Fatal Decision, Preplanning for the Dallas Trip

[Jim Root]

As I understand it the decision to make a November trip to Dallas was made at a meeting attended by President Kennedy, Vice President Johnson and Governor Connally on June 5, 1963. The meeting took place at the Cortez Hotel in El Paso, Texas. Earlier that day the President had given a speech at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs and flew to El Paso to discuss the Texas trip and other matters with the Vice President and the governor.

I have been led to believe that the date set was vague calling for the visit to be in "late November 1963" but did include Dallas as well as Fort Worth, San Antonio and Houston. I have read that sometime in September the visit was extended and would run from the afternoon of November 21 until the evening of November 22 suggesting that either the November 22 date or the November 21 date had already been decided, perhaps at the meeting of June 5, 1963.

Does anyone have more detail on this meeting? Who else may have attended? Was an actual date decided at the Cortez Hotel in El Paso, Texas on June 5, 1963?

Thanks for any help here.

Jim Root

[Ron Ecker]

From affidavit of LBJ aide Cliff Carter:

The original conversations concerning President Kennedy's trip to Texas occurred on June 5, 1963 at the Cortez Hotel in El Paso, Texas. President Kennedy had spoken earlier that day at the Air Force Academy and Vice President Johnson had spoken at Annapolis. The President and Vice President met with Governor Connally at the Cortez Hotel to discuss a number of matters, including a trip by the President to Texas. Fred Korth and I were present when the three men assembled, but Fred Korth and I left during their discussion of the President's proposed trip. The first tentative date was to have the trip coincide with Vice-President Johnson's birthday on August 27th, but that was rejected because it was too close to Labor Day. President Kennedy's other commitments prevented him from coming to Texas any sooner than November 21st, which was the date finally set.

http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/carter.htm

I think the reference to Labor Day is BS. Carter had already left the meeting by his own account when the trip was discussed.

Connally in his HSCA testimony stated why August was rejected: "August is the worst month of the year to have a fund raising affair in Texas, for anybody. Too many people are gone, it is the dog days, it is the hottest month of the year, people are on vacation."

Connally testified that no date was set in June, that he wanted time to plan. He met with JFK at the White House on October 4 to set the date etc., but by then the White House had already informed the Dallas Morning News that JFK would be in Texas on November 21 and 22. And Connally testified that he got chewed out by LBJ on the night of October 4 for not letting him know he was meeting with JFK that day. LBJ said, "I suppose you think I don’t have any interest in what is happening in Texas." Connally said that he had assumed that LBJ would be at the meeting and was surprised that he wasn’t.

BTW Connally testified at one point, regarding the motorcade route, "I think it was published on Tuesday and, of course, the event occurred on Friday, so they had that much time." I wonder who "they" were, and if Connally had the code term "the big event" (used by E. Howard Hunt) in mind when he said "the event."

[Jim Root]

Ron

Thanks for the info.

In reading the Cliff Carter account, Carter does seem to suggest that the Nov. 21, 22 date may have been set at the June 5 meeting. I find this of particular interest.

Contrast this with the testemony of Gov. Connally which suggests that the Nov. 21, 22 date was not decided until Oct. 4, 1963. But the Oct. 4th meeting seems to be nullified as the day the Dallas trip was decided upon because it is stated that, "by then (Oct. 4th) the White House had already informed the Dallas Morning News that JFK would be in Texas on November 21 and 22." I have also found this quote, "In September, the White House decided to permit further visits by the President and extended the trip bo run from the afternoon of November 21 through the evening of Friday, November 22" making the October 4 date moot.

I guess that I leave open the possibility that Connally may have been mistaken about what decisions were made on June 5th and would lean toward accepting the memory (or perhaps notes) of a "staff" person who would be responsible for managing the local fund raising etc. to be done during the "event." It seems that a decision made on Oct. 4th would reduce the lead time necessary to organize and maximize the trip into a profitable and successfull political "event."

Since the trip, it seems, was "extended" sometime in September to begin on the afternoon of Nov. 21 it could be that the original plan was for the trip, since President Kennedy could not be available befor Nov. 21, may have originally been planned for only Friday, Nov. 22.

Ron (others), does this seem to make any sense to you? Agree, disagree?

