Robin Finn

Outline for Phillips' book can be viewed here as a part of the Harold Weisberg collection.

former CIA officer Glenn Carle: "During the 1960s, Maurice Bishop was the alias used by an infamous CIA officer in Mexico City, whom conspiracy theorists believe met Lee Harvey Oswald shortly before President John F. Kennedy was murdered in 1963. The alleged meeting is cited as clear evidence that CIA officers were somehow involved in Kennedy’s assassination. I knew Maurice Bishop, whose real name was David Atlee Phillips. A long time ago, he got me into the agency." http://glenncarle.com/tag/central-intelligence-agency/ from the 2013 edition of Anthony Summers' book Not in Your Lifetime: "In conversation with Phillips, he recalled in 2013, he asked him about the allegation that he had been “Bishop.” The response he received is startling, given Phillips’s history of flat-out denial." “He did not say, ‘Yes, I am Maurice Bishop,’ Carle remembered, “It was clear to me, however, that he was the man who had used the Bishop alias… . Phillips’ reaction was to acknowledge that he was the man in question… . He tacitly accepted its accuracy; but he did not explicitly confirm to me that he had done what he was accused of doing: meeting with Oswald. He avoided discussing this point.” "The quote used here is from a February 5, 2013, letter from Carle to the author’s principal colleague Robbyn Swan, who had noted that—in a book review—Carle had written: “I knew “Maurice Bishop,” whose real name was David Atlee Phillips.” In his letter to Swan, Carle also wrote: “Another case officer colleague—a contemporary of Phillips, now long dead—in fact the man who introduced Phillips to his second wife, also spoke to me in a way that indicated that Phillips had been “Bishop.”

The same ploy that had been used in 1963-a purported meeting with an intelligence officer from a hostile country(LHO and Kostikov in Mexico City)-was used again in the aftermath of 9/11 when it was falsely reported that Mohammed Atta had met with an Iraqi intelligence officer in Prague in the months preceding the attack. Other parallels with 1963 are found in Kevin Fenton's Disconnecting the Dots-CIA hiding what the agency knew about hijackers being in the U.S. because they were possibly using them as part of an operation.

More photographs of DeTorres https://tangodown63.com/de-torres-bernardo/

Somehow two different documents were merged into one release here: http://documents.theblackvault.com/documents/jfk/NARA-Oct2017/2018/180-10110-10100.pdf The second is an account of the interview of Phillips by Hardway that Fonzi discusses in his book and that Hardway writes about here.( Phillips became nervous when he realized Hardway had proof that all of the sources pushing the "Castro did it" angle immediately after Nov.22 were directly linked to Phillips). I believe one of Phillips' sources of disinformation linking LHO to Cubans was Salvador Diaz Verson. If I remember correctly, all five were named in a Lobster magazine article in the 1980s, "The Search for Maurice Bishop."

How convenient that an article pushing "Castro did it" is published the week that more files are due to be released. Funny how this part got left out...

NSA web site has PDFs of released VENONA messages organized by year of origination. There doesn't seem to be a search feature for them.

This is from a CIA Latin American Task Force Report of Possible Cuban Complicity in the JFK Assassination that was done in the 1976-77 time frame. It claims that only one call was made to or from Duran on September 27? Where is the call to the Soviets to ask about LHO's visa???? No mention of the September 28 call.

This is from one one the ARRB e-mails. What a joke-Escalante met LHO in Mexico City and was the"mystery passenger" on November 22 !!! David MarwellI met with Gus Russo, David Marwell and Cinda Elser on June 26, 1995. Cinda is an independent private investigator who specializes in finding hard to locate individuals. She is a friend of Russo's and has performed investigative work for him.... Russo provided information concerning Marty Underwood and his knowledge of Fabian Escalante, the alleged "mystery passenger" on flights in and out of Mexico City and Havana in September, 1963 and just after the assassination. According to Russo, Underwood became a Kennedy family confidante and assistant when he helped In 1968, during the "height of feuding between RFK and LBJ" the latter was concerned about "two cancers; Vietnam and allegations I killed JFK." LBJ allegedly told Underwood to find out "what your friend down south knows." This was LBJ's order to Underwood to go to Mexico City to talk to Win Scott. Underwood allegedly made the trip and Scott told him "Marty - we screwed up." The CIA apparently by then knew that Fabian Escalante had been in Mexico City in September 1963. Russo is wondering if there are CIA records which would indicate if Escalante, who is now a high ranking member of Castro's government, met LHO in September 1963. Escalante was apparently the "mystery passenger" on the Cubana airlines flight from Mexico City into Havana on 11/22/63. Russo said he has a section in his upcoming book about this. Underwood also provided Russo with what the former claims are his handwritten notes from his 1968 Mexico City trip. The photocopies of the notes Underwood gave Russo, which Underwood claimed were stored in his papers at his family's home in the Midwest, were heavily redacted. (Also of interest to this investigator is that the notes were written on White House stationery. If Underwood was really in Mexico City on a "quiet" mission for LBJ in 1968 I find it highly questionable that he'd take notes on clearly marked White House stationery. It is possible he made the notes after returning to this country. When I asked Russo about this he did not know the answer.

Trump tweeted this morning":Subject to the receipt of further information, I will be allowing, as President, the long blocked and classified JFK FILES to be opened." How much further information could be coming to him in less than five days?

Shenon was a guest on the Fresh Air radio program today. From listening, I learned that: LHO was a prolific newspaper reader and had to have seen Castro's comments in the New Orleans newspaper LHO was in contact with pro-Castro Cubans in Mexico City who discussed killing JFK and he even talked about it in the Cuban consulate! Jack Ruby killed LHO to spare Jackie from having to come back to Dallas for a trial Earl Warren didn't bring Sylvia Duran to the U.S. for an interview because she was a communist??????? Some of the released documents are illegible and in foreign languages!!! Shenon communicates with other "serious researchers" but has troubled relationships with them because he doesn't agree with their theories Funny how he didn't mention anything about the extensive CIA surveillance operations in Mexico City. For someone who is sure the pro-Castro Cubans were encouraging LHO, the production from the bugs and photo ops should be critical, right? The CIA's Cuban double agents' reports should be important corroboration ,right?

A more genuine response by Phillips would have been to admit he recognized Veciana's name when they were introduced- they spoke in Spanish about anti-Castro Cubans. Instead he acted as though he didn't know anything about him , but later testified to the HSCA that he was familiar with Veciana during the time period.