Strange Life of Lee Harvey Oswald

[William Kelly]

Ron Kurtus appears to be an educator with a philosophy of education.

However I find his portrait of the accused assassin incomplete and more disturbing than the character he is trying to describe. Doesn't anyone else feel there is something grossly wrong with this? - BK

Strange Life of Lee Harvey Oswald: Assassination

School for Champions Profile

http://www.schoolfor...ey_oswald_3.htm

by Ron Kurtus (revised 8 January 2008)

As a child, Lee Harvey Oswald showed signs of violence and rebellion. He later was a U.S. Marine, lived in Russia and was involved in pro-Castro activities. Oswald then assassinated President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. A few hours later, he was arrested. Two days later, Oswald was assassinated on national television. Afterwards, many conspiracy theories concerning the assassination were created.

Questions you may have include:

• What where Oswald's childhood days like?
• What sort of adventures did he have as an adult?
• What happened during and after the assassination?

This lesson will answer those questions. There is a mini-quiz near the end of the lesson.google_protectAndRun("ads_core.google_render_ad", google_handleError, google_render_ad);

Stevenson assaulted in Dallas

On October 24, 1963, about a month before President John F. Kennedy was to be in Dallas, United Nations Ambassador Adlai Stevenson was assaulted in Dallas by an anti-U.N. fanatic.

Advisors warned Kennedy not to go to Dallas, because of the apparent hostile atmosphere in the city. Kennedy said he did not believe there would be any problems. On November 18, the Dallas Times Herald detailed the exact route of the presidential motorcade. It would run right past the Texas School Book Depository where Oswald worked.

Oswald saw opportunity

Apparently, Oswald saw this as an opportunity to make his mark and get back at society. He had never been known to be anti-Kennedy, although undoubtedly many of the pro-Castro Marxists had a grudge against Kennedy for the Bay of Pigs attack and the blockade of Cuba. There may have been conversations denouncing Kennedy and wishing the worse for him.

Although the FBI was aware of Oswald's far-left politics and bizarre activities, apparently they did not feel he was a threat to the President.

Shoots Kennedy

On Friday, November 22, 1963, Lee rose early at 6:30 AM to go to work. A neighbor said she saw him carrying a long package, and people in the Texas School Book Depository also saw him carry the package into the building. Oswald was later seen on the sixth floor of the building, looking out toward the motorcade route, taking stock of the situation.

At 12:30 PM, Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President John F. Kennedy. Texas Governor John Connally was also seriously wounded.

Lee left the rifle by the sixth floor window. A few minutes later, he was seen rushing from the building and boarding a bus. After the bus was stopped in traffic, Oswald got off and hailed a cab. He went to his rooming house and retrieved his pistol.

Captured

At 1:15 PM, Officer J.D. Tippit confronted him. Oswald shot and killed the officer. This alerted the Dallas police as to the whereabouts of the possible assassin.

Lee entered the Texas Theater to hide. The police then captured and arrested him. Lee was brought to Dallas Police headquarters and questioned. He was then formally arraigned for the murder of Tippit.

After he appeared in several lineups, Oswald was charged with the murder of President Kennedy.

On the morning of Saturday, November 23rd, Oswald was formally arraigned for the murder of Kennedy. After more questioning, Marina and Marguerite were permitted to visit Lee. He said he wanted Attorney John Abt to represent him. Abt was a former communist and known for representing people who had tried to overthrow the government.

That afternoon, Lee's brother Robert visited him. Robert later said that Lee told him that he had murdered Kennedy. Robert noted that his brother's eyes were cold and showed no emotion in his confession.

Killed

On the morning of Sunday, November 24th, Oswald was signed out of jail to be in transferred to the county facility. After a final round of questions, the transfer party started to leave the building. Members of the news media were waiting outside for a glimpse of Oswald. At 11:21 AM, Lee Harvey Oswald was shot and killed by Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby as police were escorting Oswald out of the Dallas city jail.

Jack Ruby shoots Oswald

NBC had been broadcasting the event live, and millions watched in horror the shooting of Oswald.

Ruby had been seen in the halls of the Dallas police headquarters on several occasions after the arrest of Oswald. He had impersonated a newspaper reporter to get into the area. As Ruby shot Oswald, he yelled, "You killed my President, you rat!" He was immediately arrested.

