Jump to content
The Education Forum

Can we possibly AGREE....


Recommended Posts

  • Replies 68
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Jim,

CIA involvement is obvious.

Military involvement... the fact that a general presided over the autopsy strongly suggests a military involvement. (I don't see any reason why Johnson would choose a general to handle the autopsy for the purpose of the cover-up. Therefore it seems that the general's involvement was part of the assassination plot.)

Industrial... what evidence is there for this component of the MIC? If there is no industrial component to the assassination, then it is a military coup. Right? And if that is the case, then it was the military that solicited the services of the CIA and not the other way around. I think that is the way a military coup normally works.

If there is an industrial component, then it gets more complex.

Unless... Could it have been a military coup, where the military had the interest in keeping productions of arms (i.e. industrial component) going? If so, then it would have the industrial component, but it would still be considered a military coup.

This may sound like a word game, but really it's important. Because it is not known who initiated the coup. I feel it was either a small group of powerful people, or it was the military. It would be a lot easier to understand and figure out if it were the latter. Because we know who the military leaders were.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

CIA involvement is obvious.

There are many people who would disagree. Likewise MIC.

Are they right? Are they wrong? That's what this Forum discusses.

I think a person would have to be rather uninformed, misinformed, dull, or naive to dismiss the likely involvement of some domestic intelligence group in the assassination, the CIA being the most likely IMO.

(The same may be true of MIC involvement... that I do not know. I haven't read as many books as others here, and haven't familiarized myself with the topic. So I readily admit being uninformed and naive regarding MIC involvement.)

Of course, everybody here is free to believe what they want and to argue their case.

Edited by Sandy Larsen
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The evidence clearly suggests that the assassination of JFK was a U.S. Intel/MIC hit.
CIA involvement is obvious.

Quoting Vince Bugliosi....

"For years, conspiracy theorists have written books about the Central Intelligence Agency's involvement in the assassination of JFK. And as conspiracy theorist E. Martin Schotz, a mathematician and practicing psychiatrist, puts it, "I and other ordinary citizens know, know for a fact, that there was a conspiracy [to murder Kennedy] and that it was organized at the highest levels of the CIA."

The fact that Schotz and his fellow conspiracy theorists haven't been able to come up with any evidence connecting the CIA to the assassination or Oswald has not troubled them in the least.

[...]

Whatever the CIA's short laundry list of dissatisfactions (some merely illusory, some real) with Kennedy, as I discuss later in the anti-Castro Cuban exile section of this book, Kennedy was highly disturbed with the CIA for its incompetence and its having misled him on the probable success of the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961.

Perhaps the most famous alleged quote from Kennedy about his animus toward the CIA after the Bay of Pigs debacle was that he wanted "to splinter the CIA into a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds." But in the two and a half years after the attempted invasion he never did anything remotely close to this, and it is not known to whom he supposedly said these words. The New York Times only said that Kennedy made this statement "to one of the highest officials of his administration."

The reality is that the relationship between Kennedy and the CIA, though strained by the Bay of Pigs debacle, was not nearly as bad and combustible as conspiracy theorists would want people to believe. And as we shall see, and most importantly on the issue of motive, the period of difficult relations was apparently short-lived."

-- Vincent Bugliosi; Page 1189 of "Reclaiming History"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Since it has been established beyond all doubt that Oswald killed Kennedy, the conspiracy theorists who propound the idea of the CIA being behind Oswald's act are necessarily starting out in a very deep hole before they even take their first breath of air. This is so because Oswald was a Marxist, and a Marxist being in league with U.S. intelligence just doesn't ring true."