Jim Root

Edited May 16, 2007 by Jim Root

[Gil Jesus]

Gentlemen:

I have a video interview where Connally says that the idea to come to Texas was Kennedy's and that in June 1963, Kennedy had not been to Texas since the 1960 election. That's not true. Kennedy gave a speech on the space program at Rice University in Houston on September 12, 1962. Either Connally erred in this fact or was lying, although I find it hard to believe that he would not have remembered that Kennedy had been in Texas at a time that he was running for Governor.

As far as the crooked friends of Lyndon Johnson go, you can take what they say at face value or you can draw your own conclusions. If I remember correctly, it was Carter who took control of Connally's coat and had it cleaned before the WC ever saw it.

That's destruction of evidence and obstruction of justice. They were going to impeach Nixon for the same crimes.

[Ron Ecker]

Since the trip, it seems, was "extended" sometime in September to begin on the afternoon of Nov. 21 it could be that the original plan was for the trip, since President Kennedy could not be available befor Nov. 21, may have originally been planned for only Friday, Nov. 22.

Ron (others), does this seem to make any sense to you? Agree, disagree?

I agree. According to the WC Report (p. 29), the original plan was for only 1 day in Texas, November 22. Connally opposed a motorcade in Dallas because there wasn't time for it. In September, the trip was extended by moving San Antonio from Friday to Thursday, leaving time for a motorcade in Dallas on Friday, and Connally said "I withdrew my objections to a motorcade."

To me Carter's affidavit is ambiguous about when the dates were set, but the WC Report accepted his account as definitive, as the report, citing Carter, says "The three agreed (in June) that the President would come to Texas in late November 1963" (pp.28-29).

Connally flatly contradicts that in his HSCA testimony, saying that no dates were set in June, he wanted to think about it, and the final dates would in any case be left up to the White House. He testified that he assumed the dates announced in the DMN on September 26 were the dates decided by the White House.

Judging by his testimony, you would think that Connally really had no say-so at all on the dates. He also testified, "I didn't know at the time there was a big argument about whether we go the Women's Building or the Trade Mart." Sounds like perjury to me.

[Thomas Graves]

From affidavit of LBJ aide Cliff Carter:

The original conversations concerning President Kennedy's trip to Texas occurred on June 5, 1963 at the Cortez Hotel in El Paso, Texas. President Kennedy had spoken earlier that day at the Air Force Academy and Vice President Johnson had spoken at Annapolis. The President and Vice President met with Governor Connally at the Cortez Hotel to discuss a number of matters, including a trip by the President to Texas. Fred Korth and I were present when the three men assembled, but Fred Korth and I left during their discussion of the President's proposed trip. The first tentative date was to have the trip coincide with Vice-President Johnson's birthday on August 27th, but that was rejected because it was too close to Labor Day. President Kennedy's other commitments prevented him from coming to Texas any sooner than November 21st, which was the date finally set.

http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/carter.htm

I think the reference to Labor Day is BS. Carter had already left the meeting by his own account when the trip was discussed

_______________________________________

Ron,

I don't mean to sound pedantic, but Carter's words in the affidavit you posted,

"...I left during their discussion" does not mean the same thing as "Carter had already left the meeting..." So, if what Carter really said in the affidavit is true, then it is conceivably possible, is it not, that he heard JFK and LBJ and JC talking about and ruling out August 27, and their reasons for ruling it out?

--Thomas "Devil's Advocate" Graves

P.S. and FWIW, Yes, I do believe there was a conspiracy-- I just try to be a "critical thinker".....

P.P.S. And yes I can accept Connally's reasoning that, climate-wise, late August is probably a lousy time of year to attempt political fund raising and "fence-mending" in Texas.

P.P.P.S. Keep up the good work!

________________________________________

Edited May 17, 2007 by Thomas Graves

[Jim Root]

Ron

Here is the curious coincidence that is based upon fact but first upon one simple assumption. If, as it seems, the date of the trip was established as November 22, 1963 at the El Cortez Hotel in El Paso Texas on June 5th, we could assume that potential conspritors would want to have that information as quickly as possible. I believe this to be a resonable assumption.

Facts 1:

Edwin Walker, a man of some influence in Texas political circles at that time, did in fact write a letter (dated June 5, 1963) that ended up in the hands of John J. McCloy (reproduced below).

