CIA warned (who?) that Oswald would be murdered

[Ron Ecker]

On page 23 of Michael Beschloss’s Taking Charge, there is this interesting footnote:

“A CIA memo written that day (11/23/63) reported that Oswald had visited Mexico City in September and talked to a Soviet vice consul whom the CIA knew as a KGB expert in assassination and sabotage. The memo warned that if Oswald had indeed been part of a foreign conspiracy, he might be killed before he could reveal it to U.S. authorities (National Archives).”

It makes sense to me that if the CIA somehow (I can’t imagine how) had foreknowledge of Oswald’s murder, the agency might consider it a good idea to plant the idea beforehand that such a dastardly deed would surely be the work of a “foreign” conspiracy.

This memo, however, seems to have disappeared when the lone nut scenario went into effect. In quoting the Beschloss footnote, Peter Dale Scott observes in Deep Politics III that “To my knowledge, no other researcher has yet discovered this memo.” Which raises the question, why so? Why would Beschloss refer to such an intriguing CIA memo without bothering to tell us who in the CIA wrote it, to whom it was addressed, and if he didn’t want to tell us that, at least tell us where in the National Archives it might be found?

[Lee Forman]

AGENCY INFORMATION

AGENCY : CIA

RECORD NUMBER : 104-10132-10124

RECORDS SERIES : JFK

AGENCY FILE NUMBER : 80T01357A

DOCUMENT INFORMATION

ORIGINATOR : CIA

FROM : BAGLEY, TENNENT, C/SR/CI, CIA

TO : ASSISTANT DDP, CIA

TITLE : CONTACT OF LEE OSWALD WITH A MEMBER OF SOVIET KGB

ASSASSINATION DEPARTMENT.

DATE : 11/23/1963

PAGES : 5

DOCUMENT TYPE : PAPER, TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

SUBJECTS : BEKRENEV, L.; OSWALD-MEXICO; OSWALD AND KGB; KOSTIKOV,

V

CLASSIFICATION : SECRET

RESTRICTIONS : 1B

CURRENT STATUS : OPEN

DATE OF LAST REVIEW : 07/30/1993

COMMENTS : JFK47:F2A 1993.07.30.08:41:05:430060: 1 OF 3

Hey Ron.

Maybe?

- lee

[Ron Ecker]

Lee,

Thanks, that may be it. I'll try to obtain it.

Ron

[John Simkin]

Pete Bagley, mentioned in this document, was chief of the Soviet Division of the CIA. James Angleton became convinced that the CIA had been penetrated by a "mole" working for the KGB. He ordered his assistant, Clare Edward Petty, of the ultra-secret Special Investigation Group (SIG), to carry out a study into the possibility that a Soviet spy existed in the higher levels of the CIA. Petty investigated Pete Bagley and his report ran to over 250 pages. Petty concluded that he was a "good candidate for the mole". Angleton disagreed and insisted that his friend was a loyal CIA officer. It was at this stage that Petty began to suspect that Angleton was himself a Soviet agent.

[Pat Speer]

Pete Bagley, mentioned in this document, was chief of the Soviet Division of the CIA. James Angleton became convinced that the CIA had been penetrated by a "mole" working for the KGB. He ordered his assistant, Clare Edward Petty, of the ultra-secret Special Investigation Group (SIG), to carry out a study into the possibility that a Soviet spy existed in the higher levels of the CIA. Petty investigated Pete Bagley and his report ran to over 250 pages. Petty concluded that he was a "good candidate for the mole". Angleton disagreed and insisted that his friend was a loyal CIA officer. It was at this stage that Petty began to suspect that Angleton was himself a Soviet agent.

It was Bagley, was it not, who refused to give Nosenko his bona fides. This allowed Angleton to live in his delusion that Golitsyn was the end-all. So of course Angleton defended him. Petty sounds even more paranoid than Angleton...