New Book!

[Ernie Lazar]

I was told this morning that Paul Trejo's posting privileges have been removed because of a term he used which many people consider offensive -- but which Paul never intended as a derogatory or offensive comment.

Sometimes the Word Police do not make allowances for generational differences in understanding regarding how certain people should be described.

If any moderator is reading this thread, I would suggest re-instating Paul's privileges on a probationary basis and with a warning.

I think everybody here knows that my evaluation of Paul's reasoning ability and his research habits has not been very admirable - but I do not think he intended to use any slur nor do I think his one unintentional lapse should prevent him from making further contributions here.

[John Dolva]

I agree. Give him a chance.

[Paul Trejo]

OK, I'm back.

That said, I should point out that at this stage of our slow-read of Dr. Jeffrey Caufield's 2015 book, "General Walker and the Murder of President Kennedy: Extensive New Evidence of a Radical Right Conspiracy," my theory and Caufield's theory seem to clash head-on.

I have claimed for five years on this FORUM that General Walker selected LHO as his Patsy in the JFK murder for the precise reason that LHO tried to murder General Walker at his Dallas home on 10 April 1963.

I have also claimed that several Dallas engineer yuppies encouraged LHO to hate and despise General Walker (namely, George DeMohrenschildt, Volkmar Schmidt, Everett Glover and Michael Paine). All these people -- and their close friends -- were partly guilty of a conspiracy to murder General Walker.

My theory has clashed with those who have claimed that LHO was falsely accused of the Walker shooting, i.e. that the Backyard photographs were faked by the JFK Killers, and that Marina Oswald's story was faked by the JFK Killers, and that the DeMohrenschildt stories were faked by the JFK killers, in order to frame LHO for the JFK murder.

Notice, however, that my theory clashes with Jeff Caufield's theory on completely different grounds.

Dr. Caufield joins Gary Wean, Don DeLillo and several other JFK researchers of the past generation to claim that Lee Harvey Oswald was personally supporting of the politics of General Walker, and upon the direction of Guy Banister, faked the General Walker shooting in order to boost public sympathy for General Walker.

The difference is subtle at first, but grows on the reader. In the theory of Jeff Caufield, it remains entirely possible that the Dallas engineer yuppies tried to get LHO to hate and despise General Walker. Volkmar Schmidt publicly apologized for his role, and acknowledged that LHO purchased weapons over the mail after one night when he worked for hours to convince LHO that General Walker was "as bad as Adolf Hitler." But Volkmar insisted that he didn't "tell" LHO to kill Walker. Still, one could tell that Volkmar felt guilty about it. (We can hear Volkmar's confession on YouTube in the PBS Frontline video, "Who Was Lee Harvey Oswald?")

It's the same with George DeMohrenschildt's 1978 manuscript, I'm a Patsy! I'm a Patsy! George admits he would call General Walker, "General Fokker" in the presence of LHO, to make him laugh, and speaks at length about that party in which Volkmar Schmidt compared Walker to Hitler. George said that he and LHO used to call Volkmar Schmidt, "Messer Schmidt."

Yet a totally new perspective emerges from Jeff Caufield's theory about LHO and the Walker shooting. It remains possible that LHO *pretended* to be hypnotized by the Dallas engineer yuppies, and *pretended* to hate and despise General Walker -- and nevertheless actually remained an active, personal supporter of the politics of General Walker.

In order to fake out the Liberals.

Caufield's theory portrays LHO as a more crafty sort of person than is usually considered. Also, George and Jeanne DeMohrenschildt's WC testimony can remain perfectly intact with Caufield's theory. So can Marina's WC testimony.

Remember that Marina told the truth as she heard it from LHO. But given that LHO was lying to her, then we can better understand Marina's story. For example, when Marina said that LHO always acted alone; he didn't but he told her he did. Or, when Marina said that LHO buried his rifle; he didn't but he told her he did. Or when Marina said LHO always traveled by foot and bus; he didn't but he told her he did.

What could Marina honestly relay except the words that LHO told her? If LHO lied to her continually, Marina isn't to blame for merely relaying what she was told.

With Jeff Caufield's portrait of LHO -- a secret rightist, working with Banister-Walker starting in early 1963 -- we can make pieces of the JFK murder fit together that never fit together before.

I'm not completely sold on Jeff Caufield's new theory of LHO, but I'm willing to follow his logic through to the conclusion -- and to give it a fair chance.

So, this will be my introduction to our review of chapter 14 of Caufield's new book.

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited December 24, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[John Dolva]

Cool. Welcome back.

[James DiEugenio]

The more I hear about this book, the more dubious its conception sounds.

Its sitting in the back of my car. I will get to it soon.

[Paul Brancato]

Please do Jim. I tried to read it. It's very dense and full of interesting but not necessarily pertinent detail. Plus it weighs a ton.

[Paul Brancato]

Please do Jim. I tried to read it. It's very dense and full of interesting but not necessarily pertinent detail. Plus it weighs a ton.

[Ernie Lazar]

The more I hear about this book, the more dubious its conception sounds.

