Paul Jolliffe

20 hours ago, Gerry Down said:

Hi Paul, i've started a thread trying to map out the cuban compound. Can you take a look at it and give me your opinion as to accuracy of the map of the cuban compound i have drawn?

 

Gerry,

Yes, your map seems correct to me. Good work!

Here is a current street view of the old CIA listening post at 149 Francisco Marquez. It appears to be the same building from 1963. The CIA post was on the third floor.

149 Francisco Márquez - Google Maps

And across the street, the Cuban Consulate would have been in here:

149 Francisco Márquez - Google Maps

And down the block a little, the Cuban Embassy was about here:

164 Francisco Márquez - Google Maps

The block is not very big: this aerial view shows it before some more recent buildings were put up:

Metro Jose Vasconcelos, Mexico City - Google Maps

Gerry, I think your guess about the picture here being taken on Francisco Marquez is correct - it seems to show the boulevard with some trees.

Your map is very helpful, and it raises an obvious question: Why didn't the Lopez Report include a map of the Cuban diplomatic compound?

My guess is that such a map might have stirred people to speculate that an "Oswald" made two appearances in September of 1963 - one at the Cuban Embassy and one at the Cuban Consulate.

(Did the CIA manage somehow to make sure the Lopez Report had no such map?)

Jim DiEugenio, is there any chance you could ask Ed Lopez if his report originally included a map of the Cuban diplomatic compound in Mexico City in 1963? If it didn't, why wasn't there one included?

2 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

Interesting theory, Paul.

I couldn't follow everything you said because it contradicts some of my own notions. But that's not unusual. Whenever I hear a new hypothesis, I usually have to keep it in mind and mull it over for some time before ultimately accepting or rejecting it.

The only difference between what you believe and what I believe is that the two blond guys represent two Oswalds, and that they were used in two different CIA operations. If we were to ignore the pudgy-faced Oswald impersonator, our theories would be much the same if not identical.

I would like to created a thread titled "The two Blond Oswalds" where we can discuss and study the two impersonators. Since you have a developed (at  least somewhat) hypothesis for the pudgy one and I don't, I'd hope that you would contribute to the thread. Would you be willing to do that?

 

Yes, Sandy I would be happy to add whatever I could to such a thread. However, I am not sure how much I have to add. I don't know the identity of the pudgy faced blond visitor to the Cuban Embassy on the 26th, and (at least for now) we have no photos of the visitor to the Cuban Consulate on the 27th.

If by some miracle we got identities of the CIA's human assets in Mexico City in 1963, we could compare their physical descriptions with what we suspect about both visitors. But I doubt that information even exists anymore. 

13 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

IMHO, LHO did visit MC and was also impersonated while there. 

We have three KGB agents, filmed and on the record, stating they met the bona fide LHO in MC at the Soviet Embassy. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYI4PqtIyE0

Start at the 1:03 mark. 

Jim DiEugenio has pointed out the makers of the above documentary are known state-hacks. 

It may be that the three KGB agents, including Valery Kostikov, were somehow induced to make their joint appearance; even simple bribery would suffice. 

But, barring that, it appears to me LHO did visit the Soviet Embassy, and made a display of himself, even showing a revolver.

I doubt the KBG agents would have met with LHO, on a Saturday no less, unless they had been (intentionally) tipped off that LHO was a CIA asset. So, Kostikov met with LHO to try to figure out what he was up to. 

My take is that the meeting between Kostikov and LHO was arranged by the CIA, to help build the LHO legend. 

 

 

Benjamin,

At this point, it's impossible to say for certain exactly who appeared before the three Soviet agents. While in theory it could have been our Dallas "Oswald", there is no evidence of it apart from the belated say-so of these three men.

No photos or voice tapes at a time when the CIA had round-the-clock eyes and ears on the Soviet compound. That the alleged assassin made an appearance at the most highly sensitive intelligence outpost in the Western Hemisphere just two months before the assassination and left no discernible trace, well, I don't believe it. 

But that's old news - someone did go and have some kind of interaction with at least some of the men there. Your guess that this was some kind of "Oswald legend-building CIA operation is undoubtedly correct. But as to who that person really was, I just don't know. 

19 hours ago, Greg Doudna said:

Well Paul the technical difference in definition is supposed to be that a driveway goes to an out-building whereas an alley goes between some buildings. Bill thinks because Brownlow retold Doris Holan’s story saying “driveway”, that therefore Doris Holan did not tell him and Pulte of seeing something in the alley out her front window, because, well, an alley is not the same as a driveway, as proved by a dictionary. That in turn is cited by Bill in support of Bills conspiracy theory of advance collusion of Brownlow and Pulte to wittingly fabricate that Doris Holan told them anything at all, of seeing out her front window after the shots that day.

I don’t believe Bill’s conclusion follows from the facts cited.

If Doris Holan was at home at the time, which Myers in 2020 showed pretty good evidence on independent grounds that she was, including a timed photo of her parked car there, then she would have seen everything on Patton and directly across into the alley out her front window in the moments following the shots—the gunman run by, Callaway… and any vehicle unusual movements in the alley if so.

Then the only issue becomes did she speak to Brownlee and Pulte of that which she saw long ago, or did they conspire to invent a story put in her name that agrees very well in similarity with that seen from her true Patton front window location that day—and Brownlow and Pulte invented the entire story in spite of neither Brownlow nor Pulte realizing Doris Holan lived there. 

Oh yes, that is quite clear to all who have followed this thread so far, except (obviously) to Bill Brown himself.

No reasonable person believes that Pulte and Brownlow completely fabricated an interview with a woman who decades later (unbeknownst to them), turned out to live EXACTLY where she could indeed see the alley/driveway with a police car in it!

My point in adding the link above was to show (as closely as possible from afar) the view Doris Holan really did have that day from her window at 113 Patton.

I don't care about the dictionary distinction between "driveway" and "alley" because none of us know for sure which word she used, and anyway, for all we know she may have used those terms interchangeably.

It doesn't matter which word she used to describe the place WHERE she saw a police car. We know WHERE she was looking, as those who click this link can see it for themselves. 

At the time they interviewed Doris Holan, neither Bill Pulte nor Michael Brownlow had any idea that this was what she could see:

oak cliff texas - Bing Maps

1 hour ago, Greg Doudna said:

Bill, why don’t you make whatever your point is and we can discuss it. I am not sure what you want from me since I doubt any witness said anything about a driveway in the first place. 

The alley sure looks as if it might be described as a "driveway" to me:

oak cliff texas - Bing Maps

6 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

Thanks for bringing the Teresa Proenza story to my attention. It's amazing what the CIA had going on in Mexico City at the same time!

Also I'm happy to hear that I'm not alone in my belief about how the CIA was trying to implicate Nikolai Leonov in their fabricated Oswald/Cuban/Russian conspiracy to kill Kennedy. But I have a question about that:

 

 

First you said:

I agree with you that the CIA plotters wanted to fool the FBI into believing that the short, blond "Oswald" visitor to the Cuban Embassy on the 26th and the Cuban Consulate on the 27th was an imposter (he was!) AND that this imposter was Nikolai Leonov (of course, it wasn't!)

Then you said:

You and I agree that the "Oswald" imposter at the Cuban Consulate on the 27th was unlikely to be the same blond, pudgy-faced man photographed outside the Cuban Embassy on the 26th.

 

The only way I've been able to reconcile those two statements is by assuming you believe that the CIA plotters used two different guys for the Nikolai Leonov lookalike. The pudgy-faced one at the Cuban Embassy, and the slender-faced one at the Cuban Consulate.

Do I understand that correctly?

 

 

Sandy,

Yes (probably.)

The CIA photographed the pudgy faced blond "Oswald" outside the Cuban Embassy (twice) on the 26th. We have no evidence that anyone ever showed those two images of that guy to either Azcue, Duran or Mirabal at the Cuban Consulate. (Why not? Because that would be a tacit admission that our Dallas "Oswald" was probably impersonated.)

I agree with your implication that it is hard to reconcile their physical descriptions of the man at the Cuban Consulate on the 27th with the images of the man outside the Cuban Embassy on the 26th.

Note that the Cuban Embassy "Oswald" on the 26th was highly provocative and threatening. His behavior (as we understand it from the FBI's SOLO material) would seem to have been "unprofessional."

Note also that as late as 1978, the CIA had persuaded Bob Blakey of the HSCA that a violent "Oswald" at the Cuban Embassy really had threatened to kill the president.

