David Andrews

Perhaps he did him a favor once.

Again, I don't have Fonzi's book in the house, but my recollection is that Fonzi meant that Phillips violated "basic tradecraft" by being spooked when he encountered Veciana in Reston, VA. He later denied knowing Veciana twice on the day Fonzi brought Veciana to confront Phillips during his HSCA testimony.

To play devil's advocate - DeMohrenschildt was for a time an associate of Jacqueline Bouvier's family, and knew the First Lady as a child, which weakens the "habit of writing high level people" quirk angle a bit.

I don't have the Fonzi book in front of me, but here from Spartacus is a Fonzi interview excerpt regarding the first time Fonzi brought Phillips and Veciana together in Reston, VA, which led to Fonzi recommending to Robert Blakey that Phillips be charged with perjury for denying knowing Veciana: (5) Gaeton Fonzi, interviewed on 8th October, 1994. Veciana was introduced by name to Phillips twice, once in the banquet hall and once in the hallway. Phillips even asked that it be repeated and then, when Veciana asked him, "Don't you remember my name?" Phillips responded, "No." As Veciana himself later pointed out, that was odd considering that Veciana had been exceptionally well-known in anti-Castro activity, being the founder, key fund-raiser and spokesman for Alpha 66, the largest and most militant anti-Castro group. It was odd because anti-Castro activity was the heart and soul of Phillips' mission during the period in question. It was impossible for Phillips not to know or remember Veciana's name. Phillips had simply been caught off-guard by Veciana's surprise appearance at Reston and had a little "slip of tradecraft." Phillips himself must have later realized that because later, under oath during his Committee testimony, he decided the only way he could rectify that "slip of tradecraft" was to lie and say that Veciana was never introduced to him by name at that encounter. I urged Chief Counsel Bob Blakey to recommend Phillips be charged with perjury, since we had three witnesses to that Reston encounter: myself, Veciana and an aide from Senator Schweiker's office. Blakey declined to take on the CIA. http://spartacus-educational.com/JFKphillips.htm

But Phillips knew Veciana, and seemed to have some guilty knowledge when he was confronted with Veciana. In The Last Investigation, Gaeton Fonzi published his eyewitness account of bringing Veciana to Phillips' testimony session before HSCA. Phillips reacted as if he'd seen a ghost, and refused to talk to Veciana. I believe Phillips fled the room. See Fonzi's book for the entire action. As Phillips was testifying before a commission specially investigating assassinations, gee - why was he spooked when Veciana appeared?

Remember that Howard Hunt was, allegedly, once going by "Knight."

On a lower operational level, but yes. My sense is that there were migratory field names at CIA, and they were used to confuse field contacts and destroy culpability, but perhaps also to certify persons dropping the name ( e. g., "Bishop") to other persons observing an op at CIA.

