Pierre Lafitte datebook, 1963

[Leslie Sharp]

5 hours ago, W. Niederhut said:

Yes, curiously, Ben started a duplicate thread on the subject of the Datebook's authenticity, while simultaneously recommending that duplicate threads on the subject should be consolidated... 🙄

 

Desperate moves by desperate ....😎

[Leslie Sharp]

On 7/31/2023 at 10:22 AM, Tom Gram said:

It hasn’t, and this thread makes it crystal clear that it probably never will.

Like Greg D. said, the responses to his comments in this thread are exactly what would be expected from a willful forgery operation. Greg Parker pointed out that Greg D. was effectively bullied into quitting.

 https://reopenkennedycase.forumotion.net/t2714p25-reality-checks#42423

The “situation”, as DJ calls it, is that the purveyors of the datebook are determined to immediately squash any discussion of authenticity and shift focus back to the datebook entries, which as Greg D. pointed out is a common modus operandi in forgery cases. 

This isn’t rocket science people. Until the datebook is authenticated beyond reasonable doubt by an uninterested expert third party, the datebook entries are beyond worthless as evidence. 

We don’t even have publicly accessible photographs of the entire datebook ffs. 

I will answer DJ’s ridiculous question about an authentic “seal of approval”. This is toddler level, bare-minimum due diligence, and any JFK researcher in their right mind should demand at least the following before accepting the datebook as anything more than another lame conspiracy scam in the tradition of JVB, James Files, and the McCone-Rowley memo. 

1. An independent scientific examination of the paper, ink, and handwriting of the datebook with the conclusion that all the entries were written by Pierre Laffite in 1963, with an accompanying report on the analysis that anyone can read. 

2. An open-access collection of HD images of the entire datebook. 

Instead of providing the above, or encouraging conversation and collaboration towards making it happen, the datebookers  have deflected with tactics ranging from semi-coherent word-salad to outright bullying, personal attacks, and accusing skeptics of being a cointelpro agent. Why should anyone have to put up with that sort of thing? The way Greg was treated in this thread is appalling.

Should we really just bend over and allow the Education Forum to be turned into an ongoing sales pitch for an almost certain forgery? The JFK research community has enough credibility problems already. Like Jeremy B. (I think?) said, do we really need a Hitler Diaries type forgery gaining traction leading up to the 60th anniversary? The question of authenticity is the only question that matters with this thing - and until the datebook is determined to be authentic beyond a reasonable doubt, I see no reason to not to treat the entire operation like a full-blown fraud at this point.

Kudos to Greg D. for exposing the problems with the datebook from almost day one, and continuing to expose the ridiculous and revealing behavior of its proponents. 

If the datebookers want to regain any semblance of credibility, they should 1) apologize to Greg; 2) take Greg’s advice and segregate information derived from credible sources from information derived from the datebook in all future posts, comments, essays, etc.;  3) demonstrate willingness, intent, and legitimate progress towards making the entire datebook publicly available in HD photographs, etc. and having the datebook examined by independent experts; and perhaps most importantly 4) demonstrate willingness to disavow the datebook if it is proven to be a fake. 

I am absolutely baffled by the sheer lack of skepticism by DJ and some of the other datebook defenders. This alleged datebook purports to be the most blatant evidence of conspiracy to ever pop up in the last 60 years, and yet here we have people uncritically gobbling up comically incriminating entries like “rifle into building” as if they actually mean something before establishing even a basic level of confidence that Lafitte actually wrote the damn thing, let alone wrote it in ‘63.

These questions about authenticity are not going away, and instead of jumping on anyone who raises the issue, questioning their motives, and bullying them into giving up, why not accept that the vast majority of reasonable observers are going to think that you are willfully peddling a fraud until you take steps to resolve the authenticity of the datebook beyond a reasonable doubt, and make the entire datebook accessible to the public? What’s so hard to understand about that? 

Should we really just bend over and allow the Education Forum to be turned into an ongoing sales pitch for an almost certain forgery? The JFK research community has enough credibility problems already.

You and active participants on EF are satisfied that after six decades, the salient progress in the cold case murder investigation — until now —  has been to establish that a single bullet didn't take the life of John Kennedy; that Oswald didn't fire from the 6th floor; and that a cast of thousands plotted, executed, and covered up the assassination?

Edited August 1, 2023 by Leslie Sharp

[Leslie Sharp]

On 7/31/2023 at 1:05 PM, Paul Brancato said:

