Roger Odisio

The good news, Jeremy, that you have been dragged kicking and screaming into responding to at least some of the points I made, rather than relying on your where's the memo sophistry. The bad news is your responses have been uniformly flops. Roger writes: J: I hope Tom doesn't mind if I jump in here. It's true that not all evidence need be documentary. Roger's problem is that none of the evidence he has offered is documentary. He has built almost his entire argument on inferences from premises, along with a smattering of documentary evidence provided by others. RO: You've stacked both a logical fallacy and a falsehood in this one paragraph. If it's true that not all evidence need be documentary (it is true; glad you have finally admitted that after constantly implying otherwise), it does *not* follow that it's a problem if none of the evidence is documentary. The falsehood: that I have build almost (the usual weasel word) my entire argument on inferences from premises, rather than facts. J: It's Roger's premises which have let him down, beginning with his most fundamental premise. He starts from the assumption that the people who implemented the lone-nut idea after the assassination were the same people who planned to blame a lone nut before the assassination. Well, that's something that doesn't appear to follow from any premises. It needs to be demonstrated, not merely asserted. RO: This is an amazing assertion: that the people who implemented, and presumably planned the murder were not the same people who covered it up. Or if they were, that needs to be demonstrated somehow. I've already answered this but you ignored it in favor of multiple, where is the documentary evidence, responses. But let me ask you first. How did the two separate groups theory of yours work? Did the groups know each other? Did either know what the other was doing? Was there no coordination between them? Or did a whistle blow, right after the murder, and the second team took over for the first? The coverup began within hours of the murder: The message to the planes coming back to DC, the snatching of the body from Parkland, the murder of Oswald Sunday morning, etc. I take this as evidence that a coordinated coverup was preplanned with the murder as one piece and by the same people. It seems axiomatic to me that the killers would not have carried out such a risky and high stakes murder without having a plan in place to cover up their involvement and blame someone else. And also something you never mention: without a plan to get the policy changes that motivated the murder in the first place. Was that part done separately by a third group, Jeremy? Just a few, quick points to expose the lunacy of your claim. Let's see your alternative explanation. J: As I have already pointed out, the simple fact that the JFK assassination was carried out in Dealey Plaza makes it clear that the lone-nut explanation cannot have been part of the plan. RO: Oops, nonsense right out of the shoot. The DP murder as carried out in no way precludes the use of the Oswald story. How could it? They both happened. J: Whoever planned the assassination, using multiple gunmen, would have known that hundreds of spectators would be present; that many of those spectators would be carrying cameras; and that, consequently, there was a good chance that photographic evidence would emerge which would expose the use of multiple gunmen. RO: Yep. You got something right. The killers expected that. J: No rational planners can have set up that particular assassination with the intention of making it look like the work of a lone gunman. If that had been their intention, they wouldn't have carried it out in public using multiple gunmen. They would have either (a) carried it out somewhere much less public than Dealey Plaza, or (b) used an actual lone gunman, but in circumstances which ensured that the lone gunman would be successful. And that's leaving aside their apparent choice of patsy: someone whose personal history screamed International Communist Conspiracy. RO: Mindless speculation that doesn't cover the possibilities: Or (c) the killers would have worked out a coverup plan to conceal their involvement and blame someone else. They would have calculated they could control the WC to frame Oswald, intimidate or kill most of the potential naysayers, and in large part the press would report only what they wanted them to. They concluded they could murder Kennedy in a crossfire and blame Oswald. Making sure they got Kennedy was the killers' top priority. They concluded a crossfire in cramped place like DP was necessary. They would deal with the obvious discrepancy of the Oswald story in their plan for the coverup. A reason why the coverup was crucial and had to be worked pre-murder by the killers. They calculated correctly. That's what happened. Your mystery is just another a false mystery, belied by the facts as we know them.. J: If Roger thinks I've got that wrong, he needs to show why his all-powerful Bad Guys could rationally have carried out an assassination in public using multiple gunmen and expected no evidence of those multiple gunmen to emerge. RO: Because, as usual you slip in another distortion to make your point. Whack that false strawman. The killers expected no such thing. Within their coverup plan, they planned for ways to deal with the discrepancy they had created, as I have already explained and you ignored so you could falsely claim otherwise. J: Now let's look at a selection of Roger's other unjustified assumptions. He writes: Roger is assuming that just because CD Jackson had ties to the CIA, he was doing their bidding throughout the assassination weekend. But all of Jackson's behaviour that weekend was consistent with the commercial interests of Life. If Roger is claiming that Jackson was taking instructions from the CIA, it's up to him to support this claim with actual evidence. RO: Another distortion. It's become clear your approach is to distort what I said and then attack the distortion. Jackson's ties to the CIA are true, a fact you and Tom have tried to minimize. But nowhere in the discussion of what happened to the original film on Saturday did I assume he was doing the CIA's bidding the whole weekend. It's certainly possible, but no such claim was necessary to support what I actually did say. What I said was, when the desire of the officials in DC to use the original film for the briefing boards was made known to Jackson, it's clear he would not have insisted on keeping the original to make stills for Life. He knew that federal govt's interests were far more important than his interest in making stills for the magazine. If you disagree, explain why Jackson would have turned down DC (his superiors in one sense) and give us the reasons he used. Instead of seeking shelter in your requests for documentary evidence that (1) the officials did in fact prefer the original (which you abandon when it suits you), or (2) would have approached Jackson to get it. Again your approach: lets' ignore the plain logic and ask for documents you know do not exist. The idea that all of Jackson's behavior that weekend was consistent with Life's commercial interests is nuts. Life paid $1.5 million (in today's money) for what was a commercial gold mine, then refused to cash it in by showing the film publicly. They were hiding the film, Jeremy, not making a financial return on such a large investment. They knew what the film showed, as I'm sure you understand. When a bootleg copy was shown to the public in 1975 their job of hiding the film was over. They gave it back to Z for $1. You must know this, which makes your claim even more baffling. J: The one thing Jackson did which was clearly in the interests of promoting the lone-nut idea (while also being in Life's commercial interests) was buying the physical film. But there is no obligation to speculate that this was done as part of a plan to alter the film. We can interpret this act in another way, in which Roger's "Johnson and the CIA" became aware that the Zapruder film contradicted the lone-nut story, and thought: hey, let's get our guy Jackson to buy up the film and keep it away from the general public until the fuss dies down! RO: You offer this scenario right after claiming everything Jackson did was in Life's commercial interest! You can't even keep your various false claims straight. It's good that you now acknowledge that the DC officials became aware that the Z film contradicted the Oswald tale they had already put out as the official story. When did this happen, Jeremy? Was it before or after they ordered the briefing boards made for them? Here is another chance for you to explain why these officials weren't interested in using the original film for those boards once they realized it contradicted their story. Why they would have deferred to Life magazine? J: There are two advantages of this scenario over Roger's scenario: It's consistent with the film at NPIC being the Secret Service's first-day copy, which is what the actual evidence indicates. RO: Consistently repeated this falsehood doesn't make it true. You have no evidence that the film delivered to the NPIC that Saturday came from the SS, other than the couriers said they were from the SS. That may be your most laughable assertion. It's certainly not believable evidence of anything. J: Life buying up the film and keeping it largely out of public view for 12 years is what actually happened. We know that this actually happened because a ton of actual evidence exists to show that Life bought the film and kept it largely out of public view for 12 years. RO: This is probably your strangest assertion. You're verifying the point I just made, which of course can't be denied, that Life buried the film from public view! Which also shows your claim the Life was acting solely in their own commercial interest is false. J: Actual evidence exists for this simple scenario, but, so far, there is no actual evidence to support Roger's more convoluted 'the CIA grabbed the film and altered it at Hawkeye Works' scenario, which is entirely speculative. The reason Roger's scenario is entirely speculative is that it follows from an unjustified assumption. RO: Yep. There are no memos that show what the CIA did. Is there some point you're making here, knowing there would be no such memos even if true? J: If, as all the evidence indicates, the only film those officials had access to was the Secret Service's first-day copy, there's no need to speculate that they discussed using the original film at NPIC. RO: Another whopper. The govt officials responsible for investigating the murder only had access to the SS copy! False. They knew Life had the original. It's also true their needs for the original were more important than Life's Why would they have deferred to Life? J: If Roger wants us to believe that any officials insisted on inspecting the original version of the film, he needs to supply some actual evidence to that effect, and stop making stuff up. As I pointed out earlier, there's no reason to suppose that any memos to that effect would have been censored, since a desire to see the original film would not imply that anything untoward would happen to the film as a result. Where are those memos? Plenty of internal memos and other documents from that weekend survive and are available online. Has Roger even looked for any documentary evidence to support his claims? Roger has supplied no documentary evidence that anyone in Washington insisted on viewing the original film and was not satisfied with only viewing a copy. Until he does, there is no reason to believe that claim. It's just empty speculation, based on empty assumptions. RO: More where is the CIA memo blather that you never get tired repeating. Including this time the claim that the memos that showed the officials wanted to use the original in their study would still exist, because they would imply nothing "untoward". Somehow you forget that such a memo would contradict the story accepted for decades, which you still believe, that the original went straight to Chicago and only there. Because it raises the question I am asking: why then, if they preferred the original didn't the CIA take it for the purposes of there much more important federal investigation. Such a memo likely would have exposed the whole thing about briefing boards being done for those officials (which is why they wanted the original), also submerged for decades. I could go on but the idea that a memo showing officials wanted the original film would have caused all kinds of problems for their cover story, and yours, that Life had the original the whole weekend. The point is, you spout all of this as if govt officials wanting to use the original for their briefing boards does not flow logically from the facts that the original film was superior for their purpose, it existed, and Life had it. That's what you must explain, at a minimum. J: And finally: That's what positive evidence is: documentary evidence. No such evidence exists that anything other than the Secret Service's first-day copy was taken to NPIC over that weekend. RO: Amazing. You're back to claiming that what you call "positive evidence" (whatever that is) consists only of documentary evidence. False. Completing a full circle of nonsense.

