A framework for analyzing JFKA conspiracy theories (really!)

[Guest]

On 1/30/2023 at 12:08 PM, Ron Ege said:

Agree.  A 100 percent agreed to (proven), beyond a shadow of a doubt) LHO motive for the JFKA, would be great place to begin - to eventually reach the final conclusion, answering the "whodunit" of the JFKA.

Hi

Edited February 15, 2023 by Lance Payette

[Guest]

Bye

Edited February 15, 2023 by Lance Payette

[Benjamin Cole]

3 hours ago, Lance Payette said:

No, I don't believe so. For anyone who makes the effort at assembling all the available data from U.S. and Russian sources, Oswald's life is no great mystery. There is abundant evidence of who and what he was. The efforts to make him into something other than what he was in order to force-fit him into some conspiracy theory seem pretty transparent to me. At a future date, I may do a "factoid" post of some of the CIA evidence so beloved by Morley and Newman, because to me it cuts in exactly the opposite direction of their dark speculation and is entirely consistent with who Oswald's life says he was.

So, what do you think of Ernst Titovets' book on LHO? 

I remain skeptical of both the WC version of LHO, and later CT versions to rehabilitate LHO. 

1. It is very difficult to know another person and how they will act in all circumstances---even people you have worked with for years can pop a surprise. Sad to say, every day a spouse in America is surprised to find out what their spouse of a decade or more has been up to. 

2. There is a long record on LHO suggesting he was an intel asset. That makes suppositions about his true personality difficult. Tennent Bagley thought he was a "witting asset" in Russia. You have better judgement than CIA agent Bagley regarding LHO's stay in Russia? 

If you have divined the "true" LHO, from a few scraps of written material and (widely varying) observations of some of LHO's cohorts, then I salute you. 

[Benjamin Cole]

21 hours ago, Lawrence Schnapf said:

Lance- do you realize that "plausible" is a very low standard of proof. It is lower than possible or probable. Of course, the government's failure to timely conduct a proper investigation and the inability of private researchers to compel testimony makes your challenge a bit unfair.    

That being said, Carlos Marcello confessed to planning the assassination during the CAMTEX sting operation. his confession was recorded by his cellmate who was an FBI informant. Likewise, Trafficante told his attorney Ragano shortly before he died that Carlos had made a mistake and should have gone after RFK instead of "geovanni". then there are the statements reported by Aleman, Becker and Partin to the FBI about threats made to JFK. John Davis also developed other evidence as well. These accounts more than satisfy your "plausible" standard and likely approach the probable standard as well.   And we also know that Marcello had a history of assassinating public figures, using a patsy and getting away with the murder. He had the means and motive to kill the president and the mafia knew Hoover would not pursue them since they had him by the shorthairs with his horse racing problem (Costello was giving him tips on fixed races). 

and you also require posters to accept the caricature that was painted of Lee Oswald. Lee Oswald's hiring at the TSBD made a Dallas assassination possible. Motorcades historically went down Main Street. Once they learned LHO was hired to work on a building along the parade route, Dallas became the preferred location.

And there was indeed reasonable doubt as demonstrated by the 7 mock trials conducted since 1967 by law schools and bar associations. Six of the 7 mock trials have resulted in acquittals or hung juries (full disclosure- Bill Simpich and I served as defense counsel in the last mock trial in 2017 at the South Texas College of Law that resulted in a hung jury). And these mock trials allowed all the evidence to be admitted. There are severe issues with much of the evidence used to link Oswald to the assassination. Some of it might have been excluded and other key evidence would have had an instruction for the jury to consider the challenges to the veracity of the evidence when determining how much weight to give it.      

LS--

 

Maybe this should be a separate thread but....

I certainly think that elements of organized crime could have been involved in the JFKA. Providing triggermen, or acting as a cut-out, and providing plausible deniability if the assassins were caught. Perhaps murdering Roselli. 

But the whole backstory on LHO---his likely role as an intel asset, who then visits Kostikov in the Russian Embassy in Mexico City in September 1963---seems beyond the ken of the mob. That all strikes me as intel ops. 

Add on the extraordinary pulling of strings post-JFKA to blunt investigations. 

I sure hope the Mob did not have enough pull to direct LHO to Russia, then New Orleans, Mexico City to Dallas, and then suffocate real investigations into the JFKA three times--the WC, Garrison and the HSCA. And to prevent release of docs to this day. 

