Greg Wagner
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George Galloway has just started up his own publishing company called Friction. If you have written a book about the JFK assassination and it includes the theory that the CIA was involved, I am sure George would be interested in publishing it. Contact me if you want me to approach him about it.
John-
That's terrific!
BTW, I think he's right on target about the Bush administration. Interestingly enough, his story was THE headline piece on MSNBC.com for about two hours that day. But, instead of being relegated a lower spot on the page as other news stories continued to evolve, it was buried. Within a couple of hours, you had to use the "search" function to find the story. It was effectively buried. Somebody pulled that story off of there in a hurry. Typical.
Thanks for the info.
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As I continue to research this intersesting fellow I have learned that he was married to a Russian. Information gathered from family and friends indicates that John B. Hurt was fluenet in Russian, which would not be odd considering that his wife was a native of that land.
So I posed the question about this Russian speaking ability to the NSA historian I have been communicating with an received this reply:
"Jim:
Sorry to be late in responding....
I can only confirm that John Hurt knew
Japanese, French, and Latin.
Dave
In previous communications I had received this comment:
" I cannot be more specific about Mr. Hurt's postwar assignments, since most documents about that period are still classified."
As I ponder these pieces of information, is it to much to think that John B. Hurt did in fact speak Russian and that he was working on projects that required that ability and that those "assignments.... are still classified?"
Jim Root
Hi Jim-
Well, that certainly would be the logical conclusion based on what you have discovered and what we already knew.
It is interesting that so much Cold War info is still classified.
Consider:
*As a threat to capitalism and our way of life, communism died along with the USSR in the early 1990's
*A great many of individual combatants in that struggle have also passed on
*Technology has advanced light years since the end of the Cold War, rendering many old methods of collecting data obsolete
So, what exactly are the keepers of these secrets purporting to protect? Or do the powers that be simply feel that that is none of our business?
Sorry for the tangent, but I’m wondering about the institutional processes in place for declassification of documents that the American public has every right to see.
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Mark wrote:
It doesn't matter how many books you have based your interpretation on--the scenario makes no sense and represents a inexplicable departure from logic on Kennedy's part. It's wild and mischievous speculation.
As a famous Englishman once said: "Humbug!" Mark, I think I it was you who once posted here that JFK was only paying "lip service" to a second invasion and I asked you to research how much the Kennedy Administration was funding the Second Naval Guerilla and Manuel Artime.
I see from the above post you have not bothered to find this out yet.
Why let facts get in the way of theorizing? It is, after all, much easier to pontificate than hit the books and find out what was really going on!
And let me tell you this: I suspect what the average voter felt was more important to JFK than what Nikita felt. And the Cuban Missile Crisis taught him that Nikita was not going to sacrifice the Soviet Union to save the bearded one.
JFK met with Artime on Sunday, November 17, 1963 and meetings to plan the invasion were ongoing even on the day of the assassination.
Only one thing saved Fidel's life: the bullets that took Kennedy's.
Now these facts do not, of course, PROVE that Fidel killed JFK: only that he had a strong motive. But you HAVE to ignore them because they do point straight to Fidel.
I will consider you serious about "doing your homework" (and solving the case) when you can tell me how much the Kennedy administration was funding Second Naval Guerilla. I'll give you the references if you want.
Hi Tim-
The "lip service" comment was mine on another thread.
While it is true that in a sense Kennedy was pursuing a “dual track” with regard to Cuba, when viewed in the context of his entire foreign policy 11/62 and beyond, Kennedy's intent was clear.
Consider:
*NSAM 263
*Kennedy’s signing of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in 1963
*Kennedy’s decision to opt for blockade during the missile crisis, despite pressure from within his administration to invade or conduct air strikes (Thirteen Days)
*Kennedy’s White House and the Kremlin carried out intensive back-channel communications and negotiations during the entire crisis. And while Kennedy publicly took a firm, no-negotiations stance toward the Soviet Union, he privately pursued ways to bring the crisis to a peaceful end.
*The Jean Daniel meeting, which clearly signaled his intent to open a dialogue with Castro
*The deal he cut to resolve the missile crisis. Specifically, his promise not to invade Cuba along the removal of the Jupiter missiles from Turkey. With this, one must also consider the content and tone of Khrushchev’s 12/11/62 letter to Kennedy:
“I will tell you frankly that we have removed our means from Cuba relying on your assurance that the United States and its allies will not invade Cuba. Those means really had the purpose of defending the sovereignty of Cuba and therefore after your assurance they lost their purpose. We hope and we would like to believe--I spoke of that publicly too, as you know--that you will adhere to the commitments which you have taken, as strictly as we do with regard to our commitments. We, Mr. President, have already fulfilled our commitments concerning the removal of our missiles and IL-28 planes from Cuba and we did it even ahead of time. It is obvious that fulfillment by you of your commitments cannot be as clearly demonstrated as it was done by us since your commitments are of a long-term nature…. Within a short period of time we and you have lived through a rather acute crisis. The acuteness of it was that we and you were already prepared to fight and this would lead to a thermonuclear war. Yes, to a thermonuclear world war with all its dreadful consequences…. We agreed to a compromise because our main purpose was to extend a helping hand to the Cuban people in order to exclude the possibility of invasion of Cuba so that Cuba could exist and develop as a free sovereign state. This is our main purpose today, it remains to be our main purpose for tomorrow and we did not and do not pursue any other purposes…. Therefore, Mr. President, everything--the stability in this area and not only in this area but in the entire world--depends on how you will now fulfill the commitments taken by you. Furthermore, it will be now a sort of litmus paper, an indicator whether it is possible to trust if similar difficulties arise in other geographical areas. I think you will agree that if our arrangement for settling the Cuban crisis fails it will undermine a possibility for manoeuvre which you and we would resort to for elimination of danger, a possibility for compromise in the future if similar difficulties arise in other areas of the world, and they really can arise. We attach great significance to all this, and subsequent development will depend on you as President and on the U.S. Government.”
When Kennedy flatly refused Ex-Com’s invade and air strike options and ultimately settled on the naval blockade, he did it primarily because of his concerns over what the first two options could lead to- nuclear war with the USSR. He determined that that risk was simply too great. In Khrushchev’s letter to Kennedy, he clearly indicates that, in his view, the burden is now squarely on JFK’s shoulders to avoid going right back to square one, with the increased likelihood of confrontation with the Soviets. Kennedy had just spent two of the most difficult weeks of his life deftly avoiding this confrontation. It defies logic to think that he would then wish to seek such a confrontation, while the Soviets still had thousands of nuclear weapons aimed and ready to fly. Further, Khrushchev cleverly points out that U.S. credibility is at stake. With two diametrically opposed and heavily armed super-powers vying for supremacy, the possibility of future conflict elsewhere in the world seemed likely. And should the U.S. fail to honor its commitment re: Cuba, the possibility of such conflicts being peacefully resolved through negotiation would be slim. Again, given Kennedy’s clearly demonstrated preference to avoid military confrontation with the Soviets, it defies logic to think that JFK was hell bent on invading Cuba, particularly post 11/1962.