You can claim I haven't offered any evidence to support my account because, it's now clear, you don't know what evidence is. Evidence is *any* information on which a judgement or conclusion may be based. You think to be evidence all such information must be documented, contained in a document, in order to be considered something on which a conclusion may be based. The foolishness of your definition is made clear simply by realizing it lead you to insist on documentation from the CIA in this case. Besides being a fundamental misunderstanding of what evidence is. This is a distortion. I explained who Jackson was. A long time CIA asset, still one at the time (not someone who worked for the CIA "at one point"). I said it was a *fact* that the CIA had much more important reasons for using the original film than did Life. I asserted he would have no trouble understanding that and would not have standed in the way of a CIA request for the original. If you disagree, explain why. If you think Jackson would have rejected a CIA request for the original film, explain why. Don't try instead to cut off a discussion of this central topic by screaming speculation as you been repeatedly doing. Respond to my actual points. You offered a few "leads" to inconsequential rabbit holes that mostly divert attention from the central question of what happened to the original film that Saturday. Everyone involved, not just the SS, was aware of the quality difference between the original and a copy. And the White House and CIA, after seeing the briefing boards Sunday morning, were also quickly aware that the film contradicted their Oswald story, if they had not already known that It's a fact that the govt officials asked for briefing boards to help them see what happened. That means that these officials would have discussed which version of the film they would need to do the boards. If you think that is speculation, please explain why the version of the film would not have mattered to them. Why it would not have been discussed. Why they would have been satisfied to let Life have use of the original for their far less important task of publishing stills in their magazine. It follows that these officials would have decided using the original film for the boards was clearly preferable. For the reasons I have offered, which you have ignored. But not disputed. If you disagree, if you think the govt officials would have been satisfied using a copy, please explain why. What good would a copy have done them if the boards revealed their Oswald story, already out on the streets, was wrong, which the boards quickly and clearly did. False. Once the boards were finished early Sunday morning, Art Lundahl, the head of NPIC, took them to brief McCone, who then took them to brief Johnson. There is no record of the boards being used to brief the SS. The boards were done for Johnson and the CIA, not the SS. How could you have thought otherwise? No, the SS copy is the only version *you know about* that was in DC at the time the boards were done. Your claim is based on the fact you have not found a CIA document admitting they had gotten the original from LIfe and sent it to their NPIC lab to be used for the boards. An obviously worthless basis for such a claim, alongside your acceptance of the word of the couriers that they were from the SS. It's hard to decide which is more worthless. Tom : However, is it possible that the original film was diverted to NPIC that weekend? When would that have occurred? RO: That Saturday. Tom: All the evidence suggests that the original Z-film was taken from Zapruder by Richard Stolley on the morning of the 23rd and sent to Chicago. In Chicago, black-and-white copies of the film were made, and used to prepare the Nov. 29th issue of Life. We also have corroborating accounts from Stolley and Ray Rowan that the original film was sent to New York at some point on Saturday evening or Sunday, and shown to Life executives including CD Jackson. The evidence suggests that after viewing the film, Jackson reached out to Stolley’s boss, or something like that, and told him to obtain full rights to the film. Stolley did say the film sent to New York was a copy, but it is reasonable to assume he was incorrect on that point. RO: Why did Jackson order Life to buy the full rights to the film? You imply it was because he saw that the film contradicted the Oswald story, which would have been apparent from a first gen copy as well as the original. If Life was acting as a corporation entirely separate from the CIA, did Jackson also order Life at that time to bury the film from public view for as long as possible after buying full rights? Which turned out to be almost 12 years. If so, why? No, that Stolley was wrong is a reasonable assumption only to you. It is more reasonable to assume Life made copies of the original it got from Zapruder and once the original was turned over to the CIA, they sent a copy to their New York headquarters, while keeping a copy to make the stills for their magazine. Using a copy would have been sufficient for both of Life's purposes. A copy was not sufficient for the briefing boards for several reasons as I have explained more than once. Again, if you disagree, please explain why, rather than merely offering your boilerplate claim I am merely speculating. Tom: New York gets the original film ~400 miles closer to NPIC than Chicago, but so far we do not have any evidence that the original film ever made it to Washington. RO: You have no reliable evidence that the original was sent to New York rather than to the NPIC. Tom: The logical thing to do here before proceeding would be a deep dive into the Z-film in New York that weekend, to see if we can find additional evidence. Chris Scally provided quotes from two books that mention CD Jackson’s reaction upon viewing the film on Sunday. We should check the footnotes and see if there’s any additional info. We also should look for press reports, statements from Life officials, and any documents that mention or allude to the New York trip. However, assuming the trail ends here, we’ll need to speculate to get the original film to NPIC. Since we do not have a full chain of custody, we can claim it is possible that the film was brought from New York to Washington, or to Washington directly and back to New York to be viewed at Life’s offices on Sunday, or something along those lines. So best case scenario, we have a valid argument that the original film at NPIC cannot be completely rejected based on the available evidence, but we have no positive evidence it actually occurred - and substantial evidence suggesting the film at NPIC was the SS first-day copy sent to Washington. RO: We have "no positive evidence that original film showed up at NPIC", in your view, because you will only accept a document from the CIA acknowledging such. A transparently foolish, and dare I say possibly disingenuous, position since you must know such documentation does not exist Tom: A reasonable conclusion would be the following: 1. The evidence strongly suggests that the film studied at NPIC was the SS copy sent to Washington. 2. There is a non-zero chance that the original film was obtained somehow from Life and brought to NPIC. However, barring additional evidence, we must remain skeptical. We certainly cannot present this theory as fact, and should acknowledge that our theory is likely incorrect. The next step should be to perform an exhaustive study of the documentary record to look for any corroboration. If we find any, we might have a decent case. If not, all we can do is speculate. RO: The necessity of performing "an exhaustive study of the documentary record" looking for CIA paper admitting they flew the original to their NPIC lab that Saturday is a precise statement of your myopia. You may wish to define "evidence" in such a way as to lead you there. That's your prerogative. As I said, you can do that only by misunderstanding the very nature of what evidence is. Edited 30 minutes ago by Tom Gram

