Book Review: JFK: The CIA, Vietnam, and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy by L. Fletcher Prouty

The hidden history of the Vietnam War

“We do not have precise answers as to why we gave U.S arms to Ho Chi Minh in 1945 and then a few years later provided Ho’s enemy, the French, with $3 billion of our arms. The situation is not supposed to be clear.”

L. Fletcher Prouty

The tile to L. Fletcher Prouty’s second and last book is a bit misleading. While Prouty does cover the JFK assassination and provides a good rationale for his murder by a gang of plotters, he spends a great deal of time in an area he knows very intimately–Vietnam. During his stellar career in the Air Force he was involved with clandestine operations there, going back to the early 1950’s when the French were still there and involved in a ground war with Ho Chi Minh’s army. Prouty provides the proper historical context the launched the war and why the Untied States got involved in the first place. And in Prouty’s view it started with the CIA’s involvement there. John Kennedy early on saw what the CIA was capable of doing behind his back with the Bay of Pigs fiasco. He saw the ramping up for war in Indochina and his attempts to thwart it by his signing of National Security Action Memorandum (NSAM) #263 which would have gotten our forces out of Vietnam by 1965.

But Kennedy died, his successor Lyndon Johnson signed a NSAM of his own countermanding the order, and the rest is sad and tragic history.

The CIA and Vietnam
The final role towards the end of Colonel L. Fletcher Prouty’s military career was as liaison officer between the Joint Chiefs at the Pentagon and the CIA. He covers this in great detail in his book, The Secret Team, an excellent look into how the military-industrial-intelligence establishment works within the confines of the National Security State. In that book, Prouty shows the barrier between intelligence and the military becomes so blurred it’s hard to tell where one begins and the other ends. While The Secret Team may appear to be a dull read for some, but if you can pay attention long enough, the reader will be awarded with some amazing anecdotes and a glimpse of the behind the scenes maneuvering of intelligence operations.

The CIA under Allen Dulles went from being a “quiet arm of intelligence” for the president and expands instead into a covert action agency capable of overthrowing democratically elected governments and installing puppets that will be more friendly towards United States interests, mainly business. The Cold War against communism is the stated outward goal but there is a lot more going on out of sight which amounts to a high stake, deadly poker game.

One thing I found surprising was to learn is that the CIA was in control of all United State’s military operations in Vietnam from 1954 to 1965, when the Marines officially took over. You will not read that in most history books. You will not see that on any documentaries about the Vietnam War on TV. It’s part of the hidden history that every so often gets out. And our meddling there actually goes as far back to 1945 when the Japanese withdrew and the French, who had long been there using it as a colony moved back in to a people that thought their time for independence had come. Not exactly a view shared by the French and their business interests. From then to 1975, Indochina existed in a state of war in one form or another.

Of course, this all raises other questions. For example, when and how did the CIA get the authority, obviously not Constitutional, to conduct military operations using military personnel around the world as they saw fit? Col. Proudy tells us. The other secretive agency, the National Security Council didn’t want the military to have the responsibility of doing covert operations. So it was handed to the CIA in the NCS 10/2 Directive. However, they didn't have the men for combat operations so that gave birth to Special Forces, such as the Green Berets and the other outfits that followed.

Prouty tells us that Eisenhower was leery of this arrangement and he wrote the following note on the 10/2 Directive:

“At no time will the CIA be provided with more equipment, etc., than is absolutely necessary for the support of the operation directed and such support will always be limited to the requirements of that single operation.”

Well, that sounds reasonable even though Eisenhower might as well jotted down his desires to Santa Claus. Things went to hell by the time the Bay of Pigs invasion crashed and burned. And it’s gotten no better over time. It’s mirrored in the early combat operations conducted after the 9-11 attacks in Afghanistan which were operated by the CIA. The ongoing drone missile attacks are a further extension of that. It is now known they are running their own prisons in foreign countries. What is the legal and Constitutional basis for this? Because they can? Yes, of course–because they can. And Lord knows who are in this prisons and what treatment they are getting, or how many have died there, or what their faces look like.

Going back to Vietnam, Prouty views it as two-sided civil war. One side is the communists waging war against the non-communists. The second side is the forced relocation (from a Geneva peace accord) of the northern people, the Tonkinese Vietnamese, 1.1 million strong to south Vietnam. A different people with a different culture and religion (Catholic as opposed to the southerns that were Buddhist), they over whelmed the infrastructure of the south. Prouty sees this as one of the major causes for the war in Vietnam. From this, the Viet Kong guerrilla army emerges. And not because they start out being communists, but because they fear being pushed out by the Northerners and took up arms against them in order to survive. Into this cauldron is sent the young blood of this nation to be shredded. First with special forces and later the Marines.

L. Fletcher Prouty wants us to know it’s a war the CIA got us into. And John
Kennedy saw it coming by issuing NSAM #263 which Proudy says he helped coauthor.

The End Result
Despite being such a good chronicler of the entanglement of the Vietnam war
and John Kennedy’s behind the scenes struggles with power brokers, L. Fletcher Prouty stumbles a bit here and there. For example, he lists one of the ships involved in the Bay of Pigs invasion listed as the Zapata, but none where. Look at the declassified CIA memo HERE to see the ships involved. In another section I found odd was the account of Richard Nixon and where he was on the day of the assassination. It’s quite well documented that he was in Dallas the night before, for a Pepsi bottler’s convention, Nixon being the lead council, and flew out the day of, at 9:00 A.M. Yet Prouty insists that Nixon was in Dallas at the moment of the assassination which would put him there at past noon. It simply can’t be from everything that has been published on the case. True, Nixon does change his story many times in regarding to his actions on that day. So I was mystified as to why Prouty would get this wrong since he is generally spot-on with the other issues he deals with. Basically, I get the feeling he is more versed with the issues he dealt with personally in his military career, both as a participant and an observer. Never the less, it is odd he makes these sort of mistakes in his accounting as he seems spot on with everything else.

Though the book has “JFK” in the title and his picture on the cover, there is not much here in regards to his death or a conspiracy. You’ll read more about that in Oliver Stone’s forward (the director of JFK would model the Mr. X character after Prouty).

L. Fletcher Proudy comes off as the honest insider. Everything he says that he has experience with and first hand knowledge of, has a ring of truth to it. And you can be sure it’ll be something you never read anywhere else or thought of before.


Paperback: 416 pages
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing (November 1, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1602397317
ISBN-13: 978-1602397316
Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 1.3 inches

Errata
The latest version of JFK: The CIA, Vietnam, and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy has a new and additional forward by Jesse Ventura.

The Secret Team
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1602392293/ref=rdr_ext_sb_ti_sims_1

The Blabber Mouth Theory

“Probably no one seriously involved in investigating UFO reports has escaped the hydra-headed debunking machine and its many busy attendants.”

Bud Hopkins

“In Washington they say, if two people know, it can’t be a secret.”

John B. Alexander

Though I only have a casual interest in the UFO phenomena I was intrigued with a recent broadcast (2/20/11) on Coast to Coast AM, hosted by George Knapp with retired Colonel John B. Alexander and his new book, UFOs: Myths, Conspiracies, and Realities. A lot of his comments reminded me of the Warren Commission’s defenders and their arguments against conspiracy. Col. Alexander, a career military officer, was involved with intelligence and many esoteric endeavors such as the “men staring at goats” experiment and other government program weirdness. Along the way, he got an interest in UFOs and was allowed to launch a study group. Yes, the Army version of the X-Files! He interviewed everybody within the National Security index and those in the military-industrial side as well. Alexander comes across as affable, very knowledgable and sincere, open minded with an air of authority on which he speaks.