Letter from Edwin Walker to Lt. Gen. Groves with a c.c. to John J. McCloy dated June 5, 1963.

Lt. General Leslie R. Groves

President, Association of Graduates

West Poin, N.Y.

Dear General Groves:

In view of the Sylvanus Thayer Award to John J. McCloy (May, 1963) by the United States Military Academy's Association of Graduates, I hereby resign from the Association of Graduates. I respectfully request that my name and membership be dropped from your rolls. The Association of Graduates is not representing me in it's presentation of the Sulvanus Thayer Award to John J. McCloy as an honored and distinguished United States citizen whose service and accomplishments in the national interests exemplify outstanding devotion to the ideals expressed in the West Point motto, "Duty, Honor, Country."

I prefer to stand by the ideals, principles, and traditions of the Long Grey Line - past, present, and future - rather than to stand with the Association and the temporary administrators of our government. The New Frontiersmen of today were accurately classified by Khrushchev before he took Cuba - "Too liberal to fight."

Yours sincerely,

Edwin A. Walker

c.c. Lt. General Earl Wheeler, Chief of Staff, United States Army

General Douglas MacArthur

Maj. General W. C. Westmoreland, Superintendent, United States

Military Academy

John J. McCloy

Fact 2:

We can prove that McCloy received this letter because he responded to it on June 12, 1963 (reproduced below).

My dear General:

I received through the mail the other day a copy of your resignation from the Association of Graduates of the United States Military Academy, prompted by my selection for the Colonel Thayer Award for this year.

You are a graduate of the Academy and for you to resign because a group of graduates duly selected to make an award and did so according to their best judgment, in a manner which resulted in an award to me, seems a rather fantastic expression of your disapproval of what you term "new frontier policy" as contrasted to the traditions of West Point.

Whether my selection was deserved or not, I was very much warmed by it. I was in the regular service in World War I, here and in France. I served as The Assistant Secretary of War during World War II. All during this period and since, I have been closely associated with graduates of the Academy and among them are my warmest friends. I am also very familiar with your very fine record in World War II and in Korea and I had been distressed that a leader of your qualifications should have been lost to the service, whatever the reason.

I have served the country according to my lights and opportunities, just as you have according to yours. I very much doubt that I have ever been less concerned with the security of the country than you.

I was called in form abroad in the Cuban emergency to express my views as to what should be done in regard to the presence of missiles in Cuba. I did so and I think no one misunderstood my position. Thereafter, I was asked to arrange with the Russians for the removal of the missiles. This I did and I also arranged for the removal of the bombers, though they were not part of the original agreement -- both under condidtions far better for the security of the country, in my judgment, than the form of United Nations inspection which was originally contemplated. Apart from this, I have had nothing whatever to do with Cuban policy, either under President Kennedy or General Eisenhhower. I have not been what you term a "New Frontiersman" in the sense that I have been a Republican all my life and I was born in the last century, not this one.

All this is written to you not to justify my selection, in any sense, but to urge you to reconsider your resignation from your own Graduate Association on any account with which I am Concerned. I suggest that you tell whomever you want, as vigourously as you care to, that, in your opinion, I do not deserve the Award, but to sever your relations with the Graduates of West Point on this account, though I recognize in the last analysis it is entirely your own business, does seem to me to be a hasty and perhaps ill-advised action.

Sincerely,

John J. McCloy

Major General Edwin A. Walker

4011 Turtle Creek Boulevard

Dallas 19, Texas

P.S. In the possibility that it might be of some interest to you, I am sending

to you herewith a copy of the remarks I made tot he Cadets at the time of

Award.

Fact 3:

"According to Ernest DuPuy (Mutiny at West Point), ...Sylvanus Thayer, "Father of the Military Academy" a native of Braintree, Massachusetts, assumed the command he would occupy for sixteen years, rebuilding West Point, launching its Corps of Cadets on the path of "Duty, Honor, Country." That the first fourteen months of his incumbency were spent in an atmosphere of riot and smoldering insurrection is something else again."

...And so the storm clouds rose, amongst a corps still composed mostly of young men accustomed to "Old Pewt's" laxities, and chafing under the new restrictions. They burst on Sunday, November 22, 1818, in an explosion whose reverberations would not cease until they had reached the halls of Congress, and the result of which would settle once and for all the heretofore moot status of the Corps of Cadets in the military hierarchy."

