David Talbot's New Book Brothers

[Cliff Varnell]

Can you recommend some specific sources on a Mormon/gov't alliance Harry?

Other than google that is.

Myra,

Haven't read it, but sounds interesting, fwiw...

http://www.utlm.org/booklist/titles/mormon...hecia_ub047.htm

[William Kelly]

The "new" CIA is reviving one of its oldest dirty tricks with this Bobby Kennedy smear. And yes, consider the sources-- Kissinger and Helms. I explain the genesis of this attack on RFK in my book. I just blogged about it in Salon. Here's part of what I wrote:

The CIA's new honesty is also far from complete. There is nothing in the family jewels about agency officials long suspected by congressional investigators and researchers of ties to the Kennedy assassination, including deceased agents such as William Harvey, David Phillips, David Morales and George Joannides. The agency continues to keep these records under wraps, in brazen defiance of the law.

In fact, the agency could not help taking another whack at the Kennedys with the release of its family jewels. Press reports about the declassified CIA secrets laid the blame for the assassination efforts against Fidel Castro directly on then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy. What's the original source for this anti-Kennedy smear? None other than Richard Helms, the No. 2 man at the CIA during the Kennedy presidency and a bitter enemy of the two brothers.........

.....Spreading poisonous disinformation about the Kennedys has long been one of the CIA's oldest family jewels. Helms' loyal aide Sam Halpern was a master at disseminating these lies to the press for years. But don't expect the agency to come clean about this any time soon.

PS The fact that media is once again falling for this old lie -- including NPR's Daniel Schorr, the blithering idiot Chris Matthews, CNN etc -- once again shows how deeply misinformed the press is about this hugely important chapter in our history. I can't tell you how fed up I am with my profession.

http://www.salon.com/books/authors/talbot/about/blog.html

The whole Kissinger/Helms story that RFK was behind plots to kill Castro was new to me when it recently made news, but then I just read the same story (Intelligence Wars, NYRB, 2004) in a Thomas Powers New York Review of Books from February 4, 1999.

"'Helms said all these stories are just the tip of the iceberg,' Kissinger said, as recorded by Scowcroft during the meeting with Ford. 'If they come out, blood will flow. For example, Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro.'"

"The friends and defenders of the Kennedy brothers say it isn't so; but there it is on paper, written down in the heat of government crisis, the words of a man in a position to know, recorded on the day, perhaps even within the very hour, they were uttered."

"Holland and Hersh, still on the case, also learned recently the name of the CIA intelligence officer named to serve as liaison with the attorney general during the year in which he continually pressed the CIA for results in getting rid of Castro - a career intelligence officer, now dead, named Charles Ford."

"According to Ford's office-mate Sam Halpern, a CIA officer also assigned to Task Force W in the agency's effort to get rid of Castro, Ford traveled hither and yon about the country on Robert Kennedy's business, but there public knowlege comes to an end. Hersh's book The Dark Side of Camelot, published in 1998, includes some addiional ancillary detail. Whether still-classified CIA files can fill out the story of Ford's work for Bobby remains unknown but it's likely, just as it is likely no one will be given free range of the files until many, many additional years have passed, if then."

CHARLES FORD. OKAY, LETS CHECK OUT WHAT CIA FILES HAVE ON CHUCK FORD.

FIRST A RECORD FROM 1945 OF OSS AGENTS GOING TO CHINA, INCLUDING FORD AND DEMOHRENSCHILDT'S FRIEND AND CIA DOMESTIC CONTACTS DIVISION DEBRIEFER J. WALTON MOORE! THERE ARE TWO CHARLES FORDS HOWEVER, CHARLES E. AND CHARLES D. BUT I THINK WE HAVE THE RIGHT GUY.

http://www.nara.gov/cgi-bin/starfinder/29254/jfksnew.txt

AGENCY INFORMATION

AGENCY : CIA

RECORD NUMBER : 104-10124-10342

RECORDS SERIES : JFK

AGENCY FILE NUMBER : 80T01357A

DOCUMENT INFORMATION

ORIGINATOR : CIA

FROM : FORD, CHARLES E., OSS

TO : SECURITY OFFICE, OSS

TITLE : OVERSEAS SECURITY APPROVAL [listING OF MEN LEAVING FOR

KUNMING, CHINA, INCLUDING J. WALTON MOORE].

