Kennedy Assassination Chronicles

VOL. 7, ISSUE 4 WINTER 2001

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Articles: 8 November In Dallas Conference Review Debra Conway, Jamey Hecht, Ph.D.

17 Reports of the Presidents’ Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board: An Introductory Overview John Williams, Ph.D.

20 Mysteries of the 112th Intelligence Corp Larry Hancock

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VOICES Jamie Sawa regarding the Miller Center: Here is an update on the information put out by the Miller Center, in Virginia. They have a quarterly report that I just received in the mail (I downloaded the prior versions from their website). They have been transcribing and releasing JFK transcripts and just put out a 3-volume set of JFK transcripts (I ordered a set from bn.com) along with a CD-ROM included of the actual recordings. Their website, in case you haven't heard of them, is: http://www.millercenter.virginia.edu

They have been releasing things over the last year or so on JFK in their reports. You can either download the report from their website each quarter, or sign up for the free version by mail. Jamie Sawa via email

Joe Backes regarding Body of Secrets book Review: There is no news here. There is no “revelation” here. None at all. This material was an ARRB release January 29, 1998. Bamford acts like he got this material declassified, he did not. That it's getting media attention at all is because someone the media will pay attention to put it in a book, only after it was removed from all context of the JFK assassination, the JFK Act, and Board that got it declassified in the first place. That’s insulting. It’s getting “new” media attention to try to tie it into the September 11th attacks, as though the US government had similar plans to plow commercial airliners into buildings. The National Security Archive thought this was news in April http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/news/20010430/ I think we are being used here, by Bamford to promote his book as Project Northwoods is something getting a lot of attention from that book, and Bamford had nothing to do with getting it out to the public, we did. If you want to thank someone for them, thank Doug Horne. I think JFK assassination researchers need to point out who got this material released. Also, it should not be seen as having any connection to the September 11, 2001 attacks. Here are the RIF numbers. 1.) 198-10004-10204 2.) 198-10004-10038 3.) 198-10004-10147 4.) 198-10004-10150 Joseph Backes via the internet

Look for links to documents or resource materials from this issue at JFK Lancer Online: http:www.jfklancer.com/kac_winter01/ Note: The Northwoods documents are available at http://www.jfklancer.com/kac_winter01/

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PASSAGES Representative John A. Young January 22, 2002 CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas (AP) - Former U.S. Rep. John A. Young, who was in the motorcade carrying President Kennedy when he was assassinated, died in Virginia. He was 85. Young, a Corpus Christi native, served as representative for 22 years, until he was defeated in the 1978 Democratic primary. He later practiced law in Washington, D.C., and in Corpus Christi, as well as working as a lobbyist. During 1978, Young fought to get funding approved to continue operations at Naval Air Station Corpus Christi to keep the base along. During the 1960s, Young pushed for an international airport in the city and was a strong supporter of the Port of Corpus Christi. Young also served as a Nueces County judge, Nueces County attorney and assistant district attorney. He was a retired U.S. Navy lieutenant commander and served during World War II.

Oris Burl “O.B.” Johnson: Longtime officer with Dallas police January 19, 2002 By JOE SIMNACHER / The Dallas Morning News Services for retired Dallas police Officer Oris Burl "O.B." Johnson were on Saturday at Troy Suggs Funeral Home. Mr. Johnson, 86, died Thursday at Baylor University Medical Center of complications after surgery last month for an abdominal aneurysm. He was buried in Grove Hill Memorial Park in Dallas. Mr. Johnson had a 31-year career with the Police Department, including stints as a patrolman, a traffic officer and a youth detective. He retired in 1973 as a sergeant in general assignments. Mr. Johnson was born in Tool, Texas, and grew up in Henderson County. A high school graduate, he joined the Dallas Police Department in 1942. He was one of Dallas' first traffic officers, said his son, Dale Johnson of Mesquite. "He loved the job. He liked helping people," his son said. "He liked the camaraderie." Mr. Johnson was stationed at Dallas Market Hall, where President John F. Kennedy was to speak on Nov. 22, 1963, when he was assassinated. Mr. Johnson was a member of Friendship Baptist Church in Mesquite and a member of James Ladd Burgess Masonic Lodge No. 1305 for more than 50 years. JFK Lancer

Kennedy Assassination Chronicles

In addition to his son, Mr. Johnson is survived by his wife, Ima T. Johnson of Balch Springs; a daughter, Bettie Barnhart of Dallas; five grandchildren; seven great-grandchildren; and four great-great-grandchildren.

Roy “Kees” Higgins: Former Dallas police officer on duty when JFK was shot January 19, 2002 By JOE SIMNACHER / The Dallas Morning News Services for Roy “Kees” Higgins, a former Dallas police officer who was on duty when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated, will be at 10 a.m. Saturday at Tyler Street United Methodist Church, 927 W. 10th St. Mr. Higgins, 79, died Wednesday of cancer at his DeSoto home. He will be buried in Laurel Land Memorial Park. On Nov. 22, 1963, Mr. Higgins was on a traffic detail at the Dallas Market Center, where he was awaiting the arrival of the presidential motorcade when all available officers were summoned to Parkland Memorial Hospital, said his son, Doug Higgins of Arlington. “He was very close to Parkland and pulled in seconds after the motorcade," his son said. "He assisted in the removal of the president from his car.” Kennedy was declared dead shortly after his arrival at Parkland. The historic day brought a second shock for Mr. Higgins. Officer J.D. Tippit was killed in the Oak Cliff neighborhood Mr. Higgins normally patrolled, his son said. Officer Tippit is thought to have been shot and killed by Lee Harvey Oswald less than an hour after the assassination of the president. Mr. Higgins was born in Maypearl, Texas, where he graduated from high school. He served in World War II as a medic in the Army Air Corps. He joined the Dallas Police Department in 1948 and retired in 1973. He was a Dallas County constable's officer from 1973 until his retirement in 1987. In addition to his son, Mr. Higgins is survived by his wife, Mary Lu Higgins of DeSoto; another son, Tom Higgins of Carrollton; a sister, LaVerne Lewis of Waxahachie; four grandchildren; and one great-grandchild. Memorials may be made to the Tyler Street United Methodist Church, 927 W. 10th St., Dallas, TX 75208. Vol. 7, Issue 4

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Charles A. Crenshaw November 19, 2001 By DRAKE WITHAM and LINDA STEWART BALL / The Dallas Morning News Dr. Charles Andrew Crenshaw, one of several who treated President John F. Kennedy’s gunshot wounds nearly 38 years ago, went to his grave insisting Lee Harvey Oswald was not the lone gunman. Dr. Crenshaw, chairman emeritus of the Department of Surgery at John Peter Smith Hospital, died of natural causes at his Fort Worth home Thursday. His family said Dr. Crenshaw’s health had been deteriorating in recent years. He was 68 years old. “He was quite a guy,” said Dr. David McReynolds, chairman of the surgery department at John Peter Smith. “He's one of those guys that demanded respect, earned it, and got it. It wasn’t Chuck. It was Dr. Crenshaw or The Chief.” Dr. Crenshaw started the surgery department at John Peter Smith single-handedly in 1966, Dr. McReynolds said, and was its backbone in those early years, on call practically every night. But some controversy surrounded Dr. Crenshaw's later years when he recounted his emergency room treatment of Kennedy and Oswald in two books questioning the findings of the Warren Commission. Dr. Crenshaw, an emergency room doctor at Parkland Memorial Hospital on the days Kennedy and Oswald died in November 1963, wrote about his experience in the 1992 book JFK: Conspiracy of Silence. In it, Dr. Crenshaw detailed his contention that Kennedy had been shot twice from the front, contradicting the findings of the Warren Commission that Oswald was the lone assassin, firing from behind the president. “It was just supposed to be this little book, a paperback in which he wanted to say what he saw,” said his wife, Susan Lea Crenshaw. “Then it just exploded, and he was getting all of this national, and even international, attention.” “He was disappointed that some of the other doctors did not come to his defense,” Ms. Crenshaw said, adding that the few who did remain good friends. “I’m very sad that he died,” Dr. Bob McClelland said. The professor of surgery at University of Texas Southwestern Medical School at Dallas was in the operating room at Parkland when Dr. Crenshaw, then a 4

resident, found him. The pair rushed to the emergency room to help tend to the president. “He was a very bright person,” Dr. McClelland said of Dr. Crenshaw. “Of course, he got a lot of notoriety with that book he wrote. He certainly was not writing on the basis of his imagination. ... Unfortunately, there were some misconceptions about it on both sides of the fence – on his side, and on the side of people who criticized him.” The published account made him somewhat of a hero in the eyes of those who have said all along that there was more than one gunman. “Other doctors spoke out, but he was the most vocal of them,” said Tom Bowden, president of the Conspiracy Museum in Dallas. “That’s the key.” Mr. Bowden said Dr. Crenshaw was well known among those who discount the Warren Commission’s findings. Many were eagerly awaiting his next book, released [last November]. “Unfortunately, a lot of the witnesses of those days are dying off,” Mr. Bowden said. “That does create a loss for the conspiracy community, those guys who believed in what we believe in.” Dr. Crenshaw’s second book, Trauma Room One, includes the first book, plus information about lawsuits that Dr. Crenshaw brought against his detractors and details that had come out since his first book was published, Ms. Crenshaw said. “He was so happy that the book came out,” Ms. Crenshaw said. “He just wanted to live long enough for this book to come out so it would prove that what he said in the first book was true.” But she said her husband’s true passion was medicine. “His legacy is not a book,” she said. "His life was building John Peter Smith Hospital, and that's his legacy.” Dr. Crenshaw was born and raised in Paris, Texas, before graduating from Southern Methodist University in 1953 with a bachelor’s degree. He earned a master’s degree in biology from East Texas State Teacher’s College, now Texas A&M-Commerce, in 1955 and a doctorate from Baylor University in 1957. He earned a medical degree at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School in 1960 and interned at the Veterans Administration Hospital in 1961. He completed his assistant residency in surgery at Parkland in 1965 and his senior residency in surgery in 1966. He served as the chairman of the surgery department of John Peter Smith Hospital in Fort Worth from 1966 to 1992, and he was a member of several medical

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associations. Services were held at the First Presbyterian Church, 100 Penn St., in Fort Worth. Cremation preceded the services. Besides his wife, Dr. Crenshaw is survived by his son, Charles A. Crenshaw II; his daughter, Adelaide Andrews; and two grandchildren.

Commission. I repeatedly asked JAMA for a retraction and correction and received correspondence denying our request. My coauthor Gary Shaw and I were advised to sue JAMA, and on November 22, 1992, exactly 29 years since that fateful day in Dallas, we filed suit for “slander with malice.” In October, 1994, we agreed to courtordered mediation and accepted a monetary settlement offered by JAMA. The litigation details and exposure of JAMA ‘s unethical publication are included in this book in the section written by our attorney, D. Bradley Kizzia. The House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) concluded in 1979 that President Kennedy’s death was the result of a probable conspiracy, but their records were sealed until the year 2029. The 1992 PresiThe book I origi- dent John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collecnally wrote with Jen tion Act (JFK Act) was a unique solution to nearly thirty Hansen and J. Gary Shaw, years of government secrecy, and the government was JFK: Conspiracy required to release whatever information it had conofSilence, was published cerning the assassination. The JFK Act created an inin April, 1992 and was dependent board that would oversee the government’s well-received across the implementation of the Act, the Assassination Record nation by the American Review Board (ARRB). Many of the revelations from the ARRB have public. I had broken the substantiated my allegations in the original book. According to Saundra Spencer, the autopsy photographs of Presi“edict of silence” thrust upon dent Kennedy that us, those who tried to save “I have no idea who shot President she developed at the President John F. Kennedy, Kennedy or why. What I do know is Naval Photography and, two days later, his acthat...there was a medical cover-up” Center in 1963 were cused assassin, Lee Harvey different from those Oswald. My observations in the National Arcontradicted the “official” chives since 1966. version of the assassination, The ARRB Report also suggests that Dr. Humes, one as reported in the Warren Report. I stated that Presiof three autopsy physicians, appears to have changed dent Kennedy was shot at least once, and I believe twice, from the front, and Oswald could not have been a “lone his Warren Commission testimony when his deposigunman.” I had anticipated criticism from some, but I tion was taken under oath by the ARRB. Additional never expected the vicious attack from my medical col- testimony questioned the autopsy and brain photography that are now in the National Archive and Records leagues. In May 1992, the editor and a writer for the Jour- Administration. I have no idea who shot President Kennedy or nal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) called why. What I do know is that somehow and for some a press conference in New York to promote a JAMA article which attacked me both personally and profes- reason, there was a medical cover-up. The “official” sionally. They quoted some of my fellow physicians autopsy photos do not depict the same wounds I saw in who had been in the Parkland Emergency room on that Trauma Room One at Parkland. The wounds I saw were tragic day, with statements that varied significantly from wounds of entrance, and thus they could have not come the testimony that they had sworn to before the Warren from the rifle of Lee Harvey Oswald. Copyright 2001 Charles A. Crenshaw

Author’s Note: Why This Book Was Updated By Charles A. Crenshaw

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IN THE NEWS an awful lot of megatonnage to put on the Soviets sufficient to deter them from ever using nuclear weapons. Otherwise what good are they? You can’t use them as a first weapon yourself, they are only good for deterring…I don’t see quite why we’re building as many as we’re building.”