-- Vincent Bugliosi; Page 1195 of "Reclaiming History"

XX.%2BReclaiming%2BHistory%2BBlog%2BLogo

Edited by David Von Pein
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just food for thought. One indication of a military coup, if that's what it was, would be if someone who would necessarily be involved in such a coup were to later exhibit remorse or consciousness of guilt, more specifically a tearful emotional response (not once but twice) to the subject of the assassination, a response seemingly quite out of character for a combat-tested, high-ranking military officer. Someone such as JFK’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

From “An American Soldier: The Wars of General Maxwell Taylor,” by his son John M. Taylor (pp. 290-291):

“In mid-1964, just prior to his departure for Saigon, Taylor had several conversations with Elspeth Rostow, who interviewed him at his quarters for the Kennedy Library’s oral history series. All went smoothly until the subject of the assassination arose. According to Rostow, Taylor then broke down; for several minutes there was nothing on her tape except the sound of an occasional passing car. Once he had composed himself, the interview continued.

“More than a decade later, at a family dinner, the subject turned to political dissent in the country under Nixon. Taylor had recently returned from a speaking engagement at a small New Jersey college, where hecklers had prevented him from speaking. He commented that Kennedy, had he lived, was the one person who might have preserved a degree of national cohesiveness. Then his voice broke; it was a moment before his normal self-control returned. Surrounded by his family, he had let his defenses down.”

Edited by Ron Ecker
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The evidence clearly suggests that the assassination of JFK was a U.S. Intel/MIC hit.
CIA involvement is obvious.

Quoting Vince Bugliosi....

"For years, conspiracy theorists have written books about the Central Intelligence Agency's involvement in the assassination of JFK. And as conspiracy theorist E. Martin Schotz, a mathematician and practicing psychiatrist, puts it, "I and other ordinary citizens know, know for a fact, that there was a conspiracy [to murder Kennedy] and that it was organized at the highest levels of the CIA."

The fact that Schotz and his fellow conspiracy theorists haven't been able to come up with any evidence connecting the CIA to the assassination or Oswald has not troubled them in the least.

David,

Who did Vincent Bugliosi believe impersonated Oswald in telephone calls to the Russian Embassy and Cuban Consuate in Mexico City? The former call linking Oswald to KGB assassin Valery Kostikov? Oh I know... that was just a typical prank played on tourists by the local Mexican boys!

(Source)

Why did E. Howard Hunt spill his guts on his deathbed regarding the Big Event, and name several men associated with the CIA? (Note that I don't believe Hunt had direct knowledge of much of what he said, due to compartmentalization and because he didn't have "the need to know." But, having been in that business for a time, I know how things can be pieced together after the fact. I did a little of that myself, and I'm sure someone in as high a position as Hunt, for as long as he was, would have been able to do much, much more. And did.)

Then there is CIA agent David Atlee Phillips confession to his brother, over the phone, that he was in Dallas the day of the assassination. His brother knew that he was confessing to being involved in the assassination, and hung up on him.

David Atlee Phillip's involvement is supported by Antonio Veciana's identification of Phillips as Maurice Bishop, who he saw meeting with Oswald in Dallas in the late summer of 1963. (One of Phillips colleagues, a CIA case officer named Ross Crozier, told HSCA investigators he was "almost certain" that Phillips had used the name “Maurice Bishop.”)

(Source)

These are just a few of the CIA connections that I recall at the moment.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just food for thought. One indication of a military coup, if that's what it was, would be if someone who would necessarily be involved in such a coup were to later exhibit remorse or consciousness of guilt, more specifically a tearful emotional response (not once but twice) to the subject of the assassination, a response seemingly quite out of character for a combat-tested, high-ranking military officer. Someone such as JFK’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

From “An American Soldier: The Wars of General Maxwell Taylor,” by his son John M. Taylor (pp. 290-291):

“In mid-1964, just prior to his departure for Saigon, Taylor had several conversations with Elspeth Rostow, who interviewed him at his quarters for the Kennedy Library’s oral history series. All went smoothly until the subject of the assassination arose. According to Rostow, Taylor then broke down; for several minutes there was nothing on her tape except the sound of an occasional passing car. Once he had composed himself, the interview continued.

