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Sandy Larsen

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    Disinformation in Oswald's CIA File - For molehunt purposes or for Oswald patsification purposes?

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    On 4/15/2024 at 4:21 PM, Matt Cloud said:

    With above in mind, here are some details, now, regarding the “Mexico City shenanigans” as you put it.

    One of the as yet unexplained details is the origin of the story of Oswald going to the Soviet Consulate in the first place.  The claim first appeared in public, in print, in the Mexican newspaper Excelsior on November 25, and picked up on that day by U.S. wire service U.P.I.

    According to U.P.I., dateline November 25, 1963:

    “The newspaper Excelsior said today Lee Harvey Oswald spent several days in Mexico City in late September, calling on consulates of the Soviet Union and Cuba.

    …

    Excelsior said the Cuban consulate told Oswald it could not issue the visa without talking to the United States government  and that would take 10 or 12 days.  [Oswald had evidently been there on September 27, 1963.]  The paper said Oswald left the office in a huff and slammed the door as he went.

    The next day [presumably September 28] he appeared at the office of the soviet consul and asked for a visa directly to the Soviet Union.

    [Excelsior] said Oswald supported his argument for the visa by saying his wife was a soviet citizen, that he was a Communist, and that he had lived in Russia for three years. 

    Told of Long Wait

    The soviet consul told him the normal time to process such a request would be about three months.  Oswald again left in a huff, [Excelsior] said.

    [Excelsior] said there was no indication Oswald talked to any important officials of the soviet or Cuban embassies, other than the respective consuls.”

    Now, certainly one question that immediately pops out after reading this report is where the newspaper Excelsior got its information.  The Excelsior was a worker cooperative, anti-imperialist, and not presumably an organ of the CIA.  So how did they get their information?  Would CIA leak to Excelsior and thus betray the secret (their “sources & methods”) that they had taps on the Soviet and Cuban embassies in Mexico City?  That’s a question, to you.

    Another unexplained detail involves the letter that Lee Harvey Oswald allegedly wrote to the Soviets on November 9, 1963, and reprinted in the Warren Commission as CE 15.  In the letter, Oswald writes,

    “… the Cuban consulate [sic] was guilty of a gross breach of regulations, I am glad he has since been replaced.”

    Evidently indeed, the Cuban consul, Eusebio Azcue, was replaced, as Oswald had noted in his November 9 letter.  The problem is Azcue was not replaced until November 18, more than a week after Oswald’s letter.

    This date problem in the Oswald letter to the Soviets raises a few possibilities:

    1. Oswald had a very good source in U.S. intel, who kept an eye on Mexico City comings and goings, after Oswald’s return to the U.S.;

    2. Oswald had a very good source in Soviet and/or Cuban intel, who kept an eye on Mexico City comings and goings, after Oswald’s return to the U.S.; or

    3. The letter is a forgery, written to put more Oswald-Soviet connections out there for investigators after the assassination, albeit with the Azcue timing problem in plain sight.

    I expect you, Sandy, will agree with scenario number 3, that the letter is a forgery.  I would agree.  But I expect further you will say the forgery was by C.I.A.  And there is a problem.  

    First, according to Richard Helms, in a letter to Lee Rankin of the Warren Commission dated February 2, 1964, Helms states:

    “We do not know who might have told Oswald that Azcue or any other Cuban had been or was to be replaced, but we speculate that Silvia Duran or some Soviet official might have mentioned it if Oswald complained about Azcue’s altercations with him.”

    This would be the Sylvia Duran that had described Oswald “as a blonde.”

    In 1967, columnists Robert S. Allen and Paul Scott, who had been targets of RFK’s “Mockingbird Operation,” the wiretapping of various journalists in the early ‘60s who seemed to be getting unusually good information, wrote:

    “After receiving this reply from the CIA [Helms], the Warren Commission’s staff made no further inquiry on the Azcue reference, but centered their probe on the circumstances under which the letter was prepared and later discovered.”

    And now I hear you Sandy saying “but of course Helms said that; He’s one of the plotters!”  I hear you.  I hear you.  But you’re not out of the woods.  The problem grows deeper you see.  Because in the late 1990s Boris Yeltsin of Russia presented to Bill Clinton some Soviet documents related to their monitoring of the Oswald situation.  

