Tom Dunkin

[James Richards]

Morales was still at JM/WAVE at the time of the Garrison investigation? Also, is De Torres living in Little Havana now? (Tim Carroll)

Tim,

Morales had officially left JM/WAVE in 1965 I believe. He was the Pakse Base Chief in Laos during 1966-67. I'm sure the lines of communication to JM/WAVE were still open to him though. I submit that Morales was very keen as to what De Torres was discovering during his tenure with the Garrison investigation.

Last I heard, De Torres was in Chile with the DEA but I do believe he maintains a house in Miami.

James

[Tim Carroll]

Morales had officially left JM/WAVE in 1965 I believe. He was the Pakse Base Chief in Laos during 1966-67. I'm sure the lines of communication to JM/WAVE were still open to him though. I submit that Morales was very keen as to what De Torres was discovering during his tenure with the Garrison investigation.

James

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

James,

The phrase: "I'm sure the lines of communication to JM/WAVE were still open to him though," alludes to a key difficulty in establishing many of the connections we examine. Dulles certainly wasn't out of the loop despite his "retirement." The fact that Dulles visited Nixon the day the Bay of Pigs operation was going down the tubes again reveals the continuation of non-institutional relationships, even in the midst of critical events. I just received an e-mail in the middle of the night, about 12 hours ago, detailing the timing of contacts between Wild Bill Harvey and Johnny Roselli after Harvey was dismissed from JM/WAVE.

Tim

[James Richards]

I just received an e-mail in the middle of the night, about 12 hours ago, detailing the timing of contacts between Wild Bill Harvey and Johnny Roselli after Harvey was dismissed from JM/WAVE. (Tim Carroll)

That is interesting, Tim. Hopefully you will be able to share some details there.

I am very interested in the relationship that Harvey and Roselli had firstly with each other but also with Antoneo Maceo (see below). Maceo is the namesake and grandson of the exalted Cuban leader Antonio Maceo. Maceo may have been one of the original contacts Roselli made when the idiotic Castro assassination plots began.

My interest is in the ongoing relationship between all three men as Maceo went on to join forces with Tony Varona and Manuel Artime.

Maceo below.

James

[Tim Carroll]

I just received an e-mail in the middle of the night, about 12 hours ago, detailing the timing of contacts between Wild Bill Harvey and Johnny Roselli after Harvey was dismissed from JM/WAVE. (Tim Carroll)

That is interesting, Tim. Hopefully you will be able to share some details there.

I am very interested in the relationship that Harvey and Roselli had firstly with each other but also with Antoneo Maceo (see below). Maceo is the namesake and grandson of the exalted Cuban leader Antonio Maceo. Maceo may have been one of the original contacts Roselli made when the idiotic Castro assassination plots began.

My interest is in the ongoing relationship between all three men as Maceo went on to join forces with Tony Varona and Manuel Artime.

Maceo below.

James

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

James:

The relevant segment of the e-mail I received early this morning, which is probably published somewhere or another, is as follows:

"Harvey continued to keep in contact with Johnny Roselli. According to Richard D. Mahoney: 'On April 8, Rossrlli flew to New York to meet with Bill Harvey. A week later, the two men met again in Miami to discuss the plot in greater detail....' On April 21 he (Harvey) flew from Washington to deliver four poison pills directly to Rosselli, who got them to Tony Varona and hence to Havana. That same evening, Harvey and Ted Shackley, the chief of the CIA's south Florida base, drove a U-Haul truck filled with the requested arms through the rain to a deserted parking lot in Miami. They got out and handed the keys to Rosselli."

In addition to the above, there is an FBI surveillance record of Harvey and Roselli having lunch together at a major D.C. hotel in June, 1963, long after Harvey had been assigned to Rome.

If Maceo was in with the Varona and Artime crowd, then he would not fit in with my concept of the disaffected Cubans. Artime and Varona had not been cut off from U.S. government funding, as they were associated with Second Naval Guerrilla, receiving $250K monthly. A side issue that may well relate to Second Naval Guerrilla is the flight from Cozumel by Rorke and Sullivan. I make a major distinction between participants in Second Naval Guerrilla and the disaffected people training on No Name Key.

Tim

[James Richards]

James:

The relevant segment of the e-mail I received early this morning, which is probably published somewhere or another, is as follows:

"Harvey continued to keep in contact with Johnny Roselli. According to Richard D. Mahoney: 'On April 8, Rossrlli flew to New York to meet with Bill Harvey. A week later, the two men met again in Miami to discuss the plot in greater detail....' On April 21 he (Harvey) flew from Washington to deliver four poison pills directly to Rosselli, who got them to Tony Varona and hence to Havana. That same evening, Harvey and Ted Shackley, the chief of the CIA's south Florida base, drove a U-Haul truck filled with the requested arms through the rain to a deserted parking lot in Miami. They got out and handed the keys to Rosselli."

In addition to the above, there is an FBI surveillance record of Harvey and Roselli having lunch together at a major D.C. hotel in June, 1963, long after Harvey had been assigned to Rome.

If Maceo was in with the Varona and Artime crowd, then he would not fit in with my concept of the disaffected Cubans. Artime and Varona had not been cut off from U.S. government funding, as they were associated with Second Naval Guerrilla, receiving $250K monthly. A side issue that may well relate to Second Naval Guerrilla is the flight from Cozumel by Rorke and Sullivan. I make a major distinction between participants in Second Naval Guerrilla and the disaffected people training on No Name Key. (Tim Carroll)

Thanks, Tim. Muchly appreciated.

James

[Tim Gratz]

Tim Gratz:

I have placed my pending questions in red for your ease.

A comment, and two questions:

Remember Josiah Thompson was there, working for Life, and he presumably knows whereof he speaks.  I think his book was one of the best early criticisms of the WC.

First: what information do you have that the No Name group was getting any government funding at any time?

Second: What information do you have that Clare Booth Luce ever funded the No Name group?

Thanks!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

I don't give Josiah the benefit of the doubt that he "presumably knows whereof he speaks" because he "was there, working for Life." On the basis of employment by Henry Luce?? You have really got to be kidding with that. On that basis, I should presume that Billings did nothing to derail Garrison. I agree that Six Seconds In Dallas was an excellent "early" criticism of the WC, and strongly influenced me then. But since the Sixties, his interest has popped in and out like the weather. His accounting of the highly leading Sitzman interview to me earlier this year was: "I wish I could help you but I recall very little about all this." [e-mail dated January 26, 2004]

First, you ask what information I "have that the No Name group was getting any government funding at any time," when an accurate reading of this thread clearly shows that I said the opposite: I noted "Kennedy's termination of funding in the post-Missile Crisis period," including to "some of the No Name Key participants." Did you really miss that Tim?

