David Atlee Phillips: Oswald never went to Mexico!

[Greg Doudna]

Comments on Oswald and Mexico City

Nothing about Oswald going to Mexico City assists, but only complicates, the Warren Commission conclusion that Oswald acted alone in killing President Kennedy. It runs counter to interest for the FBI and Warren Commission et al to fabricate evidence or influence witnesses or marionette-string Marina to have her say Oswald did go to Mexico City, after ca. midnight Nov 22, 1963. 

If there was incentive to cover up or suborn some witnesses to perjure testimony a certain way etc., would that not work in the opposite direction, toward if possible denying Oswald went to Mexico City? Was there even a brief period of time in which a complete coverup of Oswald's having been in Mexico City was contemplated at the LBJ/Hoover level? (But not carried out because it could not be carried out?)

As Steve Roe notes Silvia Duran's and the Cuban consulate's information was in Oswald's address book. There is no secure evidence Oswald was anywhere else during the days of Mexico City. Oswald wrote a draft of a letter in his handwriting in which he refers to having been in Mexico City. Marina spilled it that he had been to Mexico City. I have come to see that the Silvia Odio visit, far from being an argument against the Mexico City trip as often perceived and as the Warren Commission considered a difficulty, is a strong argument in support of it for this reason: the date of the Silvia Odio three-person visit can be securely established by argument to have been early eve. Wed. Sept 25, 1963. (More likely earlier evening according to Annie Odio's testimony than later in the evening of Silvia's, from Houston logistics considerations.)

Apart from the independent argument establishing that date, there is a further argument supporting that Wednesday date that I have not seen cited: in the very tiny and runon handwritten letter of Silvia's father, from his imprisonment in Cuba and writing past the eyes of his Cuban censors, Odio Sr. writes advice to family members and includes, buried in the tiny, runon difficult-to read handwritten sentences, a line of advice to Silvia to not go out Wednesday evenings with her girlfriends, that he does not think that is a good idea, at the same time telling her whoever claimed to know him on that occasion she must verify before believing. It may be that the "Wednesday evening" reference (not any other day of the week) is an allusion to what Silvia wrote in her letter to him (which has not survived, but it is clear she wrote him of the three-man visit to her), and supports that it occurred on a Wednesday evening, i.e. Wed Sept 25. Silvia was going out the evening the three men including Oswald visited her; Odio Sr. answering her letter about that visit comments on her going out on Wednesday evenings, q.e.d. a Wednesday, supporting the Wed Sept 25 date.

The point about the Wed Sept 25 date of the Silvia Odio incident is that is precisely the correct time to account for Oswald having been driven, first from New Orleans to Dallas that day, and then from Dallas to Houston that evening, to catch the bus from Houston onward for the Mexico City trip. The Warren Commission could find no evidence of or realistic mechanism of Oswald getting from New Orleans to Houston by bus, but assumed it must have happened that way anyway, when the solution is there was no bus to Houston for Oswald, but instead a witnessed presence of Oswald in a car being driven at exactly the right time on that trip. It resolves that mystery. The juxtaposition of the timing is the argument here that it was part of the Mexico City trip, and therefore that Oswald did go to Mexico City.

In addition according to sworn testimony, Oswald himself talked of the Mexico City trip in his final interrogation, not to Fritz, but to federal officials questioning him, as told by postal inspector Holmes who was present. This can be combined with calling into question the common report that Oswald denied he went to Mexico City in his interrogations. Oswald's words directly are not known to have been recorded, and have been represented as having him deny to Fritz that he went to Mexico City when asked in his first interrogation.

Agreed-upon facts are that the question was asked of Oswald by Fritz at Hosty's urging, and whatever Oswald replied was cut off by a knock on the door and Oswald then taken out for a lineup. The issue is what exactly did Oswald say in response to the question before the interruption. Hosty in little-known sworn testimony to the Church Committee, and I believe elsewhere (not only to the Church Committee), was very clear (in that testimony, though Hosty says the opposite in his book Assignment: Oswald) that Oswald did not answer the question before the interruption. There is no known record of Fritz ever asking that question again. So although it is widely believed and claimed that Oswald denied he went to Mexico City, there is some conflicting evidence on that point, competing hearsay, and it is not fully clear that he denied it.