I’m going to jump in here. I did make my own position clear by defending Greg’s questions as important and well meaning. I value Mr. Joseph’s contributions to the JFK research community greatly, but find it hard to see why he is arguing so vociferously against the posters who are harping on the issue of authentication. I’m a bit more inside than most of you in that I communicated with Hank several times on his research, not on the Lafitte diaries, before his untimely passing. I think Leslie feels a certain imperative because she was a close associate of Hank’s and worked like hell to get the book finished. I’ve asked her publicly not to take umbrage at Greg and others for their questions. She feels, rightly or wrongly, attacked. I too wish, and have stated, that I’d like to see her take a more collaborative approach. I know she has tried to get the diaries authenticated. She is apparently keeping some cards close to her vest because of legal issues. She has a lot at stake. For the sake of all, let’s try giving her a pass while we ask her to be less dogmatic. 
Robert Montenegro has stated publicly that he used the datebook entries as clues to research, and he has certainly started many deeply intriguing threads. We should not look at his work as an attempt to corroborate authenticity. He stated in that regard that he finds it hard to understand why a fake would yield such pertinent results. But he is not staking his work or credibility on authenticity of the diaries. 
One important issue I am concerned about is the accuracy of Hank Albarelli’s research into Jean Pierre Lafitte and George Hunter White. I wish all of us would separate this from the authenticity issue. I’d like Leslie to help here by addressing the issue of Hank’s source material. One cannot read the fascinating chapters on these two without wanting to know where Hank sourced the material. He often quotes, without quotation marks, things that Lafitte said. There is in my opinion a need to know this, because Lafitte is someone we need to know about. Again, without asking whether he was the organizer of the Assassination per the Datebook, who was he? Did Clay Shaw hire him as a chef? Did he and independent journalist James Phelan break into Garrison’s files and steal documents? I believe the source here is Phelan himself. 
The other only partly resolved issue is what happened between Major Ganis and Hank Albarelli? And as Leslie pointed out, why hasn’t Ganis released his Skorzeny documents for authentication and opened them up to researchers? But I will point out here that whatever the case is on this author’s split up, Robert has found much on Skorzeny, and we should want to get to the bottom of the research into genuine Nazi collusion with CIA operations. It’s very extensive, provable. What is the connection between JMWAVE officers and Reinhardt Gehlen? Here I would ask people like Greg, and Tom, who are clearly thoughtful researchers, as well as Jim D, Bill Simpich and others, to take a moment or two, forget the diaries for a while, and focus on Robert’s attempts to corroborate the explosive info that the diaries led him to uncover? In all this discussion I have heard very little from researchers on the Nazi links, despite some very convincing documentation. Is it too much to ask that you weigh in on this? 
My last question is why? If the diaries are really written by Lafitte in whole or even in part, why? I realize that without authentication it’s difficult to try to answer this. But it intrigues me. 
 

I think Leslie feels a certain imperative because she was a close associate of Hank’s and worked like hell to get the book finished

At the risk of my response to this comment being construed as "defensive", @Paul Brancato
once again, I began my research into the Kennedy assassination from Dublin, Ireland in 1993, when a former work colleague at Hunt family-owned Rosewood Hotels advised me to read Dick Russell's The Man Who Knew Too Much.

I spent large portions of the next two dozen years researching the Military-Industrial Complex in context of the assassination in Dallas.  In 2017, Hank Albarelli phoned to ask if I would co-author Coup with him.  So, to suggest that I am "defensive" solely on behalf of Hank, is factually inaccurate. This was a joint-work effort, picking up from Hank's extraordinary insight and gumshoe detective work to land access to some of the Lafitte private collection. I lay no claim to his decades long effort, but I take responsibility and accept accountability for having already accumulated the body of research and a solid grasp of the subject that this project required, at the right time, in the right place, in order to bring this book across the line for us both, along with Alan Kent.

 But he is not staking his work or credibility on authenticity of the diaries. 

As I've shared with Monté, I respect any and all who maintain a "wait and see" attitude toward the datebook; that said, I continue to wrestle with the logic of pursueing clues left by Lafitte, yet qualifying one's position on the authenticity, while presenting findings that originated from said clues.

The other only partly resolved issue is what happened between Major Ganis and Hank Albarelli? And as Leslie pointed out, why hasn’t Ganis released his Skorzeny documents for authentication and opened them up to researchers?

You may be at a disadvantage, Paul, or maybe you've forgotten because I'm fairly sure I explained the dissolution of the Ganis/Albarelli collaboration in a private email with you? I'm under no legal constraint to share publicly my first hand knowledge of why Hank didn't publish with Major Ganis.  In one of our first phone calls, he explained his concerns that the project might be headed in a direction that not only did he not agree with but that he was seriously uncomfortable overall. Maj. Ganis was approaching interpretation of their research through the lens that (paraphrasing here) Skorzeny was a friend of the West, and of democracy, and that in fact he was doing America a favor.   The issue culminated when the term "former" Nazi continued to surface in conversations, and ultimately Hank realized that Ganis wanted Skorzeny to be depicted as somewhat a hero. Hank's final words on the highly contentious issue: "Otto Skorzeny wasn't a "former" Nazi."


and focus on Robert’s attempts to corroborate the explosive info that the diaries led him to uncover?

To be clear, Monté doesn't represent Coup in Dallas; his attempts to corroborate some entries in the datebook have been amazing and it goes without saying how much I value his friendship, intelligence, his rugged independence, his courage, and his near savant skill sets: but, as he and I have discussed ad nauseam, they are pursued through a lens, as is natural for any of us.  Any conclusions he draws are based on his subjective interpretations of the datebook entries, and may or may not reflect Hank's investigation accurately or the material presented in  Coup or the forthcoming softcover edition.
 

Edited August 1, 2023 by Leslie Sharp

[Leslie Sharp]

On 7/30/2023 at 9:16 PM, Ed Berger said:

@Leslie Sharp

I'm fairly certain we didn't refer to the flight; I think the story involves David Ferrie and Carlos Marcello. It blends into the Winnipeg bar story, and gets even murkier when Souetre is alleged to have gotten drunk and spilled the beans.  Too hard to nail down, BUT, if you've come across Winnipeg native Burt Sucharov (sp?? writing from memory here) in Coup yet, and his alleged tie to John Wilson-Hudson . . . 