Second, since you invoke the Josiah Thompson standard, I believe you know enough about Clare Boothe Luce's funding that your question is more intended to draw out my sources than to acquire knowledge. Why don't you go first, Tim, and share what you know about Clare Boothe Luce's funding of the exiles, including her late night phone call on November 22, 1963? Are you denying an awareness of such funding? Are you intending to imply that there was none? My remark was, "Clare Boothe Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants." For now I will name Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo, particularly. Is there a misquoted word or lack of specificity there? Why would I provide a source in the context you present?

Lastly, I will note that we had extensive e-mail contact until I finally terminated it by asking you why this was being done in private rather than on the forum. I suggest that you try answering at least a few of the many questions I asked you, before making a show of demanding answers or sources from me. I have been quite specific, which you have not. I do have a source for naming Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo, but what's the point in providing it to you? You've routinely ducked my questions. Would you like to at least acknowledge that I had to force the issue of your evasiveness?

Tim Carroll

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I hope that makes things more clear for you.

Tim Carroll

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim, in response to your Posts 11 and 15 on this thread:.

First, you question Josiah Thompson’s statement that Life was trying to solve the JFK assassination because it was owned by Henry Luce, who you seem to think was a knee jerk right wing ideologist. I respectfully submit the facts do not support this interpretation of Luce. First, Life was the first major media publication to question the Warren Commission report, and that issue received more readership than the books of the early WC critics. That fact speaks for itself.

You posted a response to Nathaniel Weyl’s online seminar. Did you read Mr. Weyl's comments? In the seminar, Weyl states that he discovered in early 1960 that Castro was a committed Communist and wrote an article to that effect. He tried unsuccessfully to get a major media organ to publish it. Several refused, including the majority of the editorial board of Life magazine, who saw Weyl’s article as “too right wing”. Life (and Time, for that matter) were never right wing: magazines.

You have cited Halberstam’s masterful The Powers That Be as a reference. But have you read the book? If so, you would know that Henry Luce was not the knee-jerk right winger you seem to think he was.

Datum: According to Halberstam, Luce supported the nomination of Gen Eisenhower over Senator Taft in 1952. The 1952 Republican nomination for President was hotly contested. Taft was the favorite of the conservative wing of the GOP. Eisenhower was supported by the liberal East Wing establishment of the party, primarily Tom Dewey. Almost all deological conservatives (“right-wingers” to you) supported Taft. Luce’s support of Eisenhower over Taft demonstrates where Luce fell in on the ideological spectrum. (These ideological divisions remained through 1964 when the “Eisenhower wing” of the GOP vigorously fought the nomination of Sen. Barry Goldwater.)

Halberstam also details Luce’s long-standing relationship Joe Kennedy.

“[Luce] was an old friend of Joe Kennedy’s…” (page 54); “Old Joe Kennedy knew

the strengths and weaknesses of the press unusually well; he had cultivated men like Harry Luce and Arthur Krock when he was in Washington in the Roosevelt days (and made a point of having dinner with the potentially dangerous Luce the night his son accepted the Democratic nomination for the presidency).” (page 317.)

Although Life endorsed Nixon in the 1960 election, its endorsement (according to

Halberstam, was “tepid” and at the Kennedy inauguration Mr. and Mrs. Henry Luce sat in the imperial box with Mr. And Mrs. Joe Kennedy. (Page 351).

John Kennedy once remarked that nothing had helped him obtain early national recognition as much as a favorable cover story on Time magazine. (Page 353.)

Halberstam makes this interesting, and salient, observation:

“There were a number of reasons besides Kennedy’s astute courting why the Luce publications were giving him a fairer shake than liberal Democrats normally got. . .

[Luce], like many of his readers and correspondents, was fascinated and charned by Kennedy himself and the Kennedys in general---. . .all that money, all that glamour.

despite ideological reservations about the young senator he came to prefer Kennedy to Nixon.” (Page 355.)

With respection to your allegation that Billings was attempting to sabotage the

Garrison investigation, what is your proof of that? The facts seem to suggest otherwise.

As you are probably aware, while Billings was working with Garrison, he kept a

Journal. Have you read it? Here is one paragraph from his journal.

“We are independently now checking the strange story of Lorezo Hall, Lawrennce Howard and William Seymour, who were arrested Oct 1963 in Dallas on a drug charge, and who have received some interest from Weisberg. Now, we are pursuing this a little more energetically now because Acoca has come up with a report from Miami that Seymour had been known to use the name Leon Oswald and we are obtaining from Tom Dunkin pictures of these three men, and we have an interesting tape from Weisberg from an unidentifired source that further links their activities with a possible right wing conspiracy.” (Billings’ Garrison journal, May 22-23, 1967.)

The Dunkin letter to Billings (dated June 4, 1967) that started this “thread” was obviously in response to the late May request from Billings for photographs and info re Hall, Howard and Seymour.

It is clear from Billings’ journal that he was actively interested in the Garrison investigation, not trying to undermine it.

The powers that be at Life decided that Garrison was barking up the wrong tree, They were not alone in that conclusion. (Harold Weisberg: “Garrrison could not find a pubic hair in a whorsehouse at rush hour.” Anthony Summers: “[Garrison’s] probe has long been recognized by virtually everyone, including serious scholars who believe there was a conspiracy—as a grotesque, misdirected shambles.”

* * * *

So you see, sometimes things are not quite as black and white, right and left, as they

may appear.

* * * *

Tomorrow, I will post a response to your criticisms of my questions to you re the funding of the Interpen group. I do believe you are wrong about government funding of Inter-

Pen and Clare Booth Luce funding of Interpen (although she did finance some anti-

Castro activities),

Edited December 14, 2004 by Tim Gratz

[Tim Carroll]

Tim Gratz:

I have placed my pending questions in red for your ease.

A comment, and two questions:

Remember Josiah Thompson was there, working for Life, and he presumably knows whereof he speaks.  I think his book was one of the best early criticisms of the WC.

First: what information do you have that the No Name group was getting any government funding at any time?

Second: What information do you have that Clare Booth Luce ever funded the No Name group?