CIA Places “Electronic Reading Room” Online (Freedom of Information Act) http://www.foia.cia.gov/default.asp This new Reading Room replaces the clunky Electronic Document Release Center (FOIA). The site is fully searchable and has an advanced interface which allows limiting by date. A browsable list of Frequently Requested Records is also available. From the site, “The CIA has established this site to provide the public with an overview of access to CIA information, including electronic access to previously released documents. Because of CIA’s need to comply with the national security laws of the United States, some documents or parts of documents cannot be released to the public.” February 6, 2002

New Tapes: JFK Questioned Value of Nuclear Build-Up Boston: The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library today made public 240 minutes of newly declassified tape recordings of White House meetings and conversations that took place in the Cabinet Room on November 21, 27 and 29, and December 5, 1962. Portions of the tapes may be heard by visiting the John F. Kennedy Library’s web page at http://www.jfklibrary.org The conversations between President John F. Kennedy and his advisors took place shortly after the Cuban Missile Crisis and centered on U.S. policy toward Cuba, the accuracy of American press reports on matters of national security, the military budget, and the value of nuclear weapons, both as a deterrent and as a practical weapon. Of particular interest are President Kennedy’s candid views of nuclear weapons, nuclear war and deterrence. At one point during the December 5 meeting with Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and other military advisors, President Kennedy questions the usefulness of nuclear weapons as a deterrent, stating: “If the purpose of our strategic buildup is to deter the Russians, number one; number two, to attack them if it looks like they are about to attack us or be able to lessen the impact they would have on us in an attack…if our point really then is to deter them…we have 6

March 1, 2002

Kennedy Library Opens Personal Papers of Arthur Schlesinger Boston: Researchers, libraries, members of the press, and members of the public are advised that the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library has processed and made available for research four additional series of the Personal Papers of Arthur M. Schlesinger. Arthur M. Schlesinger served in the Kennedy Administration as Special Assistant to the President and is the author of A Thousand Days and Robert Kennedy and His Times. The Personal Papers of Arthur Schlesinger -- Classified Subject File is now open for research. The documents in the Classified Subject File cover the period from 1961 to 1963 and are arranged alphabetically by subject. There are 31 boxes in this open series. Highlights of the collection include the folders on disarmament, British Guiana, Cuba, and the United Nations. Researchers will note that classified portions still remain closed. Withdrawal sheets describing the closed materials will allow the researchers to request additional review. Also opened today is the Personal Papers of Arthur Schlesinger -- Classified Chronological File that consists of once classified onion skin copies of memoranda and correspondence written by Arthur Schlesinger to President Kennedy and other members of the staff from 1961 to 1963. The file is arranged by year in reverse chronological order. Copies of many of these documents will be located in other series within the Schlesinger Papers. Researchers should use this series in conjunction with the regular Chronological File of the Schlesinger Papers. Researchers will notice that there is some duplication between these series. The Personal Papers of Arthur Schlesinger -- Memoranda to the President File is also now available for research. The series consists of memoranda written to President Kennedy by Arthur Schlesinger on various topics from 1961 to 1963. They are arranged by year in reverse chronological order. The Personal Papers of Arthur Schlesinger -- Remarks for the President File is also now open and consists of speech and statement drafts written for President John F. Kennedy

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by Mr. Schlesinger. The two boxes are organized by title or location and date and are listed chronologically. Researchers may find these speech files very useful when used in conjunction with the speech files already available in the President’s Office Files and the Papers of Theodore Sorensen. The collections are available for research use in the Library’s Research Room. The hours of operation are Monday – Friday from 8:30 am - 4:30 pm, and appointments may be made by calling (617) 929-4534. Materials housed at the John F. Kennedy Library have come to the Library through two routes. First, as Federal records which come from executive departments, commissions and committees of the Federal government. Access to these materials is controlled by the originating agency. In addition, many of these materials contain national security classified information, which under laws and executive orders must be reviewed by the appropriate agency for possible declassification. Some of the materials, such as civil rights cases or litigation, also have privacy restrictions. Second, as personal papers, which come from individuals under deeds of gift and deposit agreements negotiated between the National Archives and the donor or his/her heirs. These materials, called “donated historical materials,” comprise the bulk of the Library’s holdings. Deeds of gift and deposit agreements cover the administration of the col-

lections as well as the title, literary rights, and any restrictions requested by the donor or necessitated by the nature of the materials. Many donors retain literary rights and/or restrict personal financial or medical information. A review of personal papers for national security classified information also sometimes occurs depending upon the nature of the papers themselves. The Library’s holdings currently include 246 personal papers collections, of which 175 are open fully or in part for research use. To document the life and career of President Kennedy and to provide insight into people, events, and issues of mid-

20th century American history, the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum collects, preserves and makes available for research the documents, audiovisual material and memorabilia of President Kennedy, his family, and his contemporaries. The Library’s Archives includes 36 million pages of documents from the collections of 340 individuals, organizations, or government agencies; oral history interviews with 1,300 people; and over 30,000 books. The Audiovisual Archives administers collections of over 400,000 still photographs, 8,550,000 feet of motion picture film, 1,200 hours of video recordings, over 9,000 hours of audio recordings and 500 original editorial cartoons.

Library Patrons Our list of those who generously donate a subscription of KAC to their local library.

Hughson Public Library – Bill Mills Mary Parker Memorial Library – Jerry Ballenger Brattleboro Union High School – William Holiday Tippecanoe County Public Library, Lafayette, Indiana – Jerry Robertson Gallaudet University Library,Washington, D.C. – JFK Lancer, Ed Hoffman, and Ron Freidrich Brehm Prepretory School, Carbondale , Illinois – Self-Sponsored Goodland High School, Goodland , Kansas – Brad Parker

Johnson County Library, Overland Park, Kansas – Project JFK, Mark Taylor Grand Prairie City Library, Grand Prairie, Texas – Hoffman Family/JFK Lancer Dallas Public Library, Dallas, Texas – Self-Sponsored Greensburg Public Library, Greensburg, Pennsylvania – Bob Schwartzmiller Cistercian Preparatory School, Irving, Texas – Chris Marcellos The State Historical Society of Wisconsin – Self-Sponsored Tulsa City-County Library, Tulsa, Oklahoma – Craig Roberts

Please contact us to donate a Library Subscription of the Kennedy Assassination Chronicles. JFK Lancer

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JFK Lancer’s

NOVEMBER IN DALLAS 2001 CONFERENCE November 16, 17, and 18, 2001

OBSERVING THE 38TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY A Message from JFK Lancer and November In Dallas 2001.

I

n the past five years since the initial November In the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, NID has become an important annual forum for the presentation and exchange of information on vital research and new developments. Past conferences have consistently brought together witnesses and leading persons from various backgrounds to address these issues. his year’s conference theme was “You Are the Jury.” A grand jury, to be exact. Unlike trial juries, grand juries don't decide if someone is guilty of criminal charges that have been brought against them. Grand juries listen to evidence and decide if someone SHOULD be charged with a crime. What could a grand jury evaluate in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. What is evidence? What is proof? What is opinion? What are the facts?

Dallas

Conference

on

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he 2001 NID Conference presented information that you should evaluate and hopefully, find answers to those questions.

Debra Conway and Tom Jones JFK Lancer

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YOU ARE THE JURY JFK Lancer

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Mary Ferrell - JFK Lancer Awards 2001

New Frontier Award "In appreciation for your contribution of new evidence and futhering the study of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy."

Mark Sobel

Legacy Awards Presented in appreciation for your permanent additions to the record of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Larry Hancock Malcolm Blunt Ed Sherry

Student of the Year Elizabeth Toleno, Honorable Mention Joe Biles, Scholarship Winner

Continuing our tradition of documenting the record and sharing research materials. JFK Lancer

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Speakers REX BRADFORD has devoted himself to scanning documents and digitalizing audio recordings related to the assassination of JFK, most recently in relation to Lee Harvey Oswald's alleged visit to Mexico City. An author and a designer of games for computers, he resides in Massachusetts. AL CARRIER has an extensive background as a crime scene investigator and in weapons and ballistics with military and police units. He has also attended the US Secret Service Dignitary Protection Course. Among his special interests in the death of JFK are the shot sequence, ballistic evidence, Secret Service failures, and Lee Oswald's connections to US intelligence agencies. GEORGE COSTELLO, a graduate of Johns Hopkins with a J.D. from Duke Law School, is an attorney for the Congressional Research Service of The Library of Congress. He has authored several important book reviews of Gerald Posner's Case Closed, of Gaeton Fonzi's The Last Investigation, and, most recently, of Murder In Dealey Plaza, which appeared in The Federal Lawyer (May 2001). TONY CUMMINGS has applied his unique understanding of computer graphics and digital enhancements to the photographic record. In collaboration with Bill Miller and through his company, Interactive History, he will present a presentation of some of the best visible details of the assassination that have ever been made available to the JFK research community. JAMES H. FETZER, McKnight Professor at the University of Minnesota and Co-Chair of NID 2001, has organized symposia and conferences on the death of JFK and produced a 4 1/2 hour video, "JFK: The Assassination, the Cover-Up, and Beyond". He is the editor of two collections of new studies, Assassination Science and Murder In Dealey Plaza. STEWART GALANOR is the author of the highly-acclaimed study, Cover-up, which Gaeton Fonzi has described as the single best book on the assassination of JFK. The author of Calculus: A Visual Approach and of The Paradox OF Tristam Shandy, he is a multimedia consultant and technical writer for financial institutions and the television industry. NICK GERLICH, Ph.D., an associate professor of marketing at West Texas A&M University, serves as the editor on the subject of conspiracies for Skeptic Magazine and as an e-commerce and internet consultant. Largely a skeptic of conspiracy theories, he has written about the death of JFK and attended NID 2000, which was the basis for a new piece for Skeptic that is forthcoming. JAMES GORDON, a graduate of Edinburgh University, teaches Computing and English at Selkirk High School in the Scottish Borders. His interest in the death of JFK is of long-standing and, in his courses, he uses the assassination as a subject for his students' writing assignments as well as conducting mock trials of Lee Oswald for oral presentations.

Special Thanks to: Hiawatha Daugherty, Litigation Media Betty Windsor Jessie, Office Max Dee, Ramada Inn Jim Fetzer Tony Cummings Mary Ferrell Beau Crouch Tomie Jones Steve Conway Family and Friends 1 0

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Beau Crouch and Tomie Jones Kennedy Assassination Chronicles Vol. 7, Issue 4

summer of 1995, an internship opportunity with the Review Board for these students. Five groups from Noblesville High School, totaling 56 students, interned with the Board. Current student's Michele Aleck and Elizabeth Toleno will be assisting. DAVID W. MANTIK, M.D., Ph.D., practices radiation medicine at the Loma Linda University Medical Center. He has made path breaking studies of the original autopsy X-rays, the medical evidence, and the Zapruder film, which have been published in Assassination Science and Murder In Dealey Plaza. BILL MILLER is an Illinois resident who has researched the assassinaAuthor Craig Roberts in the “Book Room.” SHERRY GUTIERREZ, a court-certified senior crime scene analyst and court certified expert on blood splatter analysis, formerly headed the Forensic Investigative Unit for St. Charles Parish of the Louisiana Sheriff's Department. A consultant to district attorneys and other law enforcement officials, she is a member of the International Association for Identification and has served on its subcommittee for bloodstain pattern evidence. LARRY HANCOCK, co-author (with Connie Kritzberg) of November Patriots, a work of historicallybased fiction concerning the death of JFK, has spent the last thirty years dealing with computers and communications. Currently Marketing Director for Zoom Telephonics, Inc, he has expended considerable effort conducting research on intelligence aspects of the assassination, including the involvement of Richard Case Nagell. BILL HOLIDAY, JFK Lancer - Mary Ferrell Teacher of the Year, 1997. A 31 year teacher of Social Science at Noblesville High School, Noblesville, Indiana, where he also serves as Department Chairperson. Noblesville's Board of School Trustees have recognized Mr. Hitchcock's students by regularly hearing presentations regarding their research and internship. Mr. Hitchcock , through his Congressman, Dan Burton, and David Marwell, Former Executive Director of the Assassination Records Review Board, arranged, for the JFK Lancer

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Teacher Bill Holiday and his high school group talk with Adele Edisen. tion for nearly two decades. His current interest is in the analysis and the synthesis of the photographic record, especially in relation to witness testimony. His recent findings have included hidden images on the 6th floor immediately following the shooting and detecting features of JFK's rear head wound in several assassination films. JIM OLIVIER, a Louisiana-based television journalist, has been researching the assassination for more than 30 years. He has produced numerous television Vol. 7, Issue 4

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Beau Crouch (head down), Rex Bradford, and Stewart Galanor prepare equipment for the next presentation.

