Michael Griffith

This is encouraging. I look forward to the film.

Another reason your comment here is curious and revealing is that Dr. Mark Moyar's Triumph Forsaken was the first book to make extensive use of newly disclosed/available North Vietnamese sources, as well as previously unavailable/neglected South Vietnamese sources. The numerous negative liberal reviews of Moyar's book are noteworthy for their odd-but-predictable failure to address the crucial information revealed in those sources, especially in the North Vietnamese sources. This inexcusable failure is as bad as the failure of the negative reviews of Doug Horne's Inside the ARRB volumes to address the historic new information he presents in those volumes. The only left-of-center author to make substantive use of the newly disclosed/available North Vietnamese sources has been Dr. Max Hastings in his superb 2018 book Vietnam: An Epic Tragedy. Not surprisingly, many of Hastings' fellow liberal scholars gave the book reviews that ranged from only slightly positive to less-than-glowing to sharply critical. Why? Because even though Hastings repeatedly argues that the war was unwinnable, condemns the bombing of North Vietnam, condemns Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Nhu, praises Daniel Ellsberg, and excoriates the Saigon regime for its many failings, he also tells the truth about North Vietnam and the Viet Cong, acknowledges that numerous military experts have argued that the war was winnable, acknowledges that the news media misrepresented the Tet Offensive and sometimes repeated Communist propaganda, criticizes the anti-war movement for white-washing the Hanoi regime's brutality, admits that the Hanoi regime was worse than the Saigon regime, and frankly discusses the reign of terror that the North Vietnamese imposed on South Vietnam after Saigon fell. By the way, have you read Triumph Forsaken yet? You obviously had not read it when we discussed the Vietnam War in the thread "Oliver Stone's New JFK Documentaries and the Vietnam War." Have you read it since then? Surely you would not get on a public board and stridently attack a book you had not even read, would you? Finally, I also think it is revealing that the only source you have been able to cite to support your negative review of Selverstone's ground-breaking book The Kennedy Withdrawal is Mike Swanson. As I have documented in this thread, Swanson's amateurish book on the Vietnam War not only contains embarrassing blunders but also shows that even his command of English is poor. In contrast, I have been able to cite numerous recognized historians and other genuine Vietnam War scholars to support my positive review of Selverstone's book.

