The WaPo Addresses JFK Records; But Misses a Big Angle

[Benjamin Cole]

The WaPo story is behind paywall. But this link may work: https://archive.ph/0bupd

I have re-posted the Aug. 24 article below in its entirety. 

The WaPo does not mention the Biden Administration's creation of the Transparency Board, nor the MFF lawsuit. 

The article reports, "in June 2023, he (Biden) announced that he had made his 'final certification" on files to be released, transferring his power to disclose documents to U.S. agencies."

Oh, that. Well, OK. That sums it up. See the WaPo motto just below, in original. Is that a warning...or are they bragging? 

Democracy Dies in Darkness

 

Trump vowed to release all remaining JFK files. What could they contain?  

Despite their differences about what they suspect happened on Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas, two prominent researchers agree the remaining files should be released.

 

 

 

By Kyle Melnick

August 24, 2024 at 11:00 p.m. EDT

 

After independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. suspended his campaign and endorsed Donald Trump on Friday, the Republican nominee pledged that if he’s elected to the White House, he will release all the documents related to the 1963 assassination of Kennedy’s uncle.

 

“This is a tribute in honor of Bobby,” Trump said at a Friday evening rally in the Phoenix area. “I will establish a new independent presidential commission on assassination attempts, and they will be tasked with releasing all of the remaining documents pertaining to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.”

 

For decades after the killing, many documents related to the event were withheld from the public, spurring conspiracy theories.

 

The Warren Commission, which was created a week after John F. Kennedy’s death in November 1963, said that gunman Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in Dallas. But others have continued to question whether Oswald worked with Soviet, Cuban or CIA agents. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told a New York radio station last year that he believes the CIA was involved in his uncle’s murder.

 

Congress passed a law more than three decades ago intended to put to rest questions about the assassination by declassifying relevant records, but there remain more than 3,000 documents that still contain redactions, according to the National Archives and Records Administration, leaving some researchers puzzled.

What to know

• When were the documents supposed to be released?
• What documents remain hidden?
• What revelations have been gleaned from documents released in recent years?
• What could we learn from the remaining files?

When were the documents supposed to be released?

 

The President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act of 1992 declared that all the documents about the assassination should be made publicly available by October 2017. However, the law allowed U.S. officials to postpone the release of documents if they thought national security and privacy concerns outweighed the public interest in disclosure.

 

Roughly 320,000 documents were identified and slated to be declassified after the law passed.

 

The law was signed the year after the release of director Oliver Stone’s political thriller “JFK,” a fictional portrayal of a New Orleans district attorney who found evidence of a conspiracy behind Kennedy’s death.

What documents remain hidden?

U.S. officials have cited privacy and national security concerns multiple times for postponing the release of some documents.

 

When he was president in 2017, Trump announced that he planned to publicly disclose the remaining documents but ultimately delayed the release of some files for national security reasons, saying they would be released by October 2021. In 2018, Trump authorized the disclosure of 19,045 documents, many of which contained redactions.

 

In October 2021, President Joe Biden also postponed the planned release of the documents, citing delays prompted by the coronavirus pandemic.

 

“Temporary continued postponement is necessary to protect against identifiable harm to the military defense, intelligence operations, law enforcement, or the conduct of foreign relations that is of such gravity that it outweighs the public interest in immediate disclosure,” Biden said at the time.

Biden released more than 13,000 documents in the following years, but in June 2023, he announced that he had made his “final certification” on files to be released, transferring his power to disclose documents to U.S. agencies.

 

Gerald Posner, who wrote the 1993 Kennedy assassination book “Case Closed,” said he isn’t sure whether Trump will follow through on his promise if he’s elected in November.

“You had an opportunity to do it, you said you were going to do it, and you didn’t do it,” Posner said about Trump. “Now, with the RFK Jr. endorsement, maybe that’s a quid pro quo, and maybe this time he’ll actually do it.”

What revelations have been gleaned from documents released in recent years?

 

Tens of thousands of documents were released between 2018 and last year. The last large batch of released documents came in December 2022, when Biden disclosed 13,173 documents.