However, his conclusions are forgone; while Alexander admits there are solid cases such as the Phoenix Lights and Rendlesham Forest incident he says there is no formal government policy to cover-up the UFOs. (I wonder if he would assume the same about conspiracy with JFK’s death?) When it comes to the realities, the main stories of the lore are the myths. There is no perceived threat to National Security so no need to get involved. In other words, I’ve looked into it and there is nothing to it–trust me–don’t worry your little head over it.

A closer examination of his statements reveals him to be another servant of the National Security State with the same old flat arguments. In many ways he maneuvers like any Kennedy conspiracy debunker, though a more gentlemanly version of one. He doesn’t resort to Bugliosi-style sarcasm and verbal abuse. Gosh, it would be nice to see a JFK anti-conspiracy debunker with this much class and seemingly fair mindedness. He portrays the man of the Open Mind though all the while, we know he’s not going to go along with any major assertions. The Phoenix Lights event he’ll acknowledge is a real phenomena but ultimately a mystery requiring more investigation. The major cannons of UFOlogy, such as the MJ-12 docs and the Roswell crash, are dismissed as hoaxes. Come what may, virtually no Warren Commission supporter will walk this fine a line. It’s all or nothing with that gang.

Everything In Washington Leaks
“Everything in Washington leaks,” says Alexander. Here is ground that has been plowed too many times. The good Colonel resembles a Warren Commission acolyte. How many times has this slogan been trotted out? Okay, how does the CIA, NSA, DIA, ONI and many other agencies stay in business? They should be gone by now if they had this many leakers. This old, tired, “nobody can keep a secret” nonsense is the classic argument against these controversies and has long been used against the JFK conspiracy researchers. Ironic that it comes from Colonel Alexander, himself being an intelligence officer with access to classified information. Has he blabbed anything? How insulting a question! That is wrong in so many different ways I could write a whole blog posting on that issue alone.

In the National Security State secrecy is the foundation of the security. In Colonel L. Flecher Prouty’s books, The Secret Team and JFK, compartmentalization is the key to containing and maintaining secret operations. Prouty would be in the loop since he was the liaison officer between the CIA and the Joint Chiefs at the Pentagon. He’s one of the insiders that let us know how the National Security State functions. One can see quite a difference between the two Colonels and how they view this issue. Prouty on one hand illustrates the need for concealment of information and operations and the processes and procedures that make it work; Alexander acts like there are no methods or procedures in place at all or if there are, they are useless. Because of this, I sense a great deal more truthfulness with Prouty. Alexander acts like these things are boring and ho-hum, striped of mystery and intrigue. He knows better.

The Blabber Mouth Theory
Another issue Col. Alexander breaches is that there isn’t any secrets that are “Above Top Secret” that the President as Commander in Chief isn’t privy to. There is if you simply don’t tell him! Kennedy ordered the CIA to stand down on assassination attempts on Castro but they didn’t–nor did they tell Kennedy anything about their ongoing operations against Cuba or for that matter what they were doing in running all military operations in Vietnam until the Marines took over in 1965. And most telling is when Jimmy Carter asked for the CIA’s UFO information and the director, at the time George Bush, told him to go to Congress. In brief, he was dead-ended. So was Bill Clinton’s early AG, Webster Hubble which Mr. Clinton asked him to look into the Kennedy assassination. He ran into the wall too. Alexander makes no mention of Carter’s run-in with the Secret Team as he wants everything to be normal to the point of dullness. Of course it’s not.

I once worked with a guy once that worked in the inner halls of government. He knew everybody from Ronald Reagan to Linda Tripp. And he admitted there were levels of classification so high the President wasn’t privy to them. He thought it was a good thing. I of course, did not. To witness Alexander deny this is quite telling and lends plausibility to his critics that he is a disinformation agent.

Col. Alexander was so adamant about people not keeping secrets George Knapp asked him, “So you’re of the belief that nobody can keep a secret...even by the military?” That’s when Alexander responds with the quote above about two people knowing something then it’s no longer a secret, which is ridiculous. One of the main jobs of intelligence operatives, both military and civilian, is the collecting and keeping of secrets. He knows it and backpedals a bit by saying that a secret can be kept for a “short period of time.” Perhaps he thought better of impugning the integrity of those people working in intelligence that work hard at keeping information under wraps and in some cases put their lives on the line to do so.

Besides, there is a certain prestige associated with keep information concealed. I’ve signed three nondisclosure agreements in the course of my professional life. I’ve never spilled the beans on any of them, even now with two of those projects no longer operational. In the military there is little prestige as violating a signed oath is rewarded with prison time, as the Navy enlisted men found out after the John Kennedy’s autopsy. They all had to sign nondisclosure agreements and were all read the riot act if they ever breathed a word of what they saw and experienced that night. (Fortunately, those former Navy personnel that were interviewed for the ARRB in the late 1990s were given a waiver. That’s how we know about the ordering of the signed secrecy agreements.)

Be that as it may, the Blabber Mouth Theory holds no value and is a weak argument that is constantly used against conspiracy advocates. People do conspire, that is why it’s criminalized.

The Debunking Way
UFO investigator Bud Hopkins in his article, Deconstructing the Debunkers: A Response, made the following point:


“It’s long been understood that debunking and skepticism are two very different things, the former, an artifact of rigid ideology and the latter an objective, scientifically-inclined position.”

That is what it appears. Though over time it seems that both debunking and skepticism has involved into the same thing. A rigid mindset whose purpose is to scoff, downplay and discredit controversial claims and beliefs. In this case, controversial since it doesn’t go along with the flow. Such as when people don’t believe what government investigators tell them about a plane crash (flight 800), an assassination (JFK, RFK, MLK, MX), a bombing (Murrah Building) and a terrorist attack (9-11). The Ruling Class does not like us exposing their deceit. So on the offensive they go, either from volunteers or paid shills. People like skeptic Michael Shermer publish a magazine to support the status quo and make a career out of it. Whatever the government says is the gospel for these people. Only the critics get scanned for their claims or errors. And of course to the Shermer crowd, the critics are always wrong.

So debunking and skepticism is really a means to an end. The way the Ruling Class defends its turf. Just say the words, you don’t have to mean them. They will sound good. In the mix, real history and what actually happened gets lost in a maze of trails. It’s lensed through the words of the winners and the losers have to fight for shelf space. With the rise of the Internet everybody has the ability to self-publish and self-broadcast. Now both sides can square off and do battle for what represents the truth. One good thing is they will no longer be able to edit the tape so Orville Nix is heard saying that he heard shots coming from the building and not the grassy knoll–and it was the knoll he heard shots from–and he is left with no platform to refute the deception.

It’s so nice to be truly free. While it lasts.


Sources
Prouty, L, Fletcher, The Secret Team and JFK; Marvin, Daniel, Expendable Elite

Coast To Coast AM Radio Show
http://www.coasttocoastam.com

Bud Hopkins, Deconstructing the Debunkers: A Response
http://www.intrudersfoundation.org/Deconstruct.html

It’s All In The Theater!

“Is everything a conspiracy? No. Only the important stuff.”

Jeff Wells, Rigorous Intuition

People often lose sight of the irony of Lee Harvey Oswald, a man arrested in a theater, in essence spent his time on earth playing a form of real theater--Cold War Theater. Inspired by the TV show, I Led Three Lives, Oswald now plays it out in real life. He plays such roles as the malcontent, the loser, the loner, the friend, the Marine, the Marxist, the jerk, the family man, the Cold War spy, and finally the assassin, all rolled up in one. And very few of these roles are real. In this light we see the maze of a contradictory life coming together in one almost cohesive whole. It’s still disorderly, with mysteries forever abounding, but at least get a glimpse of what played out, those very things they don’t want us to ever know, as our history becomes one massive National Security Secret.

