Under Cover of Night

[Sandy Larsen]

7 hours ago, Robert Morrow said:

Twymann details and confirms Lyndon Johnson PERSONALLY calling Will Fritz late on Saturday 11/23/63 and telling him to QUIT interrogating Oswald.

 

If that is true, Captain Fritz ignored LBJ's order.

Excerpted from the report of the Oswald interrogation that took place in Fritz's office on 11/24/1963 at 9:30 AM:

This interview started at approximately 9:30 a.m. on Sunday, November 24, 1963. The interview was conducted in the office of Captain WIll Fritz of the Homicide Bureau, Dallas Police. Present at the interview in addition to Oswald were Captain Fritz, Postal Inspector Holmes, SAIC Sorrels, Inspector Kelley and four members of the Homicide Squad. The interview had just begun when I arrived and Captain Fritz was again requesting Oswald to identify the place where the photograph of him holding the gun was taken. Captain Fritz indicated that it would save the Police a great deal of time if he would tell them where the place was located. Oswald refused to discuss the matter. Captain Fritz asked, "Are you a Communist?" Oswald answered, "No, I am a Marxist but I am not a Marxist Leninist." Captain Fritz asked him what the difference was and Oswald said it would take too long to explain it to him. Oswald said that he became interested in the Fair Play for Cuba Committee while he was in New Orleans; that he wrote to the Committee's Headquarters in New York and received some Committee literature and a letter signed by Alex Hidell. He stated that he began to distribute that literature in New Orleans and it was at that time that he got into an altercation with a group and he was arrested. He said his opinions concerning Fair Play for Cuba are well known; that he appeared on Bill Stukey's television program in New Orleans on a number of occasions and was interviewed by the local press often.

He denies knowing or ever seeing Hidell in New Orleans, said he believed in all of the tents of the Fair Play for Cuba and the things which the Fair Play for Cuba Committee stood for, which was free intercourse with Cuba and freedom for tourists of both countries to travel within each other's borders.

Among other things, Oswald said that Cuba should have full diplomatic relationship with the United States. I asked him if he thought that the President's assassination would have any effect on the Fair Play for Cuba Committee. He said there would be no change in the attitude of the American people toward Cuba with President Johnson becoming President because they both belonged to the same political party and the one would follow pretty generally the policies of the other . He stated that he is an avid reader of Russian literature whether it is communistic or not; that he subscribes to "The Militant," which, he says, is the weekly of the Socialist party in the United States (it is a copy of "the Militant" that Oswald is shown holding in the photograph taken form this effects at Irving Street). At that time he asked me whether I was an FBI Agent and I said that I was not that I was a member of the Secret Service. He said when he was standing in front of the Textbook Building and about to leave it, a young crew-cut man rushed up to him and said he was from the Secret Service, showed a book of identification, and asked him where the phone was. Oswald said he pointed toward the pay phone in the building and that he saw the man actually go to the phone before he left.

I asked Oswald whether as a Marxist he believed that religion was an opiate of the people and he said very definitely so that all organized religions tend to become monopolistic and are the causes of a great deal of class warfare. I asked him whether he considered the Catholic Church to be an enemy of the Communist philosophy and he said well, there was no Catholicism in Russia; that the closest to it is the Orthodox Churches but he said he would not further attempt to have him say something which could be construed as being anti-religious or anti-Catholic.

Capt. Fritz displayed an Enco street map of Dallas which had been found among Oswald's effects at the rooming house. Oswald was asked whether the map was his and wheter he had put some marks on it. He said it was his and remarked "My God don't tell me there's a mark near where this thing happened." The mark was pointed out to him and he said "What about the other marks on the map?I put a number of marks on it. I was looking for work and marked the places where I went for jobs or where I heard there were jobs."

Since it was obvious to Captain Fritz that Oswald was not going to be cooperative, he terminated the interview at that time.

 

 

[Robert Morrow]

1 hour ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

I imagine that LBJ didn't want to make a rush decision on retaliating against a foreign nation, particularly against a nuclear power like the Soviet Union. At the same time, Katzenbach and others were advising against blaming any conspiracy whatsoever, and placing the blame squarely on LHO. That probably seemed like an easy way out to LBJ. If it later turned out there was indeed a communist conspiracy, he could always retaliate in some fashion at that time.