DATE : 04/18/1945

PAGES : 1

DOCUMENT TYPE : PAPER - TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

SUBJECTS : CIA FILES; KUNMING, CHINA; MOORE, J. WALTO; TRAVEL

ORDERS

CLASSIFICATION :

RESTRICTIONS : 1A

DATE OF LAST REVIEW : 04/22/1994

COMMENTS : JFK44 : F20 : 1994.04.22.09:35:01:500007 :\

http://www.archives.gov/research/jfk/findi.../cia-files.html

Then in Box 3: after F1 - Ted Shackley, F2 William M., F3 James Angleon, F4 Win Scott, F5- Special Activties TSD John Patrice Lumumba, there's JFK-M-03 (F6) Charles Ford/RFK/Mafia.

Two other NARA JFK record RIFFS link Charles Ford to Rocky Siscalino and a guy named Fiscalini (NFN).

I'm sure Mad Max and Black Slyde Hersh have already been through these boxes and records, but there might be something there they didn't like.

If that's a Oswald/DeMorn/Moore/Ford/RFK connection, it's less than six degrees of separation.

BK

CORRECTION: Samuel Halpern RIP March 7, 2005. See: OSS Newsletter.

Also, Charles Ford has passed as well, but I did find an interesting bio:

http://webscript.princeton.edu/~paw/memori...lay.php?id=5923

Princeton Alumni Weekly Memorials > Charles Donald Ford '43 DON DIED May 20, 1990, at the age of 69, following a fourmonth bout with cancer. Born in Atlantic City, N.J., he graduated from the local high school and entered Princeton with the Class in 1939. While on campus, Don became a member of Campus Club, a member of the fencing team, and played trumpet both in the marching band and and with a group composed of students and "townies."

During WWII, Don, who had been studying Chinese, entered the Naval Intelligence Language School to take up Japanese before he completed his senior year. He later switched to Army Intelligence. After die war, he returned to Princeton and obtained his degree in 1948, in politics. Don's interest in military intelligence led him to a job with the C.I.A. as a civilian career. He served in the C.I.A. until 1976, when he retired to San Jose, Calif.

In 1948, he married Martha, who survives, as do a daughter, Kathleen; and a granddaughter, Christie. His college roommate of threeplus years, Dr. Jim Mason, remembers Don as a man who was an active, alive, takecharge type of person with a quick wit and wonderful sense of humor. To all his family, we offer our most sincere condolences.

The Class of 1943

PAW October 24th, 1990

Got you on the Scowlcroft connection Harry.

Is anybody following me down this ally?

Atlantic City, my backyard. I wonder if he was pals with John Martino?

BK

Edited July 9, 2007 by William Kelly

[Dawn Meredith]

[quote name='Tim Gratz' date='Jul 6 2007, 11:30 AM' post='109041']

Dawn wrote:

"I won't even read Ultimate Sacrifice for this reason and this type of disinformation ruined Joan Mellen's book for me. "

There are definite risks involved in reading a book with which you disagree. You might even change your pre-conceived opinions!

Dawn also wrote:

"CIA disinformation that Op Mockingbird will be happy to peddle."

Well, there is no question that Lamar Waldron is a card-carrying member of Operation Mockingbird. (I've seen his card!)

Why, why--any author who disagrees that the Garrison gospel that the CIA did it must be a Mockingbird member! But wait--I thought Walter Sheridan was reporting to RFK, not to Richard Helms! Oh, I am so confused!

I wil bite this ONE TIME only Tim. It's not my place to argue with your wacco logic. RCD does that and is the best.

While I do not know exactly WHO killed Kennedy: Good guesses tell me a combination of CIA rogues (Morales, Angleton, Philips together with high ups in the military (people so secret we don't even know who they are) and LBJ saw to it that the murder would happen, and the coverup be in place.

Any one or book which argues that the CIA's TWO FALSE SPONSERS: Castro or the Mob as being the killers is not anything I ininterested in reading. You can criticise me all you like. (As if I'd bloody well care). You are the one with the pet theory (Castro) not me. I say up front I don't kow who did it, but I do know who did not do it: Castro or the Mob.