 

Jefferson Morley, the editor of the JFK Facts newsletter, said a few revelations have arisen from those releases. The documents showed that some CIA employees didn’t believe Oswald acted alone, Morley said, and a counterintelligence official tried to “wait out” the Warren Commission’s investigation by denying it information about Oswald.

 

Posner, however, said that many of the recently released documents haven’t revealed a smoking gun, and he doubts the remaining documents will either.

 

“Some of the biggest headlines that have been pulled from the JFK files the last four or five years are what I call tabloid stories about stories that were actually old,” Posner said.

Some of the documents released since 2022 shed light on Oswald’s actions in the months before the assassination. One document from June 1962 indicated that Oswald might have been on the CIA’s radar more than a year before Kennedy’s assassination. Another said the CIA intercepted a call Oswald made in October 1963 from Mexico City to the Soviet Embassy there, wanting someone in the building “to send a tele-gram for him to Washington.”

 

 

Last summer, a newly unredacted copy of a document named the CIA employee who intercepted Oswald’s mail before Kennedy’s murder.

What could we learn from the remaining files?

 

Morley and Posner said they believe the remaining documents might show that the CIA was aware of Oswald before the assassination.

Morley said the evidence released so far leads him to suspect Kennedy’s opponents in the CIA might’ve been working with Oswald and the remaining documents could prove or disprove that theory. Posner said he thinks Oswald acted alone and the remaining documents might show the CIA failed to report him to the FBI before the assassination.

A CIA spokesperson told The Washington Post in 2022 that the agency was not withholding information about Oswald or the assassination.

 

“CIA believes all substantive information known to be directly related to Oswald has been released,” the spokesperson said. “The few remaining redactions protect CIA employee names, sources, locations, and CIA tradecraft.”

 

Even if all the Kennedy documents are released, Posner said he doesn’t think the conspiracy theories will end.

“Let’s say it doesn’t add to any evidence of a conspiracy in the case,” Posner said about the unreleased information. “People believing in conspiracy will say, ‘Well, see, there you go. They destroyed the real documents.’”

Despite their differences about what they think happened on Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas’s Dealey Plaza, both Posner and Morley hope to see the records fully released.

“Is there a smoking gun in there? You know, this is not about a smoking gun,” Morley said. “This is about the law that says all of the government’s JFK records should be made public by October 2017. We’re seven years past that blown deadline.”

By Kyle Melnick

Kyle Melnick is a reporter on The Washington Post's General Assignment desk, where he covers national and international news.

Edited August 27 by Benjamin Cole

[Greg Doudna]

Biden transferred his authority to release documents to other agencies.

OK. (Well it’s not, but never mind.)

Trump is promising to transfer responsibility to releasing documents to a commission, and “they will be tasked with releasing” the documents.

OK.

Whats the difference?

How is the one an improvement over the other?

There already are people “tasked with releasing” the documents delegated to do that by the existing president.

[Benjamin Cole]

29 minutes ago, Greg Doudna said:

Biden transferred his authority to release documents to other agencies.

OK. (Well it’s not, but never mind.)

Trump is promising to transfer responsibility to releasing documents to a commission, and “they will be tasked with releasing” the documents.

OK.

Whats the difference?

How is the one an improvement over the other?

There already are people “tasked with releasing” the documents delegated to do that by the existing president.

I agree 100%. 

The President has the authority to release the JFK Records. Do it. 

We are now more than 60 years from the JFKA. 

 

[Bill Fite]

Might actually be at the one point in history when the probability of the docs being released is going up & the person most likely to release may be..... Biden.

What's he got to lose?

[Tom Gram]

58 minutes ago, Benjamin Cole said:

I agree 100%. 

The President has the authority to release the JFK Records. Do it. 

We are now more than 60 years from the JFKA. 

 

Indeed. I could see a new ARRB - type commission being useful in tracking down records that are not already in the ARC, but all the remaining redactions can and should be released with one order from the President.

I’m very skeptical that a Trump commission would prioritize the JFK case or track down any missing records. If it happens, my guess is it’ll be a political freak show with almost zero value to researchers.

