James DiEugenio

It does appear to be true Don. Talk about wild.

I disagree about no firm conclusions. 1. The back wound was not dissected because the military guys would not let the doctors perform a dissection. 2. The brain was not sectioned, in a gunshot wound to the skull murder! 3. Stringer did not take the photos of the brain. 4. Those pics and illustrations and measurements are not of Kennedy's brain. As Cyril Wecht once said, the reason the brain disappeared is that it would have revealed two shots to the skull.

To answer the second question first: Johnson had an estimate made on this, and the estimate came back that yes Saigon would be able to hold on until after the election. As to why McNamara did what he did, no one has ever figured that one out. Except that he looked upon himself as serving his president, who ever that would be. It was a terrible mistake on his part. It ruined his reputation and split up his family. I have always felt that the Pentagon Papers was his way of doing penance. Because it included, in the Gravel Edition, a chapter on Kennedy's phased withdrawal. This is one reason I gave that flunky film The Post a bad review.

First of all, if you have not read Jim Hougan's classic book Secret Agenda, you cannot understand Watergate. Secondly, if you do not know who Lou Russell was, you cannot understand James McCord. Third, if you do not know about the controversial career of Bud Fensterwald you cannot understand that story. Let me summarize briefly. 1. Hougan makes a convincing case that Hunt and McCord were plants in the White House and the Plumbers Unit. They were really working for Helms and the CIA from the start and not Nixon and CREEP. His masterly narrative of how they got caught shows just how apparent this was and should have been. There is no way on earth that McCord should have taped six doors, or retaped the door when the guard removed it. And there is no way Hunt should have kept the burglars belongings in the hotel room with his name and number in one of the address books. Nixon finally realized Helms had set him up, but it was too late. 2. Lou Russell was McCord'a aide de camp and prior to working for McCord he worked as a security guard at the Watergate! He also said he had tapes of the call girl ring at the Columbia Plaza, near the Watergate. In other words, McCord knew about this. But, and its a big but, it was McCord's faulty initial electronic surveillance installments that made the Plumbers go back to the Watergate anew. That night, the night of the final break in, Russell was supposed to be visiting his daughter. He cut it short and ended up at the Howard Johnson's restaurant, the place where some of the Plumbers convened that night before going to the Watergate. How did Russell explain this colossal coincidence? He was feeling sentimental about an old girlfriend who used to get her hair done at the Watergate while he would wait for her at the Hojo's. A sentimental nostalgia attack made him leave his daughter's early? McCord lied about this and said Russell was not there that night. When, in fact, Hougan argues that they were both at the Hojo's at the same time. (p. 186) When the break in was delayed, Russell left Hojo's. But, revealingly, he returned when it did occur. Around midnight. How could he know that unless McCord told him? 3. McCord was the guy who got the Plumbers caught through the unbelievable idiocy with the tape. A guy who worked for CIA for 19 years did not know any better? His first attorney was Gerald Alch. Alch correctly perceived Watergate as a CIA set up. McCord fired him and hired Fensterwald, who as his first declaration said: we are going after the president. When Hougan called McCord and told him he wanted to talk about Russell, McCord adamantly refused and told his lawyer he would sue Hougan if he called again about that. It was Russell who got Fensterwald to represent McCord and also asked him for bail money for his boss, which Fensterwald provided, 40K. (Hougan, p. 303) I hope that explains why Fensterwald was doing this shell game for Russell about the checks. Finally, why would Fensterwald be banking for McCord, when another real banker was cashing checks to Russell out of McCord's personal account. (p. 306)

To abide by Mark, and getting back to the scene. If you recall, Oliver, Zach Sklar, Fletcher and John Newman, were all pilloried about this angle--that JFK was getting out of Vietnam and after his murder, LBJ changed the policy and escalated to 540 K combat troops and Rolling Thunder. So the film had two barrels in the shotgun: Kennedy was killed by a conspiracy., and the media missed a strong possible motive and had been covering that up through shills like Halberstam and Sheehan ever since. Then came the ARRB and in late 1997 they declassified the notes of the Sec Def May 1963 conference. Not only was Kennedy getting out of Vietnam, but McNamara was after them to get out even faster then they wanted to leave. And it was all there in Black and White. They couldn't deny it. And so the major papers now had to eat crow, and they did e.g. NY TImes and Philadelphia Inquirer. But then the fallback for the loony left e.g. Chomsky was that Kennedy was only doing that in a winning situation. LOL, ROTF. But then John Newman got hold of McNamara's debriefs. He explicitly said there that he and Kennedy had decided that once the training mission was over, they were getting out no matter what the situation was. America could not fight the war for Saigon. End of story. Stone was right and the MSM was wrong. And the field of Vietnam studies has not been the same since.