Some additional points about the liberal spin on the “decent interval”: -- A key point that needs to be remembered as we read the private Nixon and Kissinger statements quoted by liberal scholars is what Nixon and Kissinger desired, what they hoped and wanted to happen. This key factor is usually ignored in sources that advocate the liberal version of the decent interval. If the White House tapes and other sources reveal anything about Nixon and Kissinger’s privately expressed sentiments, they reveal that both men intensely hoped and desired that South Vietnam would remain free. For example, in Nixon’s private instructions to Kissinger before Kissinger went to Saigon to place heavy pressure on President Thieu to accept the peace agreement, Nixon said the following: I personally want to stand by Thieu and the South Vietnamese government, but as I have told him in three separate messages, what really counts is not the agreement but my determination to take massive action against North Vietnam in the event they break the agreement. . . . I do not give him this very tough option by personal desire, but because of the political reality in the United States it is not possible for me, even with the massive mandate I personally received in the election, to get the support from a hostile Congress. . . . (Larry Berman, No Peace, No Honor: Nixon, Kissinger, and Betrayal in Vietnam, Touchstone Edition, 2002, p. 196) A short time later, Kissinger sent Nixon a memorandum that noted the looming threat of a Congressional cutoff of funding for South Vietnam if a peace deal that included South Vietnam's signature were not reached. Significantly, Nixon wrote notes on the memo that made clear his desire to maintain aid for South Vietnam, and his desire to have the option of retaliating if Hanoi violated the agreement: [Kissinger:] “Thieu must realize that the alternative is a Congressional cutoff of funds within weeks and suicide for South Vietnam.” At the same time, it was essential that Thieu and the GVN approach the settlement with confidence in its abilities and U.S. backing. “We must reassure the South Vietnamese that they have the assets to prevail under the terms of the settlement, and most importantly, that you will do whatever is required to ensure that the agreement is observed by the communists.” Nixon wrote across the top of this memorandum that, “if not settled, aid is cut.” Most relevant, however, was Nixon’s notation, “agreement meets our realities” and “I need support for aid—for massive retaliation.” (No Peace, No Honor, p. 198) Clearly, Nixon had every intention of providing aid to South Vietnam after the peace agreement, i.e., after the Paris Peace Accords, and was even prepared to inflict “massive retaliation” if North Vietnam violated the Accords. In contrast, many if not most people in the anti-war movement and in the anti-war majority in Congress either openly hoped a Communist victory or did not care one bit if South Vietnam fell. I should add that the vast majority of those people fell silent when it became clear that the Communists were imposing a reign of terror on the South Vietnamese. To their credit, a few anti-war people did express remorse and regret over South Vietnam’s terrible fate, but they were a distinct minority. Nothing but denial and then silence was heard from most of those who had endlessly bashed South Vietnam, who had actually praised the Viet Cong and North Vietnam, and who had portrayed the American war effort as a senseless act of aggression and oppression. -- An assumption of the liberal version of the decent interval is that continued U.S. aid to South Vietnam would not have changed the course of the war. As I’ve mentioned, this myth was debunked years ago and has been further refuted by new information from North Vietnamese sources. Dr. Lewis Sorley: Major General Ira Hunt served during 1973—1975 as deputy commander of the U.S. Support Activities Group, in effect MACV in exile, at Nakhon Phanom in Thailand. . . . After the Paris Accords were signed, said Hunt, it was almost always the NVA that initiated combat actions, “and for about two years the ARVN were cleaning their clocks. The South Vietnamese were giving more than they were getting, there’s no question about it. But when we pulled the plug logistically there was no way they could carry on.” Confirmation from the enemy side was provided by General Tran Van Tra, who admitted that by the time of the cease-fire “our cadres and men were exhausted. All our units were in disarray, and we were suffering from a lack of manpower and a shortage of food and ammunition. So it was hard to stand up under enemy attacks. Sometimes we had to withdraw to let the enemy retake control of the population.” (A Better War: The Unexamined Victories and Final Tragedy of America's Last Years in Vietnam, New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2007, p. 357) -- Liberal historians have been misleadingly selective in the private statements they’ve quoted, and sometimes they’ve inferred meanings from those statements that the statements don’t actually support. One of the private statements that historian Ken Hughes frequently quotes is the following comment that Nixon made to Kissinger before the Paris Peace Accords were signed: "I look at the tide of history out there, South Vietnam probably is never gonna survive anyway. I’m just being perfectly candid." Did you catch Nixon’s use of the word “probably”? Liberals act like Nixon said “certainly,” but he did not. “Probably” implies a degree of doubt. If I say I’m “probably” going to see the movie, it would be misleading to pretend that I said I would “definitely” see the movie. Furthermore, liberals ignore other statements wherein Nixon expressed the view that South Vietnam could survive if it received sufficient aid. They also ignore the private statements in which he made it clear that he fully intended to maintain adequate aid to South Vietnam and even to provide air support if needed. In later years, Nixon expressed his views on the war forcefully in his 1985 book No More Vietnams: When we signed the Paris Peace agreements in 1973, we had won the war. We then proceeded to lose the peace. The South Vietnamese successfully countered Communist violations of the ceasefire for two years. Defeat came only when the Congress, ignoring the specific terms of the peace agreement, refused to provide military aid equal to what the Soviet Union provided Hanoi. (p. 18) Congress turned its back on a noble cause and a brave people. South Vietnam simply wanted the chance to fight for its survival as an independent country. All that the United States had to do was give it the means to continue the battle. Out South Vietnamese friends were asking us to give them the tools so they could finish the job. Congress would not, so our allies could not. (p. 202) Bullseye. Exactly. -- In other cases, liberals have failed to put private Nixon and Kissinger statements in their proper context. For example, authors who push the liberal version of the decent interval frequently quote Kissinger’s reported remarks to Zhou Enlai when Kissinger was trying to persuade the Chinese to pressure Hanoi to make a peace deal. Hughes’ argument is a typical example: But a transcript prepared by Kissinger's own aides of his first meeting with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai reveals how willing Nixon was to sacrifice America's credibility abroad to preserve his political credibility at home. As Kissinger explained it, the president would agree to complete withdrawal of American troops in return for Hanoi's release of American prisoners of war and a ceasefire ("say 18 months or some period"). "If the agreement breaks down, then it is quite possible that the people in Vietnam will fight it out," Kissinger said (as historian Jussi Hanhimaki found). "If the government is as unpopular as you seem to think, then the quicker our forces are withdrawn, the quicker it will be overthrown. And if it is overthrown after we withdraw, we will not intervene." Apparently it has never occurred to the spinners of the liberal version of the decent interval that Kissinger said this in order to persuade the Chinese to pressure Hanoi to agree to a peace deal, and not because he actually meant it. The liberal spin ignores the fact that, just weeks after the Accords were signed, when Kissinger became aware that North Vietnam was already violating them, he recommended to Nixon that the U.S. conduct air strikes. Dr. Sorley: By 14 March Henry Kissinger was alerting President Nixon that NVA personnel and matériel were pouring into South Vietnam, so brazenly that the enemy was now “operating in daylight and the traffic is so heavy as to be congested”—traffic jams on the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Kissinger recommended planning for a series of air strikes against the trail in southern Laos, to be conducted immediately after release of a third increment of American prisoners two days hence. (A Better War, p. 354) So obviously Kissinger misled the Chinese when he promised the U.S. would not intervene to save South Vietnam, unless by “not intervene” he meant only that the U.S. would not put ground troops in South Vietnam again. In fact, March 14 was not the only time Kissinger recommended air strikes. Two weeks earlier, Kissinger recommended air strikes. In response, on March 6, Nixon ordered an air strike. However, now under intense fire from Congress over Watergate and fearing the reaction of Congress to any military action in Vietnam, Nixon cancelled the air strike the next day (George Veith, Black April: The Fall of South Vietnam, 1973-75, Encounter Books, 2013, pp. 22-23). So clearly, Nixon and Kissinger had intended to keep their promise to South Vietnam to provide air support if North Vietnam seriously violated the Accords, regardless of what Kissinger had told the Chinese to get them to pressure Hanoi for a peace deal. -- A component of the liberal spin on the decent interval is that in June 1973, Nixon himself agreed to a ban on U.S. military action in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Says Hughes, “Nixon claimed Congress tied his hands, but he tied his own.” This is a severe distortion, to put it mildly. For one thing, Hughes fails to mention that the ban that Nixon agreed to support was a compromise measure, and that Nixon only supported it because it was not as drastic as the previous version, and because his veto of the previous version had barely been upheld. Yes, as Hughes notes, Republican vote-counters told Nixon they believed they had the votes to sustain another veto, but, as noted, Hughes fails to mention that Nixon was acutely aware that his veto of the previous version just a week earlier had barely been sustained. Furthermore, just four months later, Nixon vetoed further Congressional restrictions on his ability to intervene to help South Vietnam, but his veto was overridden. Hughes fails to mention this fact as well. The overriding fact of the matter is that Nixon and Kissinger, and then Ford and Kissinger, never stopped lobbying Congress to provide adequate aid to South Vietnam, and that if Congress had maintained sufficient aid, South Vietnam would have been able to remain independent. Even if we were to assume that Nixon and Kissinger acted for purely domestic political motives and were willing to see South Vietnam fall after a “decent interval,” this would not change the fact that it was Congress, not Nixon and Kissinger, that slashed funding for South Vietnam’s army at the very time it was engaged in increasingly heavy fighting with North Vietnamese forces. Nor would this change the fact that Nixon and Kissinger clearly wanted South Vietnam to remain free and exerted great effort to get Congress to provide adequate aid to South Vietnam.

