John Newman's new book now available

[Douglas Caddy]

John Newman wrote on Facebook yesterday:

I want to thank all of my research associates and friends who helped me with this book. I consider it to be the most difficult of all of the volumes so far in this series.

In particular I want to thank Bobby Kennedy, Jr. for his generous endorsement:

Major John Newman has crafted a groundbreaking work that finally illuminates the dark places where democracy goes to die. Using formerly classified CIA and Military Intelligence documents, Newman -- a twenty-year veteran intell...igence officer -- here exposes the now undeniable involvement of high-level military and intelligence officials in the assassination of my uncle, President John F. Kennedy. Major Newman is a brilliant and meticulous historian and sleuth from whom secrets cannot seem to hide. Newman is the ultimate patriot; devoting his life to righting the treacherous wrongs committed by clandestine spy agencies against our country and revealing existential truths about our national values. By patient parsing, he here exposes the momentous official lies that for fifty years have been corroding the heart of American idealism.
—Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., President, Waterkeeper Alliance, author of American Values, Lessons I Learned from My Family.

Thanks also to Peter Dale Scott for this endorsement:

Using analytic techniques from his days in Army Intelligence, Newman collates and overlays disparate covert narratives to provide an unmatched overview of his explosive topic: how interagency intrigues have helped obscure our understanding of the JFK assassination. The result is a fresh perspective on many other major events of Kennedy’s curtailed presidency. I have to say that I was so deeply moved by Chapter One, about the Blue Bomb and the 1960 election, that I am almost shaking. The events themselves are very powerful, but so is Newman’s narration (including the last line) -- all wonderful! Future serious historians will have to deal with this masterful book.
—Peter Dale Scott is the author of Deep Politics and the Death of JFK, The War Conspiracy, The Road to 9/11, American War Machine, The American Deep State. Dallas ’63, and Poetry and Terror.

Volume III is now available on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/172264897X/ref=sr_1_2…

[Anthony Thorne]

Interesting to see from John's introduction that the series might now encompass six volumes rather than five.

[Douglas Caddy]

John Newman wrote on Facebook yesterday:

What is still on my mind is the ending--the last six paragraphs-- of "Into the Storm":

The formula used at that meeting on behalf of the Kennedys was not a direct affront to Lemnitzer’s plans for war in Cuba. But the reprimand of Lansdale put the ball firmly in Lemnitzer’s court. He understood what he had to do. And so, Lemnitzer put his Operation Northwoods on the table two weeks later, on 13 March 1962. In Chapter Fourteen, I discussed the morally depraved details of Lemnitzer’s plan—sinking an American ship, attacking Miami, Washington and other American cities, and blaming it all on Cuba.
Three days later, Kennedy and Lemnitzer met face-to face with, perhaps, a half dozen other officers. It is very difficult to find a formal memo of the discussion in that meeting. We do have a brief handwritten note authored by Deputy Under Secretary of State U. Alexis Johnson who witnessed the event:

"The president also expressed skepticism that, in so far as can now be foreseen, circumstances will arise that would justify and make desirable the use of American forces for overt military action. It was clearly understood no decision was expressed or implied approving the use of such forces although contingency planning would proceed."

However, as this volume went to press, I discovered a memorandum indicating that a blunt rebuke of Lemnitzer by JFK took place. I will discuss that memo further in Volume IV.
Here, as a career U.S. Army officer, I am compelled to speak my mind. I speak for myself and will leave other officers of the American Armed Forces to their own counsel in this matter. General Lemnitzer betrayed his country and his oath of office to protect and defend its constitution. U.S. Army Major General Joseph Alexander McChristian, perhaps the finest Army intelligence officer ever to wear the uniform, was once asked what it means to lie about the enemy in a time of war. He spoke for what is in my heart when he replied, “It jeopardizes not only the lives of the soldiers on the battlefield, but also the future liberty of your people at home.”

