Dinkin to Ofstein to Jones

[Steve Thomas]

Eugene Dinkin served with the 529^th Ordnance Company.

In his work with the 529^th, Dinkin had a Top Security clearance.

There is a record of a 529^th Ordnance Company. They were part of the 71^st Ordnance Group, and were based in Massweiler, Germany.European Theater Ordnance Units & Activities, 1945 – 1989 https&&&www.usarmygermany.com/Units/Ordnance/USAREUR_Ordnance%20Troop%20List.htm

The 529^th Ordnance Co. was stationed in Massweiler, Germany as part of the 71^st. Ordnance Group, and did do nuclear weapons assembly work under the Advanced Weapons Support Command (AWSCOM) which was activated in March, 1959. There were crytographic operators working with those units in the 71^st who held Top Secret clearances.

 

On December 6, 1963 Thomas Crigler was interviewed by the FBI. He said that he met (Dennis) Ofstein “accidentally” on the street. Ofstein worked with Lee Oswald at Jaggars-Chiles-Stoval.

...he knew Ofstein from about June, 1960 to December, 1960 purely as another person attached to the same unit with him. He said that he had never become socially or well acquainted with Ofstein at that time. He said the caption of their group was the 507^th USASA Group, Heilbron, West Germany.”

That's US Army Security Agency, and the town is actually spelled Heilbronn.

See FBI interview of Crigler December 6, 1963:

CD 205 p. 478

https://maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=10672#relPageId=481&tab=page

 

Robert E. Jones testimony before the HSCA page 7:

https://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/unpub_testimony/Jones_4-20-78/html/jones_0007a.htm

 

 

 

The three of them are doing military intelligence work in Germany at roughly the same time in 1960.

The distance from Massweiler on the west to Nuremberg on the east is roughly 200 miles.

Very interesting.

 

Steve Thomas

 

Edited March 27, 2019 by Steve Thomas
duplicate image

[Paul Brancato]

Steve - are we to assume that mr. Crigler was interviewed because he volunteered to do so? 

Whats interesting about this thread is that Ofstein also worked at jagger-Chiles-Stovall spoke Russian, and had a military intelligence background. 

Of course the info you dug up on Dinkin is in my opinion very important, yet no one has realized that. Clearly Dinkin was in a position, as he stated, to hear secret radio communications. The fact that it took so long for someone, you, to find out that the official stories on Dinkin had the wrong info on where he had been posted in Germany, is astounding, and it should have reopened the investigation of Dinkin as a viable source. Instead it seems to have gone unnoticed. I think you could consider doing a presentation at a jfk symposium, like David Josephs did with Mexico City. 

[Steve Thomas]

11 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:

Steve - are we to assume that mr. Crigler was interviewed because he volunteered to do so? 

Paul,

 

I don't think so.

Ofstein was interviewed by FBI Agent, Kenneth Jackson on December 2, 1963. Jackson wrote up his Report on December 3, 1963.

See CD 205 p. 472.

https://maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=10672#relPageId=475&tab=page

Ofstein told the FBI of his having sought out Thomas Crigler because he was suspicious of Oswald when Oswald told him (Ofstein) that microdots could be “hidden under postage stamps and used in espionage operations”.

Thomas H. Crigler was interviewed by FBI Agent Kenneth Jackson on December 6, 1963. (CD 205 p. 478).

He told Jackson that he met Dennis Ofstein “accidentally" on the street outside the U.S. Army Recruiting Station sometime in August, 1963, and that they then went into the office.

https://maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=10672#relPageId=481&tab=page

 

Something is not kosher here.

Crigler told the FBI that Ofstein had approached him in August, 1963. That is about four to five months after Oswald had left JCS. If Ofstein was suspicious of Oswald, why would he wait five months to voice his suspicions? Ofstein said he was concerned about his future employment opportunities.

Crigler said that he barely knew Odstein, yet, about a week after meeting Ofstein in August, he (Ofstein) had visited Crigler in his home, and that twice more he (Crigler) had visited Ofstein in his (Ofstein's) house.

 

Something is not adding up here, but I don't know what it is.

 

Steve Thomas

[Paul Brancato]

Thanks for clarifying. Indeed something doesn’t add up.

