Michael Griffith

I will simply repeat the self-evident point that if a lone-gunman theorist had closely associated with Holocaust deniers and other far-right extremists the way Prouty did, had defended Scientology and Ron Hubbard the way Prouty did, had made the kinds of bizarre claims that Prouty did (Princess Diana, FDR's death, Iron Mountain, etc.), and had so markedly back-peddled on several of his key longtime JFKA claims when questioned by a federal board, nobody in this thread would make any excuses for him but would justifiably reject him as a credible source.

I work as a technical editor in a job that deals with air and missile defense. I won't be one of those lucky people who are retired and have lots of free time on their hands for at least another five years. I used to be a Civil War buff, but I lost interest in the subject about three or four years ago. I still maintain my Civil War-related websites (one on Lincoln and the other on McClellan), but I'm not active on the subject anymore.

Here are four more endorsements of Dr. Selverstone’s new book The Kennedy Withdrawal, further supporting my belief that the book is the most definitive book to date on the subject. Mack Payne, a Vietnam veteran and chief editor of the Vietnam Veteran News (VVN) podcast, calls Selverstone’s book a “tremendous book” and recommends “everybody get a copy of it.” The VVN site is featuring Selverstone’s book as “Recommended Reading” (https://vietnamveterannews.com/episode-2430/#comment-935). Vietnamese-American and Vietnam War scholar Andy Pham (also of VVN), whose parents fled Vietnam because of the Viet Cong, likewise recommends Selverstone’s book (intro to podcast 2430, https://vietnamveterannews.com/?powerpress_pinw=181-podcast). Payne and Pham arranged to have two professors of history interview Selverstone about his book on the VVN podcast (podcast 2430), both of whom spoke favorably about the book. The two professors were Professor Meredith H. Lair (George Mason University) and Dr. Sean McLaughlin (Murray State University). The podcast was recorded just a few months ago (January 19). In the podcast, Professor Lair calls Selverstone’s book “an impressive and careful piece of scholarship” (https://vietnamveterannews.com/?powerpress_pinw=181-podcast). Similarly, Dr. McLaughlin voices strong agreement with Selverstone’s conclusions about the withdrawal. He notes that his reading of the primary sources has made him “very skeptical of the suggestion that he [JFK] was genuinely considering a withdrawal before military victory had been achieved on the battlefield” (https://vietnamveterannews.com/?powerpress_pinw=181-podcast). McLaughlin’s Q&A with Selverstone on the nature of the withdrawal is informative (starts at around the 18:00 point in the podcast). McLaughlin’s Q&A with Selverstone on what JFK would have done in 1964 and 1965 is also valuable. Selverstone specifies that “it’s really hard to say with any degree of certainty what he might have done” in 1965. Lair is an associate professor of history at George Mason University, and is a former Minerva Research Fellow at the U.S. Naval Academy. She is the author of Armed with Abundance: Consumerism and Soldiering in the Vietnam War (2011). McLaughlin is the Special Collections and Exhibits Director at Murray State University. He is the author of JFK and de Gaulle: How America and France Failed in Vietnam, 1961-1963 (University Press of Kentucky, 2019).

I fear I've been a bit too sarcastic with you. On the off chance that you will take my failure to respond to your accusations about my background as proof that I have something to hide, I will address your questions. One, I've talked many times in this forum about my attendance at the Defense Language Institute (DLI). Leslie can verify this, as can several others. Or, you can do a forum search and find the many posts where I talked about my time at DLI. Two, I was not in the USAF (U.S. Air Force). I was in the Army. Perhaps you thought I was in the Air Force because I attended the U.S. Air Force Technical Training school, but that school was where all the Services sent personnel for that kind of technical training. Three, I don't live anywhere near McLean, Virginia, and have never had any association with the CIA.

I doubt that Whaley waited so long to enter pickup times on his timesheet. This doesn't make sense to me. I know he told the WC he did this, but his timesheet does not support his claim, and it would have been much easier to enter each pickup time as it occurred. We don't know what Oswald did and did not tell the police. The evidence relating to the bus ride is shaky at best. The cab-ride reenactments were unrealistic. They couldn't get the cab to Oswald's neighborhood in the required amount of time without rigging the reenactment. We'll have to agree to disagree about whether Whaley was trying to hint that there was something wrong with his identification of Oswald. I agree that he comes across as a simple man, but I also find it interesting that he volunteered such damning information about the police affidavits and about the lineup (Oswald's bawling out the police), and that he insisted that he chose the No. 2 man even after being confronted with the typed police statement that said he chose the No. 3 man. As you noted, at times Whaley was trying to say what he thought the WC wanted to hear. Yes, I agree. This fact alone calls into question his accommodating statements (waiting to record pickup times, the color of the jacket and of other clothing, where he dropped off his passenger). My bottom line about Whaley, getting back to my first reply in this thread, is that his identification of Oswald in the police lineup was not what one would normally call a "positive identification," and that given the overtly unfair nature of the lineup, there are serious questions about his identification.

More of your disingenuous nit-picking. I've already explained and modified my original statement about whom Whaley selected. My statement was too general in isolation. It was an over-generalization because I did not explain the basis for it. Without that explanation, the statement was subject to the kind of nit-picking you've been doing, which is why I revised it. If nothing else, your claim that Whaley "positively identified" Oswald in the lineup could certainly be viewed as over-generalization or an over-simplification, since it ignores the suspicious irregularities with the police statements taken from Whaley, and since it ignores Whaley's wandering, waffling, and contradictory WC testimony. Again, to all but the willfully blind, Whaley's WC testimony shows that he felt guilty about his identification, that--at a minimum--he was uncertain about it, and that he was hinting as far as he dared that he was pressured into it and that there were shenanigans involved with his police statements. Now, are you ever going to get around to defending the WC's specious explanation for the 12:30 pickup time documented in Whaley's timesheet?