Thanks!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

I don't give Josiah the benefit of the doubt that he "presumably knows whereof he speaks" because he "was there, working for Life." On the basis of employment by Henry Luce?? You have really got to be kidding with that. On that basis, I should presume that Billings did nothing to derail Garrison. I agree that Six Seconds In Dallas was an excellent "early" criticism of the WC, and strongly influenced me then. But since the Sixties, his interest has popped in and out like the weather. His accounting of the highly leading Sitzman interview to me earlier this year was: "I wish I could help you but I recall very little about all this." [e-mail dated January 26, 2004]

First, you ask what information I "have that the No Name group was getting any government funding at any time," when an accurate reading of this thread clearly shows that I said the opposite: I noted "Kennedy's termination of funding in the post-Missile Crisis period," including to "some of the No Name Key participants." Did you really miss that Tim?

Second, since you invoke the Josiah Thompson standard, I believe you know enough about Clare Boothe Luce's funding that your question is more intended to draw out my sources than to acquire knowledge. Why don't you go first, Tim, and share what you know about Clare Boothe Luce's funding of the exiles, including her late night phone call on November 22, 1963? Are you denying an awareness of such funding? Are you intending to imply that there was none? My remark was, "Clare Boothe Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants." For now I will name Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo, particularly. Is there a misquoted word or lack of specificity there? Why would I provide a source in the context you present?

Lastly, I will note that we had extensive e-mail contact until I finally terminated it by asking you why this was being done in private rather than on the forum. I suggest that you try answering at least a few of the many questions I asked you, before making a show of demanding answers or sources from me. I have been quite specific, which you have not. I do have a source for naming Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo, but what's the point in providing it to you? You've routinely ducked my questions. Would you like to at least acknowledge that I had to force the issue of your evasiveness?

Tim Carroll

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I hope that makes things more clear for you.

Tim Carroll

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim, in response to your Posts 11 and 15 on this thread:.

First, you question Josiah Thompson’s statement that Life was trying to solve the JFK assassination because it was owned by Henry Luce, who you seem to think was a knee jerk right wing ideologist. I respectfully submit the facts do not support this interpretation of Luce. First, Life was the first major media publication to question the Warren Commission report, and that issue received more readership than the books of the early WC critics. That fact speaks for itself.

You posted a response to Nathaniel Weyl’s online seminar. Did you read Mr. Weyl's comments? In the seminar, Weyl states that he discovered in early 1960 that Castro was a committed Communist and wrote an article to that effect. He tried unsuccessfully to get a major media organ to publish it. Several refused, including the majority of the editorial board of Life magazine, who saw Weyl’s article as “too right wing”. Life (and Time, for that matter) were never right wing: magazines.

You have cited Halberstam’s masterful The Powers That Be as a reference. But have you read the book? If so, you would know that Henry Luce was not the knee-jerk right winger you seem to think he was.

Datum: According to Halberstam, Luce supported the nomination of Gen Eisenhower over Senator Taft in 1952. The 1952 Republican nomination for President was hotly contested. Taft was the favorite of the conservative wing of the GOP. Eisenhower was supported by the liberal East Wing establishment of the party, primarily Tom Dewey. Almost all deological conservatives (“right-wingers” to you) supported Taft. Luce’s support of Eisenhower over Taft demonstrates where Luce fell in on the ideological spectrum. (These ideological divisions remained through 1964 when the “Eisenhower wing” of the GOP vigorously fought the nomination of Sen. Barry Goldwater.)

Halberstam also details Luce’s long-standing relationship Joe Kennedy.

“[Luce] was an old friend of Joe Kennedy’s…” (page 54); “Old Joe Kennedy knew

the strengths and weaknesses of the press unusually well; he had cultivated men like Harry Luce and Arthur Krock when he was in Washington in the Roosevelt days (and made a point of having dinner with the potentially dangerous Luce the night his son accepted the Democratic nomination for the presidency).” (page 317.)

Although Life endorsed Nixon in the 1960 election, its endorsement (according to

Halberstam, was “tepid” and at the Kennedy inauguration Mr. and Mrs. Henry Luce sat in the imperial box with Mr. And Mrs. Joe Kennedy. (Page 351).

John Kennedy once remarked that nothing had helped him obtain early national recognition as much as a favorable cover story on Time magazine. (Page 353.)

Halberstam makes this interesting, and salient, observation:

“There were a number of reasons besides Kennedy’s astute courting why the Luce publications were giving him a fairer shake than liberal Democrats normally got. . .

[Luce], like many of his readers and correspondents, was fascinated and charned by Kennedy himself and the Kennedys in general---. . .all that money, all that glamour.

despite ideological reservations about the young senator he came to prefer Kennedy to Nixon.” (Page 355.)

With respection to your allegation that Billings was attempting to sabotage the

Garrison investigation, what is your proof of that? The facts seem to suggest otherwise.

As you are probably aware, while Billings was working with Garrison, he kept a

Journal. Have you read it? Here is one paragraph from his journal.

“We are independently now checking the strange story of Lorezo Hall, Lawrennce Howard and William Seymour, who were arrested Oct 1963 in Dallas on a drug charge, and who have received some interest from Weisberg. Now, we are pursuing this a little more energetically now because Acoca has come up with a report from Miami that Seymour had been known to use the name Leon Oswald and we are obtaining from Tom Dunkin pictures of these three men, and we have an interesting tape from Weisberg from an unidentifired source that further links their activities with a possible right wing conspiracy.” (Billings’ Garrison journal, May 22-23, 1967.)

The Dunkin letter to Billings (dated June 4, 1967) that started this “thread” was obviously in response to the late May request from Billings for photographs and info re Hall, Howard and Seymour.

It is clear from Billings’ journal that he was actively interested in the Garrison investigation, not trying to undermine it.

The powers that be at Life decided that Garrison was barking up the wrong tree, They were not alone in that conclusion. (Harold Weisberg: “Garrrison could not find a pubic hair in a whorsehouse at rush hour.” Anthony Summers: “[Garrison’s] probe has long been recognized by virtually everyone, including serious scholars who believe there was a conspiracy—as a grotesque, misdirected shambles.”

So you see, sometimes things are not quite as black and white, right and left, as they

may appear.

Tomorrow, I will post a response to your criticisms of my questions to you re the funding of the Interpen group. I do believe you are wrong about government funding of Inter-

Pen and Clare Booth Luce funding of Interpen (although she did finance some anti-

Castro activities),

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

It is currently very late at night, so I highlighted the two straightforward questions you asked of me and will address them here and now, in contrast to your style:

Yes, I read Weyl's piece, and I would further assert that my response was the most detailed and documented response of any of the seminars.