Castro 03.pdf (hood.edu)

My contention is that this "Oswald" confrontation at the Cuban Embassy on the 26th was a part of the assassination conspiracy, which was separate from the "approved" CIA operation/s against the Cuban diplomatic personnel, or the hunt for Popov's Mole, or anything else.

Two separate operations (at least.)

So yes, I do think (for now) that the evidence available to us indicates that there were two separate "Oswald" imposters: one at the Cuban Embassy on the 26th (the photographed pudgy faced blond man) and a separate one at the Cuban Consulate who (apparently) was much more of a Nikolai Leonov-lookalike.

Did the assassination plotters deliberately use an "Oswald" imposter who somewhat resembled the Leonov/"Oswald" imposter? 

Yes - the plotters believed (correctly) that this would not only confuse later investigators but would induce later CIA internal investigators to hide the fact there were two men. (The CIA would never admit that their own "approved" operations using sensitive sources and methods had been compromised by people who had committed the assassination. Plus, who outside of the CIA would ever later believe that the CIA had NOT been a part of the assassination conspiracy? No one!)

Also note that the CIA was NOT going to share any details of the operations against Teresa Proenza with the HSCA in 1978, and that they managed to keep those operations secret until 1999. 

Whatever the overlap between the "approved" anti-Cuban diplomatic personnel operations and the highly provocative "Oswald" confrontation/operation at the Embassy, the CIA was determined to hide from the HSCA. (What the HSCA didn't know, they couldn't ask about.)

104-10052-10191.pdf (theblackvault.com)

On 10/11/2022 at 4:01 PM, Greg Doudna said:

The case for a patrol cruiser in the alley behind E. 10th Street at the time of the Tippit killing, and possible identification of the anonymous "affair" officer of the Myers story, Part 1

Bill, I think there is something to the story of the officer at the scene whose existence and identity was covered up and whose identity remains covered up to the present day. Part of the reason is Myers' report of the senior standing and credibility of who told him that. 

This conceivably could be some kind of intentional planting of a total fabrication (with Myers who has the most standing and credibility on the Tippit case to report), just to create a wild-goose chase. While not knowing for sure, I think Myers' judgment that his source was truthful to him (this from the way Myers' presents the story in With Malice, whether or not it is explicitly stated) weighs in favor of something there to the story. 

But what I see is it is an intentional, very late, leak to Myers. For that reason I do not regard the specifics of the story as obviously correct even if there is something to the story itself. Specifically, suppose an officer was an unknown witness at the scene. Was he really there because he was having an affair with a woman, and his presence at that location therefore completely accidental? That is the story given to Myers. If there was an officer there was that the reason or is this someone's later innocent alibi?

Many times leaks of unusual or sensational true stories happen when it is realized or feared that the true story could leak without one's wishes, so preemptively leak in the most favorable spin. It looks outwardly like someone coming forth on their own initiative. But this is standard PR practice when bad news is about to break (or there is risk of such)--get out front and leak the story yourself and frame it favorably, before hostile journalists who are after your blood leak it in a worse framing of your side. 

With this said, your whole point of this thread comes down to an argument that the Brownlow story of the police car in the alley is a tall tale, but the argument you give in support of that I have shown above is too weak to qualify as much of a significant negative argument. On the other hand Myers' high-level confidential informant saying there was a police officer there that day at that time, while not certain, is more substantial. It weighs in favor of the Brownlow story could be correct, in the sense of having something to it (not meaning in the sense of every specific of Brownlow's story).

By the Brownlow story is meant the Doris Holan story. Doris Holan claimed to be a witness that day and claimed to have seen a police car making strange back-and-forth movements and leaving that alley immediately following the shots. That Doris Holan had such a story, a claim to have been a firsthand witness, is not in dispute, though it is highly frustrating and unfortunate that there is no tape or writing from Doris Holan herself of that story, and the contents of her story are known only through the hearsay retelling of Livingstone, Brownlow, and Pulte, who unfortunately may not be the most scrupulously accurate retellers. So the only form in which Doris Holan's story is known has to be examined critically on the likely assumption that it is garbled. What Doris Holan actually said can only be reconstructed underneath the hearsay retelling of Livingstone, Brownlow, and Pulte. And of course even if there was a perfect reconstruction of what Doris Holan said, what the truth was that day can only be reconstructed underneath the telling of Doris Holan.

The Doris Holan story as Pulte, Livingstone, and Brownlow told it, and as many have believed and promoted for years, one can still find it in books, collapsed in that Myers showed that Doris Holan was not living on 10th Street at the time of the Tippit killing as Pulte, Livingstone and Brownlow had Doris Holan telling it. Myers' evidence on this is unequivocal, it is just fact, that Doris Holan did not live on 10th Street and hence the Pulte et al story of her overlooking and seeing the cruiser and the men and police car in the driveway behind the cruiser, cannot have happened as Pulte et al told it. (Added to that Myers also makes a pretty good argument that the driveway itself was blocked from exit access into the alley making the account not possible on separate grounds, but that is neither here nor there compared to the fact that Doris Holan was not living on 10th St. in the first place.) (https://jfkfiles.blogspot.com/2020/11/doris-e-holan-and-tippit-murder.html)

But the new fact established by Myers in 2020, is that Doris Holan lived at 113-1/2 S. Patton Street. That is the second floor of the apartment building on the northwest corner of Patton and the alley, and although Myers did not realize it, it actually strengthens, not weakens, the plausibility of the claim in the Doris Holan story to have seen a police cruiser in the alley. The Doris Holan story gains, is not diminished, in credibility in light of a realization of Doris Holan's actual, true, correct address. For as Doris Holan put it, when she heard the shots she ran to her front window (which in fact, not known until 2020, overlooked Patton), and the view from her window overlooking Patton looks directly east right straight directly into that alley. Doris Holan told of that alley and said she saw a police cruiser making strange backing up movements and then leaving. That is a description of seeing someone in a parked car in that alley backing up and leaving in a hurry, as it would appear to someone looking out Doris Holan's second-story window with a view looking directly into that alley.

Doris Holan still could have got it wrong, been mistaken, whatever. But her story now, on its face, becomes actually more plausible, nothing implausible about it (cutting through the garbling of the Pulte et al retelling). 

And when that is combined independently with the Myers' high-level confidential leak to Myers re the secret police officer witness there that day, that sounds, not as certain, but it sounds like corroborative support for the Doris Holan claim. So much so that I have wondered if the thing that prompted the late leak to Myers might have been the garbled versions of the Doris Holan story itself kicking around on the internet.

I also have a third independent account to add to this mix, my discovery of an account of an officer in a patrol car at the scene of the crime that day whose patrol car movements evoke that described by Doris Holan, not known on any document in the Mary Ferrell site, not known in Myers' book of 2013, not known in Myers' 2020 breaking of his research on the Doris Holan story. (Continued.)

Greg,

I tend to find your version of the Doris Holan story as retold by Michael Brownlow, Bill Pulte and Harrison Livingstone compelling.

I agree with you that from her 2nd story window at 113 1/2 Patton she would have seen the alley right in front of her, any police car in that alley, the fleeing gunman on Patton, and the confrontation between Callaway and the gunman. 

She would have been close enough to the Tippit murder scene that she could have then been out there in a matter of a couple of minutes, and her details of what she then saw were later accidentally garbled by Brownlow, et al. 

So, I think you've done a terrific job of clearing up exactly where Doris Holan was, and the basic gist of what she really did see on November 22, 1963.

(Of course, in the absence of any transcript or taped recording, we can't know exactly what she claimed to have seen.)

Now as to the identity of the mystery law enforcement officer at the Tippit scene at the time of the murder, well maybe it was Dallas Sheriff's Deputy Bill Courson. "Yesterday's clothes" could fit with the story told by the senior Dallas official to Dale Myers.

Or maybe it wasn't Courson. We don't know.

Without any written statement from Courson or anyone else, it's just impossible to say for certain. But the fact that Courson never claimed or implied that he was the first law enforcement officer on the scene is significant. (Not definitive, but significant.)

But we can say for certain that DPD officer Kenneth Croy was at the Tippit site before any other documented law enforcement officer, from any department.

Croy swore under oath that he saw no other law enforcement officer at the scene. 

Croy swore under oath that he was at the scene when Tippit's body was loaded into the ambulance. (Within just a couple of minutes of the shooting.)

John F. Kennedy Assassination Homepage :: Warren Commission :: Hearings :: Volume XII :: Page 201 (jfk-assassination.eu)

No one has ever come forward to contradict Croy, probably because it's true.