Its not quite as cut and dried as that. Please note: http://jfk.hood.edu/Collection/Weisberg-Watergate Files/Fensterwald Bud/Fensterwald 09.pdf

Is that really true Don? He thinks Smith is Tippit's son? Nice one Gil, about not paying for the ticket when he had 10 x more than enough to pay for it.

Thanks for this Lori. Its a good precis of his career in the JFK case.

Lori is correct. I looked it up in Valenti's book. You know, it is not fun driving around LA to these out of the way libraries to find these alleged source books, and then to discover that like a game of telephone, what is in the them was greatly exaggerated and distorted from what it actually says.

BTW, let me tell a little story about this scene. From the set. First, Sutherland was not the first choice. Oliver Stone wanted Brando. But there were two problems. First, he wanted a lot of money. Second, it was pure dialogue, really a monologue. There was no way they could have built that many poster boards along the way. Especially since he is supposed to be looking at Garrison. Secondly, if you know anything about acting, as the saying does, Sutherland has his character nailed from the start. To put it mildly, Costner does not. He basically is just flailing about the surface. So Stone had to coach him up a lot. Once, Sutherland walked away toward the monument, out of ear shot, and said, "If he know what the heck I was saying maybe that would help!"

BTW, Andy Purdy is a story and a half. He actually worked for Mark Lane as part of his volunteer network. He then got Groden to show the Z film to Tom Downing, the congressman from Virginia. Which was crucial to getting the HSCA off the ground since it was Downing who gave speech after speech on the floor of congress finally bringing it to a vote. Because of that Purdy was placed on the HSCA as an investigator. But when Sprague and Tanenbaum left, and then Blakey came in, something happened. Blakey called in Baden, and he then called in Purdy. Baden was now going to head the medical panel and Purdy was going to be the lead investigator. When Purdy came out of the office, he told Eddie Lopez, "We're going with the single bullet theory." Eddie then added, "Jim, from that moment on, Andy Purdy had religion about the Magic Bullet."

That show should really be good on Thursday night. I am pretty sure Stone is included.

If you do not know who these people are, going counter clockwise, its Gary Aguilar, Kathy Cunningham, Bob Tanenbaum, Mike Baden, Cyril Wecht and Andy Purdy. This is very important since it proves that the HSCA knew they were lying in their report. If not for the ARRB, we would not have found that out.

Thanks Vince. You probably have even more.

Please note that when Sutherland goes into his speculation, he says words to the effect that a phone call is made to someone, maybe to someone like his superior officer. This qualifies the scene as subjective. There are very large medium shots of LBJ later, and there is the thing about NSAM 273, and "just get me elected and I'll give you your war". I know Stone does not think LBJ was involved. But these things work dramatically and, for reasons stated above, this is qualified as subjective. Also note how he qualified the actual hit team, could be out of a camp near Athens Greece, Cubans, Mafia hire. He was trying to make the point that this must have been a high level plot, not a Mafia hit job, or some Cuban exiles, etc. And he was trying to say that VIetnam was a much overlooked possible reason for the murder of Kennedy. BTW, the real turnaround in Indochina policy was in March of 1964, with NSAM 288. But you allow things like that in a dramatic presentation. And that is what the last part of this is.