Whatever he actually answered on Friday, by Sunday morning Oswald was openly discussing his Mexico City trip. I was surprised to notice that according to an account of Leavelle of the Dallas Police, he (Leavelle) and Fritz drank coffee in a restaurant across the street for a good part of the time between 10 am and 11:20, before it was time for Oswald to be brought down from Fritz's office for the transfer to be killed. (According to the accounts I can see, Fritz though in charge of the transfer does not appear to have been hands-on in charge of its timing, with the insistence on the risky daytime transfer from Chief Curry, who was receiving orders from the mayor's office above his level on that, though the whole issue of who was responsible for what is murky. ) Therefore the objection that Fritz never mentions Oswald speaking of Mexico City Sunday morning in Fritz's written reports of the interrogations may have a possible explanation in that Fritz and Leavelle were across the street drinking coffee when Oswald talked about Mexico City on Sunday morning. Leavelle:

"Around 10: AM while the Federal agents were talking to Oswald, Captain Fritz asked me if I would like a cup of coffee. We walked across the street to the White Plaza Hotel Coffee Shop had coffee and discussed the transfer. On our way back to the office ... By the time we returned to the third floor office it was about eleven AM. The federal agents were bringing to a close their questioning of Oswald ... ("Detective Leavelle's Personal Notes", n.d., https://www.seandegrilla.com/detective-leavelle-s-personal-notes)

That is, according to this account of Leavelle, Fritz was not even present most of the time before it was time for Oswald to go below to be killed. Here is what Holmes said was going on:

Mr. BELIN. Anything else about Russia? Did he ever say anything about going to Mexico? Was that ever covered?
Mr. HOLMES. Yes. To the extent that mostly about--well--he didn't spend, "Where did you get the money?" He didn't have much money and he said it didn't cost much money. He did say that where he stayed it cost $26 some odd, small ridiculous amount to eat, and another ridiculous small amount to stay all night, and that he went to the Mexican Embassy to try to get this permission to go to Russia by Cuba, but most of the talks that he wanted to talk about was how he got by with a little amount.
They said, "Well, who furnished you the money to go to Mexico?"
"Well, it didn't take much money." And it was along that angle, was the conversation.
Mr. BELIN. Did he admit that he went to Mexico?
Mr. HOLMES. Oh, yes.

Mr. BELIN. Did he say what community in Mexico he went to?
Mr. HOLMES. Mexico City.
Mr. BELIN. Did he say what he did while he was there?
Mr. HOLMES. He went to the Mexican consulate, I guess.
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. BELIN. Now, with regard to this Mexican trip, did he say who he saw in Mexico?
Mr. HOLMES. Only that he went to the Mexican consulate or Embassy or something and wanted to get permission, or whatever it took to get to Cuba. They refused him and he became angry and he said he burst out of there, and I don't know. I don't recall now why he went into the business about how mad it made him.
He goes over to the Russian Embassy. He was already at the American. This was the Mexican--he wanted to go to Cuba.
Then he went to the Russian Embassy and he said, because he said then he wanted to go to Russia by way of Cuba, still trying to get to Cuba and try that angle and they refused and said, "Come back in 30 days," or something like that. And, he went out of there angry and disgusted.
Mr. BELIN. Did he go to the Cuban Embassy, did he say or not?
Mr. HOLMES. He may have gone there first, but the best of my recollection, it might have been Cuban and then the Russian, wherever he went at first, he wanted to get to Cuba, and then he went to the Russian to go by Cuba.
Mr. BELIN. Did he say why he wanted to go to Cuba?
Mr. HOLMES. No.
Mr. BELIN. Did--this wasn't reported in your interview in the memorandum that you wrote?
Mr. HOLMES. No.
Mr. BELIN. Is this something that you think you might have picked up from just reading the papers, or is this something you remember hearing?
Mr. HOLMES. That is what he said in there. 