The guy you quote above Mike, Mark Leepson, is utterly typical of why people like Logevall like Selverstone's book. You mean scholars who have actual credentials and who have studied the Vietnam War for years? You mean scholars who've actually read both sides and who've bothered to read primary source material on the war? Selverstone's book is an establishment project and they can now somehow say that see, we were not really wrong back then. Somehow you cannot see that. Your reading has been too limited and too one-sided for you to be passing judgment on Selverstone's book, much less on Selverstone himself. Your "review" of his book is an embarrassment, for some of the reasons I've discussed in this thread. You question Selvertone's motives and integrity, which is usually not done in a professional review. You come here citing downright quacks and hacks like Prouty and Turse, and then pretend that somehow you are qualified to review Selverstone's book. I will note again that your review simply ignores most of the evidence that Selverstone presents. And I for one am really getting sick of your personal smears of people like Jim Douglass, Mike Swanson and Fletcher Prouty. I mean did you even read Fletcher's earlier articles on Vietnam? Truth and fact are not "smears." Douglass is a 9/11 Truther. Maybe you don't think this disqualifies him as a valid source on the Vietnam War, but I do, not to mention that Douglass is a theologian by trade with no background or training in historical research and no military experience. If someone's analytical skills are so bad that they embrace the 9/11 Truther nuttiness, I will not use their research on any issue. Prouty was a nutjob and a fraud who palled around with Holocaust deniers and neo-N-azis, who appeared on a Holocaust-denying and neo-N-azi radio program 10 times in four years, who recommended that people read the anti-Semitic and Holocaust-denying newspaper The Spotlight, and who even had one of his books republished by the Holocaust-denying IHR. This is the kind of garbage you bring to the table and then you presume to be qualified to attack and judge Selverstone's book? As for Mike Swanson's book Why the Vietnam War?, it is an amateurish work that repeats a host of debunked far-left myths about the war. When you read his book, did you happen to notice all of the typos and grammatical errors? Did you notice that he doesn't even know how to properly cite sources in endnotes? The first source that Swanson cites in his endnotes is a disgusting documentary that literally could have been produced by North Vietnam's Ministry of Propaganda: Peter Davis's film Hearts and Minds. Out of Swanson's 329 endnotes, 16 of them cite one of his other books (The War State)! Really? Over 50 of his 329 endnotes cite the Pentagon Papers, which are nothing but a selection of internal government documents about the Vietnam War that were cherry-picked by two McNamara disciples (McNaughton and Gelb) and that only run through 1967. When McNaughton and then Gelb were cherry-picking the documents, they didn't interview or consult with any senior military officers or other federal agencies, not even with the White House. If you ever decide to educate yourself on the war by reading the other side, you might start with Dr. Robert F. Turner's book Myths of the Vietnam War: The Pentagon Papers Reconsidered. Yet, you trumpet Swanson's amateurish work as an example of good scholarship on the Vietnam War and proudly note that Swanson told you that he thinks Selverstone's book is awful. Look MIke, whatever America was fighting for in Indochina, what was worth 5.8 million dead? Those people over there have a pretty nice country now and guess what, its not communist. And this comment brings you mighty close to qualifying as a wingnut. As I've documented for you previously, major human rights groups, including Human Rights Watch, continue to identify Vietnam as one of the most repressive regimes on the planet, and the Communist party of Vietnam still maintains an iron grip on the government. Let's read the latest Human Rights Watch report on Vietnam, written just a few months ago: Vietnam’s human rights record remains dire in virtually all areas. The ruling Communist Party maintains a monopoly on political power and allows no challenge to its leadership. Basic rights are severely restricted, including freedoms of speech and the media, public assembly, association, and conscience and religion. Rights activists and bloggers face police intimidation, harassment, restricted movement, arbitrary arrest, and incommunicado detention. Farmers lose land to development projects without adequate compensation, and workers are not allowed to form independent unions. The police regularly use torture and beatings to extract confessions. The criminal justice system, including the courts, lacks independence, for example sentencing political dissidents and civil society activists to long prison terms on bogus national security charges. (https://www.hrw.org/asia/vietnam) And just so know, America was fighting in Indochina to try to prevent 18 million South Vietnamese from falling under Community tyranny. [2023 video of a Hanoi night market] Now before anyone says well this is today. Not so, it was like this back in the nineties. This is just shameful, not to mention misleading. Vietnam was worse in the '90s than it is now, and that's saying a lot, because, as mentioned, human rights groups still rate Vietnam as one of the most repressive nations on Earth. I provided several links in my previous reply that document the repressive conditions in Vietnam in the '90s. Len Osanic and I had a guest on who proved that. Further, when Hanoi swept through Saigon, they kept the