National Security Action Memo 271

[Neville Gully]

Soviets Planned to Accept JFK’s Joint Lunar Mission Offer

by Frank Sietzen "SpaceCast News Service"

Washington DC - October 2, 1997 - Soviet Premiere Nikita S. Khrushchev reversed himself in early November, 1963 and had at the time, decided to accept U.S. President John F. Kennedy's offer to convert the Apollo lunar landing program into a joint project to explore the Moon with Soviet and U.S. astronauts, SpaceCast learned Wednesday from one of the last remaining participants in the decision still alive.

On the eve of the 40th anniversary of the world's first space satellite, the Soviet Sputnik 1, Sergei Khrushchev, eldest son of the former Premiere and Soviet Union Communist Party General Secretary said that his father made the decision in November 1963 following a renewed Kennedy initiative to sell the Soviets on a joint manned lunar program.

"My father decided that maybe he should accept (Kennedy's) offer, given the state of the space programs of the two countries (in 1963)", Khrushchev told SpaceCast following a talk before a NASA conference in Washington on the effects of the historic Sputnik launch on Oct. 4, 1957. Sputnik was the world's first artificial satellite of the Earth, and its autumn 1957 launch into orbit is widely credited with starting the superpower space race that lasted until the end of the Cold War in 1991.

Kennedy had made the offer of a joint manned lunar program to the Russians on several occasions, but his most aggressive effort was made in a speech before the United Nations General Assembly on Sept. 20, 1963 in New York.

At the end of that address, Kennedy said: "In a field where the United States and the Soviet Union have a special capacity - space - there is room for new cooperation, for further joint efforts."

"I include among these possibilities," he added, "a joint expedition to the Moon." Why, the President asked, should the United States and the Soviet Union conduct parallel efforts that would include "duplication, of research, construction, and expenditure?"

He laid out a proposal for a joint series of space missions, which if enacted, he said "will require a new approach to the Cold War." But like his earlier proposals to the Russians on joint manned spaceflight, this one also was rejected by the Khrushchev government.

But Sergei Khrushchev told SpaceCast, that in the weeks after the rejection, his father had second thoughts. While the Premiere had agreed with Russian military leaders that said any joint Moon flight would provide an opportunity for the U.S. military to learn more about Russian rocket and missile programs, he now thought that it might be possible to learn more from the technology of the Americans.

"He thought that if the Americans wanted to get our technology and create defenses against it, they would do that anyway. Maybe we could get (technology) in the bargain that would be better for us, my father thought."

In late 1963, the Russian government was still designing their lunar launch vehicle, the N-1, and their manned spacecraft system, the Soyuz. Ultimately, the N-1 was abandoned following repeated launch failures. The Soviet manned lunar program would also be abandoned in the early 1970's following the U.S. landings in the Apollo program. The Soyuz was developed, however and became the spacecraft used in Russian space station programs, from the early 1970's right on through to today's MIR station.

Sergei Khrushchev also said his father viewed the prospects of new western cooperation linked with plans to cut back on the Russian Army size from its level of 2.5 million men in 1963 to possibly as low as 500,000 conscripts. And Khrushchev was also planning to begin diverting weapons complex design bureaus into more consumer and commercial, non-military production, a process started by the Yeltsin government that is still evolving in today's Russia.

If these newest revelations are correct, the prospects of a visit to the Soviet Union by President Kennedy during the 1964 Presidential campaign, suggested by several former Kennedy administration staffers or a visit to Russia early in a Kennedy second term might well have cemented the joint lunar plan. And such a Kennedy/Khrushchev initiative might have staved off the planning of a coup that eventually removed Khrushchev from office in October, 1964.

"I think," Sergei Khrushchev said, "if Kennedy had lived, we would be living in a completely different world." But a week after the reversal decision was allegedly made, Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas and the decision was dropped.