It’s kinda interesting that Gerald Posner agrees with Morley that the CIA is hiding information on Oswald. I wonder which redacted records Posner thinks pertain to Oswald… 

As far as I know, all the remaining withheld documents other than the section 10 and 11 stuff are available online with redactions. There are some weird exceptions and edge cases though like illegible pages and documents that were previously sanitized before they were turned over to NARA. I’m going off some correspondence with Robert Reynolds from like two years ago so I could be mistaken on this, but I’m pretty sure the redactions in the CIA HSCA Segregated Microfilm collection are an example of the latter. If I’m remembering correctly, stuff like this is technically released in full but we’ll never know what it says: 

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=55187#relPageId=10

 

[Robert Burrows]

"The Warren Commission, which was created a week after John F. Kennedy’s death in November 1963, said that gunman Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in Dallas."

But no mention of the HSCA, which came to a different conclusion. The Washington Post isn't even suitable for use as toilet paper. 

Edited August 27 by Robert Burrows

[Benjamin Cole]

1 hour ago, Bill Fite said:

Might actually be at the one point in history when the probability of the docs being released is going up & the person most likely to release may be..... Biden.

What's he got to lose?

That's an interesting observation. Biden, of course, served on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, sometimes leading it, forever. 

The Senators on that committee, and even more so the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, always strike me as establishment minions.

If anyone has heard insider scuttlebutt about the JFKA, it would be Biden. 

But...he is a company man, as they say. He ain't telling. 

 

[Benjamin Cole]

4 minutes ago, Robert Burrows said:

"The Warren Commission, which was created a week after John F. Kennedy’s death in November 1963, said that gunman Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in Dallas."

But no mention of the HSCA, which came to a different conclusion. The Washington Post isn't even suitable for use as toilet paper. 

They may have to dig up landfills and remove WaPo copies...it is that toxic. 

[Benjamin Cole]

33 minutes ago, Tom Gram said:

Indeed. I could see a new ARRB - type commission being useful in tracking down records that are not already in the ARC, but all the remaining redactions can and should be released with one order from the President.

I’m very skeptical that a Trump commission would prioritize the JFK case or track down any missing records. If it happens, my guess is it’ll be a political freak show with almost zero value to researchers.

It’s kinda interesting that Gerald Posner agrees with Morley that the CIA is hiding information on Oswald. I wonder which redacted records Posner thinks pertain to Oswald… 

As far as I know, all the remaining withheld documents other than the section 10 and 11 stuff are available online with redactions. There are some weird exceptions and edge cases though like illegible pages and documents that were previously sanitized before they were turned over to NARA. I’m going off some correspondence with Robert Reynolds from like two years ago so I could be mistaken on this, but I’m pretty sure the redactions in the CIA HSCA Segregated Microfilm collection are an example of the latter. If I’m remembering correctly, stuff like this is technically released in full but we’ll never know what it says: 

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=55187#relPageId=10

 

It would take an aggressive and determined Chief Executive, assisted by dedicated JFA researchers and a platoon of dreadnought lawyers, to get this stuff out. 

The President might have to fire a CIA director and others to get the job done. 

The media might spread stories the President was unhinged, and so on. 

Well, the odds are low....

 

[Benjamin Cole]

12 hours ago, Robert Burrows said:

"The Warren Commission, which was created a week after John F. Kennedy’s death in November 1963, said that gunman Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in Dallas."

But no mention of the HSCA, which came to a different conclusion. The Washington Post isn't even suitable for use as toilet paper. 

RB-

BTW, I wanted to tip my hat to you for this observation, and one that slipped by me. 

You are correct, the last official investigation into the JFKA, conducted by the HSCA, concluded there had likely been a second gunman and thus a conspiracy. 

The WaPo does not devote a single sentence to the HSCA finding.

As I recall, a recent similar review by NPR lacked that same very fact.

 

 

 

[David Josephs]

Consider this please

A successful cover-up is a layered affair.  Should the initial story be proven false there's be a 2nd, 3rd, 4th etc story and/or set of evidences which point to yet another false conclusion.

