As discussed in Parts 1 and 2, Lee Oswald, the alleged assassin of President John F. Kennedy has a strange and contradictory life history. Some researchers insist this conflicting evidence is proof of a body double, or doppelganger, a clandestine intelligence project. Two stumbling blocks are one, where does the double go after the assassination and two, if the impersonation begins as a youth then Oswald’s mother has to be a double as well. Many records are lost or still classified though enough has been leaked to form a much different picture than what the Warren Report first told the American public. If it is true that Oswald was operating as doppelganger for some secret project, then we can see why the government remains fanatical in its attempts to obscure the truth.
Oswald Defects to The USSR
The news that a U.S. Marine defected to a major enemy at the height of the cold war reverberated through every government agency. Memos were sent to every branch of the government and military. As they should have since Oswald had a “crypto” clearance, one higher up than Top Secret. Later, military codes would have to changed since Oswald told American embassy officials he was going to tell the Russians everything he knew—which is an act of treason but he will not be prosecuted for though it was a breach of national security and he could have been arrested right there in the Embassy. He could also have been arrested upon his return to the U.S. but was not. This is possibly more evidence of Oswald’s covert activities at this time and he is being protected. Just as he was protected at so many other junctures before he arrived in Moscow and will be after he moves on.
So Lee Oswald’s sojourn to the Communist worker’s paradise is another mysterious and strange episode in his life. One of many that would be recycled until his death. It is as fraught with anomalies as his trip to Mexico is. To summarize, he gets an early discharge from the Marines to take care of his mother, books a trip on a steamer and makes his way to Russia. He contacts the American Embassy in Moscow and announces his defecting, says he is planning on sharing military secrets with the Russians, and in a hand written letter renounces his citizenship. Later he gets assigned a job at a radio factory in Minsk, meets his future wife and marries her in six weeks and they have a baby. He becomes disillusioned, gets a loan from the State Department and he and family return to the United States in the summer of 1962.
My summary is perhaps too lean but of interest here is the peculiar issues that arise. Such as Oswald drafting a letter renouncing his citizenship. Due to a 1907 law one must fill out a “Certificate of Loss of Nationality” to relinquish citizenship. He did not. One would think the lawyers at the Embassy would have informed him of this fact. What his letter does is provide him an out should he need to return since it is not legally valid. He can tell the world he is no longer an American but the legal framework is not there. So if you want to know how he got back to the U.S. so easily this why. He was blowing smoke.
Though a good Russian speaker he rarely speaks Russian to anyone except Marina, who though he was a local when they first met. She said he spoke with a Baltic accent. Oswald’s learning Russian is shrouded in mystery with the Warren Report guessing a Marine officer teaching him. Most of the men closest to him report never seeing him doing anything in this regard. Never the less if Oswald is part of a false defector program (the ONI ran one out of Nags Head, NC) then speaking Russian too much is a dead give away to being a spy. Post cold war KGB records indicate his apartment was bugged. The Ziger family who befriended him said he never spoke Russian to them and their father who spoke English had to translate for him. Interestingly, Marina spoke English and Lee wrote her letters in English but she rarely spoke it when she came to America with him. (For more on this please see my article, From Marina Prusakova, With Love)
Oswald’s reasons for returning to America are also shrouded in mystery. He made a high salary but had no place to spend it as consumer goods were hard to find outside of the basics. If Oswald was a cold war spy the Russians had him boxed in the factory in Minsk. Not much in the way of spy activity could be done there. Other defectors like him, such as Robert Webster (who bore a striking resemblance to Oswald and met Marina—who spoke to him in English) defected and came back home after a few years disillusioned with the communist system. If Webster was an agent then he was boxed in too. The Russians had a healthy mistrust of America defectors showing up at their door. As Oswald said to his mother when she inquired about this, “Mother, not even Marina knows why I came back.” He wouldn’t even tell his wife. A Cold War spy probably would not.
The Opening of the SIG 201 File
There is good reason to believe that Oswald was a Cold War spy. Why? Because a former agent said so under oath to the HSCA in 1978. Ann Egerter worked under counter espionage chief James Angleton. In retirement at the time of her testimony, her words were so revealing it is amazing that it did not make a bigger impact in the public consciousness in regards to Oswald and the assassination.
Essentially, a SIG 201 file is opened on a CIA agent or asset in regards to a counter espionage investigation. Ann Egerter referred to SIG (Special Investigations Group) as, “the office that spied on spies.” A SIG 201 file was evidence and result of an internal investigation into one of the CIA’s own people. Egerter also asserted many different times that there was no other purpose for a SIG 201 file to be opened on an individual. That person would have to be a CIA employee in some capacity. As usual with these things, two plus two equals four. Lee Oswald is in effect a CIA spy.
Oswald’s SIG 201 file was started the year following his alleged defection, in December 1960. Oddly, the name on the file is Lee Henry Oswald. However, Ann Egerter said in her HSCA testimony that it was Lee Harvey Oswald’s 201 file. And odd occurrence but perhaps a way to throw off investigators should the truth was revealed? Plausible denial? Also, all information on Oswald should have been filed under the Soviet Affairs division but was not. It was under direct control of James Angleton who was rabid in his pursuit of moles within the Agency. Researcher John Newman (Oswald and the CIA) believes Oswald was a special project under control of Angleton and may have been.