Say goodnight Gracie.

Dawn

[Dawn Meredith]

[quote name='Tim Gratz' date='Jul 6 2007, 11:30 AM' post='109041']

Dawn wrote:

"I won't even read Ultimate Sacrifice for this reason and this type of disinformation ruined Joan Mellen's book for me. "

There are definite risks involved in reading a book with which you disagree. You might even change your pre-conceived opinions!

Dawn also wrote:

"CIA disinformation that Op Mockingbird will be happy to peddle."

Well, there is no question that Lamar Waldron is a card-carrying member of Operation Mockingbird. (I've seen his card!)

Why, why--any author who disagrees that the Garrison gospel that the CIA did it must be a Mockingbird member! But wait--I thought Walter Sheridan was reporting to RFK, not to Richard Helms! Oh, I am so confused!

I wil bite this ONE TIME only Tim. It's not my place to argue with your wacco logic. RCD does that and is the best.

While I do not know exactly WHO killed Kennedy: Good guesses tell me a combination of CIA rogues (Morales, Angleton, Philips together with high ups in the military (people so secret we don't even know who they are) and LBJ saw to it that the murder would happen, and the coverup be in place.

Any one or book which argues that the CIA's TWO FALSE SPONSERS: Castro or the Mob as being the killers is not anything I ininterested in reading. You can criticise me all you like. (As if I'd bloody well care). You are the one with the pet theory (Castro) not me. I say up front I don't kow who did it, but I do know who did not do it: Castro or the Mob.

Say goodnight Gracie.

Dawn

[Harry J.Dean]

The "new" CIA is reviving one of its oldest dirty tricks with this Bobby Kennedy smear. And yes, consider the sources-- Kissinger and Helms. I explain the genesis of this attack on RFK in my book. I just blogged about it in Salon. Here's part of what I wrote:

The CIA's new honesty is also far from complete. There is nothing in the family jewels about agency officials long suspected by congressional investigators and researchers of ties to the Kennedy assassination, including deceased agents such as William Harvey, David Phillips, David Morales and George Joannides. The agency continues to keep these records under wraps, in brazen defiance of the law.

In fact, the agency could not help taking another whack at the Kennedys with the release of its family jewels. Press reports about the declassified CIA secrets laid the blame for the assassination efforts against Fidel Castro directly on then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy. What's the original source for this anti-Kennedy smear? None other than Richard Helms, the No. 2 man at the CIA during the Kennedy presidency and a bitter enemy of the two brothers.

Helms, desperately trying to head off congressional investigations into CIA abuses in the post-Watergate period, warned that he would drag RFK -- by then conveniently dead -- into the Castro controversy. By doing this, the wily Helms was clearly trying to intimidate the Democratic-controlled Congress. At a lunch meeting in January 1975, Helms told his friend Secretary of State Henry Kissinger that "Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro" -- confident that Kissinger would spread this around Washington, as he quickly did. Helms knew his accusation against RFK was a lie, and when later pressed by the Church Committee to provide proof, he could not, admitting that the CIA had misled Bobby about its plots. In truth, RFK was appalled when he learned that the agency was collaborating with the Mafia to kill Castro -- and Kennedy believed that he shut down this sinister operation. But he did not succeed -- the CIA continued to conspire against Castro for years after the Kennedys were removed from power.

Spreading poisonous disinformation about the Kennedys has long been one of the CIA's oldest family jewels. Helms' loyal aide Sam Halpern was a master at disseminating these lies to the press for years. But don't expect the agency to come clean about this any time soon.

PS The fact that media is once again falling for this old lie -- including NPR's Daniel Schorr, the blithering idiot Chris Matthews, CNN etc -- once again shows how deeply misinformed the press is about this hugely important chapter in our history. I can't tell you how fed up I am with my profession.

http://www.salon.com/books/authors/talbot/about/blog.html

The whole Kissinger/Helms story that RFK was behind plots to kill Castro was new to me when it recently made news, but then I just read the same story (Intelligence Wars, NYRB, 2004) in a Thomas Powers New York Review of Books from February 4, 1999.