business college there going. Holy cow. Whoever your "guest" was, you'd better have that guest read the dozens of reports and studies on Vietnam's horrible human rights record from 1975 to the present day. He could start with former Viet Cong leader Truong Nhu Tang's book A Viet Cong Memoir, in which he describes the "reign of terror" (his words) that the Communists imposed on South Vietnam after the war. Then, your "guest" could read the recent research done by Australian and Asian scholars on that reign of terror, which included tens of thousands of executions and sending hundreds of thousands of South Vietnamese to concentration camps where the death rate was at least 5%. I've cited some of this research in another thread (on the Vietnam War and the movie JFK). Then, your guest could read the Human Rights Watch reports on Vietnam from 1990 to last year. Have you also had "guests" who claimed that Russia and North Korea are "pretty nice" places to live? The way I look at it is this: whatever violence there was at that time was mostly caused by America's refusal to abide by the Geneva Accords. If that would have been done then unification would have been much more peaceful and the evolution to the above would have happened much sooner. This is Communist propaganda that even left-of-center historians such as Max Hastings have debunked. For the 33rd time, North Vietnam never had any intention of following the Geneva Accords and began violating them almost as soon as the ink was dry on them. Hastings covers this issue well in his book Vietnam: An Epic Tragedy, as have literally dozens of other scholars. America did a lot of horrible things in Vietnam. We did many more good things than bad things in Vietnam. For every one bad thing we did, the Communists did four or five bad things. But you refuse to talk about the horrible things that the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong did. You cite a garbage source like Turse's book, which even Neil Sheehan condemned as shoddy, but you refuse to address the now-mountainous evidence of Communist atrocities and brutality in Vietnam. And for what? Kennedy understood that, which is why Selverstone leaves out so much of Kennedy's transformation in 1951 and distorts the meaning of Rakove's book. Only a tiny handful of far-left authors buy this nonsense. And, no, as I noted in a previous reply, Selverstone does not distort the meaning of Rakove's book. BTW, Leepson says that the message of Selverstone's book is that JFK would have done what LBJ did. Which is to stop the fall of Saigon, JFK would have escalated to combat troops and massive bombing like Rolling Thunder. To anyone who is serious about this, that is not just false, its a little loony. JFK was never going to commit combat troops. No, it's not "loony" at all, and 99% of those who "are serious about this" don't see it as "loony" either. You come to the table citing quacks and frauds like Prouty and Turse, and then you presume to call Leepson's mainstream position "loony." The overwhelming majority of scholars on this subject agree with Leepson. You think it's "loony" because you've only read a handful of books on the war and most of what you've read has been fringe stuff. Furthermore, Selverstone does not declare that "JFK wold have done what LBJ did." If you'd read his book with any care, you would know that Selverstone says that we simply cannot know what JFK would have done when faced with the situation that confronted LBJ in 1965. He does offer his opinion that he believes JFK may well have responded in a similar manner, but he stops well short of declaring this to be a certainty. What's truly "loony"--and sickening--is to claim that Vietnam is "a pretty nice country" and to whitewash the reign of terror that the Communists imposed on South Vietnam after the war. No, Vietnam is not "a pretty nice country." It's a brutal dictatorship that suppresses basic human rights, tortures and beats people, engages in arbitrary arrests, and confiscates private property whenever it pleases. And he understood that Saigon would likely fall once the withdrawal was over, but he was willing to take the heat. For JFK to withdraw those advisors, and then to reverse and send in tens of thousands of combat troops and seven million tons of bombs. You don't know that. Your only evidence for this specious theory is the self-serving claims made by some JFK loyalists many years after his death. You just don't care that these claims contradict every single public statement that JFK made on Vietnam (including those he made in the last few days of his life), and every single statement he made on Vietnam recorded on the White House tapes. Nor do you care that the earliest memoirs by JFK aides Sorenson and Schlesinger said nothing about an intent to abandon South Vietnam after the election. Nor do you care that Dean Rusk, JFK's Secretary of State, adamantly denied your theory. Nor do you care that Bobby Kennedy flatly rejected your theory when he was interviewed in April 1964 for the White House oral history project. And I repeat that your review ignores most of the evidence that Selverstone presents on this point. See, this is why I think Selverstone calls JFK a Cold Warrior. Which he was not, as opposed to LBJ who clearly was. This is why we did what we did in Stone's film, we showed this difference in several spots in the world like Indonesia. I've already answered this argument. Again, the handful of examples you cite in the film do not prove that JFK was not a Cold Warrior. They prove that he was anti-colonialist, and nothing more. There's a reason that the vast majority of historians who've written on the subject argue that JFK most certainly was a Cold Warrior.