I've decided to address the "decent interval" after all, for the sake of other readers, even though I addressed this issue in another thread ("Oliver Stone's New JFK Documentaries and the Vietnam War": LINK; see also LINK, LINK). In a nutshell, the issue of the decent interval boils down to this: liberal scholars pounced on the discovery of the decent interval as a way to divert attention from Congress's betrayal of South Vietnam and to blame Nixon and Kissinger for South Vietnam's defeat. This is the crux of the matter. As with most issues, context and assumptions are crucial. Here are some bullet points that boil down the problems with the liberal spin on the decent interval: -- It assumes a priori that the war was unwinnable, ignoring the information we now have from North Vietnamese sources, among other evidence. -- It includes the false claim that South Vietnam would have lost even if U.S. aid had been maintained at adequate levels as allowed by the Paris Peace Accords, ignoring the undeniable evidence that the South Vietnamese army more than held its own until Congress began to slash aid. -- It ignores the fact that Nixon and Kissinger lobbied furiously to try to get Congress to give South Vietnam adequate aid. -- It ignores the fact that after Nixon resigned, Kissinger continued to exert strenuous efforts to get Congress to give South Vietnam adequate aid. -- It ignores the fact that Nixon privately expressed fury and sadness over Congress's refusal to maintain adequate aid to South Vietnam. -- It ignores the fact that Nixon was under great pressure to conclude a peace agreement as quickly as possible because the incoming anti-war Congress was voicing threats to cut off all funding for the war if an agreement were not reached. Nixon would have preferred a better deal, but he did the best could under the circumstances. -- It claims that Nixon "knew" the Paris Accords would lead to South Vietnam's defeat. This is misleading. The record shows that Nixon believed the Accords would cause South Vietnam's defeat IF South Vietnam received no support. -- Yes, needless to say, Nixon and Kissinger strongly suspected that North Vietnam would not honor the Paris Peace Accords. This is a "Captain Obvious" point that liberals try to twist in their favor, as if Congress would have let Nixon refuse to make a peace deal until he could be certain North Vietnam would honor it. -- It claims that "Nixon knew the Accords were a sham." No, not quite, but he strongly suspected this, which is why he tried so hard to get Congress to provide adequate aid to South Vietnam. Much more could be said, but in the interest of time I will stop here. By the way, here are some other issues that I addressed in the thread "Oliver Stone's New JFK Documentaries and the Vietnam War" that readers might want to check out given Jim's comments in this thread: James DiEugenio calls the far-left Vietnam War documentary Hearts and Minds "the best documentary ever made on the subject" (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=475713; see also https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=475571). James DiEugenio's use of Nick Turse's sleazy book, and Turse and his publisher's agreement to issue a formal retraction to settle the Equels lawsuit (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=472065). Recent studies show that approximately 65,000 South Vietnamese were executed by the Communists after Saigon fell (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=471069). Facts about the NVA and the VC and American soldiers (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=471235). New information from North Vietnamese sources, information that most liberals studiously ignore (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=471655). Response to the myth that JFK was going to abandon South Vietnam after the election (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=471893 ; https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=471912; https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=471934; https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=471971 ; https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=475319). Devastating impact of Congress's aid cuts on South Vietnam's army (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=472358). The war was winnable (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28074-oliver-stones-new-jfk-documentaries-and-the-vietnam-war/?do=findComment&comment=473700).