 

Lyndon Johnson, who orchestrated the JFK assassination, knew darn well there was no "communist international conspiracy" to murder JFK, that is why he was taking time out of his life in a national emergency to sell his "goddamn Halliburton stock." Halliburton in 1962 had merged with Brown & Root, the major construction firm that Lyndon Johnson had made RICH for decades by steering them government contracts. LBJ's sugar daddy George Brown was an executive at Halliburton and George Brown and his brother had made LBJ super rich by giving him large amounts of "under the table" money over the decades.

LBJ also got drunk on the way back from Dallas as he drank "about half a fifth" of Cutty Sark according to flight steward Doyle Whitehead. That is because LBJ was nervous about what the Kennedy reaction would be to his murdering JFK.

Lyndon Johnson called his tax lawyer Waddy Bullion to sell his “goddamn Halliburton stock” on the day of JFK’s assassination

 

 LBJ makes call from Parkland Hospital; JFK’s corpse was still warm at this point

 

[Russ Baker, Family of Secrets, p. 132]

 QUOTE

           Pat Holloway, former attorney to both Poppy Bush and Jack Crichton, recounted to me an incident involving LBJ that had greatly disturbed him. This was around 1PM on November 22, 1963, just as Kennedy was being pronounced dead. Holloway was heading home from the office and was passing through the reception area. The switchboard operator excitedly noted that she was patching the vice president through from Parkland Hospital to Holloway’s boss, firm senior partner Waddy Bullion, who was LBJ’s personal tax lawyer. The operator invited Holloway to listen in. LBJ was talking “not about a conspiracy or a tragedy,” Holloway recalled. “I heard him say: ‘Oh I gotta get rid of my goddamn Halliburton stock.’ Lyndon Johnson was talking about the consequences of his political problems with his Halliburton stock at a time when the president had been officially declared dead. And that pissed me off… It really made me furious.”

          There are many other examples of LBJ’s apparent unconcern after the assassination, though none so immediate. For instance, on the evening of November 25, LBJ and Martin Luther King talked, and LBJ said, “It’s just an impossible period – we’ve got a budget coming up.” That morning he told Joseph Alsop that “the President must not inject himself into, uh, local killings,” to which Alsop immediately replied, “I agree with that, but in this case it does happen to be the killing of the President.” Also, on the same day LBJ told Hoover, “We can’t be checking up on every shooting scrape in the country.”

 UNQUOTE

 [Russ Baker, Family of Secrets, p. 132]

 Brown and Root, as a subsidiary of Halliburton, was awarded a bevy of lucrative contracts for the Vietnam War by Lyndon Johnson

 https://www.npr.org/2003/12/24/1569483/halliburton-deals-recall-vietnam-era-controversy

 [“Halliburton Deals Recall Vietnam-Era Controversy,” John Burnett, All Things Considered, 12-24-2003]

 QUOTE

 After Johnson took over the Oval Office, Brown & Root won contracts for huge construction projects for the federal government. By the mid-1960s, newspaper columnists and the Republican minority in Congress began to suggest that the company's good luck was tied to its sizable contributions to Johnson's political campaign.

More questions were raised when a consortium of which Brown & Root was a part won a $380 million contract to build airports, bases, hospitals and other facilities for the U.S. Navy in South Vietnam. By 1967, the General Accounting Office had faulted the "Vietnam builders" -- as they were known -- for massive accounting lapses and allowing thefts of materials.

Brown & Root also became a target for anti-war protesters: they called the firm the embodiment of the "military-industrial complex" and denounced it for building detention cells to hold Viet Cong prisoners in South Vietnam.

 UNQUOTE

 

 

[Robert Morrow]

59 minutes ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

If that is true, Captain Fritz ignored LBJ's order.