“More than a decade later, at a family dinner, the subject turned to political dissent in the country under Nixon. Taylor had recently returned from a speaking engagement at a small New Jersey college, where hecklers had prevented him from speaking. He commented that Kennedy, had he lived, was the one person who might have preserved a degree of national cohesiveness. Then his voice broke; it was a moment before his normal self-control returned. Surrounded by his family, he had let his defenses down.”

Ron,

Admittedly I sort of dismissed what you said at first, thinking that surely a person could get emotional when speaking of the death of someone they knew, especially if they were close to the person.

But after giving it more thought, I think you may be on to something.

I hate to admit it, but I am more emotional than most men I've known. For example, I was so choked up at my wedding that I could barely say my vows.

Yet when speaking of my parent's deaths, I don't weep. (I was very close to them.) Oh, I did at first. But not a year later. And certainly not ten years later.

From reading what General Taylor's son wrote about him and his emotional response, I can't help but think that the General must have really struggled over the circumstances surrounding Kennedy's death. From reading the Wikipedia article on General Taylor, I come away believing that he was loyal to both Kennedy brothers. (One of Robert Kennedy's sons is named after the General.) My gut feeling is that he was out of the loop on the assassination. But I believe that he knew after it happened that it was orchestrated by those around him. What a predicament that put him in... having to go along with a cover story he knew was a lie, and having to continue working with those who were behind the killing.

I can only imagine how all this must have repeatedly played itself out out in General Taylor's mind over the months and years following, and how it must have adversely affected him.

BTW, Kennedy replace General Lyman Lemnitzer with General Taylor as Joint Chiefs of Staff not long after he rejected Operation Northwoods, which General Lemnitzer had approved. I'm sure that Lemnitzer didn't take this lightly.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nobody was impersonating Oswald on the phone in Mexico. It was Oswald himself.

Quoting Vince Bugliosi....

"As is typical of most conspiracy writers, Jim Marrs tells his readers about the November 23, 1963, FBI memo, but then never tells them that the HSCA determined that the memo was in error. Actually, there were recordings of Oswald's voice secured by the CIA station in Mexico City resulting from its monitoring of all incoming and outgoing telephone calls at the Cuban consulate and Soviet embassy. For instance, the prelude to the typed transcript of the first of two calls made to the Soviet military attache at the embassy on October 1, 1963, at 10:31 a.m., says the caller spoke "broken Russian." The caller, per the transcript, was told that for the information he was seeking he should call a different number at the embassy, 15-60-55, "and ask for a consul." At 10 :45 a.m., the person called the consul, and the prelude to the new transcription again refers to the "broken Russian" of the caller. The transcribed monitored telephone conversation follows:

"Hello, this is Lee Oswald speaking. I was at your place last Saturday and spoke to a Consul, and they said they'd send a telegram to Washington, so I wanted to find out if you have anything new? But I don't remember the name of that Consul."

OP (Other Party): "Kostikov. He is dark/hair or skin?"

Oswald: "Yes. My name is Oswald."

OP: "Just a minute, I'll find out . . . They say that they haven't received anything yet."

Oswald: "Have they done anything?"

OP: "Yes, they say that a request has been sent out, but nothing has been received as yet."

Oswald: "And what . . . ?"

The other party hangs up.

A concluding paragraph to the transcript reads, "Station source, who did transcriptions, says Oswald is identical with person speaking broken Russian who called from Cuban [consulate] 28 September to Soviet Embassy."

A "station source" who heard and transcribed Oswald's voice on some of the tapes was identified years later as Boris Tarasoff, a CIA staff officer in Mexico City whose job in September and October of 1963 was to receive tapes of CIA telephone taps at the Soviet embassy in Mexico City and translate (from Russian into English) and transcribe the tapes. He would receive the tapes from a CIA courier the day after they were made and would return the tapes and their transcriptions to the same courier the following day. Tarasoff only remembers translating and transcribing two Oswald tapes, of telephone conversations on September 28 and October 1, 1963, though he says, "There might have been more. I am not certain." Oswald only used his name on October 1, not September 28.

