Assassination Theories

[John Simkin]

I have ranked some different theories in the order I think they are likely to be true. In fact, it is possible that the first 11 could all be true. It seems a combination of organizations were involved in the conspiracy. All these groups had been working together in an attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro. By 1963 it was clear that the only way Castro could be removed was by an American invasion. That was something that would not happen while Kennedy was president.

Theory 10 only concerns who carried out the deed, rather than who ordered it. Bringing in outside hit men is very common in Mafia killings.

(1) The Mafia, Anti-Castro Activists and the CIA

Anthony Summers is the author of The Kennedy Conspiracy. He believes that Kennedy was killed by a group of anti-Castro activists, funded by Mafia mobsters that had been ousted from Cuba. Summers believes that some members of the CIA took part in this conspiracy. Summers speculated that the following people were involved in this conspiracy: Johnny Roselli, Carlos Marcello, Santos Trafficante, Sam Giancana, David Ferrie, Gerry Patrick Hemming, Guy Bannister and E.Howard Hunt. Sylvia Meagher in her book, Accessories After the Fact, also supported the theory that Kennedy had been killed by Anti-Castro exiles.

(2) The Mafia

David E. Scheim has published two books claiming that the Mafia were responsible for the assassination of Kennedy. He believes that it was organized by Carlos Marcello, Santos Trafficante and Jimmy Hoffa. This theory is based on the idea that the Mafia were angry with both John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy for their attempts to destroy organized crime. (This policy ended with the death of Kennedy).Scheim's theory was supported by Trafficante's lawyer, Frank Ragano, who published the book Mob Lawyer, in 1994.

(3) David Atlee Phillips and the CIA

Gaeton Fonzi was a staff investigator for the House Select Committee on Assassinations. In his book, The Last Investigation, Fonzi takes the view that the assassination was organized by David Atlee Phillips, head of the CIA's Western Hemisphere Division.

(4) Rogue Members of the CIA

David Atlee Phillips, head of the CIA's Western Hemisphere Division, told Kevin Walsh, a former investigator with the House Select Committee on Assassinations: that Kennedy had been "done in by a conspiracy, likely including rogue American intelligence people."

(5) E. Howard Hunt and the CIA

In his book, Plausible Denial (1991), Mark Lane argues that CIA agents killed Kennedy. He claims that the conspiracy involved E.Howard Hunt and Frank Sturgis.

(6) CIA and Executive Action

Executive Action, was a CIA secret plan to remove unfriendly foreign leaders from power. In his book The Secret Team (1973) Leroy Fletcher Prouty claimed that elements of the CIA were worked on behalf of the interests of a "high cabal" of industrialists and bankers. He also claimed that the Executive Action unit could have been used to kill Kennedy. Prouty named CIA operative, Edward Lansdale, as the leader of the operation.

(7) Jack Ruby and the Mafia

The journalist, Dorothy Kilgallen, believed that the assassination of Kennedy had involved Jack Ruby and the Mafia. She also suggested that J. D. Tippet and Bernard Weismann were involved in the conspiracy.

(8) Right-Wing Activists in New Orleans

Jim Garrison, the district attorney of New Orleans, believed that a group of right-wing activists, including Guy Bannister, David Ferrie, Carlos Bringuier and Clay Shaw were involved in a conspiracy with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to kill Kennedy.

(9) John Birch Society

Harry Dean was an undercover agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. In 1962 he infiltrated the John Birch Society. He later reported that the society hired two gunman, Eladio del Valle and Loran Hall, to kill President John F. Kennedy.

(10) Antoine Guerini and the Marseilles Mafia

Stephen Rivele argued in the 1988 television documentary, The Men Who Killed Kennedy that the Kennedy's assassination had been organized by Antoine Guerini, the Corsican crime boss in Marseilles. He also claimed that Lucien Sarti had been one of the gunmen.

(11) Lyndon B. Johnson and Texas Oil Millionaires.