So again, as clearly demonstrated throughout the missile crisis, we see Kennedy’s understanding of the political environment in the U.S. leads to this “dual track” scenario. Just as he was publicly professing a tough stance against the Soviets during the missile crisis while privately negotiating for peace, so was that same strategy being employed post missile crisis in addressing Cuba. He could not simply “flip a switch” and shut down the exiles and the hardliners in his own government. But he was clearly and carefully moving away from that agenda and toward one of peaceful co-existence. Additionally, while Kennedy was clearly attempting to open a dialogue with Castro, it would also have helped the U.S. to gain the upper hand in such a dialogue if Fidel perceived that JFK was still willing to support his demise should such dialogue prove fruitless.
Even though (as clearly demonstrated over and over again) Kennedy was simply not willing to use the hammer, it benefited him politically, and in his appeal to Castro for dialogue, to give the appearance that he was.
So, while I will not engage in the finger-wagging, condescending tone that you delight in using, I will suggest that while one could argue Kennedy’s post 11/62 policy re: Cuba was to support yet another attempt at an exile coup or invasion, such an argument would be short-sighted, and completely out of context.
BTW, I do own a copy of Live By The Sword. Although I have not yet read it, I plan to. As most Forum users realize, rarely are books written on the assassination and surrounding events completely without problems, inaccuracies, bias, or omissions. However, they almost always have SOMETHING of value to offer. The key is knowing how to mine those nuggets, and not end up with a bag of pyrite (fool’s gold).
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Since things are quiet (and silly) around here I will tell you all the story of
SHANET CLARK'S TRIP TO THE CIA
In 1979 I was one of one hundred (two from every state) high school students selected as a William Randolph Hearst United States Senate Youth Scholar.
We traveled to Washington DC, for a week, that spring.
Mrs. Randolph Hearst (Patricia's mother, I believe) greeted us and we stayed at the Mayflower Hotel. As official Senate scholars we spent time with US Senators, and had a full schedule of events. We went to briefings at the PENTAGON, the WAR COLLEGE, Foggy Bottom (the State Department HQ), Justice, the Supreme Court (Thurgood Marshall spoke to us) and the White House. Jimmy Carter was scheduled to address us, but was busy with the Iranian hostage situation, and a speech writer filled in. I have a nice photo of me with BIRCH BAYH, and another one with JENNINGS RANDOLPH and ROBERT BYRD.
One day we all went to Langley, Virginia for a session at the CIA headquarters.
They checked our ID's at the door and we were ushered into an auditorium. It was very fancy, a perfect geodesic dome, trimmed in black and white.
The chairs were black Corinthian leather, and we were very comfortable.
A Public Relations officer of the CIA took the podium, with a more senior office of to one side with Mrs. Hearst. Some general remarks were made, which I would categorize as innocuous and we were, indirectly of course, recruited.
At the question and answer period, I rose from my seat and was recognized.
"Is it true that in the early 1960's a decision was made to place a portable radar installation on the Chinese Indian border along the Himalayan Mountains? Isn't it true that the CIA sent mountain climbers to the Himalayan border area with a portable radar set powered by the heat released by a plutonium device? And isn't it also true that the team returned a year later and could not find the device, as it had been lost in an avalanche of some sort? And isn't it also true that the PLUTONIUM has not been recovered and is now melting its way deeper into the snow at the headwaters of the Ganges River, where it will affect the health of billions of people?" That was the question I asked.
The young CIA public relations officer at the podium there at CIA headquarters looked quite shocked and was, in fact, stunned into silence.
The older CIA officer walked to the podium, frowning slightly at Mrs. Randolph Hearst.
"You, young man, have very good sources of intelligence. The situation you describe is basically true, although the nation of India has taken full responsibilty for this in a 1964 treaty."
So thats the way I was then, and that's the way I am now..........
Shanet-
That sounds like a pretty cool trip. And as far as your comments at Langley... NICE!
So basically, you've been on THE LIST since '79. Equally impressive.
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Shanet...
Quite impressive!
I am nearly unbeatable at Boggle, and once consumed 50 chicken wings in under 12 minutes.
Greg,
I challenge you to a duel.
John
Hi John!
You're on... then we'll try the chicken wings
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Glad you are going to be OK, Jack. My thoughts and prayers are with you for a complete and speedy recovery.
Greg
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Shanet...
Quite impressive!
I am nearly unbeatable at Boggle, and once consumed 50 chicken wings in under 12 minutes.
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I am working on a major piece of work showing the links between the Assassination of JFK and the Watergate Scandal.
The work is based on published documents and information received from people who do not want to be identified. It involves some speculation on my part. When it is finished it will be fully referenced except for some of my sources who wish to remain anonymous. I offer this for peer group review. I therefore welcome members to correct any mistakes that I have made in my analysis of these two events. I also hope members will provide me with any information that backs up my theory.
In 1963 a small group of men made a decision to assassinate JFK. These men were members of the Suite 8F Group. The names of these people will always remain a secret. I believe they are all dead. So is the man who they paid to organize the assassination.
There were a variety of reasons why they needed JFK to die in 1963. They had not been concerned by JFK’s election in 1960. He had made the necessary promises before he had become the Democratic candidate. He had been fully committed to fighting the Cold War. He had agreed not to try to introduce effective civil rights legislation. He had also promised not to do anything about the oil deprecation allowance and other tax benefits members of this group enjoyed. To confirm his commitment to the power enjoyed by the Suite 8F Group, JFK even agreed to make a senior member of this group, Lyndon Baines Johnson, as his running-mate.
The Suite 8F Group first began to have worries about JFK over the Bay of Pigs fiasco. However, it was events in 1962 that really began to bother them. The Cuban Missile Crisis seemed to change JFK. The shock of nearly starting a nuclear war turned JFK into a idealistic politician who was determined to bring an end to the Cold War. It is not too difficult for those in power to “turn” young idealistic men and women into corrupt politicians. It is much more difficult to deal with a machine politician who becomes converted to idealism. This problem was made far worse by his relationship with Mary Pinchot Meyer. A lifelong pacifist, Meyer was having a profound impact on JFK’s ideology.
Evidence also began to emerge that JFK was unwilling to let the Suite 8F Group continue to fleece the American taxpayer. One of their members, Fred Korth, had been forced to resign as Navy Secretary during the TFX scandal. LBJ was being investigated by the Senate Rules Committee and rumours were circulating that JFK would not protect him any longer and that he would be impeached for his role in the TFX scandal.
JFK not only had to die, he had to be removed before the Senate Rules Committee made public what they knew about LBJ and the Suite 8F Group.
It was decided to employ David Morales to organize the assassination. He brought in Rip Robertson and E. Howard Hunt to help him with this difficult task.
Morales was told to make sure that the assassination could not be traced back to the Suite 8F Group. Some of its members, especially LBJ, would become prime suspects. Therefore it would be necessary to provide a convincing “patsy” to take the blame.
Morales and his team came up with the perfect solution to the problem. They would make it look like that JFK had been killed by a team working on the orders of Fidel Castro. This would then give the opportunity for LBJ, the new president, to order an invasion of Cuba.
Therefore the conspirators had to identify two men (it had been decided that JFK would be assassinated in a crossfire operation) who could take the blame for the killing. The two men they chose for this was Lee Harvey Oswald and Gilberto Policarpo Lopez. Oswald had worked as an undercover agent for both the FBI and the CIA. As a result he had the “legend” of someone who appeared to be pro-Castro. As he was a FBI and CIA agent it was assumed that both these organizations would have to go along with this plot. If it was revealed that he was actually working as an undercover agent, serious questions would have been asked about the CIA and FBI role in the assassination.