The evidence in this case provided by all the key players describes the conspiracy... over and over and over again.

The autopsy only helps us conclude there was a cover-up ...  the WHO/WHERE/WHAT/HOW is only a result of which rabbit hole you chose to drop into.

Whatever EVIDENCE remains unseen gets elevated to GOLD STANDARD by virtue of it's elusiveness, NOT by the content or its relationship to reality.

Can anyone explain to me why you'd feel that more government files would clarify a picture for which we haven't found a single indication they relate to the actual event?

I use evidence all the time to illustrate the conspiracy..   

Can anyone please point me to a piece of evidence which authentically and reliably illustrates the actual event - which I cannot demonstrably prove to be contrived, planted, or simply created out of thin air?

Other than "JFK was shot" on 11/22, which evidence released to date proves anything more about the event and not the subsequent layers of cover-up.

THX

 

[Benjamin Cole]

10 hours ago, David Josephs said:

Consider this please

A successful cover-up is a layered affair.  Should the initial story be proven false there's be a 2nd, 3rd, 4th etc story and/or set of evidences which point to yet another false conclusion.

The evidence in this case provided by all the key players describes the conspiracy... over and over and over again.

The autopsy only helps us conclude there was a cover-up ...  the WHO/WHERE/WHAT/HOW is only a result of which rabbit hole you chose to drop into.

Whatever EVIDENCE remains unseen gets elevated to GOLD STANDARD by virtue of it's elusiveness, NOT by the content or its relationship to reality.

Can anyone explain to me why you'd feel that more government files would clarify a picture for which we haven't found a single indication they relate to the actual event?

I use evidence all the time to illustrate the conspiracy..   

Can anyone please point me to a piece of evidence which authentically and reliably illustrates the actual event - which I cannot demonstrably prove to be contrived, planted, or simply created out of thin air?

Other than "JFK was shot" on 11/22, which evidence released to date proves anything more about the event and not the subsequent layers of cover-up.

THX

 

DJ-

You are an extraordinary researcher. 

1. All the same, the JFK Records Act is the law, and the Biden Administration is doing an illegal snuff job on the records. 

2. We don't know what we don't know. There may be authentic and verifiable records being snuffed now, that would present a more-clear picture of the JFKA. 

3. While many of us strongly suspect a JFKA conspiracy, the shape of the conspiracy is unclear. Perhaps the snuffed records would help a bit in that regard. 

I agree with you that many documents pertaining to the JFKA are dubious. 

 

[David Josephs]

On 8/29/2024 at 8:34 PM, Benjamin Cole said:

DJ-

You are an extraordinary researcher. 

1. All the same, the JFK Records Act is the law, and the Biden Administration is doing an illegal snuff job on the records. 

2. We don't know what we don't know. There may be authentic and verifiable records being snuffed now, that would present a more-clear picture of the JFKA. 

3. While many of us strongly suspect a JFKA conspiracy, the shape of the conspiracy is unclear. Perhaps the snuffed records would help a bit in that regard. 

I agree with you that many documents pertaining to the JFKA are dubious. 

 

Thanks Ben...  again, just thoughts to consider:

1. By doing so, records which are still not going to tell us much get elevated to a much more important status so the next layer of the "truth" can more easily be accepted.  We're not going to find anything because the assassination was accomplished outside these US institutions from which we are getting these misleading documents.   "No really, this time they're telling the truth"
   Please
2. Oh yes we do Ben... what we don't know is generally referred to in other documents, so that when we try to find the referenced source, it's not "available".  Sorry sunshine, there is no Santa Claus.  There will be ZERO records from our government that will present anything "more clear"
3. Again.. to me, the shape of the Conspiracy is the one and only thing we do see clearly.  Just look at the evidence from Bethesda.

Have we narrowed down who the Knoll shooter(s) were?  How many shots from how many directions?  Seen an unaltered Z film?, or other film or Photo that can match the conclusive evidence from this frame from the MUCHMORE film of not only a frontal shop but the subsequent covering of the avulsed occipital in this and other frames? (below)

Please consider thinking bout it this way...  we're given a box with a photo on the outside and 500 puzzle pieces on the inside yet 475 of those pieces do not match what the outside of the box shows.  Some pieces are blank. And yes, some - a rare few - are glimpses into what actually happened, like the frame below.