    One document in that collection is a cable written shortly after the assassination on November 22, 1963, from Moscow to the Soviet ambassador in Washington.  In it, the Kremlin instructs ambassador Dobrynin to share with Secretary of State Rusk photocopies of correspondence between their embassy and Oswald but he specifically adds: 

    “When sending the photocopies, say that the letter of November 9 [discussed above] was not received by the embassy until November 18, obviously it had been held up somewhere.”

    Later in the cable, the point is more explicit: 

    “The U.S. authorities are aware of this final correspondence, since it was conducted through official mail.”

    See https://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/other/yeltsin/html/Yeltsin_0091a.htm

    This is hugely significant.  It indicates a couple of things.  One is that the Soviets knew of problems with the timing of the Azcue letter.  Second, it instructs Dobrynin to tell Rusk, impliedly, that the Soviets also knew of the U.S. mail-opening program, run then by William J Cotter.  (William J. Cotter, btw, who ran the mail-opening program, was the brother-in-law of John N. McMahon, who in 1962-63, back even in 1959, was an executive in the Agency’s COMOR operations — that has to do with overhead surveillance matters including the U-2 and CORONA satellite programs.  His sister, William Cotter's wife, Virginia Alicia Cotter nee McMahon, died young, in her 40s, in 1962.  She had been a VENONA codebreaker, BTW, in the 1940s, and is buried in Arlington.)  

    How the Soviets knew any of these details, Sandy, is a another question put to you along with the suggestion that the Soviets’ knowledge of these activities points yet again in the direction of a mole, or at very least a U.S. KGB interlocutor, who was keeping them abreast.  This supports the view that what is being targeted here — again by someone or someones, CIA, KGB, a mix of both? — is Angleton’s counterintelligence efforts, his “mole-hunt.”  

     

    Matt,

    I intend on replying to this post of yours. At the moment I am not feeling up to it. (Health issues.)

     

    Disinformation in Oswald's CIA File - For molehunt purposes or for Oswald patsification purposes?

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    21 minutes ago, Matt Cloud said:
    28 minutes ago, Sandy Larsen said:

    I'd be greatly surprised if you found my saying something much more than what I said above.

    Perhaps then you just re-summarize here for us what it is "you've said above?"  A copy and paste will do.

     

    Oh, I meant just this:

    I've never thought that commies were running the Oswald Project, or even just the young boy being cared for by those militant commies. I DO believe that he would become HARVEY Oswald after breaking up with his caretakers.

    We have very little knowledge to go by. But my guess is that the boy was a Russian speaking orphan who was somehow hooked with up the commies. I suppose they had high hopes for the boy also becoming a militant commie when he grew up.

     

    Sorry about my ambiguity in referring to it.

     

    Ideas for Water Cooler improvement.

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    Just now, Sandy Larsen said:

     

    WATER COOLER

    WATER COOLER - MAINSTREAM  (For those who believe mainstream contemporary facts.)

    WATER COOLER - ALTERNATIVE  (For those who believe alternative (e.g. MAGA) facts.)

     

     

    As I said earlier, our experience is that the alternative/MAGA people don't post in the thread dedicated to them. I think it's because they like convincing non-believers of their beliefs, rather than singing to the choir. Because of that, we might be able to eliminate their Cooler altogether. Just have these two:

    WATER COOLER

    WATER COOLER - MAINSTREAM  (For those who believe mainstream contemporary facts.)

     

    Ideas for Water Cooler improvement.

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    5 minutes ago, Cliff Varnell said:

    I think the Water Cooler needed one thread -- "Free for All."

    I think many here find "MAGA" and "Mainstream" pejoratives.

     

    Well, I'm pretty sure we will be using some segregation in order to please those who don't want to engage with those who they think believe obvious nonsense. That was the problem we had before.

    But we could promote the "one thread -- Free for All" that you speak of as the standard Water Cooler. In which case the names of the threads might be something like this:

     

    WATER COOLER

    WATER COOLER - MAINSTREAM  (For those who believe mainstream contemporary facts.)