I repeat again that 99.9% of scientists dismiss the 9/11 Truther claims as absurd, baseless, and unscientific. I know that in your echo-chamber liberal La La World, such things don't matter, but they matter to everyone else. Similarly, the claim that the Israelis were involved in the 9/11 attacks is just obscene. Radical Muslim groups began peddling this nonsense early on, and it is astounding to see it repeated in this forum. My "McAdams-esque tropes" about Prouty are "deranged"?! Funny that you should use that word, since most people who've looked into Prouty use that word to describe him. I will just repeat again that the information I provided on Prouty came from liberals (especially Chip Berlet), from the ADL, from pro-Prouty sources, and from Prouty's own writings and interviews. I think someone who have to be deranged to use him as a source given what we now know about him. What "disinformation" have I "purveyed" in the forum? I've made the case for a conspiracy in JFK's death. I've argued that elements of the CIA, the Secret Service, the Mafia, the FBI, the DPD, and the military were involved in the plot. I've cited and praised Dr. Mantik's ground-breaking research on the evidence of a frontal shot to the head and of a low rear head entry wound, and on the evidence that the skull x-rays have been altered. I've argued that Jack Ruby's shooting of Oswald was a Mafia hit facilitated by elements in the DPD. I've argued that the Zapruder film refutes the single-bullet theory and the lone-gunman theory. Etc., etc., etc. But you're upset at me because I don't buy your wingnut, bizarre theories that have nothing to do with the JFK case, and because I have the objectivity to acknowledge that Prouty was an anti-Semitic fraud, if not a genuine nutcase, who gave WC apologists a boat load of bogus claims to knock down. Part of the problem is that you and some others here subordinate the JFK case to your political agenda and merely use the JFK case as an excuse to peddle your political views. If someone disagrees with your wingnut views, you attack them, even if they ardently defend the conspiracy position in the JFK case. Since you keep trying to associate me with McAdams just because I repudiate Prouty, you might want to read my detailed critique of McAdams' claims: Some Comments on John McAdams' Kennedy Assassination Home Page

Yeah Mike, what I said was well over 100,000. Which would signify anything up to 200,000. Yes, I know, and that represents an astounding gaffe for someone who pretends to be qualified to review books and documentaries on the Vietnam War. Again, the number was at least several million. No one, but no one, disputes that over 1 million fled by boat. You know, the "boat people"? You've heard of them, right? And we know that many, many, many more wanted to leave but either did not have the means or could not escape. No one knows for sure. Phew! Uh, maybe no one among your fringe associates knows, and I'm sure the fringe books you've read, such as Swanson's error-riddled work, say nothing about it, but if you ever do break down and actually do some serious research, you will look back and cringe over your denial. With your politics and your sources you would write that the whole country wanted to leave to avoid poison gas extermination. Which of course is what you wrote. Huh? I am genuinely starting to wonder about your level of education. Do you understand what an analogy is? I was pointing out that saying that only "well over 100,000" South Vietnamese wanted to leave the country is as egregious a gaffe as saying that only "well over 300,000" European Jews wanted to leave German-held territory. I mean geez. Yeah that is why the north left the business school intact in Saigon--filthy communists. You spew this obscene garbage, joking about the terrible human suffering that the Communists imposed, and then you deny that you're far left. Never mind that the Communists murdered tens of thousands of people. Never mind that the Communists sent about 1 million people to concentration camps, where tens of thousands of other people also died. Never mind that the Communists abolished private property rights, private education, freedom of religion, and freedom of the press. Nah, never mind all those things because the Communists left the business school in Saigon intact. John Newman is a conservative. He is the man who wrote the first book length study of Kennedy and his withdrawal plan. You try and tar everyone with political smears for thinking JFK was getting out in 1965. But you cannot do that with him. And that is my point. Those are all nothing but cheap shots by you. This is a jumbled bunch of nonsense. One, Newman has made some very un-conservative statements about the Vietnam War itself, such as claiming that McNamara was responsible for the deaths of 2 million people. Two, as Selverstone has documented, Newman is simply wrong in claiming that JFK was determined to abandon South Vietnam after the election, whatever his political views may be. Three, it is a demonstrable matter of fact that the view that JFK was going to abandon South Vietnam after the election is a far-left claim that is rejected even by nearly all liberal historians. Four, I haven't tarred anyone with "political smears." Accurately describing your ideology as far left is not a smear. Describing your fellow fringe authors who hold views far to the left of the mainstream is not "smearing" them. The whole thing about the Decent Interval has been proven by Jeff Kimball and Ken Hughes with written data from the Nixon Archives in Yorba Linda. When is the last time you visited there? Just read their books. You are too busy reading those Heritage Foundation sponsored propaganda tomes about how Vietnam was really a noble cause and how Saigon could have really won the war. Nixon said twice that Saigon could not win the war. So he and Henry played for a decent interval for Saigon to fall after the truce, and Kissinger wrote about this in his notes, and Kimball found it. The whole Peace Accords was a knowing charade, there would be no peace and no honor, and the pair actually joked about it. And then they sold Thieu down the river. Read the book The Palace File. Oh, too busy reading that propaganda piece Triumph Forsaken? There is a very good reason that Nixon fought tooth and nail not to have his papers and tapes declassified during his lifetime. And now we know why. Just the opposite of JFK: They make him look even worse than he appeared much worse. Don't even ask about Kissinger and his files. That one is sickening. But Henry knew how bad it would be. He told Haldeman: we sat hare and listened to his ranting. History will not be kind to us. You got that one right Hank. As I've said, I already addressed your distorted spin on the decent interval in another thread, so I'm not going to reinvent the wheel, even though you've doubled down on your spin and have added more distorted claims. The problem in dealing with you on this issue, as on other Vietnam-related issues, is that your reading has been so limited and one sided, and that you just keep repeating your claims over and over without addressing contrary evidence that I present to you. Given these things, I just do not feel inclined to waste time revisiting the issue with you. I will note, however, that you again ignored the point, confirmed by North Vietnamese sources, that during the first year after the Paris Peace Accords, when American aid was even just barely adequate, South Vietnam's army was able to more than hold its own against the NVA. Do you not understand the implications of this fact for your spin on the decent interval? You cite utter trash like Turse's book Kill Anything That Moves, a book that even famous anti-war author Neil Sheehan condemned, a book whose author and publisher were forced to issue a formal retraction to avoid a lawsuit they knew they would lose--you cite this kind of garbage and then you call a widely acclaimed work such as Mark Moyar's Triumph Forsaken a "propaganda piece." Such a comment just reinforces the point that you have no business talking about the Vietnam War in a public forum. Just FYI, the UOT Clements Center for National Security calls Moyar's book "groundbreaking" (LINK). Military historian and former Naval War College professor Dr. Mack Thomas Owens calls the book "one of the most important books written on the Vietnam War" (LINK; his comments on the book start under "Lacking the Will"). Foreword Reviews says the book is "impressive and scrupulously researched" (LINK). Steven Rosen concludes the book is "succinct and insightful" and "deep and probing" (LINK). Military historian and Vietnam veteran Dr. Mark Scales gives the book high praise (LINK). Vietnam War scholar Dr. Tom Glenn says that Triumph Forsaken is "useful to historians" and opines that Moyar's new book, Triumph Regained, provides "scrupulously thorough descriptions of events that affected the war" (LINK). Military and foreign policy historian Dr. Mark Sempa gives Moyar's new book a very favorable review and favorably mentions Triumph Forsaken (LINK; LINK). Even most liberal historians who have critically reviewed Moyar's Triumph Forsaken have acknowledged it is a serious work of scholarship, that it has much worthwhile content, and it that contains new information from North Vietnamese sources (LINK, LINK, LINK). But you, who've read very little on the war, call it a "propaganda piece." Again, you are a fringe amateur who has no business pretending to be qualified to review books and documentaries on the Vietnam War.