Ah, I might be mis-remembering then... I'll have to go back on my notes and check out what I had on Cuba and Freeport nickel affairs that linked up to Canada. And to be quite honest Burt Sucharov was totally unknown to me until reading CiD. There's an interesting story I did come across concerning Sucharov, that he moved 1500 surplus rail cars from Canada's War Assets Administration to Argentina in 1945. This was via a company he was involved with called Sumac, where he was joined by one Andrew MacNaughton. MacNaughton seems to have become a somewhat notorious arms dealer in the Caribbean and Latin America; there's an article about him lodged in Mitch WerBell's security file.

I've tracked the Vanderbilt angle because an heiress married Northern Ireland investor John Adair and together they established the JA Ranch with Charles Goodnight in the Palo Duro Canyon located in the Texas Panhandle.  Amarillo, as you know, was HQ for Crichton's Dorchester, with Byrd on the board... An heir to the JA married into the Symington family — Stuart Symington first Sec. Air Force and partner with Clark Clifford during the BCCI debacle.

Fascinating! Do you know to what degree the Adairs might have crossed paths with Crichton down in Amarillo? I'm thinking about Crichton's latter day Arabian Shield company, which if memory serves correctly was actually formed through Dorchester. One of the investors at one point into Arabian Shield was Kamal Adham, the Saudi intelligence chief who was in turn a major stockholder in BCCI.

I don't think we nailed down McNutt with WCC.  That would be most interesting.

I've come across McNutt as a figure within the WCC itself, but I'm still working on confirming that—there's a ton of WCC materials in the Edward Stettinius papers archive that I'm hoping to get at soon, which should yield some great stuff in all directions. But at the very least we can say that McNutt was definitely involved in a WCC 'adjunct' company. In this case, the Philippine American Finance and Development Company. This was a venture dedicated to gold and other precious metals mining in the Philippines, with Stettinius a key player, along with McNutt's often business partner Joseph Hirshhorn (who was involved in funny stock deals of his own). 

I need to refresh my memory of Fassoulis.

Tomorrow afternoon or so I'll post some of my Fassoulis notes in the WCC/JFK thread you made the other day. 

 I think I shared that Hilton is named in Lafitte's ledger, along with Rosser Reeves who was a brother-in-law of Ogilvie, an original signature of World Commerce if we're not mistaken? 

The fact that Hilton is in the ledger is HUGE imo (and would also narrow the gap with other important figures, like Frank Brandstetter). And wow, I had no idea that Reeves was the brother-in-law of David Ogilvy. But yeah Ogilvy was at WCC in its foundation, back when it was known as the British American Canadian Corporation. In fact, the Ogilvy papers at the Library of Congress has BACC/WCC materials... another item on the long list of things to try and grab.

Have you looked into the stolen bonds scheme?  Cuban / American mercenaries seem fond of them as income streams? I could never figure out why.  And worked with the hypothesis that Otto and Ilse opted for nickel bonds rather than suitcases of money.

Definitely come across all sorts of funny business with the paper generated by the metals trade. Certificates and the like of precious metals—gold and silver, chiefly—are a favorite instrument of money laundering for drug traffickers and all manner of underworld denizens. There's various reasons for this, but part of it has to do with logistics. A slip of paper is easier transported than a suitcase of money, and the metal that the paper represents can be easily translated into any currency on the planet and back again. And all the while, the physical stockpile of metal can be exchanged any number of times without ever having to be moved the vault where it's sitting, because it is really the proof of ownership that is circulating instead.

One of the guys who helped innovate these mechanisms was Nicholas Deak, OSS veteran and lifelong CIA asset.

Are you seeing heroin, cocaine, the Corsicans, in this scenario? It has been posited that the Rat Lines served more than one purpose.

Absolutely!! On the one hand, the flourishing postwar drug trade catalyzed a lot of the metal scheming (which eventually drove thing to the point where drug traffickers were buying up metal mines—or perhaps this was there in the beginning...). On the other hand, the huge profit revenues of the trade were frequently laundered into investments in 'legitimate' businesses. It will take some thrashing out, but I believe this is what was happening in the case of David Baird's securities dealing foundations. Pealing that back shows a bewildering circulation of stock purchases, swaps, and sales by a high number of players in even more companies. It certainly looks like some form of money laundering on a massive scale taking place. And when you have Conrad Hilton participating in that, William Zeckendorf of Great Southwest participating, Floyd Odlum of Atlas Corporation participating...

The banker who ran all of that was Serge Semenenko, formerly of First National Bank of Boston, a man who knew both George de Mohrenschildt and Frank Brandstetter. He managed it all in accounts at Marine Midland, located at 120 Broadway, the Equitable Trust building in New York City. This is the same building where Empire Trust had it's HQ. 

Here's an interesting message from Floyd Odlum concerning the delivery of Atlas Corporation stock to David Baird, to be used as collateral for a promissory note. It's a really neat document: the man who Odlum addresses it to is none other than our familiar friend Stafford Sands.

Nailing this down seems very pertinent to me, since it never stopped and has only ballooned. There's the unforgettable charge made in 2009 by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime that during the 2008 financial crisis, major global banks were soaking up drug money as a source of liquid investment capital when all other capital streams were frozen. 

Some argue the Order of St. John is not the Knights of Malta; my history says they are one and the same.