Once again, perhaps only a curiosity, but two men who would play a roll in the assassination drama had a dialog with each other that began on the same day that the decision to go to Dallas was aparantly made. That dialog then centered around Sylvanus Thayer, a man whose most important day in his military career was November 22.

With the additonal information that I have gathered over the years I must leave open the possibility that this is not just a series of simple coincidences.

Jim Root

[Harry J.Dean]

Ron

Here is the curious coincidence that is based upon fact but first upon one simple assumption. If, as it seems, the date of the trip was established as November 22, 1963 at the El Cortez Hotel in El Paso Texas on June 5th, we could assume that potential conspritors would want to have that information as quickly as possible. I believe this to be a resonable assumption.

Facts 1:

Edwin Walker, a man of some influence in Texas political circles at that time, did in fact write a letter (dated June 5, 1963) that ended up in the hands of John J. McCloy (reproduced below).

Letter from Edwin Walker to Lt. Gen. Groves with a c.c. to John J. McCloy dated June 5, 1963.

Lt. General Leslie R. Groves

President, Association of Graduates

West Poin, N.Y.

Dear General Groves:

In view of the Sylvanus Thayer Award to John J. McCloy (May, 1963) by the United States Military Academy's Association of Graduates, I hereby resign from the Association of Graduates. I respectfully request that my name and membership be dropped from your rolls. The Association of Graduates is not representing me in it's presentation of the Sulvanus Thayer Award to John J. McCloy as an honored and distinguished United States citizen whose service and accomplishments in the national interests exemplify outstanding devotion to the ideals expressed in the West Point motto, "Duty, Honor, Country."

I prefer to stand by the ideals, principles, and traditions of the Long Grey Line - past, present, and future - rather than to stand with the Association and the temporary administrators of our government. The New Frontiersmen of today were accurately classified by Khrushchev before he took Cuba - "Too liberal to fight."

Yours sincerely,

Edwin A. Walker

c.c. Lt. General Earl Wheeler, Chief of Staff, United States Army

General Douglas MacArthur

Maj. General W. C. Westmoreland, Superintendent, United States

Military Academy

John J. McCloy

Fact 2:

We can prove that McCloy received this letter because he responded to it on June 12, 1963 (reproduced below).

My dear General:

I received through the mail the other day a copy of your resignation from the Association of Graduates of the United States Military Academy, prompted by my selection for the Colonel Thayer Award for this year.

You are a graduate of the Academy and for you to resign because a group of graduates duly selected to make an award and did so according to their best judgment, in a manner which resulted in an award to me, seems a rather fantastic expression of your disapproval of what you term "new frontier policy" as contrasted to the traditions of West Point.

Whether my selection was deserved or not, I was very much warmed by it. I was in the regular service in World War I, here and in France. I served as The Assistant Secretary of War during World War II. All during this period and since, I have been closely associated with graduates of the Academy and among them are my warmest friends. I am also very familiar with your very fine record in World War II and in Korea and I had been distressed that a leader of your qualifications should have been lost to the service, whatever the reason.

I have served the country according to my lights and opportunities, just as you have according to yours. I very much doubt that I have ever been less concerned with the security of the country than you.

I was called in form abroad in the Cuban emergency to express my views as to what should be done in regard to the presence of missiles in Cuba. I did so and I think no one misunderstood my position. Thereafter, I was asked to arrange with the Russians for the removal of the missiles. This I did and I also arranged for the removal of the bombers, though they were not part of the original agreement -- both under condidtions far better for the security of the country, in my judgment, than the form of United Nations inspection which was originally contemplated. Apart from this, I have had nothing whatever to do with Cuban policy, either under President Kennedy or General Eisenhhower. I have not been what you term a "New Frontiersman" in the sense that I have been a Republican all my life and I was born in the last century, not this one.

All this is written to you not to justify my selection, in any sense, but to urge you to reconsider your resignation from your own Graduate Association on any account with which I am Concerned. I suggest that you tell whomever you want, as vigourously as you care to, that, in your opinion, I do not deserve the Award, but to sever your relations with the Graduates of West Point on this account, though I recognize in the last analysis it is entirely your own business, does seem to me to be a hasty and perhaps ill-advised action.