Again, I do not understand the logic that all these witnesses were fabricating testimony--under oath with all the seriousness that means for personal jeopardy let alone conscience--and that physical evidence was being fabricated and planted to show Oswald was in Mexico City, against interest, when the interest of LBJ and Hoover after ca. midnight Nov 22, and then the Warren Commission appear to run in the opposite direction. I do not understand the thinking that says the FBI and Warren Commission were furiously undertaking extraordinarily elaborate machinations to fabricate witness testimony and physical evidence of an Oswald trip to Mexico City that never happened, when it flies in the face of plausibility and counter to reasonable motive. (What was going on in Mexico City when Oswald was there is of course a whole other set of issues, not to the point here.) There is also the question of was the CIA itself fooled, or was it knowingly fooling other agencies in reporting that Oswald had visited the Soviet embassy in Mexico City, and did the CIA have a track record of being fooled or fooling other agencies in that manner (I doubt it). 

[Joe Bauer]

10 hours ago, Greg Doudna said:

Comments on Oswald and Mexico City

Nothing about Oswald going to Mexico City assists, but only complicates, the Warren Commission conclusion that Oswald acted alone in killing President Kennedy. It runs counter to interest for the FBI and Warren Commission et al to fabricate evidence or influence witnesses or marionette-string Marina to have her say Oswald did go to Mexico City, after ca. midnight Nov 22, 1963. 

If there was incentive to cover up or suborn some witnesses to perjure testimony a certain way etc., would that not work in the opposite direction, toward if possible denying Oswald went to Mexico City? Was there even a brief period of time in which a complete coverup of Oswald's having been in Mexico City was contemplated at the LBJ/Hoover level? (But not carried out because it could not be carried out?)

As Steve Roe notes Silvia Duran's and the Cuban consulate's information was in Oswald's address book. There is no secure evidence Oswald was anywhere else during the days of Mexico City. Oswald wrote a draft of a letter in his handwriting in which he refers to having been in Mexico City. Marina spilled it that he had been to Mexico City. I have come to see that the Silvia Odio visit, far from being an argument against the Mexico City trip as often perceived and as the Warren Commission considered a difficulty, is a strong argument in support of it for this reason: the date of the Silvia Odio three-person visit can be securely established by argument to have been early eve. Wed. Sept 25, 1963. (More likely earlier evening according to Annie Odio's testimony than later in the evening of Silvia's, from Houston logistics considerations.)

Apart from the independent argument establishing that date, there is a further argument supporting that Wednesday date that I have not seen cited: in the very tiny and runon handwritten letter of Silvia's father, from his imprisonment in Cuba and writing past the eyes of his Cuban censors, Odio Sr. writes advice to family members and includes, buried in the tiny, runon difficult-to read handwritten sentences, a line of advice to Silvia to not go out Wednesday evenings with her girlfriends, that he does not think that is a good idea, at the same time telling her whoever claimed to know him on that occasion she must verify before believing. It may be that the "Wednesday evening" reference (not any other day of the week) is an allusion to what Silvia wrote in her letter to him (which has not survived, but it is clear she wrote him of the three-man visit to her), and supports that it occurred on a Wednesday evening, i.e. Wed Sept 25. Silvia was going out the evening the three men including Oswald visited her; Odio Sr. answering her letter about that visit comments on her going out on Wednesday evenings, q.e.d. a Wednesday, supporting the Wed Sept 25 date.

The point about the Wed Sept 25 date of the Silvia Odio incident is that is precisely the correct time to account for Oswald having been driven, first from New Orleans to Dallas that day, and then from Dallas to Houston that evening, to catch the bus from Houston onward for the Mexico City trip. The Warren Commission could find no evidence of or realistic mechanism of Oswald getting from New Orleans to Houston by bus, but assumed it must have happened that way anyway, when the solution is there was no bus to Houston for Oswald, but instead a witnessed presence of Oswald in a car being driven at exactly the right time on that trip. It resolves that mystery. The juxtaposition of the timing is the argument here that it was part of the Mexico City trip, and therefore that Oswald did go to Mexico City.

In addition according to sworn testimony, Oswald himself talked of the Mexico City trip in his final interrogation, not to Fritz, but to federal officials questioning him, as told by postal inspector Holmes who was present. This can be combined with calling into question the common report that Oswald denied he went to Mexico City in his interrogations. Oswald's words directly are not known to have been recorded, and have been represented as having him deny to Fritz that he went to Mexico City when asked in his first interrogation.