Thomas Powers, who of Oswald, in the chapter called The Mind of the Assassin, after reviewing most of his intelligence related activities, writes, "Oswald's Tale brings us right up to the pinch-lipped misery and sour odor of the man. He borught pain to many and happiness to none. Anger is what this makes me feel. It was an insect that brought Kennedy down. Would to God he had popped first beneath somebody's foot."

Powers then joins forces with Mad Max Holland and Dark Slyd Hersh, not in a search for the truth, but to step on Bobby the Bug, whose been dead eight years when, as Powers says, these words were "written down in the heat of a government crisis, the words of a man [Henry Kiss] in a position to know [bK: and known to lie], recorded on the day, perhaps even within the hour, they were uttered."

As Powers puts it (p.372-373), "...The secrets a the heart of secrets are rarely confided to official paper or the appropriate files. The deepest secrets of all have nothing to do with the burn time of ballistic missiles, the configuration of fissionable material in nuclear weapons, or other technical matters, but rather with what presidents want. Those are what ancient Chinese writer about war and statecraft Sun-tzu called 'mouth-to-mouth" matters."

"One such surfaced recently when the Assassinations Records Review Board released a two-page 'Memorandum of Conversation' from Gerald Ford Presidential Library recording some comments of Henry Kissinger on January 4, 1975, during a discussion of news stories by Seymour Hersh claiming extensive wrongdoing by the CIA."

"According to Max Holland, who is writing a book about the Warren Commission, Kissinger, then serving as both Ford's secretary of state and his national security advisor, had sought a blanket denial from the agency but had been infromed by William Colby that some major secrets remain hidden. A former director, Richard Helms, was summoned back to Washington from his post as Amabassador to Iran to fill in the details for Kissinger at a breakfast meeting shrotly before Kissinger met in the White House with President Ford and Brent Scowcroft, who was taking notes."

"'Helms said all these stories are just the tip of the iceberg,' Kissinger said, as recorded by Scowcroft during the meeting with Ford. 'If they come out, blood will flow. For example, Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro.'"

"The friends and defenders of the Kennedy brothers say it isn't so; but there it is on paper, written down in the heat of government crisis, the words of a man in a position to know, recorded on the day, perhaps even within the very hour, they were uttered."

"Holland and Hersh, still on the case, also learned recently the name of the CIA intelligence officer named to serve as liaison with the attorney general during the year in which he continually pressed the CIA for results in getting rid of Castro - a career intelligence officer, now dead, named Charles Ford."

"According to Ford's office-mate Sam Halpern, a CIA officfer also assigned to Task Force W in the agency's effort to get rid of Castro, Ford traveled hither and yon about the country on Robert Kennedy's business, but there public knowlege comes to an end. Hersh's book The Dark Side of Camelot, published in 1998, includes some addiional ancillary detail. Whether still-classified CIA files can fill out the story of Ford's work for Bobby remains unknown but it's likely, just as it is likely no one will be given free range of the files until many, many additional years have passed, if then."

"Think of the CIA's files as the nation's unconscious. There you may find the evidence, like the gouges on rock where a glacer has passed, of what American leaders really thought, really wanted, and really did - important clues to who we are as a people. Does this eternal battle over access to the files make sense when few still care what happened at the Bay of Pigs? Does it matter whether we are permitted to haul up the last piece of paper to the light of day before letting it rest? There is no right anwer, just personal preferences: some would rather know, and some would rather not."

"[Mad Max] Holland and [Dark Slyd] Hersh, still on the case....." are undobutedly sill chasing down Charles Ford and what he was doing for "Bobby" traveling "hither and yon," the office-mate to Sam Halpern, the sill-alive CIA officer also assigned to Task Force W., who also hates Kennedy.

Now that Bugliosi is fizzling out, I'm sure we will soon receive a barage of broadsides from the likes of Powers, Holland and Hersh.

BK

The note writing, record keeping General Brent Scowcroft served directly under

presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush Sr. and now with Bush Jr.

Scowcroft is only one of several thousands of Mormons imbeded within influencial

positions of U.S. Government Administrations.

It is urgent, that JFK Researchers expose such powerful socio/religious/politico

combinations!

Harry

*********************************************************************

"Scowcroft is only one of several thousands of Mormons imbeded within influencial

positions of U.S. Government Administrations.

It is urgent, that JFK Researchers expose such powerful socio/religious/politico

combinations!"