The question of whether the film that appeared at NPIC on Saturday and Sunday was the original or a copy came up because you and Jeremy claimed you knew it was a copy and therefore film alteration at NPIC or Hawkeye Works would not have made sense. In fact, it's now clear you know no such thing. "All the evidence suggests" the film was brought to the NPIC that Saturday by the SS, often repeated by you, is not true. That Saturday the officials in DC investigating the murder ordered briefing boards to be made to clarify what happened. Early Sunday McCone and then Johnson were briefed on what the boards showed. Unless you think that Oswald or someone else alone firing from the 6th floor murdered Kennedy, the boards must have contradicted the Oswald story. Oswald did it alone was already the official story, spread from at least the White House Situation Room and FBI. After the briefing, both men knew the official story was false, if they had not known it before. That's true even if neither had prior knowledge of the murder and were not involved. If, however, one or both were involved, they would have already have known the film would contradict their Oswald story. At his point we need not settle that question. The reasons are clear why the DC officials wanted the original film to be used in the boards. Neither you nor Jeremy have disputed the fact that using the original film would produce clearer results for the boards. Neither men being briefed could have known the extent of what was missing by using a copy, unless they had also seen boards using the original. There was no reason for them to settle for using a copy, unless it could be shown that someone else, like Life magazine, had a greater need for the original than they, the officials responsible for determining what happened. I'm aware of no one, including you, who has even tried to make that case. There was, in fact, another compelling reason to want the original film for the boards. When it became clear the film contradicted the Oswald story, as it did, it would be necessary to have the original while deciding what to do about the discrepancy. The original film arrived in Chicago almost 12 hours before Brugioni received some version of the film at NPIC. The CIA had its own planes. The film could have been sent to the CIA's labs in DC. Therefore their was a choice to be made that Saturday afternoon: should the original film remain with Life to make stills for its magazine or be transferred to the CIA labs for briefing boards for the officials awaiting them. The person making the decision for Life was its publisher, CD Jackson, who had done work for the CIA for decades. The CIA's argument was clear. One day after the murder with so much uncertainty about what happened and by whom, determining the answer to the important questions was, at its base, a matter of national security. Jackson understood that. Incredibly, earlier in the discussion you actually denied there was a decision to be made. You asked for the documents proving it ever happened! Up until this point, nothing I have said is speculation. I have offered a set of facts that formed the setting for deciding who would use the original film. These facts, by the way, are *evidence* in considering the question before us. All evidence does not take the form of documents. And all documents are not reliable evidence. You ask for "a plausible, evidence-based alternate scenario" to your claim the the SS sent a copy to the NPIC on Saturday. I just gave it to you. From this set of facts it's obvious the decision was easy. The CIA's need for the original film was compelling, much more important than Life's need. Life could make do with a copy that week to make the black and white stills that appeared in its first edition that hit the streets that Tuesday. Jackson would have no trouble understanding whose need was more compelling. But it's clear you don't consider the facts I laid out to be evidence. You follow your request for evidence with "Post the documents" as if that's the only form evidence can take in your view. It's not. This is especially true when some of the documents you ask for would have to be supplied by the CIA. You must know they don't exist. But wait, you say. Against all of that above, you know, in fact, that it was the SS who sent its copy to the NPIC lab that Saturday. And to HW early Sunday. And back to the NPIC later on Sunday. It was not the CIA sending a film to its own facilities. Because the couriers with the film said they were from the SS!! I gently suggested, twice, that you think about the CIA's well known principles that it lives by--the compartmentalization of duties, and the need to know. Believe it or not, some, perhaps many, of the people who had a role in planning, carrying out, and covering up the murder did not know the whole story; only their part. Nothing unusual about that. It's Standard Operating Procedure. Not only does "Bill Smith" claiming he is from the SS not mean anything, there is evidence he was lying. He was not from the SS. According to McMahon "Bill" took an active hand in picking frames to enlarge for the boards. McMahon thought the film showed many more shots than three and from different directions. "Bill" ignored him and chose the frames to enlarge. In fact some of McMahon's work doesn't appear on the extant boards at NARA, and other things were added after McMahon left. "Bill" told McMahon he wasn't to tell anyone what he had done, and if he was asked by anyone about his work that night he was to refer that person to the Captain whose name I have forgotten. Why would an SS agent do any of those things? To repeat what I said in an earlier post: you are free define what you think evidence is in doing your research. Just don't try to force me to use your restricted definition. I think it's inadequate, missing much that is important. And don't claim every inference I draw from facts known to everyone as evidence-free speculation. You have failed to contradict that where the actions of the parties that weekend lead us. The original film was diverted that Saturday to the CIA's NPIC lab so briefing boards could be made to show officials clearly what happened.