Investigations

After the death of Oswald, there were investigations of President Kennedy's assassination. Although many conspiracy theories were brought forth, in the end, it was concluded that Oswald was the lone gunman.

Multiple shooters

Because of the apparent sound of shots from several directions, some thought there were gunmen shooting from a nearby grassy knoll. Acoustic analysis concluded those sounds were echoes.

KGB spy

One theory was that Oswald was really a Soviet KGB spy by the name of Alek. The real Oswald was still in Russia. The theory claimed that the KGB was responsible for killing Kennedy. Oswald'sor Alek'sbody was exhumed years after his death and dental records showed that the body truly was Lee Harvey Oswald.

Impossible to hit moving target

Tests on whether a sharpshooter could fire two rapid shots from the 6th floor of a building and hit a moving target so accurately have been made and shown to be possible.

JFK movie

Producer Oliver Stone's 1991 movie JFK claimed to expose multiple conspiracies concerning the Kennedy assassination and stated that Oswald was innocent. Unfortunately, this was a gross distortion of historical facts in an effort to make money. (See Resources below.)

David Ferrie connection

David Ferrie knew Lee Harvey Oswald years before in the Civil Air Patrol. A strident anti-Communist, Ferrie became associated with the New Orleans office of the Frente Revolucionario Democratico, a CIA-backed organization. He was an associate of private investigator Guy Banister, a former FBI agent and political activist. Banister's office was right around the corner from the Cuban Revolutionary Council, an anti-Castro group. Oswald had included that address on some of the flyers he had been handing out.

On the afternoon of the day that Kennedy was assassinated, Banister and Jack Martin went drinking together. The two men got involved in a dispute, and Banister hit Martin several times. Martin was so badly injured that he had to be detained in the local Charity Hospital.

Over the next few days, Martin told reporters and authorities that Ferrie had been involved in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. According to Martin, Ferrie had known Lee Harvey Oswald from their days in the New Orleans Civil Air Patrol, had given him lessons on how to use a rifle with a telescopic sight, had flown Oswald to Texas and had hypnotized Oswald into assassinating Kennedy.

The FBI interviewed Martin. They then considered his evidence unreliable. But they also interviewed Ferrie twice, as well as about 20 other people in connection with the allegations. They were unable to develop a substantial case against Ferrie.

Summary

Lee Harvey Oswald saw an opportunity and assassinated President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. He may have been convinced to do this by other agitators or made up the plan himself. A few hours after Kennedy was shot, Oswald was arrested. Two days later, he was shot and killed as he was being led from the Dallas jail. Afterwards, many conspiracy theories concerning the assassination were created.

Lessons learned from this biography are:

• Bad people often have a track record of problems
• Radical or extreme politics often leads to violence
• Sometimes there is more to a historical event than meets the eye
  See side menu for more Biography topics

Those were violent times

Resources

The following are resources on this subject.

Websites

Chronology of Oswald's life - Marquette University

Lee Harvey Oswald - Famous Texans

Lee Harvey Oswald - Spartacus Schoolnet, United Kingdom

Lee Harvey Oswald in Russia - Conspiracy theory

The Assassination Goes Hollywood - Refuting "facts" of Oliver Stone movie JFK

Biography Resources

Edited July 8, 2010 by William Kelly

[William Kelly]

I think that a lot of people's misconceptions about the assassination stem from their perception of Lee Harvey Oswald.

If he killed the President and Tippit, he's a murderer as evil as Hitler.

But that belief in his guilt also makes people who assume Oswald is an evil murderer

unable to perceive him as a Patsy, even when shown that he couldn't have been the Sixth Floor Sniper,

and there are other suspects.

This profile, like Gerald Ford's Profile of the Assassin, and others, all portray Oswald as a cold cock

killer, but they can't explain why, other than to say he was crazy, his wife left him, he was a loser, etc.

I don't think Oswald was a killer or an evil person at all, and these portraits are wrong because they fail

to mention the other side of Oswald.

BK

[Greg Parker]

Ron Kurtus appears to be an educator with a philosophy of education.

However I find his portrait of the accused assassin incomplete and more disturbing than the character he is trying to describe. Doesn't anyone else feel there is something grossly wrong with this? - BK

Strange Life of Lee Harvey Oswald: Assassination

School for Champions Profile

by Ron Kurtus (revised 8 January 2008)

As a child, Lee Harvey Oswald showed signs of violence and rebellion.