The basics of the shooting have been obvious for many years to anyone who is willing to acknowledge what the Zapruder film so clearly shows. JFK starts to react to a shot at Z200, and Jackie starts to react to JFK's reaction at virtually the same moment. Yet, 26 frames later, JFK is visibly knocked forward and his hands and elbows are flung upward, from Z226-232. On top of this, 10 frames after JFK is knocked forward, and 30 frames after JFK clearly starts to reach for his throat, Connally's right shoulder is suddenly driven downward, and his face and cheeks puff, obviously in reaction to a shot that struck him a fraction of a second earlier--Connally himself said the moment of impact was Z234. Then, of course, there is the obvious head shot at Z313. That makes four shots. Thus, if nothing else, the Zapruder film proves there were at least four shots, which means that the SBT is false and that more than one gunman was involved.

SOFTWARE GLITCH. DUPLICATE.

The basics of the shooting have been obvious for many years to anyone who is willing to acknowledge what the Zapruder film so clearly shows. JFK starts to react to a shot at Z200, and Jackie starts to react to JFK's reaction at virtually the same moment. Yet, 26 frames later, JFK is visibly knocked forward and his hands and elbows are flung upward, from Z226-232. On top of this, 10 frames after JFK is knocked forward, and 30 frames after JFK clearly starts to reach for his throat, Connally's right shoulder is suddenly driven downward, and his face and cheeks puff, obviously in reaction to a shot that struck him a fraction of a second earlier--Connally himself said the moment of impact was Z234. Then, of course, there is the obvious head shot at Z313. That makes four shots. Thus, if nothing else, the Zapruder film proves there were at least four shots, which means that the SBT is false and that more than one gunman was involved.

Leaving aside your grade-school-level punctuation errors, I see that you are part of the microscopic minority of Western civilization who thinks that Ukraine "provoked" Putin to invade. Gee, why am I not surprised? Given that you believe the Secret Team may have killed John Lennon, that you regard Fletcher Prouty as a reliable source on the JFKA, and that you swallow 9/11 Truther lunacy, it's not surprising that you think Ukraine provoked Putin to invade. And just FYI, I don't bother answering every idiotic argument and bogus claim that some people make in replies. It's not that I can't answer them; it's that I determine that I'd be wasting my doing in doing so.

"Only Michael Griffith could. . .." Wow, that's rather rude. Anyway, yes, I confess that I jumped to conclusions about the article when I read the following statements as I skimmed over the article: "Where should one start? No shots came from the grassy knoll." and "Regarding the notion of shots originating from the grassy knoll location, it’s illogical to say some shot came from there while also saying Lee Harvey Oswald was a patsy." I stopped reading after I read the second statement, which obviously was a mistake on my part. So I happily stand corrected.

No need to move this discussion. It is entirely appropriate as related commentary on the point that RFK Jr. was misguided in placing all the blame on the CIA. I think you somehow failed to discern that my reply was intended to support most of your position, not challenge it. I agree that there were other powerful players besides the CIA involved in the plot, and that the CIA's role in the cover-up was somewhat marginal compared to that of the FBI, the Secret Service, the DPD, and the military. And the Mafia's significant role in the cover-up--i.e., Ruby's shooting of Oswald--can't be ignored either. I don't think it has been proved that LeMay was influencing the autopsy. I'm not certain that he was even there. The Navy brass in the autopsy room would not have taken kindly to an Air Force general ordering around Navy doctors in their presence, even assuming LeMay was in the room. This would have been a serious breach of military protocol. Of course, if the admirals were complicit in the cover-up, then, yes, they would have allowed it, but that's a big "if"--and it doesn't address whether they were ordered to be complicit and who ordered them and what they were told about the reason for the order, etc. My general point about the military and the autopsy is that we just don't know who was ultimately responsible for the fraudulent autopsy. We don't know if the White House ordered the military to do a false autopsy. We just don't know, and probably will never know in this life.