Gilberto Policarpo Lopez was a double agent working for both Castro and the CIA. Like Oswald he did not know anything about the JFK assassination plot. The important thing was that both men would both be in Dallas on the day JFK was assassinated.
The actual assassination was to be carried out by a team of men recruited via Interpen. Most of the men involved in the assassination were Cubans who had been involved in the struggle to remove Castro. They were told that the assassination would trigger off a full-scale invasion of Cuba.
The plan was to kill Oswald while attempting to flee Dallas. This was the job of J. D. Tippit. This part of the plan failed and it was Tippit who was killed.
There was never any intention to kill Gilberto Policarpo Lopez. He was allowed to flee to Cuba therefore reinforcing his guilt. (Lopez was probably tipped off that he was a suspect guaranteeing that he would get back to Cuba as fast as possible).
Within hours of JFK’s assassination, Hoover had told LBJ that the assassination had been carried out by Oswald and Lopez and had been paid for by Fidel Castro. Everything was in place for an invasion of Cuba. However, LBJ, who had not been told of the plans to kill JFK, knew that there was a major problem with the conspiracy as outlined by Hoover. LBJ realised that this was not true. He knew that JFK had been involved in secret negotiations with Castro during the months leading up to his death. Others, including several people close to JFK and senior officials in the CIA, also knew about these negotiations. Castro had no motive to kill JFK. In fact, he had every reason to want to keep him alive.
LBJ knew that he was in a position to launch an attack to overthrow Castro. However, he also knew it would only be a matter of time before this conspiracy would be unmasked. LBJ suspected that the assassination had been paid for by members of the Suite 8F Group. If this was discovered, LBJ would be blamed as the instigator of this plot.
LBJ, for ever the master politician, came up with a solution to this problem. He told Hoover to arrange the evidence to give the impression that JFK had been killed by a lone gunman. As Oswald was now dead this would help to cut off the investigation. This did mean that he could not invade Cuba. However, he would give the Suite 8 Group its much needed Vietnam War.
By this time the FBI (William Sullivan) and the CIA (James Angleton) were involved in a joint investigation of the JFK assassination. They never discovered the full story but they were now aware that Oswald had been an undercover agent for both the CIA and FBI. It is also possible that they had found evidence that linked the assassination to Morales, Robertson and Hunt.
It was not in the interest of the CIA or FBI to reveal this to the American public. Therefore both men joined LBJ and Hoover to cover up the assassination. Sullivan and Angleton rewrote their report and gave it to Hoover who passed it onto Earl Warren. This was, with a few changes, to become the Warren Report. The problem for the Warren Commission was that the evidence showed that JFK had been killed by at least two men. Therefore, they had to get involved with putting forward things such as the “magic bullet” theory.
The only way this was possible was by the CIA and FBI being able to control media reactions to the JFK assassination. This is why Operation Mockingbird plays such an important role in the cover-up. If America really did have a free and independent media, the cover-up would have been impossible.
Morales had the massive problem of cleaning-up after the assassination. It would not have been a major problem if LBJ had gone along with the Castro did it conspiracy. He now had a lot of unhappy Cubans who knew various things about the assassination (Morales was probably the only one with a complete overall picture of what had happened). Those who could not be trusted had to be eliminated. So also did people like Grant Stockdale and Mary Pinchot Meyer who knew important details of the plot. Over the next few years, others had to die as well. Journalists like Dorothy Kilgallen were a real problem and had to be persuaded to “commit suicide”.
Jim Garrison also caused major problems for Morales. Garrison discovered that anti-Castro Cubans and CIA freelance assets had been involved in the assassination. It was now decided that the public would no longer accept the lone gunman theory. Instead, Plan B, came into operation. JFK had been killed by the Mob. When Garrison refused to go along with these leaks (providing by CIA assets, Dick Billings and Bernardo de Torres) he was smeared with stories about being under the control of the Mob. It was to be several years before he could clear his name.
By 1970 those conspirators left alive felt fairly confident that the truth would never emerge about who really ordered and carried out the assassination of JFK. However, there was one man who wanted to use his knowledge of the assassination to make himself a large amount of money. That man was E. Howard Hunt.
In 1970 he had just retired from the CIA. He was desperately short of money. His novels had never sold well and he had saved nothing from his work with the CIA. However, he did have a lot of information that was worth a lot of money. Hunt knew that if he threatened the CIA with exposure he would not live long enough to collect his money. Only a novelist like Hunt could have come up with the plan that would make him into a multimillionaire.
The first thing Hunt did was to get himself a job in the White House. He used his CIA contacts to get a meeting with Charles Colson. As a result of this meeting, on 7th July, 1971, John Ehrlichman appointed Hunt to the White House staff. Working under Egil Krogh and Gordon Liddy, Hunt became a member of the Special Investigations Group (SIG). The group was (informally known as "the Plumbers" because their job was to stop leaks from Nixon's administration).
It was not long before Hunt was able to persuade Liddy to propose Operation Gemstone. Hunt then told Liddy that Larry O’Brien had documents in his office that could destroy Nixon’s chances of being re-elected. The story convinced Nixon and Hunt was instructed to organize the Watergate break-in. Hunt then recruited four men who were all involved in the assassination of JFK (Frank Sturgis, Virgilio Gonzalez, Eugenio Martinez and Bernard L. Barker). The whole thing was a set-up. Hunt arranged for the men to be arrested. He knew that the men would have in their hotel rooms evidence that they were linked to Hunt and the White House.
Hunt now unveiled his blackmail plan. Dorothy Hunt contacted Colson and told him that her husband was willing to keep quiet about White House involvement in the break-in. However, it was going to cost him a lot of money. Nixon also had to arrange it that Hunt did not go to prison. Hunt also told Colson/Nixon that the Republican Party should not be the only ones paying for Hunt’s silence. Hunt would also agree to keep quiet in court about the CIA and the Watergate break-in. He would also keep quiet about other CIA covert operations he had been involved in, including those that related to the assassination of JFK.
On 28th June, 1972, Vernon Walters told John Dean that the CIA was unwilling to provide financial assistance to Hunt and his men. The CIA knew that if Hunt was paid he would come back for more later. The CIA also knew that Hunt had taken part in the assassination of JFK for ideological reasons. Even though he would threaten disclosure, it was highly unlikely that he would go public with this information.
Nixon was unwilling to take the chance of Hunt talking. Hunt therefore got two initial payments of $40,000 and $53,000. On 14th November Hunt demanded more money. On 1st December John Mitchell tells John Dean to give Hunt a large proportion of the $350,000 that has been raised. One assumes that Hunt got this money soon afterwards.
How was the CIA reacting during this period? It is difficult to say. Maybe they did give him money. If they did, it would have come with a warning. Not that Hunt’s life was threatened. They knew that he would have arranged for details of the JFK assassination and cover-up to have been placed with lawyers with the instructions that they would be published in event of his unexpected death. No, the CIA would have used the same methods as they always used to keep people quiet. They would have told him that they would arrange for those closest to him to have accidents. This always worked. On 8th December, Hunt’s wife died in an air crash (after taking out $250,000 life insurance for the flight).