Agreed-upon facts are that the question was asked of Oswald by Fritz at Hosty's urging, and whatever Oswald replied was cut off by a knock on the door and Oswald then taken out for a lineup. The issue is what exactly did Oswald say in response to the question before the interruption. Hosty in little-known sworn testimony to the Church Committee, and I believe elsewhere (not only to the Church Committee), was very clear (in that testimony, though Hosty says the opposite in his book Assignment: Oswald) that Oswald did not answer the question before the interruption. There is no known record of Fritz ever asking that question again. So although it is widely believed and claimed that Oswald denied he went to Mexico City, there is some conflicting evidence on that point, competing hearsay, and it is not fully clear that he denied it.

Whatever he actually answered on Friday, by Sunday morning Oswald was openly discussing his Mexico City trip. I was surprised to notice that according to an account of Leavelle of the Dallas Police, he (Leavelle) and Fritz drank coffee in a restaurant across the street for a good part of the time between 10 am and 11:20, before it was time for Oswald to be brought down from Fritz's office for the transfer to be killed. (According to the accounts I can see, Fritz though in charge of the transfer does not appear to have been hands-on in charge of its timing, with the insistence on the risky daytime transfer from Chief Curry, who was receiving orders from the mayor's office above his level on that, though the whole issue of who was responsible for what is murky. ) Therefore the objection that Fritz never mentions Oswald speaking of Mexico City Sunday morning in Fritz's written reports of the interrogations may have a possible explanation in that Fritz and Leavelle were across the street drinking coffee when Oswald talked about Mexico City on Sunday morning. Leavelle:

"Around 10: AM while the Federal agents were talking to Oswald, Captain Fritz asked me if I would like a cup of coffee. We walked across the street to the White Plaza Hotel Coffee Shop had coffee and discussed the transfer. On our way back to the office ... By the time we returned to the third floor office it was about eleven AM. The federal agents were bringing to a close their questioning of Oswald ... ("Detective Leavelle's Personal Notes", n.d., https://www.seandegrilla.com/detective-leavelle-s-personal-notes)

That is, according to this account of Leavelle, Fritz was not even present most of the time before it was time for Oswald to go below to be killed. Here is what Holmes said was going on:

Mr. BELIN. Anything else about Russia? Did he ever say anything about going to Mexico? Was that ever covered?
Mr. HOLMES. Yes. To the extent that mostly about--well--he didn't spend, "Where did you get the money?" He didn't have much money and he said it didn't cost much money. He did say that where he stayed it cost $26 some odd, small ridiculous amount to eat, and another ridiculous small amount to stay all night, and that he went to the Mexican Embassy to try to get this permission to go to Russia by Cuba, but most of the talks that he wanted to talk about was how he got by with a little amount.
They said, "Well, who furnished you the money to go to Mexico?"
"Well, it didn't take much money." And it was along that angle, was the conversation.
Mr. BELIN. Did he admit that he went to Mexico?
Mr. HOLMES. Oh, yes.

Mr. BELIN. Did he say what community in Mexico he went to?
Mr. HOLMES. Mexico City.
Mr. BELIN. Did he say what he did while he was there?
Mr. HOLMES. He went to the Mexican consulate, I guess.
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. BELIN. Now, with regard to this Mexican trip, did he say who he saw in Mexico?
Mr. HOLMES. Only that he went to the Mexican consulate or Embassy or something and wanted to get permission, or whatever it took to get to Cuba. They refused him and he became angry and he said he burst out of there, and I don't know. I don't recall now why he went into the business about how mad it made him.
He goes over to the Russian Embassy. He was already at the American. This was the Mexican--he wanted to go to Cuba.
Then he went to the Russian Embassy and he said, because he said then he wanted to go to Russia by way of Cuba, still trying to get to Cuba and try that angle and they refused and said, "Come back in 30 days," or something like that. And, he went out of there angry and disgusted.
Mr. BELIN. Did he go to the Cuban Embassy, did he say or not?
Mr. HOLMES. He may have gone there first, but the best of my recollection, it might have been Cuban and then the Russian, wherever he went at first, he wanted to get to Cuba, and then he went to the Russian to go by Cuba.
Mr. BELIN. Did he say why he wanted to go to Cuba?
Mr. HOLMES. No.
Mr. BELIN. Did--this wasn't reported in your interview in the memorandum that you wrote?
Mr. HOLMES. No.
Mr. BELIN. Is this something that you think you might have picked up from just reading the papers, or is this something you remember hearing?
Mr. HOLMES. That is what he said in there. 