We have evidence of one fight at school, and a very dubious story about pulling a knife on his sister-in-law (I intend one day, to show how this story was either fabricated or exaggerated/mischaracterized). I had more than one fight at school. I'd think most boys did. That these two episodes (with one potentially not even a REAL issue), are used to show he was violent, is exasperating.

His "rebelliousness" period was bookended by his 13^th birthday (studies on potential defectors was done on 13 to 17 year olds) and John Pic leaving the Port Security Unit a unit of the CG whose whole raison d'être revolved around ridding the waterfronts of subversive elements. The schools Oswald attended would have been filled with the kids of immigrant East European waterfront workers. Not saluting the flag may well have been a type of entrapment play… seeing who supported his action which at the height of Cold War paranoia should have called into question his own loyalty and by extension, that of his family. That no such question of HIS loyalty arose, is in itself very telling, imo.

The "rebelliousness" then possibly served a dual purpose: a cover for helping expose antiAmerican sentiment in the families of waterfront workers and; helping build a profile as a potential defector.

He later was a U.S. Marine, lived in Russia and was involved in pro-Castro activities. Oswald then assassinated President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. A few hours later, he was arrested. Two days later, Oswald was assassinated on national television. Afterwards, many conspiracy theories concerning the assassination were created.

Questions you may have include:

· What where Oswald's childhood days like?

· What sort of adventures did he have as an adult?

· What happened during and after the assassination?

This lesson will answer those questions. There is a mini-quiz near the end of the lesson.

Stevenson assaulted in Dallas

On October 24, 1963, about a month before President John F. Kennedy was to be in Dallas, United Nations Ambassador Adlai Stevenson was assaulted in Dallas by an anti-U.N. fanatic.

Advisors warned Kennedy not to go to Dallas, because of the apparent hostile atmosphere in the city. Kennedy said he did not believe there would be any problems. On November 18, the Dallas Times Herald detailed the exact route of the presidential motorcade. It would run right past the Texas School Book Depository where Oswald worked.

The route may not have been officially confirmed prior to Oswald commencing at the TSBD, but the Dallas Host Committee was always going to have its way on the Trade Mart. It was a foregone conclusion; no doubt about that in my mind.

Oswald saw opportunity

Apparently, Oswald saw this as an opportunity to make his mark and get back at society. He had never been known to be anti-Kennedy, although undoubtedly many of the pro-Castro Marxists had a grudge against Kennedy for the Bay of Pigs attack and the blockade of Cuba. There may have been conversations denouncing Kennedy and wishing the worse for him.

Use sources like McAdams and Reitzes and this is what you end up with.

Although the FBI was aware of Oswald's far-left politics and bizarre activities, apparently they did not feel he was a threat to the President.

A can of worms.

Shoots Kennedy

On Friday, November 22, 1963, Lee rose early at 6:30 AM to go to work. A neighbor said she saw him carrying a long package,

But not long enough to hold the rifle…

and people in the Texas School Book Depository also saw him carry the package into the building.

No they did not.

Oswald was later seen on the sixth floor of the building, looking out toward the motorcade route, taking stock of the situation

No he was not.

At 12:30 PM, Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President John F. Kennedy. Texas Governor John Connally was also seriously wounded.

No he did not.

Lee left the rifle by the sixth floor window.

Wrong person; wrong rifle hiding place.

A few minutes later, he was seen rushing from the building and boarding a bus.

Whoa! This is getting bizarre. He was NOT seen leaving the building. He was NOT seen boarding a bus.

After the bus was stopped in traffic, Oswald got off and hailed a cab. He went to his rooming house and retrieved his pistol.

The actual evidence he was on the bus is among the more dubious of that day. No bus = no taxi = no retrieval of pistol. In fact, he owned no pistol.

Captured

At 1:15 PM, Officer J.D. Tippit confronted him. Oswald shot and killed the officer. This alerted the Dallas police as to the whereabouts of the possible assassin.

The time of the Tippit shooting was earlier than 1:15. The Dallas Police denied they had connected the two murders, though this was refuted by at least one media man who was at the arrest scene.