Yes, I read the Powers that Be, and if you read your cited page 317, your know how hardline a warning Luce delivered to Old Joe while watching the acceptance speech. But you conveniently left that out.

Have you read about the White House lunch with Kennedy and the Luces, in which they stormed out?

I have never, ever said a word about either "government funding of IntepPen and Clare Booth Luce funding of Interpen," let alone both, as you stated. So how can you assert that I am wrong about something I never said. Your misattributions are quite flagrant. The last time I corrected you on this point, contained in the quotes above, I asked you how you kept getting this wrong. For the record, the previous interchange was as follows:

"First, you ask what information I "have that the No Name group was getting any government funding at any time," when an accurate reading of this thread clearly shows that I said the opposite: I noted "Kennedy's termination of funding in the post-Missile Crisis period," including to "some of the No Name Key participants." Did you really miss that Tim?

Second, since you invoke the Josiah Thompson standard, I believe you know enough about Clare Boothe Luce's funding that your question is more intended to draw out my sources than to acquire knowledge. Why don't you go first, Tim, and share what you know about Clare Boothe Luce's funding of the exiles, including her late night phone call on November 22, 1963? Are you denying an awareness of such funding? Are you intending to imply that there was none? My remark was, "Clare Boothe Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants." For now I will name Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo, particularly. Is there a misquoted word or lack of specificity there? Why would I provide a source in the context you present?"

Finally, your offensively pedantic lecturing to me that: "So you see, sometimes things are not quite as black and white, right and left, as they may appear," represents yet another reversion to your problem with our differing politics. As I made clear in my remarks about Trento when you made the same irrelevant accusation, his politics never came to my mind and I wholeheartedly agreed that partisanship was irrelevant. Are you now claiming not to have read that, or did you forget, or just choose to ignore it?

Tim Carroll

Edited December 15, 2004 by Tim Carroll

[Tim Gratz]

Tim Carroll

I have never, ever said a word about either "government funding of IntepPen and Clare Booth Luce funding of Interpen," let alone both, as you stated.  So how can you assert that I am wrong about something I never said.  Your misattributions are quite flagrant.  The last time I corrected you on this point, contained in the quotes above, I asked you how you kept getting this wrong.  For the record, the previous interchange was as follows:

"First, you ask what information I "have that the No Name group was getting any government funding at any time," when an accurate reading of this thread clearly shows that I said the opposite: I noted "Kennedy's termination of funding in the post-Missile Crisis period," including to "some of the No Name Key participants."  Did you really miss that Tim?

Tim Carroll

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

First, I apologize that I offended you. I think, however, the record is clear that you first went personally negative by calling me evasive, etc, when I had told you in private e-mail that I needed time to research and formulate a reply to a few of your questions. But let's "bury the hatchet" and be good debating buddies, huh?. I've said several times I appreciate your intelligence and contributions here; and it is by debate that the truth often emerges.

Now, with respect to your remark above, let me quote the exact language from your post that initiated my question to you:

"Clare Booth Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination in the post-Missile Crisis."

Now, if it is simply your point that the funding was going to invidual members of the Interpen group rather than to the group as such, I simply repeat my question to you: what information do you have that there was ever government funding of any of the Interpen members; and what information do you have that Clare Booth Luce ever funded any of the Interpen group members?

The only reason why I raised the question is because I do not recall ever reading any information to that effect and from what Gordon Winslow tells me that is not how Interpen worked (and he has conversed with many Interpen members).

I don't really think this question is of such importance for either of us to get all worked up about, and I apologize for appearing a pedant by that one remark.

Edited December 14, 2004 by Tim Gratz

[Tim Carroll]

Now, with respect to the above, let me quote the exact language from your post that initiated my question to you:

"Clare Booth Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination in the post-Missile Crisis."

Now, if it is simply your point that the funding was going to invidual members of the Interpen group rather than to the group as such, I simply repeat my question ton you:  what information do you have that there was ever government funding of any of the Interpen members; and what information do you have that there Clare Booth Luce ever funded any of the Interpen group members? 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

I have named Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo as recipients of funding from the Luces, not government funding. I don't make any comments on Interpen and never have. Many consider this some tightly knit group and their minds close around the whole thing, just as yours did aroung the whole No Name Key group, which I similarly had to disclaim. I'm aware that Hemming is so closely associated with Interpen, as is Sturgis, for example, that to name an individual is often perceived as the naming of the whole group. Now that you have framed your question more appropriately to my assertion, I will provide the source, and expect that my questions to you will be answered in similarly direct fashion. Please read pages 186-187 of "Deadly Secrets," which also includes mention of the volatile luncheon break-up between the Luces and JFK. If you haven't read that book, or not longer have it, as is the case with much of my former book collection, I will quote the relevent passages upon request.

Have a good evening, or morning, or whatever; it is now 3:23 a.m. my time [the forum has yet to set its American clocks back for Standard Time, making the post appear to be at 4:23 a.m.].

Tim Carroll

Edited December 14, 2004 by Tim Carroll

[Tim Gratz]

Now, with respect to the above, let me quote the exact language from your post that initiated my question to you:

"Clare Booth Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination in the post-Missile Crisis."

Now, if it is simply your point that the funding was going to invidual members of the Interpen group rather than to the group as such, I simply repeat my question ton you:  what information do you have that there was ever government funding of any of the Interpen members; and what information do you have that there Clare Booth Luce ever funded any of the Interpen group members? 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

I have named Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo as recipients of funding from the Luces, not government funding. I don't make any comments on Interpen and never have. Many consider this some tightly knit group and their minds close around the whole thing, just as yours did aroung the whole No Name Key group, which I similarly had to disclaim. I'm aware that Hemming is so closely associated with Interpen, as is Sturgis, for example, that to name an individual is often perceived as the naming of the whole group. Now that you have framed your question more appropriately to my assertion, I will provide the source, and expect that my questions to you will be answered in similarly direct fashion. Please read pages 186-187 of "Deadly Secrets," which also includes mention of the volatile luncheon break-up between the Luces and JFK. If you haven't read that book, or not longer have it, as is the case with much of my former book collection, I will quote the relevent passages upon request.

Have a good evening, or morning, or whatever; it is now 3:23 a.m. my time [the forum has yet to set its American clocks back for Standard Time, making the post appear to be at 4:23 a.m.].

Tim Carroll

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thanks, Tim!! You ought to get to bed, but let's be friends (debating buddies, anyway). A couple of comments:

1. I don't think Sturgis was associated with Interpen. If I recall (from Weberman, I think) Hemming took over a Sturgis group, renamed it and moved it from the Everglades to the Keys (we have fewer alligators here).