Just IMHO....

 

[Charles Blackmon]

3 hours ago, Lance Payette said:

I think it's naive to think Oswald had an identifiable motive in the sense that he could have articulated on November 21, even to himself, "Tomorrow I am going to shoot the President because ...."

The fact he urged Marina to move to Dallas with him and promised her an apartment and washing machine is pretty strong evidence his thinking was in flux. As Marina herself speculated, if she'd agreed there might well have been no assassination.

If you accept the Walker attempt as legitimate, this might tell us quite a bit about his psyche and how little in the way of motive it took for him to attempt something like this, Walker being the polar opposite of JFK.

I believe the JFKA can be explained without pinning down a single motive.

Oswald was intelligent and viewed himself as an intellectual destined for a place in history. His stint in the Marines was a disaster. He defected to the USSR with a utopian notion of Marxism and a belief he'd be made a professor or political advisor in Moscow; instead, he found himself working in a factory in the backwater of Minsk, disillusioned with the opressive and largely counterfeit Soviet version of Marxism. He returned to the U.S. to find no reporters waiting to be fascinated by him. He could find nothing but menial employment and squalid living conditions. His marriage began to unravel. He shifted his utopian Marxism and dreams of a place in history to Castro's Cuba, but his trip to Mexico City was yet another disaster. He found himself living alone in a closet-sized room and working as a lowly order-filler at the TSBD. Bingo, he learned JFK's motorcade would pass right below him. He made one last attempt at reconciliation with Marina, then said the hell with it and decided to seal his place in history by seizing the opportunity Fate had handed him. If he died in the process, I'm not sure he cared. If caught, he would strut his Marxist ideology and his own quirky philosophy at a lengthy trial with the sympathetic assistance of the general counsel for the Communist Party USA. If he escaped, the assassination might be his ticket to glory in Cuba.

Is that speculation? Sure, but's speculation consistent with the facts of Oswald's life and who those facts say he was.

 

 

Just sounds like a regurgitation of Norman Mailer "Oswald's Tale". I read it, it was entertaining, but I believe Oswald was an Intelligence asset when he "defected". They had their hooks in him.

[Michaleen Kilroy]

3 hours ago, Lance Payette said:

If you accept the Walker attempt as legitimate, this might tell us quite a bit about his psyche and how little in the way of motive it took for him to attempt something like this, Walker being the polar opposite of JFK.

Can’t recall who made the case but I’ve seen a very solid argument that after GdM ascertained that LHO took at shot at Walker he let his intel contacts know in DC before he departed the US.

Then CIA moves in and gives LHO an ultimatum - do what we ask or we turn you in.

Not saying I buy the story but it’s plausible and would go a long way in explaining LHO’s behavior after and his ability to be framed.

Going back to my ongoing point, a lot of speculation is possible in JFKA because it was obviously never honestly or thoroughly investigated. That is the fault of the USG not researchers. And the best of the researchers have uncovered a lot and those of us paying attention know that conspiracy has been proven. We just don’t have the deets due to the ongoing coverup.
 

Edited January 31, 2023 by Michaleen Kilroy

[Guest]

On 1/30/2023 at 6:09 PM, Benjamin Cole said:

So, what do you think of Ernst Titovets' book on LHO? 

I remain skeptical of both the WC version of LHO, and later CT versions to rehabilitate LHO. 

1. It is very difficult to know another person and how they will act in all circumstances---even people you have worked with for years can pop a surprise. Sad to say, every day a spouse in America is surprised to find out what their spouse of a decade or more has been up to. 

2. There is a long record on LHO suggesting he was an intel asset. That makes suppositions about his true personality difficult. Tennent Bagley thought he was a "witting asset" in Russia. You have better judgement than CIA agent Bagley regarding LHO's stay in Russia? 

If you have divined the "true" LHO, from a few scraps of written material and (widely varying) observations of some of LHO's cohorts, then I salute you. 

Hi

Edited February 15, 2023 by Lance Payette

[Michaleen Kilroy]

Just now, Lance Payette said:

Oswald did things and took risks that would have been utterly unthinkable for a false defector or CIA operative.