[Steve Thomas]

16 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:

Steve - are we to assume that mr. Crigler was interviewed because he volunteered to do so? 

Whats interesting about this thread is that Ofstein also worked at jagger-Chiles-Stovall spoke Russian, and had a military intelligence background. 

Of course the info you dug up on Dinkin is in my opinion very important, yet no one has realized that. Clearly Dinkin was in a position, as he stated, to hear secret radio communications. The fact that it took so long for someone, you, to find out that the official stories on Dinkin had the wrong info on where he had been posted in Germany, is astounding, and it should have reopened the investigation of Dinkin as a viable source. Instead it seems to have gone unnoticed.

Paul,

 

I was very skeptical about Dinkin until I realized that the widely accepted story of his account was based on a false identification of the unit he served with. Once I started digging into what his real unit, the 529th Ordnance actually did, I began to accept the idea that he could have been in a position to do what he said he did.

Now, I can't prove one way or another that he intercepted radio transmissions hinting at or discussing JFK's assassination prior to the time it actually occurred, but he was where he said he was, and he was doing the kind of work he said he was doing.

 

Steve Thomas

[Steve Thomas]

17 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:

Whats interesting about this thread is that Ofstein also worked at jagger-Chiles-Stovall spoke Russian, and had a military intelligence background.

Paul,

 

I think that Ofstein is one of the most under-researched figures in the JFK case. It seems like most people sort of gloss over the military unit designations that they run across.

Crigler told the FBI that he and Ofstein were in the same unit; the 507th USASA Group, and people say, "Oh, that's nice" and move on, but I wondered, "What did the 507th do"?

Well, it turns out that the 507th was Army Security Agency, and they were tasked with intercepting Russian and German military traffic over in Germany. Ofstein had been trained in the Russian language at the Monterey School of Languages.

Ofstein was discharged in November of 1960 and after being trusted with the some of the highest military intelligence secrets our country possessed, he relocated to Dallas and went to work at a Sinclair gas station. At that point in his life he was married and had two children. So almost immediately after being discharged, he relocates to Dallas where he takes a job working in a gas station?

There was a Sinclair station at

From the 1961 Dallas City Directory page 139

https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth806907/m1/473/

J H Sinclair Service Station (James H. Bland) 1023 S. Hampton Rd. This is roughly 2.5 miles W/SW of the Texas Theater.

And, another one

former Sinclair station 622 N Haskell Ave Dallas, TX. That's way out on the northwest side.

 

(There was also a Sinclair Service Station at 1820 N. Beckley in Dallas)

At 12:45 PM on November 22, 1963 Gene Andre Guinn, age 31 of 636 Lacewood was arrested along with the Joiners for picketing at the Dallas Trade Mart. Guinn was a member of the White Indignant Citizens Council. . Guinn was also suspected of printing the “Wanted For Treason” leaflets.

DPD Archives Box 7, Folder# 7, Item# 18

http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/box7.htm

According to the Mary Ferrell Chronologies, “Guinn runs for political offices and seems to be a right winger” (He ran for City Council in 1965.) His address would be in Police District 84, which Officer Tippitt had been assigned in the past. This street is near O'Bannon street where Mrs. Stella Jacob lives. She formerly lived at 508 S. Marsalis and she works at the TSBD.”

In a handwritten note to the Guinn citation, Ferrell adds, “He owned Sinclair Station, 1820 N. Beckley; member of hate group; did Rockwell's printing?”.

 

After leaving the gas station business (smile), Ofstein goes to work for Jaggars-Chiles-Stovall, who, at the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis, just happen to be interpreting maps for the US Army, some of which are in Russian.

 

Like I said, I think Dennis Ofstein is under-researched.

 

Steve Thomas

 

[Larry Hancock]

I know that I'm always being a wet blanket but just for a sanity check I should say I've  interviewed three people who worked for either the Air Force or Army Security services, they were either radio/telegraph intercept message operators, code translators or language translators.  While they held high security clearances they certainly were not professional intelligence officers...when I talked to them two had served only one tour of duty and the other retired after a rather routine career.  All  had gone back to small towns, one working at a Walmart, one as a foster parent and the other at a similarly normal job.  The same can be said for several of the crypto operators and operations guys that I knew in the Air Force, and they were all enlisted rank.