It is not possible, in my opinion, to reconstruct the truth with the pieces of the multi-layered cover-up we are given.

Didn't happen with the 50,000 records released since 2017...

FWIW - Do me a favor please.  With the pre 2017 evidence plus '17 thru '22 doc releases... anything there present a more clear picture of those who perpetrated the JFKA versus a more clear picture of the cover-up and conspiracy to cover-up? 

Yes, Veciana was Military, Conein was Military, they were ALL military before, during and after the CIA.  How many ONI or MID files have you seen or think we will ever see...  if they even exist anymore.

Final thought... what is the HISTORY of anything founded upon?  Can you name a single monumental event in our history that has not been shown to involve employing the necessary "propaganda" from which the agreed upon History is now based?  ...only to further learn there are many layers of Propaganda to these events and learning the truth of these events completely depends on who the empirical data, and/or legends comes from.

I highly suggest you read BERNAY's PROPAGANDA written in the mid 1920's.

Propaganda will never die out. Intelligent men must realize that propaganda is the modern instrument by which they can fight for productive ends and help to bring order out of chaos

To avoid such confusion, society consents to have its choice narrowed to ideas and objects brought to its attention through propaganda of all kinds.
      -    Edward Bernays 1925 “Propaganda” final words
 

[Benjamin Cole]

6 hours ago, David Josephs said:

Thanks Ben...  again, just thoughts to consider:

1. By doing so, records which are still not going to tell us much get elevated to a much more important status so the next layer of the "truth" can more easily be accepted.  We're not going to find anything because the assassination was accomplished outside these US institutions from which we are getting these misleading documents.   "No really, this time they're telling the truth"
   Please
2. Oh yes we do Ben... what we don't know is generally referred to in other documents, so that when we try to find the referenced source, it's not "available".  Sorry sunshine, there is no Santa Claus.  There will be ZERO records from our government that will present anything "more clear"
3. Again.. to me, the shape of the Conspiracy is the one and only thing we do see clearly.  Just look at the evidence from Bethesda.

Have we narrowed down who the Knoll shooter(s) were?  How many shots from how many directions?  Seen an unaltered Z film?, or other film or Photo that can match the conclusive evidence from this frame from the MUCHMORE film of not only a frontal shop but the subsequent covering of the avulsed occipital in this and other frames? (below)

Please consider thinking bout it this way...  we're given a box with a photo on the outside and 500 puzzle pieces on the inside yet 475 of those pieces do not match what the outside of the box shows.  Some pieces are blank. And yes, some - a rare few - are glimpses into what actually happened, like the frame below.

It is not possible, in my opinion, to reconstruct the truth with the pieces of the multi-layered cover-up we are given.

Didn't happen with the 50,000 records released since 2017...

FWIW - Do me a favor please.  With the pre 2017 evidence plus '17 thru '22 doc releases... anything there present a more clear picture of those who perpetrated the JFKA versus a more clear picture of the cover-up and conspiracy to cover-up? 

Yes, Veciana was Military, Conein was Military, they were ALL military before, during and after the CIA.  How many ONI or MID files have you seen or think we will ever see...  if they even exist anymore.

Final thought... what is the HISTORY of anything founded upon?  Can you name a single monumental event in our history that has not been shown to involve employing the necessary "propaganda" from which the agreed upon History is now based?  ...only to further learn there are many layers of Propaganda to these events and learning the truth of these events completely depends on who the empirical data, and/or legends comes from.

I highly suggest you read BERNAY's PROPAGANDA written in the mid 1920's.

Propaganda will never die out. Intelligent men must realize that propaganda is the modern instrument by which they can fight for productive ends and help to bring order out of chaos

To avoid such confusion, society consents to have its choice narrowed to ideas and objects brought to its attention through propaganda of all kinds.
      -    Edward Bernays 1925 “Propaganda” final words
 

DJ-

Thanks for your comments.

