I was in high
school, probably freshman year, and supposed to already be in bed. What kept me
awake and glued to the television was a fascinating documentary anchored by
Peter Jennings of ABC about the John F. Kennedy assassination.
The digital reenactments, researcher
lectures, and witness testimony had me riveted. I had learned a bit about the
1963 shooting in Dallas in the typical classroom lecture (and cramming the
dates and facts before tests) but never really thought past the basic textbook
material. But that ABC doc was so interesting to me, for whatever reason, that
I remember thinking:
"Who needs fiction when real life is
this bizarre?”
As I recall, the conclusion of the documentary
was that the evidence presented supported the Warren Commission, that august
panel of men tasked by new President Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate Kennedy’s
assassination. As I turned the set off, I still had a buzz and many questions,
but I didn’t seriously question things until after graduation.
Today, I’m one of the 60 percent of
Americans
that doubt the Warren Commission’s determination that Lee Harvey Oswald hatched
a plan to kill President Kennedy by himself.
So I was stoked that finally the
remaining records of the JFK assassination should have been released this past
Thursday. This was mandated by a 1992 law, signed by President George H.W.
Bush, to provide transparency to the public.
As we now know, this was a partial
document dump, as President Donald Trump acceded to FBI and CIA requests for more time to prepare the sensitive material for public
consumption. There was a clause in the 1992 law allowing the 2017 President to
withhold publication for reasons of national security.
My question is, these agencies had ample time to redact names and look over these files to ready them for public release (although at this point, it may be more than national security laws behind why the agencies won't fully release un-redacted files).
The few files I looked at online at https://www.archives.gov/research/jfk/2017-release
are a buffet of information, small jigsaw pieces to a gigantic puzzle that we US citizens have trouble picturing in its final form.
Some files were routine notes on random conversations, some about
criminal elements of the 1960s, and some were completely unreadable, as The
Daily Mail reported deeper into on
Friday. Seems some of the Brits are less than impressed.
Photo courtesy of http://prostoramax.com/blog/?p=207
There’s still interesting files in the document dump, some of which I’m not sure many people are aware of
outside of routine JFK researchers.
Speaking of the English, there is a file that shows that on November 22, 1963, an anonymous person called a British newspaper just before the events in Dallas. The Cambridge News editor was told to call the American Embassy in London for "some big news" before the caller hung up.
This went down about 25 minutes prior to the assassination, and was an event I never read about during my amateur JFK assassination research. Based on media reaction to it, many writers weren't aware either.
Allow me to explain why I disagree with
the Warren Commission and believe the government should release all information
in the name of transparency:
·
I don’t believe
Oswald was killed by nightclub owner Jack Ruby because Ruby “wanted to spare
Jackie Kennedy the pain of a public trial.” It’s obvious
many citizens were anguished by what had occurred in Dallas only two days
prior, but for a shady nightclub owner with ties to organized crime to be the
one to exact retribution? The fact that this silencing of Oswald before the
public ever got a clear answer from him, let alone a criminal trial, makes
everything thereafter extremely suspect in my opinion.
·
Former CIA chief
Allen Dulles was appointed to the Warren Commission. For people
that may not know, Dulles was fired by JFK following the 1961 Bay of Pigs
invasion of Cuba. Many accounts state that Kennedy was highly suspicious of the
murky nature of the CIA afterwards, and sought more personal control of the
agency. So the guy he fired was hired to oversee his murder investigation?
There’s a great book from 2015 that goes into this and the history of the CIA
called “The Devil’s Chessboard” by David Talbot.
·
Congress investigated aspects of the CIA , Martin
Luther King Jr. and JFK assassinations during the 1970s. I didn’t know
this until fairly recently, and many others I’ve talked to that grew up in the
1970s don’t recall the media publicizing this aspect that much. Apparently
Congress was spurred to action following the Watergate scandal to look into
clandestine CIA activities (which included attempting to assassinate foreign
leaders, overthrowing elected governments, and spinning public opinion via
media assets). They eventually wound up looking again at the JFK assassination,
and concluded that the president “was probably [killed] as a result of a
conspiracy”. WHAT?! This was 1978! To be fair, many parts of the investigation
were classified and slowly released to the public beginning in the 1990s.