Eee-gads. Chip Berlet most certainly is an ultra-liberal, and it is astonishing that you would deny this. You and Jeff don't consider him an ultra-liberal because he has exposed Fletcher Prouty as a fraud and a crackpot and because he accepts the lone-gunman theory. Similarly, it is erroneous to claim that Berlet's specialty is to "go after people" who back "controversial causes, like the JFK case." In point of fact, Berlet has spent most of his career studying and exposing extreme right-wing groups. He's a former vice president of the National Lawyers Guild, for crying out loud, and he has worked in support of the ACLU, AIM, and even the Socialist Workers Party. For more information on Berlet's stainless, undeniable left-wing credentials, see the Wikipedia article on him. It is troubling that you would get on a public board and make these comments about Berlet. You do this because you refuse to admit the truth about Fletcher Prouty.

Let's take a look at Prouty's response to the Esquire article: "Esquire magazine published an article, in which they just made up these things, I've never written for Liberty Lobby. I've spoken as a commercial speaker, they paid me to speak and then I left. They print a paragraph or two of my speech same as they would of anybody else, but I've never joined them. I don't subscribe to their newspaper, I never go to their own meetings, but they had a national convention at which asked me to speak and they paid me very, very well. I took my money and went home and that's it". I go to the meeting, I go home, I don't join. Why didn't Prouty mention that he appeared on Liberty Lobby's anti-Semitic, Holocaust-denying radio show 10 times over a four-year period (as documented by the ADL)? Why didn't he mention that did not just speak at the convention but also took part in a panel discussion that included Bo Gritz? Why didn't he mention that he recommended Liberty Lobby's newspaper The Spotlight, as proudly documented by the newspaper itself? If John McAdams had spoken at a Liberty Lobby convention, appeared on their radio show 10 times, and recommended The Spotlight, would you be satisfied with the answer of "oh, shucks, I just spoke because they invited me and paid me, and then I went home. And never mind about the radio program and recommending the newspaper"? That sole speech was years ago and was no different than the speech I gave at the Holocaust Memorial Conference. I spoke my own words and ideas. I do admit to having been a rather active public speaker for all types of audiences, on a commercial except for Rotary, They're gratuitous from my point of view. That's a lie. Are we to believe that when he spoke at the Holocaust Memorial Conference, he gave a speech about the "Secret Team" and blamed the Israelis for high oil prices?! That's the speech he gave at the Liberty Lobby convention. I seriously doubt that he made the same comments at both gatherings. "The funny thing was two months earlier I had spoken at the Holocaust Conference for the second annual meeting of the Holocaust Group which I learned later the Liberty Lobby is completely opposed to. Dr. Littel, of the Holocaust Memorial organization invited me to attend and make a few comments,as others were requested. Oh, please. So Prouty only "learned later" that Liberty Lobby denied the Holocaust?! He had no idea about this during his years of associating with Carto and Marcellus, or when he talked with Carto and Marcellus about having the IHR republish The Secret Team? He never figured this out during the four-year period when he was appearing on Liberty Lobby's radio show, hosted by Holocaust-denier Tom Valentine, every five months?! Really? Col. Prouty has been asked to attend at the Holocaust Conference again later this year! And I'd bet the farm that if this really happened, it was because the Holocaust conference organizers had no knowledge of his close, prolonged relationship with Carto, Marcellus, Liberty Lobby, and the IHR. By the way, why didn't Prouty give a date for the speech he supposedly gave at the Holocaust Memorial Conference? I spent about 45 minutes Googling Holocaust conferences held in the 1980s and 1990s. I found articles/records for about two dozen such conferences, and I didn't find any mention of Prouty as speaking at any of them. I'll keep searching. Well, they put all this in this Esquire magazine but did it all backwards, as though I was a member, writing with these people or joining them. The only club I've joined is the Rotary Club!" See above. Also, why didn't Prouty address his disgraceful dodge that he gave when he was asked about Carto's Holocaust denial? The attempt of character assassination is a sign you have become a small threat. Others, at the levels I know of, have played up that as though I had been converted to something. It is just their "gentlemanly" tactic of dealing with people they can't handle otherwise.. In fact it is a CIA characteristic trait...as I well know. When they can't handle you, they attack your character. So the ADL and Chip Berlet were part of a CIA operation to discredit Prouty? Did they make Prouty appear on the Liberty Lobby's radio show 10 times in four years? Did they hypnotize him to recommend The Spotlight? Did they use mind-control drugs to get him to say "I'm no authority in that area" when asked about Holocaust denial? This classic was found on the internet; "An essay written from a leftist perspective by Chip Berlet, deals with the ties, and Mark Lane, and the extreme right-wing paranoid Liberty Lobby. Nothing here shows Prouty to be a National Socialist or an anti-Semite, but shouldn't he show better judgment in whom he associates with?" This implies I associate with National Socialists, or why else write it! But Prouty did associate with neo-N-azis and Holocaust deniers. This is beyond dispute. And where's the link to this essay? I searched for this essay every which way and could not find it. I searched for six verbatim excerpts with quotation marks from Prouty's quote from the essay and nothing came up. If the essay is real, I suspect Berlet wrote it before he learned of Prouty's "I'm no authority in that area" answer when asked about Holocaust denial, Prouty's argument that Israel was to blame for high oil prices, Prouty's numerous appearances on Liberty Lobby's radio show, and his having one of his books republished by the IHR, etc. The writings of Furhmann, Perry, Berlet, Posner, etc. are slick, cleverly written, but not based in the true facts. I wonder what they do for a living? where they work? Who pays them to write? My credentials are laid out for all to see. So Prouty didn't know what Berlet did for a living or where he worked? Really? He didn't know that Berlet was a fairly prominent ultra-liberal investigative journalist with stainless anti-fascist credentials? Really? Do you believe that?

Look, I'm still mad at your for blowing my cover. How dare you. I had a good gig going. However, my handlers have asked me to please get you to keep defending the 9/11 Truther claims in this JFK subforum, so I should thank you for your reply. Thank you. Since you accept the 9/11 Truther claims, surely you likewise recognize that the Moon landings were as phony as a three-dollar bill. Any thoughts? Finally, my handlers have asked that I try to get you to continue to defend Prouty and to keep claiming that all the documentation of his sleazy associations and nutty claims is just "McAdams/CIA disinformation." I'm counting on you.

Well, I'm still leery about some of statements regarding vaccination in general, but I definitely don't consider him to be a "quack" or a "kook" as most news outlets would have us believe. I believe he needs to squarely address his previous comments about vaccination, or else the news media is going to keep hanging them around his neck and using them to smear him.

I am very impressed that last week RFK Jr. spoke at Hillsdale College, a private conservative Christian college, and praised the college for its defense of freedom during COVID-19. This tells me two things: RFK Jr. is not a rigid idealogue, and he is not a rabid partisan.

Well, based on many of the comments in this thread, the bar for being considered a valid source has now been lowered by several feet. The new standard seems to be that as long the person claims that JFK was killed because he was going to totally abandon the Vietnam War after the election, and that Ed Lansdale was part of the assassination plot, that person can do the following and still be considered a credible source: -- Appear on an anti-Semitic, Holocaust-denying radio show, not just once or twice, but 10 times over a four-year period (after all, the anti-Semitic, Holocaust-denying group that produced the show never admitted they were anti-Semitic and Holocaust deniers!) -- Reply "Well, shucks, I'm no authority in that area" when asked about Holocaust denial -- Recommend that people read an anti-Semitic, Holocaust-denying newspaper published by an anti-Semitic, Holocaust-denying group -- Have a book published by an anti-Semitic, neo-N-azi, Holocaust-denying group (gee, it was only a small printing run after all--of course it was, because the group catered to a very small audience) -- Publicly praise two prominent Holocaust deniers for having the vision and courage to have their Holocaust-denying publishing company republish his book -- Claim that the Israelis were responsible for high oil prices -- Viciously attack critics of a known cult and the crook who founded it (that's right, he can't attack the cult and its sleazy founder; he can only attack those who criticize the cult and its founder) -- Declare that he would not be a bit surprised to learn that the "Secret Team" assassinated Princess Diana (of course, makes perfect sense) -- Take seriously the claim that Winston Churchill had FDR poisoned ("the British are coming!") -- Suggest for years and years that he was sent on a sinister trip to the South Pole during the assassination to ensure he did not notice or change the lax security arrangements for the Dallas motorcade, but then back-peddle on this suggestion when questioned about it by a federal board -- Claim, in writing, that he possessed notes that he'd taken during an alleged "stand down" phone call from the 112th MI Group, and even pretend to quote from those notes, but then fail to produce the putatively historic notes when asked to do so by a federal board. Surely such a fraud and nutjob must have "remarkable" insights about the Vietnam War as well.