Madeleine Brown claims that she was Johnson's mistress. In her autobiography, Texas in the Morning (1997) Brown claims that the conspiracy to kill Kennedy involved Lyndon B. Johnson, Clint Murchison, Haroldson L. Hunt and J. Edgar Hoover. Barr McClellan, a lawyer who worked for the Texas oil industry in the 1960s, claims in his book, Blood Money & Power (2003) that the assassination was planned and covered up by Lyndon Johnson and his lawyer, Edward A. Clark.

(12) J. Edgar Hoover

J. Edgar Hoover was concerned that Kennedy would force him into retirement when he reached the age of 70. Mark North (Act of Treason) and George O'Toole (The Assassination Tapes) both believe that Hoover either knew of plans to kill Kennedy and did nothing to stop them, or he helped to organize the assassination.

(13) Lee Harvey Oswald

The Warren Commission came to the conclusion that John F. Kennedy was assassinated by a lone gunman, Lee Harvey Oswald. This theory has been supported by several other investigators including Arlen Specter, Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, Hugh Aynesworth and Gerald Posner.

(14) The Soviet Union

James Angleton believed that Nikita Khrushchev sought revenge after he had been humiliated by Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis. In his book, Khrushchev Killed Kennedy (1975), Michael Eddowes argued that Kennedy was killed by a Soviet agent impersonating Lee Harvey Oswald. In Legend: The Secret World of Lee Harvey Oswald (1978), Edward Jay Epstein argues that Oswald was a KGB agent.

(15) Secret Service Conspiracy

In his book, Best Evidence, David Lifton claims that members of the Secret Service agents were involved in the killing of Kennedy. This included providing the assassins with a good opportunity to kill Kennedy. Lifton was highly critical of the behaviour of William Greer, Roy Kellerman and Winston G. Lawson during the assassination. Lifton believes that after the assassination of Kennedy they hijacked the body in order to alter the corpse. In the book, Mortal Error, Bonar Menninger, claims that SS agent George Hickey killed Kennedy by accident.

I would be interested in hearing from anyone who disagrees with me.

[Raymond Blair]

John. This is a topic of great interest in popular history, but I tend to not use it much or use it at all even though it is in the heart of my major course of instruction, Twentieth Century history.

The reason I tend not to look to closely at this is that I find it difficult to argue historical significance of the assassination itself. There is not a clear story line from the assassination to show any group on the historical radar getting great benefit out of JKF's assassination (other than the laws JKF supported that got passed in his name under the Johnson administration.

That aside, this looks like a great website.

[Shanet Clark]

Thats a classic rundown, many were involved...Marrs came to a similar rogue's gallery of suspects....BOnar Menninger believes the Secret Service actually fired the headshot from the following car (with LBJ in it) that's fairly unlikely...those were the dal-tex shots.

[Shanet Clark]

John-So, I am told the JFK assassination is not very important in twentieth centuryhistory. THen Also the french revolution adds nothing to our knowledge of the late eighteenth century and the assassination of Julius Ceasar is of no importance in discussions of Rome and the classical world--- a serious historian says so! the problem is the study of the Unspeakable Reality of Political Violence is not a way up the cozy academic ladder! So no one is learning any US History by studying Bay of Pigs, Hoover, Hunt/Sturgis, Dulles/cabell or Giancanna ROselli WHICH US HISTORY ARE YOU TALKIN ABOUT???

John.  This is a topic of great interest in popular history, but I tend to not use it much or use it at all even though it is in the heart of my major course of instruction, Twentieth Century history.

The reason I tend not to look to closely at this is that I find it difficult to argue historical significance of the assassination itself.  There is not a clear story line from the assassination to show any group on the historical radar getting great benefit out of JKF's assassination (other than the laws JKF supported that got passed in his name under the Johnson administration.

That aside, this looks like a great website.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[James Richards]

Interesting post, John. I was curuious to see how a few names seemed to pop up in several different sections.