Marine Days
It starts out in the Marines when Oswald’s medical records indicate he was treated for contracting gonorrhea. As the record states, “In line of duty, not due to own misconduct.” The phrase itself is fascinating. Nothing more heroic as catching the clap in service to one’s country. Where did the doctor get the nerve to write such a thing? He was most likely ordered to as contracting an STD is normally grounds for dismissal from the service at that time. Apparently somebody needed him to do more than just operate a radar station and gave him a pass on these indiscretions. Like they did with his two court marshals.

More peculiarities abound because when he was being diagnosed and treated for gonorrhea. His health records state he was treated seven times in September and early October by the medical staff at Atsugi–only his Marine unit diary says he was not there, but on a ship steaming to Taiwan.

Some have speculated that he may have been flown back and forth but that is highly unfeasible. The records could have been falsified to provide cover for Oswald’s other activities. He has a pattern of taking cover jobs to go about doing other things. And these things leave trails–conflicting and often confusing trails. After all, there are false records in his SIG 201 file at the CIA. Numerous documents in other government agencies play Scrabble with his name in various variations of Oswald Lee, Harvey Oswald, and so on. He has a pattern of “fronting” which leads to doppelganger speculations.

Oswald’s Marine medical records also state that he is given a course of penicillin for tonsillitis. Yet his childhood medical records state he had his tonsils removed at the age of six. It may very well be cover for another infection of gonorrhea. If so, yet again, he’s given another pass and the doctor can’t write the same excuse with a straight face again without being called out.

At times Lee Oswald appears to be not so much a person but a Project.

In Russia
Theater apparently plays well in Russia. Lee Oswald’s journey there, his years there, and his return home are but many segments of the play. While an involved subject I’ll mention only several instances here. One could write a whole book on the Russian defection phase of Oswald’s life.

First is Oswald’s dumping of his U.S. citizenship. He does so by writing an undated later renouncing it. Actually, to legally surrender U.S. citizenship one must fill out a “Certificate of Loss of Nationality.” Which Oswald never did. His passport files at the State Department would have been flagged. They were not. The handwritten letter meant nothing legally. It’s all for show. This way, should he decide to come back to the United States, or perhaps ordered to do so, he could. And he did. And ultimately, the main decider of who is legally a citizen is the Attorney General. Which of course, was Robert Kennedy.

When his mother asked him why he came back he replied, “Mother, not even Marina knows why I came back.” Well, that’s weird. I guess he couldn’t tell her he was ordered to come back by whoever his handlers were.

(Filling the Certificate of Loss of Nationality, established in 1907, was free till just recently; now the government charges around $400 because so many people started doing it to avoid paying taxes. Also, it is wise to arrange for a passport affiliated with another country should one try something like this.)

Secondly, Oswald vows to spill everything he knows about being a radar operator at the Atsugi airbase in Japan. This is the base where the U2 spy planes were flying out of, where Francis Gary Powers was stationed, and was basically a CIA run operation. It’s been debated about how much Oswald knew while stationed there and how high his security clearance was. In the long run it doesn’t matter–whatever he knew the military had to change out all of their codes upon the news of this landing. A safe move even if Oswald knew nothing.

However, admitting to releasing this information to an arch enemy at the height of the Cold War is a breach of National Security and something that could of gotten Oswald arrested; either at the American Embassy in Moscow or upon his return to the United States. Once again, nobody seems to care.

And when he gets back home they continue not to care when Oswald lands a job at Jagger-Chiles-Stovall, a photography and mapping company that specialized in classified government and military work. Peculiar to the outsider of such things but most likely not if you are a dangle out fronting.

New Orleans
Oswald’s Cold War theater hits its stride in the summer of 1963. By this time the Kennedy administration had survived the Bay of Pigs fiasco in 1961 and the 1962 stand-down with the Soviets over the missiles in Cuba. Lee Oswald has begun his main acting job in the town of his birth. He takes a job at the Reily Coffee Company. According to Judyth Baker, former co-worker, alleged lover and author of Me and Lee, Oswald’s job at the Reily Coffee Company was a cover, with her faking his time cards with the owner’s consent so Lee cold run “ops.” The time cards are in reprinted in her book with her “J” on them. Sounds a bit of a stretch, but Hunter Leake, the second highest CIA official in the New Orleans station gave an interview in the early 1980’s where he said he hired Oswald out as a low level currier and that his presence in New Orleans in the summer of 1963 was at the behest of the CIA. Leake further states that after the assassination he was ordered to collect all files on Oswald and personally deliver them to Langley. The cover up was on.

The Fair Play for Cuba Committee drama was the apex of Oswald’s activities durning this period. Using his alias, Alek Hidell, Oswald becomes the one-man branch of the outfit. Just about everything going on with this is phony. He’s seen all over the place handing out pamphlets, some with addresses of people such as Guy Bannister, staunch anti-communist, and some with no addresses at all. No fellow travelers are going to be able to get in touch with him by doing this. He contacts Carlos Bringuier, of the DRE, the Cuban anti-Castro organization (financed and directed by the CIA) and offers his services as a former Marine to help them in their training. He gets rebuffed. Later, he mets up with Bringuier and two other Cubans (all three, being FBI informants) and engages in his famous street scuffle on Canal Street which gets him arrested with press coverage to establish his public credentials of being a communist. This will be blazed to the world after the assassination. His trip to the DRE appears to be a fishing expedition; after all, what pro-Castro guy would want to help out the very group that is out to overthrow his man? To add to the fakery he writes a letter to the FPCC headquarters in New York relating the incident. However, the letter is postmarked 5 days before altercation takes place. Oops! Nothing like having your own secret agent man with hidden psychic powers!

Later, Oswald will appear on a radio debate program, Conversation Carte Blanche, with Carlos Bringuier, Bill Stuckey and Edward Butler (all three men are affiliated with the government in some capacity). Bringuier gave Oswald a hard time about his years in Russia and his communist background. In a major “oops” moment he blurted out the following: “I was under the protection of the....that is to say, I was was not under the protection of the American government.” In the transcript of this in the Warren Commission evidence volumes, the part above in bold is edited out. It’s only in listening to the original recording can this be heard.

Sometimes the truth outs. Oswald’s misspoken comment and quick turn-around is reminiscent of Secretary of Defense William Rumsfeld’s blurting out at a press conference that indeed, the plane that crashed in Shanksburg was shot down. It’s a quick peek behind the curtain. Was it a Freudian slip or was it real?

The Long Road Beyond
There are many more instances of Lee Oswald being an actor, albeit a small one on a much larger stage in the 1960s and on two continents. From Russia, to New Orleans, to the mysterious trip to Mexico, Oswald’s seemingly haphazard life does feature hints of direction. His actions in the summer of 1963, while appearing devoid of purpose and at times batty, is the window dressing. In his things after the assassination was found a rough draft of a speech. It’s decidedly anti-communist. A curious find for someone so ideologically bent against capitalism and the free enterprise system. Is that crudely drafted speech a glimpse of the real man behind the curtain?

It’s all a collection of footprints in the sand. Follow the trail.

Sources
Bugliosi, Vincent, Reclaiming History; Mars, Jim, Crossfire; Baker, Judyth, Me & Lee; Armstrong, John, Harvey and Lee; Garrison, James, On the Trail of the Assassins

A Long Road From Kilgallen To Casolaro

“The Octopus – Eight people who changed the course of the world, a real life “Mission Impossible” team whose gifts exploited the secret empires of rouge spy networks, big oil and organized crime.”

Handwritten note of Danny Casolaro

"That story isn't going to die as long as there's a real reporter alive, and there are a lot of them alive."