He was at the scene within just a couple of minutes of Tippit's murder. And he handled the mystery wallet at the scene, the one FBI agent Bob Barrett later asserted contained "Oswald's" identification.

Was the vehicle in which Croy arrived at the Tippit scene the same one seen by Doris Holan?

We can't say.

Why not? Because (incredibly) Croy never made a written police report of his activities and whereabouts on November 22, 1963!

Greg, you've already voiced your suspicion that the late arriving cover story from the unnamed Dallas official to Dale Myers could be a cover story to explain the impossible presence of a second Dallas law enforcement officer on the Tippit scene.

I agree.

We just disagree about who it might have been.

10 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

David,

As I said in my conspiracy theory above, the CIA plotters intended for the FBI to conclude after the assassination that it was the short, blond, Nikolai Leonov who was entering the Cuban consulate. But the person inside was really a short, blond, CIA asset who told Duran he was Oswald and wanted to get a Cuban transit visa. The plotters purpose for this was to link Leonov to the "conspiracy" they were fabricating.

You say that it was the CIA who had Duran arrested by the Mexican police. Well yeah, sort of. It was Win Scott who got her arrested. Win Scott was not one of the CIA plotters. And in fact, Scott got into trouble with his superiors for getting Duran arrested.

So anyway, the FBI became aware early on that it was Oswald that had been inside talking to Duran. I don't know how long it took for them to realize that this Oswald was actually a blond impersonator.

 

Sandy,

I agree with you that the CIA plotters wanted to fool the FBI into believing that the short, blond "Oswald" visitor to the Cuban Embassy on the 26th and the Cuban Consulate on the 27th was an imposter (he was!) AND that this imposter was Nikolai Leonov (of course, it wasn't!)

You and I agree that the "Oswald" imposter at the Cuban Consulate on the 27th was unlikely to be the same blond, pudgy-faced man photographed outside the Cuban Embassy on the 26th.

Note that the FBI was told in January of 1964 (by an informant who had spoken with Elizabeth Mora) that the first person with whom the blond "Oswald" imposter came in contact at the Cuban Embassy was Teresa Proenza:

124-10003-10386 (maryferrell.org)

Now what is fascinating is that this same Teresa Proenza was a protege of the "Cuban Vice Minister of Defense, a highly placed and extreme Moscow-line Communist. He was so high up he was part of the planning in Moscow in the spring of 1962 to put missiles into Cuba later that fall.

This man was the target of a CIA operation. The CIA wanted to create suspicion within the Cuban government that this Vice Minister of Defense was actually a stooge for the CIA (he wasn't, but the CIA wanted the Cubans to think so). The CIA wanted to create a rift between the Soviets and Cubans and within the Castro government itself over this man.

This CIA operation began in April of 1963 and involved the creation of forged documents to make it appear the Vice Minister was a CIA informant - that he had ratted out the missile build-up in 1962 to the Americans. (Again, he had not, but the documents falsely implied he had.) The Cubans paid for this material, but they made no move against the Vice Minister - no action was taken against him. The CIA operation to discredit this Vice Minister was not working.

So, on November 15, 1963, the CIA tried again with a new set of fake documents. This time, they included the tidbit that there was a second CIA plant in the Cuban Embassy in Mexico City: Teresa Proenza.

Not long after the assassination, Proenza was informed she would be unexpectedlyrecalled to Havana (as indeed she was in January of 1964.)

The Cuban government began to take the (fake) documents seriously - the CIA operation was finally bearing fruit.

In the spring of 1964, another protege of the Vice Minister was tried and convicted on charges of betraying leaders of the resistance movement to the Batista regime. 

Finally, in November of 1964, the Vice Minister and his wife (also a Cabinet member) and Teresa Proenza herself were all tried, convicted and imprisoned on treason charges.

After serving prison terms, they were eventually released.

The CIA operation had been a slow developing, but stunning success. 

So, what's the point of all this?

Simple - the very first person who the blond "Oswald" imposter approached on September 26 at the Cuban Embassy was herself soon a target of an expanded sophisticated CIA operation to create a rift within the Cuban government.

That's not a coincidence.

David Josephs has written that the Mexico City episode was a giant FUBAR and I agree.

There were multiple operations going on down there at the same time, all of them aimed at or interconnected with the Cuban diplomatic mission, and they involved a blond "Oswald" imposter.

104-10145-10381.pdf (archives.gov)

Here's something else:

The CIA's 1963 file on Nikolai Leonov (of course they knew who he was in 1978!) mentions that Leonov had "been a TARBRUSH target three times, but in two instances, the articles are not in the files . . . "

Two of these CIA operations against Leonov were in 1963. 

BIOGRAPHIC DATA: LEONOV, NIKOLAI SERGEYEVICH (maryferrell.org)

I am certain that the CIA included the two photographs of him outside the Soviet Embassy on October 2, 1963, as part of its "mystery man" investigation to incriminate him as an "Oswald" imposter. This would have been the third CIA operation in 1963 against Leonov, specifically, and would have right in keeping with the first two. 

I believe that by mixing in Leonov's image with that of the first blond man, the CIA was trying to hide the identity of the blond "Oswald" imposter's visit to the Cuban Embassy (not the Cuban Consulate) on Thursday, September 26, 1963. 

10 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

Paul,

I'm pretty sure there's a mistake in your identification of the Oswald impersonator.

Which of these two men is the Oswald impersonator? I've always thought it is the one on the left, Nikolai Leonov. Because every time I got a new clue from something Sylvia Duran or Eusebio Azcue said about their Oswald, it always better matched Leonov than the other guy.

I just did a quick search in my files and found the following statement made by Eusebio Azcue in 1978:

"The person in the film [of the real Oswald in the news) was younger and with a pudgier face compared to the hard, lines and older face of the person who requested the visa [at the Cuban Consulate in 1963]."  (Source)

Azcue cannot possibly be referring to the broad-faced guy we see above.

Therefore Nikolai Leonov is the Oswald impersonator.

 

Sandy,

The Cuban Consulate and the Cuban Embassy in Mexico City in 1963 were two separate buildings, both on Francisco Marquez Street. The CIA's surveillance post at 149 Francisco Marquez was across the street from both buildings. A CIA asset manning the 3rd floor apartment could manually photograph every visitor to the embassy, and a pulse camera could cover the consulate.

History Matters Archive - 2003 Release: Oswald, the CIA, and Mexico City ("Lopez Report"), pg (history-matters.com)

The blond, pudgy-faced man was photographed outside the Cuban Embassy (not the Cuban Consulate) on Thursday, September 26. This man, according to numerous sources, was very angry and red-faced when he was told by officials at the Cuban Embassy that he could not get a visa to Cuba there. He then was directed to the Cuban Consulate down the block. On his way out, he loudly (and provocatively) threatened to "shoot Kennedy for this."

This man identified himself as "Lee Oswald." (Of course, he was not our man at all.)

Fidel Castro himself heard all about this incident from Cuban Embassy officials immediately after the assassination. Castro himself told FBI source Jack Childs (Solo) that this was highly suspicious ("Nobody ever goes that way for a visa.")

Commission Document 1359 - FBI Letter from Director of 17 Jun 1964 re: Castro Statements (maryferrell.org)

I agree.

This pudgy-faced, blond man was a provocateur. His "performance" though, may have been too over the top. His superiors seemingly chose a different man to approach the consulate. (And notice that they waited a day, probably to minimize the chance that consulate personnel and embassy personnel would realize that a different man was now "Oswald.")

However, the now infamous (apparent) ruckus between the (new?) mystery man and Azcue/Duran occurred at the Cuban Consulate on Friday, September 27.

I don't believe the same man visited both the Cuban consulate and embassy.  This visitor to the consulate was NOT photographed, allegedly. 

Whoever this (new?) man/intelligence asset was, he was far less provocative and did NOT threaten (or even mention) President Kennedy. 

Memorable? Well, sort of. But not so much that either Duran or Azcue would drop everything and react.

The CIA at first tried to blur and conflate these two incidents, and then, once it was decided that our "Oswald" (aboard the mythical bus trip) could NOT have been in Mexico City by the 26th, dropped the embassy incident. 

But Castro heard about it, and so did the FBI, and so did the Warren Commission, and now, ultimately, so have we.

Two separate provocations, one at the Cuban Embassy, one at the Cuban Consulate, one on the 26th and one on the 27th.

The CIA (as late as 1978) was muddying the waters by getting Nikolai Leonov's image in with the blond, pudgy-faced man who visited the embassy on the 26th. 