How are you, Harry? And, so right you are!

Is it safe to lump the John Birchers' in with them, or am I just whistling down a well?

Plus, isn't obvious how the theory of "Separation of Church and State" never seemed to pertain to these privileged

classes, who in reality never amounted to anything more than a bunch of holy-rollers? Talk about Islamic fundamentalists,

these Christian guys are just as deadly.

Hi, Terry

Am in great shape as always, how are you doing?

Cant say whats safe, but the Birch Society 'is' lumped in with 'them' politically wise as an invention of, and subversive political extention by 'them'.

{see Forum Index re; Harry J.Dean}

Until later,always nice to talk with you Terry.

Harry

[William Kelly]

The "new" CIA is reviving one of its oldest dirty tricks with this Bobby Kennedy smear. And yes, consider the sources-- Kissinger and Helms. I explain the genesis of this attack on RFK in my book. I just blogged about it in Salon. Here's part of what I wrote:

The CIA's new honesty is also far from complete. There is nothing in the family jewels about agency officials long suspected by congressional investigators and researchers of ties to the Kennedy assassination, including deceased agents such as William Harvey, David Phillips, David Morales and George Joannides. The agency continues to keep these records under wraps, in brazen defiance of the law.

In fact, the agency could not help taking another whack at the Kennedys with the release of its family jewels. Press reports about the declassified CIA secrets laid the blame for the assassination efforts against Fidel Castro directly on then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy. What's the original source for this anti-Kennedy smear? None other than Richard Helms, the No. 2 man at the CIA during the Kennedy presidency and a bitter enemy of the two brothers.

Helms, desperately trying to head off congressional investigations into CIA abuses in the post-Watergate period, warned that he would drag RFK -- by then conveniently dead -- into the Castro controversy. By doing this, the wily Helms was clearly trying to intimidate the Democratic-controlled Congress. At a lunch meeting in January 1975, Helms told his friend Secretary of State Henry Kissinger that "Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro" -- confident that Kissinger would spread this around Washington, as he quickly did. Helms knew his accusation against RFK was a lie, and when later pressed by the Church Committee to provide proof, he could not, admitting that the CIA had misled Bobby about its plots. In truth, RFK was appalled when he learned that the agency was collaborating with the Mafia to kill Castro -- and Kennedy believed that he shut down this sinister operation. But he did not succeed -- the CIA continued to conspire against Castro for years after the Kennedys were removed from power.

Spreading poisonous disinformation about the Kennedys has long been one of the CIA's oldest family jewels. Helms' loyal aide Sam Halpern was a master at disseminating these lies to the press for years. But don't expect the agency to come clean about this any time soon.

PS The fact that media is once again falling for this old lie -- including NPR's Daniel Schorr, the blithering idiot Chris Matthews, CNN etc -- once again shows how deeply misinformed the press is about this hugely important chapter in our history. I can't tell you how fed up I am with my profession.

http://www.salon.com/books/authors/talbot/about/blog.html

This posted thread is approaching a mile marker milestone. 12,000 views. That's pretty remarkable.

Is this the most visited thread on the forum, or is there another or others, besides the Forum Survey and Index?

I'd also like to bring this around to the topic of Brothers again, and see if David Talbot will return to fill us in on how goes the Media Wars, and answer some more questions.

Thanks,

BK

Edited July 11, 2007 by William Kelly

[John Simkin]

This posted thread is approaching a mile marker milestone. 12,000 views. That's pretty remarkable.

The discussion about the first edition of Someone Would Have Talked has reached 21,625 page views:

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=693

[William Kelly]

This posted thread is approaching a mile marker milestone. 12,000 views. That's pretty remarkable.

The discussion about the first edition of Someone Would Have Talked has reached 21,625 page views:

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=693

Thanks John,

We're lucky to have both authors answer quesitons on the forum.

BK

[Jim Glover]

It is urgent, that JFK Researchers expose such powerful socio/religious/politico

combinations!"[/color]

How are you, Harry? And, so right you are!

Is it safe to lump the John Birchers' in with them, or am I just whistling down a well?

Plus, isn't obvious how the theory of "Separation of Church and State" never seemed to pertain to these privileged

classes, who in reality never amounted to anything more than a bunch of holy-rollers? Talk about Islamic fundamentalists,

these Christian guys are just as deadly.