Some background on David Irving v. Gitta Sereny, a formidable investigator and admirable historian: [wiki] Books[edit] The Case of Mary Bell was first published in 1972 following Mary Bell's trial; in it Sereny interviewed her family, friends and the professionals involved in looking after Mary during her trial. This book was edited by Diana Athill who would also edit Sereny's Into That Darkness. Into That Darkness (also following an initial article for the Telegraph magazine) was an examination of the guilt of Franz Stangl, the commandant of the Treblinka and Sobibor extermination camps.[9] She spent 70[10] hours interviewing him in prison for the article and when she had finished he finally admitted his guilt; he died of a heart attack nineteen hours later. Albert Speer: His Battle with Truth (1995) is a biographical work on Albert Speer, German minister of Armaments during World War II. In it, Sereny explores how much Speer knew about the Holocaust. During the Nuremberg trials, Speer had avoided a death sentence, claiming all the while that he knew nothing of the Holocaust. However, Sereny concludes that Speer must have known based on a letter he wrote to the Jewish community in South Africa (after the war), and the fact that his closest assistant attended the Wannsee Conference (where the details of the genocide of the Jews were worked out) who could not have failed to inform him about the proceedings. In 1998, she was embroiled in a controversy in the British press when her second book on Mary Bell, Cries Unheard[11] was published and she announced that she was sharing the publishing fee, from MacMillan Publishers, with Mary Bell for collaborating on the book. Sereny was initially criticized in the British press and by the British government, though the book quickly became, and remains, a standard text for professionals working with problem children. Sereny wrote of her final book, The German Trauma (2002): "The nineteen chapters in this book, all intimately concerned with Germany before, during and since the end of the Third Reich, describe more or less sequentially what I saw and learned from 1938 to 1999, thus almost over a lifetime."[12] David Irving libel suit[edit] British writer David Irving initiated a libel case against Sereny and the Guardian Media Group for two reviews in The Observer where she asserted he deliberately falsified the historical record in an attempt to rehabilitate the Nazis. Irving maintained a personal animosity for Sereny, whom he calls "that shriveled Nazi hunter", for successfully refuting his claims since the publication of his book Hitler's War. When, in 1977, Sereny cross-checked the source he cited for his assertion that Hitler knew nothing about the Final Solution, and therefore could not have ordered it, she found he had excised a caveat which would have contradicted his claim. "I know many of the same people as he does who were of Hitler's circle," Sereny said. "That is scary for him. He says we jostle at the same trough. The difference is that he loves that trough, and I don't... There is, I think, [for him] despair in all of this." Although the case did not go to court, the cost to the Guardian Media Group of preparing its legal defence amounted to £800,000.[13]

I can't get into cases now, but I suspect from my own studies that the cognomen "Bishop" was used by more than one person at CIA for forays into the field. I suspect Tracey Barnes used "Bishop:" also when out of the office. Check the past threads for other research on this.

Roger, don't forget that in those days the government was operating on dedicated phone exchanges established in major cities, and there were secure connections to military installations. So - no public record, and any record that was maintained could still be designated Classified. Has anyone sought assassination-period telecommunications records through FOIA?.

Related or not? US groups opposed to Trump and conservatism are now labeling themselves Anti-Fascist or "Anti-Fa." Groups in the opposite camp acknowledge the Anti-Fa in the press and on the internet, but are not disavowing the name "fascist" in indignation. So, apparently Americans are now self-identifying as fascist. Expect them to adopt the name any day now.

I was going to say, was this a "rogue op" strictly to give McCone plausible deniability? May not have worked with RFK. I know of another rogue op like this. Fifty years ago today, a partnership called The Beatles did a side project under the name Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Fooled nobody. If the hit team is CIA-oriented (Mob, Cubans, Corsicans, Prouty's hit team in Greece, Harvey's Euro hit team), then it is done through "normal channels."

Paul wonders if the Army support man is Lansdale (actually General, USAF). This assumes that the support man is a lower-ranking liaison between the planners and higher-ranking officers in the Army (and other services?) Fletcher Prouty cites Lansdale as CIA's man in the USAF and the East Asian theater. So if we have a cabal of Dulles, Phillips, Harvey, Lansdale, and perhaps Angleton - do we not have "the CIA" and not "rogue agents"? It seems like a partners' meeting at a firm, and not a "rogue" operation. If you factor in Helms and Hunt and Morales, well...that's quite a lot of rogues at or near the top. This is not much like Clay Shaw and Dave Ferrie gossiping at mens' parties.

Thank you, Ernie, for the research recommendations. I think the history of FBI counterterrorism, c.1980-present, is underexamined, and too often presented in empty puffery that lists some players and a slew of organizational structure, without presenting any of the process, only the judgment that the results have been heroic, but the resources and internal support lacking. Time for more and better. Peter Lance has been a start, but some of his conclusions are questionable, as is his small industry of creating a shelf of books around the same, repeated core of information.