There is no evidence that Nikolai Leonov ever posed as our "Oswald", but I think it's certain that the CIA wanted the FBI and any other investigators to think that he did. 

59 minutes ago, Stu Wexler said:

Re: Leonov. In an interview with either the Church or Rockefeller Committee, Angleton did everything he could to put a giant arrow above Leonov's head re the assassination. 

I would add that Leonov was one of three Russians who independently told the same story about Oswald freaking out to them at the Soviet Embassy, only each of the relevant persons put themselves as the person who had to deal directly with Oswald when it happened. So someone was lying or they all were.

Two other things. Leonov was very close to Che and other Cubans. And he became one of Putin's mentors.

Stu

Stu,

I've never read that Nikolai Leonov claimed to be one of the three Soviet officers who met "Oswald" on Saturday, September 28. I've always understood that the three were

Victor Kostikov

Oleg Nechiporenko

Pavel Yatzkov.

Can you provide a citation for the claim that Leonov was one of the three who supposedly met "Oswald" either on Friday, September 27 or Saturday, September 28?

26 minutes ago, Steve Thomas said:

Paul,

Neither the DPD transcript, nor either of J. Edgar Hoover's letters to Rankin say that the individual seen running from the TSBD was armed with a rifle.

Frankly, I don't know where that information came from. Somebody who did shoddy research conflated the two accounts and put them together.

Hoover's letters say that, based on information provided by the Dallas Police, a man was seen running from the TSBD, but there was no mention of a rifle.; but we already knew that from Roger Craig. Maybe the DPD was relaying Craig's info to the FBI.

Steve Thomas

Steve,

This gets curiouser and curiouser:

The first DPD "transcript" of their radio calls on 11/22/63 has Sawyer mentioning a "30-30 or some kind of Winchester." 

However, this "witness" with whom Sawyer spoke could provide neither a clothing description nor whether the suspect was still in the building! 

("I don't know for sure and the witness he had didn't have (sic) the description but we have got that building saturated by now. We should know something before long.")

So, when Sawyer testified to the Warren Commission, did he just invent the part about the witness claiming the suspect ran from the building? If not, then why on November 22 in response to the dispatcher's direct question about whether the shooter was still in the TSBD, Sawyer said the witness "had didn't have the description" (whatever that meant)?

Did the witness claim to Sawyer that he'd seen the suspect run from the building, or not?

[Radio Transcript for November 22, 1963] - Page 47 of 168 - The Portal to Texas History (unt.edu)

8 minutes ago, Steve Thomas said:

https://www.jfk-assassination.net/dpdtapes/

 

12:45

Dispatcher

Attention Elm and Houston is reported to be an unknown white male, all squads. Attention all squads. The suspect in the shooting at approximately thirty, slender build, height five feet ten inches, weight one hundred sixty-five pounds, reported to be armed with what is thought to be a 30 caliber rifle. Attention all squads. The suspect from Elm and Houston is reported to be an unknown white male about thirty, slender build, five feet ten inches tall, one hundred sixty-five pounds, armed with what is thought to be a 30-30 rifle. No further description at this time, or information. 12:45.

 

as 12:54 PM (Dallas time), … a female telephone operator at the Dallas Police Department, who quickly provided the description of the alleged Presidential assassin for a KLIF reporter who was recording the phone call for later broadcast. The description she provided was: "White male, 30 [years old], 5-10, 165, 30-caliber rifle, and I believe it was at Elm and Houston where it came from; now I don't know definitely and I don't like to say." [The audio can be heard HERE.]" -- DVP; April 19, 2019

 

What's the problem?

Steve Thomas

Steve,

Thanks for posting both of J. Edgar Hoover 1964 letters to J. Lee Rankin that the suspect's description came from an unknown witness. What is so striking about this is that this "witness" claimed to have seen a suspect "running from the Texas School Book Depository immediately after the assassination" (presumably holding a .30 caliber rifle.)

Of course, no one else saw this suspect. Of the hundreds of people in and around the TSBD in the immediate aftermath of the shots, none were reported to have seen anyone run from the TSBD with a rifle!

That description was absurd!

This "witness" was clearly a plant whose task was to send the DPD off immediately on the wrong trail. 

That Rankin was still trying to shore up the source of Sawyer's description two months after the publication of the Warren Report is overwhelming proof that he, Rankin, did not believe a key contention of the Warren Report: namely that Howard Brennan was Sawyer's source!

Rankin knew that Brennan was NOT Sawyer's source, and Rankin's request to Hoover on November 2, 1964 (find Sawyer's source, FBI!), is proof of that beyond any doubt whatsoever.

FBI 105-82555 Oswald HQ File, Section 221 (maryferrell.org)

49 minutes ago, David Josephs said:

g.  All we can go by are the descriptions from AZCUE and DURAN who do not describe LEONOV and this recap from HELMS finally gives us an idea what the OSWALD that ALVARADO saw looked like:

I am not aware whether either was asked about LEONOV...  very little truth was told about Mexico in the WCR and Sprague was thrown off the HSCA for wanting to know more about Mexico.  They didn't ask more since they didn't want to confirm the man down there was not Oswald... IMO.

Mr. CORNWELL. Directing your attention to the period of time immediately after the assassination, the day of the assassination or the day after the assassination, did you during that period of time have an occasion to see pictures of the alleged assassin in the newspapers or to observe on television the man identified at that time as Lee Harvey Oswald?
Senor AZCUE. Yes, sir, not so close to the date, not in the first few days, not immediately thereafter. Some time I calculate approximately-and I say this because I am not a great movie fan, but it was in mid-December approximately--I saw at that time the film in which Ruby appears assassinating the Oswald who was there, and I was not able to identify him and only 2 months had gone by since I had seen the Oswald who appeared at the consulate. And I had a clear mental picture because we had had an unpleasant discussion and he had not been very pleasant to me and I did not recognize when I first saw him. I did not recognize Oswald. The man who went to the consulate was a man over 30 years of age and very thin, very thin faced. And the individual I saw in the movie was a young Man, considerably younger, and a fuller face.
Mr. CORNWELL. What color hair did the individual have to the best of your memory who visited the consulate?
Senor AZCUE. He was blond, dark blond.
Mr. CORNWELL. Did the individual you saw in the movie, the person who was killed by Jack Ruby, resemble more closely the individual in these photographs to your memory than the individual who visited the consulate?
Senor AZCUE. I believe so.
Mr. CORNWELL. I would like to show you JFK exhibit F-434. Do the representatives from the National Archives have the original or a small photograph of that exhibit? While they are looking, Mr. Chairman, I believe we neglected to ask that JFK exhibit F-407 be admitted into evidence.
Chairman STOKES. Without objection it may be entered into evidence. [The information follows:]

JFK EXHIBIT F-407. 

Mr. CORNWELL. That is a passport. May we have that exhibit admitted into evidence, Mr. Chairman, JFK F-434?
Chairman STOKES. Without objection it may be entered into evidence. [The information follows:]

JFK EXHIBIT F-434. 

Mr. CORNWELL. Did the individual who visited the consulate look like that individual?
Senor AZCUE. No.

 

h. As to the entire thing being made up...
We must remember that Duran is saying this man did not return after the early afternoon when he supposedly brought photos (from a place Duran cannot remember telling him to go).  Nothing about this summary suggest the call originated from Duran's desk, or that the "Oswald" fellow was even with Duran at this point.

 

I mean how much BS can the HCSA throw?

CORNWELL - Let me read something to you, and ask you if it at all refreshes your memory or if hour(sic) have a memory of a conversation similar to this? I don't believe I read this to you before, when we talked the other day, or did I? Did I read and excerpt from Daniel Schorr's book to you?
TIRADO - No, you told me.
CORNWELL - Okay. I'll read it to you then at this time. It's an excerpt from a book called Clearing the Air, written by Daniel Schorr, published in the United States in 1977. And page 177 reads as follows: "In and interview in July 1967 with a British journalist, Comer Clark, Castro (meaning Fidel Castro) said that Oswald had come to the Cuban Consulate twice, each time for about fifteen minutes. The first time, I was told, he wanted to work for us. He was asked to explain but he wouldn't, he wouldn't go into details. The second time he said he wanted to free Cuba from American imperialism. Then he said something like 'Someone ought to shoot that President Kennedy.' Then Oswald said, and this is exactly how is was reported to me, maybe I'll try to do it." Do you recall any conversation like that in either what was said to you by Oswald or that was said by Oswald to Azcue or anyone else that you might have overheard?
TIRADO - No, I don't remember.
CORNWELL - Did any part of that conversation occur?
TIRADO - No, because I don't remember that he says he was to go to work in Cuba because he only that he wanted to go in-transit. That's what I remember.