Although the Johnson administration made a similar offer for joint manned spaceflights early in 1964, the Russians were too suspicious of the new administration, some analysts have suggested. And, Khrushchev said, much of the rationale for the acceptance of the joint mission plan was the "chemistry" built up between his father and John F. Kennedy, who had clashed repeatedly with the Soviet leader during the previous two years but seemed to be moving towards a new relationship and foreign policy following the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis and Kennedy's speech before American University in the summer of 1963, proposing new U.S.-Soviet cooperation and a joint Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

The Soviet government viewed the Kennedy initiative started at American University as a major turning point in U.S.-Soviet relations during the Kennedy Presidency.

Analysts, however, must be cautious about Khrushchev's new information. Both the Soviet Politburo and the U.S. Congress would have had to approve the bold plan, which would have abruptly ended the space competition started in 1957, and opened the U.S. space industry to direct Russian involvement, a radical idea in the 1960's Cold War environment.

Some have also suggested that, given the political atmosphere of the time, the U.S. Congress of 1963/64 would not have looked too favorably on dropping a space program sold primarily as "beating the Russians to the Moon" for one that would, in essence, bring them along on a spacecraft and booster paid for by the U.S. taxpayer.

But Kennedy fretted over the cost of the Apollo program almost literally until the day he died. A joint plan would have preserved the project while reducing the cost, further shifting its rationale onto foreign relations and superpower stability - goals now identified with the current US-Russian space partnership and a reason often given today for continuing the program. And had the President lived to conduct a 1964 campaign, U.S.-Soviet cooperation following years of tension may well have been a central element to the foreign policy espoused during that election effort. The available documentary evidence suggests that Kennedy was moving towards a new cooperative relationship with the Soviet government that he hoped to expand following a reelection in 1964.

But history will never know what possibilities existed in the space program that was not to be, in what Sergei Khrushchev called "those wonderful golden years" now long passed into the mists of history.

http://www.spacewar.com/news/russia-97h.html

[William Kelly]

Thanks Evan and Neville,

To me it looks like JFK had a change of heart sometime after the Nov. 21, 1962 budget meeting with NASA administrators, which LBJ is absent from. Where was he? He's the one whose supposed to be responsible for NASA and organizing the effort to put a man on the moon. Webb says it can be done by 1968, but his assist D. says that Mercury was three times the cost predicted and Gemini was worse, so when they talk about $420 million they are really talking two or three times that amount, especially if you put it on the fast track and tell the contractors that money is no object.

JFK asks about the contracts, the contracting process, how they put them out to bid and it's the same contractors the military uses - Lockhead, Bell, General Dynamics, et al., and Kennedy gets confused and refers to the particle accellerator that costs hundreds of millions of dollars and nobody knows what it does.

Then you have JFK telling a reluctant NASA that he wants them to make putting a man on the moon their number one priority, and make it a national priority, as it is a test of systems, and our system must win this one.

A year later he is changing his tune and instead of competing with the Soviets, he wants NASA to be buddy-buddy pals with the Ruskies and work together with them to put a man on the moon.

But not only does NASA and our military not want to partner with the Russians, the Soviets don't want to do it either, execpt for Supreme Leader Nikita Kruschev, who lost some respect over the Cuban missile crisis and now bends a little the other way, and after JFK is wacked, he too is removed in a coup.

What happened to NSAM 271? Did Webb report on the deadline JFK gave him or did LBJ just wink at him?

And why wasn't LBJ at the Nov. 21, 62 NASA budget meeting? Was he in Nam or somewhere?

BK

Edited May 3, 2010 by William Kelly

[William Kelly]

From Jean Hudon's Newsletter

WHY JFK WAS SHOT

"Citizens of this Earth, we are not alone."

With those dramatic words, President John F. Kennedy intended to inform

the American public and the world at large that the U.S. government had

made contact with aliens from deep space.

But before he could deliver the speech on November 22, 1963, the beloved

leader was cut down by an assassin's bullets.

That is the astonishing claim of JFK researcher Professor Lawrence

Merrick, author of an upcoming blockbuster book Killing the Messenger:

The Death of JFK.

"We now know the real reason why President Kennedy was assassinated,"

declared Prof. Merrick of Cambridge, Mass.