You know, it's interesting: I have a friend who is a real OSJ watcher who started off being skeptical of the claim that the OSJ was affiliated with the 'real' Knights of Malta, due to the apparent non-existence of the Russian lineage that they cite. But after amassing a large number of internal OSJ documents over the years, he has come to believe that IS connected to the real K of M, albeit in a different manner than what they state. 

On the topic of weird metal stuff, he's shown me a document from one OSJ man's archival papers, discussing the induction of one of Willoughby's boys from the Philippines into the order. The person in question is described as the world's expert on Yamashita's Gold, or something along those lines. 

Gonna read what you posted from the paperback edition now! 
 

Ed, I was halfway through with my response and it disappeared.

Will recreate soon.

This is an intriguing line of inquiry.

[Leslie Sharp]

I'll just leave this here.

. . . I met Lisa Pease once in LA when I was there for an event related to my book on Frank Olson. . . . She sought me out in LA and tried to pump me on Pierre Lafitte, but I had no interest in sharing anything with her. I was told she was acting on behalf of DiEugenio.

DiEugenio [and Pease] have locked themselves into a box on the assassination and I suspect they will live to regret it, but I'm sure their combined pathology will attempt to slam many more people before that occurs.
 
 My best,
 
 Hank 

[Jonathan Cohen]

28 minutes ago, Leslie Sharp said:

I'll just leave this here.

. . . I met Lisa Pease once in LA when I was there for an event related to my book on Frank Olson. . . . She sought me out in LA and tried to pump me on Pierre Lafitte, but I had no interest in sharing anything with her. I was told she was acting on behalf of DiEugenio.

DiEugenio [and Pease] have locked themselves into a box on the assassination and I suspect they will live to regret it, but I'm sure their combined pathology will attempt to slam many more people before that occurs.
 
 My best,
 
 Hank 

It's just non-stop victim mentality from the Coup in Dallas brigade, isn't it? "Acting on behalf of" Jim DiEugenio? On behalf of what? Our top-secret cabal that goes around jealously spying on other Kennedy assassination researchers? Give me a break.

[Leslie Sharp]

3 minutes ago, Jonathan Cohen said:

It's just non-stop victim mentality from the Coup in Dallas brigade, isn't it? "Acting on behalf of" Jim DiEugenio? On behalf of what? Our top-secret cabal that goes around jealously spying on other Kennedy assassination researchers? Give me a break.

You know nothing of this dynamic.  The exchange only scratches the surface.

Hank was hardly a victim; he was an astute, experienced, long-term observer of human nature, particularly that of "the research community."

[Leslie Sharp]

@Ed Berger there may be something applicable to our recent discussion here:
 

Dick Russell provides a limited analysis of the primary source material of Albarelli's last investigation.  if you continue reading, James Angleton is germane to the discussion of his former boss, DCI Allen Dulles' alleged Weekend At The Farm:

 

Dick Russell: ANGLETON: Listed in the datebook by his last name as well as initials (JA and JJA), the then-head of Counterintelligence for the CIA appears to have been involved in “high-level gathering in DC'' during which “Lancelot planning” was discussed. The Lancelot reference is to a plot to kill JFK. The datebook’s final mention of James Angleton,(December 5, 1963) states: “JA – CLOSE OUT LANCELOT.” Angleton’s name was not generally known until the mid-1970s, when he was forced out of the CIA following revelations that he’d organized an illegal domestic spying program. 

 

Albarelli / Sharp:  

. . . After the war, having immigrated to the US, Clifford Forster ran the American Friends of Paix et Liberté designed to counter the propaganda of the French Communist Party. He later formed several similarly aggressively anti-communist committees in the US focused exclusively on threats to French colonial dominance in Algeria. By 1960, he was chairman/cofounder of The American Committee for France and Algeria, launching a bulletin similar to Willoughby's Foreign Intel Digest called Integration, the preferred term of fascist sympathizers to define the resolution of the Algerian question. Forster wrote, “. . . [we] believe that, in the interests of humanity and Western civilization, American policy as well as that of our allies will be best served by an Algeria integrated with France.” (Sept. 1960—emphasis added) 

            By 1961, President John Kennedy was taking a different position which strongly favored Algerian independence from France.

            Forster had argued, “The importance of Algeria and indeed all of North Africa to the defense of Western Europe cannot be underestimated. . . . These are the simple strategic facts involved in the global struggle between East and West. . . .” 

            A close read of Forster’s analysis of “the importance of Algeria . . .” exposes a far less noble motive. Referring to Oil, Gas & Chemical Service, June 8, 1959, Forster alerts his readers that the petroleum industry publication sounded the warning in these terms: “Recent exploratory successes in North Africa and the development of sizable oil reserves in Algeria have directed attention to the entire northern part of the continent of Africa. The vigorous exploration and development of oil reserves in the Sahara Desert areas of Algeria will bring France into the ranks of important oil producing nations….” Intentional or not, Forster was transparent: rightful independence of Algerians hinged on dominance over the country’s natural resources.      Reflecting on the 1952 “Meadows - Skorzeny” scheme launched in Franco’s Spain compels researchers to wonder how the discovery of vast oil reserves in the Sahara factored into the long-range projections of Texas independent oilmen.