Anna Tarasoff, Boris's wife, who assisted him with the transcriptions in Mexico City, told the HSCA there was another taped conversation between Oswald and someone at the Soviet embassy for which no transcript has been found, in which Oswald identified himself, said he was broke, and wanted financial aid from either the Russians or the Cubans so he could leave the country. "They definitely turned him down. In fact, if I recall, they finally got disgusted and hung up on him." "

-- Vincent Bugliosi; Pages 1049-1050 of "Reclaiming History"

Edited by David Von Pein
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nobody was impersonating Oswald on the phone in Mexico. It was Oswald himself.

Quoting Vince Bugliosi....

"As is typical of most conspiracy writers, Jim Marrs tells his readers about the November 23, 1963, FBI memo, but then never tells them that the HSCA determined that the memo was in error. Actually, there were recordings of Oswald's voice secured by the CIA station in Mexico City resulting from its monitoring of all incoming and outgoing telephone calls at the Cuban consulate and Soviet embassy. For instance, the prelude to the typed transcript of the first of two calls made to the Soviet military attache at the embassy on October 1, 1963, at 10:31 a.m., says the caller spoke "broken Russian." The caller, per the transcript, was told that for the information he was seeking he should call a different number at the embassy, 15-60-55, "and ask for a consul." At 10 :45 a.m., the person called the consul, and the prelude to the new transcription again refers to the "broken Russian" of the caller. The transcribed monitored telephone conversation follows:

"Hello, this is Lee Oswald speaking. I was at your place last Saturday and spoke to a Consul, and they said they'd send a telegram to Washington, so I wanted to find out if you have anything new? But I don't remember the name of that Consul."

OP (Other Party): "Kostikov. He is dark/hair or skin?"

Oswald: "Yes. My name is Oswald."

OP: "Just a minute, I'll find out . . . They say that they haven't received anything yet."

Oswald: "Have they done anything?"

OP: "Yes, they say that a request has been sent out, but nothing has been received as yet."

Oswald: "And what . . . ?"

The other party hangs up.

A concluding paragraph to the transcript reads, "Station source, who did transcriptions, says Oswald is identical with person speaking broken Russian who called from Cuban [consulate] 28 September to Soviet Embassy."

A "station source" who heard and transcribed Oswald's voice on some of the tapes was identified years later as Boris Tarasoff, a CIA staff officer in Mexico City whose job in September and October of 1963 was to receive tapes of CIA telephone taps at the Soviet embassy in Mexico City and translate (from Russian into English) and transcribe the tapes. He would receive the tapes from a CIA courier the day after they were made and would return the tapes and their transcriptions to the same courier the following day. Tarasoff only remembers translating and transcribing two Oswald tapes, of telephone conversations on September 28 and October 1, 1963, though he says, "There might have been more. I am not certain." Oswald only used his name on October 1, not September 28.

Anna Tarasoff, Boris's wife, who assisted him with the transcriptions in Mexico City, told the HSCA there was another taped conversation between Oswald and someone at the Soviet embassy for which no transcript has been found, in which Oswald identified himself, said he was broke, and wanted financial aid from either the Russians or the Cubans so he could leave the country. "They definitely turned him down. In fact, if I recall, they finally got disgusted and hung up on him." "

-- Vincent Bugliosi; Pages 1049-1050 of "Reclaiming History"

I don't believe for a second that FBI agents accidentally reported that they listened to Mexico City tapes of Oswald and determined that the voice didn't match that of Oswald's. That stretches credibility too far.

I have studied this incident further and I can see why it became so confusing.

The CIA was bugging the Russian Embassy in Mexico. This, of course, was a very sensitive operation. It's one thing to bug an embassy located in one's own country. It's quite another thing to bug an embassy located in some other country. Both are sensitive operations, but the latter is sensitive on a whole different level.

Apparently FBI agents in Dallas listened to the tapes and informed Hoover that the voice didn't match Oswald's. Later it was realized that the bugging program was in danger of being exposed and the FBI had to do some back-tracking. Yet at the same time, it was vital to the security of the United States to understand if Russia was somehow involved in the assassination.