That old canard. I saw a documentary that showed who the CIA was willing to work with in Afghanistan and Iraq. They will use ANYONE they can manipulate and that serves their purpose. The end always justifies the means.

[Guest]

On 1/30/2023 at 6:19 PM, Benjamin Cole said:

LS--

 

Maybe this should be a separate thread but....

I certainly think that elements of organized crime could have been involved in the JFKA. Providing triggermen, or acting as a cut-out, and providing plausible deniability if the assassins were caught. Perhaps murdering Roselli. 

But the whole backstory on LHO---his likely role as an intel asset, who then visits Kostikov in the Russian Embassy in Mexico City in September 1963---seems beyond the ken of the mob. That all strikes me as intel ops. 

Add on the extraordinary pulling of strings post-JFKA to blunt investigations. 

I sure hope the Mob did not have enough pull to direct LHO to Russia, then New Orleans, Mexico City to Dallas, and then suffocate real investigations into the JFKA three times--the WC, Garrison and the HSCA. And to prevent release of docs to this day. 

Just IMHO....

 

Hi

Edited February 15, 2023 by Lance Payette

[Guest]

On 1/30/2023 at 7:04 PM, Michaleen Kilroy said:

That old canard. I saw a documentary that showed who the CIA was willing to work with in Afghanistan and Iraq. They will use ANYONE they can manipulate and that serves their purpose. The end always justifies the means.

Hi

Edited February 15, 2023 by Lance Payette

[Benjamin Cole]

16 minutes ago, Lance Payette said:

I thought Titovets' book was excellent and revealing in ways Titovets perhaps didn't intend - as I have discussed in other threads, Oswald did things and took risks that would have been utterly unthinkable for a false defector or CIA operative. (Titovets, of course, doesn't think the Oswald he knew would've assassinated JFK.)

Another excellent source is Peter Vronski, who went to Minsk and really did his legwork. He told me that he went fully expecting to establish Oswald's intelligence connections but came back believing "the Warren Commission basically got it right."

I firmly believe the Morley, Newman, et al., "Oswald-as-false-defector" and "Oswald-as-intelligence-operative" narratives are utter, agenda-driven nonsense.

Risks?

You realize the CIA was running unapproved provocative Cuban ops...during the Cuban Missile Crisis? 

Oh, a little bit of risk there. You know, maybe a nuclear war....

[Charles Blackmon]

5 hours ago, Lance Payette said:

 Modern rifles do not emit "puffs of smoke."

You can guarantee that no gun could have created the smoke that many witnesses (it wasn't just Holland) observed in Dealey Plaza? 

I think if I ever need to consult with a firearms specialist I will look elsewhere.

 

[Guest]

On 1/30/2023 at 7:19 PM, Benjamin Cole said:

Risks?

You realize the CIA was running unapproved provocative Cuban ops...during the Cuban Missile Crisis? 

Oh, a little bit of risk there. You know, maybe a nuclear war....

Hi

Edited February 15, 2023 by Lance Payette

[Guest]

On 1/30/2023 at 7:21 PM, Charles Blackmon said:

You can guarantee that no gun could have created the smoke that many witnesses (it wasn't just Holland) observed in Dealey Plaza? 

I think if I ever need to consult with a firearms specialist I will look elsewhere.

 

Bye

Edited February 15, 2023 by Lance Payette

[Benjamin Cole]

10 minutes ago, Lance Payette said:

You're missing the point. I'm not talking about the CIA taking risks. I'm saying no false defector or CIA operative would've done unnecessary, pointless things that could've got him shot or sent to Siberia, thereby short-circuiting whatever his mission was.

You have such a deep understanding of LHO's personality, and also of CIA assets on foreign assignment, that you know how they will behave in all circumstances? 

Perhaps LHO was sent to the SU because he was bit of a risk-taker and oddball. And who else would go as a false defector? A stable family man in the US, with career and good prospects? 

As for nuts in the CIA...Howard Hunt, McCord and several other CIA assets were involved in the Watergate break-in, which was about as nutty and ill-conceived an amateur op as ever seen. Talk about nutty? The Keystone Kops were more swift. 

William Harvey used to get drunk and wave his pistol around at dinner (in a restaurant or dinner party). So smooth. 

CIA operatives are not 10 feet tall. They are fellow human beings with all the flaws anyone has, and maybe more, if they accept an assignment to falsely defect to the SU.