Mr. GRIFFIN. At the time you opened up the curtains and looked out, did you have any idea that this might be the man who would be accused of shooting the President?

Mr. ROBERTSON. If I hadn't, I wouldn't have been there.

On a side note, I've always thought this testimony from Robertson was interesting:

Mr. GRIFFIN. How close was your photographer to you?

Mr. ROBERTSON. I don't have any idea. He was there someplace shooting his pictures.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you know if he got a picture of that episode?

Mr. ROBERTSON. I thought he did until just the other day when they told me he didn't. Apparently the filter in the camera was in the wrong place.

This was Ron Reiland, a professional cameraman. Although it is possible he made the biggest mistake of his professional career by not placing the filter correctly, I find it all too convenient that the only footage of the arrest came out too dark for viewing anything clearly.

Lee entered the Texas Theater to hide. The police then captured and arrested him. Lee was brought to Dallas Police headquarters and questioned. He was then formally arraigned for the murder of Tippit.

There was NO arraignment.

After he appeared in several lineups, Oswald was charged with the murder of President Kennedy.

On the morning of Saturday, November 23rd, Oswald was formally arraigned for the murder of Kennedy.

There was NO arraignment.

After more questioning, Marina and Marguerite were permitted to visit Lee. He said he wanted Attorney John Abt to represent him. Abt was a former communist and known for representing people who had tried to overthrow the government.

The Smith Act sought to abridge freedom of speech for advocating a political system antithetical to capitalism. Other laws dealt with "wanting to overthrow the government". I don't think any of the Smith Act defendants were charged with treason or similar offences, and the usual penalty for Smith Act "offence" was 5 years not death. In any case, it was eventually ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. It is not true that Abt defended Smith Act clients. He did act as an advisor to the legal teams.

Abt was more directly involved in McCarran Act litigation.

That afternoon, Lee's brother Robert visited him. Robert later said that Lee told him that he had murdered Kennedy.

Robert made no such claims. Unbelievable crap.

Robert noted that his brother's eyes were cold and showed no emotion in his confession.

There was NO confession. What did he have to confess to?

Killed

On the morning of Sunday, November 24th, Oswald was signed out of jail to be in transferred to the county facility. After a final round of questions, the transfer party started to leave the building. Members of the news media were waiting outside

There was a crowd outside. But the media throng was in the basement.

for a glimpse of Oswald. At 11:21 AM, Lee Harvey Oswald was shot and killed by Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby as police were escorting Oswald out of the Dallas city jail.

Oswald was shot because Fritz broke the tight formation HE had ordered for the protection of the prisoner. Had that formation been kept, Oswald gets out alive.

Jack Ruby shoots Oswald

NBC had been broadcasting the event live, and millions watched in horror the shooting of Oswald.

Ruby had been seen in the halls of the Dallas police headquarters on several occasions after the arrest of Oswald. He had impersonated a newspaper reporter to get into the area. As Ruby shot Oswald, he yelled, "You killed my President, you rat!" He was immediately arrested.

That is what Ruby claimed he said, yes…

Investigations

After the death of Oswald, there were investigations of President Kennedy's assassination. Although many conspiracy theories were brought forth, in the end, it was concluded that Oswald was the lone gunman.

From John Abt's autobiography: "At one point, Rankin asked Arnold Johnson to appear before the Warren Commission and I accompanied him. We had little to say, for our small tale was barely worth the telling. The Party hardly enjoyed a beneficent relationship with the federal government, and we expected little charity this time around. But it quickly became obvious that neither the FBI no the Warren Commission were interested in digging into the case, to really discover if there was a conspiracy. They certainly weren't interested in showing that the Communists were a party to the matter. We were pleased with this, of course, but it seemed somewhat unusual given the unrelenting hostility federal agencies had heretofore shown to the Party. They were quite content to let it rest as they had started out: Oswald was alone responsible, an unfathomable lone assassin." Advocate and activist: memoirs of an American communist lawyer pp252-3

Multiple shooters

Because of the apparent sound of shots from several directions, some thought there were gunmen shooting from a nearby grassy knoll. Acoustic analysis concluded those sounds were echoes.

KGB spy

One theory was that Oswald was really a Soviet KGB spy by the name of Alek. The real Oswald was still in Russia. The theory claimed that the KGB was responsible for killing Kennedy. Oswald'sor Alek'sbody was exhumed years after his death and dental records showed that the body truly was Lee Harvey Oswald.