Dorothy Kilgallen

“What very few historians or other people have grasped is that intelligence has been institutionalized in our country. When the CIA was invented in 1947, we began to encrypt our history. The CIA charter said it shall be an ‘engine of conspiracy...’ ”

Jim Hougan, noted expert on Intelligence

As always, there is a pattern to the way things work in the world. When you focus not so much on events and deep politics, and on the investigators themselves, another pattern emerges. The pattern of those people that get too close to the truth. And two such people were national columnist and What’s My Line regular Dorothy Kilgallen and journalist Danny Casolaro. Both died under mysterious circumstances, Kilgallen from an alleged accidental drug overdose and Casolaro from an alleged suicide. Both said shortly before their deaths they were on the verge of big breakthroughs in their investigations. For Kilgallen, it was her research into the death of John Kennedy. For Casolaro, he was deep into investigating the theft of Inslaw’s PROMIS software. Both received warnings and death threats for their involvement with these investigations.

You Can’t Know Everybody’s Business
For many years the CIA issued an assassination handbook to each new intelligence officer. (It is unknown if it is still issued.) It mentioned various methods, guns, knives, stealth and so on. It also had sections on making the assassination look like an accident. Simulated suicide of a victim is not mentioned though seems like a viable method along with many mentioned in the manual. As stated in section #2, Accidents:

“For secret assassination, either simple or chase, the contrived accident is the most effective technique. When successfully executed, it causes little excitement and is only casually investigated...”

The key point is “casually investigated.” And that was certainly the case in Kilgallen’s death. The NYPD never interviewed the hairdresser that discovered her body. Suicides and accidental drug overdoses more than anything else provide cover. But, nothing is perfect and loose ends generally abound. Such as the suicide victim that is left handed but the gun is found in the right hand. Or in Danny Casolaro’s case, an aversion to blood and then found almost drowning in it.

So you can’t completely know everybody’s business, their personal habits, likes and dislikes. So if you wanted to off somebody and make it look like an accident or a suicide there are always going to be something out of place.

Two Bodies, Two Paths, Same Trail
Danny Casolaro was found in a Sheridan Hotel room tub filled with his own blood, his wrists deeply slit in August of 1991. His brother Tony, a doctor, pointed out that Danny was terrified of blood or anything to do with it. To take his own life that way and perish in his own blood is unconscionable. Oddly, his body was quickly embalmed without the Casolaro family’s consent. An autopsy was performed and traces of two antidepressants, Hydrocodone and Tricyclic were found in his system. Danny was never known to use drugs of this nature. They never found any prescriptions for them or medicine bottles for such drugs. No other drugs were found in his system. The only health problem discovered were Multiple Sclerosis lesions found on the brain. There was no past indication of any mental health issues. Being a writer there was nothing in his notes of having such issues.

On the other hand, if the death of Dorothy Kilgallen was a faked overdose of alcohol and barbiturates, it was done by people that had little knowledge of her or her personal habits. Dorothy’s body was discovered by her hairdresser, Marc Sinclaire on the morning of November 8, 1965. Immediately he knew things were wrong when he discovered her in the third floor bedroom of the townhouse–normally she slept in the fifth floor bedroom. She was found sitting up in bed, still wearing her make-up, false eyelashes, false hair piece and earrings from the previous night’s TV show. Normally, she would never go to bed in this state. She was not wearing her regular pajamas, but instead a blue matching peignoir and robe. A book was on her bed, but upside down, a book she finished reading two weeks earlier. Her reading glasses were nowhere near. The air conditioning was on though there was no need for it being a crisp fall morning in Manhattan.

The autopsy showed her to be in overall good health, but tests found her to be over the legal limit for alcohol consumption. The cause of death would be ruled as "acute ethanol and barbiturate intoxication, circumstances undetermined." However, in 1968, a newer method of chemical detection was developed and using Kilgallen’s saved tissue samples, proved that she died of a lethal mix of three barbiturates: secobarbital, amobarbital and pentobarbital. Acute barbiturate intoxication indeed! It should be noted her favorite drink included the ingredient, quinine, which can be used to mask the taste of barbiturates. Nevertheless, these drugs were never found in her home and like Casolaro, there were no prescriptions or pill boxes for these drugs.

Even more peculiar was the name of the pathologist that appeared on the death certificate. Dr. James Luke, a New York City medical examiner, did the autopsy. However, another physician, Dr. Dominick DiMaio had his name signed on the death certificate. When questioned about this Dr. DiMaio said he didn’t know why his name was signed there as he was not working out of Manhattan. As he said in a 1995 interview in Midwest Today magazine, “I was in Brooklyn. Are you sure I signed it? I don't see how the hell I could have signed it in the first place. You got me." If this is true, his name was forged.

Missing Files
Incidentally, upon their deaths, both people had their research papers and files disappear. It’s odd because there is no reason for it. If Casolaro did commit suicide, then what did he do with his briefcase that he always carried with him? (While his briefcase may have vanished, his other files and notes were at his apartment not bothered. His family retrieved them.) The disappearance of documentation is suspicious as it’s unrelated to the event but too important a piece of evidence just to fade into nothing. If he was not murdered and made to look like something else, such as an accident or a suicide, then why do these important things go missing?

With Kilgallen her death is considered an accidental drug overdose. If that is so, then why does her JFK research file disappear upon her death? It was unknown what it contained but she did the last known interview with Jack Ruby and her file most likely contained the notes of that interview. The FBI has shown an interest when they found out her son was searching for the file in 1975, ten years after her demise. They inquired of him if he had found it yet; he had not and evidently never did. Notice the FBI, supposedly having solved the case within 24 hours in 1963, still has an interest in her files. What more could they possibly learn from that?

With Casolaro there is the cut wrists, the razor blades and the suicide note. The cause of death and the resulting evidence looks straight forward despite several kinks. The same with Kilgallen in how her body was found. It all comes down to the missing documents. The missing files are the most suspicious part of this type of event and create an air of intrigue, a sense that there is more going on than meets the eye. If the files had not gone missing there is nothing to ponder save the tragedy of the event.

Convergence
Wikipedia, in their entry on Danny Casolaro states his investigation of the Octopus is a “conspiracy theory.” Seems to me, a theory can’t get you killed or cause your things to vanish. Wikipedia, while a good source for quick information is a New Media online outlet that in many ways operates like the Old Media did, or what is left of it still does. Read what you will about JFK, 9-11, or the Octopus with caution. You will only get part of the story from whomever the anonymous posters are.

Cheri Seymour, author of the The Last Circle, probably the best book on the Casolaro/Octopus/Inslaw affair, chronicles just how deep a conspiracy it really was and how deep it runs and branches out into so many other areas of lawless activity. She interviewed many of the same people as Casolaro did and gathered much of the same facts and documentation, if not more. To try and put this complicated story simply, the Inslaw company developed a database program called PROMIS which through a series of maneuvers, was pirated by the Department of Justice, reengineered with a backdoor and sold by the government to spy on other governments around the world, friends or not. Seymour eventually shows how PROMIS could be used for international money laundering from illegal drug trafficking. Sounds pretty wacky, huh? Just read it and check out her documents in the back. If you can read her book and not see a criminal conspiracy in operation here, then you can’t handle the truth of the way the world actually works.

Dorothy Kilgallen on the other hand seems to get better treatment though they have to use the John McAdams as a source, which leads to an article by an McAdams’ acolyte, Eric Paddon. Staying in style, it presents just enough information to make a Warren Commission critic appear to be a kook, in this case, Kilgallen, which is easy to do by selectively editing the facts as Paddon does. That is the M.O. of these guys whether it is McAdams, Paddon, Bugliosi and Posner–they are all cherry pickers of the evidence. They have to be in order to make it all work out right. Too bad they don’t put the government’s claims under the same withering inspection. I won’t go into the Kilgallen piece here, not because the evidence presented is so damning–but more of an issue of why bother haggling with such closed minds that use selective fact checking to build a case on something. Nevertheless, most of the controversial things I’ve mentioned here you won’t read on Wikipedia about this case.