Hi, Terry

Am in great shape as always, how are you doing?

Cant say whats safe, but the Birch Society 'is' lumped in with 'them' politically wise as an invention of, and subversive political extention by 'them'.

{see Forum Index re; Harry J.Dean}

Until later,always nice to talk with you Terry.

Harry

Hi Harry,

Maybe you or someone can help me out.

I remember seeing somewhere or reading about some religious material found by the 6th floor spinpers nest.

Is it just my imagination again?

Now i just found out there is an oswald rifle for eachh of the 3 Oswalds...same serial numbers but different rifles...

and you thought the "Shell Game" was far out!

back to the revolution,

Jim

[William Kelly]

The "new" CIA is reviving one of its oldest dirty tricks with this Bobby Kennedy smear. And yes, consider the sources-- Kissinger and Helms. I explain the genesis of this attack on RFK in my book. I just blogged about it in Salon. Here's part of what I wrote:

The CIA's new honesty is also far from complete. There is nothing in the family jewels about agency officials long suspected by congressional investigators and researchers of ties to the Kennedy assassination, including deceased agents such as William Harvey, David Phillips, David Morales and George Joannides. The agency continues to keep these records under wraps, in brazen defiance of the law.

In fact, the agency could not help taking another whack at the Kennedys with the release of its family jewels. Press reports about the declassified CIA secrets laid the blame for the assassination efforts against Fidel Castro directly on then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy. What's the original source for this anti-Kennedy smear? None other than Richard Helms, the No. 2 man at the CIA during the Kennedy presidency and a bitter enemy of the two brothers.

Helms, desperately trying to head off congressional investigations into CIA abuses in the post-Watergate period, warned that he would drag RFK -- by then conveniently dead -- into the Castro controversy. By doing this, the wily Helms was clearly trying to intimidate the Democratic-controlled Congress. At a lunch meeting in January 1975, Helms told his friend Secretary of State Henry Kissinger that "Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro" -- confident that Kissinger would spread this around Washington, as he quickly did. Helms knew his accusation against RFK was a lie, and when later pressed by the Church Committee to provide proof, he could not, admitting that the CIA had misled Bobby about its plots. In truth, RFK was appalled when he learned that the agency was collaborating with the Mafia to kill Castro -- and Kennedy believed that he shut down this sinister operation. But he did not succeed -- the CIA continued to conspire against Castro for years after the Kennedys were removed from power.

Spreading poisonous disinformation about the Kennedys has long been one of the CIA's oldest family jewels. Helms' loyal aide Sam Halpern was a master at disseminating these lies to the press for years. But don't expect the agency to come clean about this any time soon.

PS The fact that media is once again falling for this old lie -- including NPR's Daniel Schorr, the blithering idiot Chris Matthews, CNN etc -- once again shows how deeply misinformed the press is about this hugely important chapter in our history. I can't tell you how fed up I am with my profession.

http://www.salon.com/books/authors/talbot/about/blog.html

This posted thread is approaching a mile marker milestone. 12,000 views. That's pretty remarkable.

Is this the most visited thread on the forum, or is there another or others, besides the Forum Survey and Index?

I'd also like to bring this around to the topic of Brothers again, and see if David Talbot will return to fill us in on how goes the Media Wars, and answer some more questions.

Thanks,

BK

Now that David has checked back in, I'd like to ask him if he read the thread on Charles D. Ford and if encountered C.D. Ford in the course of his research?

Thanks,

Bill Kelly

[Robin Finn]

Question for David.Did you know of Phillips' contact with Ben Bradlee before you interviewed Bradlee for your book?

Edited July 14, 2007 by Robin Finn

[John Simkin]

Question for David.Did you know of Phillips' contact with Ben Bradlee before you interviewd Bradlee for your book?

David Leigh is now the top investigative journalist with the Guardian. He has been the main person behind the exposure of the BAE scandal. I used to teach his son and have his contact details.

[William Kelly]

Question for David.Did you know of Phillips' contact with Ben Bradlee before you interviewd Bradlee for your book?

David Leigh is now the top investigative journalist with the Guardian. He has been the main person behind the exposure of the BAE scandal. I used to teach his son and have his contact details.