LEAP - At any time during you conversation with the Consul, did you discuss the possibility that Oswald was a penetration agent? Intelligence agent for a foreign power? Did you discuss that possibility?
TIRADO - No. I don't think so because we didn't have time. Because this man was in my office and I was in Azcue's office so I couldn't leave him many times alone.
LEAP - Did you ever have conversations with Ascue out- side of Oswald's presence relative to the issue?
TIRADO - Repeat the question please.
LOPEZ - Did you ever have a conversation with Azcue when Oswald was not in the office about the possibility that he was an intelligence agent for some country?
TIRADO - No, no. I don't think so. We only thought that he was a crazy man, an adventurer, or something like that.
LEAP - Did it ever enter your mind that that he was a penetration agent?
TIRADO - Perhaps. Perhaps, because it happened, it happened sometimes that somebody came and say this is a policeman or something like that.
LEAP - That's all the questions that I have.

Paul - I only speculate that the entire thing could have been made up due to the complete lack of corroboration of anything which occurs within the Cuban Embassy.  All we have are the words or AZCUE and DURAN... when AZCUE's close friend and CIA double agent LITAMIL/9 repeatedly confirms no Oswald appeared at that embassy.

What we have from these 2 is taken from the "interrogation" of Duran, hand their HSCA transcripts.  Who else in Mexico puts Oswald at the Cuban Embassy?

i.  ENGLISH

DURAN and PROENZA both claim the man who came in was speaking ENGLISH.

CORNWELL - On the very first visit, would you describe to us what the man said and did, and what you said in response?
TIRADO - Yes, he, well, he enter and he ask me if I speak english and I say yes, and then he start asking me about requirements to go to Cuba, to get a visa to go to Cuba, and I explain it.

DURAN never called the Soviet Embassy on the 27th... or during that week - at all - related to the man calling himself Oswald.  

The calls on the morning of the 27th were all in Spanish - not Oswald
The OSWALD-character disappears 2x.  Once after the final call on the 27th to the Soviet Embassy, and then after DURAN claims he returns with photos and completes the application.

The calls on the 27th are all in Spanish... the calls on the 28th are a mixture of English and poor Russian.
The real point being, as you see from other Monthly Summary reports, there were simply not that many people saying the things they supposedly said related to this AMERICAN wanting to travel to Cuba/Russia...  (I believe the woman mentioned in the Sept Summary was FERRER - the woman in contact with LEONOV... but I am only speculating)

104-10004-10257 is the RIF with the transcripts of all the calls.  Calls from after 4pm on the 27th and those on the 28th do not mention LEE OSWALD.. only the call from OCT 1 - from which Tarasoff claims to be able to recognize the voice from the 28th calls... calls we all know were not of DURAN/OSWALD.

Calls from the 28th include the "OSWALD" character asking the SOVIETS to speak Russian and not English. (imagine the wire taps picking up the Russians speaking English to an American who speaks in terrible Russian and asks they speak in Russian and it NOT being reported).   Mostly nonsense is exchanged before the call ends.  Oct 1 - "Hello, this is LEE OSWALD speaking"

Right.  

Hope that addresses your questions with a little background...

DJ

Thanks, David.

I thought Teresa Proenza worked at the Cuban Embassy, not the Cuban Consulate.

124-10003-10386 (maryferrell.org)

The HSCA wrote that someone claiming to be "Lee Oswald" (but certainly NOT the same man later arrested in Dallas) visited the Cuban EMBASSY in Mexico City on Thursday, September 26 shortly after 1:00 pm in search of a visa to Cuba. Pay careful attention to his physical description:

180-10110-10100 (maryferrell.org)

This man was then directed to the Cuban CONSULATE:

LOG AND CONTACT STRIP/FILM NO 250/CUBAN EMBASSY, MEXICO CITY (maryferrell.org)

The Mexicans then photographed this "Oswald" impersonator for the CIA as he left the Cuban EMBASSY at 1:30 on Thursday, September 26, 1963 (the bottom two photos are the "Oswald" impersonator, not the top two, of which I'll say more in a moment):

FACT SHEET ON PHOTOGRAPHS: CUBAN EMBASSY (maryferrell.org)

Now what is really curious to me is that the CIA in 1978 included two photos of a different man, taken on October 2, 1963, as he entered the Soviet compound:

See the top two photos, especially the one of this new man on the left:

FACT SHEET ON PHOTOGRAPHS: CUBAN EMBASSY (maryferrell.org)

This man is, beyond any doubt, Nikolai Leonov. Look at the photo of him on the top left in the link above and compare it with this picture of Leonov:

For the CIA to claim these two photos were of "a well-dressed, unidentified male carrying a coat as he entered the Soviet/Embassy Consulate compound" was absurd! 

The CIA knew damn well they were giving the HSCA pictures of Leonov from October 2! The CIA also knew that the first man photographed on September 26 had claimed (falsely) to be "Oswald"!

By putting these four photos of two separate men together, the CIA was hoping the HSCA would conflate these two men. Apparently, it worked: notice that the CIA's version of the HSCA press release of July 30, 1978, made no mention of the fact that these pictures were of two different men. 

Therefore, the CIA as late as 1978 was still trying to deceive the HSCA by linking the "Oswald" impersonator in Mexico City with Nikolai Leonov.

I can think of no innocent explanation for this CIA action. 

12 hours ago, David Josephs said:

"While there he was photographed several times In the company of CASTRO and KRUSCHEV, and supposedly served as CASTRO's interpreter. LEONOV's principal task in Mexico City has been the smuggling of arms to insurgent groups in Latin America, especially Guatemala."
 

My understanding is the FBI only knew what the CIA told them about 9/27-10/3 and about what occurred at the Embassies and supposedly caught on tape.  And given the amount of surveillance and his closeness with Castro, those at the Cuban Embassy would probably be aware of LEONOV.  Also, he was 5'7".

The strange thing is the argument Duran mentions in her testimony below is that AZCUE's job was to recruit doubles.  To turn Americans, especially those showing disdain to the US and wanting to leave.  Azcue would have spent time to see if this was a penetration agent - or a potential asset.   Instead he and Duran claim there was a heated argument with yelling and screaming with "Oswald" being thrown out at the end...  the exact opposite of what should have occurred.

Note: The day after Phillips arrived in MX the Sept 1963 Monthly Summary report goes out recapping all of the important leads their tapping efforts produced.  We do not see a single word about an American anywhere... Here is the Sept report:  and an older one explaining what info LIENVOY exploits including looking for "English speaking persons". ie Albert Kennedy.  Contemporaneous reports - and the fact nothing was reported related to all that occurs on the 27th and 28th of Sept - suggests to me the entire thing was a charade.

Whether anyone was ever there, and this was run entirely by either Cuban, Mexican, CIA, or FBI forces - or a combination thereof - with all the scenarios simply created out of thin air...  LITAMIL-9 & 7 report no signs of Oswald - and these were the CIA within the Embassy itself.

There may have been a person making those first calls on Friday morning, but the images used for that application were not the same as those used on the 27th, they matched the man there - if there was, not Oswald.

 

 

DURAN (Letter C.) replying to a call from the Soviet compound saying that yes, the "man" is there now.  This at 4:26pm...  and in direct conflict to Duran's claim he never returned - testimony below.

 

.   

 

All the FBI found via PECK and OCHOA was that there was no sign of Oswald in MX during that week.  So if he did meet with Davis at the LUNA, it was either very quick, or very very quiet.

More importantly are the transcripts.  After the initial calls on the morning of the 27th, there is no more contact between "Oswald" and the Embassies/Duran.  The remaining calls, including the man at the Embassy, were not of Oswald/Duran.