That contention has done great damage to the case for conspiracy. That contention, including its key component that JFK was going to abandon South Vietnam after the election no matter what, was the worst error in Oliver Stone's movie JFK. Critics pounced on this unfortunate blunder and hammered it so effectively that they got away with ignoring the valid parts of the film. Logically and historically, the contention makes no sense. First of all, it has long been known that LBJ, far from being chummy with the Joint Chiefs, not only distrusted them but spewed angry tirades at them, even in front of others. If the plotters killed JFK over Vietnam, they would never have let LBJ choose a dove like Hubert Humphrey as his VP. And if the plotters killed JFK over Vietnam, and if LBJ was part of the plot in any way, he surely would not have imposed insane, suicidal restrictions on the war effort in Vietnam. There is one reliable way to judge any book about the Vietnam War. If the book does not include the historic information revealed in the newly released/translated North Vietnamese sources, it is like a book on the JFK assassination that ignores the ARRB materials. It is not necessarily worthless, but it is missing a large amount of historic information, at the very least. If the book does not include this information and also argues that the war was unwinnable, that the South Vietnamese army was impotent, that the Saigon regime was as bad as the Hanoi regime, that U.S. forces routinely engaged in wanton destruction, etc., then the book is fatally flawed and misleading. Here is a summary of some of the things we have learned from the released/translated North Vietnamese sources: -- The North Vietnamese routinely exaggerated the damage done by American bombing to civilian areas. -- In at least two periods during the war, the North Vietnamese war effort was on the verge of implosion. -- By the end of the brief Linebacker II bombing campaign in 1972, North Vietnam's air defenses were on the verge of collapse. During Linebacker I and II, the Hanoi regime's ability to supply its forces was drastically reduced. If Lineback II had been continued for just two more weeks, North Vietnam would have been crippled, if not virtually shut down, and would have been unable to supply its troops or conduct meaningful military operations. -- The 1968 Tet Offensive was an act of desperation because Hanoi's leaders recognized that the war was going badly for them in 1967. Even hardliners such as Le Duan recognized that the protracted-warfare approach was not working against the Americans, and they concluded that time was no longer on their side. -- The Tet Offensive and the two subsequent mini-Tets later that year were horrendous military disasters that incurred gigantic losses in men and equipment. -- Hanoi's leaders were literally stunned when the Tet Offensive failed to induce a "general uprising" among the South Vietnamese. They were shocked that the vast majority of South Vietnamese stood by the Saigon regime, even during the brief period at the outset of the offensive when the Communists seemed to have the upper hand in many parts of the country. -- On many occasions, the South Vietnamese army and air force fought effectively, even ferociously. -- Even with all the restrictions that LBJ placed on American bombing through 1968, Rolling Thunder bombing raids were doing even more damage to Hanoi's war effort than American hawks believed they were doing at the time. -- American reports of progress in the war effort in 1963, 1966, 1967, 1968, and 1969 to early 1972 were valid and justified. -- Hanoi's leaders intended to use any coalition-government arrangement as a means to impose Communist rule on South Vietnam. -- Hanoi's leaders used ceasefires and peace negotiations to resupply their forces and to move more forces into position, in violation of the conditions of the ceasefires. -- MACV's enemy casualty estimates were not wildly exaggerated but were usually in the ballpark of the Hanoi regime's own numbers. -- The Hanoi regime viewed the American anti-war movement and most American news outlets as valuable allies. -- Hanoi's leaders did all they could via propaganda to pressure Congress to reduce military aid to South Vietnam after the Paris Peace Accords, and they privately cheered the anti-war members of Congress for repeatedly slashing that aid. Books that discuss the information revealed in the North Vietnamese sources include the books by Lien-Hang T. Nguyen, Truong Vu, Mark Moyar, Lewis Sorley, and George Veith. They're all available on Amazon. Briefly, another useful way to judge a book on the Vietnam War is whether or not it addresses the evidence that has emerged about the reign of terror that the Communists imposed on South Vietnam after the war. Important new research on this issue has come from Australian and Asian scholars, among others. We now know that instead of a few thousand random executions, many tens of thousands of executions were carried out after the war. We also now know that the original estimate that around 300,000 South Vietnamese were forced into concentration camps was markedly low and that closer to one million people were sent to those camps. We further know that the death rate in the camps was at least 5%, at the bare minimum. If a book fails to address these facts, it is probably trying to whitewash the aftermath of the war or its author is not well read on the war. Posting a video taken decades after the war that shows some Vietnamese celebrating, and then claiming that it was like this in the '90s (no, it was not: LINK, LINK, LINK, LINK), as Jim has done in this thread and in others, is misleading, if not shameful. That video reminds one of the N-azi propaganda films that showed concentration camp prisoners enjoying recreational games and eating hearty meals. Every single major human rights group rates Vietnam as one of the worst and most repressive regimes on the planet today (see, for example, World Report 2022: Vietnam | Human Rights Watch).

Wow. Really? You're still gonna pretend to be clueless about the problems with Whaley's "identification" and pretend that it was a "positive identification"? Anyway, here's my answer: I don't believe Whaley recognized Oswald as the passenger he picked up at 12:30. I believe he was pressured into eventually going along with an Oswald identification. I think this explains the suspicious issues with the police statements taken from him, and I think it explains his WC testimony. Again, to all but the willfully blind, Whaley's WC testimony shows that he felt guilty about his identification, that--at a minimum--he was uncertain about it, and that he was hinting as far as he dared that he was pressured into it and that there were shenanigans involved with his police statements. The core issue with Whaley is the fact that the 12:30 pickup time documented in his timesheet categorically rules out Oswald as the passenger. This explains his statements about the color of the jacket and the rest of the man's clothing. The WC's argument that Whaley picked up this passenger at 12:47 is bogus, but they had to make that claim because that was the earliest they could get Oswald to the spot where he allegedly entered Whaley's cab. The WC simply lied when it claimed that the 12:30 entry was not precise because Whaley supposedly entered his pickup times in 15-minute intervals. His timesheet itself refutes this lie. The timesheet includes entries for 6:20, 7:50, 8:10, 8:20, 9:40, 10:50, and 3:10. Furthermore, if the passenger had really entered the cab at 12:47 or 12:48 as the WC claimed, Whaley, according to Commission's own argument, would have entered the time as 12:45 or 1:00. Obviously, Whaley entered 12:30 as the pickup time because that's when he picked up the passenger. But the WC could not accept this because it couldn't get Oswald to the cab until 12:47. And we haven't even addressed the rigged reenactments of Whaley's drive from downtown Dallas to Oswald's neighborhood. Here, too, the Commission's timeline for Oswald's movements collapses like a house of cards.