Previous content deleted because while skimming over the first few paragraphs of the article, I mistakenly concluded that it was arguing for the lone-gunman position. I goofed!

I think I should start by revisiting a severe gaffe you made in your "review" of Rory Kenedy's documentary. I discussed this gaffe in a previous reply to you, but I think it warrants another look because it shows that you really have no clue what you're talking about. You said, in all seriousness, that "well over 100,000" South Vietnamese did not want to stay behind to live under communism, when the actual number was at least several million. This blunder is as bad as saying "well over 300,000 European Jews did not want to remain in German-controlled territory." One could excuse this egregious gaffe if you had just started studying the Vietnam War and had only read a few general articles on the subject. But you pretend to be qualified to review books and documentaries on the war. You posture as though you are some kind of an authority on the subject. Yet, you've made numerous statements that show that your research has been meager and largely limited to fringe sources. Yes, you are most certainly far left, and I cannot believe you could be so delusional as to believe otherwise. In this forum alone, just in the last year or two, you have made numerous far-left claims on a wide range of issues. I cited a few examples in my previous reply, but you ignored them. You keep trying to hide behind John Newman. But we're not talking about Newman, and I haven't compared your views on JFK's Vietnam policy to Newman's. I've compared your views to those of numerous liberal historians, and I've pointed out that your views on the subject are even farther to the left than theirs. I answered your distorted claims about the decent interval in considerable detail in another thread, yet here you are, as usual, repeating your claims while saying nothing about the facts that contradict them, facts that I personally presented to you, with sources, in another thread. I'm guessing you still have not read Dr. Larry Berman's book No Peace, No Honor: Nixon, Kissinger, and Betrayal in Vietnam, which examines the decent interval in great detail. And I would again point out that Rory Kennedy's documentary does not even mention the decent interval, not even once, but your "review" of the film goes on and on about it. I notice you ignored the point that in the first year after the Accords, when American aid was even just barely adequate, South Vietnam's army more than held its own against the NVA. It was only after repeated aid cuts that the situation changed, as Ira Hunt documents in painstaking detail in his book Losing Vietnam: How America Abandoned Southeast Asia (University Press of Kentucky, 2013). Hunt was the deputy commander of USAAG in Thailand after the Paris Peace Accords and was responsible for tracking the fighting in South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. The U.S. Naval Institute says of Hunt's book, "For the serious historian or military strategist who would want to have one book in his library to explain the loss of South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, this would be it." Hunt's book sheds important light on the decent interval by debunking the liberal myth that maintaining adequate U.S. aid would not have changed the outcome of the fighting. Finally, regarding your odd claim that I have "ignored" what Graham Martin did, no, I have not. Go back and read what I said. I have not "ignored" it at all. I just disagree with your extremist spin on his actions. I agree with Rory Kennedy's portrayal of Martin in her documentary: that Martin made a tragic mistake in delaying the evacuation but that his motives for doing so were honorable, and that once he realized that an evacuation had to be done, he did everything in his power to evacuate as many South Vietnamese as possible. And, needless to say, if your good buddies the North Vietnamese had honored the Paris Peace Accords, there would have been no need to even think about an evacuation. Let's put the blame where it morally and actually belongs, and not on a good and decent man who was put in a terrible situation because of the treachery and brutality of the Communists and because of the back-stabbing of the anti-war majority in Congress.

This is true, but the military may have been ordered by their civilian superiors to conceal the truth about JFK's wounds with the excuse that this was necessary to avoid World War III, or the military brass at Bethesda may have been misled by the Secret Service into believing that the Kennedy family did not want a complete autopsy. Given Doug Horne's evidence that the Secret Service facilitated the alteration of the skull x-rays and the suppression of autopsy photos, this suggests the military may not have been the driving force behind the medical cover-up. The CIA did not control the FBI either, and the FBI played a leading role in the cover-up regarding the evidence against Oswald and Oswald's activities. The CIA was not the agency whose agents literally abducted JFK's body in Dallas, prevented the local medical examiner from performing an autopsy, and whisked the body off to DC. The Secret Service also confiscated news footage of Dr. Perry's observations about the throat wound. There was so much more going on here than the stuff done by the CIA.

So in response to my post recommending Rory Kennedy's documentary, this is your crude, juvenile reply? I think your reply says volumes about your maturity, mindset, and credibility. Apparently, in your mind, a person is a prostitute for the military industrial complex if they wish that 18 million people had not fallen under brutal tyranny, if they point out the suffering and atrocities that the Communists imposed on those people, and if they observe that this terrible outcome could have been avoided if Congress had honored our commitment under the Paris Peace Accords to resupply South Vietnam's military forces. When you're not busy defending an anti-Semitic fraud who provided WC apologists with a gold mine of bogus claims to shred, you're peddling nutty theories such as the 9/11 Truther lunacy. You are a dream come true for WC apologists. They love it when JFK conspiracy theorists discredit themselves and the cause by advocating fringe, bizarre theories that have nothing to do with the JFK case. Are you actually denying that your ideology is far left? Surely you must realize that anyone who has read your posts over the last few years alone knows that you are very near the left fringe of the political spectrum. Surely you know that even most liberal historians, some of whom are very liberal, reject your fringe view that JFK was going to abandon South Vietnam after the election. Surely you know that even most liberal historians regard Fletcher Prouty as a fraud, if not a genuine nutcase, whereas you claim he was a valuable and reliable source. Surely you know that even most liberal historians reject your fringe view that there would have been no Cold War if FDR had lived. Surely you know that even most liberal human rights advocates would view your rosy portrayal of life in Vietnam as false, if not bizarre and shameful. And on and on and on we could go. And, I take it that you have no comment on the point that your review omits numerous important facts discussed in the documentary, and that your review gives the misleading impression that the film supports your far-left view of the war.