"It appears that some individuals within our government were determined

to maintain the secrecy surrounding captured UFOs -- and decided to

silence the President before he could speak."

Prof. Merrick says he began a search for the undelivered speech after

learning the President's original handwritten notes had fallen into the

hands of Texas Governor John Connally -- who was riding in JFK's death

car that fateful day in Dallas.

"I was surprised to find that Kennedy handed Connally the speech, which

was on note cards, to look at, shortly before the motorcade set off at

12:55 p.m.," said Prof. Merrick.

The governor was badly wounded in the gun attack.

"Connally was terrified for his own life," said the historian.

"He placed the bloodstained index cards in a safety deposit box with

orders to a trusted aide that the contents not be revealed until after

his death."

When Gov. Connally died in 1993, the aide removed the cards and held on

to them.

Last year, Prof. Merrick tracked down the aide, who passed the speech on

with a guarantee of anonymity.

Prof. Merrick was flabbergasted when he read the cards. He took them to

five handwriting analysts, who agreed the speech was "95 percent

certain" to be Kennedy's.

Research reveals that just days before his trip to Dallas, JFK met with

his predecessor President Dwight D. Eisenhower, notes Prof. Merrick.

"I believe he was seeking advice on whether to go public with the facts

about UFOs," Prof. Merrick said. "But other government insiders

apparently felt the truth about UFOs would cause widespread panic. And

they were willing to kill to keep the information secret.

"I hope now President Clinton will give the speech that should have been

delivered 36 years ago."

Here is what the President would have said:

My fellow Americans, people of the world, today we set forth on a

journey into a new era. One age, the childhood of mankind, is ending and

another age is about to begin.

The journey of which I speak is full of unknowable challenges, but I

believe that all our yesterdays, all the struggles of the past, have

uniquely prepared our generation to prevail.

Citizens of this Earth, we are not alone. God, in His infinite wisdom,

has seen fit to populate His universe with other beings -- intelligent creatures such as ourselves.

How can I state this with such authority?

In the year 1947 our military forces recovered from the dry New Mexico

desert the remains of an aircraft of unknown origin. Science soon

determined that this vehicle came from the far reaches of outer space.

Since that time our government has made contact with the creators of

that spacecraft.

Though this news may sound fantastic -- and indeed, terrifying -- I ask

that you not greet it with undue fear or pessimism. I assure you, as

your President, that these beings mean us no harm.

Rather, they promise to help our nation overcome the common enemies of

all mankind -- tyranny, poverty, disease, war.

We have determined that they are not foes, but friends. Together with

them we can create a better world. I cannot tell you that there will be

no stumbling or missteps on the road ahead.

But I believe that we have found the true destiny of the people of this

great land: To lead the world into a glorious future.

In the coming days, weeks and months, you will learn more about these

visitors, why they are here and why our leaders have kept their presence

a secret from you for so long.

I ask you to look to the future not with timidity but with courage.

Because we can achieve in our time the ancient vision of peace on Earth

and prosperity for all humankind.

God bless you.

Edited May 5, 2010 by William Kelly

[William Kelly]

James Webb

LBJ Library Oral History

http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/archives.hom/oralhistory.hom/WEBB-J/webb.pdf

….So when we came uptown with Ken BeLieu who became Assistant Secretary of

the Navy, the fellow who lost a leg in the war, worked on Mr. Johnson's staff. He had an

office in the Navy building, he was going to be Assistant Secretary to the Navy. So as

soon as we got to his office, I called up Clifford, and said, "Clifford, you've got to help me get out of this." And he said, "Ha, ha, I'm the one that recommended you. I'm not going to help you get out of it."

Well, the Space Council had been established in the original act of 1958. President

Eisenhower had not wanted it to be active. He had insisted on being chairman. They had

several outside members, from outside the government, and this was not a particularly

good way to carry on planning for the government, and it turned out that the concerns in

the Bureau of the Budget, the concerns among the White House staff serving Kennedy,

and the concerns of Mr. Johnson all ran together along the lines of not having these

outside people, of expecting agencies like the DOD and NASA to coordinate their

activities in the first instance to the extent that they could, and not to say everything is got

to come up for coordination at the council level.