Nobodies spy. Asset, if anything. The only real question is whether he was witting or unwitting.

Edited July 18, 2010 by Greg Parker

[Peter McGuire]

I think that a lot of people's misconceptions about the assassination stem from their perception of Lee Harvey Oswald.

If he killed the President and Tippit, he's a murderer as evil as Hitler.

But that belief in his guilt also makes people who assume Oswald is an evil murderer

unable to perceive him as a Patsy, even when shown that he couldn't have been the Sixth Floor Sniper,

and there are other suspects.

This profile, like Gerald Ford's Profile of the Assassin, and others, all portray Oswald as a cold cock

killer, but they can't explain why, other than to say he was crazy, his wife left him, he was a loser, etc.

I don't think Oswald was a killer or an evil person at all, and these portraits are wrong because they fail

to mention the other side of Oswald.

BK

They are clearly one sided. You have to admit that the conspirators did a great job in this aspect of the plot. When you create a cop-killer who tried to kill a General who then worked at the building where shots came from and capture him with a pistol and get pictures of him beaten while resisting arrest, you have what you need. Subsequent information will not matter. You have your man.

LEE HARVEY OSWALD

. . . if you put the murdered President of the United States on one side of a scale and that wretched waif Oswald on the other side, it doesn't balance. You want to add something weightier to Oswald. It would invest the President's death with meaning, endowing him with martyrdom. He would have died for something. . . . A conspiracy would, of course, do the job nicely. — William Manchester.

Edited July 18, 2010 by Peter McGuire

[Len Colby]

His "rebelliousness" period was bookended by his 13^th birthday (studies on potential defectors was done on 13 to 17 year olds) and John Pic leaving the Port Security Unit – a unit of the CG whose whole raison d'être revolved around ridding the waterfronts of subversive elements.

Incorrect as has already been pointed out to you on another thread. The PSU as it's name indicates is and was responsible for providing security at ports. Briefly at the height of the Cold War ssisting the FBI investigate supposed subversives was only part of its responsibilities, it cleared the vast majority of the people in investigated (was over 90% IIRC). Their is no evidence Pic was involved in those investigations.

[David Andrews]

Oswald was perhaps the best-connected 24 year-old in history, with incredible breadth of association. It would be an unexplainable anomaly for such a person to act - or be acted upon - apart from some confluence of those connections.

[Peter McGuire]

Oswald was perhaps the best-connected 24 year-old in history, with incredible breadth of association. It would be an unexplainable anomaly for such a person to act - or be acted upon - apart from some confluence of those connections.

Indeed.

Johnson told Walter Cronkite in an April 1975 interview that “he was quite a mysterious fellow, and he did have a connection that bore examination, and the extent of the influence of those connections on him I think history will deal with more than we're able to do now."

From Plausible Denial Mark Lane page 45

[David Andrews]

Oswald was perhaps the best-connected 24 year-old in history, with incredible breadth of association. It would be an unexplainable anomaly for such a person to act - or be acted upon - apart from some confluence of those connections.

Indeed.

Johnson told Walter Cronkite in an April 1975 interview that “he was quite a mysterious fellow, and he did have a connection that bore examination, and the extent of the influence of those connections on him I think history will deal with more than we're able to do now."

From Plausible Denial Mark Lane page 45

Maybe Alexander the Great had Lee beat for connections at 24 - but Alex came from money.

In all their experiences, Oswald's contemporaries - Gordon Novel, Gerry Hemming, Loran Hall - had never done the Mission to Moscow duty that Lee did.

To Jim DiEugenio - when you discuss with Len Osanic and John Judge how the research community should convene to establish CT issues that can't be argued or ignored...maybe the range of connections attributable to Oswald (or "Oswald") is one talking point to apply.

Edited July 18, 2010 by David Andrews

[Mark Knight]

Considering all that Oswald did, all the places he went, and all the people he knew...if Oswald wasn't doing this stuff on orders from a handler [FBI, CIA, ONI, or maybe ARMY Intel], if the LN'er are correct that this was all a coincidence...then Lee Harvey Oswald was the REAL Forrest Gump.