Understandably, at his trial, Hunt and the other burglars remained silent. Hunt had been dealt with but there was still one other person who was trying to expose the people behind the JFK assassination and the Watergate burglary. That was Deep Throat. This was a man who knew a great deal about both events. Along with James Angleton, he knew more about the conspiracy to kill JFK than anyone other than Morales and Hunt (Robertson had died in 1970). Deep Throat was William Sullivan. He had been willing to go along with the cover-up in 1963 for the sake of the FBI and his career. It was always a difficult decision to make. Like JFK he was a Roman Catholic. He was also a member of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party.
Sullivan’s attitude changed when Hoover sacked him on 28th August, 1971. Not that he was out of work for long. He was immediately given a job by Richard Nixon. On the surface this was a shrewd move by Nixon. After all, Sullivan knew most of Hoover’s secrets. Information was power. Sullivan also knew a great deal about Nixon. He was determined to use his new position to expose CIA involvement in the JFK assassination as well as removing the reactionary Nixon.
Sullivan got some of his information about Watergate from his CIA buddies, Richard Helms, Cord Meyer and Richard Ober. Not that they were aware that Sullivan was Deep Throat. If they had been they would have told him not to use the Washington Post to get the story out. Sullivan did not know they were part of Operation Mockingbird. Therefore, the story about Nixon and Watergate came out, the story about the JFK assassination was suppressed.
Would Sullivan have told the House Select Committee on Assassinations about what he knew about the death of JFK. Probably. But we will never know. He was shot dead on 9th November, 1977. An inquest decided that he had been shot accidentally by hunter, Robert Daniels, who was fined $500 and lost his hunting license for 10 years.
Very intriguing, John. I’ll be interested in reading the final product. Of particular interest will be the point of contact between S8F and the boys at JM/WAVE (Morales, et al.). Good work so far.
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Greg wrote:
I’ll bet Felipe Vidal Santiago’s declarations to the exile groups operating out of south Florida about the Kennedy administration’s olive branch to Castro went over very well. Perhaps Felipe and David Morales discussed it over tea and decided to just scrap their plans re: Cuba and open a flower shop together in Little Havana.
Greg, and the source for the fact that Vidal Santiago was spreading this information among the South Florida exiles is . . . none other than Fabian Escalante, one of the plotters! (He was also in Dealey Plaza.)
So I suppose you also believed Simpson that drug lords killed Nicole. There's nothing like getting information from one of the plotters.
I hate to sound sarcastic, but you know not whereof you speak. You claim the Kennedys were only "paying lip service" to the idea of a second invasion of Cuba. Talk, of course, is cheap. Therefore I assume you assert that the Kennedy administration was giving no more (just talk) to the Second Naval Guerilla or to Artime.
Please check your facts and then correct your post. If what you have read does not detail the extent to which the Kennedy Administration was funding the Second Naval Guerilla, and how much it was paying Artime, then you are not reading the right information.
Major players in the Kennedy anti-Castro campaign were Joseph Califano and his aide, Alexander Haig. Both of whom think Castro did it.
Now who do you HONESTLY think knows more about what was going on back then? You, who were not even born then (and are obviously not "up to speed" on AMTRUNK, the Second Naval Guerilla, Artime, etc) or Califano and Haig?
Do you even know what AMTRUNK was? Have you read the CIA memo re AMTRUNK? Have you read Califano's memoirs? Haig's? I somehow suspect not.
Why don't you research what was really going on back then and then do your posts. Understand I know all about the peace initiatives. The question is how to reconcile the apparently irreconcilable policies.
I'm sure Haig knew PLENTY about what was really going on back then. But I wouldn't trust him any more than you trust Escalante.
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Since Prouty was certain that Lansdale is in the photo, it is important to consider what Prouty thought Lansdale was doing there. Here is what Prouty told the ARRB, describing it as his personal opinion: “(Lansdale) was very good at the ‘C and D’ (Cover and Deception) role. He was very good at the scenario role. So I figured, if he’s there, he’s on duty. And if he’s on duty, he’s doing a scenario. Well, the scenario were the tramps. . . . I mean, what a silly thing to run in the middle of the show. But that’s what they were doing. You see, it’s to distract . . . And Howard Hunt has had to admit he was there.”
Does anyone know when Hunt has ever admitted that he was there? Another instance in which Prouty just didn’t know what he was talking about.
And consider this Prouty statement to the ARRB (remember, this man wrote a book on the JFK assassination and helped inspire a movie about it on which he was a paid consultant): “I’ve never even picked up the Warren Commission Report. I wouldn’t know if I saw it.”
This led the ARRB’s Christopher Barger to compare Prouty, in an interview summary, to “a con man selling snake oil to remedy a disease about which he knows nothing.”
But back to the tramps. I’m willing to accept the idea of Prouty and others that the tramps may have been used for deception. But that would hardly be Lansdale’s only reason for being there. If a legendary operator like Lansdale was there, he was probably running the whole show in Dealey Plaza, not just running some tramps for deception. Plus I don’t think the tramp deception worked very well, since this deception occurred about an hour and a half after the assassination. At that time the real deception of the day was being culminated elsewhere, at the Texas Theater.
Or did the plotters foresee the deception of using tramps being effective later, working years afterward through photographs, to keep researchers, before such researchers existed, off track? I think there may be a tendency to give the killers too much prescience of later events and issues as they went about planning their killing.
I just can’t see these tramps or actors as being worth Lansdale’s trouble. If there had been no tramps arrested or photographed that day, what difference would it make? None really, except that we wouldn’t be talking about it. The president would still be dead and we still wouldn’t know who did it.
Ron
Hi Ron-
You make very interesting, well-supported points. I don't know if that's Lansdale or not, but I agree with your assessment that IF Lansdale was in DP, he was doing something significant. Whether that would have related to the Tramps is anyone's guess, but in my mind, it would be difficult to believe that those three characters (whoever they were) and Ed Lansdale passing each other in close quarters next to the TSBD, even 1.5 hours later, was just a coincidence.
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Hi Greg.
The short answer is, power recognises power when it acts. I belive that the
original plotters, would have been a relatively small group ( Texas oil IMHO)
but once the deed was done, all the Kennedy haters jumped on board, to ensure
a high level cover up took place. Steve..
And there were sure plenty of haters at the time. That's part of the difficulty... so many people/groups with motive. But good stuff Steve, thanks!
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Charlie..
The part that I find most compelling is the limited number of conspiritors,
I have argued on a seperate thread that this is the only scenario that makes sence. A small number of ruthless, dedicated men in on the planning, and an
even smaller number of ruthless, expendible men at the kill zone. It also helps
with the cover up to limit numbers. Steve..
Hi Steve-
You make an excellent point and one that I keep going over in my head.
On the one hand, you have a much simpler operational plan with a small group (such as Cuban exiles and JM/WAVE types, for example). And perhaps it's safer, and easier to keep under wraps.
On the other hand, if there were an existing relationship between someone in said small group and someone, say in the Pentagon (Lansdale, Gen Walker, etc.) who was of like mind re: Kennedy and his foreign policy, would it be a less risky proposition to ally with that level of power than to go it alone? This goup would form the nucleus that could not only whack Kennedy, but exercise greater span and control of aspects like security in DP, the route, the patsy, the gathering of evidence in the aftermath and the "management" of witnesses, the autopsy, and most importantly to them, a cover-up that would work as well as this one has.