segments on various aspects of the assassination, in- groups--including the CIA, the Mafia, and banking including several with Jim Garrison, former District At- terests--preferred JFK not remain President. KENNETH A. RAHN, is an atmospheric chemtorney of New Orleans, who tried Clay Shaw for involvement in a New Orleans-based conspiracy to kill ist and professor at the Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, where he has been President Kennedy. JERRY POLICOFF became absorbed by the study since 1973. He received a B.S. in chemistry from MIT in 1962, and later a Ph.D. in meteorology from the Uniof the assassination during versity of Michigan in 1971. the mid-1960s, when he met His specialty is measuring Sylvia Meagher, Harold trace elements in aerosols by Weisberg, Mark Lane, and neutron activation. He presother critics of The Warren ently offers courses in chemReport. As an advertising istry, atmospheric chemistry, trainee in New York, he beglobal change, scientific came interested in media writing, and the JFK assascoverage of the event, which sination at the university. He led to a long piece on the role became interested in the JFK of The New York Times in assassination in 1992, first its promoting the cover-up. He general aspects and later its has since published in New scientific aspects. Most reTimes, The Washington Star, cently, he has been focusing Rolling Stone, The Villlage on the neutron activation Voice, and The New York analysis of the bullet fragTimes Op-Ed Page. ments by the FBI and the CRAIG ROBERTS, a HSCA, and is continually former Marine Corps sniper being surprised by how imin Vietnam with extensive portant these results are turnlaw-enforcement experiing out to be. ence, has authored Kill MICHAEL SPARKS Zone: A Sniper Looks At leads a non-profit think tank, Dealey Plaza, widely acThe 1st Tactical Studies claimed as an outstanding Group (Airborne), originally contribution to studies of the based out of Ft. Bragg, NC, death of JFK. He is an exCrime scene expert Sherry Gutierrez which field-tests military pert on why many powerful 1 2

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equipment and makes recommendations to the U.S. Army at no charge. His primary interest in his spin-off group, The 4th Tactical Studies Group (Conspiracy), is to solve the assassination of JFK and to restore confidence in our government. DONALD THOMAS, who specializes in entomology and has been employed by the US Department of Agriculture since 1983, has also undertaken The conference audience listens attentively. research on the death of President Kennedy, including, most recently, a major study of echo correlation in Dealey Plaza recorded during by Jamey Hecht, Ph.D. the assassination, which appeared in a British journal of forensics. He holds adjunct appointments at Texas November in Dallas 2001 was a success. The atA&M and at the Universidad Nacional Autonoma Mexicana and is also a research associate of The tendance was unusually low, because the 9-11 attacks reduced our mobility. And yet these same attacks added Carnegie Museum and The Nebraska State Museum. STU WEXLER, currently a Web Developer, who an urgency to the proceedings. The whole country was graduated from Tulane University in 1998 with a de- buzzing with the phrase “wake-up call,” and suddenly gree in history and a minor in philosophy. He has been the things and ideas and institutions to which our orgaresearching the JFK assassination since the 7th grade, nization pays such anxious attention — violence, inand has made presentations on the subject at his high ternational traffic in arms and narcotics, government school. Wexler's main interests in the case are Oswald's malfeasance and deception, equal protection under law and all that threatens it — began to draw very broad background and the physical evidence. JOHN WILLIAMS, Ph.D., has developed a keen public acknowledgement. Although it felt a little risky interest in the history and activities of the Foreign In- to get on a plane and fly to Dallas, it also felt like that telligence Advisory Board, especially from November city was the right place to be in the new millennium, 1962 to October 1964. A faculty member at the Uni- confronting difficult truths and sharing the burden of versity of Wisconsin-Stout, Menomonie, WI, he offers longing for an elusive justice. I couldn’t attend quite courses in its Department of Human Development, all the sessions (so I can’t comment on them all here), Family Living, and Community Educational Services. nor meet quite all the attendees. But this was my first NID conference and it was unforgettable. Craig Roberts spoke persuasively about a wide variety of episodes and the linkages among them. He seemed to me especially well acquainted with the machinations of the Nixon-Kissinger administration during the Vietnam War, and the criminal activities of those officials and their associates throughout the 1970’s. I got the impression that his primary expertise lay in the heroin and banking adventures of that period, on which he was quite an arresting speaker. But he also made it clear that there was continuity between the narcotics-banking fiasco of the old Nugan Hand Bank and BCCI, and more recent stuff in places like Afghanistan. I got his autograph on a copy of his Kill Debra, Tom, and Steve after the Awards Banquet Zone: A Sniper Looks at Dealey Plaza. Stewart Galanor, the author of the celebrated

November In Dallas: A Review

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Cover-Up, gave a witty and incisive talk about the witnesses in Dealey Plaza and the way the Warren Commission and the HSCA offered misleading and even mendacious summaries of their testimony. In this as in so many other areas, the Commission and its successors falsified, omitted, and distorted the sworn testimony of witnesses for whose integrity they cared not a whit, having sold their own in exchange for a place in the new order of things. Galanor’s devastatingly specific array of examples filled the audience with the too-familiar mood of frustrated indignation, along with a keen gratitude for his labor and his integrity. John Williams described the role of the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board in the Jim Oliver, Awards Banquet MC, Dennis David, Kennedy Administration and contrasted it KeynoteSpeaker, and Joe Biles, Student of the Year with the use other presidents made of the Scholarship Winner. (Kelly Creech produced the same body. This issue is part of a very imgraphic on the screen and also the banquet film.) portant area, since JFK’s vexed relationship with the intelligence community is at the heart of his pects of the President’s murder. It’s painful to see the murder and bears strongly on his achievement — the movement wracked by factionalism over issues that are Kennedy vision of international peace, shared prosper- proportionately tiny compared to our shared concern ity, and popular sovereignty. I found Professor Will- with the big issues. It may be extra work to cope with iams articulate, scholarly, and human. I hope others a few graying alpha males in the room, but it’s generwill emulate his clarity and the compassionate sense of ally worth it: Jim Fetzer’s books are highly visible, mission that animated his presentation. valuable resources and his colleagueship is a tremenI found the presentations by Jim Fetzer and David dous asset to Lancer and its mission (particularly beMantik compelling, detail-oriented, and insightful about cause of his background in the philosophy of science the medical evidence and the many forensic areas of and methodology). I was honored to meet the guy. the JFK case in which their expertise have purchase. Rex Bradford’s Mexico City presentation was On the other hand, I share some reservations about their helpful because it took account of new document restyle, which sometimes struck me as needlessly defen- leases and audio-tapes. It was a very complimentary sive. The Zapruder-film alteration presentation to the the controversy has been surprisingly Mexico City picture already divisive, since it doesn’t touch on come into sharp focus in the most politically important as1999, when John Newman brilliantly refined Peter Dale Scott’s account of the story — the Oswald impersonation, the elaborate waltz of photos and tapes and lies that the Mexican DFS and the CIA danced around the FBI and the rest of us. I was honored to meet Ed Hoffman, who stood on the triple underpass in 1963. I was honored to meet Debra Conway, whose energy and intelligence and devotion make the conThe Award Banquet ference possible every year. 1 4

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Perhaps the movement’s most important public- tion, a yearning for possibilities lost and a bitterness ity achievement since Oliver Stone’s film (and Peter over wasted human potential. If the Indochina War had Dale Scott’s winning of the University of California never escalated, to choose just one example of CIAPress as the publisher for his Deep Politics and the driven aggression, another 58 thousand young AmeriDeath of JFK) has been the vindication of the HSCA’s cans of all colors and a million Vietnamese might tofindings on the dictabelt recording and the grassy knoll day be working, loving and laughing. If the idealism shot. Donald Thomas presented a version of his “Echo of the New Frontier were in the ascendant today — Correlation Analysis and the Acoustic Evidence,” the with its respect for learning and the arts, its genuine if same paper that recently won worldwide attention af- politically vexed love of peace, and its confidence in ter publication in a prominent British journal. Attend- the ability of the human intellect to identify and meet ees congratulated Dr. Thomas and thanked him for his genuine human needs — we might not be in the enviimpact on the public. ronmental, economic, and geopolitical peril that domiFor me, the most moving event of the day was nates our daily attention. November in Dallas is a hard Larry Teeter’s long and spellbinding speech about the experience. But the act of telling the truth in the presRobert Kennedy murder. Teeter is Sirhan Sirhan’s cur- ence of one’s fellow citizens has a remarkably salutary rent attorney, and he knows the case as well as anyone effect. does, perhaps better than anyone now living. He spoke The poet Holderlin wrote, “where grows the danwithout notes, with the ger, there grows also the passion and urgency of an saving power.” Though inspired lawyer. If you the violence and the cononly know the JFK case, tempt for the law conPerhaps the movement’s most imporas I did, you risk missing tinue, though the intellitant publicity achievement since the horrific reach of the gence budgets are soarOliver Stone’s film ... has been the vinproblem, the way it uning and the world is milidication of the HSCA’s findings on the dermines American juristarized as never before, dictabelt recording and the grassy prudence, compromises people now know that knoll shot. equal protection, vitiates the government routinely the public will to elect lies. They know that it officials of our own does so when big busichoosing, and fosters a ness and the military subculture of cynicism and even despair. Larry Teeter vert popular sovereignty. And they are beginning to spelled out the long-range planning of RFK’s murder realize that the government is a public institution which and the chilling chicanery of its judicial aftermath, the they can collectively change for the better, so that it way it all ran on violence, deceit, bribery, and an impe- works for peace and economic justice, educating the rious contempt for the law on the part of the guilty of- population instead of jailing it. Though the world ails ficials and their confederates. As Ted Kennedy said at miserably, it is also rife with viable solutions waiting Bobby’s funeral, “he saw war…and tried to stop it.” for widespread acceptance. The kind of truth-telling That’s why he’s gone. exemplified by, say, South Africa’s Truth and ReconAt the Dallas conference, we come together to ciliation Commission may be the lever that eventually expose ongoing deception, to offer our findings to our overturns American denial, and turns our faces away colleagues, to articulate hypotheses and to exchange from current obsessions (sports, celebrities, cars, guns, information, to speculate and to affirm and to mourn. beef, etc) and toward policy once again. JFK Lancer Most of the people who killed the Kennedys and Dr. and its sister organizations in the political justice moveKing are dead now. The methods of the unpunished ment are a central part of this bright possibility, more conspirators and opportunistic accessories continue and central than is generally acknowledged. I’m proud that many of their secrets remain hidden, despite the heroic I was there last November, and until we meet this Noefforts of the much-maligned Church Committee and vember I wish you all clean reading glasses, loud voices, its successors like the ARRB. So a conference like this sharp pens, and solidarity. one brings up a great deal of difficult thought and emo-

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NID 2001 Videos FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 16 • NID01-V01 A MAJOR MOTIVE (1.5 hrs.) $20 Craig Roberts, JFK, THE CIA, AND THE SOUTHEAST ASIA DRUG CONNECTIONS • NID01-V02 THE STUDY OF DEALEY PLAZA WITNESSES (1.5 hrs.) $20 James Gordon, Stewart Galanor • NID01-V03 PIECES OF THE PUZZLE (2 hrs.) $30 TEACHING JFK MODELS OF INSTRUCTION Bill Holiday, Michele Aleck, Elizabeth Toleno HOW TO THINK ABOUT CONSPIRACY Michael Sparks • NID01-V04 DOCUMENTS UNDER THE JFK ACT (1.5 hrs.) $20 John Williams, FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE ADVISORY BOARD Larry Hancock, ARMY INTELLIGENCE GROUP 112TH • NID01-V05 MEXICO CITY DOCUMENTS AND AUDIOTAPES (1 hr.) $20

Rex Bradford • NID01-V06 Larry Teeter, Attorney for Sirhan Sirhan (3+ hrs.) $35 Ron Redmon, JFK, RFK, AND MLK Similarities in the Three Assassinations

SATURDAY NOVEMBER 17 • NID01-V07 PIECES OF THE PUZZLE (1.5 hrs.) $20 Bill Miller and Tony Cummings, PHOTOGRAPHIC ANALYSIS Larry Hancock, THE DAL-TEX PHOTO * NID01-V08 JFK AND THE MEDIA, Moderator, David Mantik (2 hrs.) $30 Nick Gerlich, George Costello, Jerry Policoff * NID01-V09 THE FILM, THE PHOTOS, AND THE SHOTS (3 hrs.) $45 Al Carrier David Mantik, REVIEW OF MOORMAN PHOTO EXPERIMENT • NID01-V10 CRIME SCENE EVIDENCE (2.5 hrs.) $35 Sherry Gutierrez, BLOOD SPATTER ANALYSIS Donald Thomas, ECHO CORRELATION ANALYSIS AND THE ACOUSTIC EVIDENCE • NID01-V11 BANQUET and AWARDS CEREMONY (1.5 hrs.)$20 MC: Jim Olivier Awards Presentation, Tom Jones, and Debra Conway Film Tribute, Kelly Creech Banquet Address, Joe G. Biles, 2001 JFK Lancer-# Winter 2001 Vol 7 Issue 4Mary Ferrell Student Scholarhip Winner Banquet Address, Dennis David Concluding Remarks, Jim Olivier

Tapes may be ordered individually or as a complete set of 12 for only $199.00 (that’s $86 off the $285 actual price!)