       Among the far-right propaganda outlets touted by Clifford Forster’s Integration were those published by Kent Courtney, an active member of the White Citizens Council, and the John Birch Society (JBS). A critical aspect of what appears on the surface as a loosely knit network, which in retrospect surfaces as a powerful worldwide ideological movement, was the American Opinion Speakers Bureau, promoted by the JBS. That stable of speakers included Clifford Forster, featured speaker at Billy James Hargis' annual “Christian Crusade” convention held in Dallas in 1964, just months after the assassination. Forster was Otto Skorzeny's business friend. As noted previously, Christian Crusade was wrapped up in the Congress of Freedom identified in the Lafitte datebook.

       Apparently, Algeria was still on the mind of former director of the CIA, Allen Dulles in October 1963. In so many words, Dulles agreed with Forster that despite Algerian independence secured in 1962, capitalism writ large was not served by that major political shift on the African continent. During his trip to Dallas, October 28/29—the forty-eight-hour period critical to "Lancelot Planning," according to Pierre Lafitte—the dynamics in Algeria dominated Dulles’s speech before the Dallas Council on World Affairs.

 

. . . On October 17th—one day before James Angleton told Pierre Lafitte that there had been a high-level gathering in DC, the Dallas Morning News published a brief announcement, “Former CIA Boss Sets Dallas Talk.” The story read: “Allen W. Dulles, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency will address a meeting of the Dallas Council on World Affairs at noon on Monday, October 28, in the Baker Hotel . . .” Neil Mallon, a member of the board of Republic National Bank had been a friend and confidant of Allen Dulles throughout Dulles’s tenure as director of Central Intelligence. It was through Dulles’s prompting that Mallon founded the Dallas chapter of the Council on World Affairs, an invaluable instrument for the agency since 1951 and the perfect venue on October 28, 1963, for Dulles to promote his book and speak on national security issues including reference to specific activity in hot spots around the world, suggesting he was being briefed in spite of his having left the agency in 1961. The Dallas chapter of the Independent Petroleum Association of America also held their monthly meeting on October 28th.

            On October 27th, the Dallas Morning News followed up and announced that oil expert Jack Crichton, having recently returned from an oil tour of Romania, would present his report to the Petroleum Engineers on the following Friday, November 1st. 

            On October 29th, Kent Biffle of the Dallas Morning News published a summation of Allen Dulles’s speech the night before under the headline, “Allen Dulles Looks Behind Red Moves”: “Khrushchev announced he ‘isn’t going to the moon next week’ to foil the Kennedy plan for a joint moon effort.” Dulles said, ‘Russians are arming Algerian troops in hopes of finally gaining a solid foothold in Africa . . . The Soviets have been trying for ten to fifteen years to find the foothold they want in Africa. They tried in Egypt, the Congo, Guinea and Ghana.’” Biffle continued, “Dulles said that in arming the Algerians against the Moroccans, the Reds are again trying to find a satisfactory foothold in Africa.” We should underscore here that as DCI Allen Dulles had been a frequent visitor to the hotels and homes of numerous close friends in Dallas, Texas, including of course Mallon. Indeed, some people close to the CIA director would quietly remark that Dallas had become an important base of operations for the CIA, second only to headquarters in Langley, Virginia. (See Endnote.)

            Dulles’s October 28th talk before Mallon’s Dallas Council on World Affairs further tilled the soil when he included reference to the Algerians’ fight for independence—a subject close to the heart of this book. The speech was a companion piece to other recent impassioned anti-communist pleadings at various venues around the city including those of the woeful, anti-Red princess from Romania. Jack Crichton’s report to Dallas petroleum executives—scheduled within days of Dulles’s speech at the DCWA—recapped his Romanian oil tour which most assuredly described the plight of that country under The Reds, planting propaganda and stoking the anti-communist fires in Dallas. Crichton’s talk was just four days prior to Lafitte making a note, Meet with Crichton at Tech building.

Edited August 1, 2023 by Leslie Sharp

[Paul Brancato]

7 hours ago, Leslie Sharp said:

I think Leslie feels a certain imperative because she was a close associate of Hank’s and worked like hell to get the book finished

At the risk of my response to this comment being construed as "defensive", @Paul Brancato
once again, I began my research into the Kennedy assassination from Dublin, Ireland in 1993, when a former work colleague at Hunt family-owned Rosewood Hotels advised me to read Dick Russell's The Man Who Knew Too Much.

I spent large portions of the next two dozen years researching the Military-Industrial Complex in context of the assassination in Dallas.  In 2017, Hank Albarelli phoned to ask if I would co-author Coup with him.  So, to suggest that I am "defensive" solely on behalf of Hank, is factually inaccurate. This was a joint-work effort, picking up from Hank's extraordinary insight and gumshoe detective work to land access to some of the Lafitte private collection. I lay no claim to his decades long effort, but I take responsibility and accept accountability for having already accumulated the body of research and a solid grasp of the subject that this project required, at the right time, in the right place, in order to bring this book across the line for us both, along with Alan Kent.

 But he is not staking his work or credibility on authenticity of the diaries. 

As I've shared with Monté, I respect any and all who maintain a "wait and see" attitude toward the datebook; that said, I continue to wrestle with the logic of pursueing clues left by Lafitte, yet qualifying one's position on the authenticity, while presenting findings that originated from said clues.

The other only partly resolved issue is what happened between Major Ganis and Hank Albarelli? And as Leslie pointed out, why hasn’t Ganis released his Skorzeny documents for authentication and opened them up to researchers?