Sorry, to intrude...but it may be a stretch to talk about "trusted with the highest military intelligence the nation possessed"....

 

 

 

[Steve Thomas]

4 hours ago, Larry Hancock said:

I know that I'm always being a wet blanket but just for a sanity check I should say I've  interviewed three people who worked for either the Air Force or Army Security services, they were either radio/telegraph intercept message operators, code translators or language translators.  While they held high security clearances they certainly were not professional intelligence officers...when I talked to them two had served only one tour of duty and the other retired after a rather routine career.  All  had gone back to small towns, one working at a Walmart, one as a foster parent and the other at a similarly normal job.  The same can be said for several of the crypto operators and operations guys that I knew in the Air Force, and they were all enlisted rank.

Sorry, to intrude...but it may be a stretch to talk about "trusted with the highest military intelligence the nation possessed"....

 

 

 

Larry,

 

I don't mind you being a wet blanket. Reality checks are good.

On the other hand...

I don't think Ofstein was doing analysis. I think he he was doing intercepts though. How many people at that time knew we were intercepting Russian military traffic?

From what I've read, the 507th took the raw data and shipped it to either Fort Meade or Vingt Hill Farms where it was decoded.

As far as a job afterwards... How about this flight of fancy?

I had been doing some reading on the 507^th Army Security Agency Group in Germany in the 1950's and 60's. The soldiers talked about using IBM punch cards in their work. Several said that there was a job waiting for them at IBM when their hitch was over.

(Source: Email from John O'Neil) (served in 1960)

https://www.usarmygermany.com/Sont.htm?https&&&www.usarmygermany.com/Units/ASA%20Europe/USAREUR_ASAE.htm

"My next duty station (after Vint Hill Farms) was with the 507th USASA Group (Field Army) at Heilbronn am Neckar. We had 4 -2½ ton trucks with expandable sides that held all our IBM equipment that ran off portable diesel generators (one per truck).

Jim Campbell in his email said “(When I was in, no 206 had ever re-enlisted - IBM had a job ready for them when they got out.)” When I got out I went to the IBM office in San Francisco, showed them my diploma with TJ Watson’s signature and asked for a job, they asked me what I knew about computers, so I told them I’d seen one in Germany. I got the hint when they said ‘Goodbye, thanks for stopping in”.

 

Ian Lloyd, Why the Texas Theatre? Jfk assassination forum

http://www.jfkassassinationforum.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=da10693a75f6fceb0ce372badd010bff&topic=1633.msg24228#msg24228

According to Ian Griggs' "No Case To Answer" (Johnny) Brewer mentions "2 IBM men" who he says he didn't actually know, but were in his shop when Oswald ducked into the doorway but, when Brewer came back to his shop, they had disappeared never to be seen again?

Lee Farley, “Oswald's Escape Plan? Jfk assassination forum

http://www.jfkassassinationforum.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=da10693a75f6fceb0ce372badd010bff&topic=3304.msg61982#msg61982

 

“The main reason I place suspicion on Brewer is because when Oswald first entered Hardy's Shoe Store, Brewer claims he was with two people that he had known for over a year.  These two men, he says, worked for IBM. They were in the neighborhood and they popped in and were "killing time" and "lounging around." The Dallas Police didn't seek these individuals to find out who they were and what they saw. No one, it appears, was interested in them in the slightest. They just disappeared from existence.

Brewer had an interview with British researcher Ian Griggs in 1996. Brewer brought up the two men who were in his store (who worked for IBM) and he stated that in his absence they "locked up" for him. Lo and behold, Brewer says that although he had known these men for over a year, and they regularly came into his store to "kill time" he couldn't remember either of their names.”

 

Thomas Crigler told the FBI that he had "accidentally" met Dennis Ofstein on the street, and I wondered how that happened. Ofstein lived at 6015 Bryan Parkway in Dallas. That's over on the northeast side of Dallas. Crigler lived at 1705 McAdams in Oak Cliff. That's on the southwest part of town, about four blocks south of Illinois. The next major cross street to the west of 1705 McAdams is S. Hampton Rd.

I mentioned that there were a couple of Sinclair stations in Dallas. One of them was:

From the 1961 Dallas City Directory page 139

https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth806907/m1/473/

J H Sinclair Service Station (James H. Bland) 1023 S. Hampton Rd. This is roughly 2.5 miles W/SW of the Texas Theater.