2. I do not think Bayo was ever a "member" of Interpen; his name does not come up on Interpen lists (including the one made by John.)

3. "Deadly Secrets" is certainly a great book, but I do not have it. (Read it from the library and returned it.) If you would not mind quoting the passage that would be great.

4. Most important, though: this interchange started because you stated you did not think Life would have been interested in solving the JFK case because Clare Booth Luce was funding Interpen members. The most significant question is why would this be? And it gets back to politics. Let me say this for the record. I was not a Kennedy supporter in 1960, and I think that as President he made some significant errors including the Bay of Pigs (even if you want to say it was not out-thinking the CIA that such a small group of exiles could ever defeat Castro's army) and in allowing the overthrow of Diem (which his advisers did (with the encouragement of Republican blueblood Henry Cabot Lodge). In his recent book, Eric Alterman argues that Kennedy's failure to disclose all of the terms of the resolution of the Cuban missile crisis led to later problems. Nevertheless, I was, I am sure, as saddened and grieved by his death as many of his most ardent supporters. (I think I spent most of that week-end in tears.) Every patriotic American should want to see his murder solved, and, if they do not, then they are not, IMO, patriots. And I am sure I want to see the assassination solved in my lifetime as much as any member of this Forum does!

Now, even assuming arguendo that Clare Luce was using her millions to fund Hemming or any other member of his crew, why would she not be interested in solving Kennedy's murder? And even if she could not care less, that doesn't necessarily mean her husband felt the same. So, in the spirit of debate, can you explain why you think Luce's funding of a No Name Key guy (or any other anti-Castro Cuban) translates into her disinterest in solving the assassination?

Thanks!

Edited December 14, 2004 by Tim Gratz

[Tim Carroll]

Now, with respect to the above, let me quote the exact language from your post that initiated my question to you:

"Clare Booth Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination in the post-Missile Crisis."

Now, if it is simply your point that the funding was going to invidual members of the Interpen group rather than to the group as such, I simply repeat my question to you:  what information do you have that there was ever government funding of any of the Interpen members; and what information do you have that there Clare Booth Luce ever funded any of the Interpen group members? 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

I have named Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo as recipients of funding from the Luces, not government funding. I don't make any comments on Interpen and never have. Many consider this some tightly knit group and their minds close around the whole thing, just as yours did aroung the whole No Name Key group, which I similarly had to disclaim. I'm aware that Hemming is so closely associated with Interpen, as is Sturgis, for example, that to name an individual is often perceived as the naming of the whole group. Now that you have framed your question more appropriately to my assertion, I will provide the source, and expect that my questions to you will be answered in similarly direct fashion. Please read pages 186-187 of "Deadly Secrets," which also includes mention of the volatile luncheon break-up between the Luces and JFK. If you haven't read that book, or not longer have it, as is the case with much of my former book collection, I will quote the relevent passages upon request.

Tim Carroll

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim.... A couple of comments:

1. I don't think Sturgis was associated with Interpen. If I recall (from Weberman, I think) Hemming took over a Sturgis group, renamed it and moved it from the Everglades to the Keys (we have fewer alligators here).

2. I do not think Bayo was ever a "member" of Interpen; his name does not come up on Interpen lists (including the one made by John.)

3. "Deadly Secrets" is certainly a great book, but I do not have it. (Read it from the library and returned it.) If you would not mind quoting the passage that would be great.

4. Most important, though: this interchange started because you stated you did not think Life would have been interested in solving the JFK case because Clare Booth Luce was funding Interpen members. The most significant question is why would this be?... Now, even assuming arguendo that Clare Luce was using her millions to fund Hemming or any other member of his crew, why would she not be interested in solving Kennedy's murder? And even if she could not care less, that doesn't necessarily mean her husband felt the same. So, in the spirit of debate, can you explain why you think Luce's funding of a No Name Key guy (or any other anti-Castro Cuban) translates into her disinterest in solving the assassination?

Thanks!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

This very post begins with your statement: "Now, with respect to the above, let me quote the exact language from your post that initiated my question to you: "Clare Booth Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination in the post-Missile Crisis."

You seem to be wondering, so let me first answer that I find your misquoting and twisting of words perturbing when you receive and then ignore a correction repeatedly. I will correct your misquote of "the exact language," as you put it: "Clare Boothe Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination of funding in the post-Missile Crisis period."

Answers to your questions:

1. I don't think Sturgis was associated with Interpen. I don't know if "Interpen" or Commandos L or what all names Sturgis operated under and at which times. In the context in which I used his name it was only as an associate of Gerry Hemmings, and not in connection with the Luces.

2. I do not think Bayo was ever a "member" of Interpen; his name does not come up on Interpen lists (including the one made by John.) The question implies some sort of statement I've made about Interpen. I'm now simply quoting my former statement again, contained above: "I don't make any comments on Interpen and never have. Many consider this some tightly knit group and their minds close around the whole thing, just as yours did aroung the whole No Name Key group, which I similarly previously had to disclaim."

3. "Deadly Secrets" is certainly a great book, but I do not have it. (Read it from the library and returned it.) If you would not mind quoting the passage that would be great.

"In the spring of 1963 Life began a one-magazine campaign to congeal American jingoism behind the military adventures of the Cuban exiles. One blood-and-guts cover memorialized with a tilt toward hagiography the men who had fought in the Bay of Pigs. Another fighting Life front page heralded Andrew St. George's Caribbean theater-of-war report on the Commandos L attack on the Russian freighter Baku. Publicity of this sort swelled the non-CIA-controlled exiles. It was against this background that Kennedy invited the Luces to lunch at the White House. Luce said later that he would never have gone had not Joe Kennedy been such a good friend of his; he accepted the invitation in respect of the father, not the son.

Kennedy exercised all his considerable charm to convince the Luces that their publications should curtail their coverage of the exile commandos. The President did not confide in the beetle-browed king of the weeklies that he had his own plans for military action against Cuba; JFK wanted his Secret War kept secret.

Luce took the opposing view; that the exiles needed transfusions of the ink of the free press to encourage them in their resolve to overthrow Castro. (the talk around the water cooler at Life was that Luce had been persuaded by an Italian fascist friend - a man of his social circle - that Castro could be toppled if his opposition didn't become discouraged.)

The luncheon conversation became heated. At one point the nasty nine-letter word "warmonger" was used. This led to Mr. and Mrs. Luce leaving before they had touched their desserts.

