With a blood soluble paralytic a strike anywhere on the body is successful -- this could not be assumed with a standard round.

And the damage shown on the neck x-ray was utterly inconsistent with a standard round. The shallow wound in the back was utterly inconsistent with a standard round.

The only "theory" I advance here is that the back shot -- the second shot -- was a toxin.

Because they wanted no shots from in front to be visible? Come on, Cliff? This couldn't be the reason?

No, that's not the reason. The purpose was to render the target paralyzed. What do we see in the Zapruder film? JFK seizing up paralyzed in a little over two seconds.

Furthermore, the neck is a smaller target and thus more difficult to hit, right? Especially on a moving target. Why risk this?

They didn't need to hit him in the neck -- anywhere on his body would have worked. Here you present the argument I made above -- why risk a dicey first-shot/kill-shot when you MUST score a direct hit on the head of a moving target? The risk for a blood soluble round was nil. The risks of a failed first-shot/kill-shot were enormous.

Because I take it you don't expect those two seconds to still be that short amount of time (which as I understand your theory, is an absolute requirement) if this toxin originated in, say, his chest?

First of all, it's not my theory -- it was the theory of the guys who actually handled the body on 11/22/63.

This scenario was so compelling to them that FBI SA Sibert called the FBI Lab to inquire as to the existence of such weaponry.

Did you read this?

http://karws.gso.uri.edu/Marsh/New_Scans/flechette.txt

A shot to the chest would work as well as a shot to the throat.

GV:

2) I also find it extremely hard to believe that if there were more than a single shooter, one of them would be taking all those enormous risks involved in an endevour like this one -
without having the capacity to actually to do the job, which was to kill JFK?

I don't follow you. The shooters firing the blood soluble rounds weren't taking any more of a risk than anyone else. The idea behind using a paralytic was to reduce the risk for everyone.

GV:

You've got to admit that this idea is somewhat far fetched...?

The autopsists didn't think it was far-fetched. The FBI men at the autopsy didn't think it was far-fetched. It isn't far-fetched when you consider the minor damage to the throat the shot caused; it isn't far-fetched when you consider the fact that the back wound was shallow; and it isn't far-fetched when you consider the fact that JFK seized up paralyzed in a little over two seconds.

And it isn't far-fetched when you consider the historical fact that such weaponry was tested on humans by the Central Intelligence Agency.

Edited by Cliff Varnell
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...

However Cliff's point, if I understand him correctly, is that any shot from the North Knoll from a distance of around 200 feet would surely pass all the way through the body. And I feel there is not much argument with that. ....

Without knowing the weapon that was used, and the type of ammo that was used, this is all speculation.

Yes, but it is speculation generated by the people who actually examined the body. The contemporaneous impressions of those on the scene trump the speculations of those who were not on the scene.

Right?

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