Gene Wheaton and Carl Jenkins

[Larry Hancock]

That's not an area the Jenkins lead took us into but it did provide more insight into the fact that a number of JMWAVE officers and AMOTS were very active in Mexico City before and during 1963.   Bill Simpich has done some great work on that.  So has Stu Wexler. And we know that Phillips was having his role significantly expanded under Fitzgerald,  wearing two hats in intelligence and propaganda not just for the Mexico City Station but for AMWORLD across Central America.  And we certainly don't fully understand his trip both to DC and Miami in October.

The Jenkins lead did take us to Max Gomez and a new understanding of how JMWAVE officers and possibly even Cuban assets were placed within AMWORLD, ostensibly for logistics support but clearly to do other things as well...and that took Max to Mexico City in November 1963 - it may have taken him through Dallas on the way, with a stop at Red Bird (and that would be a block buster if we could only confirm it).  

Bottom line, when Barney spoke not just of being tight with Phillips but also of Morales making a lot of trips to Mexico,  it was one more warning of how little we really know about what JMWAVE was doing in Mexico.  While Miami station is most obvious in running missions directly against Cuba,  its fair to say that a good deal of its operations were actually conducted though its auxiliary station in Mexico City - and that the COS there may certainly not have been aware of all that was going on  (not all that unusual when CIA put an oprational base in country where there was also a CIA station within the American embassy).

[Paul Brancato]

I thought Max Gomez was Felix Rodriguez. 

[Larry Hancock]

Absolutely correct Paul, my slip,  I'm actually talking about the "Manny Chavez" who we introduce in the Wheaton/Jenkins study.   Good catch;  I think I have two many names stored for my available gray cells to handle.

I corrected the mistake in my original reply - thanks for the help.

Edited April 23, 2020 by Larry Hancock

[Gary Murr]

David Boylan asked:  “Gary, do you know if the Adelaide and the Joanne were the same ship?” And my original response was yes. Further to that…

Hi David:

I have done a quick search of some of my AMWORLD files in an effort to find substantiation of my thought that the AMWORLD/JMWAVE maritime assets “Joanne” and “Adelaida” were one and the same vessel. I am listing below two RIF numbers that I feel give some credence to this theoretical assertion on my part. You can search them on the MFF site in the CIA documents section. The thing to notice is in both instances though the individuals involved in these telephone conversations [all are well known to you – grin] talk about both ships, note where these records are to be filed – last page of each report, bottom left hand corner under “File:” You will find the name “Joanne” but not the name “Adelaida.” I cannot recall, off the top of my head right now, if I ever found communication between these individuals involved in AMWORLD indicating that a “File” under the name of “Adelaida” was ever set up.

Both RIF “Agency” are CIA [files]

RIF: 104-10162-10163

RIF:  104-10241-10060

[Matt Allison]

Didn't January describe the "Colonel" that showed up with the Cuban at Redbird as "fair complexioned"?

[Larry Hancock]

I don't find that in my writing on Red Bird but I may have missed it,  perhaps Mathew Smith noted that somewhere.  As best I can see January never really interacted with him; he just showed up with the Cuban pilot and exited immediately - I think he showed up again when the plane departed but January said nothing about talking with him - not sure who signed the acceptance papers, likely the pilot who had actually done the work and held the FAA certifications to do so. The officer/civilian appears just to have been along for the ride and not around the balance of the week.

All the remarks I find in a quick check are about the Cuban who January notes spoke English with no accent - which seems to have made an impression on January.

Apparently the Colonel was in civilian clothes and it was the Cuban who told him the other man was actually an Air Force officer.

[Matt Allison]

I'd assumed it was the same Colonel but I could also be wrong. This is from Smith's “Conspiracy: The Plot To Stop The Kennedys” 

"One company Wayne January was a partner in was said to be Royal Air Service Inc., which was wrapping up the selling off of large aircraft--supposedly part of a top-secret government program that was interested in developing radar mapping for low-level flying by such planes as the F-111 fighter-bomber. At the time of our story they only had one DC3 left to sell off to finish the contract. This final plane was sold in mid-November by January’s partner and the owner showed up on November 18 to sign for it. January told [author Matthew Smith] he was a very well-dressed gentleman. January said “he was about six feet tall, fair complexioned, brown hair, and late thirties to early forties. His haircut was short, military type, and wore slacks and a sport shirt.” January also said, “he had no particular accent.” January said later on he found out he was an Air Force Colonel who specialized in the type of plane being specialized…."