SUNDAY NOVEMBER 18 • NID01-V12 NEUTRON ACTIVATION ANALYSIS (2 hrs.) $30 Jim Fetzer, Ken Rahn, Stewart Galanor, Stu Wexler

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You’ll find these tapes a most valuable research tool! Kennedy Assassination Chronicles Vol. 7, Issue 4

Reports of the Presidents’ Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board: An Introductory Overview By John M. Williams Ph.D. This significant series of reports is taken from meetings of the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, which occurred during the terms of Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. By no means are all the meetings of the Board included here. Only those deemed to have material pertinent to the Kennedy assassination have been included in the present release. The Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (FIAB) was originally appointed under President Eisenhower as a tactic to forestall the creation of a bi-partisan “Watch Dog Committee” recommended in 1955 by the Hoover Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government. In January 1961, President Kennedy decided that there was a continuing need for a Presidential Advisory Board on Foreign Intelligence, but he temporarily delayed the appointment of new members for a later date. Following the disaster of the Bay of Pigs, however, the President very quickly acted to establish the FIAB by Executive Order. The Board was at work by May, and Board Chairman, James Killian appointed himself and three other Board members to serve on a Board panel “. . . to study the extent to which the government should be involved in political, psychological, propaganda, and paramilitary activities; and the policy which should be pursued by the U.S. Government in these matters.” (Excerpts from the Minutes of the President’s FIAB meetings with respect to Covert Actions Matters: Undated Memorandum). Under President Kennedy, this Board kept a busy schedule. In approximately two and a half years, the Board met for 25 meetings covering a period of 39 days. Of these, only 10 meetings covering 19 days are included here. These reports provide an important, yet very partial view of the Board’s work during this time. In accord with the purpose of this release, material from four Board meetings under President Johnson are also included. Further details concerning the Board’s history are provided in a summary given by Clark Clifford for the first meeting with President Johnson on January 30, 1964.

The reports given here cover Board meetings which occurred from November 9, 1962 to October 2, 1964. Some memoranda from these meetings contain material, which dates back as early as May 15, 1961. However, historians and researchers must be ready to face a “patchwork” of releases from the overall reports, which might accu- Clark Clifford: Presidential rately be described advisor and head of PFIAB as an “Assassination for JFK Review Board’s Sampler.” This author cannot help wondering how many chefs and what kind of chefs it took to cook up this curious compilation of reports. We need to look further at this question. What, first of all, are some highlights of these important reports?

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1. The first highlight comes in the last cited meeting of the Board for this release on October 1 and 2, 1964. There we read that the Chairman, Clark Clifford, had met with President Johnson a number of times for discussion of various subjects, and on these occasions had taken the opportunity to progressively acquaint the President with the work of the Board. “Mr. Clifford pointed out to the Board that, unlike President Kennedy, who had reconstituted the Board in 1961, and was THOROUGHLY acquainted with its functioning, President Johnson had not been as intimately associated with the Board, PRIMARILY FOR THE REASON THAT NO INTELLIGENCE RELATED INCIDENTS HAVE THUS FAR ARISEN in President Johnson’s 17

Unfortunately, the report does not indicate which of the recommendations Kennedy approved and which ones he deferred or rejected. term to evidence his special need for the Board’s assistance.” (Memorandum for the File: October 1-2, 1964: Italics added). Could it be that we are faced with two Presidents whose very different foreign policies eventuated in a very different relationship to the intelligence agencies around foreign intelligence? Under President Kennedy, the deliberations of this Board served a vitally necessary role. What exactly this role was is suggested in this series of meetings. 2. The second highlight of this series of reports is in their ambivalent, yet increasing, focus upon understanding and evaluating the covert action programs being carried out during this period of the Cold War, especially by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). (Cf. PFIAB No 206-10001-10017: undated report as a starting point). An important turning point in the Board’s audit and evaluation of these programs seems to have been reached sometime in early 1963 from this author’s reading of extant sessions. These reports constitute an important source for helping to open up this issue. 3. Another highlight of the Reports is an immense volume of material relating to both intelligence reconnaissance as well as covert sabotage operations relating to Cuba. (See especially the FIAB Memorandum for Jan 11, 1963, and the General Chronology for the Meeting of January 25-26, 1963, among others). 4. A fourth highlight is the mixed sequence of reports the Board received from various sources, especially CIA Concerning the situation in Vietnam. Among these are reports by Richard Helms and John McCone to the Board in 1964 concerning how seriously the political situation had deteriorated in Vietnam by late 1964. 5. Another point of interest is the summary of the series of recommendations made by the Board to President Kennedy from May 1961 to November 1963 as summarized in the meeting of January 30, 1964. Unfortunately, the report does not indicate which of the recommendations Kennedy approved and which ones he deferred or rejected. These are some highlights of this series of reports. However, there are other issues raised in them which may be of interest to researchers or historians includ1 8

ing such matters as reports on the Mongoose Program, some concerns raised by the President concerning intelligence operations, and Allen Dulles’ view of the importance of covert operations programs which may have brought him into direct conflict with President Kennedy. Readers must be prepared to find themselves perplexed and frustrated by the number of postponements or deletions from the material which interrupt the flow of thought, or suddenly cut off discussion of issues at hand. In many instances, the blocking out of information, even on meeting agendas is crudely done. It suggests a reckless haste on the part of censors. Apart from blockages filling whole parts of pages, this reader noted the outright deletion of 328 additional pages which would have brought the Memoranda cited to nearly 750 pages rather than the 416 pages of text that were actually released. In a supposed democracy, this sort of crudity in censorship is unconscionable! It severely stunts the scope of these reports. These omissions open up an important question: What were the criteria for determining the selection of reports which were, at least in part, released? It may be that the original order of releases gives some hint concerning the criteria of selection for this series. The first four selections in the series came from late 1963 (2) and 1964 (2). This is where the meetings of November 22, 1963 (last under Kennedy) and January 30, 1964 (first under Johnson appear). This reader’s hypothesis is that the criteria for relating these meetings to the assassination were not formed apriori, but were developed in the process of selection with those having the most obvious connection selected first. This makes the question of how this series was seen as connected to the assassination an ambiguous one. With the paramount emphasis given to material on Cuba, and intelligence operations connected to the Cuba situation, this author wonders whether the selecting editor suspected that the material might have some bearing upon the issue of whether an anti-Castro or proCastro Cuban force was motivated to be involved in the assassination, or whether these documents might throw some light upon such a Cuban related motive. Whatever the criteria may have been, what these reports actually say or suggest to their readers may be very different than what the selecting editor intended or the criteria might have emphasized. To this reader, the struggle by members of the Board over the question who had de facto jurisdiction over covert operations became an increasingly salient question through this series of reports. Clearly this issue put the intelli-

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gence agencies into some conflict with the President and his Executive Branch; yet how serious this conflict may have been remains to be resolved. The issuance of these reports suggests a glaring defect in the historical record around the Kennedy Administration, one pointed out by John Newman and others in their writings. Not enough attention has been given to the kinds of disagreement between President Kennedy and various members of his Administration as well as others outside of it over important issues of foreign policy, which occurred during his administra-

tion; nor have the degrees of conflict over these issues been evaluated carefully enough. The patchwork of these reports does not adequately assist in clarifying these issues and the extent of conflict around them, but they do provide some important indications of it. Further clarification requires as full a release of the documentation of all these meetings as possible. Such release is mandatory if historians, researchers, and concerned citizens are to be entitled to do their work of furthering an accurate understanding of this important moment of United States and world history.

Memorandom for Files: Meeting D ecem ber 27-28, 1962, just after the C u b a n M i s s i l e Crisis. JFK Lancer

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MYSTERIES OF THE 112 INTELLIGENCE CORP GROUP presented by Larry Hancock

One of the ongoing areas of mystery and speculation in regard to events in Dealey Plaza on November 22, 1963 has been the activities of the 112th Army Intelligence unit. The documents available to us now appear to resolve many of these mysteries, all except the most fundamental one – the actual role of the 112th in Dallas. This paper and its related document collection address the following “mysteries”: 1. Organization, mission and personnel of the 112th Intelligence Corps Group (INTC) 2. Organization, mission and personnel of the 316th Intelligence Corps Detachment 3. Activities of 112th Group II (Dallas) personnel on November 22, 1963 4. Performance of “Protective Service” duties by the 112th INTC 5. The role of Specialist James Powell and the history of his TSBD photograph 6. Possible identification of 112th personnel as “mystery” Secret Service agents 7. The role of Warrant Office Edward Coyle; attendance at the Armory robbery meeting on November 22, 1963 8. Errors in the sworn testimony and statements of Col. Jones, 112th INTC G2 officer 9. Errors or “contradictory” intelligence in 112th and 4th Army intelligence reports 10. “Stand-Down” of the 316th Detachment on November 22, 1963

Why there should be any mystery in regard to the role of the 112th is itself perplexing since we have access to extended, sworn interviews with its Operations Officer, first with the Church Committee and then the HSCA. In addition, we now have an extensive investigation by the ARRB and further interviews with additional group personnel. Unfortunately, as we will see, the statements by these individuals are totally at odds with each other and with the statements and reports of Secret Service Dallas trip lead agent Lawson as well as with memoranda from the Department of Defense and 112th unit history. In fact, we now know that the purported Operations Officer giving sworn statements to the Church and House Select Committees never held the position 2 0

he specified and was serving as intelligence officer (G2), not operations officer (G3). It is also now clear that we lack any statements from 112th Group Commander, the actual 112th Operations Officer and either the Dallas Unit commander or his Deputy Commander -– indeed all of the officers in direct line of command for any unit field activities in Dallas during the Presidential visit. However, we do have intelligence “spot” reports transmitted from the 112th personnel in Dallas to their headquarters in San Antonio and relayed to other government organizations. They give us a picture of the type of information that the 112th was collecting in Dallas, its sources within the DPD and they allow us to judge the quality and effect of this information. What

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we see in the Dallas reports and the information relayed by Col. Jones, the unit’s G2 Intelligence officer, shows the unit to have been involved in intelligence collection -– not in protective service as maintained by the same Col. Jones in his statements to the Church and House Select Committees. The organization and mission of the 112th INTC and 316th as military units is far from mysterious and has been further documented in great detail by the work of the ARRB.1, 2, 3, 4, 7 The United States Army was and is organized into a serious of Regional Army Commands. Each of these commands being staffed with integrated resources including intelligence/counter intelligence organizations. The command assigned to the Southern region of the US in 1963 was the Fourth Army and its intelligence unit -– the 112th Military Intelligence (INTC) Corps Group was headquartered, along with Fourth Army itself, in San Antonio, Texas at Fort Sam Houston. The 112th was structured into seven operating regions encompassing five states -– Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma and New Mexico. The regional units maintained physical offices and limited staffs in major metropolitan centers. Region II staff were located at 902 Rio Grande, in the Rio Grande Building, Dallas. The Region II unit in Dallas was commanded, in the Fall of 1963, by Lt. Col. Roy Pate and his Deputy Commander was Lt. Col. Edgar Boyd. The unit history also lists a Col. Willard W. Mize as overall 112th INTC Group Commander -– with his G3 Operations Officer as Lt. Col. Stanley Greer and his S2 Intelligence Officer as Lt. Col. Robert Jones. The Operations/S3 for the 112th had been Col. Reich, however, in December of 1962 the 316 INTC detachment had been transferred from Fort Jackson, South Carolina to Fort Sam Houston and attached to the 112 th. Actually no people or equipment moved with the transfer and 316 members were still designated as 316th -– the Region I (San Antonio) 112th commander was initially designated acting 316th detachment commander. The 316th would eventually emerge as a truly separate unit in 1964, once staffing slots were back filled, but during 1963 it appears that personnel assigned to the 316th assumed tasks within Region I and their activities are actually reported under Region I in the 112 th unit history. Whether or not the 316th performed any unique activities or whether it operated outside of San Antonio is unclear. Col. Reich being moved to become 316 Detachment Commander in July of 1963 and his S3 Operations officer position was filled by Lt. Col. Stanley Greer. JFK Lancer

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“Spot reports give us a picture of the type of information the 112th was collection in Dallas, its DPD sources...and shows the unit to have been involved in intelligence collection -- not protective services.”