Again, I do not understand the logic that all these witnesses were fabricating testimony--under oath with all the seriousness that means for personal jeopardy let alone conscience--and that physical evidence was being fabricated and planted to show Oswald was in Mexico City, against interest, when the interest of LBJ and Hoover after ca. midnight Nov 22, and then the Warren Commission appear to run in the opposite direction. I do not understand the thinking that says the FBI and Warren Commission were furiously undertaking extraordinarily elaborate machinations to fabricate witness testimony and physical evidence of an Oswald trip to Mexico City that never happened, when it flies in the face of plausibility and counter to reasonable motive. (What was going on in Mexico City when Oswald was there is of course a whole other set of issues, not to the point here.) There is also the question of was the CIA itself fooled, or was it knowingly fooling other agencies in reporting that Oswald had visited the Soviet embassy in Mexico City, and did the CIA have a track record of being fooled or fooling other agencies in that manner (I doubt it). 

Did the Mexico City bound bus Oswald reportedly boarded in Houston leave in the evening?

Here's a great conundrum regards Oswald.

He couldn't have made more of an effort to be publicly noticed and noticed by our intelligence and FBI agencies in the 4 or 5 months leading up to the "Big Event."

He is so noticed in downtown NO passing out pro-Cuba leaflets in broad daylight he is photographed, filmed, arrested and put on radio and TV there.

Passing out pro-Cuba leaflets in super hot anti-Castro NO at that time was the equivalent to bull horn calling for new Marine recruits on the campus of UC Berkeley in 1969.

Begging for a physical confrontation commotion such as he had with Bringuier and his boys. More drama to be noticed even more.

Oswald then goes to Mexico City and simply walks up to the main entrances of the most surveilled Embassies there with cameras everywhere and everything he says tape recorded.

Oswald isn't so dumb he is unaware of how much he will be photographed, recorded, tracked, even followed doing these laughably overt shenanigans at these most important adversarial embassies loaded with spies.

Oswald was purposely thrusting himself into a ( I'm here, I'm crazy, I'm angry and making scenes ) highest level political intrigue limelight so aggressively it screams illogicalness to a totally suspicious degree.

He burst into the Dallas FBI offices and angrily leaves a note demanding they leave his wife alone?

Oswald had to be mentally detached in deciding to do JFK right from his place of work and thinking he could get away with it...knowing he had created an intelligence file the thickness of a telephone book with all the most politically crazy and extreme antics he was publicly participating in, in just the last 4 months before 11,22,1963.

Oswald seemed much more intelligent and thoughtful in his words and demeanor after being arrested than the stupid "look at me everybody" politically extreme publicity hound he was in the months leading up to 11,22,1963.

 

Edited December 31, 2022 by Joe Bauer

[Matt Allison]

9 minutes ago, Joe Bauer said:

Did the Mexico City bound bus Oswald reportedly boarded in Houston leave in the evening?

Joe- that bus left Houston in the very, very early morning hours of Thursday, September 26th, 1963. 2:35 AM, to be precise.

[James DiEugenio]

In 2017, we finally got the declassified documents from the two CIA plants who were inside the Cuban Embassy.  Gaeton Fonzi had told me that Eddie had talked to them back in the HSCA days.

They both said that Oswald was never there.  The CIA did not want to believe this. So they asked again.  Again they said he was not there.

Also, in 2017, we got the inventory check on the photos at the Cuban Embassy.  No Oswald.

Marina Oswald repeatedly told the Secret Service while she was in detention that Oswald never told her anything about being in Mexico City.  

The idea that a printed name in Oswald's notebook proves he was there, I mean are you serious?  In the milieu Oswald was in, that proves nothing.  Three words: Richard Case Nagell.

When someone mention Harry Holmes, I get ready to throw up.

But when one is at the bottom of the barrel, this is what one spits up.

I mean what is next, Oswald at the twist party? Or maybe Priscilla Johnson finding a ticket in August?

 

 

 

Edited December 31, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Joe Bauer]

26 minutes ago, Matt Allison said:

Joe- that bus left Houston in the very, very early morning hours of Thursday, September 26th, 1963. 2:35 AM, to be precise.