Actually, not it's not, not at all. Again, he appeared on Liberty Lobby's fascist, Holocaust-denying radio show TEN TIMES IN FOURS YEARS. He recommended that people read the pro-N-azi, Holocaust-denying Spotlight. He had one of his books published by the IHR, another pro-fascist, pro-N-azi, Holocaust-denying group. He blamed high oil prices on the Israelis. He refused to condemn Carto's denial of the Holocaust. In fact, he praised Carto and Marcellus for having the vision and courage to republish his book. Why oh why can't you just admit the truth about Prouty? If Prouty was not a fascist, he certainly felt comfortable associating with fascists and accepting money from fascists for years. My heavens, if Trump, Steve Bannon, and Bill Regnery had spent so many years palling around with and profiting from Holocaust deniers and neo-N-azis, you guys wouldn't listen to any excuses for such conduct. Nor would I. As some here know, I was raised Jewish for part of my childhood; I speak Hebrew (learned in college, then at DLI, and then in Israel); I lived in Israel for a short time; and I'm proudly pro-Israeli and pro-Jewish. I happen to read Israeli newspapers fairly frequently. Several Israeli newspapers argued that Steve Bannon, far from being an anti-Semite, was a strong ally of Israel. The Israeli newspaper Ha Aretz reported on one Jewish group's findings (the Zionist Organization of America, or ZOA) about Bannon: "ZOA’s own experience and analysis of Breitbart articles confirms Mr. Bannon’s and Breitbart’s friendship and fair-mindedness towards Israel and the Jewish people,” the organization said in a statement. "To accuse Mr. Bannon and Breitbart of anti-Semitism is Orwellian. In fact, Breitbart bravely fights against anti-Semitism.” The organization added that it "welcomes" Bannon's appointment and wishes him success. About two years ago I looked into the charge that Breitbart was anti-Israeli and/or anti-Semitic. I have been an occasional reader of Breitbart, but not a regular one. When I heard the claim that Breitbart was anti-Semitic, I decided to investigate it because I had never seen any indication of this in the Breitbart articles I'd read. When I checked, I found no evidence whatsoever that Breitbart is anti-Semitic or anti-Israeli. Indeed, Breitbart is strongly pro-Israeli. I defy anyone to search the Breitbart site and find me one article that is the slightest bit anti-Israeli. And make no mistake, you will NEVER find an anti-Semite who is pro-Israeli. As for Trump, he has always been strongly pro-Israeli. Part of his family is Jewish. He has a daughter who is Jewish and Jewish grandchildren. He has invested in Israel. He was the one president who had the courage to move our embassy to Israel's capital city. Perhaps this is why public opinion polls in Israel have consistently showed Trump more popular in Israel than Obama. The substantial majority of Israelis viewed, and still view, Trump as a great friend and backer of Israel. In fact, Trump's popularity in Israel rose during his presidency.

Leslie, very interesting stuff. I don't agree with your conclusions about some of the conservative figures you mention, but I definitely agree with you about The Spotlight. Prouty's close and prolonged association with Carto, Liberty Lobby, and the IHR discredit him as a source and should cause us to repudiate him. And, just so you know, I'm not a huge Trump supporter. I think he did many good things for the country, but I believe he should have been prosecuted for purposely waiting to tell the 1/6 rioters to stand down. I have never thought highly of him as a person. I regard him as emotionally and morally unfit for high office. He was my fourth pick among the GOP candidates in the 2016 Republican primary (my picks were Carson, Rubio, Kasich, and then Trump--come to think of it, I would have voted for J. Bush over Trump if it had been a contest between the two). I think it is quite a reach to impugn tens of millions of Republicans because of a very small handful of unsavory people among them. There are equal numbers of unsavory characters among the Democrats too. To me, it makes no sense to drag modern politics into discussions on the JFK case. Plenty of conservatives believe JFK was killed by a conspiracy (and not a Soviet one). As I've said, when we drag politics into the JFK case, we risk alienating and driving away a large part of our reading audience.

More ducking and dodging, bobbing and weaving, and hemming and hawing. Anything but an honest facing of the facts. Do you really need an account of how poor, misguided, gullible, clueless Prouty "came into this orbit"? Sheesh, the guy appeared on Liberty Lobby's obscene radio show 10 times over a four-year period. He let the IHR republish one of his books. He recommended The Spotlight. Absolutist??? Again, how close and how long of an association with a bunch of lunatic Holocaust deniers, anti-Semites, and white supremacists is enough to discredit someone as a source? I'd say appearing on their radio show 10 times in four years, having them republish one of his books, speaking at one of their conventions, recommending their newspaper, sitting on a discussion panel with Bo Gritz, blaming Israel for high oil prices, etc., etc.,--I think that's a close enough and long enough association to thoroughly, totally discredit Prouty as a source. But that's just me.

Uh, well, the problem is that my statement is defensible based on Whaley's own WC testimony. I did not say that Whaley said that he chose Knapp. On the other hand, writing quickly and wanting to move on to the point about the pickup time in the timesheet, I did not explain the basis of my comment that Whaley chose Knapp. I should have explained that although Whaley said he chose Oswald he also repeatedly said that he chose the No. 2 man and that the No. 2 man was Knapp, not Oswald. I should have also explained that Whaley even specified that the man he chose was the third man to come out to the lineup, and that this was Knapp, not Oswald. And I should have added that Whaley even correctly noted that the men entered the lineup from left to right, which makes it even more puzzling that Whaley kept insisting that he chose the No. 2, and that he stuck to this even when confronted with the typed police statement that said he chose the No. 3 man. To address your rather dishonest nit-picking, I've edited that statement in my original reply to read as follows: To all but the willfully blind, it is obvious that Whaley had doubts, if not guilt, about his "identification" of Oswald in the lineup and was dropping fairly obvious hints that there was something wrong with his "identification." The real crux of the matter is that Whaley's "identification" of Oswald in the police lineup was hardly "positive" when considered in light of Whaley's WC testimony and the irregularities in the police statements taken from Whaley. This, in turn, takes us back to the crucial 12:30 pickup time noted in Whaley's timesheet, which categorically rules out Oswald as the passenger.