Personally, I believe the assassination and the cover-up were two different things. Trying to link people into both is where it all gets messy. I also don't think any organization as an entity was responsible but several individuals from an interesting cross section with similar personal motivations and ambition were involved hence the cross-pollination.

David Morales and the banner of JM/WAVE are a good example where CIA, Mafia and anti-Castro Cubans mixed freely. Operation Tilt with participants like John Martino, Eddie Bayo and Rip Robertson cover the spectrum nicely.

As to the cover-up, Hoover and LBJ stand out above all.

FWIW.

James

[Wim Dankbaar]

I wrote this two years back. Still valid:

I wish I could answer that in just one sentence. The first thing people want to know is: Who fired the shots and who were behind it? It can’t be answered in two seconds. If you want to hear who did it as quickly as possible, my answer would be: A combination of CIA, Mafia, Texan oil-millionaires, anti Castroites and high officials in the military and government. In effect, of all the different theories on who was behind it, our answer is: “All of the above”, excluding the KGB and Castro. Those are disinfo stories, tossed in there by the CIA on purpose.

All those groups together? That does not sound very credible!

That I cannot help. It’s not my fault that the public does not know that all these groups worked tightly together and were in fact sides of the same cube. But it is so clear. Everything roots back to the Bay of Pigs. All those groups worked in paramount on that and they all had a common interest to get Cuba back.

[Tim Carroll]

deleted for space

Edited November 5, 2004 by Tim Carroll

[John Simkin]

Six months is a long time when investigating the Kennedy assassination. I would now argue that the Mafia had nothing to do with the assassination. My top one would be anti-Castro Cubans, members of Interpen and a few well-placed members of the CIA (Phillips, Morales and Harvey).

I agree with James that you have to distinguish between the assassination and the cover-up. I believe that the original plan was to blame the assassination on pro-Castro forces in America in order to get an invasion of Cuba. LBJ refused to go along with this and was able to persuade the FBI and CIA to cover-up the conspiracy (both had good reason to go along with LBJ’s plans).

[Shanet Clark]

A better term than the Military Industrial Complex would be "John Kennedy's militant reactionary political opposition"

[Tim Carroll]

A better term than the Military Industrial Complex would be "John Kennedy's militant reactionary political opposition"

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Shanet:

It wasn't just John Kennedy's. This same group came straight out of WWII with a mission of total military dominance. The mindset that led the U.S. to cross the evolutionary threshold of strategic rather than tactical warfare at Dresden and the other mass firebombings directed at civilian populations, then to unnecessarily use the atomic bomb, then to incorporate the Nazi intelligence as our own in Eastern Europe, and ultimately through the late 1940s and 1950s to build toward a level of sufficiently overwhelming force mixed with total demonization of liberal godless communism, to pretextualize a "preemptive" first strike. The moment had technically been reached in the summer of 1961 when the Corona satellite rendered the few existent Soviet ICBMs suddenly useless. The hairtrigger was in place in Berlin and Kennedy's range of choice was absurdly narrow, as he well knew. His response was to show strength, call up troops, authorize 1,000 new ICBMs (LeMay's request being for 10,000, and JFK saying 1,000 was the least he could get away with), while at the same time he engaged in secret correspondence with Khrushchev. When the showdown came in October 1962, and the "militant reactionary political opposition" finally had reason to believe they had JFK cornered, with the Chairman of the JCS actually informing JFK that he had until Monday, JFK gave away the store in the form of a secret deal to dismantle U.S. missiles in Turkey within 6 mos. This secret deal was huge. It was not just JFK being soft, or afraid of the nuke, as was said in hip Pentagon circles, it was treason of the first order. And it wasn't just a treasonous way out of that one crisis, it was an almost religious betrayal of a military theology - like a high priest reaching the culminating moment only to suddenly throw off his garments and walk away. There is ample evidence of how changed JFK was by the joust at the abyss.