·
The Richard Helms memo. The link to the left is from reporting by The Sun
of the United Kingdom. This nugget includes one of the recently released JFK documents.
The events took place during the congressional inquiries into the CIA’s
clandestine activities during the mid-1970s. And you can’t make this up… in the
middle of former CIA head Helms’ testimony, the document just ends. Right after
he’s asked if Lee Harvey Oswald had any CIA connections… but I’m sure the next
part will appear crisp and clean in the
next document dump, amirite?
·
The post JFK
Assassination body count. This always throws me for a loop.
Oliver Stone’s “JFK” film went into this, but since it was based on New Orleans
District Attorney Jim Garrison’s investigation during the 1960s, the public
wasn’t exposed to what happened afterwards during the 1970s, when new investigations were launched by Congress.
The bodies kept on
piling up. I’m talking about people who were thought to have knowledge of the
assassination or had some role of investigating it during the mid-1960s.
JFK
researchers have extensively documented this, and a good book I’d recommend is
“Hit List” by David Wayne and Richard Belzer.
I’ll close this down by listing just
some of the mysterious deaths… this research is courtesy of the late writer Jim Marrs. Marrs published a deep-dive of reasons why Kennedy was killed as a result of a
conspiracy of some kind in 1989 with “Crossfire”. Chart sampled from
| 1974 | Earle Cabell | Mayor of Dallas on 11/22/63, whose brother, Gen. Charles Cabell was fired from CIA by JFK | Natural causes |
| 6/75 | Sam Giancana* | Chicago Mafia boss slated to tell about CIA-mob death plots to Senate Committee | Murdered |
| 7/75 | Clyde Tolson | J. Edgar Hoover's assistant and roommate | Natural causes |
| 1975 | Allen Sweatt | Dallas Deputy Sheriff involved in investigation | Natural causes |
| 12/75 | Gen. Earle Wheeler | Contact between JFK and CIA | Unknown |
| 1976 | Ralph Paul | Ruby's business partner connected with crime figures | Heart attack |
| 4/76 | James Chaney | Dallas motorcycle officer riding to JFK's right rear who said JFK "struck in the face" with bullet | Heart attack |
| 4/76 | Dr. Charles Gregory | Governor John Connally's physician | Heart attack |
| 6/76 | William Harvey* | CIA coordinator for CIA-mob assassination plans against Castro | Complications from heart surgery |
| 7/76 | John Roselli* | Mobster who testified to Senate Committee and was to appear again | Stabbed and stuffed in metal drum |
| 1/77 | William Pawley* | Former Brazilian Ambassador connected to Anti-Castro Cubans, crime figures | Gunshot ruled suicide |
| 3/77 | George DeMohrenschildt* | Close friend to both Oswald and Bouvier family (Jackie Kennedy's parents), CIA contract agent | Gunshot wound ruled suicide |
| 3/77 | Carlos Prio Soccaras* | Former Cuban President, money man for anti-Castro Cubans | Gunshot wound ruled suicide |
| 3/77 | Paul Raigorodsky | Business friend of George DeMohrenschildt and wealthy oilmen | Natural causes |
| 5/77 | Lou Staples* | Dallas radio Talk Show host who told friends he would break assassination case | Gunshot to head,ruled suicide |
| 6/77 | Louis Nichols | Former No. 3 man in FBI, worked on JFK investigation | Heart attack |
| 8/77 | Alan Belmont | FBI official who testified to Warren Commission | "Long illness" |
| 8/77 | James Cadigan | FBI document expert who testified to Warren Commission | Fall in home |
| 8/77 | Joseph C. Ayres* | Chief steward on JFK's Air Force One | Shooting accident |
| 8/77 | Francis G. Powers* | U-2 pilot downed over Russia in 1960 | Helicopter crash (He reportedly ran out of fuel) |
| 9/77 | Kenneth O'Donnell | JFK's closest aide | Natural causes |
| 10/77 | Donald Kaylor | FBI fingerprint chemist | Heart attack |
| 10/77 | J.M. English | Former head of FBI Forensic Sciences Laboratory | Heart attack |
| 11/77 | William Sullivan* | Former No. 3 man in FBI, headed Division 5, counter- espionage and domestic intelligence | Hunting accident |
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