Luce went directly from the White House to the High Arctic of Time-Life's corporate headquarters in New York, where he convened an extraordinary meeting of all his editorial brass. If the United States of America was being chicken, Time, Inc., was declaring war on Cuba. The Founder said that despite a corporate austerity program then in effect, they were going all out to assist the exiles in military actions against Cuba. Contact was to be made with principal exile groups to arrange for reporters and photographers to go along on raids. Time, Inc., would provide logistical and financial assistance where necessary, but he did not want the company ripped off the way the CIA had been. [authors' interview with St. George]

With this directive, Luce, the great editorial innovator, invented a new form of journalism for which he is yet to be credited in standard histories of the printed word. The Founder was taking his gremlins beyond the familiar world of checkbook journalism into the nether reaches of paramilitary journalism.

Life's feuding editorial duchies - the national desk, Miami bureau, and others - took the master's fiat as a competitive call. They constantly tried to upstage one another, spying, usurping credit, and striving to get the most dramatic pictures of the commandos wreaking havoc. Andrew St. George, who went along on most of the raids as Life's unofficial chief war correspondent for the Caribbean theater, estimated that the magazine spent close to a quarter of a million dollars during 1963-1964, a sizable sum in the pioneer era of paramilitary journalism. The Hungarian said that he himself ws paid some $50,000 in expenses as Life's main contact with exile groups such as Alpha 66.

The front-line command post was Life's regional bureau office in the DuPont Plaza Hotel in Miami, a magnet which quickly attracted hell-bent-for-action types like Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo, who belonged to Commandos L. St. George used the hotel bar as a watering hole for his exile contacts. "They drank brand-name brands," he said. At first his financial orders were strictly beer budget: "you will give these people money in very small amounts - buy them fried chicken, beer, things like that. Help out as you can, but do not finance the raids as such." Apparently Life's legal department was familiar with the Neutrality Act.

But the expenditures soon became more substantial. Life purchased ship-to-shore radios for Alpha 66 and paid commandos for exclusive stories - money often plowed back into the raids. The magazine became so deeply involved that it provided life insurance for commandos and correspondents. To make a claim, the next of kin had to fill out forms referred to by Life staffers as "widow papers"....

In the early summer of 1963, Life became involved in a plot to kidnap two Russian officers from Cuba [Operation Tilt]. This scheme was the product of a trinity of conspiratorial interests - frustrated exiles, Luce's increasingly rabid anticommunism, and a CIA cabal - bent on inflicting severe political damage on John F. Kennedy by showing him up as either a dupe of the Soviets or a supreme commander oblivious of a new missile threat in Cuba.... The plan was to debrief them privately at the Gettysburg farm of Pawley's old friend Dwight Eisenhower, then to call in the press and embarrass JFK by displaying the Russkies as living proof that Soviet missiles were still on Cuba.*

4. Most important, though: this interchange started because you stated you did not think Life would have been interested in solving the JFK case because Clare Booth Luce was funding Interpen members. The most significant question is why would this be?... Now, even assuming arguendo that Clare Luce was using her millions to fund Hemming or any other member of his crew, why would she not be interested in solving Kennedy's murder? And even if she could not care less, that doesn't necessarily mean her husband felt the same. So, in the spirit of debate, can you explain why you think Luce's funding of a No Name Key guy (or any other anti-Castro Cuban) translates into her disinterest in solving the assassination?

In the month preceding the assassination, Clare Boothe Luce wrote in Life: "What is now at stake in the decision for intervention or nonintervention in Cuba is the question not only of American prestige but of American survival."** Stong stuff indeed!

Then, the very night of the assassination, Clare Boothe Luce received the famous phone call from one of her anti-Castro beneficiaries whom she admitted to knowing well (well enough to have her home phone number), informing her of Oswald's trips to Mexico City, accompanied by the familiar litany that Oswald had claimed he was "a crack marksman and could shoot anybody - including the Pesident or the Secretary of the Navy." Ironically, Governor Connally had been Secretary of the Navy in 1961, when Oswald wrote him asking that his undesirable discharge be reversed. By the time of the assassination, the Secretary of the Navy was Fred Korth, who had been Marguerite Oswald's divorce lawyer.***

I stated that I did not think Life, which kept the Zapruder film from the public for 12 years, would have been interested in solving the JFK case for the same reason I've speculated why Bobby Kennedy wasn't interested in solving it: some activity with which they were involved had backfired (possibly Operation Tilt), resulting in the president's assassination. That is just my own interpretation.

Tim

*Warren Hinckle & William Turner, Deadly Secrets: The CIA-Mafia War Against Castro And The Assassination Of J.F.K., (New York: First Thunder's Mouth Press, 1993; originally published as The Fish Is Red by Harper and Row, 1981), 186-188.

**Arthur M. Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy And His Times, (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1978), 506.

***Anthony Summers, Not In Your Lifetime, (first published as Conspiracy by McGraw-Hill Books in 1980), 322-324.

Edited December 14, 2004 by Tim Carroll

[Tim Gratz]

Now, with respect to the above, let me quote the exact language from your post that initiated my question to you:

"Clare Booth Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination in the post-Missile Crisis."

Now, if it is simply your point that the funding was going to invidual members of the Interpen group rather than to the group as such, I simply repeat my question to you:  what information do you have that there was ever government funding of any of the Interpen members; and what information do you have that there Clare Booth Luce ever funded any of the Interpen group members? 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

I have named Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo as recipients of funding from the Luces, not government funding. I don't make any comments on Interpen and never have. Many consider this some tightly knit group and their minds close around the whole thing, just as yours did aroung the whole No Name Key group, which I similarly had to disclaim. I'm aware that Hemming is so closely associated with Interpen, as is Sturgis, for example, that to name an individual is often perceived as the naming of the whole group. Now that you have framed your question more appropriately to my assertion, I will provide the source, and expect that my questions to you will be answered in similarly direct fashion. Please read pages 186-187 of "Deadly Secrets," which also includes mention of the volatile luncheon break-up between the Luces and JFK. If you haven't read that book, or not longer have it, as is the case with much of my former book collection, I will quote the relevent passages upon request.

Tim Carroll

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim.... A couple of comments:

1. I don't think Sturgis was associated with Interpen. If I recall (from Weberman, I think) Hemming took over a Sturgis group, renamed it and moved it from the Everglades to the Keys (we have fewer alligators here).

2. I do not think Bayo was ever a "member" of Interpen; his name does not come up on Interpen lists (including the one made by John.)