Look, it's just an exaggeration to say that without the military the CIA is "toothless." That is just not true. If you want to say that in some cases without the military the CIA would be less effective or even unable to deploy, well, yes, I would agree with that. But to say they'd be "toothless" without the military is going too far. And as for JFK's order that mandated that military-type operations be taken out of the CIA's hands and put under the responsibility of the JCS, the CIA flat-out ignored it, as some of our fellow conspiracy theorists have noted in their books and articles. The CIA continued to carry out paramilitary operations without the JCS's knowledge, much less their approval. In Vietnam, in many cases the military had no idea what the CIA was doing. In both Vietnam and Laos, in many cases the CIA was a law unto itself. It had its own bases, its own weaponry assets, its own intelligence apparatus, its own supply chain, etc., etc. We'll agree to disagree.

They were "called" all sorts of things: advisors, attaches, assistants for this or that, and not always in an allegedly military capacity either. The CIA not only had its own weaponry assets in South Vietnam, it had its own bases.

As a 21-year veteran of military intelligence and as a long-time student of military and intelligence history, I can assure you that that is not true. Just look at the Vietnam War: The CIA had numerous weapons and assets of its own in South Vietnam.

Most liberals everywhere regard the NY Post as a "rag," even though its journalism is better than that of most left-leaning newspapers. I agree that RFK Jr.'s focus on the CIA as the chief culprit is overly simplistic. Plus, this is not the kind of stuff he needs to be saying right now if he hopes to be taken seriously as a candidate. If he had limited his comment to saying that he believes JFK was killed by a conspiracy, without naming the CIA as the chief suspect, his comment would not have been nearly as controversial or newsworthy. Some of the best evidence regarding suspects points to the Mafia. We should keep in mind, however, that in several government-sponsored assassinations and attempted assassinations, the Mafia was the hired gun, not the mastermind, although the Kennedys' war on the Mafia may well have prompted the Mafia to play a more active role in the case of JFK's death. Yet, there is also credible evidence that points to the involvement of powerful rogue elements of the CIA. My own belief is that several powerful groups combined to assassinate JFK and then to cover up the crime.

Your review provides further evidence that you really have no business talking about the Vietnam War on a public board. You have every right to do so, but you have no business doing so. You allow your far-left ideology to drive your conclusions, and your review is further proof that your reading has been limited and one sided. When people read your review and then watch the documentary, or vice versa, they are going to see that your review ignores much of the information presented in the film, and that your review goes off on tangents that merely seek to buttress your spin. It is curious that your review seeks to paint the documentary in a mostly positive light, and that you pretend that the film supports your far-left spin on the war. Every other far-left review stridently condemns the documentary; one of them even accuses Rory Kennedy of being as bad as a right-wing reactionary. One suspects that since Rory Kennedy is RFK's daughter, you could not bring yourself to condemn her documentary, and so you decided to pretend that it supports your viewpoint, when in fact it does no such thing. It is telling that your review says nothing about the documentary's information on the devastating impact of Congress's aid cuts, which violated our promise in the Paris Peace Accords, and which forced South Vietnam's army to ration everything from ammo to barbed wire to bandages. Funny how that point never made it into your review. It is also telling that your review says nothing about the film's segment on Communist brutality during the war, including the horrific massacre at Hue (which dwarfed the My Lai massacre in scale and brutality). To read your review, one would think the documentary spends considerable time on the "decent interval," since you spend several paragraphs discussing it, when in fact the film does not even mention it. I've already dealt with the holes in your spin on the decent interval in another thread, so I won't reinvent the wheel here. Yes, the film does heap considerable criticism on Ambassador Martin, but it also gives him praise and puts his tragic delay in ordering an evacuation into proper context, another fact that is missing from your review. The film notes that Martin could have left much earlier but that he insisted on evacuating as many South Vietnamese as possible before he left. The film further notes that Martin thanked Herrington for making unauthorized runs to take South Vietnamese to the docks to get them on boats. Your review ignores these facts and demonizes Martin in a way that goes far beyond what the documentary says about him. People who read your review and who watch the documentary are going to wonder how and why you failed to mention and discuss any of these facts, among others. And people whose reading on the Vietnam War has been more balanced than yours are going to see that your review repeats a number of long-debunked liberal myths and contains several rather glaring omissions, such as the impact that the continuation of adequate U.S. aid would have had on the course of the fighting, the fact that Nixon and Kissinger fully intended to honor our pledge to aid South Vietnam but that Congress made that impossible, the performance of South Vietnam's army, etc. Even with the disgraceful aid cuts imposed on South Vietnam's army by our Congress, it took the North Vietnamese army over two years of hard fighting and massive casualties to conquer South Vietnam. Fighting resumed within weeks after the signing of the Paris Peace Accords. As the documentary notes, soon after the Accords, the North Vietnamese kept escalating their attacks on South Vietnam, and then finally decided to launch a full-scale invasion in March 1975 because they concluded the U.S. would not intervene. Newly disclosed/available North Vietnamese sources confirm that when the U.S. provided just barely adequate aid in the first year after the Paris Peace Accords, South Vietnam's army more than held its own. Finally, your review says there were "well over a 100,000 [sic]" South Vietnamese who did not want to stay behind to live under communism. Yikes. As any serious student of the Vietnam War can tell you, the number was at least several million, not 100,000-plus. Over 1 million South Vietnamese fled by boat. Around 400,000 of them died at sea. About 800,000 made it to other nations. Those refugees would be the first to tell you that there were many, many, many other South Vietnamese who wanted to flee but who did not have the means or could not escape.