Ernie, can I put to you the question I asked Larry Hancock? What, in your opinion, are the best books on the FBI 1980-present? Counterterrorism a special interest.

Larry - thanks. I've read the Crumpton book and gotten a lot out of it. I'll have to re-read Richard Clarke to see why you would recommend it. It struck me as a bit empty, like Louis Freeh's My FBI, but I should review Clarke in light of what I've read since his book came out. One book I got a bit out of is Matt Apuzzo, Enemies Within: Inside the NYPD's Secret Spying Unit and Bin Laden's Final Plot against America, which gives good background on the interworkings of CIA and FBI with NYPD prior to 9/11. How do you feel about the portrayal of FBI in Peter Lance's books?

Do these kids really know Piaf? https://www.identityevropa.com/

Larry, what are the best FBI books for the period 1980-present? Counterterrorism emphasis a plus.

In more sensationalist writing about intel ops, Division Five gets credited with black bag work (office and home break-ins, document theft or photography, and related arts) in both the cold war and Cointelpro periods, and is sometimes cited as a domestic death squad. The death squad business is chiefly what I meant by "rumors." That's why I brought Division Five up after Cliff's post above, and I think these rumors are what Paul was interested in. It's great to get the organizational facts from Ernie and Larry, but what about the rumors? Mae Brussell bought into the rumors, yet the places where she couldn't separate fact from paranoia, and so disseminated both, are the weakest parts of her research and the least useful parts of her writing and broadcasting.

Division Five is cited many places - including MLK in Memphis - but never with any definitive history. Sometimes I see its existence denied. So - reality or rumor. Larry Hancock?

I'm going to re-read Pic's testimony tonight and try to describe the friction between Pic and Jenner exactly, with quotations.

So Cubans? Also, not to go off track - and not specifically directed to Cliff - what is known about FBI's Division Five? Death squad in reality, or just a rumor?

Jim, has John ever considered why John Pic took an angry attitude in his WC testimony? One couldn't read his emotions from the transcript, but the WC counsel brings the attitude up to Pic and threatens Pic with the law and the military authorities if he doesn't cooperate. This may be the only instance in the WCR where a witness receives this treatment.

Good to see the Krock article, Jim. Often that article is cited as anti-CIA and the source of warnings that the CIA was too powerful and interfering, but it's clear from reading Krock that his is an equivocating response to Richard Starnes' courageous work. Krock is doing damage control, goading Kennedy, and stealing Starnes' glory, all in one shot. If a plot against Kennedy were not already underway, this piece would be a serious incitement to war between the Agency and the Executive.

"Dirty Dick" Helms seems obvious - that was his nickname well before Watergate. One of the curiosities of the letter is recipient "Arturo Verdestein," or Arthur Greenstein. This was a curious friendship for Nagell to have and maintain, and not enough is known about this guy, or researched in the Russell book. "Arthur Greenstein" seems oddly close to "Abe Greenbaum," though this may be only coincidence. It's possible Nagell wrote to Greenstein as he had few friends after incarceration, and Greenstein was an innocent who wanted to know what put Nagell away.. "Snerd" the "illegitimate son" of Castro, "reborn as Terd" after the assassination? Who dat? The most common association of the name "Snerd" was "Mortimer Snerd," a ventriloquist's dummy created by Edgar Bergen, which Nagell would have been aware of from period TV appearances. I think "Snerd" was also a cognomen for "idiot" (it may be the linguistic ancestor of today's "nerd.") Some perspicacious researcher should be able to trace "Greenbaum" by deciphering his espionage hijinks as detailed in the letter. "House on 92nd street" refers to a wartime Nazi spy ring bust, supposedly involving nuclear secrets, fictionalized in a famous movie of the same title. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037795/ Note how Nagell obliquely works former Nazis into the letter as a "lead," using the release of old Fuhrer recordings on LP. P. S. - Another Lincoln number is 5, as in five-dollar bill.