Thomas Crigler worked as an Army recruiter. There was a recruiting office on Illinois about one or two blocks from the Texas Theater and Brewer's Shoe store in Oak Cliff.

A lot of the guys who worked in the ASA said that they were recruited into the Agency directly at the recruiting office, even before they went to boot camp.

Ofstein himself told the WC, "Well, when I went in the service I was interested in radio--I was a disc jockey at the time, and the closest thing my recruiting sergeant said that I could get to radio would be possibly with the Army security agency, so I signed up, and after basic training I went to Fort Devens, Mass., and was held there on a temporary status while the agency determined what type training I should have..."

 

How "accidental" was this meeting between Ofstein and Crigler.

Sorry this is so long. Like I said, it was a flight of fancy. What can I say. I'm a Libra, and as an air sign, I spend 95% of my time out in space somewhere.

 

Steve Thomas

 

Edited March 28, 2019 by Steve Thomas

[Larry Hancock]

Steve, I don't want to intrude into the thread any further, the only reason I personally got into the security services and the subject intercepts was because of my interest in a) military communications and b) specifically in regard to the JFK assassination with the Kirknewton incident which you find written  up in detail in SWHT.   That might be useful if you take a look. 

The overall all tasking was that the Air Force did what you would call strategic, long distance intercepts on radio and teletype traffic....with separate installations (requiring huge antenna farms) in Scotland and England. One for military intercepts and one for commercial.  Both were NSA installations and focused on particular watch lists.  As far as I know the Army focused on tactical intelligence, targeting Russian, East German and Eastern bloc forces with a special interest in force composition, movements, logistics chains....which get really dull and boring and involve what unit and type of force is using what radio frequency etc...which is one reason lots of very dull routine military comm traffic had to be recorded and shipped back for computer analysis.

And of course Germany was still officially "occupied" through 1955 and the vast bulk of all overseas American Army personnel were stationed either in Germany or Korea until well into the 1960's.  And that's enough from me.

 

 

[Steve Thomas]

1 hour ago, Larry Hancock said:

Steve, I don't want to intrude into the thread any further, the only reason I personally got into the security services and the subject intercepts was because of my interest in a) military communications and b) specifically in regard to the JFK assassination with the Kirknewton incident which you find written  up in detail in SWHT.   That might be useful if you take a look. 

The overall all tasking was that the Air Force did what you would call strategic, long distance intercepts on radio and teletype traffic....with separate installations (requiring huge antenna farms) in Scotland and England. One for military intercepts and one for commercial.  Both were NSA installations and focused on particular watch lists.  As far as I know the Army focused on tactical intelligence, targeting Russian, East German and Eastern bloc forces with a special interest in force composition, movements, logistics chains....which get really dull and boring and involve what unit and type of force is using what radio frequency etc...which is one reason lots of very dull routine military comm traffic had to be recorded and shipped back for computer analysis.

And of course Germany was still officially "occupied" through 1955 and the vast bulk of all overseas American Army personnel were stationed either in Germany or Korea until well into the 1960's.  And that's enough from me.

 

 

Larry,

 

Intrude. Please. You've been keeping my feet grounded for a good dozen years or more.

I think you're right about the Army ASA focus vs the Air Force or NSA focus. The Army's was more tactical.

Something else that has kind of fascinated me...

https://www.usarmygermany.com/Sont.htm?https&&&www.usarmygermany.com/Units/ASA%20Europe/USAREUR_ASAE.htm

Quote:

Webmaster Note: The 502nd ASA Group had been a TOE (Table of Organization and Equipment) unit while the 507th USASA Group was a TDA (Table of Distribution and Allowance) unit. The underlying reason for the redesignation was in the ASA having been forced to downsize in 1957 after a DoD decision that year to cut the Army's strength by 50,000 personnel. The ASA found itself unable to sustain the manning of its tactical TOE units. In order retain a support structure in the tactical commands, the TOE units were inactivated and replaced by units which were tailored specifically to the needs of their supported command (i.e. mission tailored). These new mission structured units were TDA (Table of Distribution and Allowance) units. The designations of these TDA units also differed from the TOE units they replaced. TOE units were designated as "ASA" whereas TDA units were titled "USASA."