Sincerely,

John J. McCloy

Major General Edwin A. Walker

4011 Turtle Creek Boulevard

Dallas 19, Texas

P.S. In the possibility that it might be of some interest to you, I am sending

to you herewith a copy of the remarks I made tot he Cadets at the time of

Award.

Fact 3:

"According to Ernest DuPuy (Mutiny at West Point), ...Sylvanus Thayer, "Father of the Military Academy" a native of Braintree, Massachusetts, assumed the command he would occupy for sixteen years, rebuilding West Point, launching its Corps of Cadets on the path of "Duty, Honor, Country." That the first fourteen months of his incumbency were spent in an atmosphere of riot and smoldering insurrection is something else again."

...And so the storm clouds rose, amongst a corps still composed mostly of young men accustomed to "Old Pewt's" laxities, and chafing under the new restrictions. They burst on Sunday, November 22, 1818, in an explosion whose reverberations would not cease until they had reached the halls of Congress, and the result of which would settle once and for all the heretofore moot status of the Corps of Cadets in the military hierarchy."

Once again, perhaps only a curiosity, but two men who would play a roll in the assassination drama had a dialog with each other that began on the same day that the decision to go to Dallas was aparantly made. That dialog then centered around Sylvanus Thayer, a man whose most important day in his military career was November 22.

With the additonal information that I have gathered over the years I must leave open the possibility that this is not just a series of simple coincidences.

Jim Root

MMA sent dates/times to RID of JBS, re; all JFK intended visits!

MMA = Mormon Mole Agents {within gov.}

RID = Research Intelligence Department

JBS = John Birch Society

JFK = John F. Kennedy

H.J. Dean

[Jim Root]

Harry

Do you know when they would have first sent info about the Dallas visit?

By September 26, 1963 the dates were published by the Dallas press. It would seem that nothing after 9/26 could carry any sinister implications, at least concerning "moles" revealing unknown travel information. So our period of interest seems to be between June 5, 1963 and September 26, 1963.

Would you agree?

Jim Root

[Harry J.Dean]

Harry

Do you know when they would have first sent info about the Dallas visit?

By September 26, 1963 the dates were published by the Dallas press. It would seem that nothing after 9/26 could carry any sinister implications, at least concerning "moles" revealing unknown travel information. So our period of interest seems to be between June 5, 1963 and September 26, 1963.

Would you agree?

Jim Root

Hi, Jim

Re; dates and times

A continious stream of behind the scenes information reached the

Society via MM Agents in place, including the 'movements', and

'personal activities' of the president, much that was printed for it's

members in Birch Society literature/propaganda.

H.J. Dean

[Greg Parker]

The first public announcement of a possible trip was made by LBJ through the Dallas Times Herald of April 24, 1963. LBJ was quoted as saying that "President Kennedy may visit Dallas and other major Texas cities this Summer." (CE 1972)

The WC report states in ch2 p28 that, "He had made only a few brief visits to the State since the 1960 Presidential campaign and in 1962 he began to consider a formal visit." and cites Connally and O'Donnell for this assertion.

I do not think Carter's statement that "President Kennedy's other commitments prevented him from coming to Texas any sooner than November 21st, which was the date finally set." necessarily indicates that Nov 21 was set at that meeting. I think at that time, it was just generally agreed it should be late November.

Late November was the time-frame Eugene Dinkin believed the assassination would take place -- a time-frame he arrived at during September and the first half of October. This is the same period we see the dates for the actual trip being finalised or discussed - announced in Dallas papers, Sep 26 and discussed further on Oct 4.

The Sept 26 and Oct 4 dates almost exactly match Oswald's trip via Houston to MC and subsequent return to Dallas. Somewhere in this period, the motorcade was confirmed, with only the fine details to be worked out. However, disputes over the luncheon venue held up a final decision for a number of weeks.

Houston was on the Presidential itinerary. Oswald had told Ruth Paine he was going there to look for work. Evidence exists in the volumes that this is precisely what he did, though obviously without success. Then he gets an unadvertised job in Dallas on a possible motorcade route. This job is temporary, and created by virtue of some the existing order fillers being given reflooring work during a downturn in business instead of being laid off and rehired later, as had been the norm (see testimonies of Williams and Givens). However, at some time after starting at the TSBD, Oswald applied for a position at DeVilbiss - right next to the Trade Mart.