Another direction in which the general consensus ran was that the President

wanted the Vice President to have an active role of leadership in this space program, but

he didn't want to abdicate as President either; and in a sense he wanted to control the

agenda of the council, that he wanted to determine those items on which he would seek

and would accept advice, and further that he did not want to abandon the normal

budgetary process by having the Space Council make the space budget, but in fact he

wanted the Budget Director to have full responsibility over the entire budget, including

space. Now, all of that came to focus in revisions of the law establishing the Vice

President as the chairman. And I think if you look at those pretty carefully, you'll find that every item that I've just described was incorporated.

It had a popular image, that the President in a sense had turned everything over to

the Vice President, but this simply is not written into the law nor was it in fact true. On

the other hand, he was very happy for Mr. Johnson to take the lead in talking about things

and making speeches and participating actively in carrying out things that the President

decided he wanted, such as to expand the program. He said, "Get it done." But he was

not about to step aside and there were many around him who felt the space program

should not be expanded, that manned space flights should not be a very large endeavor;

and so in a sense he was not prepared to abdicate those decisions to anyone--the Vice

President, the Budget Director, me as administrator, or anybody else. He wanted to have

his part in them.

….basically in all of these Presidential advisory groups, if you are not aware of it, then I think it's quite important for you to understand it, they operate in the way the President of the United States wants them to operate. This was true when Mr. Kennedy was President and Mr. Johnson was chairman of the council; it was true when Mr. Johnson was President and Mr. Humphrey was chairman of the council.

…So my first presentation to President Kennedy was: we must increase our booster

power and we must begin to think about manned space flight after Mercury. So I asked

for something over $300 million dollars to increase the work on the Saturns, the big

boosters, and to increase the work on the large spacecraft to fly on them. Kennedy

approved the booster side; he did not approve the spacecraft side. As I remember it, he

approved $125 million dollars, something of this kind. But specifically did not approve

the spacecraft, in a sense deferred this for further decision.

….This was one of the early things that I did, and I can't remember now what Mr. Johnson's involvement was, was to make contact with Gilpatric and McNamara. As I recall it, back about February or early March, we had signed an agreement not to unilaterally start the development of large spacecraft. We already had an agreement not to start the development of a large booster without a written sign-off of the other. This was to prevent somebody suddenly saying, "we've let a contract." See what I mean?

Oh, the Air Force had a strong desire, at least a large part of the Air Force had a strong

desire to upset the 1958 law and to have this mission. They felt that this should be carried

out very much like the Navy had done Antarctic exploration in the earlier days with

Admiral Byrd. They felt genuinely that this was an important element of national power,

national capability, that they had the capability to do it, and that they were the proper ones to do it, and the 1958 law was a mistake. So there was a strong drive to--at the change of administration--to reverse the previous policy and to increase their role. There was also a strong desire on the part of Mr. McNamara not to do that because of the expense of it, and the feeling that he was not satisfied that it was necessary for them to do that.

…he was in favor of the program we worked out which was in fact a division and which

followed the law. The law said NASA would develop these advanced technologies, but

that the military application of them and research related to that application will be done

by the military services. So McNamara was clearly wanting to follow the law as it was

laid out.

What happened was this: we knew we had to launch these big machines. We looked all over the world to find the best place to launch them from. The further north we went, the more problem we had of overflying Africa. The further south we went, the less energy would be required to get into orbit, but the logistics problems were greater; about a billion dollars had been invested at Cape Kennedy. We looked at Hawaii, we even considered building an island off the coast of Georgia or off the coast of Florida. It turned out in the end that Cape Kennedy, Cape Canaveral at that time, was the best place for us to go. Now Huntsville was already where it was. It had been put there

by the Army. Von Braun's group was working there. The Saturns were under

development. They were on navigable water so that you could ship the really big stuff

down the Mississippi River.