The ARRB determined from unit records that Col. Jones was never assigned to the position of S3/Operations and served as S2/Intelligence Officer in 1963 and later was reassigned to 112 th Group Executive Officer in 1964. This is of considerable importance as the Group Intelligence officer only reviews reports, collects intelligence and prepares reports for Headquarters; the S2 has no role in field operations or tactical assignments of unit personnel. The primary function of the 112th was intelligence collection and, as noted, the intelligence officer in November 1963 was Lt. Col. Robert E. Jones. Unit activities normally included background investigations, domestic intelligence against suspect subversive or potentially disruptive organizations and counter intelligence against suspected enemy agents, fellow travelers or potential intelligence leaks. Most of the work of the 112th involved either standard security background checks, security inspections of 4th Army units, however it also engaged in limited monitoring and maintaining files on individuals and groups seen as domestic intelligence targets. The 112th, as all the Regional Military Intelligence Groups, provided information to the FBI as well as to Police Departments and indeed worked at establishing close connections to major police departments in order to use their internal resources (including their Special Services Groups -– actually police counter intelligence, often known as “Red Squads”). It would not be uncommon to find a MIG performing surveillance on the same individuals or groups as a police department or the ATF (Alcohol. Tobacco and Firearms) and to also find them sharing information among themselves and with the FBI. Indeed in Dallas on November 22, members of all 3 groups were meeting in regard to an ongoing inquiry into armory thefts and gun running to Cuban exiles.8 SA Hosty of the FBI and MI SA Coyle of the 112th independently corroborate this meeting on the morning of November 22. Coyle’s interview with the ARRB provides background on that investigation and the inter-agency miscues which led him to call the meetVol. 7, Issue 4

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ing.9, 18 Unfortunately, the statements of both Coyle and Hosty are in direct conflict with that of Col. Jones. Jones stated in his HSCA testimony that “Captain” Ed Coyle was on duty on November 22 performing Secret Service liaison for the Presidential trip – while Agent Hosty states in his autobiography that Ed Coyle spent the morning of November 22 in a multi-agency meeting. This is only one of many instances where the statements of Col. Jones is counter to that of all the personnel stationed in Dallas -– in addition he misstates Coyle’s actual rank (which was Specialist 5 th, with a later promotion to Warrant Officer). An example of the unit’s intelligence work can be seen in a report from Region I in San Antonio dated November 1, 1963; this report is on the “Cuban Officer Training Program” and examines in detail efforts being made by Manolo Artime to recruit veterans of the Bay of Pigs who were then in special officer training courses. Cubans were being aggressively recruited to join a revolutionary training camp in Nicaragua. These individuals were being told that the US had abandoned them but that Artime was going to be receiving support from both France and Germany.10 In their counter-intelligence role, agents of the 112/316th had been very much involved in observing and collecting information on Lee Oswald’s FPCC activities in New Orleans. Indeed its agents collected handbills from his first leafleting beside the carrier WASP and their files contained the name Hidel from those handbills as well as the name Oswald. Col. Jones maintained, and it seems quite reasonable, that the Oswald file at the 112th was opened based on Oswald’s New Orleans activities.7, 11 We know a good deal about the organization, mission and roles of the 112th. However we have two completely different versions as to what a dozen of its personnel were or were not doing in Dallas on November 22 and we have a major conflict over one of the key photographs taken of the TSBD by 112 th Special Agent James Powell. The contradiction arises entirely from the testimony of Col. Jones, given under oath. Jones was initially interviewed by the Church Committee who seemed largely concerned with whether his personnel could have been any of the mystery men seen in Dealey Plaza -– and whether their credentials or self identification could have been as Secret Service Agents. It is unclear why the Church and HSCA committees selected Col. Jones given that he was not the Dallas Commander nor in the direct 112th chain of command at all. 2 2

However his statements on 112th activities in his HSCA testimony are very clear and very concrete. 11 As to his duties, Jones states: “Upon my assignment to the 112th, I was appointed the Operations Officer for the entire group...I was directly responsible for all counterintelligence operations, background investigations, domestic intelligence and any specials operations in this area.” The most basic question about November 22, 1963 was whether or not the 112th deployed personnel in Dallas to perform Protective Services in support of the Secret Service. Col. Jones himself gave a firm “Yes” to that question: “We provided a small force – I do not recall how many but I would estimate between 8 and 12 -– during the Presidential trip to San Antonio Texas and then the following day, on his visit to Dallas. The Regions also provided additional people to assist.” This clearly suggests that local Dallas personnel were augmented by additional 112th staff and that their mission was protective service Jones goes to some length to state that his people were “under the control and supervision of the Secret Service” and were to “supplement the manpower of the Secret Service.” Col. Jones further states that Ed Coyle and “Captain” James Powell were among the local Dallas personnel assigned to these duties: “James Powell was one of those liaison personnel…he was a Captain and also wore civilian clothes and was assigned to Region 2 of the 112th MIG. He was on duty the day of the assassination.” Col. Jones goes on to state that he was never informed that Captain Powell had taken a photograph of the Texas School Book Depository Building and that a copy of the photograph was never submitted to the 112th; he describes Captain Powell as being “negligent” in his actions in regard to the photograph. Note: Powell’s records and ARRB interview show him

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to have been a Specialist, probably a Sergeant (E5) at this time and not an officer; his file also contains a report prepared for his Region II commander in which he mentions taking a photograph of the TSBD with his private camera -– this memo does not state that he was not on duty at the time but does describe him going to his office after the incident. His FBI report of January 3, 1964, states that he turned the photograph in question over to Lt. Col. E. E. Boyd of Region II, Army Intelligence in Dallas and also mentions that he observed a Negro male in one of the windows at the time of taking the photograph. In his ARRB interview Powell states that none of his group were involved with the Presidential trip in any way and that none of them participated in Protective Service. He makes it clear that he was not on duty but had taken leave to observe the motorcade and hopefully take pictures of the President’s visit.12, 13, 14, 15

“ ...Why Col. Jones was selected to explain their role to two Congressional committees and lied under oath.”

Col. Jones also gives an elaborate description of how his group functioned in conjunction with the Secret Service when called on for such assignments. Interestingly enough, although VIP Protection is discussed in the Standard Operating Procedures for the 316th (which happens to be in the ARRB records) the type of protection it addresses is much more comprehensive and seems to be written for situations where the Army has primary responsibility for security -– such as the visit of a VIP to a base or Army operations area. Col. Jones does indeed seem to be comfortable with Secret Service liaison duties beyond that of his unit’s normal duties.7 But more importantly, because of the assassination, we have access to the detailed preparations by the Secret Service for Dallas, including Dallas Secret Service lead man SA Lawson’s trip summary and postassassination report. In addition the DPD generated extensive reporting of their preparations including lists of all planning meetings and the agencies and personnel represented.16 SA Lawson himself was especially detailed in listing all meetings and attendees down to the Fire Department, Trade Center employees and Airport personnel. All groups involved in security arrangements including back up personnel from the Sheriffs Department and Texas Department of Public Safety are described. Nowhere in any of Lawson’s reports or in the Dallas Police reports is any mention made of contact with or support by members of the 112th or 316th, or any military personnel at all. Additionally, the Department of Defense advised

the HSCA that no record of any request or action for protective support exists in regard to the Dallas visit of the President.5 When all the current evidence is considered, it seems that the fundamental mystery of the 112th is not whether or not they were deployed for protective service in Dallas but rather why Col. Jones was selected to explain their role to two Congressional committees and why he appears to have consistently lied under oath. Interestingly enough, his first testimony to the Church Committee was largely devoted to presenting information which convinced the committee that 112th personnel could very well have been mistaken for the “mystery” agents with credentials reported in Dealey Plaza. We now know this to have not have been the case for 112th personnel in general and SA Powell specifically.17 One point of speculation might be that the mystery of these men with credentials may have been a part of an ongoing assassination cover up, otherwise we are left with an Army Col. who is either am inveterate liar or totally incompetent and unreliable (the conclusion apparently reached by the ARRB -– based on their internal memos). We do know a good deal about the intelligence collection activities of the 112th on November 22, primarily based on a series of “Spot” reports as well as memos from Col. Powell to other agencies and FBI memos relating his reports. These reports also give us a good idea of at least some of the 112th’s routine Dallas Police contacts.18 One report identifies information as originating with Captain Dowdy – in actuality this is George M. Doughty who was in charge of the Identification Bureau within the DPD Services division. For reference it is important to note that Captain Doughty was the officer in charge of the Identification group located on the fourth floor of the DPD offices. This group was part of the Services division which included the Crime Scene Unit, the Photo section, Fingerprint section and records section. Given the background and counterintelligence tasks of the 112th is certainly makes sense for them to have a connections the ID group. With Captain Doughty as a source, it would appear that they

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should have been getting solid and reliable intelligence about the identity and possessions of individuals taken into custody on November 22. This brings us to the other unresolved mystery of the 112th, nothing more or less than the fact that the majority of the information given to them and reported by them to various agencies was either incorrect, inaccurate or actively suppressed -– since it did not become a part of the official investigation or record. To appreciate this we have to take a look at it item by item. Apparently the first formal intelligence passed to Col. Jones was the identity of the suspected assassin. According to Jones he was given only the name “Hidel” with no mention of “Oswald” and no reference to multiple ID’s or the use of an alias. Indeed Col. Jones is on record as being able to provide the DPD with the information that Hidel was very likely Lee Oswald, based on the cross index listings in the Oswald file and the earlier information from New Orleans. Obviously this is in significant contrast to portions of the official record including statements by a variety of arresting officers that both names, multiple identifications documents and the use of an alias were known from the very beginning and even transmitted by radio from the patrol car carrying Oswald (said statements however are not confirmed by the radio transmission log). By Friday evening, a lengthy report was provided to the 112th by the DPD detailing the circumstances of an incident in Dealey Plaza early that week. This incident involved men who were observed by civilians and officers in the area of the “grassy knoll” fence, apparently “sighting in” a rifle. One of the men was described as clearly fitting the description of the subject (Oswald) and the car associated with the incident was stated to fit the description which the subject (Oswald) had been seen driving. This would later cause some confusion since no DPD report of this incident or any of this information is in evidence and the facts of this report present a major contradiction to the official historical record. By late in the evening, the situation had escalated to the point where Fourth Army Intelligence developed a urgent cable which contained the information that Oswald had been proven to be a “card carrying Communist” and that he had “defected to Cuba in 1959.” This urgent advisory cable was sent to the US Strike Command at McDill AFB in Florida. Strike Command was, at the time, the combined services quick reaction military force which had command and control over operational Army groups (McDill was also heavily focused on Cuban intelligence gathering). Col. Jones 2 4

was questioned about this cable by the HSCA and denied having had any knowledge of it at the time or of the 112th having provided any of the information referenced in the cable. He stated that such information was in contrast to that in his file on Oswald/Hidel. According to this report, the 112th had obtained these pieces of information from officer Stringfellow of the DPD Criminal Intelligence section. Stringfellow reported to Lt. Jack Revill’s command and this unit was charged with investigating crimes of an organized nature, subversive activities, racial matters and labor racketeering. The CI unit, along with the Vice Squad and Narcotics squad reported to Captain W. P. Gannaway (a reserve Army Intelligence officer). Certainly it makes good sense that the 112th would be in communications with Revill’s unit, however, it surely did not seem to be getting accurate information in terms of the official story. And if we believe Jones, Fourth Army gathered the information for its STRIKE command report from the Dallas Police organization though some other channel than its own intelligence organization. Note: Lt. Revill also initiated a major controversy by relating FBI agent Hosty’s remarks that the FBI was aware of Oswald and the fact that he was capable of violent actions. In the end then, while the organization and mission of the 112th is no mystery, there are two very large open questions which relate to the unit. The first being why their commander would aggressively present what surely appears to be a false story of the 112th performing Protective Service in Dallas and having deployed a considerable number of personnel to do so. The second open question has to do with the information being passed to the 112th. Was it simply incorrect or does it reflect reality? Reality before a cover-up? In regard to the information from the Identification Section and Captain Doughty, we really have to wonder whether or not the first available identity for the man taken into custody at the Texas Theatre was A. Hidel and whether that was the only identification provided to the DPD in the initial billfold turned into the ID section. In regard to the information from Lt. Revill’s DPD intelligence unit, I would suggest that the question would be why apparent untruths were given to the 112th -– unless we can find some record that anyone in Dallas or even the media thought Oswald to be a Cuban defector? Or that the DPD has failed to share with us a CPUSA card with Oswald’s name on it (or would that be Hidel?). Of course, Oswald he did show a CPUSA

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card to Sylvia Duran in Mexico City and Hoover was talking about multiple trips by Oswald to Cuba that afternoon…perhaps the 112th had the real story on Nov. 22 and it never made it into the official record? One final area of speculation pertaining to the 112th is that of the widely circulated “Stand Down” of military protection in Dallas. This story originated in a contact between a former member of the 316th and Col. Fletcher Prouty.20 The ARRB devoted considerable attention to Col. Prouty’s information and interviewed Col. Prouty in depth as well as the former 316th commander, Col. Rudolph Reich. In his ARRB interview, Fletcher Prouty makes it clear that an unnamed individual called him (the call was unsolicited and Prouty did not personally know the individual) and described that the unit had at first been ordered to deploy in Dallas and then called back at the last moment -– creating a major protest by the 316th detachment commander and his deputy. Col. Prouty did not provide a name for the caller to the ARRB although he states the caller represented himself as an officer of the 316th. However, in one of Col. Prouty’s earlier papers he does name the caller and he is listed on the 316th staff roster as a PFC, Private First Class. 21 The ARRB interviewed Col. Prouty at length and was also able to locate and interview the 316th commander, Col. Reich. Col. Reich directly denied the stand-down story and elaborated on the fact that his unit never did protective service, had no special training and that he had personally written a letter to the Army requesting advice as to possible legal responses to the story of the stand down. It is unclear what if any advice he was given but he did provide a copy of the letter to the ARRB.22

CONCLUSION and SUMMARY References and Sources obtained through the work, files and gracious support of Malcolm Blunt, Debra Conway and Anna Marie Kuhns-Walko ) with advice and counseling on military history files of the 112th from Larry Haapanen. Note: The majority of the documents containing statements by individual members of the 112th and 316th, the organizational and personnel documents pertaining to the 112 th and the various 112th “Spot” reports and other related reports as well as a variety of internal ARRB memos and investigation assessments are contained in the booklet and CD-Rom “Mysteries of the 112 th” published by and available though JFK Lancer. All documents were provided though the JFK Lancer

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courtesy of Malcolm Blunt, Debra Conway and Anna Marie Kuhns-Walko. The ARRB background memo on Army Intelligence in Dallas, the Personnel Roster of the 112th INTC, the personnel list for the Region II group in Dallas, a variety of related Fact Sheets and a copy of the 316 th Intelligence Corps Detachment’s Standing Operating Procedures are provided in a reference booklet and CDROM available through JFK Lancer Resource Mail Order. Interviews with group personnel and other related documents are also included. (1) ARRB Memorandum, Wray to Gunn; Subject: Army Intelligence in Dallas (2) Department of the Army Unit Lineage and Honors, 112th Military Intelligence Brigade (3) 112th INTC Group Personnel Roster as of 31 January 1963 – Headquarters and Region II/Dallas (4) Fact Sheet on 112th Intelligence Corps (5) Fact Sheet on Protective Services - DOD memo to Committee (6) Fact Sheet on Destruction of Oswald IRR Dossier – DOD memo to Committee (7) 316 th Intelligence Corps Detachment; Tactical Standard Operating Procedures (8) Hosty, Assignment Oswald; Hosty identifies the 112th member as Edward Coyle (9) Coyle, interview with ARRB, Tim Wray and staff, July 29, 1996 (10) Memo to Joseph Califano, General Counsel from Office of Secretary of the Army, December 11, 1963; Califano Box 6, Folder 10 “Cuban Officer Training Program” memoranda (11) Jones Executive Session testimony to HSCA; April 20, 1978 / RIF 180-10116- 10200 (12) Powell FBI Report; January 3, 1964 (13) Powell Memorandum for the Record, November 22, 1963 (14) Powell Select Committee on Assassinations interview, Basteri/Maxwell, January 1, 1978 (15) ARRB Powell Interview transcript, Wray; April 12, 1996 (16) Report of the United States Secret Service on the Assassination of President Kennedy; statements by agents Lawson and Sorrels; JFK Assassination File, Dallas Police Chief Jesse Currey; DOD statement described on page 184 of HSCA report.