[Myra Bronstein]

...

Dear General Groves:

In view of the Sylvanus Thayer Award to John J. McCloy (May, 1963) by the United States Military Academy's Association of Graduates, I hereby resign from the Association of Graduates. I respectfully request that my name and membership be dropped from your rolls. The Association of Graduates is not representing me in it's presentation of the Sulvanus Thayer Award to John J. McCloy as an honored and distinguished United States citizen whose service and accomplishments in the national interests exemplify outstanding devotion to the ideals expressed in the West Point motto, "Duty, Honor, Country."

I prefer to stand by the ideals, principles, and traditions of the Long Grey Line - past, present, and future - rather than to stand with the Association and the temporary administrators of our government. The New Frontiersmen of today were accurately classified by Khrushchev before he took Cuba - "Too liberal to fight."

...

I'm probably the last one to learn the significance of "New Frontier":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Frontier

"The term New Frontier was used by John F. Kennedy in his acceptance speech in 1960 to the Democratic National Convention at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum as the Democratic nominee. Originally just a slogan to inspire America to get behind him, the phrase developed into a label for his administration's domestic and foreign programs.

'We stand at the edge of a New Frontier—the frontier of unfulfilled hopes and dreams. It will deal with unsolved problems of peace and war, unconquered pockets of ignorance and prejudice, unanswered questions of poverty and surplus.'"

[Bernice Moore]

The first public announcement of a possible trip was made by LBJ through the Dallas Times Herald of April 24, 1963. LBJ was quoted as saying that "President Kennedy may visit Dallas and other major Texas cities this Summer." (CE 1972)

The WC report states in ch2 p28 that, "He had made only a few brief visits to the State since the 1960 Presidential campaign and in 1962 he began to consider a formal visit." and cites Connally and O'Donnell for this assertion.

I do not think Carter's statement that "President Kennedy's other commitments prevented him from coming to Texas any sooner than November 21st, which was the date finally set." necessarily indicates that Nov 21 was set at that meeting. I think at that time, it was just generally agreed it should be late November.

Late November was the time-frame Eugene Dinkin believed the assassination would take place -- a time-frame he arrived at during September and the first half of October. This is the same period we see the dates for the actual trip being finalised or discussed - announced in Dallas papers, Sep 26 and discussed further on Oct 4.

The Sept 26 and Oct 4 dates almost exactly match Oswald's trip via Houston to MC and subsequent return to Dallas. Somewhere in this period, the motorcade was confirmed, with only the fine details to be worked out. However, disputes over the luncheon venue held up a final decision for a number of weeks.

Houston was on the Presidential itinerary. Oswald had told Ruth Paine he was going there to look for work. Evidence exists in the volumes that this is precisely what he did, though obviously without success. Then he gets an unadvertised job in Dallas on a possible motorcade route. This job is temporary, and created by virtue of some the existing order fillers being given reflooring work during a downturn in business instead of being laid off and rehired later, as had been the norm (see testimonies of Williams and Givens). However, at some time after starting at the TSBD, Oswald applied for a position at DeVilbiss - right next to the Trade Mart.

Here you go Greg...B

[Greg Parker]

Thanks Bernie!

[Jim Root]

Greg

"Late November was the time-frame Eugene Dinkin believed the assassination would take place -- a time-frame he arrived at during September and the first half of October. This is the same period we see the dates for the actual trip being finalised or discussed - announced in Dallas papers, Sep 26 and discussed further on Oct 4."

September is when a retired NSA employee named John B. Hurt left for an extended visit to France. France is where Eugene Dinkin, who had access to NSA intercepts, had stumbled upon information that led him to believe an assassination of the President would take place in late November.

John B. Hurt was associated with both the men assigned to investigate Lee Harvey Oswald's potential intelligence connections (Frank Rowlett and Meredith Gardner). John B. Hurt was also closely associated with John J. McCloy.

John Hurt would be the name of a man Lee Harvey Oswald would attempt to contact just hours before his own execution by Jack Ruby.

Connection? Coincidence?

Jim Root