You may be at a disadvantage, Paul, or maybe you've forgotten because I'm fairly sure I explained the dissolution of the Ganis/Albarelli collaboration in a private email with you? I'm under no legal constraint to share publicly my first hand knowledge of why Hank didn't publish with Major Ganis.  In one of our first phone calls, he explained his concerns that the project might be headed in a direction that not only did he not agree with but that he was seriously uncomfortable overall. Maj. Ganis was approaching interpretation of their research through the lens that (paraphrasing here) Skorzeny was a friend of the West, and of democracy, and that in fact he was doing America a favor.   The issue culminated when the term "former" Nazi continued to surface in conversations, and ultimately Hank realized that Ganis wanted Skorzeny to be depicted as somewhat a hero. Hank's final words on the highly contentious issue: "Otto Skorzeny wasn't a "former" Nazi."


and focus on Robert’s attempts to corroborate the explosive info that the diaries led him to uncover?

To be clear, Monté doesn't represent Coup in Dallas; his attempts to corroborate some entries in the datebook have been amazing and it goes without saying how much I value his friendship, intelligence, his rugged independence, his courage, and his near savant skill sets: but, as he and I have discussed ad nauseam, they are pursued through a lens, as is natural for any of us.  Any conclusions he draws are based on his subjective interpretations of the datebook entries, and may or may not reflect Hank's investigation accurately or the material presented in  Coup or the forthcoming softcover edition.
 

I always find this kind of picking one sentence or another to respond to without taking account of the entirety of what I said less than satisfactory. You didn’t respond to large portions, the most important of which is my encouragement to take a more collaborative approach.
I presume you don’t know why Ganis hasn’t shared his Skorzeny papers with the research community. 
You are not listed as a co-author of Coup in Dallas. The first time you said that you considered yourself one was in response to a previous post of mine which, like this one, was written to express some empathy with you, to try to explain why you may be defensive or feel attacked. 
Your initial response to Greg D, shortly after publication and on the first Forum thread you initiated, was that he had an ulterior motive for asking a perfectly legitimate question, which you can see is on the minds of most everyone. That is not collaborative, and the response down the road has not been a good one for you. I stand by what I said then, and now, and wish you would backpedal a bit. I’m not your enemy as you well know, and my primary motive is to help you, not criticize.
My last question - the WHY of Lafitte writing a diary or datebook - is perhaps too difficult to answer prior to authentication, but it is an important one. 
What is the current status of authentication efforts? 

[Leslie Sharp]

1 hour ago, Paul Brancato said:

I always find this kind of picking one sentence or another to respond to without taking account of the entirety of what I said less than satisfactory. You didn’t respond to large portions, the most important of which is my encouragement to take a more collaborative approach.
I presume you don’t know why Ganis hasn’t shared his Skorzeny papers with the research community. 
You are not listed as a co-author of Coup in Dallas. The first time you said that you considered yourself one was in response to a previous post of mine which, like this one, was written to express some empathy with you, to try to explain why you may be defensive or feel attacked. 
Your initial response to Greg D, shortly after publication and on the first Forum thread you initiated, was that he had an ulterior motive for asking a perfectly legitimate question, which you can see is on the minds of most everyone. That is not collaborative, and the response down the road has not been a good one for you. I stand by what I said then, and now, and wish you would backpedal a bit. I’m not your enemy as you well know, and my primary motive is to help you, not criticize.
My last question - the WHY of Lafitte writing a diary or datebook - is perhaps too difficult to answer prior to authentication, but it is an important one. 
What is the current status of authentication efforts? 

I don't know why Ganis hasn't shared his Skorzeny papers.

You are not listed as a co-author of Coup in Dallas.

I am co-author of Coup in Dallas as noted in the joint-work copyright.  Please review the title page which Hank submitted with the prelim draft in April 2019 that appears in the Front Matter of Coup. 


The first time you said that you considered yourself one was in response to a previous post of mine which, like this one, was written to express some empathy with you, to try to explain why you may be defensive or feel attacked. 

I'm surprised by this, Paul.  We have communicated periodically since Hank's passing, and I am fairly certain I've walked you through, both by phone and email, the circumstances of Hank first contacting me to ask if I would co-author the book, my reticence at appearing on the front cover in spite of his insistence (I won that argument), and the struggle to see this book published against a number of odds even I was shocked by after he died.

That is not collaborative, and the response down the road has not been a good one for you.

I have and intend to continue to collaborate with those who can hold two concepts - perhaps opposing - at the same time: i.e., IF the datebook is legitimate, where do Lafitte's notes lead.  

was that he had an ulterior motive for asking a perfectly legitimate question,

I questioned why anyone would review a 700+ page book — just 10 days after publication — based on a 5-6 page co-author's statement specific to provenance and authenticity without mention of the revelations in the narrative of Hank's investigation let alone  his personal  introduction which lays out provenance and arguments for authenticity.  Anyone that chose that approach — not dissimilar to Fred Litwin's I might add — had to have a "motive." Have you ever wondered why Greg won't actually discuss Hank's investigation? Why didn't Greg contact the living coauthor to question the authenticity face to face as it were?

I’m not your enemy as you well know, and my primary motive is to help you, not criticize.

I've always considered this an investigation into the murder in Dallas, and have approached pubic discourse with that focus. It's not personal for me, and I trust you have a similar philosophy.

the WHY of Lafitte writing a diary or datebook - is perhaps too difficult to answer prior to authentication, but it is an important one. 
What is the current status of authentication efforts? 