Also on navigable water at New Orleans was this large vacant plant, forty-three

acres under one roof, and nearby in Mississippi was a lot of land that could be used for the testing of these big boosters. In those days, nobody knew how much damage the noise

would do, how much explosion risk there was. So with Huntsville being something like

1,800 miles from Cape Canaveral up the river and through the Gulf, we figured that if we

could take this big New Orleans plant, get it for $1 a year, we could assemble the vehicles there. We could manage the production from Huntsville, and we could involve American industry along the rivers and the coasts and much of the work on the smaller elements could be done anywhere in the country. If a big booster was made on the West Coast, it could come through the Panama Canal; if it was up the Mississippi in Minnesota or Chicago, it could come down the Mississippi; St. Louis could come down. In other words, here was a natural line of flow built around the--Huntsville--Cape Kennedy axis with the New Orleans assembly plant and the Mississippi test facility in the middle.

Then the question of where are we going to build the large manned spacecraft

came and the very configuration of this axis concept led you to Houston. You didn't want

to put a second big installation in New Orleans. You might have to go to very large space

stations that would be constructed outdoors and moved by water. Houston had a very

large technical capability. Rice University was there. We had a board that looked into

this. So our purpose was to do the space program. Incidentally, many benefits did come

to the south, and obviously many people thought of them; we were not unaware of them.

We thought it was important for the economy wherever we were to benefit. This is true in

Cleveland where we've got a laboratory; it's true in California, where we've got two

…The basic reason was to get the space program done in the most effective way

possible and to build scientific engineering and managerial strength for a long time into the future. We were not looking at the cheapest way of making stuff in tents or building

poured concrete buildings. We realized that when man left the air, when he had an engine

big enough to leave the air and the earth and to move around in space, you are entering a

new and unlimited arena, and that we were not just constructing the fastest, quickest way

to get a few payloads into orbit. We were building permanently.

…The basic fact of the matter is that as we studied these things, I

informed President Kennedy and not Mr. Johnson that we were moving in our thinking

towards Houston. Albert Thomas was a pretty powerful man in the House at this time. I never told Albert Thomas that our thoughts were moving in this direction. But Kennedy called up Thomas one day and said, "I need your help on a couple of bills here--three bills." And Albert said, "Now, Mr. President, I don't know about this." And Kennedy said, "Now, you know Jim Webb is thinking about putting this center down in Houston." Albert never knew it until that time. And he said, "In that case, Mr. President--" and he supported the three things, but he felt that he had a commitment from Kennedy from then on.

…Now, Mr. Johnson was much more intimate in the sense of saying, "You know, I

hear this," or, "I hear that," or, "These people are maneuvering around. What are they

really up to?" Because he and I had a more intimate relationship than I ever had with

Kennedy. In many ways, he was a sort of lonely man. Every once in awhile he would

want to get someone that he knew, liked, trusted, and just talk a little bit. And this would

extend into his telephone conversations. He's a great man on the telephone. He loved to

call you up and just talk on the phone. He also was a great man to try you out, to put a

great deal of pressure on you just to see how you reacted to the pressure. He got a little

fun out of that, I think.

…Well, the problem insofar as NASA was concerned was zero. We never had any business with Bobby Baker, never did any, I never met him except once or twice on social occasions, I never turned to him for advice about what was going on in the Senate. When Clark Mollenhoff first broke the stuff, he called me up on the phone and he said, "You know about that house Bobby Baker got?" I said, "No, I don't know about it." He said, "Were you ever there?" "No, I was never there." And so forth. I mean, I just was not involved in that side of the operation.

Now Fred Black was working for North American, they were our very large

contractor, and Black was sent to me by Senator Kerr on three different occasions. We

turned every one of them down. So as far as we were concerned NASA simply was not

involved. Now, the Senate went into a pretty careful investigation after the fire and there

were a lot of ugly rumors and in executive session Senator Brooke was the guy who

stepped forward and said, "Now, I have to ask you these questions." He said, "Were you

ever a stockholder in the Serve-U Vending Company?" I said, "No, sir." "Were you ever

a director?" "No, sir." "Did you negotiate the contracts by which the vending machines

were put into North American?" "No, sir. I didn't know about it until I read about it in

the papers."