Remarkably, Warren Commission defenders such as Bugliosi, Mailer, McAdams, and Posner continue to deny there was any evidence of Oswald being associated with the CIA. Vince Bugliosi in Reclaiming History totally ignores Ann Egerter’s testimony to the HSCA not only in his 1600 plus pages of his book but also in over 900 pages of End Notes. Buglosi implies that people other than CIA personnel can be appear in a 201 file, saying that a 201 is, “A file kept on an individual, including CIA employees…” Not so according to Ann Egerter.
Even stranger is the HSCA’s final report, states there was “no evidence” linking Oswald to the CIA, obviously ignoring Ann Egerter’s testimony as well. Another example of why Congress should never be allowed to investigate tragic events such as this.
Oswald Seen Outside of Russia
Once again, Oswalds appear in places they shouldn’t be. Most telling is one of the few surviving documents from an employment application filed with the Texas Employment Commission in Ft. Worth in April of 1962. It is well documented that Oswald, wife and daughter were in Minsk at that time. In volume 19, page 491 of the Warren Commission evidence volumes, is listed a few surviving applications with the TEC. Such as form E-40a, Aptitude Profile Test (APT) B-1002 and the Occupational Aptitude Pattern test (OAP). Of all of these the OAP is dated for 4/62 when he is in Russia. The other forms are dated for summer of 1962 when he had returned to America.
Of note is the APT B-1002 from which is normally given to insurance claim examiners, something clearly out of Lee Oswald’s league. The FBI or WC never investigates why he would be given this test. Also, on the application listed as Cunningham Exhibit No.1-A, there is listed employment (description barely unreadable—office work?) for one year in New Orleans in 1961. Once again he is Russia at this time.
Lee Oswald, or someone impersonating him, was seen by so many people that it made it’s way all the up to Hoover at the FBI. In a 1960 memo, Hoover is warned that someone is impersonating a Lee Oswald. This memo is written in a simple, matter of fact way, as if this is prior or common knowledge. If the Lee Oswald we have been handed is a malcontent, misfit of a young man why would he be impersonated? The only answer is he was an action guy of some sort playing one role for official history and another one for the National Security State.
In another memo dated from March 31, 1961 a state department official Edward Hickey writes to a fellow official John White informing him that, “there is an imposter using Oswald’s identification data…” and recommending his passport should be forwarded to him on a personal basis—to make sure the right Lee H. Oswald got it. So it was becoming well known in closed circles that this Oswald character had a cloud swirling around him and warnings were being sent out through the proper channels.
Lee Oswald was once again spotted in various places he should not have been while in Russia. He was seen in and out of the Lake Ponchartrain CIA training camp for Cuban operations in Louisiana to as far south as Key West in Florida. Attorney Robert Tanenbaum said during his brief tenure with the HSCA said he saw a film of the Cuban exiles in training at Lake Ponchartrain. Seen in the film was CIA man David Atlee Philips, David Ferrie, and Lee Oswald. This time period could anytime around around 1960-63. Oswald is either in Russia at this time or in New Orleans. Never the less, he is seen in the presence of CIA operatives, while he is not supposed to have known any under the official story. Oh, if we could just see this film!
There are too many accounts to document here but one of interest is the HSCA testimony of Marita Lorenz. Lorenz, a former lover of Castro became involved with the CIA’s JM/WAVE project, which was the driving force behind the Bay of Pigs operation. She claimed to have met Oswald in a CIA safe house in Florida in April of 1961—when he was supposed to be in Russia. In the transcript one can sense the chagrin of the lawyer questioning her, incredulous at her words. He kept trying to shake her off her testimony but she remained steadfast. Later, she would recant her statements, most likely under the threat of perjury. Of course to change her views like that would be perjury as well but she was never indicted. What she said the first time around certainly had the ring of truth to it, especially when compared to other witness accounts and later day documents showing Oswald was being impersonated.
The Luggage
One last note here on this phase of Oswald’s life. Upon arriving with wife and baby in New York, a welfare caseworker was assigned to help them. He took note of seven bags, as he had to help move them from the ship to the hotel they were staying at. Shortly thereafter, when they were taken to the airport, only five bags were available. When asked, Oswald said that two were shipped ahead of them via train. Later when brother Robert arrived at the Ft Worth airport to pick them up there were only three bags to collect. So two bags were missing after landing in New York and two more bags were missing after they returned to Texas, a total of four. Yet neither Lee nor Marina ever complained of missing luggage—an odd occurrence to say the least. What happened here?
Although Marina maintained they were never separated on their trans-Europe train trip to Holland, their passport stamps tell a different story. At the East Berlin border crossing Marina’s passport is stamped. Lee’s is not stamped till they get to the German/Belgium border. Documentation that he crossed from east to west is not recorded. It has been speculated that he was taken aside and debriefed at this point by military intelligence, possibly ONI. It may also be that he was given four extra bags with intelligence files in them to act as a currier. (Later, CIA officer Hunter Leake would say he hired Oswald as a currier in New Orleans in 1963.) Thus, the missing luggage would be no consequence to them.
COMING IN PART 4: High strangeness leads up to the big event.
Sources: Newman, John, Oswald and the CIA; Armstrong, John, Harvey and Lee; McKnight, Gerald, Breach of Trust; Warren Commission Report; Mailer, Norman, Oswald’s Tale, Douglass, James, JFK and the Unspeakable; www.ctka.net (Probe Magazine article archive)
assassination