The following is from a memo Hoover sent to Secret Service Chief Rowley on 11/23, which was included in the HSCA's top secret Lopez Report:

…..The Central Intelligence Agency advised that on October 1, 1963, an extremely sensitive source had reported that an individual identified himself as Lee Oswald, who contacted the Soviet Embassy in Mexico City inquiring as to any messages. Special Agents of this Bureau, who have conversed with Oswald in Dallas, Texas, have observed photographs of the individual referred to above and have listened to his voice. These Special Agents are of the opinion that the above-referred-to-individual was not Lee Harvey Oswald….

It is known that two Warren Commission staff members, David Slawson and Howard Willens, listened to the tapes during a trip they made to Mexico City in April of 1964,. They have admitted so to two prominent authors (Peter Dale Scott, Deep Politics II, p. 12 and Anthony Summers, Not in Your Lifetime, p. 277) as well as to Chief Council Jeremy Gunn of the ARRB. Due to the sensitive nature, their admission to Gunn was off the record. However, we know about it indirectly from testimony given by Anne Goodpasture (formerly of the CIA Mexico City Station) to the ARRB:

Gunn. I have spoken with two Warren Commission staff members who went to Mexico City and who both told me that they heard the tape, after the assassination obviously. Do you have any knowledge of information regarding tapes that may have been played to those Warren Commission staff members?

Goodpasture. No. It may have been a tape that Win Scott had squirreled away in his safe. [Anne Goodpasture ARRB testimony of 12-15-1995, p.147].

Source:

The Fourteen Minute Gap: An Update

Link to comment
Share on other sites

MC_Mugs.jpg

Nov. 23, 1963 (from a 1963 transcription of a phone conversation):

LBJ: Have you established any more about the visit to the Soviet Embassy in Mexico in September?

HOOVER: No, that's one angle that's very confusing for this reason. We have up here the tape and the photograph of the man who was at the Soviet Embassy, using Oswald's name. The picture and the tape do not correspond to this man's voice, nor to his appearance. In other words, it appears that there is a second person who was at the Soviet Embassy down there.

CIA wasn’t only taping conversations at the Russian and Cuban installations, it also had pulse cameras, and backup pulse cameras, aimed at the entrances to both buildings, photographing everyone coming and going. Yet no picture of “Lee Harvey Oswald” entering or leaving either building was ever produced, nor was an audio recording supplied by the CIA, just lame excuses.

Edited by Jim Hargrove
Link to comment
Share on other sites

From reading what General Taylor's son wrote about him and his emotional response, I can't help but think that the General must have really struggled over the circumstances surrounding Kennedy's death. From reading the Wikipedia article on General Taylor, I come away believing that he was loyal to both Kennedy brothers. (One of Robert Kennedy's sons is named after the General.) My gut feeling is that he was out of the loop on the assassination. But I believe that he knew after it happened that it was orchestrated by those around him. What a predicament that put him in... having to go along with a cover story he knew was a lie, and having to continue working with those who were behind the killing.

I've always thought that the "Lansdale" walking past the tramps in Dealey Plaza looks as much like Taylor (if not moreso) than Lansdale.

taylor.jpg

Taylor also wore a large ring on the fourth finger of his left hand.

taylorring.jpg

Just sayin'.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I suspect Kennedy's killers were supra-institutional actors, players operating outside the normal hierarchies of the State Dept, CIA, Pentagon, Federal Bureau of Narcotics.

The template for supra-institutional action may be found in Col. William Corson's take on the murder of Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Nhu 11/2/63.

Joseph Trento, The Secret History of the CIA, pgs 334-5:

<quote on, emphasis added>

Who changed the coup into the murder of Diem, Nhu and a Catholic priest accompanying them? To this day, nothing has been found in government archives tying the killings to either John or Robert Kennedy. So how did the tools and talents developed by Bill Harvey for ZR/RIFLE and Operation MONGOOSE get exported to Vietnam? Kennedy immediately ordered (William R.) Corson to find out what had happened and who was responsible. The answer he came up with: “On instructions from Averell Harriman…. The orders that ended in the deaths of Diem and his brother originated with Harriman and were carried out by Henry Cabot Lodge’s own military assistant.”