The reason it became sort of, I think, acute was when I was in Oklahoma I was

asked to go on the board--you see, I was on several boards outside the Kerr-McGee

group--I was asked to go on the board of the Fidelity Bank and Trust Company, which

was a small independent bank. I told them I couldn't afford to do that just for director's

fees, unless it was some business interest I couldn't do it. That worked forward to the

point that I and other people in Kerr-McGee bought a substantial interest in the bank, and

I became a director representing our group.

Now, when I became Space Administrator, I did not sell the Fidelity stock. The

last thing that ever entered my mind was that a bank in Oklahoma City would be involved

in any way with the space business. It turned out that Senator Kerr arranged for that very

bank to loan money to Bobby Baker in a substantial amount. So everyone tried to draw

the association that I owned stock in the bank, Baker got a loan from the bank, the

vending machines went into North American. So it was a question of association, but

there was nothing to it and the record of the Senate investigating committee, the Senate

committee in executive session, clearly shows that. So there was no problem so far as we

were concerned; it was a problem where people who were looking for something to burn

Mr. Johnson or Senator Kerr or the Democrats were determined that there was something

wrong and that they were going to go find it.

…I do not remember ever discussing it, except after the fire, when I made it clear that all the stuff that had been raked over before would probably be raked over again because North American was the contractor, and that he should make up his mind how he wanted the investigation handled, that I was prepared to do it responsibly and show that a government agency could get at the facts and whatever deficiencies that were there could overcome them, or we could have a presidential commission, or we could have a congressional investigation, he would have anything he wanted. And I pointed out to him on that occasion that a good deal of the past stuff about the Baker-Black episode would probably be raised by his enemies, and he should take that into account in deciding how he wanted it handled. And he said, "I want you to handle it."

You see, Hornig and his scientists were urging a presidential commission. There is

always somebody around urging something. And I just made it very clear that if he

wanted me to do it, I would do it, and that if he wanted it any other way, it was fine with

me. So he said, "All right, I want you to do it." I said, "Well, now, there's just one

stipulation I want to lay down. And that is that you are not bound to this decision. You

can change it at any time you want, but I want to be told first. If you change your mind

about wanting me to be in charge of it and get the job done, then you tell me first if you

want to change." So we shook hands--only time I ever struck a bargain with a presidential

handshake.

…And let me say this: that this was perfectly clear to President Kennedy as well as to

me. I talked to the President about two or three weeks before he was killed, and I said,

"Now, look, we're going into a campaign, and I have had a good deal of experience in

these matters and so have you. The space program is going to be an issue in the campaign

in '64. How are you going to furnish the leadership? What are you going to be prepared

to do? Are you going to stake your whole prestige on support of this program?" And I

said, "I have to tell you that I think that the Secretary of Defense will not want to support

the program as having substantial military value. So you are going into a political

campaign with my saying that it has very important technological benefits for the military

services, and the Secretary of Defense being unwilling to say it."

In a limited way. Kennedy sent for me. This was, I think, a day after Gilruth had made a

speech up here before some kind of an organization in which he talked about the

importance of preeminence in space, the fact that you couldn't have a Russian spacecraft

attached to an American booster, that the technical problems were too great, stuff of this

kind. The President said that he was thinking of making another effort with respect to

cooperation with the Russians, and he thought he might do it before the United Nations,

and he said, "Are you in sufficient control to prevent my being undercut in NASA if I do

that?" So in a sense he didn't ask me if he should do it; he told me he thought he should

do it and wanted to do it and that he wanted some assurance from me as to whether or not

he would be undercut at NASA. I said, "No, sir, I have sufficient control and I will see

that you are not undercut." So he said, "Thank you very much."

I went on to St. Louis, and I was there at Senator Symington's house, we had been

moving around out there a little bit in Missouri, when Bundy called me and said, "The

President does want to make this speech, and he wants to be sure that you know about it."

So I then immediately telephoned direct instructions around to the centers to make no

comment of any kind or description on this matter. So in a sense I was in on it, but not as

a deciding person.