By and by, Wikipedia serves to enforce the views of the status quo on the Internet under the guise of the free flow of information.

Summary
In Kilgallen and Casolaro we have two diligent and brave truth seekers that both met untimely deaths just as they were about to pull the covers off of closely held secrets and there is much here to tie them in a pattern. It is more or less the same pattern investigators of high crimes and deep politics stumble into. I just don’t understand why people in this line of work, when playing ball with the Big Boys, don’t find better ways of protecting themselves. At least have a can of pepper spray available if you are not going to carry a gun. Bad people know there are lines the good people won’t cross–and they use that to their advantage.

Whether both were murdered or not is still a matter of speculation. One can never know for sure till new witnesses come forward or new evidence is discovered. However, if they were both murdered it was of no use in the long run as killing journalists does not stop the pursuit of the truth. As Dorothy Kilgallen wrote about the assassination of JFK, "That story isn't going to die as long as there's a real reporter alive, and there are a lot of them alive."

Amen! Indeed. It goes on forever.


Sources
Seymour, Cheri, The Last Circle; Proudy, Fletcher, L, The Secret Team; Gordon, Thomas, Secrets and Lies

A Tour of the Dallas Police Department Archives

(Updated here:  https://georgebailey.substack.com/p/a-tour-of-the-dallas-police-department)