First of all, since I wrote a reply to Vince Bugliosi on this, let me say that what is so remarkable about this scene is this: for the first time in a dramatic feature film that was seen by millions, the public was informed of the crimes of the CIA in overthrowing governments and attempted and successful assassination plots. All done with first rate skill and impact. Plus a scene stealing performance by Sutherland. What ease the man had, exhibiting complete authority and control. When they sit down after that walk he then begins to inform Garrison about the Cuba project, MONGOOSE, and then Vietnam. That segment about Vietnam utterly enraged the MSM and academia. Because hacks like Halberstam and Sheehan had been selling this BS about Johnson's policy being a continuation of Kennedy's policy. Which was complete and utter horse dung, and Johnson was part of that BS. When X references NSAM 263 and 273, those were shockers: that in the space of a few days, LBJ had more or less cancelled 263 and said he was not going to let Vietnam go the way China did. Can you imagine comparing South Vietnam with China? All of this is true. Even the scene with the generals talking about Kennedy like they did, that was borne out with the declassification of the Missile Crisis tapes. If anything, the film did not go far enough in that regard since work by others--Goldstein, Kaiser, Blight-- has furthered what Prouty and Newman did with Stone. And Newman has gone further also in the second edition of his book. There is a scene in that book where Kennedy comes into a meeting he called, he was deliberately late. This took place right after the debate on NSAM 111 had concluded. JFK sat down, made some small talk and then declared "Once policy is decided those on the spot either implement it or they get out." He paused and then said, "Now who is going to implement my policy on Vietnam?" And McNamara raised his hand. This is why Johnson says in the film, you control McNamara and you control Kennedy. Everything said about Vietnam is pretty much dead on. And this is what made the MSM go into a spastic state since what they had been preaching for decades was shown up as pure myth. Plus this provided a reason for JFK's murder. As per Lansdale, Stone always said that Lansdale was a dramatic device, that someone like Lansdale was enlisted to draw up a plan. But since he had been running MONGOOSE he was a pretty good figure to use. Was it him? Who knows. What is really surprising about Stone's film is how close he got without the ARRB. BTW, that Washington scene did not really need to be done with Mr. X, Fletcher Prouty. If I had been advising Stone at the time, I would have used Nagell in the park, and then I would have had Garrison flying home and opening up a letter from a history professor at Ohio U. The guy wrote him a 26 page handwritten essay about the death of Kennedy and the escalation of the VIetnam War. Can you imagine what a scene that would have been? With Garrison smoking his pipe, one light on in his study, a narrator reciting the letter, intercutting scenes of him reading with the scenes in Indochina of Rolling Thunder and combat troops arriving. Too many people who know little or nothing about New Orleans or the film--who have not even read The Book of the Film-- have a tendency to pontificate about both subjects, to the point they sound like Dan Rather, Edward Epstein or Tom Brokaw. PS. The NSAMs 55-57 were designed to begin to turn over the larger covert actions of the CIA to military intel. This is one reason why the DIA was created.

Len Osanic is putting together a two week tribute to Cyril Wecht. This week will be Gary Aguilar, Dawna Kauffman, and me. Next week I think will be David Mantik, Mike Cheeser and I think Vince. Big maybes are Tanenbaum and Oliver Stone. No one does it like Black Op Radio. Thanks Len. Cyril deserves it.

BTW, when you watch that HSCA testimony, note that they are trying to discredit him with Guinn's NAA results. Got that? In other words, its rubbish they are throwing at him. That is how desperate they are.

Thanks VInce, but do we really need three threads on this? I mean c'mon.

This is a bit out of order which makes it hard to follow. But if you want to see how bad the HSCA really was, watch it all the way through. Even Stokes and Dodd sold him down the river. But he fought on with the good fight.

His performance in front of the HSCA was simply excellent. He was so sensible and so sound. And made very clear the bunk they were trying to sell. Can someone post that?

You got that right Sandy. What a bad day to wake up and learn of this.

Here is the notice: https://www.post-gazette.com/news/obituaries/2024/05/13/cyril-wecht-jfk-allegheny-county-pittsburgh/stories/202403220106 He insisted on doing that last conference in Pittsburgh on the 6oth anniversary, and he and Ben did do it. I thought something was up when I asked Ben about Cyril doing a spot on that Russian documentary. But Ben said he could not. First Mark Lane and now Cyril. Sheesh.

You are welcome since you earned them. And I repeat, when Hoover says they violated your rights, take it to the bank as to how bad the DPD was. Craig Watkins sure understood it. So did the Innocence Project.

An interesting interview with Bruce de Torres about "The JFK Assassination Chokeholds". Its wide ranging and he actually read the book so its informed. https://realitywithbrucedetorres.buzzsprout.com/1246169/15049850-reality-with-bruce-de-torres-18-james-dieugenio