It seems riskier in some ways to seek such an alliance. But once successfully formed, it seems like it might make it much easier to exercise a high degree of control over the events they were planning, thus reducing the overall risk.
And on the one hand, the fewer people that are in the loop, the lower the risk of the plan being discovered. Unless the potential allies possessed such authority that they could in fact insulate the group from official scrutiny.
But pre-existing, trusted relationships would be the key to any such alliance, in my view.
So, which is the riskier proposition? Which scenario would better enable the perps to carry-out the op as they did?
An interesting question indeed.
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Hi Tim-
It's good to see that you still have your sense of humor. But with regard to Cuba, I believe that Kennedy's actions here revealed his true intent, regardless of what lip service he was feeding Artime in an effort to placate the exiles:
Tim Wrote: Were you aware that supposedly Garrison's first scenario was that the assassination was a homosexual thrill-kill?
No, that’s a new one on me. Never heard that… it’s a good thing Garrison got on track in attempting to expose Shaw’s truly incriminating associations; those with the CIA, Bannister, Ferrie, et al.
Tim Wrote: Greg, respectfully, you need to read your history. JFK and RFK were going to effect regime change in Cuba before the 1964 election...
I understand that Kennedy was paying lip service to Artime and the Cuban exiles, but whether you or I believe that Kennedy was going to act to effect “regime change” (that term is hilarious, by the way) before 1964 or at any other time is a moot point. The groups in question didn't believe it. The exile community and their Agency partners ONCE AGAIN felt betrayed by Kennedy’s placation of the communist Castro. Kennedy had lost much of his credibility with them after the BOP. So, Mongoose was started later in '61 and basically went nowhere (there had been no acts of sabotage, and even the one which had been attempted had failed twice).
Are you suggesting that then, after these perceived betrayals and failures, Kennedy’s refusal (despite pressure from within his administration) to either invade or bomb Cuba once the missiles were discovered, and then his public pledge to NOT invade Cuba in order to resolve the crisis, was well-received by the exile community, their allies, and the Agency faction running them? I’ll bet Felipe Vidal Santiago’s declarations to the exile groups operating out of south Florida about the Kennedy administration’s olive branch to Castro went over very well. Perhaps Felipe and David Morales discussed it over tea and decided to just scrap their plans re: Cuba and open a flower shop together in Little Havana. On second thought, I'll bet they didn't. Do you think that the Kennedy government’s arrest of groups of exiles and mercenaries training in the Keys in late 1962 for further action against Castro was evidence to the anti-Castro Cubans, et al. of Kennedy’s continued support of their cause? According to a December 1962 article in the Miami Times Herald, “Cuban exile leaders speculated that the crackdown indicates a stiffened U.S. policy toward anti-Castro resistance forces....”
Kennedy’s credibility with the groups in question was certainly shaky before the resolution to the missile crisis, but when this occurred- their patience with JFK went to zero then and there.
As someone with the experience in politics that you possess, you of all people must certainly realize that politicians on both sides of the aisle frequently say what they need to say and promise the moon to placate one group or another, while executing contradictory policy and then employing their spinners to put a happy face on it. That’s politics. So, while Kennedy may have been trying to find a way to placate the exile community post 10/62 through promises of this or that, Kennedy’s actions were clear and deliberate. The exiles’ dreams were finished! The right-wing hawks had been collared since 4/1961 and now they were shut down. Further evidence of the direction of the Kennedy Foreign Policy agenda came in October 1963 in the form of NSAM 263 and with the Jean Daniel meeting. The missile crisis changed the views of both JFK and RFK on Cuba and foreign policy in general. In Thirteen Days, Bobby (I can’t immediately recall if this was a conversation he had with someone, or simply his own introspection) was questioning whether invading a sovereign nation, one that had committed no act of aggression against the U.S., nor any treaty violations, was consistent with the values that America wished to demonstrate to the world. To me, that doesn’t sound like a man still committed to “regime change” in Cuba.
The Kennedy administration's actions, as outlined above, are a much more accurate indicator of intent than what JFK may have been telling Artime.
Tim Wrote: You are suggesting that JFK was publicly assassinated (making him a martyr and assuring RFK's ultimate election unless he was also assassinated) to prove to who that the right-wing defense establishment was in control? Not to the punlic certainly. To LBJ?
To make that fact clear and to dissuade future challenges to their authority, as JFK had done. No, certainly not to the public. They had Lyndon right where they wanted him. NSAM 273 was signed 4 days after Kennedy’s murder.
Tim Wrote: No, sorry, that dog won't hunt, I'm afraid!
Whoof!
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James,
Several things have to be considered in Prouty’s ID of Lansdale in one of the tramp photos. First, it’s apparently true that Lansdale was somewhere in Texas at the time of the assassination. It’s also true that there is a resemblance to Lansdale in the photo, as far as a man walking away from the camera can be said to resemble someone. The resemblance is mainly in the man’s bearing as photographed. But there is also dissimilarity, in the hair which appears too long or wavy on top. There is also a photo that may show the same man, walking the other way on the Elm Street extension (p. 495 in Pictures of the Pain, the first man on the left), and he doesn't look like Lansdale.
But assuming it’s Landale in the tramp photo, it should be noted that he appears to be paying no attention to the tramps. He is walking past them toward the rail yard, as he might do if he were hanging around the scene to see that there were no loose ends or whatever, though one would think he would have long departed the scene by the time these photos were taken. By around two o’clock, what more was there for a manager of the assassination to see? But assuming he was still hanging around, looking everything over, there is no evidence that he ever looked at the tramps or said a word to them. This could mean he was acting like he didn’t know them, but was reassuring them by his presence. But it could also mean that they were just three tramps who meant nothing to him.
Prouty expressed certainty that this man was Lansdale. But at the risk of offending any Prouty fans here, he was often just full of BS. Prouty talked, for example, about how he was sent out of the country in November 1963 so that he could not take part in presidential security in Dallas, and he told how Army Colonel Reich in Texas got upset when he received a stand-down order for his unit to provide no security in Dallas. But the fact is that Prouty’s job at the Pentagon had nothing to do with presidential security, and there would have been no reason for him to be in Dallas had he not gone off on his trip. Colonel Reich told the ARRB that there was no stand-down order, that his unit had no presidential security responsibility to begin with, and that Prouty was “smoking something.”
In his own ARRB interview Prouty said that Lansdale is seen in the photo, and implied that Lansdale and others were engaged in a distraction tactic with the tramps. When asked if anyone could confirm Lansdale's presence in Dallas, Prouty cited Stone's book of the film JFK saying that Lansdale was in Texas. Prouty also said that he sent the photo to an acquaintance who also knew Lansdale, and that this person corroborated that the man in the photo was Lansdale. When asked if he could identify this person so the ARRB could talk to him, Prouty said, "No. No, that's a personal matter." So who was he talking about? What happened to Krulak?