From what I remember, David Leigh was with Tony Summers when he tracked down Vecina's secretary and Virginia Prewett, the NANA reporter who knew Veciana and both David Atlee Phillips and "Maurice Bishop."

Like Phillips, I think Prewett has since died of cancer.

It would be interesting to learn David Leigh's take on that scene.

And if David Talbot knew of Ben Bradlee's assigning Leigh to the story and why there never was a story published?

Bill Kelly

Edited July 14, 2007 by William Kelly

[Terry Mauro]

The "new" CIA is reviving one of its oldest dirty tricks with this Bobby Kennedy smear. And yes, consider the sources-- Kissinger and Helms. I explain the genesis of this attack on RFK in my book. I just blogged about it in Salon. Here's part of what I wrote:

The CIA's new honesty is also far from complete. There is nothing in the family jewels about agency officials long suspected by congressional investigators and researchers of ties to the Kennedy assassination, including deceased agents such as William Harvey, David Phillips, David Morales and George Joannides. The agency continues to keep these records under wraps, in brazen defiance of the law.

In fact, the agency could not help taking another whack at the Kennedys with the release of its family jewels. Press reports about the declassified CIA secrets laid the blame for the assassination efforts against Fidel Castro directly on then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy. What's the original source for this anti-Kennedy smear? None other than Richard Helms, the No. 2 man at the CIA during the Kennedy presidency and a bitter enemy of the two brothers.

Helms, desperately trying to head off congressional investigations into CIA abuses in the post-Watergate period, warned that he would drag RFK -- by then conveniently dead -- into the Castro controversy. By doing this, the wily Helms was clearly trying to intimidate the Democratic-controlled Congress. At a lunch meeting in January 1975, Helms told his friend Secretary of State Henry Kissinger that "Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro" -- confident that Kissinger would spread this around Washington, as he quickly did. Helms knew his accusation against RFK was a lie, and when later pressed by the Church Committee to provide proof, he could not, admitting that the CIA had misled Bobby about its plots. In truth, RFK was appalled when he learned that the agency was collaborating with the Mafia to kill Castro -- and Kennedy believed that he shut down this sinister operation. But he did not succeed -- the CIA continued to conspire against Castro for years after the Kennedys were removed from power.

Spreading poisonous disinformation about the Kennedys has long been one of the CIA's oldest family jewels. Helms' loyal aide Sam Halpern was a master at disseminating these lies to the press for years. But don't expect the agency to come clean about this any time soon.

PS The fact that media is once again falling for this old lie -- including NPR's Daniel Schorr, the blithering idiot Chris Matthews, CNN etc -- once again shows how deeply misinformed the press is about this hugely important chapter in our history. I can't tell you how fed up I am with my profession.

http://www.salon.com/books/authors/talbot/about/blog.html

The whole Kissinger/Helms story that RFK was behind plots to kill Castro was new to me when it recently made news, but then I just read the same story (Intelligence Wars, NYRB, 2004) in a Thomas Powers New York Review of Books from February 4, 1999.

Thomas Powers, who of Oswald, in the chapter called The Mind of the Assassin, after reviewing most of his intelligence related activities, writes, "Oswald's Tale brings us right up to the pinch-lipped misery and sour odor of the man. He borught pain to many and happiness to none. Anger is what this makes me feel. It was an insect that brought Kennedy down. Would to God he had popped first beneath somebody's foot."

Powers then joins forces with Mad Max Holland and Dark Slyd Hersh, not in a search for the truth, but to step on Bobby the Bug, whose been dead eight years when, as Powers says, these words were "written down in the heat of a government crisis, the words of a man [Henry Kiss] in a position to know [bK: and known to lie], recorded on the day, perhaps even within the hour, they were uttered."

As Powers puts it (p.372-373), "...The secrets a the heart of secrets are rarely confided to official paper or the appropriate files. The deepest secrets of all have nothing to do with the burn time of ballistic missiles, the configuration of fissionable material in nuclear weapons, or other technical matters, but rather with what presidents want. Those are what ancient Chinese writer about war and statecraft Sun-tzu called 'mouth-to-mouth" matters."