Note: Chief Currey makes special note that at Love Field, SA Lawson met him immediately before the motorcade and introduced Jack Puterbaugh of the White House staff as well as Army Col. Whitmeyer (no statements are available for Whitmeyer and he was not interviewed by the WC). Both individuals were clearly in the pilot car for the motorcade but SA Lawson makes Vol. 7, Issue 4

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no mention of his assigning them to the vehicle in spite of very detailed remarks about his activities at Love Field (SA Lawson was a former Army Reserve intelligence officer – personal correspondence, Vince Palamara). However, further research suggests that this minor mystery is due to the fact that Col. Whitmeyer was present due to his personal friendship with Chief Lumpkin, that he had ridden down in the pilot car from DPD headquarters and that he was later given an

“official” role in the lead car by the DPD in order to explain his presence – after the fact. (Personal correspondence with Dallas researcher Michael Parks). (17) “The Secret Service Agent on the Knoll,” Debra Conway, Kennedy Assassination Chronicles Vol. 6, Issue 4, also online at http://www.jfklancer.com/knollagent/ (18) Spot Report 2200 hours Nov 22 from Lt. Green (Dallas) to Major Dippo (San Antonio); Nov 26 memo to SAC

Edward Coyle ARRB Interview July 29, 1996. The Army Intelligence Agent that met with FBI’s Hosty the morning of November 2, 1963 2 6

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FBI San Antonio from ASAC Brooking based on call from Lt. Col. Jones; Nov 27 memo from San Antonio FBI to Dallas SAC and Director based on call from Lt. Col. Jones; Fourth Army cable to U.S. Strike Command, McDill Florida based on intelligence from 112th obtained from Stringfellow of DPD Intelligence unit. (See Scott, Deep Politics p 275 for analysis; Strike Command. (19) Report of Investigation (Military Police), Fort Hood,

Donald Whittier, January 9, 1964. (20) “The Guns of Dallas,” Fletcher L. Prouty; also Prouty in Gallery Magazine. (21) Transcript of ARRB interview with L. Fletcher Prouty and various internal ARRB memoranda and summary reports. (22) Transcript of ARRB interview with Col. Rudolph M. Reich (Ret).

document showing Col. Jones’ report to Captain “Dowdy” of the DPD (sic) on the silhouette target sighting. JFK Lancer

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More Mexico Mysteries Adapted from a talk given at the November In Dallas 2001 conference Rex Bradford

Overview The truth of what happened in Mexico City several weeks prior to the assassination of President Kennedy remains elusive. New revelations “from the files” deepen the mystery rather than clarify it in many cases. Once-secret HSCA depositions and documents in the HSCA’s “Segregated Collection,” particularly the so-called Russ Holmes Work File, contain an abundance of fascinating and disturbing details. This essay will not try to paint the larger picture or present some overarching new thesis. Rather, it is an interim vehicle for discussing some important new findings and revelations; adding bricks to the edifice whose ultimate form remains obscure.

Introduction – Mexico City: The Rosetta Stone It is difficult to overstate the importance of what is usually called the “Oswald in Mexico City” affair. Certainly the topic was an important one to the CIA— probably a third of the 40,000 pages in the Russ Holmes Work File collection of CIA documents are devoted to it. The Mexico City story is important because it shows that there was a sophisticated operation which served to set up Oswald prior to the assassination, something beyond the wherewithal of Mob figures or anti-Castro Cubans acting alone. It is also important because it finally provides an explanation for why men like Earl Warren, who certainly weren’t part of any conspiracy and normally wouldn’t engage in such a stark coverup, were put in the position where they did so. Mexico City is indeed the Rosetta Stone of the JFK assassination. The most easily understood aspect of the Mexico City affair remains the tapes of an Oswald, who apparently was not Oswald, calling the Soviet Embassy in late September and early October of 1963. John

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Newman spoke in some detail about these at the 1999 November in Dallas conference, and discussed some of the evidence which shows that the FBI did indeed listen to these tapes in the early morning of November 23, 1963. They determined that it wasn’t Oswald’s voice on the tapes, an inconvenient fact that began to be covered up that evening, even before Oswald was killed by Jack Ruby.

The Non-Oswald Tape The conversation in which FBI Director Hoover informed the new President, Lyndon Johnson, about this, has itself been erased, as I discovered a few months after Newman’s talk.1 In this conversation, a transcript of which survives, Hoover told LBJ: We have up here the tape and the photograph of the man who was at the Soviet Embassy, using Oswald’s name. That picture and the tape do not correspond to this man’s voice, nor to his appearance. In other words, it appears that there is a second person who was at the Soviet Embassy down there.2 This phone call, now reduced to 14 minutes of hiss, was followed up that same day by a five-page FBI Report sent to both the White House and the Secret Service. This report repeated the message in no uncertain terms:

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The Central Intelligence Agency advised that on October 1, 1963, an extremely sensitive source had reported that an individual identified himself as Lee Oswald, who contacted the Soviet Embassy in Mexico City inquiring as to any messages. Special Agents of this Bureau, who have conversed with OsKennedy Assassination Chronicles Vol. 7, Issue 4

wald in Dallas, Texas, have observed photographs of the individual referred to above and have listened to a recording of his voice. These Special Agents are of the opinion that the above-referred-to individual was not Lee Harvey Oswald.3 Now I’m not going to go through the rest of the materials which corroborate this account, and show that the subsequent denials from both the CIA and FBI are without merit. Suffice to say that Jeremy Gunn of the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB) got it straight from the horse’s mouth, from two Warren Commission staffers who listened to the tapes in April of 1964. Although it’s disturbing and symptomatic of the delicacy of this matter that the ARRB didn’t see fit to get this acknowledgement in sworn testimony. Instead, we get the account in a bit of a roundabout fashion, in the form of a question asked of CIA Mexico City exemployee Anne Goodpasture: Gunn. I have spoken with two Warren Commission staff members who went to Mexico City and who both told me that they heard the tape after the assassination obviously. Do you have any knowledge of information regarding tapes that may have been played to those Warren Commission staff members? Goodpasture. No. It may have been a tape that Win Scott had squirreled away in his safe.4

Ultra-Sensitive Sources The fact that the CIA was taping the Soviet Embassy in Mexico City was of course an ultra-secret secret, a perfect place to hang a plot into and be sure that there would never be a full public airing. The Warren Commission got a lot of vague runaround regarding how the CIA knew what it was telling them during the early months of 1964, until finally in April three staffers were sent by the Commission to Mexico City to try and get some harder information. But even the seventy-page internal report of this trip, written by David Slawson in April 1964 but not released until 1996, never directly says that the tapes were been listened to, instead referring to transcripts:

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Mr. Scott’s narrative of course took a rather long time to complete, and we interrupted him at many points with specific questions. During the course of the narrative we were shown the actual transcripts, plus the translations, of all the telephone intercepts involved, and we were also shown the reels of photographs for all the days in question that had been taken secretly outside the Cuban and Soviet Embassy entrances.5 Documents like this will be used by some to continue to assert that the tapes never really existed at the time of the assassination. I think what’s really going on here is that Slawson and Coleman got “the treatment” from the CIA. The ultra-sensitivity of the tapes was impressed upon them in the most forceful terms. This conclusion is not just conjecture. For instance, William Coleman, David Slawson’s partner, told the HSCA just how sensitive he believed the telephone tapping operation to be. In a recorded interview of August 2, 1978, he discussed just how much this had been impressed upon him, and even said he thought it was a “great disservice to the United States” that some of these secret operations were becoming public in the 1970s. He also told the HSCA that if this information had not been public knowledge already, “I would be fudging like hell with you fellows.” He apparently went on to do just that, when Ed Lopez asked him directly about the question of the Oswald tapes surviving the assassination: Lopez. Did the agency ever…..explain why it did not have an actual tape recording of Oswald’s voice? Coleman (soft): “I haven’t the faintest idea whether they did or did not. I mean, I don’t know, I’m pretty sure this question was probably asked of them and they probably gave us…if they had—I don’t know whether they had or they didn’t have, I mean, I really don’t know but I do know that there was…but I’m pretty sure that if we asked them “where is it?”….. (trails off)6 Coleman went on to explain why even detailed internal Warren Commission memos might not contain the most sensitive information in them. He also ex-

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plained that this material was so secret that not even members of the Warren Commission could be let in on it: Coleman. By that time…..we were sophisticated with the CIA, and therefore we wrote memoranda…..we tried to use the jargon of the CIA, because we felt it was important not to even indicate to everybody on the Commission some of these sources, because…..Dave Slawson had a special clearance with the CIA and there were some people that didn’t.7 In fact, as late as May 5, 1964, nearly a month after their Mexico City trip, these Warren Commission staffers had apparently kept every single Commissioner in the dark about sources and methods. Besides the three staffers (Slawson, Coleman, and Willens), apparently only Commission Counsel J. Lee Rankin had been told. A Memo For the Record written by CIA’s Thomas Hall of a May 5, 1964 meeting with Slawson notes that: According to Mr. Slawson, only Messrs. Rankin, Willens, Coleman (?) and he presently know of the telephone taps in Mexico City. Slawson, Willens and Coleman were briefed on the taps during their visit to Mexico City.

……….

“Who’s Kostikov?...[He’s] believed to work for Department 13 of the KGB -the department responsible for assassination.”

40 Million Americans Now, those who have seen the transcripts of the “Oswald” calls know they’re pretty innocuous if a bit confused, and are plausibly interpreted to be about Oswald’s visa request. The September 28 call has a disturbing comment that “I went to the Cuban Embassy to ask them for my address because they have it,” which would be the cause of much concern at the CIA postassassination, as it appeared to imply an Oswald relationship with the Cuban Embassy. The October 1 call had something even nastier in it, a reference by “Oswald” to a previous meeting with a man whose name the Soviet guard on the phone supplies: Kostikov.9 Who’s Kostikov? Warren Commission Document 347, one of those withheld until the 1990s, is a CIA report on Oswald’s Mexico City trip, written on January 31, 1964. It contains the following:

According to Mr. Slawson, no member of the Commission now knows of the telephone taps in Mexico City (he did not mention Mr. Dulles). Mr. [ ******** ] carefully briefed Mr. Slawson (probably rebriefed him) on the importance of these telephone taps to U.S. security and the grave damage that would be done to U.S. – Mexican relations if knowledge of their existence became public. Mr. Slawson quite clearly was a bit unhappy that certain information could not be used, since the taps were the only source. Oswald’s very bad Russian was the example he used. I asked what opinion Mrs. Oswald had of her husband’s Russian. She thought that he spoke it very well.8

This information is apparently what prompted Lyndon Johnson to tell Senator Richard Russell:

It’s unclear whether any Commission members were ever told of the telephone taps.

…..we’ve got to be taking this out of the arena where they’re testifying that Khrushchev and

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Kostikov is believed to work for Department Thirteen of the First Chief Directorate of the KGB. It is the Department responsible for executive action, including sabotage and assassination. These functions of the KGB are known within the Service itself as “Wet Affairs” (mokryye dela). The Thirteenth Department headquarters, according to very reliable information, conducts interviews or, as appropriate, file reviews on every foreign military defector to the USSR to study and to determine the possibility of utilizing the defector in his country of origin.10 [emphasis added]

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Castro did this and did that, and kicking us into a war that can kill 40 million Americans in an hour.11 Johnson, of course, had learned almost immediately that it wasn’t really Oswald on the phone, and so this Department Thirteen connection was a phony one. But he presumably didn’t tell that to Chief Justice Earl Warren when he arm-wrestled Warren onto his President’s Commission, with “what Hoover told me about a little incident in Mexico City.”12

The Third Tape Now again, the phone calls themselves are not really very sinister, though some dire implications could and were drawn from them in some quarters. But the assumption here is that the record is complete and unaltered. However, we have many reasons to suspect that this is not the case. In particular there are indications, as John Newman wrote about in Oswald and the CIA, that there was another phone call which is not in the current record. 13 Newman made use of the Lopez Report’s discussion of the testimony of David Phillips and that of Anna Tarasoff, half of the husband-wife CIA transcription team. But as we’ll see, even the Lopez Report is incomplete in regard to the relevant testimony here.