Excerpted from the report of the Oswald interrogation that took place in Fritz's office on 11/24/1963 at 9:30 AM:

This interview started at approximately 9:30 a.m. on Sunday, November 24, 1963. The interview was conducted in the office of Captain WIll Fritz of the Homicide Bureau, Dallas Police. Present at the interview in addition to Oswald were Captain Fritz, Postal Inspector Holmes, SAIC Sorrels, Inspector Kelley and four members of the Homicide Squad. The interview had just begun when I arrived and Captain Fritz was again requesting Oswald to identify the place where the photograph of him holding the gun was taken. Captain Fritz indicated that it would save the Police a great deal of time if he would tell them where the place was located. Oswald refused to discuss the matter. Captain Fritz asked, "Are you a Communist?" Oswald answered, "No, I am a Marxist but I am not a Marxist Leninist." Captain Fritz asked him what the difference was and Oswald said it would take too long to explain it to him. Oswald said that he became interested in the Fair Play for Cuba Committee while he was in New Orleans; that he wrote to the Committee's Headquarters in New York and received some Committee literature and a letter signed by Alex Hidell. He stated that he began to distribute that literature in New Orleans and it was at that time that he got into an altercation with a group and he was arrested. He said his opinions concerning Fair Play for Cuba are well known; that he appeared on Bill Stukey's television program in New Orleans on a number of occasions and was interviewed by the local press often.

He denies knowing or ever seeing Hidell in New Orleans, said he believed in all of the tents of the Fair Play for Cuba and the things which the Fair Play for Cuba Committee stood for, which was free intercourse with Cuba and freedom for tourists of both countries to travel within each other's borders.

Among other things, Oswald said that Cuba should have full diplomatic relationship with the United States. I asked him if he thought that the President's assassination would have any effect on the Fair Play for Cuba Committee. He said there would be no change in the attitude of the American people toward Cuba with President Johnson becoming President because they both belonged to the same political party and the one would follow pretty generally the policies of the other . He stated that he is an avid reader of Russian literature whether it is communistic or not; that he subscribes to "The Militant," which, he says, is the weekly of the Socialist party in the United States (it is a copy of "the Militant" that Oswald is shown holding in the photograph taken form this effects at Irving Street). At that time he asked me whether I was an FBI Agent and I said that I was not that I was a member of the Secret Service. He said when he was standing in front of the Textbook Building and about to leave it, a young crew-cut man rushed up to him and said he was from the Secret Service, showed a book of identification, and asked him where the phone was. Oswald said he pointed toward the pay phone in the building and that he saw the man actually go to the phone before he left.

I asked Oswald whether as a Marxist he believed that religion was an opiate of the people and he said very definitely so that all organized religions tend to become monopolistic and are the causes of a great deal of class warfare. I asked him whether he considered the Catholic Church to be an enemy of the Communist philosophy and he said well, there was no Catholicism in Russia; that the closest to it is the Orthodox Churches but he said he would not further attempt to have him say something which could be construed as being anti-religious or anti-Catholic.

Capt. Fritz displayed an Enco street map of Dallas which had been found among Oswald's effects at the rooming house. Oswald was asked whether the map was his and wheter he had put some marks on it. He said it was his and remarked "My God don't tell me there's a mark near where this thing happened." The mark was pointed out to him and he said "What about the other marks on the map?I put a number of marks on it. I was looking for work and marked the places where I went for jobs or where I heard there were jobs."

Since it was obvious to Captain Fritz that Oswald was not going to be cooperative, he terminated the interview at that time.

 

 

That is a very good point! Maybe LBJ called on Sunday morning instead.

Notice Oswald is taking a bullet within 2 hours of the start of his interview by Fritz, Postal Inspector Holmes, SAIC Sorrels, Inspector Kelley and four members of the homicide squad.

Then immediately after Oswald takes a bullet in the belly from Ruby, Lyndon Johnson was calling Parkland Hospital wanting to get a "confession" from Oswald.

Lyndon Johnson to Dr. Charles Crenshaw on 11/24/63

 “I want a death-bed confession from the accused assassin. There’s a man in the operating room who will take a statement. I will expect full cooperation in this matter.”

Paul Kuntzler letter:

QUOTE

After Oswald was shot by Mafia member Jack Ruby, President Johnson called Parkland Hospital.  Phyllis Bartlett, Chief Telephone Operator for Parkland Hospital, remembers the call:  "The call came in and said, 'Hold the line for the President."  Bartlett continued when she said, "It was just a second or two when he came on in a loud voice and said, 'This is Lyndon Johnson, Connect me to the accused assassin's doctor.' "

          Ms. Bartlett put the President through to an office adjoining the operating room where Dr. Charles Crenshaw was urgently called to answer the phone.  He recalls:

 "I picked up the phone and it was there I heard this voice like thunder that stated: 'This is President Lyndon B. Johnson.' "  And he asked,  "How is the accused assassin doing?"  I was so startled that the only thing that I could say was:  "He is holding his own.  He has lost a lot of blood.  He said:  "Would you take a message to the chief operating surgeon?"  It was more of an order than a question.  "There is a man in the room, I would like for him to take a deathbed confession."