 

 

[Larry Hancock]

Wow, that's sort of confusing....I wonder if that copy is unintentionally confabulating incidents and people in some fashion....why would January take the time to note the fact that the fellow spoke with no accent if he was fair complected and an apparent Anglo.  Or would he take the trouble to note the lack of any regional accent. David is looking for other photos of Chavez - check this one out:

https://www.fold3.com/page/85369970-manuel-j-chavez/

That sort of takes me back as there was some confusion about different aircraft being stripped and configured for different purposes. At one time I thought it might be a gunship prototype for that new AF program, out of Hulbert field in Florida. 

Strangely the F-111 radar part of the story dovetails tangentially with a separate story of radar test aircraft being used for the F-111 project and a fellow who came up with the log of one demonstration flight of one of the new systems on a very low level, high speed  flight over the Alleghenies...what was interesting was that one of the entries on the passenger log was "Jack Ruby" and the flight was out of DC.   Spent a lot of time on that one. This almost sounds like its mixing the two stories as those aircraft flying the special radar controlled flight packages were certainly not transports. The whole challenge was tracking and flight control at very high speed.

And of course "later on" in Matthew's copy would be a matter of days, from the Cuban pilot doing the acceptance...

What is clear from the FAA paperwork is that the aircraft in question was sold to the Houston Air Center and kept on its books for a couple of  years before being sold on to a Mexican carrier. 

Of course nothing is ever simple...sigh.

In this instance I think the driver has to be the level of detail about the Cuban pilot - I will say that I went over all this a number of times with Matthew himself, our discussions centered on the pilot as January's interactions with the other individual that week in November were very limited and all we were left with were the dialog with the pilot and what I managed to dig up on the aircraft itself. That was with help from Alan Kent and a very nice FAA employee who requested to remain anonymous.  Of course the Houston Air Center historian was very helpful - up to the point where the identify of that aircraft was tied down ..

Matthew himself did not have the final details on the aircraft when he was initially writing up the incident,  simply because January would did not want the aircraft number released until after his death - and only then could we confirm things and really begin tracking. .

So....confirmation of any of this would rest with the pilot and with any confirmation that might have come from Chavez - at this point it has to remain intriguing but speculative, based on what we can confirm about AMWORLD and Chavez travel to Mexico in that time frame.

Edited April 23, 2020 by Larry Hancock

[David Boylan]

1 hour ago, Gary Murr said:

David Boylan asked:  “Gary, do you know if the Adelaide and the Joanne were the same ship?” And my original response was yes. Further to that…

Hi David:

I have done a quick search of some of my AMWORLD files in an effort to find substantiation of my thought that the AMWORLD/JMWAVE maritime assets “Joanne” and “Adelaida” were one and the same vessel. I am listing below two RIF numbers that I feel give some credence to this theoretical assertion on my part. You can search them on the MFF site in the CIA documents section. The thing to notice is in both instances though the individuals involved in these telephone conversations [all are well known to you – grin] talk about both ships, note where these records are to be filed – last page of each report, bottom left hand corner under “File:” You will find the name “Joanne” but not the name “Adelaida.” I cannot recall, off the top of my head right now, if I ever found communication between these individuals involved in AMWORLD indicating that a “File” under the name of “Adelaida” was ever set up.

Both RIF “Agency” are CIA [files]

RIF:  104-10162-10163

RIF:  104-10241-10060

Thanks Gary! 

That is what I suspected. The Mr. Archer referred to here was Desmond Fitzgerald and Boysen was of course, Henry Hecksher. 

[Matt Allison]

Larry- FWIW, that link you just posted with the pic of Chavez actually does show him to be rather fair complexioned, so perhaps everything still jibes.

[Larry Hancock]

That was my impression as well Matt,  we are going to check for other photos. 

Also David has confirmed an interview with Chavez in which he confirms he had indeed flown the type of aircraft which was being picked up at Red Bird:

MC: Oh,J was flyin because when I came back to actual duty I didn't start
flying, but when I became a regular officer, *I went back on flying status,
so I was flying C-47s* - anything that moved!

  MC: Oh, the Caribbean, yeah! Just had a uh, wonderful time! Nicaragua,
Guatemala, Central America, and uh, then, in between uh... we also provided
transportation to help the uh, missions, and the attaches in South America. *So
I'd get a C-47 and we'd take supplies to Peru, Chile, and Argentina, and
Brazil. So we were flying all over Latin America.*

Looks like a fit for the remark on his flying experience that January made...

Edited April 23, 2020 by Larry Hancock

[Andrej Stancak]

This essay provides as close as possible picture of the group of anti-Castro Cubans and CIA operatives that eventually embarked on the Kennedy assassination mission. 

