JFK in writer's sights for 12 years

[Michael Hogan]

Although it was dated today, this seems like an old article:

http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.d...RES06/808100307

[William Kelly]

Although it was dated today, this seems like an old article:

http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.d...RES06/808100307

Yes Michael, the WP ran the story in July.

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=13178

I wonder if I can get a grant from the J. Lucas Foundation to research the CIA's use of private foundations to support their covert operations over the course of decades, a fact known to the Ruskies but kept from the American people.

BK

[William Kelly]

http://bulk.resource.org/gpo.gov/hearings/105h/90483.pdf

Mr. Max Holland-"Thank you Mr. Chairman. I would like to make a brief statement summarizing my testimony.

"Nearly 75 years after President Lincoln's assassination a chemist turned author named Otto Eisenschimal provoked national furor with his 1937 book Why was Lincoln Murdered? Eisenschimal claimed that one of the most important events in American history was still a mystery. And Eisenschimal claims to have uncovered the truth. President Lincoln was the victim of a conspiracy organized by his Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, who was allegedly opposed to the President's program of a charitable post-war reconstruction of the South. When pressed Otto Eisenschimal openly admitted he had no evidence to support his case. At the same time though it was precisely the documentary record that enabled critics to prove that Otto Eisenschimal's book was just another in a long line of lunatic theories about the first assassination of an American president.

"Here lies, I submit, the long term importance of the work being carried out by the ARRB. The meaning of the raw data being unearthed by the Review Board will probably not be appreciated anytime soon by the generation sentient when President Kennedy was murdered in Dallas. But if these generations cannot come to terms with history as it happened in their lifetimes then at the very least they have an obligation to handle over in so far as is possible a complete and thorough documentary record. Citizens will need that record to rebut the Otto Eisenschimal's of the next century, not that there is any dearth of them now.

"I strongly support without qualification the extension of the Review Board for another year and full funding of its operations. Bringing its work to an abrupt end will not only diminish the investment of time and resources already made it in all likelihood will throw the whole initiative into chaos. Not least of all gutting the effort now will surely create an elaborate suspicion about the federal government's intentions in the first place.

"I would like to spend the balance of my time describing the three areas where I think the Review Board has made its greatest contributions. The first has to do with the Warren Commission. The Review Board's labors have resulted in many new documents that I believe will eventually remove the stigma that has been attached to the Commission, which has probably [been] the most unfairly reviled and ridiculed entity ever created by the federal government. These records paint a sobering portrait of our federal government during a very traumatic time. It is not the idealized versions depicted in civics textbooks, nor the demonized version featured on talk radio, it's the real federal government, imperfect, plodding, driven by ambition, mistrust, rivalries and compartmentalized by secrecy, working at cross purposes or in ignorance, simultaneously guided by the most banal bureaucratic instincts and the most elevated national concerns. Somehow through all of that it does struggle and manage to do the right thing.

"Besides the Warren Commission I think the work of the Review Board has made a very substantial contribution towards understanding the operations of the intelligence community. The assassination necessarily caused what can only be termed a mobilization of the U.S. intelligence communities far flung resources. The government had to determine that weekend who was responsible and whether the assassin or assassins had any coconspirators either foreign or domestic.

"Consequently, the records being released now constitute a gold mine of information about domestic and foreign intelligence operations at the midpoint of the cold war. These records not only shed new light on what the government knew 34 years ago, their release is an object lesson into why they have been kept secret all of these years. They do not contradict the federal government's official conclusion as stated in the Warren Report, rather the documents were kept secret because they disclose or tend to disclose ongoing intelligence sources and methods. With the release of these documents the intelligence community verdict in the wake of the assassination can finally be assessed in some fairness and thoroughness. And the fact is that the information provided by the FBI, CIA, and other agencies was instrumental to preventing the United States government from overreacting when the circumstantial public evidence was highly suggestive of a link between Lee Harvey Oswald and a foreign power.

"The Last area in which the Review Board has made its, perhaps its greatest contribution has to do with the whole issue of secrecy and disclosure. The balance between secrecy and disclosure has always been in favor of secrecy, especially since World War II, controlled by laws highly deferential to the equities of the interested government agencies. The fine citizens who serve on the Review Board decided that if their mandate was to have any meaning it was imperative to pierce this veil. They had to get at categories [of information] that had been classified before, including information derived from intelligence sources and methods. While some historians have been critical of the resources devoted to this particular effort I like to believe that a breakthrough had to be achieved somewhere, and in fact, the records pertaining to President Kennedy's assassination make an excellent demonstration project of what can now be released. The lines drawn by the Review Board should prove helpful as the government undertakes to declassify the vast body of records generated during the cold war. "Finally, I'd like to say that the entire history of the federal government's efforts in the wake of the assassination including the experience of the Review Board serves as a cautionary tale. Perhaps it will enable the government to strike a better balance between secrecy and disclosure in the future. For there exists no better example of the heavy wages of doubt, suspicion and public cynicism exacted by secrecy in the Kennedy assassination experience. Thank you Mr. Chairman."