UNQUOTE

 

Edited April 25 by Robert Morrow

[Sandy Larsen]

7 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

BTW, how did Johnson eventually find out about the plots?

It was the Drew Pearson story through Johnny Roselli.

When that got into the papers, LBJ told Helms he wanted a report on this.

 

Yeah, but that wasn't till 1966. When Roselli claimed that Castro had sent some hitmen to the U.S. to kill Kennedy in retaliation for him trying to kill Castro.

Which, BTW, I don't believe given that I believe the assassination plotters were CIA. And the CIA certainly wouldn't have acquired their hitmen from Castro.

 

7 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

That is how we got the CIA IG Report.

After reading it, Johnson told his assistant he now thought the CIA was involved in JFK's murder.

 

That's interesting. I'd like to see that report.

 

7 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Although [LBJ] never said that in public.  The closest he got I think was when he said Oswald was likely not working alone. He had some help.

 

I think it is likely that LBJ trusted what Hoover had to say about there being a real possibility of a communist plot.

Hoover said publicly very early on (Nov. 25?) that Oswald was the lone gunman. But on Nov. 29 he said the following to LBJ by phone:

"This angle in Mexico is giving us a great deal of trouble because the story there is of this man Oswald getting $6,500 from the Cuban embassy and then coming back to this country with it. We're not able to prove that fact, but the information was that he was there on the 18th of September in Mexico City and we are able to prove conclusively he was in New Orleans that day. Now then they've changed the dates. The story came in changing the dates to the 28th of September and he was in Mexico City on the 28th. Now the Mexican police have again arrested this woman Duran, who is a member of the Cuban embassy... and we're going to confront her with the original informant, who saw the money pass, so he says, and we're also going to put the lie detector test on him."

 

 

[Robert Morrow]

Let me tell you about DREW PEARSON - he was one of the national reporters who had already written an expose of Lyndon Johnson that was to run in the Sunday papers of 11/24/1963. I am unsure if it was printed or not but I doubt so.

Once LBJ became president DREW PEARSON was a complete 100% media shill for LBJ. LBJ used to tell Pearson I *might* make you Secretary of State one day as he massaged his ego. LBJ would often use Pearson's column as a leaking avenue to put out dirt on his enemies (Robert Kennedy, Don Reynolds, etc.).

[James DiEugenio]

Sandy,

The CIA IG report, which is invaluable and one of the triumphs of the ARRB, is at MFF.  And its completely declassified now.  If you have not read it please do.

 

[James DiEugenio]

 

In the Washington Post of December 12, 1977, you will see a story about LBJ's chief of staff Marvin Watson telling Deloach that after reading the CIA IG report Johnson now felt the CIA was involved in the murder of President Kennedy.

Unfortunately that is behind a wall.

[Robert Morrow]

1 hour ago, James DiEugenio said:

 

In the Washington Post of December 12, 1977, you will see a story about LBJ's chief of staff Marvin Watson telling Deloach that after reading the CIA IG report Johnson now felt the CIA was involved in the murder of President Kennedy.

Unfortunately that is behind a wall.

1) Marvin Watson was a longtime inner circle LBJ henchman

2) FBI Deke DeLoach - I interviewed him in 2011. He said LBJ was a "family man." DeLoach and his family used to go to Camp David at Easter to be with LBJ's family. LBJ could have replaced Hoover at any time with DeLoach; that is how Hoover was kept under control by LBJ.