B: Then, sir comes Mr. Kennedy's tragic death and Johnson's succession to the presidency. Do you recall when you first saw him after the assassination?

W: Gosh, it's so hard to dissociate what you see on television and what you see in person.

B: Yes, particularly at that event. He's known to have called a number of people in the days immediately after the assassination.

W: He did not call me. The first time I remember seeing or doing any business with him—I mean, I might have seen him casually, shaken his hands, I mean, I was in and out, I had a White House pass, as you know, so I could go in, and out without asking anybody. The first time that anything of any significance occurred was sometime about the middle or end of December when he was considering the submission of his budget. You see, Kennedy had not sent a budget up, and he sent for me with Kermit Gordon, the budget director, and he said, now, let's see, maybe he had me at a Cabinet [meeting]. He used to, you know, invite me every once in awhile to Cabinet meetings and to other meetings in the Cabinet Room, and I may have been at one of those and he said, "Come into my office afterwards." But in any event, he and Kermit Gordon and I were there in his office, and he said, "I've just got to get some kind of a tax bill through, and Harry Byrd will not support it unless I guarantee I will hold expenditures of NASA under $5 billion, and I want you to do that." I said, "All right, sir, if that's what you want me to do, that's what I'll do." You see Dryden, Seamans and I kept a control on the program so that we were not a juggernaut, we were not out from under control in the wild way that people said.

Edited May 5, 2010 by William Kelly

[Pamela Brown]

There is a unique aspect to NSA 271 that may perhaps have been overlooked - namely that JFK, who was in some respects a mouthpiece for Wernher Von Braun, may have been working both behind the scenes and directly to reassemble the Peenemunde group that was split up at the end of WWII. This would place him in the position of, in effect, attempting to push the agendas of a Fourth Reich. In addition, his father, Papa Joe, was a Hitler appeaser. I find it hard to believe that these odd coincidences were overlooked by those who wished ill to JFK.

[Pamela Brown]

From Jean Hudon's Newsletter

WHY JFK WAS SHOT

"Citizens of this Earth, we are not alone."

With those dramatic words, President John F. Kennedy intended to inform

the American public and the world at large that the U.S. government had

made contact with aliens from deep space.

But before he could deliver the speech on November 22, 1963, the beloved

leader was cut down by an assassin's bullets.

That is the astonishing claim of JFK researcher Professor Lawrence

Merrick, author of an upcoming blockbuster book Killing the Messenger:

The Death of JFK.

"We now know the real reason why President Kennedy was assassinated,"

declared Prof. Merrick of Cambridge, Mass.

"It appears that some individuals within our government were determined

to maintain the secrecy surrounding captured UFOs -- and decided to

silence the President before he could speak."

Prof. Merrick says he began a search for the undelivered speech after

learning the President's original handwritten notes had fallen into the

hands of Texas Governor John Connally -- who was riding in JFK's death

car that fateful day in Dallas.

"I was surprised to find that Kennedy handed Connally the speech, which

was on note cards, to look at, shortly before the motorcade set off at

12:55 p.m.," said Prof. Merrick.

The governor was badly wounded in the gun attack.

"Connally was terrified for his own life," said the historian.

"He placed the bloodstained index cards in a safety deposit box with

orders to a trusted aide that the contents not be revealed until after

his death."

When Gov. Connally died in 1993, the aide removed the cards and held on

to them.

Last year, Prof. Merrick tracked down the aide, who passed the speech on

with a guarantee of anonymity.

Prof. Merrick was flabbergasted when he read the cards. He took them to

five handwriting analysts, who agreed the speech was "95 percent

certain" to be Kennedy's.

Research reveals that just days before his trip to Dallas, JFK met with

his predecessor President Dwight D. Eisenhower, notes Prof. Merrick.

"I believe he was seeking advice on whether to go public with the facts

about UFOs," Prof. Merrick said. "But other government insiders

apparently felt the truth about UFOs would cause widespread panic. And

they were willing to kill to keep the information secret.

"I hope now President Clinton will give the speech that should have been

delivered 36 years ago."