[Greg Parker]

His "rebelliousness" period was bookended by his 13^th birthday (studies on potential defectors was done on 13 to 17 year olds) and John Pic leaving the Port Security Unit a unit of the CG whose whole raison d'être revolved around ridding the waterfronts of subversive elements.

Incorrect as has already been pointed out to you on another thread. The PSU as it's name indicates is and was responsible for providing security at ports. Briefly at the height of the Cold War ssisting the FBI investigate supposed subversives was only part of its responsibilities, it cleared the vast majority of the people in investigated (was over 90% IIRC). Their is no evidence Pic was involved in those investigations.

It was a small part of what the Coast Guard did. It was a 100% of what the PSU did. That is all the evidence needed that Pic was involved in it. You want him to confirm it? Too bad. He was happy to volunteer what his duties were when working on the cutters, but he was completely mute about what he did in the PSU.

The PSU, at the outbreak of the Korean War, was tasked with eliminating "risks from suspected communist merchant seamen and waterfront workers".It did so by working with the FBI and ONI, as well as their existing networks of informants. The numbers of those who lost their jobs due to this program was "probably greater than the toll of victims in any other loyalty or security program of the day." Security Isn't Free by Commander C Douglas Kroll, Naval History Magazine, February, 2002. According to the same article, the Navy now admits that data collected from informants was never checked and many of those affected, were either innocent, or at the very least, posed no threat to National Security. Pic was based at Ellis Island, which housed immigrants - many of whom hailed from East Europe. The potential for enemy agents and subversives among them was greater than any other group. If you wanted to find potential security threats - Ellis Island had plenty going for it. By August of 1952 when Lee Oswald arrived, 500,000 individuals had been screened in the program and demand for people to work in the PSU was unprecedented - yet at that very time, Pic was granted leave to show his kid brother around the Big Apple.

There is also this extremely interesting information from Hank Albarelli:

After Bainbridge, from April 1952 to February 1953, Lee Harvey Oswald's half-brother returned to New York City and was assigned to the Coast Guard's Port Security Unit at Ellis Island. The Security Unit, an outgrowth of the Espionage Act of 1950, was charged with identifying, investigating, and ridding the New York harbor, longshoreman's union, and maritime industry of Communists and subversive elements.

This assignment is extremely interesting because earlier, in April 1951, one of Frank Olson's killers was being held, pending deportation, in a cell on Ellis Island. Later, at the same time that Oswald's step-brother was assigned to duty on the island, several additional major drug traffickers from France and Corsica, apprehended in a major Federal Narcotics Bureau operation headed up by George Hunter White as a dual narcotics-CIA operative, were being held at Ellis Island. Illicit drugs impounded from these arrests were transferred to a secret holding compound in New Jersey, where according to CIA documents, the drugs were disbursed to various researchers under contract with the CIA and to other unknown places. One of the French traffickers apprehended by White would be sent to a federal prison in Atlanta where he would be subjected to intense mind control experiments. Multiple drugs were used during those experiments, including morphinum, dicain, and heroin. Some readers may recall that these same drugs in 1964 were discovered listed in Lee Harvey Oswald's stepbrother's notebook. (Dicain, according to pharmacists, has never been available in the U.S. It can only be purchased overseas, and was used in Eastern Europe.)

Of equal interest, is that earlier still, during World War II, White and a number of other FBN agents assigned to the OSS, precursor to the CIA, worked very closely in New York with Port Security and the Office of Naval Intelligence on what is now commonly called Operation Underworld. This was the top-secret project that involved the freeing from prison of infamous gangster Charles "Lucky" Luciano in return for his, and the Mafia's, assistance with the Allied invasion of Italy. All of the FBN agents assigned to work on Operation Underworld went on to become covert operatives for the CIA, and would become connected in a variety of ways with Projects MK/ULTRA and MK/NAOMI.

In anticipation that you'll want something to verify the PSU was an outgrowth of the Espionage Act, I have lifted this from one of my past posts on the subject: These [Port Security] units had been set up in response to Truman signing in Public Law 679 on the 9th of August, 1950.