Lyndon Johnson on 4/3/1967 told his Chief of Staff Marvin Watson that the CIA had something to do with the JFK assassination https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=62412#relPageId=60&search=In_this%20connection,%20Marvin%20Watson%20called%20me%20late%20last%20night (FBI Deke DeLoach memo -see page 2)

 

From Robert Kennedy and His Times by Arthur Schlesinger (1978) (p. 616 in a footnote):

"In 1967 Marvin Watson of Lyndon Johnson's White House staff told Cartha DeLoach of the FBI that Johnson "was now convinced there was a plot in connection with the assassination. Watson stated the President felt that CIA had had something to do with this plot." (Washington Post, December 13, 1977)

[James DiEugenio]

Here you go Sandy. Direct link to CIA IG Report.  Which, IIRC, Fetter has no footnotes to.  Kind of mind boggling.

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=9983

 

This was so incriminating that Helms told the guys who wrote it to destroy their notes, and he kept only one copy, the ribbon original in his safe. Which Johnson read. 

I think he did that because he understood that logical, informed thinkers may have thought that these plots--which featured the CIA, Mafia, and Cuban exiles--could then have been turned against JFK.

[Roger Odisio]

45 minutes ago, Robert Morrow said:

1) Marvin Watson was a longtime inner circle LBJ henchman

2) FBI Deke DeLoach - I interviewed him in 2011. He said LBJ was a "family man." DeLoach and his family used to go to Camp David at Easter to be with LBJ's family. LBJ could have replaced Hoover at any time with DeLoach; that is how Hoover was kept under control by LBJ.

Lyndon Johnson on 4/3/1967 told his Chief of Staff Marvin Watson that the CIA had something to do with the JFK assassination https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=62412#relPageId=60&search=In_this%20connection,%20Marvin%20Watson%20called%20me%20late%20last%20night (FBI Deke DeLoach memo -see page 2)

 

From Robert Kennedy and His Times by Arthur Schlesinger (1978) (p. 616 in a footnote):

"In 1967 Marvin Watson of Lyndon Johnson's White House staff told Cartha DeLoach of the FBI that Johnson "was now convinced there was a plot in connection with the assassination. Watson stated the President felt that CIA had had something to do with this plot." (Washington Post, December 13, 1977)

C'mon guys.  Why would you pay attention to anything Johnson said about when it first dawned on him that the CIA was involved in the JFKA. Just more misdirection.

Yeah, and it was Joe Alsop who convinced him to create what became the WC and Bobby's idea to put Allen Dulles on it.

[James DiEugenio]

Roger:

in your last sentence, the first part is accurate.  Alsop did have a very strong part in convincing LBJ to form the Warren Commission, and that is clearly documented by Donald GIbson in his milestone essay in the book The Assassinations.

The last part is in all likliehood not true. I think that after the fact LBJ realized what a joke it was to put Dulles on that Commission and he felt the need to blame someone he despised.  

As per your first statement there is a very clear reason to think that way about the CIA/Mafia plots and LBJ.  

Its in the IG Report.  They admit it on pp. 132-33: no president had any knowledge of the plots. Its right there in B and W.  And its so devastating that Helms only kept one copy.  That is clearly not what Helms wanted to hear.  But the authors of the report reluctantly came to that conclusion.  

The first exposure of the plots was done by Roselli to Anderson, who printed a very much distorted view of them.  Johnson, like many others, saw this story.  He asked Helms for an accurate report on them.  And that is how we got that report. Which actually traces how the Anderson story was put together, again its right there in B and W. 

If you have other information about this, and if its solidly documented, I would certainly like to see it. And so would everyone else.

 

Edited April 25 by James DiEugenio

[Robert Morrow]

59 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

Roger:

in your last sentence, the first part is accurate.  Alsop did have a very strong part in convincing LBJ to form the Warren Commission, and that is clearly documented by Donald GIbson in his milestone essay in the book The Assassinations.

The last part is in all likliehood not true. I think that after the fact LBJ realized what a joke it was to put Dulles on that Commission and he felt the need to blame someone he despised.  

As per your first statement there is a very clear reason to think that way about the CIA/Mafia plots and LBJ.  

Its in the IG Report.  They admit it on pp. 132-33: no president had any knowledge of the plots. Its right there in B and W.  And its so devastating that Helms only kept one copy.  That is clearly not what Helms wanted to hear.  But the authors of the report reluctantly came to that conclusion.  

The first exposure of the plots was done by Roselli to Anderson, who printed a very much distorted view of them.  Johnson, like many others, saw this story.  He asked Helms for an accurate report on them.  And that is how we got that report. Which actually traces how the Anderson story was put together, again its right there in B and W. 