On the other matters Prouty's ARRB interview was an embarrassing fiasco. An ARRB memo dated 10/23/96, from Tim Wray to David Marwell and Jeremy Gunn, says that Prouty “either contradicted, dismissed, or could not verify what he has elsewhere asserted to be historical fact.” The memo says that a summary of Prouty’s interview would not do it justice because no one would believe it: “We need to do a full transcript of his interview with us because – given the fact that it is so full of retractions, contradictions and disqualifications of his other statements – there’s no way we can fairly represent the interview in summary form without it looking like a hatchet job.” Wray then says “we should do a ‘Wrap Up Memo’ explaining why so much of what he says is not worth further investigation.”
Ron
Hi Ron-
Here is a comparison shot of the Lansdale figure and the man in the photo you refer to. In my opinion, it's not the same guy- we have two different people here. But like the "Lansdale" figure and so much else in this case, it's difficult to know for sure.
Thanks for the scoop on Prouty. I was not aware of the problems with his credibility. Still, how long had he known Lansdale? Seems like he would have been in a position to make the ID.
Thanks Ron... good observations.
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Given the time frame and what seems like a very poor escape plan, I agree that logic suggests the Tramps are innocent of being connected to the assassination.
Having said that, there is one sticking point. Fletcher Prouty and Victor Krulak have identified a man in one of the tramp photographs as being Ed Lansdale (two men who would know).
Now if this is Lansdale, then that surely sheds a new light on things. If it is not Lansdale then we have another excellent look-a-like present in Dealey Plaza. Add that frustrating aspect to two of the Tramps themselves being excellent look-a-likes to men who feature heavily in assassination literature, and I for one am not quite ready to put this one to bed.
FWIW.
James
Excellent point James. The scenario is even more curious when viewed in context below. Now, if the police are toting shotguns (albeit quite casually) and escorting these three characters, would Joe Pedestrian put himself in such close proximity to this motley crew, trapped and confined between these non-cuffed arrestees and a wall/fence? I would think most people would give them a wide berth. And most people would not place themselves in what appears to be a trapped position. Not unless that person KNEW the detainees and knew he would be in no danger.
I don't know, but Fletcher Prouty was adamant that it was definitely Ed Lansdale.
If he was right, then I'm with James- this sheds a whole new light on the Tramps and the liklihood of their involvement.
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Interesting scenario but why would Hoover risk his place in history and possible death in the electric church by dispatching JFK by pulling the trigger when he could have accomplished the same objective (the removal of JFK) in a safe manner, as well as a manner that would forever destroy forever the political viability of his nemesis RFK: sinmply pick up the phone and call the edotor of the Chicao Tribune (or Dealey at the Dallas Herald for that matter).
What would have happened if on November 22, 1963, rather than running that ridiculous right-wing black bordered ad the Dallas Herald would have had headlines detailing: 1) the Rometsch matter; 2) the Marilyn Monroe affair and JFK's sharing national secrets with her; and 3) the Judith Campbell/Giancana matter?
I'll tell you what: JFK would have been dead (politically) four hours before the assassination.
So why would Hoover, who had evidence of the "dirty secrets of Camelot" call on a corrupt cop to do his dirty work when all he had to do was call a few reporters?
Didn't someone once say "The pen is mightier than the Sword"?
Hi Tim-
You are correct of course when you suggest that JFK's removal from power could have been executed in many other, less public, and much less risky ways than occurred in Dallas. He was extremely vulnerable because of the Rometsch and Campbell affairs.
However, the violent, public display that we saw in Dallas was not only designed to effect Kennedy's removal, but it was also meant to send a very clear message about who was in charge and the consequences of disobedience. The power in question of course being the right-wing militant reactionaries present in the national security structure at the time. The deal struck by Kennedy to end the missile crisis was the last straw.
Interesting Freudian slip there, Timothy: Hoover (a homosexual) risking "possible death in the electric church." I knew the Christian conservative base was anti-gay, but death in the electric church seems a bit harsh even for them!
Just kidding of course. I'm certain it was a simple typo.
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A heads up for Aussie forum members. On Friday, 20th of May at 9.30pm, the History Channel is running what is listed as a first run documentary on the life of Jack Ruby.
Have any of our international forum members seen this program?
James
Greetings James!
I don't think I've seen it, but here is the description of a program on the HC over here:
Saturday, May 21 @ 7pm ET/PT
On November 24, 1963, a stunned America struggled to accept the assassination of President John F. Kennedy two days earlier. As tens of millions stared at their televisions that Sunday morning, they witnessed TV's first live murder--the killing of assassination suspect Lee Harvey Oswald by Dallas strip-club owner Jack Ruby. What was seen for 47 hours as an isolated tragedy became one of the most notable suspected conspiracies in US history. And while the Warren Commission claimed that Oswald and Ruby both acted alone, the House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded in 1979 that JFK's murder most likely resulted from a conspiracy. Now, a new development has shaken both sides of the conspiracy controversy. Recently revealed evidence suggests the CIA may have been tracking Oswald and indicates a possible link among anti-Castro Cubans, Carlos Marcello, Ruby, Oswald, and the CIA.
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James, can you identify and post the photo of the CIA bureaucrat whose sole responsibility was to come up with these names? (Tim Gratz)
Hi Tim,
The individual's name is classified as top secret but I did manage to secure this image of him below from the Agency's 'Let's Make A Word' department.
James
James... you are a mess! That is freaking hilarious!
Although... now that I take a closer look... this dude looks A LOT like the guy standing at Main & Houston. I think we may have a break in the case!
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Cookie monster has to eat fruit now, what a travesty, fat people ruin everything.
John
Come on, John! We don't ruin EVERYTHING. The world needs good department store Santas and offensive linemen too!
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Greg wrote:
Making the connection to our topic, using a conservative mindset, wouldn’t elastic tolerance of ideas (running down all leads, examining all walls, considering all possibilities) have the same problems that a conservative would claim plague progressive politics? I apologize for the tangent, but it seemed relevant given your position.
Greg, in my opinion there is neither a "liberal" nor a "conservative" philosophy to be applied to crime investigations.
My home state (Wisconsin) is best known for two things (well, maybe three if you include diary products): 1. Darn cold (and long!) winters; and 2. Clean government.
In Wisconsin, the county coroners were elected on non-partisan tickets. If I recall correct, so was the register of deeds and county clerk. A lot less political patronage.
Presumably Republican coroners employ the same methodology in investigation deaths as do Democrats. There is no such thing as a partisan pathology.
The Florida Keys are known for: 1. IMO, best weather in continental United States; and 2. mosquitos. Here there is an elected Mosquito Control Board and, yes, you guessed it, you run for the Board on a partisan basis! Republicans spray mosquito poison in a different manner than Democrats, I guess.
Long-winded way to illustrate my point: criminal investigations ought not involve partisan political considerations. And another point I have made before: Republicans who disagreed with JFK politically should be as intererested in solving his murder as Democrats. Someone once posted (Mr. Charles-Dunne if I recall) that had Reagan or Bush I have ever been assassinated, he would have investigated that with the same interest as he investigates the Kennedy assasination. I regret the apparent fact that many who share my political philosophy are not as interested in solving the assassination as I am. For any assassination is a crime against the rule of law and a crime against our country.
Well said, Tim.
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Pat wrote: When you hit a wall, you have to examine the wall, see if it's real, and then follow the wall to where it leads.
Tim Wrote: I appreciate Greg's point and respect Jim Root's intelligence and integrity but the difficulty is that unlike Jim I do not think we can start with one assumption and then try to find the evidence to prove it. I think we need to run down all possible leads even if some may prove to be dead ends. And we have to recognize that our pet theories may be wrong.