Authentication won't reveal the WHY of Lafitte maintaining a daily record.  I've heard at least a half-dozen theories, none of which are necessarily persuasive.  Why did Hunter-White keep notes; why did Win Scott maintain what I'm led to believe were diaries beginning in the early 1950s (and WHERE are those diaries?); why did Robert G. Storey keep a daily account of his experience during Nuremberg; why have I kept notebooks for decades?

The current status of authentication is, as I've shared several times on various threads on this forum, incomplete.

Edited August 2, 2023 by Leslie Sharp

[Jeremy Bojczuk]

Leslie Sharp writes:

Quote

The current status of authentication is, as I've shared several times on various threads on this forum, incomplete.

Well, that's a start. We now have a straightforward sentence that begins to explain the current state of play. The authentication is incomplete.

It would be helpful if Leslie could set out, in one comment and in clear English (or Latin; either would do), the ways in which the authentication is incomplete. The following questions may help to identify the details that ought to be provided:

• Have the ink, paper and handwriting in the datebook all been examined by accredited experts (assuming that such a thing exists in the realm of handwriting analysis)?
• If the ink, or the paper, or the handwriting have not been examined by any accredited experts, why has this not happened?
• If this has happened, who are those experts, what are their credentials, and what precisely are the results of their examinations?
• Where can we read the results of their examinations of the datebook?
• If these results are not publicly available, what steps are being taken to make them publicly available?
• If no such steps are being taken, why not?
• In short, what solid evidence is there to support the claim that the datebook is authentic?

Earlier, Greg Doudna gave good reasons to suppose that the datebook is not authentic. Rather than deal with the points he made, he was bullied into silence, which is a pretty strong indication that:

• Greg's criticisms were accurate;
• the datebook is probably a fake, as most of us suspect;
• and Greg's attackers also suspect that it's probably a fake.

As Jim and Tom pointed out, the treatment of Greg was disgraceful and the moderators really ought to do something about it, if they haven't already (and about the spamming of the forum with numerous threads about the same topic, including lengthy quotations from the holy book: it's like 'Harvey and Lee' all over again).

Given the number of individuals over the years who have claimed involvement in the JFK assassination on dubious grounds, it shouldn't be a surprise that people are refusing to accept the authenticity of a document which:

• hardly anyone has seen,
• is not in the public domain,
• contains vague and incomplete statements which are open to wild interpretation (e.g. an illegible squiggle = DUUM = "two rifles were taken into the building" = a bunch of Nazis killed JFK, or something),
• and, as Leslie admits, has not been properly authenticated.

The last of these is the most worrying: a book has been published which pushes a theory that relies fundamentally on a hand-written document which has not even been authenticated!

When there is any doubt about written sources, the first thing a reputable author of non-fiction would do is to verify those sources, and only then construct a theory based on those sources. I'm sure Leslie can appreciate why so many of us find the "incomplete" nature of the authentication worrying.

Leslie clearly wants to find out the truth about the JFK assassination. No doubt she's aware of the harm that might be caused to JFK assassination research if her theory gets publicity in the media, only for the datebook then to be exposed as a fake.

[Leslie Sharp]

•  

1 hour ago, Jeremy Bojczuk said:

Leslie Sharp writes:

Well, that's a start. We now have a straightforward sentence that begins to explain the current state of play. The authentication is incomplete.

It would be helpful if Leslie could set out, in one comment and in clear English (or Latin; either would do), the ways in which the authentication is incomplete. The following questions may help to identify the details that ought to be provided:

• Have the ink, paper and handwriting in the datebook all been examined by accredited experts (assuming that such a thing exists in the realm of handwriting analysis)?
• If the ink, or the paper, or the handwriting have not been examined by any accredited experts, why has this not happened?
• If this has happened, who are those experts, what are their credentials, and what precisely are the results of their examinations?
• Where can we read the results of their examinations of the datebook?
• If these results are not publicly available, what steps are being taken to make them publicly available?
• If no such steps are being taken, why not?
• In short, what solid evidence is there to support the claim that the datebook is authentic?

Earlier, Greg Doudna gave good reasons to suppose that the datebook is not authentic. Rather than deal with the points he made, he was bullied into silence, which is a pretty strong indication that:

• Greg's criticisms were accurate;
• the datebook is probably a fake, as most of us suspect;
• and Greg's attackers also suspect that it's probably a fake.

As Jim and Tom pointed out, the treatment of Greg was disgraceful and the moderators really ought to do something about it, if they haven't already (and about the spamming of the forum with numerous threads about the same topic, including lengthy quotations from the holy book: it's like 'Harvey and Lee' all over again).

Given the number of individuals over the years who have claimed involvement in the JFK assassination on dubious grounds, it shouldn't be a surprise that people are refusing to accept the authenticity of a document which:

• hardly anyone has seen,
• is not in the public domain,
• contains vague and incomplete statements which are open to wild interpretation (e.g. an illegible squiggle = DUUM = "two rifles were taken into the building" = a bunch of Nazis killed JFK, or something),
• and, as Leslie admits, has not been properly authenticated.

The last of these is the most worrying: a book has been published which pushes a theory that relies fundamentally on a hand-written document which has not even been authenticated!

When there is any doubt about written sources, the first thing a reputable author of non-fiction would do is to verify those sources, and only then construct a theory based on those sources. I'm sure Leslie can appreciate why so many of us find the "incomplete" nature of the authentication worrying.

