Larry Hancock

For a minor update, the conference is planned for the Lorenzo Hotel, the site of the last Lancer Dallas conference - Gabriella is just waiting on the finalization of the contract to provide actual details on that.

Guys, I know that has been bandied about in regard to Dinkins for years but other than has having served in the Army in France I cannot find any evidence that he was ever involved in communications intercepts nor that such things were done in France.  As to being a code operator, that essentially involved using a machine to encrypt or decypt messages send through military channels (our military).  A relatively routine job but one obviously requiring a level of classification.  Much different than being say a crypto service or repair technician (those guys trained in the building next to me when I was in the Air Force) and not at all similar to being an intercept operator monitoring foreign transmissions.

As to Paul and a crazy person in Scotland, you will find my extensive research on that including reference with an interview of said crazy person in SWHT - look for Kirknewton, others in the DPUK have done extended research on that as well.  Personally I consider Kirknewton a possible leak in the plot, for reasons I go into in the book, having to do with one of the anti-Castro folks I've written about at length, Victor Hernandez.

Paul, that is a bit off target, Staff D assets (not necessarily in the ZR program) were working for he CIA directly, if the CIA had control of their missions and their take.  If certain things collected during those missions would have helped in doing some communications intercept collections they would have shared it with NSA for NSA to do that work.  As far as my research goes I could never confirm Dinkinw having been involved in intercept work, for Europe that was done at two different locations, one in Scotland and one in England - one focused on civilian targets the other military.

The ZR program was simply a cover for money to be used to recruit deniable assets for Staff D,  for different purposes but including "spotting" potential assets for Staff D missions. Roselli used it to house the money and related paperwork for funding assassination projects but the only one of those we know he actually implemented was against Castro and used Roselli.

Nothing to link JMWAVE to Madrid - however the AMWORLD project did have links though Madrid and other European capitals for weapons purchases and Artime had some connections to Spain as it was hoped Spain would support the AMWORLD operations against Castro. Hunt came into his Madrid assignment via his close friendship with Artime as far as I can speculate.

Bottom line, George as he himself admitted, had been a source for government and intelligence agencies (note: this was not viewed as evil back then, it was viewed as patriotic and by many as a duty) - it bought him connections and contacts and he was a consultant and a promoter.  He admitted all that.  Worse yet for the CIA he was admitting his contact with CIA domestic op, although he likely  thought of him as just another government guy to befriend, do favors for and maintain a good relationship with for whatever might come up.  Pretty typical relationship for domestic ops.

But it it had been fully explored and called out, that would have been something that would have made huge press headlines - CIA Monitored Oswald before President Killed, and certainly George had to be "diminished", have his credibility undermined and also shown that he and his reputation were very much at risk - all of which comes out in how he was handled by the WC.

Harvey drank excessively, so did Morales, but both were smart and totally action oriented - look at the Berlin tunnel gambit - in high risk operations.  Who the heck do you pick to take over an international assassination project other than the sharpest and baddest dude you can find - Harvey.   Who has the nerve to stand head to head with RFK over Cuba, Harvey.  Who gets booted after the missile crisis.     I've always failed to understand how a man with his skills and experience and whose wife is on record talking about how much they both hated the Kennedy's would not be the top suspect?  Is he just too obvious...

Gerry,  I think Oswald collected a lot of information including detailed information on the factory because he wanted to write about how the Soviet system worked, we know that he was very disappointed when he did come back that the media did not contact him and interview him about life there (which does seem sort of stupid on their part because he was fully prepared to dump on the Soviet system, not Russia but problems with the system, it would have made some great interviews).  As a matter of fact we find that spelled out at length in his diary and in the manuscript.  And yes I am writing an extended restudy of Oswald...not sure what I will do with it other than satisfy myself at this point.

On your question, the "manuscript" was constructed from pieces of his diary and notes he had brought back (smuggled) and was done almost immediately after his arrival home....so that gives us his first and best feelings about Russia and Soviet communism.  He had been very disappointed over the Soviet factory system, the class structure in management and other aspects of it that he considered far from the socialist model. At one point Oswald even went "on strike" in the factory - something that really created a problem for his managers.

The other writing, as far as I can tell, including the typed pieces, was done sometime in the January - March time frame when he had a stable job and time to himself in the evenings to get his thoughts down.   That's when he did the essays, which were fueled by several of the rather sophisticated publications he was routinely reading:

The Nation, The Militant (obtained by subscription from the Socialist Workers Party), The Worker (obtained by subscription from the Communist Party of the United States of America), The New Republic (an American progressive magazine with commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts), The Nation  (a  biweekly American liberal magazine that covered political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis),as well as The Road to Socialism and Hands Off Cuba.

That is my best guess on the timing of his writing at present...  

The best I can tell is that the ZR crypt was used for "outsourcing" assets for illegal tasks, something where you would not want to use your own personnel or even operationally approved assets - given its association with Staff D  I suspect that was primarily for things like burglaries, safe cracking, thefts, strong arm stuff against couriers etc.  Certainly reason to think it could involve things like poisonings, etc on occasion.  (the CIA normally had no sense of humor with crypts but I if they did I suspect "rifle" had more to do with burglary than shooting.  It also looks like they were limited and that ZR actions did not involve things like wire taps or electronics...I've been surprised that ZR assets were not used in Cuba instead of sending in Christ and his team.