So that coordinates a time frame that allows for the possibility of his visiting Sylvia Odio's apartment on Sept. 25th. and having enough time to be driven from the Dallas area to Houston.

[James DiEugenio]

Joe, no one knows how Oswald got to Houston, I mean no one has ever been able to figure that out.

If you do not know how he got to Houston, then you do not know what bus he got on.  Or even what day.

And no one has been able to precisely note the day of the Odio visit.

Those are two variables that the Commission should have sorted out but they did not.

We know what they tried to do to Odio.  They did everything they could to discredit her.  Thus muddying the waters even more.

 

[Bob Ness]

6 hours ago, Mart Hall said:

I’m only a five year newbie to all this but it’s very difficult to accept that there were at least 4 security services involved in this and yet none of them are able to provide incontrovertible evidence that LHO who was killed on 11-24-63 was in attendance at either embassy.

Because of a series of bad breaks they weren't able to do so. Spastic multi-agency-wide equipment failures at inconvenient times. Much of the rest got fumbled into the incinerator on top of that. Very unfortunate.

[Bob Ness]

5 hours ago, Gene Kelly said:

Lee apparently is paid $25 (by Bannister and Associates)

Is that correct? Source?

[Matt Allison]

According to Marina, Oswald said he was going to Mexico, and he asked her to keep that a secret.

That seems like a big deal, but we don't know why he said that.

Perhaps Ruth Paine wondered what the deal was with Lee, but most likely she didn't care much. Her focus was Marina. That summer she had repeatedly asked Marina to come back to Texas to live with her.

[Bob Ness]

5 hours ago, Greg Doudna said:

Mr. BELIN. Did he say what he did while he was there?
Mr. HOLMES. He went to the Mexican consulate, I guess.
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. BELIN. Now, with regard to this Mexican trip, did he say who he saw in Mexico?

Are you suggesting that Bellin coached him how to answer off the record? That's what it looks like.

[Bob Ness]

1 hour ago, James DiEugenio said:

They both said that Oswald was never there.  The CIA did not want to believe this. So they asked again.  Again they said he was not there.

Also, in 2017, we got the inventory check on the photos at the Cuban Embassy.  No Oswald.

Do you have sources on that, Jim?

[Matt Allison]

 

[Matt Allison]

The helpful thing about the scenes in the above video are the interviews Anthony Summers did with primary witnesses.

btw, fwiw, it appears there are different versions of the above documentary.

[James DiEugenio]

54 minutes ago, Matt Allison said:

According to Marina, Oswald said he was going to Mexico, and he asked her to keep that a secret.

That seems like a big deal, but we don't know why he said that.

Perhaps Ruth Paine wondered what the deal was with Lee, but most likely she didn't care much. Her focus was Marina. That summer she had repeatedly asked Marina to come back to Texas to live with her.

Matt:

The very first interrogation of Marina was done at the Inn of the Six Flags hotel by two secret service agents, one being Charles Kunkel.  Harold Weisberg got that through FOIA.   The agents repeatedly asked her about this matter.  She got sick and tried of saying no.

It got comical.  When someone on TV would mention Mexico CIty, Marina would look at them before they could ask and say no again.

I do not give two cents what she said later.  Because we know what happened to her later.  She wanted to stay in the USA. And she said things like, "That is the fateful rifle of Lee Harvey Oswald."  That is not what she told those SS agents.

Edited December 31, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Greg Doudna]

 

1 hour ago, Bob Ness said:

Mr. BELIN. Did he say what he did while he was there?
Mr. HOLMES. He went to the Mexican consulate, I guess.
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. BELIN. Now, with regard to this Mexican trip, did he say who he saw in Mexico?

Are you suggesting that Bellin coached him how to answer off the record? That's what it looks like.

No I make no such suggestion. The expression "(Discussion off the record)" is part of the Warren Commission transcript of the court reporter, not from me. Notation of discussion off the record occurs frequently with Warren Commission transcripts of testimony of witnesses. Your guess is as good as mine what that was about. One possibility in keeping with Belin behavior elsewhere is Belin could have asked where Holmes was going with his testimony on a particular point, before entering it into the record, i.e. Belin asking the witness a question off the record, finding the answer suitable, then asking the same question again on the record. That could be one possibility but who knows.

Edited December 31, 2022 by Greg Doudna