By the way, in 2014, RFK's youngest daughter, Rory Kennedy, produced a superb documentary on the end of the Vietnam War titled Last Days in Vietnam. Yes, I said RFK's daughter, i.e., one of RFK Jr.'s sisters. The film was nominated for an Oscar award. Here's some of what Kyle Smith says about the documentary: Last Days in Vietnam, the Oscar-nominated 2014 film by Rory Kennedy (the youngest child of Senator Robert F. Kennedy, who died before she was born) is available for streaming on Netflix. It’s a devastating counterpunch to the anti-American propaganda Hollywood and the rest of the leftist culture have been spewing about Vietnam for more than four decades. . . . The effort Kennedy documents so vividly led to the rescue of 77,000 Vietnamese. The immense courage and honor of the heroes depicted in the film, and the clamor of the South Vietnamese to receive their share of American liberty as Communism descended upon their homeland, make for an eloquent rejoinder to those who dismiss the entire war as a misbegotten mess. (‘Last Days in Vietnam’: War Victory Squandered by Congress | National Review) Far-left critics howled at the documentary, one even going so far as to accuse Kennedy of resembling a right-wing reactionary. The documentary pulls no punches about the Communists' brutal conduct. It also discusses the devastating impact that Congress's aid cuts had on South Vietnam's army and notes that the U.S. had promised in the Paris Peace Accords to resupply the South Vietnamese army. The documentary also acknowledges that "hundreds of thousands" of South Vietnamese were sent to concentration camps after the war and that many people died of disease and starvation in the camps. To its great credit, PBS aired the documentary. It is now available on numerous streaming platforms, including Netflix and Amazon.

Yes, very good point. The bullet-shaped dent in the windshield frame is another fatal fact for the lone-gunman theory. And then there's the bullet mark in the sidewalk on the north side of Elm Street observed and reported by Eugene Aldredge. From my article "Extra Bullets and Missed Shots in Dealey Plaza": Within a day or two of the assassination, Dallas resident Eugene Aldredge saw a dug-out, four-inch-long bullet mark in the middle of the sidewalk on the north side of Elm Street, which is the side nearest the TSBD. Aldredge did not tell the FBI about the mark until shortly after the release of the Warren Commission Report because he assumed, logically enough, that the mark had surely been noticed by law enforcement officials and would be discussed in full in the Commission's report. When he realized that the mark apparently had been "overlooked," he immediately contacted the FBI and told them about it (Weisberg 383-390). Aldredge related to the FBI that Carl Freund, a reporter for the Dallas Morning News, had also identified the mark as a bullet mark. Less than a week after Aldredge informed the FBI of the mark's existence and location, he took a friend to see it. They found the mark, but saw that it had been altered--it had been filled in. Said Aldredge, . . . we went to the site and found the mark, [which was] formerly about 1/4 inch deep, had been filled in with what appeared to be a mixture of concrete and asbestos. . . . A crude attempt had been made to make the altered mark appear to be weather-worn to match the surrounding concrete. In its report on the mark, the FBI admitted to locating it and described it as being approximately 4 inches long, 1/2 inch wide, and "dug out." And why did the FBI dismiss the significance of this mark? Because, explained the Bureau, it could not have been made by a shot from the window from which Oswald allegedly fired. Extra Bullets and Missed Shots in Dealey Plaza

As I said, I have nothing more to say about Prouty in this thread, nor have I continued to follow the thread. However, I thought I would pay a quick visit to the thread to let you folks know that the rumble.com website that Matthew Koch keeps citing includes articles that argue that the moon landings were faked.

Let's put it this way: Something clearly knocks JFK visibly forward starting at Z226. Not only is he knocked forward, but his arms and elbows are flung upward. These reactions, second only to those of the head shot, are the most obvious and dramatic reactions in the Zapruder film, and they occur after JFK has already started clutching at his throat. These movements clearly have nothing to do with the shot that causes JFK to freeze his waving motion and to start to bring his hands toward his throat, and that causes Jackie to suddenly turn her head to the right to look at JFK, beginning at Z200. And neither of these two shot reactions can rationally or credibly be connected with Connally's dramatic reactions that start at Z238. In Z238, Connally's right shoulder collapses, his cheeks and face puff, and his hair becomes disarranged. After reviewing high-quality enlarged prints of the Zapruder film, Connally said the frame of impact was Z234, and he said "there was no question" that he was not hit before Z231. This was the guy who actually experienced the wounding and who obviously knew himself better than anyone else. There is just too much evidence of the Z184-186 shot to wave aside. In addition to JFK's and Jackie's reactions that start at Z200, there's a strong blur episode that starts at Z189. Howard Brennan starts to snap his head to the right at Z207. George Hickey starts to turn his head to the right at Z195. But even if one cannot bring himself to acknowledge the evidence of at least one pre-Z190 shot, it is hard to fathom how the bullet that knocks JFK forward starting at Z226 could be the same bullet that slams Connally's right shoulder downward starting at Z236, especially given the fact that Connally was certain he was not hit before Z231.