Paul, come on. How close and how long of an association with Holocaust deniers, white supremacists, and anti-Semites is acceptable to you? We're not talking about a casual, brief association. We're talking a close and prolonged association that included Prouty having a book republished by the IHR (as I just proved), Prouty appearing on Liberty Lobby's radio show 10 times in a four-year period (documented by the ADL), Prouty expressing his pride and gratitude for the IHR's willingness to republish his book (documented by anti-fascist, ultra-liberal journalist Chip Berlet), Prouty recommending that people read The Spotlight (as proudly confirmed by The Spotlight itself), Prouty's evasive answer when asked about Carto's Holocaust denial (also documented by Berlet), etc., etc. If a conservative lone-gunman theorist did half of these things, every WC critic in this forum would justifiably condemn him, and no sane conservative WC apologist would dare cite his work.

Thank goodness for the Internet Archive website. Thanks to the website, I was able to find "friendly" proof that Fletcher Prouty had his book The Secret Team republished by the IHR's Noontide Press. I found this proof in a book that ardently defends Holocaust denial, white supremacy, the IHR, and Liberty Lobby and its newspaper The Spotlight. The book was written by radical right-winger and Holocaust denier Michael Collin Piper and is titled Coup d’Etat: The Bizarre Inside Story of How an Intelligence Operative Tied to the CIA and Israel’s Mossad Orchestrated the Take-Over of the Institute for Historical Review And Set in Motion the Ultimate Destruction of Liberty Lobby. I might add that the IHR, via its Noontide Press, also published The Spotlight. The book's appendix lists books and publications that were published or republished by the IHR's Noontide Press. The list includes Prouty's book The Secret Team (LINK). Here are some other splendid titles published or republished by Noontide Press: White America, by Earnest Sevier Cox. In case you didn't already guess, Cox was an ardent white supremacist. Lincoln's Negro Policy, by Earnest Sevier Cox The Myth of the Six Million, by David Hoggan. This is a standard Holocaust denial text. Willis Carto was a contributor. Debunking the Genocide Myth: A Study of the National Socialist Concentration Camps and the Alleged Extermination of European Jewry, by Paul Rassinier. This is another popular book among Holocaust deniers. Our Nordic Race, by Richard Kelly Hoskins The Hoax of the 20th Century: The Case Against the Presumed Extermination of European Jewry, by Dr. Arthur Butz Liberty Lobby Membership Cookbook Report From Iron Mountain, by Leonard Lewin Anne Frank's Diary: A Hoax, by Dietlieb Felderer Eugenics & Race, by Dr. Roger Pearson. Pearson was a purveyor of extreme racist and anti-Semitic views. In 1958, he founded the Northern League for North European Friendship, a group that promoted Pan-Germanism, anti-Semitic, and neo-N-azi racial ideology. Anti-Zion, by William Grimstad The Liberty Lobby Congressional Handbook Is the Diary of Anne Frank Genuine?, by Robert Faurisson. (Yes, it is, but these nutjobs argued that it was faked.) The Zionist Factor, by Ivor Benson The Life of An American Jew in Racist, Marxist Israel, by Jack Bernstein Epic: The Story of the Waffen SS, by Leon Degrelle. Don't you know that Hitler was actually a swell guy, and that the SS were noble warriors? Behind Jonestown, by Ed Dieckmann. If you think Prouty's nutty theory about Jonestown is bad, Dieckmann makes Prouty's theory look respectable by comparison. While spinning a wild tale about Jonestown, Diechmann takes time to deny the Holocaust. Germany Reborn, by Herman Goering. For those who don't know, Goering was one of Hitler's henchmen and a leading figure in the Third Reich. The Auschwitz Myth, by Wilhelm Staglich. The How - Liberty Lobby's Record of Its Political Aims Spotlight on the Bilderbergers Inside the Bilderberg Group Coup D'Etat: The ADL Scheme to Seize Control of Latin America. ADL is the Anti-Defamation League The Six Million Reconsidered, by William Grimstad 100 Best of The SPOTLIGHT - two volumes 1986 and 1987 108 Astounding Stories by The SPOTLIGHT. (LINK)

Wow. Just wow. This is just so pathetic. Here's a radical right-wing defense of the IHR that lists Prouty's The Secret Team as being one of the books published by the IHR's Noontide Press: Full text of "Michael Collins Piper books" (archive.org) How about all the research on Prouty done by Chip Berlet, a card-carrying ultra-liberal with a stainless pro-civil rights and anti-fascist record? How about the ADL's research on Prouty? Let's read more of what Berlet has documented about Prouty, including the fact that Prouty had the IHR republish his book The Secret Team: The Liberty Lobby’s Spotlight newspaper superimposed Prouty’s original thesis on its own conspiracy theory regarding Jewish influence in U.S. foreign policy. Sometime in the 1980s, a number of critics of U.S. intelligence operations, including Prouty, began to drift toward a working alliance with Spotlight and Liberty Lobby. They began to feed information from their sources inside the government to publications and groups that circulate conspiracy theories alleging Jewish influence and control over world events, They also began feeding tips to CIA critics on the Left. . . . In his new preface to The Secret Team, recently republished by the Institute for Historical Review, Prouty writes of the “High Cabal” which coaches the “Secret Team” and controls the world. (LINK) At the Liberty Loby conference Fletcher Prouty released the new Institute for Historical Review’s Noontide Press edition of his book on CIA intrigue, The Secret Team. Prouty also moderated a panel where Bo Gritz wove a conspiracy theory which explained the U.S. confrontation with Iraq as a product of the same "Secret Team" outlined by Prouty. . . . Gritz agreed to run as the 1988 vice presidential candidate of the Populist Party on the ticket with presidential candidate David Duke. Duke’s past affiliations with the Ku Klux Klan and neo-N-azi movement are still reflected in Duke’s political ideology. Even Readers Digest called the Populist Party a haven for neo-National Socialists and ex-Klansmen. The Populist Party was originally founded by notorious anti-Semite and Hitler apologist Willis Carto who founded the Liberty Lobby. A photograph of Gritz shaking hands with David Duke at the nominating convention was published in Liberty Lobby’s Spotlight newspaper. (LINK) Again, are you really, really asking us to believe that Prouty had no clue about Liberty Lobby and the IHR, even after attending and speaking at the above-mentioned Liberty Lobby conference and appearing on Liberty Lobby's radio show 10 times over a four-year period? How many hours spent with the radio show's host, Tom Valentine, would it have taken any sane, halfway educated person to figure out that the show was a nutcase forum?