Cornwell Is it possible that, in addition to his visits on Friday, he also came back the following day on Saturday mourning?
TIRADO - No.
CORNWELL - How can you be sure of that?
TIRADO - Because, uh, I told you before, that it was easy to remember, because not all the Americans that came there were married with a Russian woman, they have live(d) in Russian and uh, we didn't used to fight with those people because if you, they came for going to Cuba, so apparently they were friends, no? So we were nice to them, with this man we fight, I mean we had a hard discussion so we didn't want to have anything to do with him.
CORNWELL - Okay. I understand that but I don't understand how that really answers the question. In other words, the question is, what is it about the events that makes you sure that he did not come back on Saturday, and have another conversation with you?
TIRADO - Because I remember the fight. So if he (come) back, I would have remembered.
CORNWELL - Did Azcue work on Saturdays?
TIRADO - Yes, we used to work in the office but not for the public.
CORNWELL - Was there a guard, was there a guard out here at the corner near number seven on your diagram on Saturdays?
TIRADO - Excuse me?
CORNWELL - Was there a doorman out near the area that you marked as number seven, on the diagram?
TIRADO - Yes, but on Saturday he never let people ...
CORNWELL - Never let people in.
TIRADO - No.

 

63-12-02 Olga Prjevalinskiy FERRER Porf Russian-Spanish NEW ORLEANS Met with LEONOV KGB Arms Smuggler in Mexico till Sept 17 104-10408-10335.pdf 148.65 kB · 0 downloads

Thanks, David.

So, to sum up as I understand it:

a. There is no evidence to support the WC's conclusion that our "Oswald" went by bus to Mexico City. (Your previous work on that is quite definitive as far as I can tell.)

b. There is no good evidence to support the CIA's claim that our "Oswald" went to either the Cuban or Soviet consulates in Mexico City on either Friday, September 27 or Saturday, September 28, 1963. (No surveillance tapes or photos.)

c. CIA procedures about "English-speaking persons" having contact with either the Cubans or the Soviets in Mexico City should have resulted in CIA documents about any such encounters, if any actually occurred. But the September summary report for Mexico City makes no mention of anything on the 27th or the 28th. 

d. Sylvia Duran's recollection about the number of visits by the suspicious man on the 27th is shaky - she swore he only came to the consulate once (in the morning), but in the transcript of the phone call to the Soviets in the afternoon, she said that "yes, he is here now", implying the man in question had returned. 

(I am not sure that is particularly important. By the time she testified to the HSCA, she may have honestly forgotten or blurred together the details of the man's visit/s.)

e. Someone else may (MAY) have visited the Cuban consulate on Friday morning, September 27, and the later statements of both Azcue and Duran were based on their recollections of their encounter with that man (whoever he was, and whoever he may have pretended to be at that moment.) 

f. The extant picture of "Oswald" attached to the visa application was not the same one originally attached. It must have been switched out later, right?

g. Key question: Did the visitor on the 27th actually resemble Nikolai Leonov, and if not, then why did the Mexican Security Service turn over pictures of someone who did resemble him to the HSCA?

Did anyone at the HSCA ever show pictures of Nikolai Leonov to either Duran or Azcue and ask if he resembled the man who (supposedly) came to the Cuban consulate on the 27th? If the HSCA did not ask, why not?

h. If the entire encounter at the Cuban consulate on the 27th was a total fabrication out of thin air, dreamed up later by David Atlee Phillips in the CIA, then what could possibly explain the adamant stories told under oath (and in spite of torture!) by both Duran and Azcue for decades to come?

To me, Duran and Azcue come across as real witnesses to a real encounter with someone (but not our "Oswald") at the Cuban consulate on the 27th. 

i. Last question:

In what language, Spanish or English, was the man on the 27th speaking while at the Cuban consulate? When Duran called the Soviets later on the 27th, what language did she speak on the phone, Spanish or Russian?

Is it possible the lack of any mention of the man/Duran/Azcue incident on the 27th in the CIA summary report for September was because the entire encounter was in Spanish? (And that the CIA was unaware when the monthly summary was written, a few days later presumably, that the (Spanish-speaking?) visitor to the Cuban consulate on the 27th had claimed to be an American?)

Is that even possible?

Thanks, David. 

23 hours ago, Leslie Sharp said:

I'm particularly interested in the Helsinki leg of the trip which coincided with a global youth fest as I recall?  Are you familiar with that storyline?

What are the odds that Billy Lord graduated a few years before George W. Bush at the same Midland, Texas High School? and a classmate of Lord's is photographed with George de Mohrenschilldt on Travis St. with George and Jeanne's little wire haired terrier.  (as a personal anecdote:  the Travis St. address is in the same block as an apartment occupied by a receptionist at Professional Travel Service located at Two Turtle Creek in the early 1970s; one of our agency contractor's was the wife of de M's buddy Bruce Calder and on at least one occasion he and George came into the 7th floor office to pick Mitzi up for lunch.)

Wilson-Hudson is one of those characters who the government alleged was "unstable," "crazy," etc., yet for some reason, DCI George H. W. Bush took the time to commit to record:
 

John Wilson-Hudson: To underscore the potential significance of Wilson-Hudson to the investigation into the 1963 assassination of President Kennedy: Memorandum For: Director of Central Intelligence, From: John H. Waller, Inspector General, Subject: Jack Anderson Reference to 28 November 1963 CIA Cable.  “ . . . The dissemination was based on a 27 November 1963 cable from London . . . raising a question as to his [John Wilson-Hudson] reliability . . . “ The undated memo was from the CIA IG to Director of Central Intelligence George Herbert Walker Bush. www.maryferrell.org

 

United States. Congress. House. Select Committee on Assassinations. Investigation Of the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy: Hearings before the Select Committee on Assassinations of the US House of Representatives, Ninety-Fifth Congress, Second Session. Washington : US Govt. Print. Off., 19781979.

(734) A memorandum from the deputy director of plans of the CIA to the FBI provided additional information about John Wilson Hudson. (670) A “usually reliable source” reported on August 8, 1951, that Carl John Wilson Hudson was a Spanish citizen of British descent residing in Chile and a contact of Bert Sucharov, a suspected Soviet agent in Santi-ago, Chile. (671) Wilson was born in Liverpool, England, on December 29, 1916. (672) After arriving in Chile in 1939, in his capacity of journalist Wilson reportedly be n “a one-man crusade against the British Government.” (673) Anogfiar source described as “usually reliable” and “whose inform-ation was evaluated as “possibly true” reported in 1952 that Wilson was “very probably an intelligence agent.” (674) _

(735) It was also reported by a “usually reliable source” that on June 18, 1959, Carl John Wilson, a British journalist, sent a cable to the British Parliament and the British Trade Union Federation claiming he had confirmed that the U.S. military attachés in the Caribbean were providing military advice to dictators. In this cable, Wilson reportedly protested these actions “in the name of humanity.” (675) Another report from another “usually reliable source” stated that Wilson was involved in a planned attack from Cuba on Puerto Cabezas, Nicaragua, during the weekend of June 27–28, 1959. (676) Associated Press reported on July 1, 1959, that the Cuban home of Capt. Paul Hughes was raided, leading to the seizure of:

A large arms cache and air-sea invasion plans and the detention of two other Americans, a British journalist, several Cubans, and nearly 200 would be members of an expeditionary force against the regime of Nicaraguan President Luis Somoza. (677)

The article stated that “the British subject was identified as Carl John Wilson, a freelance journalist who had been in Havana several weeks.” (678)

(736) The committee was unable to locate John Wilson Hudson. In response to the committee’s inquiries, the Metropolitan Police in London, England, contacted unspecified government agencies, but these efforts were unsuccessful. (679) It has been alleged that Hudson is dead. (680) Analysis

(742) It has not been possible to corroborate the allegation that Ruby visited Trafficante at Trescornia. John Wilson Hudson was not located, and Trafficante denied any such meeting, although he did recall an individual fitting Hudson’s description. José Verdacia also recalled a British journalist who was at Trescornia.

 

 

What are the odds that this same Billy Lord would be so harrassed in January of 1977 by non-governmental "investigators" seeking to "locate, interview, monitor and influence every single person who ever knew Lee Oswald . . . " that he, Billy Lord, would seek relief from no less than President Carter?

And that one of those doing the harrassing would be the son of the then CIA director (George H.W Bush) and himself a future president of the United States, George W. Bush? 

On 8/14/2023 at 3:39 PM, Sandy Larsen said:

Regarding the Mexico City incident....

The totality of Mexico City evidence indicates that CIA plotters fabricated the Mexico City trip out of thin air to make it look like Oswald and his accomplices went by car to Mexico City in order to meet with Russians and Cubans to arrange the assassination of Kennedy. This fake story was meant to implicate Oswald as leader of the hit team in America, and KGB agents Valeriy Kostikov and Nikolai Leonov as his Russian contacts in Mexico City. (According to the CIA, Kostikov was supposedly the KGB's assassination's chief and Leonov was supposedly in charge of spreading communism to the western hemisphere.)