    WATER COOLER - ALTERNATIVE  (For those who believe alternative (e.g. MAGA) facts.)

     

    The top one is the standard Cooler for everybody.

     

    How to delete photos in locked threads.

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    5 minutes ago, Cliff Varnell said:

    Consider yourself contacted, Sandy.  I'd like to delete attachments on the 56 years thread.

    Now what?

     

    Will you do me a big favor, Cliff?

    I'm trying to teach Ron Bulman the ropes. Would you ask him to help you? That way we can test my instructions, and at the same time train Ron.

    Thanks.

    I'll help out if Ron can't. But Ron's a bright guy and I think he'll have no trouble doing this.

     

    Disinformation in Oswald's CIA File - For molehunt purposes or for Oswald patsification purposes?

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    13 minutes ago, Matt Cloud said:

    Okay -- so you don't know whether there was Soviet involvement in the Oswald Project, is that correct? 

     

    Other than Harvey fake defecting to the Soviet Union, I don't know of any Soviet involvement. And I see no reason to believe there was such an involvement.

     

    13 minutes ago, Matt Cloud said:

    All we have here are your guesses -- ...

     

    Yes, of course. That's all anybody has to offer... their guesses.

     

    13 minutes ago, Matt Cloud said:

    ...that he was loosely affiliated with communists but then that relationship was severed?  Is that correct?

     

    Yes.

    (Unless I'm forgetting something. Or if I missed something somebody posted.)

     

    Disinformation in Oswald's CIA File - For molehunt purposes or for Oswald patsification purposes?

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    4 minutes ago, Matt Cloud said:

    I gather from that that Michael Kalin has been placed now too in the penalty box, as I had, for misdemeanors I did not commit -- an allegation of "harassing" for the observation that editing posts weeks old, the content of which has become a material point of discussion in the thread, was "self-serving."  Wonderfully revealing, all.

     

    In any case, I ask you, Sandy, by which I include all of those you include when you employ your "we" as you do so often here ("We believe [X]"), how do you square the Harvey & Lee thesis, and indeed the entire discussion going back years here relating to the anonymous call to the Tippits of Connecticut, where you explore the possibility of "militant commies" -- your words -- running the Harvey project, with your claim here that you see no reason to include the possibility of other intelligence organizations involvement?   On the one hand, you did, for a time at least, see the possibility apparently of the Communist Party running Harvey yet on the other hand, with respect to Mexico City, you see no such possibility.  Is that why you must hermetically-seal off the "Mexico City shenanigans" from a larger contextual understanding of what you yourself claim is a decades-long intelligence operation?  Is it KGB ran Harvey but CIA did Mexico CIty?  Elaborate, if you wouldn't mind, please.  

     

    Matt,

    I've never thought that commies were running the Oswald Project, or even just the young boy being cared for by those militant commies. I DO believe that he would become HARVEY Oswald after breaking up with his caretakers.

    We have very little knowledge to go by. But my guess is that the boy was a Russian speaking orphan who was somehow hooked with up the commies. I suppose they had high hopes for the boy also becoming a militant commie when he grew up.

     

    Ideas for Water Cooler improvement.

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    1 hour ago, Mark Ulrik said:

    I'm just a simple country boy, so please bear with me. These "facts" are what others might call ideas or views, right?

     

    Not in general.

    Believe it or not, we have a set of facts and a set of opposing non-facts. (Sometimes more than one opposing non-fact for a given fact.) And which one a given person believes is the real fact will largely depend upon his or her political leanings.

    This has long been the case to some extent, but became extremely common when Donald Trump was elected President in 2016. Trump is famous for referring to any news he doesn't care for as "fake news." Of course, if you're not a Trump follower, you will call it what it is... news, not fake news. Some people refer to the truly-fake news as MAGA news.

    I use the word "facts" instead of "news " because this phenomenon extends beyond what might be reported in the news.

    Having said that...

    Certainly there is some fake news reported by the mainstream media. But I, like many others, believe that the news from these sources is far more reliable than news from alternative news sources, most of which have a far-right bias.