3. "Deadly Secrets" is certainly a great book, but I do not have it. (Read it from the library and returned it.) If you would not mind quoting the passage that would be great.

4. Most important, though: this interchange started because you stated you did not think Life would have been interested in solving the JFK case because Clare Booth Luce was funding Interpen members. The most significant question is why would this be?... Now, even assuming arguendo that Clare Luce was using her millions to fund Hemming or any other member of his crew, why would she not be interested in solving Kennedy's murder? And even if she could not care less, that doesn't necessarily mean her husband felt the same. So, in the spirit of debate, can you explain why you think Luce's funding of a No Name Key guy (or any other anti-Castro Cuban) translates into her disinterest in solving the assassination?

Thanks!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

This very post begins with your statement: "Now, with respect to the above, let me quote the exact language from your post that initiated my question to you: "Clare Booth Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination in the post-Missile Crisis."

You seem to be wondering, so let me first answer that I find your misquoting and twisting of words perturbing when you receive and then ignore a correction repeatedly. I will correct your misquote of "the exact language," as you put it: "Clare Boothe Luce was directly funding at least some of the No Name Key participants, to supplement Kennedy's termination of funding in the post-Missile Crisis period."

Answers to your questions:

1. I don't think Sturgis was associated with Interpen. I don't know if "Interpen" or Commandos L or what all names Sturgis operated under and at which times. In the context in which I used his name it was only as an associate of Gerry Hemmings, and not in connection with the Luces.

2. I do not think Bayo was ever a "member" of Interpen; his name does not come up on Interpen lists (including the one made by John.) The question implies some sort of statement I've made about Interpen. I'm now simply quoting my former statement again, contained above: "I don't make any comments on Interpen and never have. Many consider this some tightly knit group and their minds close around the whole thing, just as yours did aroung the whole No Name Key group, which I similarly previously had to disclaim."

3. "Deadly Secrets" is certainly a great book, but I do not have it. (Read it from the library and returned it.) If you would not mind quoting the passage that would be great.

"In the spring of 1963 Life began a one-magazine campaign to congeal American jingoism behind the military adventures of the Cuban exiles. One blood-and-guts cover memorialized with a tilt toward hagiography the men who had fought in the Bay of Pigs. Another fighting Life front page heralded Andrew St. George's Caribbean theater-of-war report on the Commandos L attack on the Russian freighter Baku. Publicity of this sort swelled the non-CIA-controlled exiles. It was against this background that Kennedy invited the Luces to lunch at the White House. Luce said later that he would never have gone had not Joe Kennedy been such a good friend of his; he accepted the invitation in respect of the father, not the son.

Kennedy exercised all his considerable charm to convince the Luces that their publications should curtail their coverage of the exile commandos. The President did not confide in the beetle-browed king of the weeklies that he had his own plans for military action against Cuba; JFK wanted his Secret War kept secret.

Luce took the opposing view; that the exiles needed transfusions of the ink of the free press to encourage them in their resolve to overthrow Castro. (the talk around the water cooler at Life was that Luce had been persuaded by an Italian fascist friend - a man of his social circle - that Castro could be toppled if his opposition didn't become discouraged.)

The luncheon conversation became heated. At one point the nasty nine-letter word "warmonger" was used. This led to Mr. and Mrs. Luce leaving before they had touched their desserts.

Luce went directly from the White House to the High Arctic of Time-Life's corporate headquarters in New York, where he convened an extraordinary meeting of all his editorial brass. If the United States of America was being chicken, Time, Inc., was declaring war on Cuba. The Founder said that despite a corporate austerity program then in effect, they were going all out to assist the exiles in military actions against Cuba. Contact was to be made with principal exile groups to arrange for reporters and photographers to go along on raids. Time, Inc., would provide logistical and financial assistance where necessary, but he did not want the company ripped off the way the CIA had been. [authors' interview with St. George]

With this directive, Luce, the great editorial innovator, invented a new form of journalism for which he is yet to be credited in standard histories of the printed word. The Founder was taking his gremlins beyond the familiar world of checkbook journalism into the nether reaches of paramilitary journalism.

Life's feuding editorial duchies - the national desk, Miami bureau, and others - took the master's fiat as a competitive call. They constantly tried to upstage one another, spying, usurping credit, and striving to get the most dramatic pictures of the commandos wreaking havoc. Andrew St. George, who went along on most of the raids as Life's unofficial chief war correspondent for the Caribbean theater, estimated that the magazine spent close to a quarter of a million dollars during 1963-1964, a sizable sum in the pioneer era of paramilitary journalism. The Hungarian said that he himself ws paid some $50,000 in expenses as Life's main contact with exile groups such as Alpha 66.

The front-line command post was Life's regional bureau office in the DuPont Plaza Hotel in Miami, a magnet which quickly attracted hell-bent-for-action types like Gerry Hemming and Eddie Bayo, who belonged to Commandos L. St. George used the hotel bar as a watering hole for his exile contacts. "They drank brand-name brands," he said. At first his financial orders were strictly beer budget: "you will give these people money in very small amounts - buy them fried chicken, beer, things like that. Help out as you can, but do not finance the raids as such." Apparently Life's legal department was familiar with the Neutrality Act.

But the expenditures soon became more substantial. Life purchased ship-to-shore radios for Alpha 66 and paid commandos for exclusive stories - money often plowed back into the raids. The magazine became so deeply involved that it provided life insurance for commandos and correspondents. To make a claim, the next of kin had to fill out forms referred to by Life staffers as "widow papers"....

In the early summer of 1963, Life became involved in a plot to kidnap two Russian officers from Cuba. This scheme was the product of a trinity of conspiratorial interests - frustrated exiles, Luce's increasingly rabid anticommunism, and a CIA cabal - bent on inflicting severe political damage on John F. Kennedy by showing him up as either a dupe of the Soviets or a supreme commander oblivious of a new missile threat in Cuba.... The plan was to debrief them privately at the Gettysburg farm of Pawley's old friend Dwight Eisenhower, then to call in the press and embarrass JFK by displaying the Russkies as living proof that Soviet missiles were still on Cuba.*

4. Most important, though: this interchange started because you stated you did not think Life would have been interested in solving the JFK case because Clare Booth Luce was funding Interpen members. The most significant question is why would this be?... Now, even assuming arguendo that Clare Luce was using her millions to fund Hemming or any other member of his crew, why would she not be interested in solving Kennedy's murder? And even if she could not care less, that doesn't necessarily mean her husband felt the same. So, in the spirit of debate, can you explain why you think Luce's funding of a No Name Key guy (or any other anti-Castro Cuban) translates into her disinterest in solving the assassination?