All the same, I think the JFK Records should be released. 

 

[Roger Odisio]

22 hours ago, David Josephs said:

Thanks Ben...  again, just thoughts to consider:

1. By doing so, records which are still not going to tell us much get elevated to a much more important status so the next layer of the "truth" can more easily be accepted.  We're not going to find anything because the assassination was accomplished outside these US institutions from which we are getting these misleading documents.   "No really, this time they're telling the truth"
   Please
2. Oh yes we do Ben... what we don't know is generally referred to in other documents, so that when we try to find the referenced source, it's not "available".  Sorry sunshine, there is no Santa Claus.  There will be ZERO records from our government that will present anything "more clear"
3. Again.. to me, the shape of the Conspiracy is the one and only thing we do see clearly.  Just look at the evidence from Bethesda.

 

Multilayered coverup is a good description of the situation.

 

I think one way to break the logjam is to concentrate on Oswald's alibi (as Sylvia Meagher suggested decades ago).  Was Oswald on the 6th floor?  Did he shoot anyone?  In his first interrogation the afternoon of the murder Oswald said he was on the first floor and at some point went outside to "watch the p parade".

 

To do this, however, we must break out of the straightjacket that has been imposed, and accepted by too many around here, as to what constitutes relevant sources of information to look for.

 

It's true the JFK Act was written in terms of the release of govt records.  But the politicians who passed the law were smart enough to delegate to the ARRB the job of defining exactly what they were to look for and where to look.

 

After a couple of years of hearings and rulemakings, in the summer of '95, the ARRB settled on the broadest definition possible of "record".  A JFKA record is any information, no matter its form or who possesses it, that is relevant to understanding the murder.   Properly defining record opens up a mountain information mostly ignored in the frantic chase to uncover what the CIA is hiding.

 

What would an enhanced Darnell and Wiegman films show about who was on those steps shortly after the murder?  They are not being hidden by a govt agency, but by a private "media" org whose job it is supposed to be to bring the truth to the public.

 

Not only do I think NBC executives know what the film original shows, but it's likely, for example, that Darnell did too.  That's why when approached by folks from ROKC he refused to talk to them.  Too many difficult questions to answer, too hard to make up sufficient lies. But he died a few years ago while everyone was chasing govt documents.

 

I'd like to see the final report by the French of their March, 1964 investigation into the whereabouts of Jean Rene Souetre.  Fensterwald tried to get it in the 80s but was refused because Soetere was still alive.  He has since died. 

 

I think the newspaper article that instigated the inquiry was a hoax.  I wonder what the French concluded.  They knew Souetre had been involved in plots to shoot DeGaulle. And DeGaulle never believed the Oswald story.

 

In that investigation the FBI said that the CIA had a thick file on Souetre and the CIA admitted to talking to him in the Spring of '63.  Where is that file?  The JFK Act allows for the State Dept to contact the French about the matter.

 

I'd like to see the steno tapes of the interviews the WC did of Vicki Adams and Shelley and Lovelady, all on the same day. NARA says they established a place for them in the Collection, but they're missing.  Even Judge Seeborg apparently is amenable to allowing Bill and Larry to ask for a further search for records alleged to be missing.

 

Written statements were easy to alter.  Not so with the tapes.  It's important to nail down which lie the WR used to discredit Adams' testimony and to expose it as a such.  

 

In isolating Adams so they could discredit her, the WC did not officially interview Dorothy Garner, tho they talked to her and must have known what she said.  Is there anything more from Garner other than what she told Barry Ernest in his book? 

 

This is just a small inkling of the relevant information not currently in the Collection.  My understanding is that Bill and Larry have been compiling such a list to ask for at the proper time in their lawsuit.

 

The point is, chasing after information thought to be hidden by govt agencies may be mostly a diversion. That is particularly clear if David is right that such information is unlikely to exist.  Or if it did, it hasn't survived.

 

The focus of further work needs to be considerably broadened to encompass the actual definition of "record" established by the ARRB.

 

If Oswald's innocence can gain acceptance, that would destroy whatever validity remains of the WR, and should lead to demands to find out what really happened.