Its sitting in the back of my car. I will get to it soon.

I put it aside for 10 days to let some of the data sink in. I have about 275 pages left to read and I will then prepare a critique which I will post here.

[Paul Trejo]

Let us proceed into the next chapter of Jeffrey Caufield's new book, General Walker and the Murder of President Kennedy: The Extensive New Evidence of a Radical Right Conspiracy, Chapter 14, The Walker-Hargis National Speaking Tour and the Walker Shooting Incident, Spring 1963.

Recall, first, that only days before Walker traveled to Jackson, Mississippi to start the 30 September 1962 racial riot over the registration of the first Black American student, James Meredith, at Ole Miss university, General Walker published an “Open Letter” to JFK on 26 September 1962. Here's a reproduction of that “Open Letter.” http://www.pet880.com/images/19620926_EAW_Open_Letter.JPG . We notice that the Ole Miss crisis played a minor role in that “Open Letter,” while the Cuban Crisis played the major role. This was arguably the first public indication of Walker's 1963 obsession with Cuba.

Caufield offers citations to show that when General Walker was acquitted by a Mississippi Grand Jury on January 21, 1963 for any role in the Ole Miss racial riots of 1962, Walker also met with Gerry Patrick Hemming on that day, and on the following day. In a letter to a rightist comrade on February 2, 1963, Gerry Patrick Hemming said that General Walker was finally ready to throw in his lot with the radical Cuban Exile movement and its continuing raids on Communist Cuba. This represents a new dimension of Walker's politics from 1961-1963.

In mid-February, 1963, General Walker and segregationist Reverend Billy James Hargis began their coast-to-coast speaking tour denouncing JFK, the United Nations, the Civil Rights movement and the National Council of Churches (for their failure to keep American Churches racially segregated). The tour would last until early April.

During this same time, Caufield reports, Willie Somersett had reported to the FBI the many movements of Joseph Milteer, Clyde Watts, Kent Courtney and Guy Banister in Louisiana as they plotted right-wing violence against Civil Rights targets.

During this same time, said the FBI, Lee Harvey Oswald was taking photographs of General Walker’s house in Dallas, and making his own Backyard Photographs, which he distributed to George De Mohrenschildt, Roscoe White and The Militant newspaper and Marina his wife.

Soon after General Walker returned from his Midnight Ride speaking tour, the Dallas Morning News of April 11, 1963 reported that somebody tried to assassinate General Walker in his home late on the previous night. No suspect was in custody.

According to the Dallas Morning News, the shooter of April 10, 1963 was never found.

General Walker was quick to tell the public that his shooter was part of a Communist plot. Kent Courtney published in his Independent American on April 16, 1963, “This is proof that there is a Communist threat from within our nation.” Billy James Hargis returned to his own speaking tour in May, and published a booklet entitled, Edwin Walker; the Target and the Man, also claiming a Communist plot in the shooting.

Billy Hargis quoted Walker as saying that the Moscow newspaper, Pravda, had marked Walker as an “ultra” target in 1961 (though this was probably a loose reference to the US Overseas Weekly newspaper which toppled Walker in 1961, because Walker later accused them of a Communist plot. Walker had suggested to the 1962 Senate Subcommittee that the Overseas Weekly newspaper was seditious; a subsidiary of Pravda).

William “Scotty” Duff, a.k.a. McDuff, who was General Walker’s live-in, bisexual houseboy, was accused as the most likely shooter, by Julia Knecht, who was Walker’s home secretary. Knecht and Robert Allen Surrey had hated McDuff since the day he moved in back in December 1962, and they rushed to kick McDuff out of Walker’s house while Walker was on his speaking tour. Without a word they just moved all of McDuff’s belongings out onto the sidewalk. Julia in particular said she feared the shooting was McDuff’s revenge.

The DPD contacted Walker’s friend and attorney, former General Clyde Watts, who had some weeks previously taken McDuff to his own home in Oklahoma and given him a job. The DPD then arrested McDuff and gave him a complete lie-detector test – and McDuff easily passed it. General Walker invited McDuff to return to his Dallas home, but McDuff refused because Knecht and Surrey had treated him so badly.

Eye-witnesses to the Walker shooting in April, 1963 reported to the DPD their perceptions that there were two shooters, and that they traveled by automobile. The conflicting data ultimately moved Dr. Caufield to give emphasis to one DPD report suggesting that General Walker staged the April shooting as a publicity stunt. Caufield writes:

…Dallas Police Lieutenant L.E. Cunningham – who had led the original investigation of the shooting in April – expressed his skepticism about the supposed attempt on Walker’s life. He stated, “This was a method used by General Walker to gain additional publicity…Walker will exploit current news releases to the fullest extent to gain maximum publicity.” (Caufield, General Walker and the Murder of President Kennedy, 2015, p. 384)

Jeff Caufield also raises the article in a German newspaper, the Deutsche Nationalzeitung, on November 29, 1963, which exposed an interview with General Walker taken early in the morning of November 23, 1963, less than 18 hours after the JFK assassination. That article claimed that LHO had been Walker’s shooter back in April. The German FBI (BND) interviewed the interviewer, Helmet Muench, who stated that General Walker himself was the source of that statement.