If you have other information about this, and if its solidly documented, I would certainly like to see it. And so would everyone else.

 

Lyndon Johnson wanted to rig the cover up to the JFK assassination with a "Texas Court of Inquiry" led by trusty conservative Waggoner Carr. Waggoner Carr was going to have LBJ man Leon Jaworkski and Robert Storey the head of the SMU law school be his advisors on this rigged cover up.

Most of the Warren Commision members were conservatives and close to LBJ and his friends.

When LBJ was faced with the reality that the American public would not trust Texans to investigate the JFK assassination he succumbed to the pleadings of people like Joe Alsop and the Washington Post and he decided to rig a national commission with 1) one of his absolute closest friends Sen. Richard Russell (D-GA), the leader of the segregationists and LBJ's mentor 2) Hale Boggs - longtime LBJ pal whose wife Lindy Boggs WAS THE BEST FRIEND OF LADY BIRD JOHNSON 3) John J McCloy - who Jim DiEugenio says had a relationship with LBJ. (Kai Bird's bio on McCloy.) McCloy also close to ABE FORTAS, longtime LBJ fixer lawyer. McCloy had to be removed by JFK as an arms control negotiator because he was too much of a hawk and he was replaced with Averell Harriman who in close consult with JFK got a nuclear test ban treaty done. 4) Allen Dulles fired CIA director who like LBJ, hated the Kennedys 5) Gerald Ford, who Bobby Baker said used to have trysts in an apartment that the FBI was bugging. Ford later said privately he knew it was a conspiracy 6) Sen. John Sherman Cooper (R-KY) - who happened to be a close personal friend of JFK and who while on the Warren Commission BELIEVED THAT LYNDON JOHNSON HAD JUST MURDERED JFK - see his aide Morris Wolffe who is alive today and saying that 7)Earl Warren was chosen to appeal to liberals and LBJ told him the Communists killed JFK and we have to cover up so that we do not have nuclear war.

The other person who LBJ considered early on was Gen. Lauris Norstad- who was a right wing general who fought with JFK who got to control nuclear weapons. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/08/jfk-vs-the-military/309496/

LBJ was so pleased with Allen Dulles cover up work on the Warren Commission he sent him down to Mississippi to investigate the disappearances of the 3 murdered civil rights activists.

LBJ was so pleased with cover up work of FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover that he he gave him a lifetime exemption from retiring at the mandatory age of 70.

In other words, you could say LBJ rigged the Warren Commission just like he was ready to rig a Texas Court of Inquiry into the JFK assassination.

 

 

 

[Roger Odisio]

19 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Roger:

in your last sentence, the first part is accurate.  Alsop did have a very strong part in convincing LBJ to form the Warren Commission, and that is clearly documented by Donald GIbson in his milestone essay in the book The Assassinations.

The last part is in all likliehood not true. I think that after the fact LBJ realized what a joke it was to put Dulles on that Commission and he felt the need to blame someone he despised.  

As per your first statement there is a very clear reason to think that way about the CIA/Mafia plots and LBJ.  

Its in the IG Report.  They admit it on pp. 132-33: no president had any knowledge of the plots. Its right there in B and W.  And its so devastating that Helms only kept one copy.  That is clearly not what Helms wanted to hear.  But the authors of the report reluctantly came to that conclusion.  

The first exposure of the plots was done by Roselli to Anderson, who printed a very much distorted view of them.  Johnson, like many others, saw this story.  He asked Helms for an accurate report on them.  And that is how we got that report. Which actually traces how the Anderson story was put together, again its right there in B and W. 

If you have other information about this, and if its solidly documented, I would certainly like to see it. And so would everyone else.

 

JD:  Roger:

 

in your last sentence, the first part is accurate.  Alsop did have a very strong part in convincing LBJ to form the Warren Commission, and that is clearly documented by Donald GIbson in his milestone essay in the book The Assassinations.

 

RO: I, and others, have listened to a tape of the Alsop phone call secretly recorded by Johnson.  There's no need for its existence to be "documented" by Gibson or anyone else. 

 

I'm going to assume you accept the idea that the purpose of the WC, as shown by what it did, was not to uncover the truth of what happened but to conceal it.  To cover up the role of the killers and blame someone else.