Harvey saw it as the place to hide the new executive action project and activated it to bring Roselli back into Castro assassination efforts. What else he might have hidden under it in 63 is a really good question.

As to the NSA connection, as far as I can tell the CIA carried out actions to obtain codes, code books, and related materials such as frequencies used in adversary diplomatic and military transmissions and provided them to NSA...Simpich did a great job of outlining that relationship in regard to Mexico City.  Of course CIA also gave NSA "targets" for their intercept watch lists, as did the military and other agencies like DEA.  NSA focused on the actual technical collections including the physical intercept facilities, some of which they essentially subcontracted, primarily to the Air Force.

Oswald began using photography and related skills after being let go from Taggerts in Dallas, he tried for another similar job with another company there but didn't get it, he used it on his resume and in looking for jobs with the placement office in New Orleans but of course he always need a job ASAP and ended up in menial work.  He had taken photographs pretty extensively in the Marines, acquired one or more cameras and made lots of photographs in Russia.  Photography was probably the highest skill/experience he could claim in looking for work in 1963,

Matt,  Harvey had actually been reassigned to Rome in early 1963 after being replaced by Des Fitzgerald with the CIA Cuba group in January. But he seems to have retained a number of his Staff D duties and connections though much of 1963,  doing some TDY (temporary duty) visits to Italy but not fully relocating to Italy until summer.  His trip to Florida, which included Roselli, was in the April 14-21 63 and the related travel documents refer to ZRRifle,  ostensibly it was to terminate the project or the person (Roselli, apparently).  However he did not just travel to Miami but took a boat trip down to the CIA maritime operations base in the Keys. Certainly Harvey had carried out the assassination project, bringing in Roselli and using anti-Castro Cuban personnel as it  targeted Castro in 62/63.

Bill Simpich has done a good job in State Secret of showing that as far as communications, being copied on memos etc.  Roselli still remained very much in the loop on Staff D and related counterintelligence activities well into 63.

The Harvey testimony you cited does not fully jibe with what we know now and that would include a meeting with Roselli in DC before his final departure, one in which Roselli stayed with Harvey at his house - that was observed by the FBI and brought some attention and a warning about associating with him.  Don't want to rely on memory on the date for that but this whole sequence of events is in SWHT/2010. 

For reference, while Harvey used ZRIFLE as an element of Staff D international operations (it apparently had been used previously as well), he was soon assigned to run the CIA element of Mongoose targeting Cuba and initiated Castro assassination projects using Cubans, in fact the expense reports filed for travel to Florida in 1963  were actually filed under ZRIFLE and he likely paid for Roselli's expenses for travel to Florida that way. Certainly Harvey is directly connected to anti-Castro Cubans and a variety of assassination activities including the rifle teams that were formed to go after Castro - which was to be a subject in the final testimony he was called to give before his murder.

It appears the FBI agent was not as well read as Lee Oswald...hard to miss the reference to Orwell's Animal Farm..

I agree Ben, I've increasingly come to feel that Oswald was put into a set of boxes...one from the Warren commission, one created as a public image even outside of the details actually in the WC investigation supplements and one by the research community (which I contributed to).  I'm working on breaking my view of him out of all three boxes to a view which includes his own views and agendas as drivers in his actions.  As you say, not that it exonerates him from anything but it may give a lot more nuanced view to just how vulnerable he was becoming during 1963.

And as far as his reading list, it was a lot more sophisticated than many of my contemporaries at his same age back then - certainly comparable to what some of us were reading at college level. 

Greg, Oswald had an abiding interest in social political structures and had come to believe  that both the Capitalist and Communist systems were "rigged" against the common man and kept individuals essentially abandoned individuals like his mother and himself and depressed economic levels with no way up and no political voice. He had expected better in Russia but found it rigged too - Titovits writes about that. So I suspect he was using the word literally in its classic political sense. 

"Greek democracy created at Athens was direct, rather than representative: any adult male citizen over the age of 20 could take part, and it was a duty to do so. The officials of the democracy were in part elected by the Assembly and in large part chosen by lottery in a process called sortition."

One of the things we have inherited is a very artificial view of Oswald's intelligence, when he was interested in something he tested quite well...in school, in the Marines (getting a relatively advanced job placement in Marine Air) and even in his job placement tests.  In the Marines his officers commented on his advanced level of knowledge of world politics and affairs and several people commented that he knew as much or more than his officers and was a jerk by bringing that up in conversations and making them look bad..intentionally. 

In at least one instance his job placement counselor commented that he was suited for much better jobs than he was getting but the problem was that he always needed jobs  urgently and was out of work and had to take more menial jobs than his tests indicated he might have gotten otherwise. He came across quite well in job interviews but reference were a problem for him given that he cycled though the jobs and most all of them were relatively menial.

On your last point, all of his writing suggests violence but it does support political change....and some sort of compromise in government systems, a position between Capitalism and Communism, which is why he leaned towards Socialism (he seems to have equated Marxism with Socialism not Communism).