Dallas Police Department Files Reveal Their Secrets...And Mysteries

Ever since it was announced that the Dallas Police Department was going to be placing their JFK evidence online (link HERE), I’ve been meaning to go through it and finally did. It’s a rather tedious task. The layout of the web page is certainly last century; there is no search though an index is provided. The links on the page are listed as boxes, and clicking those links takes one to another page filled with links for the scanned documents in GIF format. There is a code number for each GIF supposedly related to each box. But that is so jumbled up that some files that should be in Box 10 are actually in Box 15. The photographs are the worst part; they are badly scanned and for all purposes, unusable. For much better copies of the photos you have to go the online archive at The Portal to Texas History web site (linked HERE). Some of the other scanned documents are unreadable, some are blank pages, and many are a rambling series of seemingly unnecessary duplicates. Never the less, even a blind hog can find an acorn and there are quite a few to be found here. So, after plodding through most of them during the holidays I have created this post as list of the highlights. Some of this is trivia, some a new take on old evidence and other items are just flat-out mysterious. Who knows, maybe some of this stuff is only of interest to me, but I’m hoping some of the information presented here will be of some enlightenment to readers and researchers. J. D. Tippet’s Personnel File Officer Tippet’s personnel file makes for an interesting read. Just about everything is listed in Box 8 and also Boxes 16-17. He joined the Dallas Police Department in 1952. First off is J. D. Tippet’s Rorschach evaluation conducted by H. M. Chapman. Here it is in full: “This man appears to be wholly devoid of any imaginative facilities. His percepts are predominantly the most common. His range of interest and achievements is quite limited, seen in his very narrow associational content. He takes little note of rare and unusual stimuli in his environment. His mental functioning is highly stereotyped. In conformity, he is within the limits of the average in that his thinking corresponds with that of the community at large. However, he proceeds occasionally with alogical reactions. His grip on reality is below the average. Errors of judgment may be expected. On two occasions he resorted to edging while handling the cards. This is a very unhealthy sign. Only a single overt expression of feeling is revealed. This, however, is at the stable level and gives a slight indication of warm social contact.” It starts out harsh but ends on one final, positive sentence. The “Errors of judgment may be expected...” did indeed happen. See below for those instances. Tippet did display courage in life threatening situations many times during the course of his law enforcement career although this psych test seems to be little concerned with that attribute. Officer Tippet suffered many injuries as a policeman. This includes such injuries as a dog bite, an ice pick in the knee (ouch!), and a punch in the eye while trying to arrest a suspect. The most life threatening occurred on September 2, 1955, at 12:30 A.M., when Tippet and a fellow officer confronted a very drunken Leonard Garland outside of a club. Garland pulled a semi-automatic pistol, stuck it in Tippet’s face and said, “Stick’em up.” He didn’t and Garland attempted to fire his pistol but he had the safety on. This error allowed Tippit and his partner to draw their service revolvers and fire, killing Garland. The records indicate no internal investigation for this incident and in fact, Tippet was nominated for a departmental award. Quite a change from the way things are handled today! It was of course, an action of self defense and Tippet was protecting the life of his partner as well. It was later discovered that Leonard Garland was wanted by the FBI. Reports indicate that J. D. Tippet was reprimanded several times. He accidentally missed two court appearances in a row and was suspended for one day without pay. He had other minor incidences such as losing his police ID and his driver’s license (along with a warrant) and did have a shotgun stolen out of an unlocked squad car. To be fair, his file contains many notes of praise for his work, helping to return stolen items, being courteous and professional, etc. Overall, J. D. Tippet’s records indicate he was a good police officer, and most certainly among the very brave. The Mauser Rifle Report Box 2 features the signed and sworn affidavit of Deputy Constable Seymour of the discovery of a 7.25mm, bolt-action Mauser rifle at approximately 1:22 P.M., on the day of the assassination and his resulting report on it. An old story in the annuals of the Kennedy assassination, the discovery of a different rifle than Oswald’s Mannlicher-Carcano launches into one of the many controversies in the case. Discovered by Deputy Sheriff Eugene Boone in the northwest corner of the sixth floor, it was identified as a Mauser by him, Deputy Constable Seymour Weitzman, and Deputy Sheriff Roger Craig. What is striking is officer Weitzman’s detailed account of what the rifle looked like. He specifically mentioned the power of the scope as being 4/18 in optical range, the same as Oswald’s Mannlicher-Carcano scope. He also mentioned it has a thick sling attached to it. He and Deputy Sheriff Eugene Boone found the rifle between some boxes in the northwest corner of the sixth floor. Deputy Sheriff Roger Craig was there and also identified the rifle as a Mauser. Deputy Boone executed a signed affidavit (not included with the Dallas files) that the rifle was a Mauser as well. Weitzman said he handed the weapon over to Captain Fritz who then ejected a live round from the gun and for a while, publicly stated the gun found was a Mauser. (Later, this story would be changed to ejecting a live round from a Mannlicher-Carcano.) Later, this whole story evolves into Oswald’s Mannlicher-Carcano with three spent 6.5mm spent hulls on the floor. It is a mystery as to why. All three of these police officers in their Warren Commission testimony mention finding a Mauser. Officer Seymour Weitzman ran a sporting goods store on the side and was very experienced with firearms. It’s hard to believe he would so badly misidentify a firearm like this, a firearm he had probably seen before. Roger Craig said it had “Mauser” stamped on the barrel near the breach. Hard to get that wrong. Also, the affidavit of Weitzman is created on 23rd, the day after the assassination; nobody had gotten to him to have him change his account. He would later give the same description in his Warren Commission testimony. Check out the line of questioning HERE. You’ll notice that the attorney, Mr. Ball, never questions Weitzman in regards to the discrepancy to the weapon type, or how the Mauser morphs into a Mannlicher-Carcano. But later, the Warren Commission will decide that Weitzman and the other officers were simply mistaken. The bottom line–there is no signed or sworn affidavit by any police officer in the Dallas Police archive that documents finding a Mannlicher-Carcano. Jack Ruby’s Arrest Records Box 8 and 15 have Jack Ruby’s prior arrest records. This amounted to minor brushes with the law such as selling booze on Sunday (12-5-54). The more serious encounter involved a handgun. In July 26, 1953 Ruby was spotted with a snub nosed .38 in his pocket. At the time, a businessman was allowed to carry a firearm without a permit so long as he was carrying money derived from his business; the firearm being used for protection from robbery. He was arrested by detective C. W. Deloney. Ruby’s excuse was that simply forgot he had the gun on his person. He bonded out of jail and that was the end of it. Apparently, the snub nosed .38 was the same S&W pistol he would use to kill Lee Oswald with on live TV on November 24, 1963. Big Man Seen With A Gun Also included in the Dallas Police files are files from other departments and in this case, the Dallas County Sheriff’s Department. An affidavit dated 11-22-63, and signed by the witness, Philip Ben Hathaway (Box 15), reports of seeing a man with a gun shortly before the assassination. According to Hathaway, him and three friends were taking off from work to see the parade and were walking up Akard street towards Main, when they saw a large man, dressed in a suit, estimated to be 6’6” or 6’7” and over 250 pounds and walking by headed towards Commerce street. Hathaway said he saw the man carrying what he described as a gun case. He assumed there was a rifle in it as it was of cloth and leather construction and would have been limp without containing anything–he never saw the actual rifle though implied the barrel made an impression against the cloth casing. He also noted how weighty it appeared as the man carried it. A friend remarked to Hathaway that possibly the man was a Secret Service agent. The time this man was seen was 11:50 A.M. Hathaway’s friend, John Stevens R. Lawrence, also present, gave his sworn and signed affidavit to witnessing this individual as well (Box 15). The Secret Service has long maintained they had no agents in Dealey Plaza, only in the follow-up car. So was this the eye witness account of another shooter? Or another sighting of a phony Secret Service agent? Report on Michael and Ruth Paine Box 13 features a background report on Michael and Ruth Paine, written by W. S. Biggio a detective with the Dallas Police Criminal Intelligence Division. It’s stated in the report that the Paine’s moved to Irving, Texas from Malvern, PA in 1959 so Michael could work as an engineer for Bell Helicopter Corp. Prior to moving in 1959 Michael Paine is listed by informant T-1 (FBI) as a self-employed farmer and Ruth Paine as a housewife. Probably no one has made a smoother career shift from farming to aeronautical engineering than Michael Paine! Interestingly, It should also be noted that the Paine’s tax returns from 1956 to 1958 are classified. Mostly likely they would be doing the farming/housewife gig during this time period. Why would the government classify the tax returns of mere farmer and his wife? What were they really up to? The Curtain Rods The most curious piece of evidence listed was a series of small cards in Box 12 documenting attempts to get finger prints off curtain rods. The curtain rod story is supposed to be a total fabrication Lee Oswald allegedly told to Buell Wesley Frazier, his fellow co-worker that drove him to work that morning. Frasier, curious of the package Oswald had with him was told it was curtain rods to be used in his room at the boarding house. It was later concluded that the package contained a disassembled rifle that Oswald allegedly snook into the building that morning for the assassination of President Kennedy. (Please note that the main witness to all of this is Buell Wesley Frazier, and he flunked his polygraph examination, the night of the 22nd. His sworn statement about the rods in Box 2.) Never the less, the story of Lee Oswald lying about the contents of the package, takes root. So it’s quite odd to have in the Dallas Police evidence archives, not only documenting attempts to check for fingerprints, but also vague photographs of the rods with the prints as well. Nothing much is said about it either, just that they took some prints. So it’s a mystery as to where the curtain rods are from, where they were found or for that matter, what happened to them. It’s all just a great big zero. Maybe Oswald was telling the truth after all? (Good quality photographs of the prints from the curtain rods can be seen HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE.) Long Term Interest One thing of note that is evident in the archives is the Dallas Police Department maintained their JFK file long after the assassination. There are various documents spread about involving various investigations and requests for documents not only from the lawyers of the Warren Commission but also later from the House Select Committee on Assassinations in the late 1970s. There is an apparent long-held interest by people such as Chief Curry as he contacts sources, such as the editor of Playboy magazine for a copy of Mark Lane’s 1967 interview. Ironically, for the members of the public that try to contact the Dallas Police Department, with new or interesting information or questions, they basically get the standard brush off. One such individual was Emory Brown, Jr. (Box 8) who got the standard reply from various Dallas Police officials to J. Edgar Hoover himself that stated there was, “a prompt, intensive, objective and thorough investigation of the assassination of President Kennedy.” No conspiracy for them, yet they maintained conspiracy-oriented files such as Lane’s interview with Playboy or other documents in regards to Jim Garrison’s conspiracy angle in the trial of Clay Shaw. Not to mention all of the correspondence, to and from, people like Emory Brown. Miscellaneous Files Box 1 contains a five-page report from the FBI lab in Washington, analyzing some early evidence that the DPD submitted for examination within 24 hours of the assassination. This includes such items as the rifle, the magic bullet (CE399), various bullet fragments both found and taken out of victims, the blanket, bag, and so on. John Armstrong states in his book, Harvey and Lee, that all of the evidence collected in Dallas by the police was submitted to the FBI within 24 hours, examined by them, returned to the DPD, and then “officially” given back to the FBI four days after the assassination. This implies a lot of hanky-panky going on with the evidence. I don’t doubt the chain of evidence was broken in the case but this five-page report shows a less than sinister motive for tampering. In this situation some evidence was handed over rapidly to the FBI but not all. James Hosty in his book Assignment: Oswald, was involved with collecting evidence and boxing it up. He reports none of the shipping back of forth going on. Evidently, some evidence was sent off early to the FBI but not all of it. Box 2 features a report on the Jack Ruby’s rectal probe. Yes, three inches up the wa-zoo of Ruby’s lower G.I. Ouch! The document shows it was ordered by both the DPD and the FBI. That’s what you get for murdering a government operative on live TV, bud. Box 8 has a Report dated 4-20-54 to Chief J. E. Curry from J. H. Sawyer, Inspector of the Police, which features his interview with Mrs. Eva Grant, Jack Ruby’s sister. Apparently she had gotten a copy of a police report, the contents of which she claimed would help her brother, showing Dallas Police officers perjuring themselves in the case. Also of note is she claimed the FBI and the DPD had tapped her phone. Inspector Sawyer tried to dissuade of her this idea but as she said replied, “How else did you know about my getting ahold of this report?” Busted! Box 13 has lists testimonies of numerous employees of the School Book Depository Building. Noted here because Russ Baker on page 112 of his book, Family of Secrets, says the building was empty of tenets six months before the assassination. Not so according to these files which feature up to six long-term employees. One witness, Mrs. Geneva L. Hines had been employed in the building over over six years. Sources Dallas Police Department Archives: http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/ Evidence Photographs - The Portal to Texas History - Dallas Municipal Archives: http://texashistory.unt.edu/explore/partners/DSMA/browse/?start=0&fq=untl_collection%3AJFKDP Seymour Weitzman WC Testimony: http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh7/html/WC_Vol7_0058b.htm

Assignment: Oswald by James P. Hosty, Jr.

Former FBI Agent’s Book Reveals Some Surprises

I’ve read that FBI Special Agent James P. Hosty’s book, Assignment: Oswald, published in 1996 and now out of print, offers some surprising background details on the early turbulent days of the FBI’s investigation of the Kennedy and Tippet murders. Hosty’s account spares no one in this frank description of the events and personalties that shaped the early days of the JFK assassination investigation. James Hosty does a good job at recounting the chaotic scenes in the Dallas FBI headquarters and later, the Dallas Police Department with the gaggle of photographers and newsmen, the chain smoking, coffee swilling detectives, the banging and clanging of the teletype machines and typewriters, to the short fuses of overworked men enduring sleepless nights fueled by caffeine and adrenaline.