 

Once Oswald was murdered, eliminating a trial, there was going to have to be an official investigation of the murder.  When did this simple idea get turned into a vehicle for covering up the murder framing Oswald?  And by whom?

 

Was that Alsop's purpose in suggesting the idea to Johnson?  Was he part of the coverup? No?

 

Was does it mean to you that within one week after the murder Johnson announced the WC and named 6 figureheads and Allen Dulles to run it?  And that the WC was staffed by lawyers--and no investigators worthy of the name--to selectively sift through the evidence, and lie about things when necessary, to build a blatantly false case against Oswald? 

 

Doesn't that indicate the idea for an investigation had already been turned into that nefarious a vehicle? Have you read Salandria's indictment of this process in his false mystery speech in '98?

 

The WC was Johnson's creation. Who was responsible for turning it into a vehicle to frame Oswald, if not him?,  That's the important question, not whose idea the WC was in the first place.

 

Though I don't believe it for a minute I could almost accept that the WC was not originally Johnson's idea.  That he was some kind of empty vessel that had to be convinced by Alsop. Almost. 

 

But It's clear to me that just as the murder required a coverup plan to be in place before the shots were fired, essential parts of that coverup were the murder of Oswald before he could talk to a lawyer and the creation of an official investigation to hide what happened and blame Oswald.  The planners must have considered what that investigation would be before themurder.

 

The existence of the Alsop call proves nothing.  We know about it because Johnson wanted us to know. He wanted you to believe creating the commission that framed Oswald was someone else's idea. Similarly, we don't know about some of the other things Johnson said and did that weekend.  Or anything about what Dulles was doing at the CIA hideout in Virginia.

 

JD:  The last part is in all likliehood not true. I think that after the fact LBJ realized what a joke it was to put Dulles on that Commission and he felt the need to blame someone he despised.  

 

RO:  It's certainly false, but not for the reason you offer. Appointing Dulles was not a joke.  It was necessary to conceal the CIA from scrutiny and keep the investigators focused on their job.  Dulles was the only commissioner without a full time job. Claiming the appointment was Bobby's idea was one of the last pathetic ploys of an old man to try to protect his reputation and throw off anyone sniffing around his culpability.

 

Btw,  I have developed some of the points here more fully in the the thread I started, Why LBJ was an essential participant in the plan the murder Kennedy.  I sense you may disagree with at least some of it.  If so, I would appreciate reading your comments.

 

 

 

 

 

[Sandy Larsen]

20 minutes ago, Roger Odisio said:

The WC was Johnson's creation. Who was responsible for turning it into a vehicle to frame Oswald, if not him?,  That's the important question, not whose idea the WC was in the first place.

 

Very early on there was evidence pointing to Oswald as the perp. There was also evidence pointing to Cuba and Russia (as well as Oswald) as the perps.

Johnson didn't want anything to do with the conspiracy angle that would lead to international consequences... like war. After all, Hoover said that the evidence for the conspiracy was far from solid. So Johnson did the easy thing and chose to accept the lone gunman evidence.

Later he would discover that the lone gunman solution wasn't so great after all... because it wasn't correct. Which meant that the FBI and WC had to lie there heads off to make it all work out.

 

[Roger Odisio]

1 hour ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

Very early on there was evidence pointing to Oswald as the perp. There was also evidence pointing to Cuba and Russia (as well as Oswald) as the perps.

Johnson didn't want anything to do with the conspiracy angle that would lead to international consequences... like war. After all, Hoover said that the evidence for the conspiracy was far from solid. So Johnson did the easy thing and chose to accept the lone gunman evidence.

Later he would discover that the lone gunman solution wasn't so great after all... because it wasn't correct. Which meant that the FBI and WC had to lie there heads off to make it all work out.

 

What evidence implicating Oswald are you talking about, Sandy?  They murdered Oswald about 45 hours after the JFKA precisely because they knew they could not prove he did it in court. They couldn't let him talk to a lawyer.  And of course they knew he didn't do it.

Johnson chose to go with the lone nut story because he wanted no part in blaming Cuba or Russia, not because it was somehow the easy choice.  He knew the problems with the lone nut story up front; he didn't discover them later.  His job was to paper over them.

The same question goes for your claim that there was evidence implicating Cubs and Russia.