You admit, as you must, that a copy of the Z Film does not provide the same clarity as the original. I said that's a logical reason for the officials responsible for finding out what happened to want to use the original for their briefing boards. Moreover why would they willingly use inferior information, since they couldn't possibly know whether what they have missed by using a copy was crucial or not, without knowing what was in the original? Moreover, unless you want to claim the murder was done by Oswald, or somebody by themselves from the 6th floor, you must admit the original Z film contradicted the Oswald story officials were already spreading (from the WH Situation Room, e.g). As such, that admission must be part of your analysis, as much as you want to seriously confine things to what official, surviving documents say that were left behind for you to find. Officials from the WH and CIA would have to consider that contradiction and its impact on their story. They would need the original film to deal with that were they to find such evidence on their briefing boards. You have no response to either points, no countervailing points to offer. Points of logic to you are simply speculation, unsupported assumptions from which we can learn nothing. Instead, as always, you do two things on this point. 1. Seize on my use of the word "if" in my explanation of the second reason (deleting other parts of the sentence, thereby distorting it to make it seem as if I'm merely offering some contingency), in order to claim what I said is speculation unsupported by anything. Which you say allows to ignore the point. Of course it doesn't, but such a comment allows you to slip away. 2. Ask where are the documents that prove that the WH and CIA were considering any such thing? Secure in the knowledge there won't be any such documents. Or, if there ever had been, they would not survive to today for obvious reasons. On top of that, on the topic of who delivered the film to the CIA labs, you ask: "Can Roger give us a plausible reason why CIA officers would tell other CIA employees at a CIA plant that they were actually Secret Service officers? What would they hope to gain by doing that?" To discredit the idea of simply, gullibly, believing who the couriers said they were. After I had just answered that! As if you have no idea how the CIA functions, and never heard of their basic principles of the need to know and compartmentalization. Feigning such ignorance to try avoid questions here, but it does you no favors. None of this is a surprise. But In constantly repeating the same response built around the question, where is you documentary evidence, no matter the point raised, your posts have descended into self-parody.

Chris, Are you suggesting that Horne, like Jeremy, had no inkling that "Bill Smith from the SS" was an alias when he checked SS records? Or that Horne was checking the records out of caution to try to verify his expectation the name was false. In the latter case, you are correct. I was too flippant to put researcher in quotes and wrong to say he was surprised to not find the name.