"One such surfaced recently when the Assassinations Records Review Board released a two-page 'Memorandum of Conversation' from Gerald Ford Presidential Library recording some comments of Henry Kissinger on January 4, 1975, during a discussion of news stories by Seymour Hersh claiming extensive wrongdoing by the CIA."

"According to Max Holland, who is writing a book about the Warren Commission, Kissinger, then serving as both Ford's secretary of state and his national security advisor, had sought a blanket denial from the agency but had been infromed by William Colby that some major secrets remain hidden. A former director, Richard Helms, was summoned back to Washington from his post as Amabassador to Iran to fill in the details for Kissinger at a breakfast meeting shrotly before Kissinger met in the White House with President Ford and Brent Scowcroft, who was taking notes."

"'Helms said all these stories are just the tip of the iceberg,' Kissinger said, as recorded by Scowcroft during the meeting with Ford. 'If they come out, blood will flow. For example, Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro.'"

"The friends and defenders of the Kennedy brothers say it isn't so; but there it is on paper, written down in the heat of government crisis, the words of a man in a position to know, recorded on the day, perhaps even within the very hour, they were uttered."

"Holland and Hersh, still on the case, also learned recently the name of the CIA intelligence officer named to serve as liaison with the attorney general during the year in which he continually pressed the CIA for results in getting rid of Castro - a career intelligence officer, now dead, named Charles Ford."

"According to Ford's office-mate Sam Halpern, a CIA officfer also assigned to Task Force W in the agency's effort to get rid of Castro, Ford traveled hither and yon about the country on Robert Kennedy's business, but there public knowlege comes to an end. Hersh's book The Dark Side of Camelot, published in 1998, includes some addiional ancillary detail. Whether still-classified CIA files can fill out the story of Ford's work for Bobby remains unknown but it's likely, just as it is likely no one will be given free range of the files until many, many additional years have passed, if then."

"Think of the CIA's files as the nation's unconscious. There you may find the evidence, like the gouges on rock where a glacer has passed, of what American leaders really thought, really wanted, and really did - important clues to who we are as a people. Does this eternal battle over access to the files make sense when few still care what happened at the Bay of Pigs? Does it matter whether we are permitted to haul up the last piece of paper to the light of day before letting it rest? There is no right anwer, just personal preferences: some would rather know, and some would rather not."

"[Mad Max] Holland and [Dark Slyd] Hersh, still on the case....." are undobutedly sill chasing down Charles Ford and what he was doing for "Bobby" traveling "hither and yon," the office-mate to Sam Halpern, the sill-alive CIA officer also assigned to Task Force W., who also hates Kennedy.

Now that Bugliosi is fizzling out, I'm sure we will soon receive a barage of broadsides from the likes of Powers, Holland and Hersh.

BK

The note writing, record keeping General Brent Scowcroft served directly under

presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush Sr. and now with Bush Jr.

Scowcroft is only one of several thousands of Mormons imbeded within influencial

positions of U.S. Government Administrations.

It is urgent, that JFK Researchers expose such powerful socio/religious/politico

combinations!

Harry

*********************************************************************

"Scowcroft is only one of several thousands of Mormons imbeded within influencial

positions of U.S. Government Administrations.

It is urgent, that JFK Researchers expose such powerful socio/religious/politico

combinations!"

How are you, Harry? And, so right you are!

Is it safe to lump the John Birchers' in with them, or am I just whistling down a well?

Plus, isn't obvious how the theory of "Separation of Church and State" never seemed to pertain to these privileged

classes, who in reality never amounted to anything more than a bunch of holy-rollers? Talk about Islamic fundamentalists,

these Christian guys are just as deadly.

Hi, Terry

Am in great shape as always, how are you doing?

Cant say whats safe, but the Birch Society 'is' lumped in with 'them' politically wise as an invention of, and subversive political extention by 'them'.

{see Forum Index re; Harry J.Dean}

Until later,always nice to talk with you Terry.

Harry

*********************************************************************

Hey Harry,

Are you anywhere out here, by me?

Please contact me: tmauro@pacbell.net

If it's conducive with you, I'd like to hook up, if you might possibly have some time in the near future?

Ter

[Terry Mauro]

Duplicate post deleted by T. Mauro on 7-14-07 at 11:11 PDT

Edited July 14, 2007 by Terry Mauro