While there, Oswald collected $6500 down payment for the hit. But like almost everything else, this didn't really happen. An informant just said it did.

The only things that really happened were 1) some phone calls made to the Cuban and Russian consulates, and 2) a small, blond, Oswald imposter entered the Cuban Consulate a few times. The Cuban Consulate employees thought he was Oswald and was there trying to get a Russian Visa. But the CIA plotters intended for the FBI to think he was Nikolai Leonov and was involved in the assassination plot.

Sylvia Duran, a Cuban Consulate employee, was also a target of this CIA plot. Unfortunately for the plotters, the Mexican police interrogated her and word got back to the FBI that the guy they were supposed to believe was Nikolai Leonov was actually the Oswald impersonator.

The CIA plotter's purpose for the fake phone calls was to alert the FBI to Oswald's (supposed) connection to the (fake) Mexico City story, so they would investigate it. But that became irrelevant since the FBI had already learned of Oswald's imposter from Sylvia Duran's interrogation by the Mexican Police.

The coverup....

J. Edgar Hoover assumed that the Mexico City trip really happened but ignored the Cuban/Russian plot. He also removed the automobile trip and Oswald's companions in order to avoid any talk of conspiracy. He and the Mexican authorities fabricated the bus trips to take the place of the automobile.

Notes....

Note that the CIA plotters didn't care if Oswald was seen watching the presidential parade. They had painted him is a ringleader, not a shooter.

One of his shooters in the TSBD used a Mauser. This was part of the plot. The Carcano was part of the coverup.

 

Sandy,

If I follow you correctly (a big "if"), then the plotters impersonated Nikolai Leonov pretending to be our "Oswald". But the FBI saw through the ruse.

OK.

How did the FBI know for sure that Nikolai Leonov had not actually pretended to be "Oswald"?

(Note that I don't believe that the USSR had anything to do with the assassination, nor do I think the KGB was using "Oswald" as any sort of witting asset.)

But the Mexican Security Service did turn over pictures to the HSCA in the 1970's of a blond man who bore a remarkable resemblance to Leonov!

Blond Man: 

Nikolai Leonov: 

The blond Oswald in Mexico - JFK Assassination Debate - The Education Forum (ipbhost.com)

Mervyn,

That's the $64,000 question.

No one knows.

The official story is (as everyone here knows) that Dallas Police Inspector Herbert Sawyer phoned in it to the DPD dispatcher around 12:44.

Warren Commission, Volume VI: J. Herbert Sawyer (wordpress.com)

Mr. Belin.

All right, now, sir; you did broadcast that description out of this

Mr. Sawyer.

Yes, that's correct. That shows on the radio log.

Mr. Belin. Where did you get that description?

Mr. Sawyer.

We are talking now about the colored man?
Mr. BELIN. No, I am talking about the one that is on Sawyer's Deposition Exhibit A, that shows you at 12:43.
Mr. SAWYER. That description came to me mainly from one witness who claimed to have seen the rifle barrel in the fifth or sixth floor of the building, and claimed to have been able to see the man up there.

Mr. Belin.

Do you know this person's name?

Mr. Sawyer.

I do not.

Mr. Belin.

Do you know anything about him, what he was wearing?

Mr. SAWYER. Except that he was--I don't remember what he was wearing. I remember that he was a white man and that he wasn't young and he wasn't old. He was there. That is the only two things that I can remember about him.

Mr. Belin.

What age would you categorize as young?

 

Mr. Sawyer.

Around 35 would be my best recollection of it, but it could be a few years either way.

Mr. BELIN. Do you remember if he was tall or short, or can't you remember anything about him?

Mr. Sawyer.

I can't remember that much about him. I was real hazy about that.
Mr. BELIN. Do you remember where he said he was standing when he saw the person with the rifle?

Mr. Sawyer.

I didn't go into detail with him except that from the best of my recollection, he was standing where he could have seen him. But there were too many people coming up with questions to go into detail. I got the description and sent him on over to the Sheriff's Office.
Mr. BELIN. Inspector, do you remember anything else about this person who you say gave you the primary description?
Mr. SAWYER. No, I do not, except that I did send him with an escort to the Sheriff's Office to give fuller or more complete detail.
Mr. BELIN. Do you know if he was taken there to see a lineup at the police station?

Mr. Sawyer.

No.

Mr. Belin.

Did you ever see him again?

Mr. Sawyer.

Not to my knowledge.

 

So, whoever fed this "description" to Sawyer has never been identified, yet gave a height and weight estimate that could only have come from someone on the sixth floor, at least according to the official story. 

 

Since our man "Oswald" wasn't on the sixth floor during the shooting, this unidentifiable "witness" was almost certainly an intelligence asset, pointing the finger of suspicion at the pre-designated patsy to the police before any real system for taking statements was in place. 

 

This "witness" was never seen again. 

 

(The problems with Howard Brennan's testimony and story are legion and legendary. I will not rehash them here other than to say that Brennan was NOT the mystery "witness".)

Thanks Adam and Micah. 

Fascinating stuff.

For what it's worth, I myself had several phone conversations with Harold Weisberg back in the 1990's, and his question to me always revolved around "Why would any conspirator fake pictures when the pictures we do have show evidence of a conspiracy?" (He was certain that the extant record of the pictures taken at the autopsy is incomplete. Some pictures from that night have never seen the light of day.)

I don't remember discussing two ambulances at Bethesda with him, but this makes sense: any autopsy at Bethesda would automatically mean the Navy would send an ambulance with a shipping casket, regardless of whether it was actually used later.

Weisberg's seminal work on the autopsy, his 1975 "Post Mortem", remains an absolute classic. 

 I have a first edition of it, and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in the medical evidence. It is the starting point. 

Post Mortem: The Classic Investigation of the JFK Assassination Medical and Ballistics Evidence and Cover-Up: Weisberg, Harold: 9781626360617: Amazon.com: Books

1 hour ago, Chris Barnard said:

If I remember correctly he was supposedly a good friend of Ted Kennedy, he spoke after Teds death, recanting stories. You would think Ted had given his opinion.  
 

What should we expect from Biden, he is the establishment. Did nothing exceptional in 30-40 years, and waited for his time to sit in the top seat. IMO he was being shrewd, not honest in answering the questions. 

Of course. Political expediency is the watchword/phrase for all national politicians. 

And Joe Biden's "Love Affair" with the CIA has been the subject of news stories for years:

Joe Biden’s Love Affair With the CIA - The American Prospect

If the theory that 214 Neely was a CIA safehouse is true (and I think that's a real possibility), then is there any chance that JFK documents yet to be released might somehow contain a list of Dallas-area addresses used by American Intelligence agencies?

(Remember, "Oswald" vehemently denied to Captain Fritz that he ever lived there. Marguerite Oswald not only told author Joechim Joesten that "Oswald" did not live there, but that Marina DID "with another man." And finally, note that the initial FBI list of "Oswald's" addresses did NOT include Neely Street.)

After all, if 214 Neely Street is now slated for destruction, then it won't be used as a safehouse anymore by any agency. 

Or are these safehouses such state secrets that they will be forever exempt from public disclosure? 

Can the CIA plausibly claim that even if 214 Neely Street was not a safehouse (a big and doubtful "if"), the revelation of a former safehouse in Dallas would somehow continue to endanger its current spies, and that therefore they could not release any such addresses?

On 12/7/2022 at 1:33 PM, David Boylan said:

 

After working with Larry over the last few years I've learned some of the key principles that he uses in his research: Does it fit the context? Is it consistent? Does it make sense? Does it fit with what we know?

 

If we apply some of these questions to Oswald's "escorts" and the Sylvia Odio visit:

 

Would Oswald travel with people that he doesn't know? Would "Angel/Angelo" and "Leopoldo" travel with each other unless they knew each other or were friends? After visiting Odio did Angel and Leopoldo stay in Dallas or did they go onto Mexico City? If this was part of a CIA Op to get Oswald to Mexico City what was the Op? Were they CIA assets? Would the CIA take a chance on those that weren't trusted assets? How would her visitors know about Sarita (DRE) and her, Sylvia (JURE), and her father (MRP)?

 

After looking at these questions, Larry and I came up with two sets of individuals. The first set was Carlos Hernandez (Angel?) and Victor Espinosa Hernandez (Leopoldo?). They were both close to each other having come up through the camps training for the Bay of Pigs. Carlos considered Victor one of his best friends. They were in New Orleans in summer of 1963 having come from Miami. Victor had the idea that they could bomb Havana. Victor's friend Mike McLaney volunteered his brother Bill's place at Lake Pontchartrain to store the dynamite and bomb casings.