Early on Hosty makes this sobering assessment of being in the FBI:

“With time, my idealism waned, and I accepted the hard fact that law enforcement is basically gray. I also came to understand that one of our jobs was to protect the Bureau’s image at all costs, even if it ran roughshod over individuals or principles.”

A candid disclosure to say the least. And therein, lies the problem with the FBI investigating crimes. Their approach will have political angle to it. Hosty clearly illustrates this later when his boss Gordon Shanklin, who he describes as a “damn good man” orders him to destroy evidence in the case. Not once but twice, with a third time implied. And why? So as to eliminate any embarrassment to the prestige of the FBI and hence, J. Edgar Hoover since both were viewed as one and the same at the time. It should also be noted that Hoover’s early comments immediately after the assassination were that the FBI had no foreknowledge about Oswald, but in fact, they had a file on him starting the year of his defection to the Soviet Union in 1959. They kept him under tight surveillance by the time he landed back in America in June of 1962 to just a few days before the assassination in 1963.

The Destruction Of Evidence
As stated above, when Hosty reflects that part of his job was to “protect the Bureau’s image at all costs, even if it ran roughshod over individuals or principles...” he more than prove that the destruction of a note passed to him from Lee Oswald, apparently annoyed at Hosty for interviewing his wife. As stated previously Hoover had said the FBI had no previous interaction or knowledge about Oswald–and obvious lie–and with Hosty keeping him under surveillance the note, though unsigned, becomes a problem. Embarrassing Hoover was a one-way ticket to Nowhere Land or early retirement. Hosty was ordered by Gordon Shanklin to destroy the note and the memo that went with it. And he did so. That is of course, a felony and destruction of material evidence in a murder investigation.

Which of course, makes one wonder what else they destroyed...

The second time came when Shanklin orders Hosty to destroy Oswald’s rough draft letter to the Russian Embassy in Washington, D.C. According to Hosty, Shanklin was not in his right mind from the long, stressful hours and irrationally blew up at him, demanding that Oswald’s draft and Ruth Paine’s updated copy to be destroyed. Hosty, more cautious this time, decided instead to create an FD-302 report and file the letters away in a standard evidence folder. Later, in a better state of mind, Shanklin thanked Hosty for filing it away and preserving this important piece of evidence. The second felony is thus, avoided.

The third time, implied was when Hosty was sent to retrieve evidence at the Dallas Police headquarters. This included Oswald’s wallet which will be mentioned later but more importantly, Oswald’s notebook, which featured one page with Hosty’s name, car license number, and office location in it. When he returned the items he got what he described a funny look from Special agents Shanklin and Malley. Later, he asked a colleague, Emory Horton about this, who tells Hosty they were hoping he would rip the page out the notebook with his name in it! Hosty apparently never thought of doing such a thing, nor was ever ordered to do so. Once again, more potential embarrassment for Hoover.

When giving his Warren Commission testimony, James Hosty is never asked about the destruction of Oswald’s note to him. Nor is he asked about why he is listed in Oswald’s notebook. That is probably because when the FBI transcribed the notebook for the Warren Commission they intentionally left out the Hosty page.

The destruction of Oswald note would follow James Hosty down through his career, resurfacing from time to time, and be embellished to include a bomb threat. According to Hosty, the other players in this drama, including Gordon Shanklin would be playing a game of “cover the ass.” Hosty believes that justice was served in the case since one, he never lied under oath to the WC about the note as he was never asked about it; two, he didn’t commit Obstruction of Justice because there was no pending trial or hearing when the note was destroyed; and finally, no getting him for destruction of government property as the note was not officially entered in as evidence as it was considered an unsigned personal letter.

All technicalities of course. Never the less, Hosty does admit to doing wrong in destroying the note. Even though he was disciplined twice by Hoover, which included a month’s suspended pay, he was reimbursed for it years later. In the end all he has to do is worry over it because there will be no legal ramifications from his actions.

The Origin Of The Second Wallet
Long considered a conspiracy wacko theory by the Lone Nut gang, the story of the two wallets, both owned by Oswald, which I have covered before, has its real genesis in the comments made by FBI Special Agent, Robert Barrett to James Hosty who documents the event in book. So to be clear, this doesn’t originate with nuts looking for a plot; it comes to us from law enforcement officials.

According to Barrett, he came upon the Tippet murder scene to be shown a wallet by Captain W. R. Westbrook of the Dallas Police. Barrett is asked if he knows a Lee Oswald or an Alex Hidell, which he does not. Even more remarkable is the billfold is seen being examined by Capt. Westbrook and two other Dallas Police officers on newsreel footage (no audio) shot by Ron Reiland of WFAA-TV. Interesting enough, nobody, either the Dallas Police officers present at the crime scene nor Barrett, documents this evidence find in their official reports.

The confusion builds with Oswald being arrested with a billfold on him. Two wallets? Who runs around with two on them? This leads to theories of Oswald being framed for the Tippet murder and hence, a conspiracy. Robert Barrett firmly believed the murder of Tippet was a shut case, a “slam-dunk” as he said. Why? Partly because he saw the wallet with Oswald’s ID in it at the Tippet murder site. As stated above, when Hosty is sent to the Dallas Police to retrieve evidence he signs a receipt for a wallet and he neatly writes the whole thing off as being the one taken off Oswald shortly after his arrest. The point being, Oswald already had a wallet on him. So they take the billfold from the Tippet murder scene and imply it fell out of his pocket there? I think not. As they stated at the time, the police didn’t search Oswald before they placed him the squad car and sped away to book him. It is documented that a wallet was found in his left back pocket when they did search him.

As one can see, the two billfolds does make for a confusing episode. Warren Commission supporter Dale K. Myers simply says the second wallet has “no pedigree” and “To date, the wallet’s origin and owner remain unknown.” Another defender of the WC, Vince Bugliosi, in the End Notes to his book Reclaiming History simply concludes that the errant wallet is Tippets. But that is not what SA Robert Barrett told James Hosty! The Dallas Police officers seen handling a wallet on film–they never said it was Tippets. And besides, Tippet’s wallet is documented to have been found with his belongings at the hospital. The last known person to have the wallet in hand was officer Westbrook. After that, it’s lost in the fog.

Other Revelations, Tampering of a Personnel File
Probably Hosty’s most interesting revelation is that his own personnel file was tampered with containing altered documents to make him out to be derelict in his duties. After an internal investigation of Hosty’s handling of the case, Gordon Shanklin and Jim Malley questioned Hosty about what he knew, typed it up and placed it in his file. Years later when turned down for a promotion he inquired about it and found out that he had been blacklisted by the second in command of the FBI, Clyde Tolson (Hoover’s roommate). After he got access to his file, he found to his shock that the answers to the questions had been changed to make him look at fault and negligent in his investigation of Oswald. Hosty had wisely made a copy of the original questions and answers. He also photocopied the new documents that had been altered. He has no proof but speculated it was Shanklin and Malley that made the alterations.

Here’s a list of more allegations and events:

• Robert Oswald was found to be in the room when Marina Oswald was being questioned. Hosty was there and thought Robert was a Secret Service agent. This is a violation of procedure in the questioning a witness.
• Marina Oswald’s phone was tapped. One time she is heard saying that the American people were suckers to send her any money. Hosty reports a total of $70,000 initially came in.
• Hosty apparently never knew that Marina could speak, read, and write in English. Lee mailed her letters written in English while they were still living in Russia. It is of note that Hosty apparently never saw this evidence or Robert Oswald’s statements to the FBI that Marina spoke to him numerous times in English.
• The bullet retrieved from the Gen. Walker shooting was a “tentative match” by the FBI lab for Oswald’s rifle. Only a 5-point match and the FBI required a 7-point match. So, the Warren Commission sent the bullet off for testing by the New York State Police lab. They only required a 5-point match and of course they got it.
  