Tim

Edited October 15, 2004 by Tim Carroll

[Jack White]

(1) The Mafia, Anti-Castro Activists and the CIA...YES, WORKING FOR DULLES

(2) The Mafia...YES, WORKING FOR DULLES

(3) David Atlee Phillips and the CIA...YES, WORKING FOR DULLES

(4) Rogue Members of the CIA...YES, WORKING FOR DULLES

(5) E. Howard Hunt and the CIA...YES, WORKING FOR DULLES

(6) CIA and Executive Action...YES. DULLES

(7) Jack Ruby and the Mafia...YES

(8) Right-Wing Activists in New Orleans (and elsewhere)...YES

(9) John Birch Society...YES

(10) Antoine Guerini and the Marseilles Mafia...NO! A FALSE SPONSOR.

(11) Lyndon B. Johnson and Texas Oil Millionaires...YES!!! LBJ AND DULLES!!!

(12) J. Edgar Hoover...YES!!!

(13) Lee Harvey Oswald...NO...A PATSY SUPPLIED BY CIA

(14) The Soviet Union...NO, A FALSE SPONSOR

(15) Secret Service Conspiracy...YES

I would be interested in hearing from anyone who disagrees with me.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

John...

After studying this for more than 40 years, my conclusion is that

you left off your list the MAIN PROBABILITY...A COMBINATION

OF MANY ON YOUR LIST. (And you left off a chief suspect...the

MILITARY.) Also you left off your list a frequent false sponsor,

CASTRO.

At the top of the cabal were DULLES and LBJ, BACKED BY MANY

OF THEIR RICH CRONIES, mostly Texas Oil Men but not

exclusively. Dulles and Lyndon made sure Hoover and Nixon

were on board (chief investigator and opposition party). Dulles

recruited CIA operatives for organizational details, headed

by Phillips, Hunt, Conein and Lansdale. This operational team

recruited Cubans, Mafiosi including Ruby, right-wing groups,

etc. AS WELL AS THE PLAN TO FRAME OSWALD AS THE PATSY.

The operational group prepared all the scenarios used. According

to Prouty, the scenarios were planned by Lansdale and Conein,

while Phillips and Hunt were recruiters and operators of the plot.

Lyndon probably arranged participation by the Secret Service

and the MILITARY. Lyndon may have also recruited LUCE,

BUSH, and ZAPRUDER. Lyndon pressured media and he and

Hoover operated the coverup.

Your list has nearly all the SUSPECTS, but fails to connect

them.

Jack

[Paul Kerrigan]

A better term than the Military Industrial Complex would be "John Kennedy's militant reactionary political opposition"

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Perhaps a better name still would be the "intelligence- military-industrial-financial-political-media- criminal" complex" which is what it had become by the time Eisenhower warned the U.S. about it.

[Tim Carroll]

deleted for space

Edited November 5, 2004 by Tim Carroll

[Terry Mauro]

I still believe we should include the banking sector and Wall Street's financial houses [national and international], including the Federal Reserve Board and its members, as well as Allen Dulles' association via his Wall Street law firm. Kennedy was planning on dismantling the Federal Reserve during his next term of office, had he been allowed to run and become re-elected. Where would that have stood Dulles, and the special interest groups? Who's doing business with whom, anyway? Rockefeller is Standard Oil, Chase Manhattan is Rockefeller's bank. You mention the Texas Oilmen. Are they not doing business in the same way as the rest of these people? You need banks to finance your projects, handle your assets. They all come under the umbrella of the Federal Reserve, which isn't even a government entity, it's the bankers' entity. If anything, they should be included due to the Dulles/Wall Street connection.

Edited October 14, 2004 by Terry Mauro

[Ron Ecker]

I think that "national security state" is an established term that is synonymous with military/industrial complex, but is perhaps more descriptive. MIC leaves out "intelligence," which is readily identified with national security.

Ike should more properly have said "military/intelligence/industrial complex," but of course that's too much of a mouthful and would have ruined the speech.