Having served as ambassador to Moscow and governor of New York, W. Averell Harriman was in the middle of a long public career. In 1960, President-elect Kennedy appointed him ambassador-at-large, to operate “with the full confidence of the president and an intimate knowledge of all aspects of United States policy.” By 1963, according to Corson, Harriman was running “Vietnam without consulting the president or the attorney general.”

The president had begun to suspect that not everyone on his national security team was loyal. As Corson put it, “Kenny O’Donnell (JFK’s appointments secretary) was convinced that McGeorge Bundy, the national security advisor, was taking orders from Ambassador Averell Harriman and not the president. He was especially worried about Michael Forrestal, a young man on the White House staff who handled liaison on Vietnam with Harriman.”

At the heart of the murders was the sudden and strange recall of Sagon Station Chief Jocko Richardson and his replacement by a no-name team barely known to history. The key member was a Special Operations Army officer, John Michael Dunn, who took his orders, not from the normal CIA hierarchy but from Harriman and Forrestal.

According to Corson, “John Michael Dunn was known to be in touch with the coup plotters,” although Dunn’s role has never been made public. Corson believes that Richardson was removed so that Dunn, assigned to Ambassador Lodge for “special operations,” could act without hindrance.

<quote off>

I suspect all the operatives in the murder of JFK took their orders from other supra-institutional actors.

Averell Harriman was the #3 man at the State Department but when it came to So. East Asia he operated on his own agenda.

Ellen J. Hammer's A Death in November: America in Vietnam 1963, pgs 177-80:

<quote on>

Washington, August 24, 1963

A handful of men in the State Department and the White House had been awaiting an opportunity to encourage the Vietnamese army to move against the [Diem] government. They intended to exploit the latest crisis [massive raids on Buddhist pagodas August 21] in Saigon to the full. "Averell [Harriman] and Roger [Hilsman] now agree that we must move before the situation in Saigon freezes," Michael Forrestal of the White House staff wrote in a memorandum to President Kennedy.

..."Harriman, Hilsman and I favor taking...action now," Forrestal informed the president. Kennedy was at his Hyannis Port residence in Massachusetts for the weekend. The three men had drafted a cable of their own to [uS Ambassador to South Vietnam Henry Cabot] Lodge. The substance, according to Forrestal, had been generally agreed to by [commander in chief of Pacific Command (CINCPAC)] Admiral [Harry D.] Felt. "Clearances [are] being obtained from [Acting Secretary of State] Ball and [the Department of] Defense...Will advise you reactions Ball and Defense, but suggest you let me know if you wish comment or hold-up action." A copy of their draft was dispatched to the president.

This would become Department of State telegram No. 243.

It stated that the American government could not tolerate a situation in which power lay in [Diem brother and head of SVN secret police] Nhu's hands. Military leaders were to be informed that the United States would find it impossible to continue military and economic support to the government unless prompt dramatic actions were taken by Diem to redress Buddhist grievances and remove the Nhus from the scene...Ambassador and country team should urgently examine all possible alternative leadership and make detailed plans as to how we might bring about Diem's replacement if this should become necessary...

...Harriman and Hilsman were determined to send their cable that very day. They found Acting Secretary of State [George] Ball on the golf course, and he telephoned the president in Hyannis Port. Kennedy made no difficulty about giving his approval, assuming that the appropriate officials agreed.