Ben, I'd encourage you to read samples of Oswald's 1963 writing as a benchmark, compare both the content and vocabulary to a 12  year old.  There are several pieces available in Warren Commission materials:

The Collective Life of a Russian Worker – WC Exhibit 92,   pg 287-336 Vol 16,

On Communism and Capitalism – WC Exhibit 25, pg 106-122 Vol 16

The Communist Party of the United States – WC pg 422-430 Vol 16

The Athenian System  / Outline and Principles pg 431-434 WC Exhibit 98 Vol 16

Oswald took lots of photos "at work" in the Marines (just not in the radar room), he took lots of photos many places - I have seen one taken with fellow workers at the Minsk plant, its in Groden's book. There is also one photo of a Marine jet flight line. Actually the number of photos taken in Russia, with co workers, with friends, with girl friends, with other guys, doing tourist stuff totally puts lie to his being asocial, much less anti-social.

If you email Gabriella she can probably give you the menu ...grin.   I will say that an in person conference for the 60th anniversary is probably going to draw a number and group of attendees you may not see together again.

This year's conference will be both in-person and virtual; details at:

https://jfklancerpublications.com/

This year's conference will be both in person and virtual; details here:

https://jfklancerpublications.com/

This year the 60th anniversary conference will be both in-person and streaming - initial dates and details at:

https://jfklancerpublications.com/

Well I will offer the best insight into that comment in Tipping Point - one likely to be rather contrarian - in my Lancer conference presentation this coming November.  At that point, for better or worse, I'll have spent the better part of a year revisiting Lee Oswald from the most objective perspective I can muster.

These connections have been known and discussed for a long time unless I'm missing something here?

http://jfk.hood.edu/Collection/Weisberg Subject Index Files/F Disk/Ferrie David William/Item 85.pdf

https://spartacus-educational.com/JFKarcacha.htm

Beyond that as far as I can tell far Albert is not related or connected to Rose so that is not part of any revelation - until someone proves in such a connection.

Several of these stories and leads are indeed very old and had been discussed for years when I entered this case in the nineties.  I immediately ran across them in the Third and Fourth decade journals in a literature search ....early researchers had looked into some the best they could and written articles for Jerry Rose.  I would recommend reading the Third and Fourth Decade Journals...all of them...which are archived on the Mary Ferrell Foundation web site.   You will come across several of the ones  you listed as well as others and its good context.

https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Featured_The_Third_Decade_Journal.html

https://www.maryferrell.org/php/showlist.php?docset=1115

The big question indeed is how the "diplomat" communicated with the CIA, for instance was it though the Mexico City station?  Its easy enough to imagine the station might have been active at cultivating sources inside Cuba and of course diplomats from friendly nations are always good targets in that respect.

Of course WAVE had always been on the look out for internal sources in Cuba as well.

If you want to get really wild its interesting to recall that Angleton had his own diplomatic contacts and sources in Havana, with enough reach to offer them to Harvey as back up in his Castro assassination efforts. 

Many folks are not familiar with Angleton's being assigned to reorganize CIA counter intelligence against Cuba following the BOP disaster, a project which he appears to have worked on with Morales and the Morales trained AMOTs who went on to become the Cuban Intelligence Service, reporting to Sforza by 1963.

If we could tie down where the report was submitted to the CIA it would really be helpful, in that regard my leading suspect is still Mexico City station - if true it could well be a matter of CIA officers there taking advantage of a sensational story to further prime the pump for a Castro conspiracy, as they had with Lopez.

What we need are the initial CIA intake documents which would tell us where the story came into the system...

Not sure what we could totally write off,  the private flights were reported either after the fact or from "unreliable" (but unidentified) sources. 

Based on the wording in one document the passenger reporting the Cubana flight hold actually might have been Italian (not the mystery passenger that did not show up but the source that reported the suspicious ground hold) - not really out of the question given that even diplomatic personnel from foreign nations traveled though MC to Cuba. 

And apparently the idea that the Cubana aircraft was held for a mysterious passenger may be pure speculation since the aircraft was on the ground for the routine service/hold time and the document even states that the "sources" information on the time of the hold was not reliable.

Its just another set of leads that lets us pretty much read whatever we want to into it I'm afraid. 

I would say not the "CIA" but definitely certain CIA officers were - for example Phillips was writing in his book Nightwatch years later that there had been a Castro conspiracy and that Oswald was indeed paid to shoot JFK....just as he orchestrated in the Lopez story. Actually Phillips wrote three books - nobody reads the others it seems - and put that into all of them.  There is no doubt he was pushing a Castro conspiracy just as DRE and others were. 

For that matter Mexico City station as a whole was pushing the Castro conspiracy angle for days if not longer - until HQ moved to shut them down and the FBI destroyed the Lopez story.  The FBI even destroyed Martino's story about a Castro plot even thought Hoover had been eager to support it at first.

So yes, I definitely believe individual CIA officers were - we now have the documents showing WAVE set off investigating Cuban involvement.  I have to wonder if we never saw the report from that because Sforza managed to come up with something that also implicated Castro.