From the previously quoted Navy History Magazine article:

In July 1950, maritime employers and the noncommunist maritime unions

attended a conference in Washington to address "questions of national

security," specifically, ways to prevent communists from remaining active in

the U.S. Merchant Marine.3 The ILWU and Marine Cooks and Stewards claimed

the objective of this conference was to crush them. (In fact, three

anticommunist locals of the ILWU attended the conference and signed the

agreement.4) All agreed to a plan whereby the Coast Guard would determine,

on the basis of information from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

and the Office of Naval Intelligence, who in the Merchant Marine were

security risks.5

By 4 August, a Seattle steamship company had fired 65 members of the Marine

Cooks and Stewards Union for refusing to submit to the screening test.6

Early in September, Captain Theodore R. Weitzel arrived on the West Coast to

head a 28-member team that would screen stevedores.7

Even before the voluntary program was adopted, Senator Warren G. Magnuson

(D-WA) introduced a bill to amend the Espionage Act of 1917. Magnuson's

speech mentioned the danger of foreign-flag vessels smuggling an atomic bomb

or bacteria into the country and the need for giving the President authority

to control such vessels in U.S. waters without declaring a complete

emergency.8 President Truman signed it into Public Law 679 on 9 August.

On 20 October the President issued Executive Order 10173, which directed the

Secretary of the Treasury to carry out the necessary safeguards and not only

superseded the voluntary program for the seagoing trades but also included

waterfront employees in the screening program. Access to vessels and

waterfront facilities was limited to people who carried a Coast Guard Port

Security Card. The order also provided for an appeal procedure.9

Edited July 19, 2010 by Greg Parker

[Greg Parker]

Greg:

I think Len asked: What is the evidence Pic was involved with PSU, and further that he was rooting out subversives rather than just making ports secure instead of just protecting them from crimes like vandalism and theft.

Jim,

Len is more than capable of accessing Pic's testimony where he gave a full run down of all his service postings.

The second part was answered. Here it is again for the terminally obdurate: It was a small part of what the Coast Guard did. It was a 100% of what the PSU did. That is all the evidence needed that Pic was involved in it. You want him to confirm it? Too bad. He was happy to volunteer what his duties were when working on the cutters, but he was completely mute about what he did in the PSU).

The PSU was not a )^&%ing pissant mob of dance hall bouncers, pub security guards or even waterfront police. The unit was formed specifically for reasons of National Security as an outgrowth of the old Espionage Act. It's sole purpose was in rooting out subversive elements. Thus, Pic could not have any other duties - especially ones imaged by the likes of Len. I can't make it any clearer than that. Lots of innocent people got caught up in it, and I believe Lee's "rebelion" (not saluting the flag etc) was merely an act designed to test the loyalty of other kids and teachers. Lee's "rebellion" ceased at the very same time Pic left the PSU.

[Jack White]

Oswald was perhaps the best-connected 24 year-old in history, with incredible breadth of association. It would be an unexplainable anomaly for such a person to act - or be acted upon - apart from some confluence of those connections.

He was outdone by the 19-year old Judyth Vary Baker by the world' best-connected individual.

LHO...best connected

JVB...best connected

Soulmates or.....?

Jack

[Thomas Graves]

Oswald was perhaps the best-connected 24 year-old in history, with incredible breadth of association. It would be an unexplainable anomaly for such a person to act - or be acted upon - apart from some confluence of those connections.

He was outdone by the 19-year old Judyth Vary Baker by the world' best-connected individual.

LHO...best connected

JVB...best connected

Soulmates or.....?

Jack

Was LHO "best connected" partially because he knew JVB, or was it the other way around? Or both? Or neither?

--Thomas

Edited July 19, 2010 by Thomas Graves

[Peter McGuire]

Considering all that Oswald did, all the places he went, and all the people he knew...if Oswald wasn't doing this stuff on orders from a handler [FBI, CIA, ONI, or maybe ARMY Intel], if the LN'er are correct that this was all a coincidence...then Lee Harvey Oswald was the REAL Forrest Gump.

Then let's get this important topic back on track.

Edited July 19, 2010 by Peter McGuire

[David Andrews]

Jack's funnin' us. But is there enough evidence in contacts, phone numbers, residences (esp. those LHO had or visited in Dallas) military assignments and documents, civilian cover jobs, etc., to prove or strongly imply that LHO was an active operative for one or more intel services on November 22, 1963? Perhaps this is an area where research consensus can be reached. I hope without resort to either Baker or Haslam.

Edited July 19, 2010 by David Andrews