After the call to Kennedy the rest was simple. Ball telephoned [secretary of State Dean] Rusk in New York and told him the president had already agreed, and Rusk gave his own unenthusiastic endorsement. When Roswell Gilpatric (McNamara's deputy at Defense) was called at home by Forrestal, he too was told that Kennedy had cleared the telegram and he was assured that Rusk had seen it. Gilpatric reluctantly gave the clearance of the Department of Defense but was concerned enough about the substance of the cable and the way it had been handled to alert General Taylor, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Taylor sent for a copy of the cable. When he read it, his first reaction was that the anti-Diemists in the State Department had taken advantage of the absence of the principal officials to get out instructions that would never have been approved as written under ordinary circumstances. John McCone also was out of town, and rather than try to locate him Harriman had reached Richard Helms, who provided the clearance of the Central Intelligence Agency.

With the president's approval State Department telegram 243 was dispatched to Saigon at 9:36 P.M. on August 24.

John Kennedy would regard this as a major mistake on his part, according to his brother Robert. "He had passed it off too quickly over the weekend at the Cape--he had thought it was cleared by McNamara and Taylor and everyone at State. In fact, it was Harriman, Hilsman and Mike Forrestal at the White House and they were all the ones who were strongly for a coup. Harriman was particularly strong for a coup.

<quote off>

Trivia question: who were the top civilian officials in the Kennedy Admin. hard at work the afternoon of 11/22/63?

http://www.ronaldecker.com/tokyo.html

The top guy by the order of succession was Sec of Defense Robert McNamara but he was sidelined that afternoon, didn't find out the Commander in Chief had died until informed by Bobby Kennedy, &kept busy with relatively minor tasks like gathering Oswald's files, and making arrangements for the arrival of AF1.

The top US officials on the job from the moment Kennedy was pronounced dead were the #2 man at the State Department, George Ball, Averell Harriman right beside him.

The two guys most responsible for the dispatch of Cable 243 and the seismic shift in Kennedy's So East Asia policy were the two guys at the pinnacle of power in DC the day Kennedy died.

Averell Harriman was a man of immense wealth and power belied by his #3 ranking at State.

On December 15, 1959, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev landed in Washington DC on the first stop of a two week tour of the States.

The next day he showed up at W. Averell Harriman's pad in Manhattan.

From Spanning the Century The Life of W. Averell Harriman, by Rudy Abramson, pg. 575

<quote on>

In his second-floor drawing room, Harriman gathered leaders from mining, manufacturing, oil, chemicals, banking,
and insurance industries, including John D. Rockefeller III; General David Sarnoff, chairman of RCA; Frank Pace,
chairman of General Dynamics Corporation; W. Alton Jones, chairman of Cities Service Corporation; and John J. McCloy,
chairman of Chase Manhattan Bank. By his estimate, scribbled on a yellow legal pad before Khrushchev arrived, they
represented assets of some $38 billion. Among them, as witnesses to history, were a few men of ordinary means,
former ambassadors, educators, and, notably, Rockefeller Foundation president Dean Rusk, and Harvard economist
John Kenneth Galbraith, the latter having invited himself as a "representative of the proletariat."

Surround by Picassos and Derains, their voices muffled by Persian carpets, the capitalist Titans greeted the Communist
chieftain one by one, then sat in a semi-circle savoring caviar and sipping champagne and New York wine as Averell
conducted his exposition of capitalism, war profits, and American politics. No one present, nor any of their friends,
he and the others assured the guest of honor, favored world tensions. The assembled war profiteers, said the host, were
men who'd champion disarmament the moment it became safe for the United States. There was not a hint, however, that
mingling with the millionaires did anything except reinforce Khrushchev's belief that he was then in the presence of the
men who controlled America far more than Eisenhower and the members of Congress he had met in Washington.

One testimonial to free enterprise followed another. And when the Soviet leader reasserted his stubborn belief that the
men present composed the country's ruling circle, Galbraith later tattled, "Somebody demurred, but in perfunctory fashion.
After it was over, Harriman insisted that the Soviet leader had gained insights of "real importance."


<quote off>

Note the heavy Rockefeller presence. Johnny D 3, John McCloy, Dean Rusk.

The military industrial complex star chamber circa 1959, with John D Rockefeller III and W. Averell Harriman the top players.

Edited by Cliff Varnell
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now

×
×
  • Create New...