J: The question I asked was: Why should "Johnson and the CIA" have assumed that a first-generation copy would not have contained enough detail to determine the number and direction of the shots? Roger hasn't answered this. Of course the original film would reveal more detail than a copy, but Roger has given us no reason to doubt that a first-generation copy would be sufficient for discovering basic information such as the number and direction of shots. RO: My clear answer was, there was no reason for the White House and CIA, as part of an official investigation, to even consider using a copy when they didn't have to. You have acknowledged the original would reveal more detail. How would they have known that if they used a copy the detail you acknowledge would be missed wasn't crucial? I gave a second reason for them to prefer the original, which you have ignored. If they had any reason to suspect the Z film contradicted their Oswald story, which it did, and which they likely would have expected, they needed possession of the original film to deal with that problem. Altering or destroying a copy would accomplish nothing while Life still had the original and was going to publish stills from it. J: Combine that with what the documentary evidence tells us: on the Saturday afternoon, high-ups in Washington had access to one version of the Zapruder film, namely the Secret Service's first-day copy. The fact that it was Secret Service officers (and not CIA officers) who brought the film to NPIC, and Secret Service officers (not CIA officers) who took it away afterwards, strongly suggests that the film in question was in fact the Secret Service's first-day copy. RO: Wow! Your evidence for the "fact" that both couriers were from the SS is..... that's what they said! Including the comically named "Bill Smith". Which sent a "researcher" off to try find Bill on a SS roster and was puzzled when he couldn't find him. That's your idea of the "research" that you want me to perform. Have you heard of the principles of compartmentalization and the need to know that the CIA lives by. None of the photo analysts that weekend had a need to know who the couriers were, who they worked for, or in McMahon's case what film he was working on (McMahon said the word Zapruder was never used in front of him). J: If, as Roger proposes, the CIA had somehow obtained the original Zapruder film and conveyed it to Washington on the Saturday, surely we would expect to find CIA officers taking the film to the CIA's very own NPIC, and CIA officers taking it away again afterwards. But we don't, do we? Since the relevant officers were actually from the Secret Service, the only reasonable conclusion is that they were bringing and taking away the Secret Service's own copy. RO: Yep, we would expect CIA staff to have delivered the film to persons ready to work on it at their NPIC lab. And to HW too. You've given no reason to suspect anyone else delivered it. J: The reason I keep going on about documentary evidence is that, if Roger wants to propose an alternative scenario, he really needs to do more than speculate about what he thinks "Johnson and the CIA" might have wanted. You can't build a case based only on speculation, when a plausible alternative case exists which is based on solid documentary evidence. RO: You haven't made the case that using a copy for the boards was a plausible alternative. It wasn't. J: So, if Roger wants to persuade anyone that the original Zapruder film was in Washington on the Saturday evening, he needs to produce actual evidence that supports that claim. Obviously we can't expect to find a CIA memo detailing that this particular CIA plane flew from Chicago to Washington, and that this particular CIA agent had the film in his hand luggage. But we might expect to find some trace in the documentary record that "Johnson and the CIA" wanted to obtain the original film rather than a copy on the Saturday. Has anyone even bothered to trawl through the records, looking for something like this? If not, why not? RO: Looking for a" trace" of "documentary evidence" that the White House and CIA wanted to use the original film, not a copy, to make briefing boards is a fool's errand. It's obvious that's what they wanted. There is no need to verify that with "documents". You have failed to offer any reason why they would have preferred, or even settled for, using a copy. J: Roger's scenario is that the assassination involved multiple gunmen in order to make sure that JFK was killed, and that before the assassination it was decided that the blame would be placed on a lone nut. That sort of makes sense, until you work out that staging such an assassination in public isn't consistent with blaming it beforehand on a lone nut. As I pointed out earlier, if you decide to stage an assassination in front of hundreds of spectators (which there were), you can expect dozens of those spectators to capture images of the assassination (which they did), and that there was a good chance that some of those images would expose the assassination as the work of more than one gunmen (which is what happened). If you want to use multiple gunmen to assassinate someone in front of hundreds of spectators, dozens of whom would be taking photos and home movies, you can expect evidence to emerge that would at least suggest that multiple gunmen were involved. You would only do this if (a) you didn't care that the assassination might look like a conspiracy or (b) you actively wanted the assassination to look like a conspiracy. To look at the problem from a different direction: if you want to blame a lone nut beforehand, you would either (a) use an actual lone gunman with better skills, a better-quality rifle, and a better line of sight than Oswald is supposed to have had, or (b) use multiple gunmen and stage the assassination somewhere very much less public than Dealey Plaza. What you wouldn't do is stage the assassination in a way that produces photographic evidence that more than one gunman was involved, and then go around trying to clean up the photographic record afterwards. Not only would this have involved unnecessary work and almost certainly not have succeeded, but there was no guarantee that photographs or home movies might come to light in the future, exposing any photo-alteration. In short, whoever was behind the assassination can only have staged it in Dealey Plaza in order to make it look like a conspiracy (and chose a patsy whose personal history made the conspiracy look as though it originated with the Cuban or Soviet regimes). And if they wanted to make it look like a conspiracy, they wouldn't have cared what the Zapruder film or any other photographic evidence showed. RO: This is really bizarre. You claim the killers could only have staged the murder in DP if they wanted to make it look like a conspiracy. Well they did stage the murder there and have spent the last 60 years denying there was a conspiracy. Does that convince you that your point is nonsense? You further claim that the killers would not have created the discrepancy between their story and what actually happened because that would have involved "unnecessary work" and "almost certainly not have succeeded". Haven't you noticed? The plan and the coverup *has* succeeded for 60 years. I've explained some of the coverup things were done to achieve that success, and true to form, you haven't addressed any of them. J: To get back to the topic of this thread, the notion that Oswald was chosen as a patsy before the assassination as an integral part of the plot (which may well be the case), is not consistent with the claim that the original Zapruder film was examined at NPIC and altered at Hawkeye Works (for which there is no good evidence anyway). RO: It couldn't be more consistent because, as I said, choosing Oswald as the patsy created the need to alter the Z film that contradicted their story. J: Of course not. If anyone (a) had control of the film and (b) wanted to completely eliminate any incriminating evidence in the film, the only sure way to do so would be to destroy the film. The fact that the film was not destroyed, and survives to this day in the national archives, shows that the people who controlled the assassination either (i) didn't control the film or (ii) didn't care about any incriminating evidence it contained. There is no justification for assuming that some all-powerful Bad Guys controlled everything from start to finish. RO: Silly me. I assumed you would understand that altering the film was the better option than destroying it because altering it left them with a film they could claim was original, and there was no need to explain what happened to the film, which much of the world knew about and wanted to see. I actually expected you to understand that and abandon your false argument.