David Phillips 1976 Allegation First, David Phillips’ allegation. On November 26, 1976, the day before he was to testify before the House Select Committee on Assassinations, CIA Chief of Cuban Operations David Phillips dropped a bombshell into the media. The AP reported, in a story headlined “Oswald Offered Soviets Data for Trip,” that Phillips remembered another phone call, one not in the record.14 In that call, Phillips recalled, Oswald offered the Soviets information that “might be useful to them.” Ronald Kessler of the Washington Post wrote a lengthier story the same day (of which the Russ Holmes Work File contains many copies, an indication of the interest elicited at CIA) entitled “Hill Panel Probing Oswald Call.”15 Kessler reported that Oswald was trying to wrangle a free trip to the Soviet Union in exchange for information. Now, as recorded in these articles Phillips’ story was still not of a “Hey, I’m going to kill the President JFK Lancer

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like you told me” phone call. Nonetheless, it’s more sinister than the calls we have transcripts for, and might very well include statements that would imply a working relationship between Oswald and the Soviets. And if this story is true, it indicates that the record on Mexico City has been fudged a bit, which is disturbing also. The HSCA testimony of David Phillips is now public, held among the so-called Security Classified testimony in 9 boxes at the National Archives. Phillips was questioned by Richard Sprague, the HSCA’s head at that point and for a few months more, until strange circumstances led to his ouster and replacement by Robert Blakey. In his deposition, David Phillips started out answering directly and then slowly started to dance sideways under questioning, trying to maintain his allegation without being pinned down too hard on specifics: Mr. Sprague. The United Press has a specific quotation of a statement which they say you made to a United Press International reporter named Daniel F. Gillmore, quoting in part as follows: “I have the recollection hazy after fourteen years that Oswald intimated that he had information that might be useful to the Soviets and Cuba, and that he hoped to be provided with free transportation to Russia via Cuba.” Did you make that statement to Mr. Daniel F. Gillmore of United Press International? Mr. Phillips. I did, sir. Mr. Sprague. Is that statement accurate? Mr. Phillips. I think it is, sir, yes, it is. Mr. Sprague. There is, in the Washington Post of yesterday’s date, a story by Ronald Kessler in which he quotes you in part stating that you recall from a transcript Oswald telling the Soviet embassy, “I have information you would be interested in, and I know you can pay my way” into Russia, but that is not part of the quote. Is that what you said in part to Mr. Kessler? Mr. Phillips. I feel I cannot answer that yes or no without explaining that I met with Mr. Kessler on two occasions, once for a long lunch, once in a coffee shop, and he called me two or three times on the phone. In these discussions with Mr. Kessler, I did— he raised the subject of whether or not Oswald was offering information, was being paid, wanted to be paid to go to the Soviet Vol. 7, Issue 4

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The Tarasoffs and the Lopez Report

Union, and wanted to know whether or not I could confirm that. I did confirm in the sense— Mr. Sprague. My question is, I have read a specific quotation, Mr. Phillips. You are under oath at this time. Mr. Phillips. I understand. Mr. Sprague. And I will reread the quotation, because I do want to know, did you make this statement in part. I understand that there were other parts to the conversation, but did you make this statement to Mr. Kessler—I’m not talking about you, I am talking about what Oswald allegedly said: “I have information you would be interested in, and I know you can pay my way.” Mr. Phillips. I think I may have said that or something near to it, but what I intended to convey was that Mr. Kessler was saying, well, is that the idea, and I said yes, that was the idea that we gathered.16

Now, if this story were solely told by David Phillips, researchers might very well write it off as some form of disinformation. But, as the Lopez Report relates, the story received corroboration. Anna Tarasoff, wife of Boris Tarasoff and part of the team which transcribed the Oswald calls, remembered such a conversation. The Lopez Report relates that on April 12, 1978, Anna Tarasoff was shown the extant transcripts of conversations, but that: In addition to these transcripts, Ms. Tarasoff testified that she remembered one more conversation that involved Lee Oswald.18 In her own words: According to my recollection, I myself, have made a transcript, an English transcript, of Lee Oswald talking to the Russian Consulate or whoever he was at that time, asking for financial aid.

By 11 pages later in the interview transcript, though, Phillips had backed pretty far off the original story, and was talking about a conversation which was mainly about a visa: Mr. Sprague. I do not want you to give an answer based upon what anyone else says. I do not want you to give an answer trying to square your answer with what you believe is on somebody else’s transcript or anything else. I want this to be your own answer as best you can recall, of what was the purport of that first intercept. Mr. Phillips. Okay. All right. Obviously after so long I can’t remember it word for word, but I remember that the thrust of the conversation was Oswald saying to the Soviet he talked to in the Soviet Embassy, “What have you heard about my visa, what news do you have?” “What have you heard about my visa, what news do you have,” something like that. I also recall that Oswald was saying “What’s wrong, why don’t you do this?” And I recall something in that conversation that I can only call an intimation that he said “Well, you really should talk to me,” or something like that. Now, it seems that I recall that, and that is all that I recall with absolute clarity.17

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Now, that particular transcript does not appear here and whatever happened to it, I do not know, but it was a lengthy transcript and I personally did that transcript. It was a lengthy conversation between him and someone at the Russian Embassy.19 Ms. Tarasoff remembered specifically another call with content similar to that described by Phillips. Furthermore, she remembered that the conversation was lengthy, unlike the short transcripts which exist now, and in English, not broken Russian or Spanish. But the Lopez Report also notes: Mr. Tarasoff did not confirm his wife’s recollection of another conversation including Oswald. He said that he did not remember any other calls involving Lee Oswald or any details of Oswald’s conversations that were not reflected in the transcripts.20 And that’s an accurate account of the Tarasoff’s April 1978 testimony, which is now public, part of nine boxes of Security Classified testimony.

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The Tarasoffs’ Earlier Testimony But completely ignored in the Lopez Report is earlier testimony of both Mr. and Mrs. Tarasoff, testimony given nearly a year-and-a-half earlier. In fact, Richard Sprague’s team had barely finished interviewing David Phillips when they flew down to Guadalajaro Mexico to interview the Tarasoff couple, on November 30, 1976. And in this interview, Boris Tarasoff didn’t have the memory lapse he was to exhibit later, during the Blakey era. The summary of this earlier interview, included along with the transcript in the file, contains the following: The Tarasoffs claim to remember translating and transcribing at least two conversations involving Oswald. They remember that the first one was fairly short and routine. Oswald did not identify himself in this first conversation. The second one was much longer and Oswald did identify himself in this conversation. The Tarasoffs remember Oswald discussing his financial situation in this call. They deny making any editorial or marginal comments in the transcription of this call. The Tarasoffs remember nothing unusual about the first call or the circumstances surrounding its delivery or transcription. The second call was delivered to them and they were asked to transcribe the Oswald call as quickly as possible. Their contact expressed a strong interest in the identity of the caller and the substance of the call. The Tarasoffs translated and transcribed the call and returned the transcript on the same day, using an emergency contact as opposed to waiting until the next morning and using their standard contact.21 In this interview, both Tarasoffs clearly remembered an English conversation, which Anna transcribed as she typically handled English calls whereas her husband typically did the Russian ones. This may be responsible for her memory being better regarding the content of the call. But that there was such a call, in English, lengthy, and with a great deal of excitement surrounding it, both Tarasoffs were explicit, as this excerpt reveals: Mr. Brooten. There was a second long conJFK Lancer

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versation. Between the first conversation and the second conversation, were you asked to attempt to determine the identity of this person? Mr. Tarasoff. Oh yes. Mr. Brooten. All right, would you describe that. Mr. Tarasoff. Well, to the best of my knowledge, we either got the note or was it passed verbally, I think we got a note, no? Mrs. Tarasoff. Well, if I’m not mistaken, the party that brought the reels, there was a notation made to listen to number so-and-so on tape so-and-so dated whatever date it was, because each reel had a date and a number and according to the numbers, then there were, the transcripts of each conversation within that had a number, so you ran the tape until you came to a certain number and then you listened. Mr. Brooten. Now, did they want you to or did they give you any instructions about attempting to determine who the caller was in that case? Mr. Tarasoff. Yes, they certainly did. They wanted to know the name of the person. Then if we learned the name to get in touch with them immediately and turn in the transcript, to make the transcript, turn it in forget about Spanish, Russian or whatever was on the reel— Mrs. Tarasoff. In other words, this was top priority if we got the name, to work on it. Mr. Tarasoff. It was very important to them. Mr. Brooten. All right sir. Now did you receive a second tape with this same individual speaking to anyone at the Soviet Embassy? Mr. Tarasoff. Well that’s, you mean the third conversation? Mr. Brooten. All right, no but there was a second one. Mr. Tarasoff. The long one, yes.22 In this lengthy interview, the following points were made quite clearly: • Both Tarasoffs remembered. Both Tarasoffs remembered another call. • Lengthy. It was a lengthy call. • English. It was in English, and Mrs. Vol. 7, Issue 4

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Tarasoff transcribed it. • Financial Discussion. Oswald discussed his financial situation. • Keen Interest. The CIA was very keen on this call, both the identity of the caller and the substance.

“On the lack of a photograph of Oswald, Scott wrote, ‘persons watching these embassies photographed Oswald as he entered and left each one, and clocked the time spent on each visit.’”

An Incomplete Record There are many other clues that something is missing from the CIA’s story about what happened in Mexico City in late September and early October of 1963, and that the record we have today has been effaced. Another of the Security Classified depositions is that of Ray Rocca, who was Chief of the Research & Analysis division of Counter Intelligence at CIA. Rocca was shown the October cable traffic which reported on the Oswald calls. He exhibited a fair amount of confusion, referring repeatedly to cables which had been sent earlier than the “first” cable of October 8. Rocca finally threw up his hands and said of the “first” cable: “Well, it seems to me too late, that communication began earlier from Mexico City.”23 Win Scott, the CIA Mexico City station chief, was another whose account does not square with “the record” as it exists in CIA documents. In a manuscript entitled Foul Foe, Scott complained about the Warren Commission’s account of the Oswald visits. Writing about the lack of a photograph of Oswald, for instance, he wrote: “persons watching these embassies photographed Oswald as he entered and left each one, and clocked the time he spent on each visit.”24 The HSCA uncovered this manuscript, whose contents were disputed by the CIA, but HSCA investigators were less sure that Scott was in error. Writing to DCI Stansfield Turner on October 13, 1978, HSCA Chairman Louis Stokes wrote a letter which began “I am writing you with regard to a matter of grave concern to the House Select Committee on Assassinations,” and went on to describe problems with the CIA’s story regarding photo surveillance. Regarding the Scott manuscript, Stokes wrote “Scott’s comments are a source of deep concern to this Committee, for they suggest your Agency’s possible withholding of photographic materials highly relevant to this investigation.”25 The Tarasoffs’ 1976 testimony is clear and believable, despite the memory lapse exhibited by Boris Tarasoff more than a year later. This “missing call” might have occurred on Monday, September 30, a day suspiciously lacking in activity in the official record.26 3 4

No one’s memory of such a call includes any ultra-sinister discussion such as a plot to kill Kennedy. But what is remembered of the call gives it a more sinister import than those now in the record. Besides Oswald’s offer of information and assertions that “I know you can pay my way,” the lengthy call might have contained indications that the Russian’s knew Oswald and had dealt with him before. This would probably only be the case if the call was a complete fabrication, with neither Oswald nor the real Soviet Embassy officials on the other end, but there are many indications that the September 28 “Saturday” call is such a fabrication (among other things, both supposed parties to the call deny that such a call could have taken place on that day, when the embassies were closed).27 Perhaps it is this “third call” which prompted Lyndon Johnson to bandy about the figure of “40 million Americans involved” in a nuclear exchange, and prompted a cover-up of more than just visa talk.

Telephone Taps and Human Informants The new documents reveal more about how the telephone tapping operation worked, and what other sources of information the CIA had at its disposal in Mexico City.

Mr. Hoover’s Informant A reasonable working assumption has been that the tapes were flown up on the night of the 22nd on the same Naval Attache plane that carried the “Mystery Man” photographs. I think that’s still the most likely scenario, even though there’s not a single released document that says so. But there’s another possibility.