I agree that ideally, in a case such as this, one would “examine the wall” every time. And ideally, in a case such as this, it would be wise to “run down all possible leads.” While I don’t mean to suggest that one should be selective in the walls they examine or the leads they run down based on how well they fit one’s pet theory, a person should be selective about what walls they examine and about what leads they run down based upon the source of the information.
As I stated above, in an ideal world, you’d run down the lead anyway, examine the source, and then assign a proper degree of weight to your findings based on your assessment of the source’s credibility. The problem with the Kennedy murder investigation is that it is not taking place in an ideal or even a typical environment. It is my contention that (and I believe that Pat may disagree with me on this) “they”, whoever you believe “they” are, have been and are currently engaged in a campaign, via print media (every year around 11/22, The Columbus Dispatch prints the same Warren Commission conclusion in their account of this event. As if it had been universally accepted long ago.) and the Internet. Clare Boothe Luce was merely one, obvious example. Most are probably not so obvious.
So, the “tightrope” to which I refer represents one’s decision on what leads to run down, or the amount of resources to commit to examining a given wall, based on one’s assessment of the source of the lead. This up front discrimination is made necessary by the misdirection campaign being employed by those who wish the truth to remain hidden. Tim helps to emphasize my point when he talks about not allowing pet theories to guide one’s decisions. True enough. But the other side to that coin is examining everything. If a researcher takes that approach, he will go to his grave with a vast amount of knowledge about this case. But time will run out on him, just as it did on the HSCA. He will have been buried under a mountain of “leads”. And he will have come no closer to the truth. So, that’s the difficulty here: one must keep an open mind and avoid the myopia of irrevocably lashing one’s self to a pet theory, while avoiding the certain futility and defeat that will result in the elastic tolerance of ideas that commits a researcher to chase down every rumor, and examine and define every wall.
Mr. Gratz, (and this is not a criticism of your political affiliations; a question really) I would suspect that you especially, being an arch conservative, strict-constructionist type, would be very well-schooled in the dangers and problems present in elastic tolerance of ideas. Correct me if I’m wrong here (and I know that you will if I am), but isn’t that an underlying fundamental difference between the labels “conservative” and “progressive”? Strict vs. loose construction; the inelasticity of ideas vs. the elasticity of them? Making the connection to our topic, using a conservative mindset, wouldn’t elastic tolerance of ideas (running down all leads, examining all walls, considering all possibilities) have the same problems that a conservative would claim plague progressive politics? I apologize for the tangent, but it seemed relevant given your position.
But credit where credit is due, Tim: “And we have to recognize that our pet theories may be wrong.” An absolutely true statement sir. Ipso facto, the tightrope.
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Among the numerous Oswald sightings in 1963 that conflict with Oswald’s known whereabouts, a man whom Margaret Budreau later believed to be Oswald came into Budreau’s Music and Appliance Store in Rhinelander, Wisconsin, on July 15. (That same day Oswald cashed a check at Martin’s Restaurant in New Orleans.) This Oswald’s wife was with him, and they spoke to each other in a foreign language other than French or German. He bought a Motorola portable radio and batteries. When Budreau asked for his name for warranty purposes, he became indignant and told her that his name was Homer Wyley, Jr. Or so said the FBI. According to Budreau, she told the FBI that the man said his name was Homer Walker, Jr. The FBI changed it from Walker to Wyley.
At least three coincidences for the price of one at Budreau’s! Oswald is in two places at once, uses the name of a man whom he allegedly tried to shoot, and in its report the FBI gets the name wrong. (Say the names. Does Walker sound, or look, like Wyley?)
Other good stuff on all the Oswalds here:
http://www.jfklancer.com/Page1.html
Ron
"Say the names. Does Walker sound, or look, like Wyley?"
That would be a big negatory.
Good stuff, Ron. Thanks for the link.
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Vincent Salandria is a first-generation critic of the official government story (LNT / WC) and his views influenced Gaeton Fonzi's approach to the case.
I just started re-reading Fonzi's The Last Investigation when I came across this insightful comment he made to Fonzi as GF was beginning his work for the HSCA: "He ventured that I would get mired in a quagmire of inconsequential details. They'll keep you very, very busy and eventually wear you down" (pg. 52).
I ran across another version of the same quote from VS to GF on a Salandria bio page: "We must face the fact -- not waste any more time microanalyzing the evidence. That's exactly what they want us to do. They have kept us busy for so long. And I will bet, buddy, that is what will happen to you. They'll keep you very, very busy and eventually, they'll wear you down"
(http://karws.gso.uri.edu/JFK/The_critics/Salandria/Salandriabio.html).
Most certainly, they will try. And with the advent of the Internet and electronic media, it has become easier to accomplish.
I'll be the first to admit that I don't know much about Vincent Salandria. But I do know one thing, he was dead-nuts-on in those comments.
Distract, re-direct, and confuse the issue by offering "information" and "leads". Clare Boothe Luce's intentional misleading of Senator Richard Schweiker is one example among probably hundreds. Luce admitted that she had concocted the name "Julio Fernandez" and told Schweiker that "Fernandez" told her that Oswald was hired by Castro to murder JFK in response to The Kennedy administration's attempts on his life. So, Schweiker sends Fonzi to find this Julio Fernandez and find out what he knows. Of course, Fonzi soon realizes that finding a Cuban named Julio Fernandez is much like seeking an American named John Smith- there are hundreds, if not thousands, of them. And given the fact that the Julio Fernandez that Boothe referred to didn't exist (by her own admission at a much later date)... well, you can begin to see how effective a tactic this can be. Fonzi wasted almost 2 years trying to track down this non-existent individual. Distract, re-direct, and confuse the issue. It's been one of the perpetrators' most effective tactics in dealing with truth-seekers. Fonzi on pg. 59, "When I asked Luce about it (her admission of her phony story), she simply smiled sweetly." And Fonzi's realization of what she was really up to is succinctly put: "When I walked out of the Watergate late that afternoon, I knew only one thing for sure: An awful lot of time had been spent checking out Luce's story and, in the end, it led nowhere at all."
Subsequently, Fonzi discovered that while Luce was feeding Schweiker misinformation, she would glean from him certain details about the investigation, which she then called and reported to CIA Director William Colby. He also later witnessed a speech that she gave at a meeting of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers (David Atlee Phillips' organization) which was a "...vigorous defense of the intelligence establishment...." But perhaps that wasn't all that shocking in light of the fact that she was on the Board of Directors of that organization.
My belabored point? Based on her social position and history of public service, Luce was considered a very credible (Schweiker: "impeccable") source at the time she made those false statements (the ones designed to distract, confuse, and re-direct- stay with me on this) to Schweiker. But later, once certain facts about her associations with various groups and individuals were examined, it was obvious to Schweiker and Fonzi, hindsight being what it is, that they had been duped. Handled, if you will. All that time and effort, not to mention getting off on some "Castro did it" idea that was a winding path to nowhere, and they realized that they should have known better from the start. Certainly, once CBL's associations were examined, the light bulb went on.