Jonathon, Is it your plan to follow me around the board and quickly cover up what I wrote so that only your name appears on the front page? Which is a sure sign to people to ignore the thread. How else can I explain the constant flow of inane and in this case irrelevant liners you post each time? The pattern seems unmistakable.

Thanks for this, Chuck. It leaves those who are unable or unwilling to engage with the facts and analysis presented here little choice but to attack Horne. I was particularly struck by Horne's citing of that fabulous book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn that explains the difficulty of overthrowing an entrenched paradigm, or set of ideas.

I'm always glad when you don't completely hide behind your exhortation to produce the CIA documents that prove what they did. But instead try to respond to at least some of the particulars of what I am suggesting. J: There's no reason to assume that "using only the original film for the boards would suffice." Why should "Johnson and the CIA" have assumed that a first-generation copy would not have contained enough detail to determine the number and direction of the shots? RO: There is no reason to believe that Johnson and the CIA would have assumed a copy was good enough. How could they know that? In fact there is no reason to think they had any reason to make any assumption at all about the quality of a copy, and every reason to think they would have wanted to use the original for the boards they had ordered to be made. They were in charge of the official investigation to find out what happened. As I have explained and you have ignored, the benefits of using the original for the boards in their situation, compared to using a copy, are clear. The idea that they would have settled for a copy when they could use the original is ludicrous on its face. J: Since the only version of the film within hundreds of miles of Washington on the Saturday afternoon was the Secret Service's first-day copy, a copy was all they had access to. Until Roger provides actual evidence (i.e. not speculation) that the original was sent to Washington, or that "Johnson and the CIA" or any of their minions believed that only an original film would do, there is no good reason to believe that the film at NPIC was anything other than the Secret Service's first-day copy. RO: This is false. As you know the original was in Chicago almost 12 hours before Brugioni began working on the boards. It was no problem to send it to the CIA's lab in DC. Shorn of the falsehood, all you have here is another claim that you won't believe that happened without documentation from the CIA to corroborate it. Evidence you know does not, and could not, exist. J: Roger is implying that "the planners", a term which seems to be synonymous with "Johnson and the CIA", had intended as part of their pre-assassination plan to blame the assassination on a lone-nut patsy. RO: There is no question that the planners of the murder would, as an integral part of the coverup, have settled on blaming a patsy before going ahead with the murder. See my discussion about that today with Matt. J: But if the blame-it-on-a-lone-gunman-patsy element was decided in advance, it made no sense to have JFK eliminated in public by multiple gunmen, in front of hundreds of people who might capture images which contradicted the lone-gunman story. For the same reason, it made no sense to try to alter any of the films or photographs, because there could have been any number of other films or photographs in existence which might have exposed the alteration. If, on the other hand, the blame-it-on-a-lone-gunman-patsy element was only decided after the event, on the Saturday afternoon once news of Oswald's arrest reached Washington (Roger mentions "the message from the White House Situation Room a few hours after the murder"), the people who made that decision cannot have been the people who instigated a public assassination using more than one gunman. It isn't credible that the same people would have been happy for spectators to capture evidence of multiple gunmen, only to change their minds when someone gets arrested in Dallas less than an hour and a half after the assassination. In both of these scenarios, there would have been no reason to alter the Zapruder film, or indeed any of the other films and photographs. That's why no good evidence exists that any such alteration happened. RO: So, you're willing to accept that the actual murder, as captured by the Z film, contradicted the Oswald story they advanced, so you can argue against the idea that the story was part of the coverup plan devised before the murder. While simultaneously arguing there was no reason to alter Z film and so it was not done. (I'm assuming you have abandoned your original assertion that the planners would have destroyed the Z film instead of trying to alter it). Let's review. The killers' top priority was to make sure JFK didn't escape the ambush. That's why they set up multiple shooters firing from different directions. Concealing the killers' involvement was not enough and in fact they didn't do a very good job of that. They needed someone else to blame as part of the coverup plan to divert attention from themselves. This is the classic story we have been offered in other political murders of the 60s--King and Bobby for example. One reason for its use over and over again was probably the success that was had with covering up the JFLA. The Oswald story became the sole focus of the WC investigation. No other considerations or parties were considered. The WC's job was to complete the frame of Oswald. The planners of course were aware of the glaring discrepancy they had created by blaming Oswald. Which required them to thoroughly plan beforehand a series of steps to try to cover it up. * Kill Oswald before he could talk to a lawyer; they couldn't allow a trial * Because there would be no trial, create a commission that could be relied on the frame Oswald. * Snatch the body at Parkland to control the autopsy * Yes, alter the Z film which had captured the discrepancy. * Countless other smaller actions designed to blunt the emergence of any alternatives to the Oswald story. E.g., the 1967 CIA memo to its field offices suggesting the argument that critics of the WC hoax were offering only unsupported conspiracy *theories*, while the WC had already explained all the facts. You may recognize that argument. In creating this discrepancy the planners calculated that the things they could do, among others I haven't mentioned, together with their control of the major media, would be likely to let them get away with the murder. Turns out, they were right.