I stated that I did not think Life would have been interested in solving the JFK case for the same reason I've speculated why Bobby Kennedy wasn't interested in solving it: some activity with which they were involved had backfired, resulting in the president's assassination. That is just my own interpretation.

Tim

*Warren Hinckle & William Turner, Deadly Secrets: The CIA-Mafia War Against Castro And The Assassination Of J.F.K., (New York: First Thunder's Mouth Press, 1993; originally published as The Fish Is Red by Harper and Row, 1981), 186-188.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim, thanks for the post, and thanks for taking the time to insert the language from Deadly Secrets. I remember reading The Fish is Red when it was first published.

I agree with you that it is POSSIBLE that Life would not have wanted to "solve" the JFK case IF the Luces were concerned that some of the anti-Castro "commandos" they had funded would turn out top be participants in the conspiracy. That is a perceptive point, and I think fear of embarrassment was behind a lot of the cover-up. However, with respect to LIFE magazine, the IF is a big IF. (We now know, of course, that some people think that some members of the Bayo-Pawley mission were involved in the assassination, but this is hindsight.) If I recall correctly, I do not believe too many people were considering involvement by anti-Castro Cubans in the years immediately following the assassination (although, as you are, I am sure aware, two WC members wrote a memo urging investigation of anti-Castro Cubans who, they posited, might have manipulated LHO into killing JFK by making him believe he was doing it on behalf of Castro).

The fact that Life was the first major media organ to question the LN conclusion of the WC speaks volumes. You should also consider that reporters working for Life had a personal interest in solving the "crime of the century". It would be the biggest story of the century. As The Powers That Be point out, JFK understood very well that not everything that is printed in a newspaper or magazine is rigidly controlled by the publisher or even the editor, and he was intelligent enough to cultivate personal relationships with individual reporters, e.g. Sidey from Time.

My original point stands: Josiah Thompson said, and I believe him, that the reporters at LIfe working on the Kennedy story all wanted very much to solve the assassination. He perceived no pressure from any Life manager to the contrary.

I'm old enough I remember reading that issue of Life!

I am not sure if I STILL understand the distinction you are making about the No Name Key group. As I understand it, after 1961 the activities at No Name Key were run by Interpen. Since one of the things the Interpen group was doing was providing military-type training for anti-Castro activists, the island would obviously host non-Intepen members from time to time.

For clarification, I believe Sturgis and Hemming were never buddies and remember reading Hemming's commenting on his low opinion of Sturgis. If I could find the quote, I would not be able to post it because, if I recall, at least every third word was a profanity or scatological.

(MORE TO COME LATER: I NEED TO EDIT THIS, SORRY!)

Edited December 14, 2004 by Tim Gratz

[Shanet Clark]

Great Post Tim Carroll

I am sure the great Warren Hinckle would be proud to be posted here on the Forum.

[Tim Carroll]

Great Post Tim Carroll

I am sure the great Warren Hinckle would be proud to be posted here on the Forum.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Did I tell you my great Warren Hinckle story about election night, 1984?

[Tim Carroll]

I agree with you that it is POSSIBLE that Life would not have wanted to "solve" the JFK case IF the Luces were concerned that some of the anti-Castro "commandos" they had funded would turn out top be participants in the conspiracy.  That is a perceptive point, and I think fear of embarrassment was behind a lot of the cover-up.  However, with respect to LIFE magazine, the IF is a big IF.  (We now know, of course, that some people think that some members of the Bayo-Pawley mission were involved in the assassination, but this is hindsight.)... 

The fact that Life was the first major media organ to question the LN conclusion of the WC speaks volumes.  You should also consider that reporters working for Life had a personal interest in solving the "crime of the century".  It would be the biggest story of the century....

My original point stands:  Josiah Thompson said, and I believe him, that the reporters at LIfe working on the Kennedy story all wanted very much to solve the assassination.  He perceived no pressure from any Life manager to the contrary.

I am not sure if I STILL understand the distinction you are making about the No Name Key group.  As I understand it, after 1961 the activities at No Name Key were run by Interpen.  Since one of the things the Interpen group was doing was providing military-type training for anti-Castro activists, the island would obviously host non-Intepen members from time to time.

For clarification, I believe Sturgis and Hemming were never buddies and remember reading Hemming's commenting on his low opinion of Sturgis.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Tim Gratz:

Please note that I was making additions to my previous post as you were responding, regarding Op Tilt, Luce's October statement impugning JFK's defense of U.S. security and Luce's assassination night phone call at home. As for this post, thanks for the acknowledgement that Bayo-Pawley may have given Life something to conceal. It is not inconsistent that Life would have continued to question the LN theory, since the Luces were personally involved on Nov. 22 with those pushing the "Castro did it" line.

As for understanding my No Name Key distinction, you answered it yourself with the fact that non-Interpen members were hosted "from time to time." Your statement explains why you repeatedly had me talking about Interpen when I was intending nothing of the sort. Finally, with regard to your "clarification" about Sturgis and Hemming, I have made no statement or judgment about their relationship. It has little relevance in my understanding.

To reiterate:

In the month preceding the assassination, Clare Boothe Luce wrote in Life: "What is now at stake in the decision for intervention or nonintervention in Cuba is the question not only of American prestige but of American survival."* Stong stuff indeed!

Then, the very night of the assassination, Clare Boothe Luce received the famous phone call from one of her anti-Castro beneficiaries whom she admitted to knowing well (well enough to have her home phone number), informing her of Oswald's trips to Mexico City, accompanied by the familiar litany that Oswald had claimed he was "a crack marksman and could shoot anybody - including the Pesident or the Secretary of the Navy." Ironically, Governor Connally had been Secretary of the Navy in 1961, when Oswald wrote him asking that his undesirable discharge be reversed. By the time of the assassination, the Secretary of the Navy was Fred Korth, who had been Marguerite Oswald's divorce lawyer.**

I stated that I did not think Life, which kept the Zapruder film from the public for 12 years, would have been interested in solving the JFK case for the same reason I've speculated why Bobby Kennedy wasn't interested in solving it: some activity with which they were involved had backfired (possibly Operation Tilt), resulting in the president's assassination. That is just my own interpretation.

Tim Carroll

*Arthur M. Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy And His Times, (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1978), 506.

**Anthony Summers, Not In Your Lifetime, (first published as Conspiracy by McGraw-Hill Books in 1980), 322-324.

Edited December 14, 2004 by Tim Carroll