This is total hogwash. Sheesh, how can you spew such trash? The fact that Liberty Lobby was anti-Semitic was obvious to any honest, rational person who spent 30 minutes studying the group's publications, leadership, and activities. The ADL identified Liberty Lobby as anti-Semitic. Hundreds of journalists and many newspapers, magazines, and journals identified Liberty Lobby as anti-Semitic. Two federal courts, including the U.S. Court of Appeals for DC, ruled that the evidence that Liberty Lobby was anti-Semitic was "compelling." For about the 20th time: Liberty Lobby regularly hosted events that included Holocaust deniers, anti-Semites, and white supremacists. I personally attended one of them in Portland, Oregon, when I was in my early 20s. Liberty Lobby's radio program included multiple appearances by Holocaust deniers, anti-Semites, and even neo-N-azis. Liberty Lobby's newspaper The Spotlight regularly included articles that favorably covered Holocaust deniers, anti-Semites, and neo-N-azi groups. The paper also accepted ads from neo-N-azis. Liberty Lobby's founder was Willis Carto, who denied the Holocaust and constantly attacked Jews and the state of Israel. Liberty Lobby worked closely with the IHR, which published numerous books and articles that denied the Holocaust. Your continued refusal to acknowledge the plain truth about Liberty Lobby is disgraceful. Do you really, really believe that Prouty had no idea about Carto, Marcellus, Liberty Lobby, and the IHR, given all the time he spent with them? Are you asking us to believe that Prouty knew nothing about the numerous newspaper and magazine articles that discussed Liberty Lobby's anti-Semitism? He appeared on Liberty Lobby's radio program 10 times in four years, and you think by the fourth of fifth time he still had no clue about the kind of vile trash the program peddled, after spending so much time with its host, Tom Valentine?

Well, shoot, W., it looks like you've blown my deep cover. Who would have dreamed that my cover would be blown by someone who read my online "About the Author" page, which has been publicly available for about 20 years. Since you've blown my cover through cunning inference, I might as well admit that back in the 1990s, the Air Force Intelligence Agency (AIA) planted me in the research community because they suspected that the CIA had planted Prouty in the community to discredit the case for conspiracy and to tarnish all serious JFKA research. They wanted me to track Prouty's progress and effectiveness. Fast forward to a few weeks ago. I might as well confess that a few weeks ago, my AIA (now AFISRA) handlers assigned me the task of seeing how many researchers in this forum I could get to come to Prouty's defense even after I documented his close and prolonged ties with anti-Semitic, Holocaust-denying groups and persons. Based on your previous posts in defense of the deranged claims made by the 9/11 Truthers, my handlers told me, "This guy W. Niederhut looks like a prime candidate to come to Prouty's defense. We assess that he will discredit and disgrace the case for conspiracy even more than Prouty did. Plus, we assess that two or three others in the forum, including one of the moderators, will likewise defend Prouty, even to the point of arguing that Liberty Lobby was not 'overtly' anti-Semitic." Frankly, I was skeptical. I told my handlers, "Surely no one in their right will come to Prouty's defense once I document his long-term relationship with Liberty Lobby and the IHR, especially since most of my material will come from Chip Berlet, a card-carrying ultra-liberal who has exposed right-wing groups for years and who has worked in support of the ACLU, the National Lawyers Guild, and even the Socialist Workers Party. When they read Berlet's research on Prouty, they will repudiate Prouty in a heartbeat." My handlers replied, "Our analysis shows that some WC critics will in fact repudiate Prouty when they see the evidence about his Liberty Lobby and IHR ties, but we also assess that W. Niederhut and a few others will stand by Prouty, even it means attacking Berlet and dancing around Prouty's anti-Semitic ties." I must confess that my handlers were right. They're always right. I should have known better than to question them. Now that my cover has been blown, I feel obliged to further confess that my real name is Allen Dulles Jr., and that Curtis LeMay was my godfather.

You're still evading the key issues and doing so in a disingenuous manner. Let's see if we can unpack the situation with Whaley with a series of factual observations. -- Whaley repeatedly told the WC that he picked the No. 2 man. The No. 2 man was Knapp. Whaley also specified that the man he chose was the third man to come out, which was Knapp, not Oswald. In so doing, Whaley correctly described how the police had the lineup members enter the lineup. -- Whaley said he identified Oswald as his passenger and said Oswald was bawling out the police over the unfairness of the lineup, but Whaley then kept insisting that he picked the No. 2 man, that the man he picked was the third man out, and revealed some serious irregularities about the statements that the police took from him (two handwritten and one typed). -- The first handwritten statement, the one written by Montgomery, says nothing about Whaley choosing the No. 3 man, i.e., Oswald. -- Whaley's account of Oswald's bawling out the police over the lineup has justifiably been cited for decades as proof that the lineups were unfair. -- Whaley recorded on his timesheet that he picked up his passenger at 12:30. This pickup time categorically rules out Oswald as the passenger. So, the WC floated the flimsy argument that Whaley erred by a whopping 17 minutes, and that Whaley recorded his pickup times in 15-minute increments, which was false. Then, the WC contradicted its own lame argument by saying that Whaley picked up Oswald at 12:47. They said 12:47 because they knew they couldn't get Oswald to Whaley's cab earlier than that. Yet, Whaley recorded that he picked up the passenger at 12:30, and his other entries showed no sign of a 15-minute-increment pattern. -- Whaley's description of the passenger's clothing contradicted the clothing that the WC said Oswald was wearing. -- An honest judge would have had, at a minimum, serious doubts about the validity of the lineup and the admissibility of Whaley's contradictory "identification."