******************************

As the moment of maximum danger in the Cuban Missile Crisis approached, the president finally got around to firing Lemnitzer. On 1 October 1962, Kennedy installed General Maxwell Taylor as the new Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The choice of Taylor, as events turned out, was a very bad mistake. Taylor would end up working secretly with other senior officers to subvert President Kennedy’s order to begin the withdrawal of U.S. military advisors from Vietnam.
The ship of the brothers Kennedy was sailing headlong into the winds of war. Though they might still stop it in Cuba, war was coming nonetheless. The miraculous conclusion of the Cuban Missile Crisis would be short-lived. It was only an intermission—much like the passing eye of a huge hurricane.
At the moment, for me—save for the steadily building hatred for the Kennedy brothers and the metamorphosing CIA plots to assassinate Castro—what lies on the other side of that intermission is mostly dark. But a saying John Kennedy was wont to quote comes to mind:

Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh in vain. [Psalm 127:1]
—Remarks prepared [undelivered] for speech at the Trade Mart
Dallas, Texas, 22 November 1963

[James DiEugenio]

Unfortunately, there is no Kindle version yet.  I guess when Amazon collapsed Crate Space into Kindle there is now  a problem with the process.

 

BTW, if I was advising John, I would tell him to stick to five volumes.  Please do not do six.  You want people to read the thing don't you?

 

 Its the same problem I had with Doug Horne.

[Paul Brancato]

Alan Dale says kindle edition will be available soon.

[B. A. Copeland]

3 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Unfortunately, there is no Kindle version yet.  I guess when Amazon collapsed Crate Space into Kindle there is now  a problem with the process.

 

BTW, if I was advising John, I would tell him to stick to five volumes.  Please do not do six.  You want people to read the thing don't you?

 

 Its the same problem I had with Doug Horne.

But Jim, what if the info is just too vast and 6 (or even more) are needed? I mean at least its Newman and at any rate, its just more to learn about the case from his research. i guess what i'm saying is that, once you've invested in learning the truth, does it matter how many volumes? (no sarcasm intended of course!). You're the expert compared to myself but I was curious about your perspective.

[Chuck Schwartz]

Also from John Newman's facebook "Yes, all this on point to where the trail leads from here. Lemnitzer's papers are downtown D.C. at the National Defense University (Taylor's are there too!) so they are within reach. Bamford went there to check them out and what he found convinced me we need to go check it out. The Lemnitzer-Lansdale nexus in Mongoose is full of clues "

[Joseph McBride]

I read Doug Horne's five-volume set eagerly in two weeks. I learned a lot from it

and am glad he put in all the valuable detail.

Edited January 25, 2019 by Joseph McBride

[Anthony Thorne]

Newman’s last comment was in response to an odd digression I’d raised. Prof Richard Pipes pops up in the narrative of COUNTDOWN TO DARKNESS. Lemnitzer would eventually assemble alongside various Committee on the Present Danger members on the Team B group in the latter half of the 70’s. And that Team B group, full of long term anti communists like Paul Nitze, was chaired by Pipes.

in the volume HOW HARVARD RULES, there’s a long essay - titled something like HARVARD AND THE NATIONAL SECURITY STATE - which goes into the milieu of many of those guys, Nitze and others, and their shared background at Harvard.  Philip Zelikow, a fixture at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, was later the guy chosen to ‘edit’ the transcripts of Kennedy’s meetings with the Joint Chiefs for publication.

I like the idea of Newman doing a lot of books, but if each volume takes two years to write, it’s a long haul. I’m glad he keeps very fit and does yoga.

Edited January 25, 2019 by Anthony Thorne

[James DiEugenio]

But Joe, how many people did that?

And being a writer you know that the longer the text the harder it is too manage and to find a through line.  Which is important in keeping the reader's attention.

I want John to sell as many books as he can.  He does not have Caro's built in publicity machine since he is not in bed with the MSM

 

[Joseph McBride]

I'm just saying if you are truly interested, you can read Horne's five volumes in two weeks. It's not hard to do so

even while working for a living. And the details of the Zapruder film alteration and the body alteration are crucial. Horne turned

up fresh and convincing evidence of both. As you know, these are still matters of

controversy even within the research community, so it was wise of Horne to lay out

all of his evidence. People can then agree or disagree based on what he presents,

and he doesn't simply speculate or make unsupported claims, as too many authors do. He was in a special position with the ARRB and was

able to find aid in the interrogation of key witnesses as well as to

obtain revealing documents and other witness reports. He differs with some of

the approach of the others on the ARRB and goes well beyond their report, which

in some ways was another US government coverup. I found Horne's prose lucid, so I didn't think the text was hard to manage.