    Here is a simple example:

    The mainstream media reports that the reason Donald Trump has four criminal indictments against him is because the evidence point to his being guilty. In contrast, MAGA news sites report that Donald Trump is the victim of false indictments because Democrats have weaponized the Justice Department against him in order to keep him from being elected.

     

    How to delete photos in locked threads.

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    Special Instructions for Deleting Photos in Locked Threads

    The procedure for deleting photos in a locked thread differs from the standard procedure.

    Once a member has been granted permissions to delete photos in locked threads, he should follow these instructions for deleting those photos:

    1. Navigate to the My Attachments page of the website. (This is done by clicking My Attachments in the main menu.)
    2. To the right of each attached photo is a little square check box. Check this box for each photo in the locked thread that you'd like to delete.
    3. Upon checking one or more check boxes, a black menu will appear at the bottom of the window. Click the trashcan in the menu to delete all the selected photos.
    4. Once you are finished deleting locked photos, contact the Administrator again and notify him of this fact, so that he can remove from your account permissions to delete locked photos.

     

    How to delete photos in locked threads.

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    If you find you cannot delete photos and free up attachment space because they are posted on a locked thread, do the following:

    Contact an Administrative Staff member and ask him to follow instructions in the (hidden) post below in order to temporarily grant you permissions to remove photos from locked threads. (Only administrators can see that post.)

    Once you have been granted permissions, follow the instructions in the second post of this thread.

    Once you are finished deleting locked photos, contact the administrator again and let them know you are finished. He will remove your temporary permissions.

     

    Ideas for Water Cooler improvement.

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    4 hours ago, Cliff Varnell said:

    "For those who believe mainstream contemporary facts."  I find that off-putting.

     

    4 hours ago, Kirk Gallaway said:

    Ok, That's Sandy's definition. I would have worded it differently.

     

    In the new system, I would word the Coolers as follows:

    Either:

    WATER COOLER - MAINSTREAM  (For those who believe mainstream contemporary facts.)

    WATER COOLER - MAGA  (For those who believe alternative facts.)

    WATER COOLER - MAINSTREAM vs MAGA  (For those who want to challenge the other side.)

    Or:

    WATER COOLER - MAINSTREAM  (For those who believe mainstream contemporary facts.)

    WATER COOLER - ALTERNATIVE  (For those who believe alternative (e.g. MAGA) facts.)

    WATER COOLER - MAINSTREAM vs ALTERNATIVE  (For those who want to challenge the other side.)

     

    How would you guys word them?

     

    Ideas for Water Cooler improvement.

    in JFK Assassination Debate

    Posted

    (Following is a copy of my OP that members might have missed.)

     

    Kirk Galloway has suggested that the Water Cooler threads be moved back to this -- the JFK Assassination Debate -- forum. (That's not exactly his idea, but it is the only way his idea can be achieved.) They currently reside outside this forum, near the Political Discussions forum.

    Kirk's goal is to make it easy to see if there is a new post to read, and to make it a bit quicker to navigate to.

    William Niederhut reminisces how interesting the old "56 Year" was when many forum members were participating. Unfortunately that thread met its demise when it was -- in some members' opinions -- spammed by individuals who believe in "alternate news." It was ultimately closed from further posts due to endless bickering related to that issue.

    I later opened up the Water Cooler threads in an effort to restore the "56 Year" thread general discussion. I segregated the Cooler by "news type belief" (mainstream vs. alternate vs. both ) to satisfy the "spam" averse members and to keep the peace.

    Generally speaking, this has worked out well for mainstream news believers. For some reason, alternate news believers don't post there.

    The downsides of the Water Coolers are what Kirk and William have expressed concern about, as noted above:

    1. More difficult to use.
    2. Loss of participation.

     

    I am considering the following solution to these problems: Move the Water Cooler threads to this forum, but keep them segregated. Members would be allowed to post on any topic they choose, as long as their post didn't cross the news-type line of segregation. (Posting to the "both types" Cooler would allow any news-type post.)

    Doing this would definitely satisfy Kirk's desire of making it easy to see when there is a new post, and making it easier to navigate to. But I don't know if it would increase participation. The latter, in my opinion, would be of greater value than the former.

    I am opening this topic up to discussion. Any suggestions? What can be done to increase participation?

     

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