But the idea to frame Oswald had to have been settled on some time before the murder (we probably don't need to know exactly when). Designating a patsy along with concealing the planners' involvement were both crucial elements of the coverup. An essential part of designating a patsy was to decide what to do with him after the murder. In this case that meant killing Oswald before he could talk to a lawyer, and replacing the trial with a commission that could be counted on to frame him. All of these issues and their resolution could not wait to be handled on the fly after the murder. The planners were professionals.

Or, if the critic avoids grappling with the particulars of a theory, but instead continually asks for documentary evidence of said particulars, when he knows such evidence doesn't exist, and he knows why, then--draw your own conclusions about the value of such an approach. The latest example that stands out: the clamor for documentary evidence to show that CD Jackson ever discussed with his contacts at the CIA the conflicting interest Life and the CIA had in using the original of the Z film for their own purposes.

Yes, that reference to Oswald as the patsy had to have been one of the latest. Together with the even clearer message from the White House Situation Room that afternoon explicitly naming Oswald as the assassin to the group of officials on the plane back to DC. But it couldn't have been the first. Had the killers waited until after the murder to decide on Oswald as the patsy, that means the plan to kill him before he could talk to a lawyer mustn't have been developed until then or later as well. I assume everyone understands that before the murder the killers had to have had a plan to conceal their involvement. That's not enough. Blaming someone else--Oswald--is an essential element to such a plan. In fact, as we can see, blaming Oswald took center stage in the coverup. Framing Oswald, while ignoring, destroying and lying about contrary information, was the focus of the WC, the official investigative body of the murder. They never considered other, readily available information that might have led them to where the killers were hiding. The killers didn't even do a very good job concealing their own involvement as the failed attempt to alter the Z film and their subsequent attempts to hide it from public view illustrate. Yet, 60 years later, they have gotten away with it. In short, there is no mystery as to when the killers decided to blame Oswald as part of their coverup plan.

This may be your worst post yet, Jeremy, tho admittedly there is lots of competition for that honor. Of course I'm sayng that Johnson and the CIA wanted briefing boards prepared that Saturday in order to see if the Z film contradicted the Oswald story that had already started to put out. And if so to what extent. I've said, several times. that's one reason why using only the original film for the boards would suffice. Now you're feigning ignorance about when the Oswald story was first floated, leading to your usual cry for documentary evidence. There were a number of statements by officials implicating Oswald that afternoon. But the clearest, the one I have focused on, is the message from the White House Situation Room a few hours after the murder to the officials on the planes coming back to DC, including AF1, fingering Oswald as the lone assassin. The message was referenced in Theodore White's The Making of the President, 1964. According to Vince Salandria the party on AF 1 learned that "there was no conspiracy, learned of the identity of Oswald and his arrest" The message was also mentioned in Pierre Salinger's book, With Kennedy. Not only was the message form the Situation Room false, no one there could have possibly known it was true. Let me quote from Salandria's famous speech delivered 35 years after the murder, The JFKA: A False Mystery Concealing State Crimes. The message from the SR was "conclusive evidence of high level US government guilt. The first announcement of Oswald as the lone assassin, before there was any evidence against him, and while there was overwhelmingly convincing evidence of a conspiracy, had come from the White House Situation Room. Only the assassins could have made that premature declaration that Oswald was the assassin." He concludes :"Bundy {who was running the SR} was indirectly instructing the Presidential party and the cabinet members that he was speaking for the killers....They were being circuitously informed that the assassination had been committed by a level of US power that was above and beyond punishment." Whew! that last part has turned out to be true, hasn't it Jeremy? Where you no doubt see unsupported speculation from Salandria, I see insight worthy of pursuing. Anyway, to answer your false mystery, the messages from the WHSR establish that the killers had settled for the Oswald story early on. In fact it's clear to me that the murder would not have proceeded without a story in place the planners had agreed on, to among other things, hide their involvement, blame someone else, and get the policy changes that motivated the murder in the first place. This moth eaten false mystery has been answered in several ways many times. Maybe I'll circle back some day to talk about it. In any case, it's clear you're not as smart as the killers were.