Leslie clearly wants to find out the truth about the JFK assassination. No doubt she's aware of the harm that might be caused to JFK assassination research if her theory gets publicity in the media, only for the datebook then to be exposed as a fake.

 

• Have the ink, paper and handwriting in the datebook all been examined by accredited experts (assuming that such a thing exists in the realm of handwriting analysis)?

As referenced previously, examination of the datebook funded by a documentary film company under contract for a 6-8 part series based on the forthcoming book Coup in Dallas was initiated in London in November 2018. 

• If the ink, or the paper, or the handwriting have not been examined by any accredited experts, why has this not happened?
• If this has happened, who are those experts, what are their credentials, and what precisely are the results of their examinations?

The examination was stalled in early 2019 due to insufficient handwriting exemplars. I previously provided Greg (in particular) with the names of the experts in their respective fields, thinking that with his apparent background in this area he might recognize their names. Perhaps you can review that exchange.

 

• Where can we read the results of their examinations of the datebook?

The preliminary report of the handwriting expert remains under a binding Non-Disclosure Agreement with his firm and the documentary film company.

The ink and paper analysis remains the property of the documentary film company as well. The examiner is also under NDA.

Final authentication came to a screeching halt with Hank's stroke in mid-May, 2019.

• If these results are not publicly available, what steps are being taken to makethem publicly available?

A separate examination was initiated in the US in the fall of 2022; the status remains incomplete pending additional handwriting exemplars, the same obstacle encountered in London.

• If no such steps are being taken, why not?
• In short, what solid evidence is there to support the claim that the datebook is authentic?

We have been advised by three respected experts in this field that unless this case is brought to court, a final report on authentication can and likely will be challenged, regardless. Anyone in "the community" for example, can hire another examiner to dispute a finding.

The London reports were not Hank's property; efforts to obtain at least a nominal statement from either of the experts — both of whom remain under NDA — have thus far failed. If either responds to inquiries from parties with no legal standing,  as one who does have legal standing, I would be most interested in what they have to say.  

[David McLean]

Paul, I do take your points seriously, and am not plugged in enough to be thorough  in response.

Here is what I can say about the WHY of Pierre Lafitte diary situation…about 1951-55, he worked very closely  with George White, who kept a diary over years and for Albarelli who consulted it closely, this was a vital entry point I am sure.

Read Doug Valentine’s unchallenged work on the FBN/CIA overlap - 80 indexed references to GHW in the first, one hundred in the second, that’s nearly one every four pages. Thou, only four for Lafitte and none in vol 2 and six for Francois Spirito.

Page 141, “On 6 December, 1955 Gottlieb visited White and Pierre Lafitte one last time in New York. He arrived with a fountain pen air-gun and an instruction manual on the use of drugs and protitutes” for White’s FBN  job  in San Francisco.  On pages 110-11, Valentine describes the Orsini case as “the first postwar crack in the French connection…and cannot be overstated,” where PL ratted on his old French colleagues, and two years later he and Francois Spirito ended up in Frank Olsen’s Statler Hotel room.  How Albarelli fingered these two in A Terrible Mistake is not well documented,in my recollection, but the Olsen family received a Presidental apology, from Gerald Ford,of all people in “ the year of intelligence” of 1975. Note that George White and Skorzeny both died in 1975, and Lafitte may have too, am trying to find a reference for that.

To quote someon, “You can’t make this stuff up”

 

 

 

 

 

 

[David McLean]

52 minutes ago, David McLean said:

Paul, I do take your points seriously, and am not plugged in enough to be thorough  in response.

Here is what I can say about the WHY of Pierre Lafitte diary situation…about 1951-55, he worked very closely  with George White, who kept a diary over years and for Albarelli who consulted it closely, this was a vital entry point I am sure.

Read Doug Valentine’s unchallenged work on the FBN/CIA overlap - 80 indexed references to GHW in the first, one hundred in the second, that’s nearly one every four pages. Thou, only four for Lafitte and none in vol 2 and six for Francois Spirito.

Page 141, “On 6 December, 1955 Gottlieb visited White and Pierre Lafitte one last time in New York. He arrived with a fountain pen air-gun and an instruction manual on the use of drugs and protitutes” for White’s FBN  job  in San Francisco.  On pages 110-11, Valentine describes the Orsini case as “the first postwar crack in the French connection…and cannot be overstated,” where PL ratted on his old French colleagues, and two years later he and Francois Spirito ended up in Frank Olsen’s Statler Hotel room.  How Albarelli fingered these two in A Terrible Mistake is not well documented,in my recollection, but the Olsen family received a Presidental apology, from Gerald Ford,of all people in “ the year of intelligence” of 1975. Note that George White and Skorzeny both died in 1975, and Lafitte may have too, am trying to find a reference for that.

To quote someon, “You can’t make this stuff”

Further to the WHY…when Lafitte began working with the FBN against Orsini, it was as a future witness, and the first of several similar  undercover ops, so he needed contemporaneous documentation. Likewise White who at the time, about 1951 I believe, he was also an investigator for the Kefauver committee and again would be required to keep one record for his employer and one for himself as insurance.

 

Corrections -Olson, not Olsen AND Leslie Sharp and Alan Kent  are listed on the TP and Leslie in a”Co-author’s Postscript” AND not the Statler but the Statler Hilton, where  Albarelli has him the bell captain. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Paul Brancato]

I have a question about George Hunter White’s diary. Where is it? Can we read it? I assume Hank read it and sourced from it.