The subject of Lee Oswald being impersonated has been an ongoing subject of this blog. The idea of Oswald having a double in play, as part of an intelligence operation, is a valid model, despite the fringe nature of the subject. It calls into question what we can find believable about the events surrounding the assassination of John Kennedy and furthermore, how such an operation could have been withheld from the public for so long.
While the late Vincent Buglosi may bemoan Oswald being impersonated as a wacky conspiracy theory, ironically, the first notion that Oswald was being impersonated originates in the government itself.
The Smoking Memo
At some point in time FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover discovered from a source that a possibility existed that Lee H. Oswald may have been impersonated. He directed a memo to Department of State officials, dated June of 1960, inquiring about this issue. It is important to note that the memo was sent to the State Department officials in the American Embassy in Moscow–not the officials in Washington, DC. From this, we see Hoover’s early interest in Lee Oswald's defection and living in the USSR.
What response Hoover got back in return is unknown.
The researcher that uncovered this document, Jones Harris, once told me that this memo should never have been released. It reveals too much about what is going on behind the scenes with the important and powerful people such as Hoover, and what they were thinking about regarding Lee Oswald, who at this point was a Person of Interest. It also gives us a hint that something else is going on with the young Marine defector. It exposes that Hoover lied when he stated at the time of the assassination that the FBI knew little regarding Lee Oswald, when in effect, Hoover had taken a keen interest in him early on. Most likely as early as 1959, the year Oswald defected to the Soviet Union.
Senator Richard Russell
Another victim of Lyndon Johnson’s arm-twisting, the senior senator from Georgia was a reluctant member of the Warren Commission. He would shortly after joining be the second member of the government to learn of Oswald being impersonated. Sen. Russell would become the Commission member with the lowest attendance at Commission hearings. He was a powerful and influential member of the Senate and was obviously a very busy man.
However, it may also be understood that the Commission was nothing more than a dog and pony show for public consumption. The Commission’s work was time limited and they were dependent on evidence being supplied by various agencies of the government, many not that forthcoming. As Commission member John Jay McCloy once told researcher Jones Harris, the Commission suffered from not having full disclosure (and Earl Warren would say as much to the New York Times in 1964).
Despite Sen. Russell’s lack of attendance at Commission hearings he launched his own behind the scenes investigation, which was largely centered on Oswald. For this effort he contacted Colonel Philip Corso, of military intelligence. (Yes, that same Colonel Corso of Roswell crash fame.)
Col. Corso knew people. One person he knew well was William Sullivan of the FBI’s Domestic Intelligence Division. Sullivan reported back to Corso that there were two birth certificates for Lee Harvey Oswald. This explains why Oswald’s birth certificate has never been officially released. There is more than one!
Corso’s next source was Francis Knight of the U.S. Passport Office. There, he learned from Knight that there were two passports issued to Lee H. Oswald and two different people had used them both.
From this we have two more important government officials that knew of Oswald being impersonated. Or else something really unusual was going on regarding this young man, a fellow billed as a loser and malcontent. Deep in the Federal bureaucracy there was a special interest in this man and paperwork, real or fabricated, was being created for his background. It was the crafting of a Legend.
It is unknown what Sen. Russell’s reaction was to learning of Oswald’s two birth certificates and the two passports being issued under Oswald’s name. He apparently shared none of this information with the Commission at large. He most likely knew for certain that the Warren Commission was never going to get to the truth with these issues.
In an interview conducted by researcher Jones Harris, Sen. Russell told Harris his belief that there was a conspiracy in the assassination of John F. Kennedy (Sen. Cooper said this as well in a separate interview). Apparently the Georgia Senator’s conspiratorial views may have stemmed from what he learned from Col. Corso.
So the first opposition to the Warren Report was from within the Commission itself.
And the suspicion that Lee Oswald was being impersonated originates in the government by people notconsidered to be “Conspiracy Theorists.”
Sources
Col. Philip Corso’s conversation with John Armstrong.
John Armstrong, Harvey and Lee, p. 362
Interviews conducted by Jones Harris were told to the author of this article.
The Hoover Memo
http://digitalcollections.baylor.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/po-arm/id/41952/rec/8
The Hoover Memo
http://digitalcollections.baylor.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/po-arm/id/41952/rec/8