In Closing
James P. Hosty is like a lot of guys. Your average, honest working stiff that starts out gung-ho and then runs into the Wall. Where politics crush justice, truth, and morals. The Long Knives arrive to stab you in the back for the things they did. That’s why Hosty remarked, “I also came to understand that one of our jobs was to protect the Bureau’s image at all costs...” and he flung head-long into it when things transpired to embarrass Hoover who punished him in certain ways, unjustly.

There is a lot of irony here too. Hosty take his swipes at the “conspiracy buffs” for coming up with nonsense involving the assassination but his focus is narrow. He only centers on his end of it and the work he did. He seems to have no other interest in areas that conflict with the official account as revealed in the Warren Report. He goes along with it all being a Company Man. Yet his account of the machinations of his fellow FBI agents behinds the scenes, being ordered to destroy documents, his own personnel file being tampered with containing altered documents to make him the fall-guy, is one broad reaching account of conspiratorial activity. How then, are these men to come to an honest investigation into the death of the President? Or for that matter, in our century, when the September 11 attacks occurred? Can we ever trust these people?

Assignment: Oswald makes a good addition to any researcher’s library. James Hosty’s frank account of his experiences as an FBI agent, warts and all, is an honest and down-to-earth account of those early days of the Kennedy assassination.

Sources
Assignment: Oswald by James P. Hosty, Jr. with Thomas C. Hosty, Arcade Publishing, 1996, photographs, 328 pages. Out of print. Available used from various online sources. Price varies.

James P. Hosty’s Warren Commission testimony
http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh4/pdf/WH4_Hosty.pdf

2010, A Year End Review

2010 has proved to be an awesome year for me and this place I have for writing and pondering one of the monumental events in American history, the assassination President John F. Kennedy. I’m thankful for the internet and web sites such as Blogspot.com that give me the chance to publish my thoughts. Thanks also to numerous sites that now link this blog. On Facebook I’ve met up with numerous fellow researchers to discuss ideas and that’s been great for debating the facts without the general rudeness ones finds on forums. And most of it all, all of you readers have made it all worthwhile, with a banner year for site traffic. The best year ever! Thank you! Most grateful.

Here, in the final winter days of 2010 we see the monumental forces that JFK was trying to wrestle power from, those “entrenched interests of enormous strength” as L. Fletcher Prouty wrote and which ultimately Kennedy lost to, come to fore with a steady erosion of our Constitutional rights. The rude and outrageous harassment of women and children to simply board a plane; the FCC under the guise of “Net Neutrality” attempts to fix something that is not broke so as to affix its talons into it for greater control; The DHS, not content with No Fly Lists is now working towards a No Work List as well, where a citizen has to pass through a security hoop so as not to be considered a threat to the Homeland; The HDS has also been granted the authority to shut down web sites that they suspect of committing copyright infringement, something that should be under the control of the FBI and in the past would need a judge to sign off of on; the government now says it can examine credit card transactions without a warrant–something that would be a felony if you or I did that; the TSA views all air passengers as criminals and inspects people as if they were cattle while placing critics on watch lists. The catalog of outrages and humiliations could go on for many pages. It is all just a lot of little steps towards one big tyranny. I view 2010 as the year of many lost liberties.

Our government, established on a Constitutional Republic, has now grown into a vast, criminal enterprise where the People are expected to serve it and not the other way around, as it grows in power and avarice. We now live in a National Security State where everybody, young and old, are considered a threat and have to be vetted. If John Kennedy had lived, or simply survived that ruinous day in Dealey Plaza, I think he could have thwarted a lot of what we are experiencing now. That was certainly where he was headed in his final days on earth. Certainly Vietnam would have turned out differently because after 1961 and the Bay of Pigs disaster he knew who and what he was up against. He was the last President to confront these unseen powers. And a sad note that is...

I hope we don’t became a people such as what Bruce Springsteen sang about in Jungleland. “The poets down here right nothin’ at all–they just stand back and let it all be.”

The Politics and Unexpected Things
It’s amazing sometimes what kind of things you can get into just simply trying to write about subject. I’ve had people contact me from well known writers and searchers, impostors, to people on the kooky fringe. One guy emailed me with the idea that the grassy knoll shooter was a diversion; the real kill shot came from Jackie. I don’t respond back to people with this sort of nonsense–how can you? I want nothing to do with them and certainly no email trail between us.

The big uptake in traffic has resulted in a large surge in attention from various agencies of the government, military, and those corporations that profit from them. The full litany of the military industrial complex that President Eisenhower has stopped by. It spoke to me how deep all of this runs even now, almost 50 years as the assassination of John F. Kennedy. This has also launched a host of commentary on various forums. As they say, you know you are getting somewhere when you start getting your character trashed on the Internet! They also say that any publicity is good publicity. Okay, not really, but at least people can come to my blog, read the articles, and see that I am trying to be reasonable and fair in dealing with the facts. They can decide for themselves what the truth is for them. Anyway, I am fully aware that this endeavor is not about me–it’s about finding the truth.

Another factor is the little things that happen along the way. For example, I only fly once a year and each time, since I started this blog, I’ve had my luggage searched by the TSA. Which means three times so far. It’s easy to tell–they leave their calling card in my bag. This is of course a violation of my 4th Amendment rights for undue search but under the Homeland Security mania anything goes. Note that I have no arrest or criminal record as a juvenile or adult, nor have I ever been a member of a any subversive group. So is it because I’m a government critic through my writing about JFK? I don’t know but it could be with other critics being placed on government lists (not that I fancy myself of any importance to be placed on one). Ironically, my Congressman John Mica, is one of the sponsors of the bill that launched the TSA. I’ll be sending him a written complaint with a host of questions in the coming year.

Books
As usual, another good year for JFK conspiracy-oriented books. In fact, I know of no book supporting the lone gunman theory that was published in 2010. Of all that were published, Me and Lee by Judyth Vary Baker (see my review HERE) was the most informative and with much ground-breaking material not ever seen before. What makes it an important book is that it offers first-hand account of someone that knew Lee Oswald personally–to the point to being, according to her words, the lover of Oswald during the summer of 1963 in New Orleans. It’s a far more detailed narrative than Oswald’s widow Marina, ever told and it’s rich with the personalities of the period. It often reads like a who’s-who of JFK conspiracy characters and events. As I read it I thought, too bad that Jim Garrison didn’t have Judyth Baker as a witness! As she connects all the major figures together–Oswald, Ruby, Ferrie, Shaw and Banister into a cohesive group of which she claimed to have met and interacted with. Her story makes sense and I think overall, adds much to the history of the days leading up to the assassination. It’s a familiar story that reads fresh. The details of Lee Oswald’s personality and work in New Orleans in the summer of 1963 are fleshed out in such a way to fill in most of the mysterious areas of his life. You’ll never read or think about Oswald the same again. It’s a truly thought provoking read.

And one interesting aside. The TV show 60 Minutes launched a 14-month long investigation of Judyth Vary Baker’s allegations which unfortunately, and mysteriously, was never aired. They either found out her story was bogus or else they found it was true and knew they could never air it. Mostly likely the latter is the case. After all, the mainstream media (other than the History Channel one time) has never presented anything on the JFK assassination that was pro-conspiracy or for that matter, entreated the possibility of a conspiracy as being a legitimate area of inquiry.

A Look Ahead To 2011
I hope to eventually get a book published featuring the “best of” blog articles. I’ll be updating each article with the latest information or new discoveries along the way. Podcasting. I hope to get that started as there are few JFK podcasts out on the web. And of course, the writing and research continues.

As we move into a new year I leave you with these words from Fredrick Douglass:

“Those who profess to favor freedom, yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”