Here is what the President would have said:

My fellow Americans, people of the world, today we set forth on a

journey into a new era. One age, the childhood of mankind, is ending and

another age is about to begin.

The journey of which I speak is full of unknowable challenges, but I

believe that all our yesterdays, all the struggles of the past, have

uniquely prepared our generation to prevail.

Citizens of this Earth, we are not alone. God, in His infinite wisdom,

has seen fit to populate His universe with other beings -- intelligent creatures such as ourselves.

How can I state this with such authority?

In the year 1947 our military forces recovered from the dry New Mexico

desert the remains of an aircraft of unknown origin. Science soon

determined that this vehicle came from the far reaches of outer space.

Since that time our government has made contact with the creators of

that spacecraft.

Though this news may sound fantastic -- and indeed, terrifying -- I ask

that you not greet it with undue fear or pessimism. I assure you, as

your President, that these beings mean us no harm.

Rather, they promise to help our nation overcome the common enemies of

all mankind -- tyranny, poverty, disease, war.

We have determined that they are not foes, but friends. Together with

them we can create a better world. I cannot tell you that there will be

no stumbling or missteps on the road ahead.

But I believe that we have found the true destiny of the people of this

great land: To lead the world into a glorious future.

In the coming days, weeks and months, you will learn more about these

visitors, why they are here and why our leaders have kept their presence

a secret from you for so long.

I ask you to look to the future not with timidity but with courage.

Because we can achieve in our time the ancient vision of peace on Earth

and prosperity for all humankind.

God bless you.

I might be tempted to consider this article the product of a well-intended loonie except for the fact that Wernher Von Braun is on record, through Dr. Carol Rosin, who was his spokesperson for the last few years of his life, of saying very much the same thing (not about JFK's assassination) about extra-terrestrial life. And if we are tempted to wonder what color the sky was in WVB's world, we have only to take a nanosecond to recognize the fact that if there were unique experiences he would not only have heard about them but would have had to figure out what to do about them in order to keep the Apollo craft and crew safe. WVB was right in the middle of everything. Oh, and, in an odd coincidence, he happened to be right next door in Alamogordo when whatever it was crashed at Roswell NM. :-0

Edited December 15, 2015 by Pamela Brown

[James DiEugenio]

Has no one here read Seamus Coogan's masterful expose of the MJ 12 hoax at CTKA?

http://ctka.net/2011/MJ-12_Preamble_I.html

Although Seamus is associated more with hit critique of John Hankey, I always thought this was the best thing he ever wrote for CTKA. Very important in so many ways. The people who pushed this one remind me of the people who put together that recent hoax about Stanley Kubrick directing the moon landing.

This piece is so good it actually got Seamus a paying job in journalism.

[Pamela Brown]

Has no one here read Seamus Coogan's masterful expose of the MJ 12 hoax at CTKA?

http://ctka.net/2011/MJ-12_Preamble_I.html

Although Seamus is associated more with hit critique of John Hankey, I always thought this was the best thing he ever wrote for CTKA. Very important in so many ways. The people who pushed this one remind me of the people who put together that recent hoax about Stanley Kubrick directing the moon landing.

This piece is so good it actually got Seamus a paying job in journalism.

I have read it and found it very interesting. It does, however, imo, fall prey to the fallacy of false alternatives. It also concerns me that anyone in the JFK conspiracy research community, comfortable with weighing and evaluating different aspects of the conspiracy and coverup could then turn around and slap the wrists of anyone asking for more definition about the issues of UFOs etc. So I appreciate the article, just have a different perspective.

[Douglas Caddy]

I have come to believe that the CIA is behind the disinformation being promoted that denies the existence of Majestic12 and its successors.

A president of the U.S. who was presented with credible information concerning the threat of extraterrestrial aliens to Planet Earth would undoubtedly move quickly to create an entity such as Majestic12 to monitor and advise. This is what President Truman did.

Succeeding U.S. presidents have dealt with the issue also.

http://fktv.is/mikhail-gorbachev-confirms-discussing-andquot-alien-threat-scenarioandquot-with-president-reagan-27476