I find the same is the case with John Newman, who is taking a different angle and knows his material thoroughly.

I want the detail and the analysis. These books are for experts and scholars more than for general readers.

Edited January 27, 2019 by Joseph McBride

[Ron Bulman]

On ‎1‎/‎25‎/‎2019 at 1:37 AM, Joseph McBride said:

I'm just saying if you are truly interested, you can read Horne's five volumes in two weeks. It's not hard to do so

even while working for a living. And the details of the Zapruder film alteration and the body alteration are crucial. Horne turned

up fresh and convincing evidence of both. As you know, these are still matters of

controversy even within the research community, so it was wise of Horne to lay out

all of his evidence. People can then agree or disagree based on what he presents,

and he doesn't simply speculate or make unsupported claims, as too many authors do. He was in a special position with the ARRB and was

able to find aid in the interrogation of key witnesses as well as to

obtain revealing documents and other witness reports. He differs with some of

the approach of the others on the ARRB and goes well beyond their report, which

in some ways was another US government coverup. I found Horne's prose lucid, so I didn't think the text was hard to manage.

I find the same is the case with John Newman, who is taking a different angle and knows his material thoroughly.

I want the detail and the analysis. These books are for experts and scholars more for general readers.

"more THAN for general readers".  Guess I should skip it though I found Oswald and the CIA and JFK and Vietnam informative, as well as your book, as I'm not a scholar or expert.   It is a little pricey for a working man with not a whole lot of time for reading or posting.

[Anthony Thorne]

Ron, I’d suggest giving it a shot, on Kindle perhaps (and there are apps that let you read Kindle ebooks on your phone if you don’t have a tablet) as the ebook versions of this series are much cheaper. Book 2 ends with David Atlee Phillips in his back yard weeping with anger over the Bay of Pigs, and I think Book 3 for some readers would actually be a decent starting point.

[James DiEugenio]

Well, the price went down to 28 bucks.

But still no Kindle.  John said the problem with this is that Amazon decided to dump Create Space and collapse it into Kindle and that has caused a real back up log. Since now you have to go to other companies for the layout and format.

Ron,  i reviewed part 1, and I will be reviewing part 2 soon.  SO if you want to start with part 3, just read those two.

[Ron Bulman]

I still hope to read it but don't know when.  I have Where Angels Tread Lightly but have never yet made it to Countdown to Darkness.  Just thumbing back through it I should probably re read Angels.  It, as were Oswald, and, Vietnam are deep.  They make me stop and think about what I've read at times to absorb it and at points I may go back and re read a portion in relation to a new point that's come up.  I owe Mr. McBride an apology for my prior comment.  As I'm not a scholar, expert of for that matter a researcher, which he is, in particular the expert on the Tippit murder imho,  I felt myself being dumped into the general part.  But I'm not.  Most of the books I've read on the assassinations are not read by the general public or for that matter casual readers about the JFK assassination in particular.  While some of them may sell well, more especially over time, few ever make best seller lists.  They are seldom mentioned by the main stream media so anyone not already interested in the subject never hears about them which is a shame.  One has to seek them out.  If the damned msm, as well as some of the literary societies and historians would acknowledge and maybe review them I think more people would read the work of Dr. Newman, and Mr. McBride, among others.  A classic example to me is RFK Jr's book last year American Values.  The Kennedy name, not a cousin, nephew or niece but RFK's son.  The name still draw's attention.  All the candid stories about growing up a Kennedy, at times in the White House, Hickory Hill, his grandparents.  All that would have been eaten up by the public.  If the Washington Post and New York Times had reviewed it.  But he mentioned doubt's about his Father and Uncle's murders.   I'm glad he did.  At least those who do read it will know something a little closer to the truth.  Sorry to rant or ramble.  Off the soapbox now. 

Edited January 28, 2019 by Ron Bulman