 

Both were CIA assets. Carlos was AMHAZE-2523 and Victor AMHINT-24. Carlos had an active CIA Provisional Operational Approval (POA) in Sept 1963.

 

Carlos had been used in a previous DRE propaganda and psych warfare operation run by the DRE/APMSPELL case officer at the time (Aug 1962) Ross Crozier. He and 8 other members of the DRE travelled to Helsinki for the World Youth Festival to disrupt the Cuban delegation and I speculate, help with the defection of Rolando Cubela (AMLASH) [Victor Espinosa was also close to Cubela. He and Cubela would go out clubbing in Cuba. Victor was in Cubela's hospital room when Fidel and Raul Castro came to visit. Raul was particularly close to Cubela.]

 

The DRE (Student Revolutionary Directorate) was composed of young independent minded members. In other words, the CIA could not control them. One example was when Crozier under the alias of Roger Fox accompanied 9 DRE members to the 8th World Youth Festival in Helsinki, July-Aug 1962. John Koch and Enrique Beloyra were so disruptive that the Finnish police "detained" them. Koch and Beloyra were banned from joining the remaining members from speaking at the festival. Despite the ban, Carlos Hernandez, Juan Salvat and Anna Diaz-Silveira managed to speak and draw attention to Koch and Beloyra's detention. The Finnish police released them both on the condition that they leave Finland the next day.

 

From a previous essay:

 

It didn't take DRE members (Salvat, Hernandez, Blanco) long before they caused an international incident by firing on the Blanquita hotel in Havana (Aug 24th). Both Czech and Russian officers were staying there. The purpose was to bring attention that Russians were in Cuba. They also reported that there were Soviet missiles in Cuba.

The end for Crozier aka "the man in Miami" came when he asked Luis Fernandez-Rocha (AMHINT-53) and Salvat and three others to infiltrate Cuba on either Oct 23-24 during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Ostensibly to report on military intelligence but told they might have to direct artillery fire.

Their Today Show interview on Nov 12 and a newspaper article bought DRE members Fernandez-Rocha and Jose Lasa a face to face  meeting with Richard Helms himself on Nov 13, 1962. Nestor Sanchez translated.

Helms informed them at this meeting that there would be a change in their contact in Miami. (He would replace Crozier with George Joannides alias Walter Newby). He said that (Joannides) could come directly to him (Helms) if he needed any clarification.

 Fernandez-Rocha Report to Joannides aka Howard

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=18928#relPageId=3

Even after Joannides(Newby) replaced Crozier, the DRE were still doing their own thing. https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=16129#relPageId=3

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Did Carlos end up in Dallas? We know that his friends and fellow DRE members were in Dallas during early October 1963 giving speeches and were fundraising. Specifically, Juan Salvat and Anna Diaz-Silviera. As noted above Carlos was on stage with Salvat and Diaz. Here we have this report from Dallas in October 1963:

 

“In one such event the unidentified speaker made extremely hostile remarks about President Kennedy, stating that something was going to be done to deal with him. After the speech, and upon learning he had been taped, the speaker took it by force - warning that he held a black belt in martial arts. It is impossible to identify that speaker, but for reference, DRE member Carlos Hernandez is noted in CIA documents as being both skilled in martial arts, and regarded as a sharpshooter.”

 

 

Now if Joannides was running an Op against the FPCC (see what Jeff Morley discussed during the press conference), it would seem to me to use a trusted asset and someone on the CIA payroll.

David,

Isn't the general theory about the Odio visit that members of the DRE were posing as members of JURE to enlist Sylvia's help? 

If so, then Carlos Hernandez would fit the bill. However, he was quite visible as a DRE extremist and risked being recognized by Sylvia Odio as such, right? 

Or, did she recognize him as a member of DRE? Wasn't she herself sympathetic to DRE? Did she and her sisters regard DRE as the more "cutting-edge" anti-Castro group? That was the contention of Ray and Mary LaFontaine, who may (or may not) have been correct.

On 12/8/2022 at 1:52 AM, Sandy Larsen said:

 

Yeah, that makes sense.

What I can't figure out is how "Oswald's" visit with Sylvia Odio makes him look like a Castro sympathizer. Or how it is supposed to implicate Castro in the assassination.

Anybody have any good ideas?

 

Sandy,

I have pointed out before that the Odio visit actually has two distinct parts: the actual visit by ("Leopoldo", "Angel" and "Oswald") and the follow-up phone call, a couple of days later, and the distinction is the key.

During the actual visit to Sylvia Odio, our "Oswald" said nothing, and nor did his companions insinuate to Sylvia that our "Oswald" was a crazy, anti-JFK nut, capable of assassination. Instead, they focused solely on enlisting Sylvia's help.  However, I suspect the real purpose of the visit (not the phone call) was to visually show our "Oswald" to Syliva - for her to see him and be able to recognize him later. (There must have been something sinister in their manner, because Sylvia did not take the bait - she refused to help the men without checking with her father.)

This all tells me that our "Oswald" did not know (as he was standing in the doorway at that moment) that his companions would soon portray him as a violent potential assassin. He probably thought he was spying on these men, and would soon report back to his handler (in the FBI, maybe?)  about their supposed plans.

However, "Leopoldo" and "Angel" were on to him. They already knew he was an (FBI?) snitch. I suspect their CIA handlers had already tipped them off about our "Oswald's" true allegiances. That's why they hated him.

And so, a day or two later, the incriminating phone call was made, and only then did the crazy, murderous image of our "Oswald" emerge, forever implanted in the mind of Sylvia Odio. 

We have no evidence that our "Oswald" ever knew that he was supposed to be an insane JFK-hater, ready to shoot him. I am certain that our "Oswald" was NOT within earshot when the later phone call to Sylvia was made. 

The phone call is key - without it, the Odio visit might have been dismissed as merely another mistaken witness contact with someone who resembled our man.

You are absolutely right that if our "Oswald" knowingly planned to impersonate a potential assassin, then he would have acted accordingly in Sylvia's presence. But he did not, and that meant he did not know what his companions would soon say about him!

And that tells me that the "Oswald" visitor to the Odio apartment in late September was indeed our "Oswald", Marina's husband, the man murdered by Jack Ruby, all one-in-the-same.

I agree with the theory that the reason for the bizarre visit by an "Oswald" lookalike plus Hernandez to Robert McKeown's place in September 1963 was to implicate the leftist "Oswald" with Castro's gun-runner from 1959. If the/an/any assassination rifle could be traced to Castro's former buddy/ally/gun-runner Robert McKeown, then Castro himself would be blamed for 11/22/63. 

However, I am far from convinced that our man "Oswald" actually was the real visitor to McKeown's place in Baytown Texas during Labor Day weekend in 1963. 

This article is from the Houston Chronicle of April 28th, 1959 edition in which Fidel Castro is quoted as offering a "post in government or perhaps franchises" to McKeown as thanks for his help running guns to Castro's men during the Cuban Revolution. 

The anti-Castro Cubans and their CIA handlers wanted to implicate Castro in the assassination by getting Castro's former buddy to sell rifles to an "Oswald" lookalike in early September, 1963. 

Because McKeown smelled a rat (correctly), he refused the deal. 

9 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Thanks for commenting.

LHO's library card for New Orleans indicates he was a serious reader of a wide range of literature. His wife Marina said he was reading all the time. 

I have never delved deep enough into communist or Marxist philosophy to know of the finer points, but some make much about the fact LHO, in the famous backyard photo shots, had newspapers from rival strains of communism on display, something no real intellect would have done.  

At this late date, perhaps we cannot be sure of LHO's true sentiments. My guess is LHO was an intel asset. Others say his thoughts on socialism were sincere. He was a young fellow, and people do evolve. 

Ben,

FWIW: I think it is highly likely that Marina's husband was genuinely sympathetic to "socialism" as an ideal on some level but hated the actual "communism" he witnessed first-hand in the USSR. I think it is beyond doubt that he was a tool of U.S. Intelligence, both witting and unwitting. He told David Ferrie that leafletting in New Orleans near Tulane was part of "a job" (for which he was to be paid $25), yet I see no credible evidence that he would have knowingly participated in a plot to assassinate JFK. He may (MAY) have thought he was part of something to prevent such an event, but even that is uncertain. Exactly what he thought was to happen on 11/22/63 is unknown, but he sure reacted as if he had NOT expected the assassination.