 

Whereas up to that point, the ASA's had been feeding their product direct to Washington, they were now required to report to the field commands - in this case, the majority of which was the 7th Army, which, if my memory serves me right,  was headquartered in Nuremberg.

A lot of the grunts grumbled about that. Too much red tape.

 

Steve Thomas

 

[Larry Hancock]

Steve, you might find something interesting in this batch of information - if you have not already seen it:

https://www.usarmygermany.com/Sont.htm?https&&&www.usarmygermany.com/Units/HqUSAREUR/USAREUR_HqUSAREUR.htm

I wonder if strategically part of the change may have had to do that by 1957 worries were not so much about the Soviets rolling west to the Atlantic across a broad front but rather about the increasing chance of military engagement over Berlin.  If that happened there would be no time to send signals intel back to DC for processing but you would need it right there on the front lines...strange that it would involve more red tape but then again you wonder how much got fed back from Washington the other way...grin.

The other big change going along with that was the decision to field a "pentomic division" and to face up to nuclear exchanges on the battlefield, that was a relatively new thing...but even when JFK faced his Berlin challenge his military plan included escalation all the way up to tactical nukes.

[Steve Thomas]

4 hours ago, Larry Hancock said:

Steve, you might find something interesting in this batch of information - if you have not already seen it:

https://www.usarmygermany.com/Sont.htm?https&&&www.usarmygermany.com/Units/HqUSAREUR/USAREUR_HqUSAREUR.htm

I wonder if strategically part of the change may have had to do that by 1957 worries were not so much about the Soviets rolling west to the Atlantic across a broad front but rather about the increasing chance of military engagement over Berlin.  If that happened there would be no time to send signals intel back to DC for processing but you would need it right there on the front lines...strange that it would involve more red tape but then again you wonder how much got fed back from Washington the other way...grin.

The other big change going along with that was the decision to field a "pentomic division" and to face up to nuclear exchanges on the battlefield, that was a relatively new thing...but even when JFK faced his Berlin challenge his military plan included escalation all the way up to tactical nukes.

Larry,

 

I always looked at it as a power struggle. Information is power and whoever controls the flow of information controls the power.

The field commanders looked at it as who knows better how to respond to situations on the ground; them or the pencil-necked geeks back in Washington?

I think you saw this played out in Vietnam over the next decade as command and control decisions more and more were being made in Washington rather than Saigon.

The problem was that a lot of those front line generals were pushing for the use of tactical nuclear weapons. Some of those generals were even recommending that the use of "limited" nukes be left in the hands of front-line commanders, and that horrified Washington. Things could spiral out of control.

I can just envision the arguments that went on in the DOD and wonder where Eisenhower stood on all this.

I'll read the documents you referenced in your post.

 

Steve Thomas

[Steve Thomas]

5 hours ago, Larry Hancock said:

.strange that it would involve more red tape but then again you wonder how much got fed back from Washington the other way...grin.

Larry,

 

An example of the "red tape" from the website you referenced...

 

Extract from an unfinished personal memoir called Up From Cambria City by COL Basil J. Hobar, USA (Retired) September 18, 2013Bonita Springs, Florida

 

“It took years for me to develop even an understanding of this array of organizations and units oriented on defeating the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies when they attacked. From the standpoint of 2ndLt Hobar soon to be on the “front” in Bamberg, the headquarters of 7thArmy and USAREUR might as well have been on the moon!”

 

“All these layers of bureaucratic organization caused problems with each piling regulation upon regulation. The Headquarters of the Department of the Army (HQDA) in Washington issued Army Regulations (ARs) and other directives that governed every phase of every thing the Army did. General Inspections, called IGs, were mostly about how well you were following those regulations. Each major headquarters down the chain of command issued regulations on top of regulations creating an impenetrable bureaucratic lash up. This maze of regulations flummoxed those of us who had to try to carry them out. In an extreme case I might be tasked to do something and before I could act I would have to have available the AR, the USAREUR regulation, the 7thArmy regulation, the 5thCorps regulation or directive and the 3rdID regulation! This could drive a man to drink. Somehow we muddled through and the Army did a lot of things very well.”

 

Steve Thomas