Tom: Yes the government was interested in the Z-film. That’s why copies were made and given to the SS and FBI. RO: Classic off-topic diversion. I didn't say "the government", Tom. I said the two persons in the government with the official responsibility to find out what happened--the new president and the director of the CIA--had, by definition, the most interest in what the Z film showed. It was already clear the Z film was a crucial record of the murder. They had the clearest and most urgent need to know what it showed. McCone ordered Lundahl to have briefing boards done *for him* (not the SS or FBI) that Saturday night. When they were finished Lundahl briefed McCone about what they showed. McCone then briefed Johnson. No one is disputing that 2 of the three copies originally made for Zapruder went to the SS and the FBI. And Zapruder kept the third copy to exchange it later for the original when Life returned with the original in a few days after the agreement. copies went Do you see the difference between the needs for the film of the president and the CIA director vs those of the SS and FBI? At that point on Saturday, the copies were sufficient for the purposes of the SS and FBI. But copies were not sufficient for the president and the CIA to do their jobs. They needed to use the film original when enlarging individual frames 40 times. Moreover if some or all of these officials had any reason to believe the Z film might contradict the Oswald story they were already going with, they needed to have the original to try to figure what to do about it. Doing anything with a copy while Life had the original would make no sense. I've already made these points. Neither you or Jeremy has seriously challenged them. Instead you both have mostly sought refuge in your claim that what I'm saying is nothing but worthless speculation. That Saturday there were two entities that wanted to use the film original for their own purposes. Life, who had paid a lot of money to buy the original film from Zapruder. And the president and CIA who needed to use the original to enlarge key frames in make briefing boards so they could see what happened. Your caustic attempt to dismiss that as an issue, or any contact between the CIA and presumably CD Jackson at Life about it as "some side discussion" is not credible. The use of the original film was a central issue between them that had to be resolved. The CIA knew Life had bought the film original from Zapruder. When they made the decision to do briefing boards, do you imagine the topic of whether they needed the original film for that purpose never came up? Of course they knew they needed to original film for the boards. CD Jackson, a long time CIA asset was running Life, at the time. He was well versed in the national security implications of the murder, particularly in the midst of the uncertainty about what happened just one day before. He would have no trouble understanding that the needs of the president and his cronies at the CIA for the film original far outweighed those of his magazine to publish some stills from the film in a few days. No, the question of who gets the use of the original film that weekend is not some side issue. It's a central question. It's highly likely, however, no extended discussion was really necessary. The answer was as obvious to Jackson as it was to the CIA. Sandy tried to explain to you that what I have offered is a hypothesis. You know, a premise that accounts for a set of facts that can used as a basis for further investigation. Seeing that the technical debate about alteration was unlikely to be resolved soon or to everyone's satisfaction, I offered a logical, alternative explanation for the claim of alteration. I did so in the hope that there would be a discussion about the points I made. You and Jeremy have shown no interest in that. Only on a few occasions have you even tried to deal with the substance of what I said. Instead your comments are loaded with the question where is my documentary evidence for each thing I said. In doing so, you have tried to ignore the fact that most times you are asking for documentation by the CIA of what they have done. Your questions answer themselves. You must know that. But you keep asking them in lieu of addressing the substance of what I said. In fact the few times either of you have tried to address substance, you response has been lame. Well, if the McMahon group did produce briefing boards at the NPIC (something you could not deny) it was probably done sometime in December, Jeremy said. What was done at the two CIA labs that weekend? Nothing, Jeremy says. Maybe a few staff wandered by and then went home. Did Brugioni even do the boards as he claimed? They no longer exist. His detailed accounting of that seminal event in his life was made as an old man decades afterward. Maybe he was misremembering. Maybe, Jeremy said, he just wandered by the NPIC that weekend and left without doing anything. Was there any documented evidence that the film even was sent to HW? That place that no one but the CIA knew even existed and whos very name was classified until 2010. Where is the CIA's documentation that they sent the film there that weekend you ask? Maybe your latest claim takes the cake. No one should believe there was an issue between the CIA and CD Jackson about which entity would use the film original, nor of course any discussion of such, unless the CIA has produced documents verifying it. You weren't supposed to know about that Tom, or any attempt to divert the original film to the NPIC that Saturday. You have a right to decide for yourself what constitutes proper research. But don't keep trying to insist I must accept the boundaries you have created for yourselves. Particularly when your search for documented evidence in this case is so transparently and falsely manufactured--looking for documents that for the most part you have to know do not exist. Tom: If you want anyone to believe there was some side discussion about obtaining and analyzing the original Z-film that weekend, you need to produce some actual evidence. RO: A clear statement of your myopia. Tom: Otherwise Jeremy is right. Your argument is pure speculation and assumptions. You’ll never convince anyone who isn’t already convinced. RO: It's become obvious that I won't convince you and Jeremy of anything. But not because all I'm offering is speculation and assumptions. What follows is a mind boggling account of what you think real research consists of. Just a few comments. Tom: So even though it looks like DeLoach was working from erroneous information, this is actual documentary evidence that high-level officials in the FBI and Justice Department were in discussions about retaining the original Zapruder film as evidence on the 23rd. RO: No. Life had the original. I thought you understood that. Zapruder had kept a copy. I thought you understood that. Tom: If I were making the “discussion” argument, I’d also include what happened with the WC. Zapruder told the FBI that the 16mm original was “much clearer” than the 8mm copies: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=62284#relPageId=21 When the WC saw this FBI report, they reached out to Life to obtain the original film for microscopic study, or something like that, because they thought the original would be more valuable as evidence. I don’t have the internal WC memo handy but it’s in the same google drive link I posted a few comments back with the Life contract. RO: So you conclude the WC wanted to original Z film to study because they thought it was superior to using a copy! I'm stunned . That's the same reason the CIA wanted the original with which to make briefing boards at its NPIC lab. Which you dismiss because, unlike with the WC, there is no memo from the CIA explaining that. It's obvious, isn't it, that the CIA had a genuine and compelling reason for wanting to use the original film to make its briefing boards. Contrast that with the WC, created to conceal as much of the truth as it could, and instead frame Oswald. Tom: My point is it is a lot more convincing to make your case with actual research and evidence vs. some variation of “this happened cause I said so”. If you want to get the original Z-film to Washington by Saturday night, repeating the same assumption-filled mantra over and over again isn’t really going to cut it. RO: This sort of claim that I expected you to believe, or at least treat seriously, the scenario I offer simply because I said so, should be beneath you, Tom. You know it's not true. That's not what I said, nor could it be implied from anything I did say.

Chris, What you offer here is an explanation of why the SS would have been willing to send its copy of the Z film to the CIA's lab at the NPIC that Saturday. If that's what the CIA wanted. I think it's pretty clear, however, that the CIA preferred to use the original film currently held by Life magazine to make its briefing boards. Not only because the original was a superior source, but, as I explained, having the original allowed them the options of dealing with any problems to their Oswald story exposed by the original film. Using a copy to make the boards while Life still had the original would have foreclosed any attempts to alter that copy, if that is all they had. Which is one reason Jeremy seized on the idea that the CIA had only the SS's copy to use to make its boards.