The question is whether some members of AMWORLD also took part in actual shooting or were they just around to provide a likely but false lead? I was intrigued by the appearance of Hal Feeney in one of the photographs shown in the article because his head bears some similarity to the partial human figure discovered by Robert Groden in one of Dillard pictures.

 

We have a thread about Hal Feeney on this Forum:

 

 

 

 

Edited April 24, 2020 by Andrej Stancak

[Larry Hancock]

Another thread on Feeney would be good, I wouldn't want to divert this one but in my new book In Denial I describe some brand new information related to Feeney. It appears that he  played what could have been a key role in an virtually unknown plan which very possibly would have involved a provocation involving an incident at the Guantanamo Naval Base at the start of the landings at the Bay of Pigs.

Such a provocation could well have changed the whole complexion of the American intervention in Cuba.  And it would not have been the last such plan Feeny was involved with - for those who have In Denial, you can pursue this in the chapter on Hidden Measures. 

As to Feeney, his operational association with Izquerdo, who we do go into in this paper, as well as his relationship with Morales are both of interest and further research on what Feeney was doing in 1963 would fit well in a new thread on him.

Edited April 24, 2020 by Larry Hancock

[Greg Wagner]

Hal Feeney

Tony Izquierdo

Barney Hidalgo

Edited April 24, 2020 by Greg Wagner

[Michaleen Kilroy]

On 4/20/2020 at 12:50 PM, Larry Hancock said:

In the earliest months of the ARRB, Gene Wheaton contacted its staff with the simple statement that he might be able to offer a lead to them, a lead to someone who might have information on the Kennedy assassination.   Years later Malcolm Blunt found the released records describing the Wheaton contact, referred it to me and Stu Wexler and we did preliminary vetting of the two main names associated with that lead - Carl Jenkins and Rafael Quintero.  Stu also followed up by locating and contacting the main staff member who was in touch with Wheaton. Thanks to newly released CIA documents we were able to corroborate the background of both men, and their role in CIA anti-Castro operations.

Over the following decade, ongoing efforts at crypt cracking and massive document research by Bill Simpich and David Boylan provided us with a totally new look at Carl Jenkins, a man who had an extremely significant role not only in the Cuba Project, but in the new AMWORLD effort that kicked off in 1963.  A man whose operational significance goes far beyond the formerly mysterious figure of David Morales.

Over the last few  years that research led us from Jenkins into a host of names and associations that may be quite relevant to the Kennedy assassination conspiracy. And now thanks to the work of Rex Bradford, that full story - with document links and illustrations - is available online at the Mary Ferrell Foundation.  We urge serous researchers to read and ponder it, both for the new history it reveals and for further leads to the conspiracy.  You will find it at this link:

https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Essay_-_The_Wheaton_Lead.html

David and I will both be here to help with questions -  especially David, whose knowledge and ability to recall the intricacies of the names and documents is way beyond mine.

I've read through the Wheaton interview and am getting through the rest.

This seems like one of the most substantial finds in JFK research to me.

Wheaton's bona fides seem beyond reproach, and Carl Jenkins seems like he was perfectly positioned to accomplish the assassination he boasted about.  Quintero was just another in a long line of bitter anti-Castro fighters except is more likely a participant because he was being trained by the CIA to assassinate Castro.

A few thoughts:

• It's strange Wheaton didn't talk to authorities sooner as a self-described lawman for life.
• It's also strange Wheaton didn't have one scrap of detail on the operation that isn't already known or at least theorized, e.g. triangulated crossfire.  As an operations person himself, you would think that would've been top of mind in his conversations with Jenkins and Quintero.
• At the same time, and as the article points out, he never once tried to gain publicity or notoriety from his knowledge of these two.
• Also, the two different reactions of Jenkins and Quintero - the former claiming it never happened and the latter claiming Wheaton was confused about what they said - bolsters Wheaton's veracity.

For what it's worth, my gut tells me these guys were involved.  Those involved in the CIA-backed Castro assassination plots were long considered by researchers to have turned on JFK.  This article gives a lot of credence to that with the details on their training and who was involved, and makes so much sense in terms of means, motive and opportunity, down to knowing how to frame a patsy (for Castro, to make it look like a non-US hit).

What is also shocking, and also demonstrates how essentially institutionalized JFK's murder was, these CIA agents have no fear of telling an outsider about their role in the assassination, as if knowing no repercussions would be forthcoming.  They're confessing but with no real fear of going to jail for it.

It's groundbreaking research, IMO.  Congrats to Larry, David, Bill and all those who contributed.  For the first time,  it feels like this case could be resolved in my lifetime.  

One question - is Jenkins still alive?  If so, is someone still trying to get him on the record?

Edited May 4, 2020 by Michaleen Kilroy