(Muench had published his article using the alias, “Hasso Thorsten.” When the Warren Commission asked Walker about this article’s claim, Walker replied that the Germans merely guessed it, and the Warren Commission attorney’s accepted Walker’s word.)

In this chapter Caufield also writes about Larrie and Robbie Schmidt. Larrie was a former US Army soldier, the leader of CUSA (Conservatism USA) and through Robert Allen Surrey, got his older brother and US Army soldier, Robbie Schmidt, a job inside General Walker’s home as a chauffeur and errand boy in 1963. Some people suspected them of having participated in the April shooting. Larrie today denies any connection, and affirms that he and his brother held Walker in high regard; and besides, Robbie wasn’t Walker’s chauffeur until weeks after the shooting.

Jeff Caufield writes of the 1963 home movie of John Martin, who filmed the bullet holes in Walker’s home in the first part of his film, and in the latter part of his film he shows his flight to New Orleans, and then films LHO being arrested on Canal Street. In this way Martin linked the Walker shooting with LHO in August, 1963. Caufield writes:

The most likely explanation for the film is that General Walker directed Martin to film both the Dallas and New Orleans scenes tied to Oswald – which means that it is evidence Walker knew in advance about Oswald, and his planned phony fight with Bringuier, contrary to his Warren Commission testimony that he knew nothing of Oswald before the assassination. (Caufield, General Walker and the Murder of President Kennedy, 2015, p. 414)

Aside from the fact that both Walker and LHO were close to Guy Banister, the conflicting nature of WC testimony convinces Caufield that the Walker shooting “was a sham.” Caufield doesn’t claim (as does the 2002 book by Wm. Fritz, The Kennedy Mutiny) that LHO worked directly for Walker. According to Jeff Caufield, LHO worked only for Guy Banister, while Walker secretly coordinated affairs with Guy Banister and Kent Courtney.

I’ve already noted the sharp contrast of this theory of the Walker shooting with the theory that I’ve touted since 2010 on this FORUM. Yet one can compromise, and suggest that General Walker made LHO his Patsy in his JFK plot, not because LHO shot at Walker in April 1963, but simply because LHO had lived in the USSR (for whatever reason) and this marked LHO as expendable according to the politics of General Walker.

Jeff Caufield’s interpretation of events agrees with the mandatory tenets of my own, i.e. he doesn’t blame Ruth Paine for the Walker Note or the Backyard Photographs, and he consistently pursues a civilian Rightist plot – with room for rogues from any source to render assistance.

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited December 24, 2015 by Paul Trejo

[James DiEugenio]

The more I hear about this book, the more dubious its conception sounds.

Its sitting in the back of my car. I will get to it soon.

I put it aside for 10 days to let some of the data sink in. I have about 275 pages left to read and I will then prepare a critique which I will post here.

Look forward to that Ernie.

I hope you are more formal in your approach than PT.

[Larry Hancock]

Given your earlier post Paul, what I'm really interested in seeing is the scenario, a timeline and some proof that Oswald became personally close to Walker, close enough so that Walker would trust him to shoot

at him (involving some level of confidence he would not be killed in the process; like knowing Oswald was a really good shot...or perhaps not actually being in the room when the shooting occurred) or

that Oswald would do that for Walker....

[Paul Brancato]

Prediction - there will be no proof forthcoming of any personal relationship between Oswald and Walker.

[Paul Trejo]

Given your earlier post Paul, what I'm really interested in seeing is the scenario, a timeline and some proof that Oswald became personally close to Walker, close enough so that Walker would trust him to shoot at him (involving some level of confidence he would not be killed in the process; like knowing Oswald was a really good shot...or perhaps not actually being in the room when the shooting occurred) or that Oswald would do that for Walker....

Larry, I believe you misunderstood my summary of Jeff Caufield's chapter 14. I didn't say (and Caufield doesn't say) that Lee Harvey Oswald had a personal relationship with General Walker.

I made it clear that *others* have said that, but not Jeff Caufield.

What Caufield says (and what I said) is that Lee Harvey Oswald was committed to the POLITICS of General Walker, through people like Kent Courtney and Guy Banister.

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

[Larry Hancock]

Thanks for the clarification Paul, just to further help me be clear then, is the scenario that Oswald was set up to take a shot at Walker with or without Walkers prior knowledge?

[Paul Trejo]

Thanks for the clarification Paul, just to further help me be clear then, is the scenario that Oswald was set up to take a shot at Walker with or without Walkers prior knowledge?

Well, Larry, according to my reading of Jeff Caufield's new book, General Walker concocted the idea of an fake assassination attempt on himself to boost his popularity. Walker told Kent Courtney and Guy Banister about this.

Guy Banister and his people manipulated Oswald to participate in this publicity stunt.

Regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited December 25, 2015 by Paul Trejo