Clearly, these tactics (distract, re-direct, and confuse the issue) are still employed today against truth-seekers. And the people behind these tactics have incrementally fragmented the research community year after year and have essentially had many researchers chasing their tail, lest we be united (or at least more so) and become a more powerful voice.
Someone once told me that, "The most effective lies are 90% truth." I don't think a more true context exists for that statement than in the quest for answers about this case.
We all walk a very fine line when we try to be open-minded about such a difficult and complex issue. The dangers of being myopic in one's views are significant, an overall hindrance, and it's a trap that's not difficult to fall into. Conversely, when one exercises elastic tolerance of ideas, one nudges the door open further for the Clare Boothe Luces, the Posners, the [fill in the blank with any number of individuals] of the world.
And they are out there. Probably closer than you think. So my friends, walk that fine line as best you can.
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A question which occurred to me recently is, exactly who had custody of the briefcase referred to as "the football", the one containing the confidential codes to begin/control a nuclear attack, on November 22, 1963, between 12:30 and the time of LBJ's swearing-in aboard AF1?
I tried to do a Google search, but came up empty...and I know that Alexander Haig wasn't there to claim "I'm in charge"...so who was, as it were, "holding the bag?"
A recent report in the newspaper on the history of "the football"--so named, according to this article, because of the code name "dropkick" once associated with the nuclear defense plan--said that "the football" has existed since at least the days of the Cuban Missile Crisis. So...who had the football when the QB got sacked, and before the second-stringer got suited up?
Hi Mark-
If I'm not mistaken, I believe it was Kennedy's military attache, General Godfrey McHugh. I cannot immediately recall where I read this, so (anyone) please correct me if I'm misinformed here.
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The Colonel G. McHughe was the Command Pilot [PIC] of Air Force One that day. The football [as it is today] was carried by an NSA Officer given the "simulated" rank of Army Warrant Officer, and an alias name & ID.
The Halliburton [bullet/blast resiatant] casse contains an always "ON" beeper transponder so that "Looking Glass" [RC-135 / Boeing 707 then] can insure that its repeaters will forward all nuke codes via VHF/UHF to NORAD and Omaha.
Should the "Football" malfunction, the VP's QB passes it to the Prez's W/O !!
GPH
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Gerry-
Thanks for the correction. I was stating what I had read "somewhere". I'm glad you caught it and got it right.
JFK and Watergate
in JFK Assassination Debate
Posted · Edited by Greg Wagner
Hi Tim-
Well I certainly don’t mean to frustrate you, but I do understand where you’re coming from, as I too have felt that same frustration at times. And I will make an effort to read Live By The Sword this summer. Perhaps that will help me to better understand your point-of-view.
You use the word “fact” repeatedly in your effort to point out what you perceive to be errors in my thinking:
“…you are using logical analysis to support your position, but not the FACTS.”
“…you probably could have discovered those facts through the index…”
“Look at the facts, man.”
“The facts seem to make no difference to you…”
You are right in suggesting that the weight of an argument should stand on the facts, as truth and inquiry are a process related to fact, logic, and argument. However, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, the facts in this case are often contradictory and ultimately inconclusive. This is largely, but not entirely, due to disinformation and governmental secrecy, the result of which renders deductive logic (the process of reaching a conclusion that is guaranteed to follow, eg. mathematics) unavailable in many instances. Or as the Talking Heads so eloquently put it:
Facts are simple and facts are straight
Facts are lazy and facts are late
Facts all come with points of view
Facts don't do what I want them to
When the nature of the evidence renders deductive reasoning impossible, we are left with abductive reasoning (reasoning based on the principle of inference to the best explanation). The key to understanding abductive reasoning lies in the “inference to the best explanation” part. It appears that this is where you and I view things differently.
Tim, you made the very true statement that there are different ways to interpret evidence (I think your reference was to NSAM 263). That is an absolutely true statement. However, I would suggest that some methodologies of interpreting evidence are inherently more reliable, and I would argue more correct, than others. For example, with regard to my reference to NSAM 263, you ask, “…what does that necessarily have to do with whether or not he (Kennedy) intended an invasion of Cuba? JFK could certainly have decided that America had an interest in getting rid of Communists within our backyard….” To support my premise that Kennedy’s true agenda regarding Cuba, the one that began in October 1962, was one seeking coexistence with Castro’s Cuba rather than eradication, I utilized abductive reasoning. That is, I used several other facts, matters of historical record, to establish context: NSAM 263, Kennedy’s signing of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in 1963, Kennedy’s decision to opt for blockade during the missile crisis, Kennedy’s intensive back-channel communications with Khrushchev while publicly taking a firm, no-negotiations stance toward the Soviet Union, Jean Daniel’s meeting with Castro, the deal Kennedy made to resolve the missile crisis, and Khrushchev’s 12/11/62 letter to Kennedy. These are matters of fact, that when viewed in relation to one another, form a very clear, logical basis for understanding Kennedy’s foreign policy. This is where understanding abductive reasoning and inference to the best explanation is valuable. The “dual track” appearance Kennedy’s Cuba policy had on the surface (going forward from 11/1962) forces historians to decide which “track” Kennedy was truly supporting, and would have supported had he lived. In my view, since the nature of the evidence precludes the use of deductive reasoning (deductive logic), abductive reasoning (abductive logic) is the correct method to employ. Given the established framework I cited, which clearly establishes Kennedy’s tendencies and over-arching philosophy with regard to conflict and foreign policy, abductive reasoning tells us that Kennedy’s ultimate “track” with regard to Cuba was one of dialogue and peaceful co-existence. This is true because it is the “track” that is most congruent with the many Kennedy foreign policy decisions which frame this issue in historical context.
As opposed to abductive reasoning, the methodology you employ to interpret the evidence in this instance is interpolation. Interpolation is a message (spoken or written) that is introduced or inserted. For example, in your prior post you stated, “…Khruschev’s response to the Cuban missile crisis might have convinced him (Kennedy) that the Soviet Union would never go to war over Cuba.” While certainly a possibility that one might consider, the facts as they exist today simply do not provide any contextual framework or support to that idea. In fact, Khrushchev’s 12/11/62 letter to Kennedy candidly and forcefully stated just the opposite (see an excerpt of the text of this letter in my prior post). Additionally, in another letter between the two of them during the same period (I can’t seem to locate it at the moment, but perhaps another Forum member can recall the date of this communication), there is a passage that expresses a truth that they both understood to the effect that there are forces in their respective governments that they themselves may become powerless to control should tensions escalate. So, while the idea that Kennedy might have concluded that the Soviets would not go to war over Cuba based on the outcome of the missile crisis sounds plausible on an elementary level, closer examination using sound logical reasoning methodology renders such a suggestion devoid of merit. Such are the pitfalls associated with interpolation.
Abductive reasoning versus interpolation.
With regard to Kennedy’s funding of the Second Naval Guerilla, I believe I addressed that in my earlier post. Call it leverage to be used in the dialogue Kennedy was seeking, call it temporary placation of the militant exile community and the hawks in his administration, call it a “carrot and stick” approach, or call it a combination of all of the above. But common sense and the employment of sound methodology in interpreting the facts clearly prevent one from calling it Kennedy’s true policy toward Cuba.
And no, I have not researched the amount of money Kennedy pledged to the Second Naval Guerilla. However, simply providing funding doesn’t tell us anything about the motivation behind such financial support.