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On November 26, just after the dust had settled and the CIA and FBI had agreed that there were no tapes after all, only transcripts, CIA Director McCone and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover had a little phone conversation. Here is an excerpt, taken from a transcript preserved in CIA files:28 Hoover. But there is no question that he [Oswald] is the right man. There are a lot of aspects that we have dug up, for instance, with regards to the matter in Mexico City. We have now found that the photograph that was taken was not that of Oswald. We do find from our informant down there that Oswald did call at the Embassy that day and the informant has given us the conversation that he had….. [emphasis added] Is Hoover being chummy here, referring to a CIA teltap operation as “our informant?” Or does he mean something else here? The HSCA put this transcript in front of Ray Rocca, Chief of Research & Analysis in the CIA’s Counter Intelligence division. Rocca was a key player in 1963 and had been hired back during the Rockefeller Commission’s tenure to pull together materials on Mexico City. When shown this transcript, Rocca immediately recognized the “informant” as LIENVOY, the cryptonym for the taping operation. Here is an excerpt from his deposition: Mr. Goldsmith. I would like to show you a transcript of a telephone conversation between Mr. McCone and Mr. Hoover dated 26 November, 1963. It is CIA document number 2134. Does that appear to the [sic] a transcript of a telephone conversation? Mr. Rocca. Yes, it does. Mr. Goldsmith. Would you read the middle paragraph, which makes reference to an FBI informant. (pause) Mr. Rocca. That’s LIENVOY. That’s their material [************************** **********************]. Mr. Goldsmith. So, how would— Mr. Rocca. I would interpret it that way. I have never read this piece of paper that I recall. That would be my reaction. Mr. Goldsmith. For the record, let’s get this JFK Lancer

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clear. The Director of the FBI, Mr. Hoover, is making reference to an informant that the FBI had in Mexico City, and he is indicating that the informant has informed the Bureau as to the contents of Oswald’s conversations in Mexico City. From your answer, I take it that you assume that Mr. Hoover is referring to the LIENVOY operation. Mr. Rocca. And he is subtly letting Mr. McCone know that Mr. McCone’s resources down there were not unique, that they, too, had access to [ ****************** ]. Mr. Goldsmith. [*************************************** ******************************** ]. Mr. Rocca. [************************************* *************************], yes. Mr. Goldsmith. [********************************** ************************************]. Mr. Rocca. Yes.29 The following day, CIA HQ sent a cable down to the Mexico City station, alerting them to Hoover’s revelation. DIR 85245 of November 27 suggests that Sylvia Duran’s statements be used instead of the LIENVOY take, to avoid compromising the operation, and then goes on to discuss the problem of where the FBI is getting its information. In the following cable standard CIA-speak applies, so “KUBARK” refers to the CIA and “ODENVY” is the FBI. 2. PLS NOTE THAT DIRECTOR ODENVY IS GETTING FROM ODENVY MEXI MUCH INFO WHICH OBVIOUSLY ORIGINATES WITH THE LIENVOY OPERATION. ODENVY HERE APPARENTLY DOES NOT REALIZE THAT THIS INFO WAS PRODUCED BY A KUBARK OPERATION, AND INDEED, ODENVY MAY BE GETTING THIS LIENVOY INFO THRU ITS OWN CLANDESTINE SOURCES [ **************** ] OR EVEN IN THE [ ************ ]. PLS TRY TO CLARIFY WITH ODENVY REP THERE THE EXACT MANNER IN WHICH HE HAS OBTAINED SUCH INFO AND THE FORM IN WHICH HE HAS Vol. 7, Issue 4

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SENT IT TO ODENVY HQ. WE MUST AVOID THE INADVERTENT COMPROMISE OF LIENVOY. It’s apparent that, one way or another, FBI Director Hoover had his own access to the telephone tap material, and even CIA did not appear to have known how. Does this mean the FBI had its own tapping operation? Probably not. While it remains unclear whether the FBI had access to raw tapes, or transcripts, or simply information, the most plausible explanation is that Hoover had people “in on” the CIA teltap operation, LIENVOY. Naming it a “CIA” operation may be what is confusing things here, because it’s likely that LIENVOY was not fully a CIA operation at all. There remain many redactions in these transcripts and documents in this area, but what is being kept secret does not seem to be so much the methods as the sources, specifically just who it was that ran LIENVOY. One redaction in Richard Helms’ HSCA testimony holds the key, and its contents can be guessed fairly easily:

As an aside, the Rocca HSCA deposition has another very interesting moment, prior to the discussion of the Hoover-McCone call. Michael Goldsmith, the HSCA interviewer, was trying to find out why the CIA’s Counter Intelligence staff, the CI/SIG group in particular, was the one that opened the 201 file on Oswald a year after he defected to the Soviet Union. Goldsmith was curious, because CI/SIG was concerned primarily with penetrations of the DD/P, the operations group inside the CIA.

Mr. Helms. I do not know whether it has been made, the Committee has been made of the fact that the reason for the sensitivity of these telephone taps and the surveillance was not only because it was sensitive from the Agency’s standpoint, but the telephone taps were running in conjunction with the [ **************** ] and therefore, if this had become public knowledge, it would have caused very bad feelings between Mexico and the United States, and that was the reason.30 Substitute “Mexican DFS” for the redacted text, and things fall into place nicely. The Mexican security service no doubt managed the physical placement of telephone taps within their own country, and probably supplied the people who manned the listening post as well. Hoover, with his extensive contacts in Latin America, no doubt had his own backchannel into what was ostensibly a CIA operation but which was not really fully their show. It’s interesting to speculate as to exactly when the FBI got access to the “Oswald” tapes or transcripts, whether right away on November 22, or a few days later before the November 26 phone call, or even prior to the assassination.

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Mr. Goldsmith. …..My question is more narrowly focused in why would CI/SIG in particular have been opening the file. Mr. Rocca. Because of their concern, basically, with the problem of Americans and they were the recipient of the materials, probably from the Office of Security, if not the actual copy of that material, certainly the chit chat. Bruce Solie was – B-R-U-C-E S-O-L-I-E – constantly in touch with Mr. O’Neill and with Mrs. Edgerter, I am sure. Mr. Goldsmith. But from the face of it, it does not appear that Oswald posed any sort of a counter intelligence threat in terms of the penetration of DDP personnel. Mr. Rocca. Of the U.S. security interest. At a very high level, though, he did, involving other departments and agencies of the government. Mr. Goldsmith. I understand, and I am not suggesting that a file should not have been opened by the CI staff. I am just trying to determine why CI/SIG in particular, which was concerned about DDP penetrations, would have been opening the file. …………. Mr. Goldsmith. How would the function of CI/SIG in that case be different from in the Office of Security, in general? Mr. Rocca. It would be with respect to where and what had happened to DDP materials with respect to a defection in any of these places. Mr. Goldsmith. Again, though, Oswald had nothing to do with DDP at this time, at least apparently. Mr. Rocca. I’m not saying that. You said it. [ emphasis added ]31

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Human Informants: Two, to be Exact, One Male, One Female Telephone taps and photo surveillance were only two of the tools employed in the spy-vs-spy game played in Mexico City. Many of these operations are touched upon in a three-volume history of the Mexico City CIA station, sanitized excerpts of which were shown to three HSCA investigators. 32 While still heavily redacted, this lengthy set of excerpts describes a variety of operations conducted against the Cuban Embassy (and other embassies). Microphones were planted in various offices. Wastebasket trash was recovered and analyzed. Passenger manifests from flights to and from Cuba were passed along. A photo-surveillance van followed “targets” around the city. While the first microphone transmitter was installed in the Cuban Embassy in February 1961, so many redactions are present that it is impossible to be certain that the planted microphones were in operation during the time of the Oswald visit in the fall of 1963.33 But another operation ensured that more listening ears than microphones would be present in the Cuban Embassy. Have a look at this cable, sent from the Mexico City CIA station to headquarters on November 28, 1963. [**********] REPORTED 27 NOV AFTER SYLVIA DURAN FIRST ARREST WAS PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE THAT THERE GREAT DEAL DISCUSSION OF THIS IN EMBASSY. SHE BACK IN OFFICE 25 NOV AND SEEMED QUITE PLEASED WITH HER PERFORMANCE. HER ACCOUNT INTERROGATION CONTAINED LITTLE NEW EXCEPT POLICE HAD THREATENED HER WITH EXTRADITION TO U.S. TO FACE OSWALD. SHE HAD NO FEAR OF CONFRONTATION. [********] DESCRIBES HER AS VERY INTELLIGENT AND QUICK-WITTED. OF ASSASSINATION ITSELF [*********] SAID THERE ALMOST NO DISCUSSION IN EMBASSY. STAFF MEETING 23 NOV VERY SHORT AND SOMBER WITH GENERAL IMPRESSION BEING ONE OF SHOCK AND DISBELIEF. HEARD NO EXPRESSIONS OF PLEASURE. [***********] SEEN NIGHT 27 NOV HAD NOTHING TO ADD TO ABOVE. INDEED HER VERSION MUCH LESS DETAILED. JFK Lancer

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NEITHER [ ****** ] NOR [ ******** ] HAD ANY PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE OSWALD PRESENCE CUBAN EMBASSY AT ANY TIME.34 The report above clearly comes from human informants inside the Cuban Embassy. This cable and others35 show that there were two informants, one male and one female, who worked there. Their identities are not revealed, at least in these cables of the days following the assassination, where their identities are redacted.36 What did these human informants know of the events of September/October 1963? The last line of the above cable says that they had no personal knowledge of Oswald’s presence, and this claim was reiterated in a cable sent the following day from CIA HQ to the White House, FBI, and State Department: NONE OF THESE SOURCES HAD ANY PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE OF ANY VISITS THAT LEE OSWALD MAY HAVE MADE TO THE CUBAN EMBASSY IN MEXICO CITY OR OF ANY BUSINESS HE MAY HAVE TRANSACTED.37 The key phrase here may be “personal” knowledge, as opposed to what these informants learned from other employees. HSCA investigators Ed Lopez and Harold Leap found and interviewed these two informants, without permission from the CIA. According to another HSCA investigator, Gaeton Fonzi, the informants told Lopez and Leap that “the consensus among the employees within the Cuban Consulate after the Kennedy assassination was that it wasn’t Oswald who had been there.”38 The informants also said that they had reported this fact to the Agency.

Luisa Calderon’s Foreknowledge The “Oswald” tapes weren’t the only taped conversations of concern to the CIA and the assassination investigators. A November 26 call between Cuban Ambassador to Mexico Hernandez Armas and Cuban President Dorticos was a cause of some concern. Hernandez told Dorticos that the DFS had asked Sylvia Duran about intimate relations with Oswald, and Dorticos for his part repeatedly asked whether she had been asked about monetary payments to Oswald.39 Another taped call, one which caused the HSCA much Vol. 7, Issue 4

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consternation, involved Cuban Embassy employee Luisa Calderon. Volume XI of the HSCA’s Report, careful to avoid disclosing sources and methods, laid out the issue: A reliable source reported that on 22 November 1963, several hours after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Luisa Calderon Carralero, a Cuban employee of the Cuban Embassy in Mexico City, and believed to be a member of the Cuban Directorate General of Intelligence (DGI), discussed news of the assassination with an acquaintance. Initially, when asked if she had heard the latest news, Calderon replied, in what appeared to be a joking manner, “Yes, of course, I knew almost before Kennedy.”40 The “reliable source” is again a telephone tap, which captured a conversation at 5:30 PM local time, several hours after the assassination. A loose “transcript” of the conversation starts this way: HF asks LUISA if she has heard the latest news and LUISA, in a joking tone says, “Yes, of course, I knew almost before Kennedy.” HF smiles and comments that it is very bad; …. There are a few oddities here. How one ascertains that a person is “smiling” in a telephone conversation is one. Also, this conversation was accompanied by a handwritten note which includes: “22 Nov Lienvoy Luisa Calderon and man outside.” “Man outside” is typical CIA-speak for a man on an outside telephone line (and LIENVOY is the teltap operation). But the “transcript” notes that the other person is HF, presumably Hispanic Female. The handwritten note also says that “cc original and transcript sent to Galbond via Kingman. Nothing to Buro yet,” interestingly keeping the FBI in the dark for the moment.41 In any case, the HSCA became greatly concerned about the possibility that Luisa Calderon had exhibited foreknowledge of the assassination with her joking statement “Yes, of course, I knew almost before Kennedy.” If a “conspiracy buff” took some similar statement on the part of an American official and ballooned it into a conspiracy mountain, they would of course be subjected to deserved ridicule. But the double-standard applied to Cubans, particularly one thought to be in the employ of the Cuban intelligence 3 8

service, made this case different. In his interview with William Coleman, Ed Lopez devoted 15 minutes to the topic of Luisa Calderon, even though Coleman couldn’t even remember who such a person was. The HSCA wrote several pages in Volume XI about their concerns, and the page devoted to her in the Final Report was more space than they devoted to many more important matters. An obvious question here is whether Luisa Calderon made any statements between the time of the assassination and this 5:30 PM call, statements which might clarify whether she really had any foreknowledge or was merely joking. For instance, is there a document with transcripts of all taped calls for November 22, and does Luisa appear in other, earlier calls? There is no evidence that I’ve found to indicate that the HSCA asked this question, or received such a transcript log. But one does exist. RIF #104-1040410426 contains 49 pages of Spanish transcripts and English translations for November 22, 1963. And indeed there is not just one but two prior calls involving Luisa Calderon, one at 1:30 PM and one at 2:00 PM. Here is the beginning of the English translation of the first call: 1330 hours. Unidentified woman calls LUISA (in Cuban Embassy). Caller asks LUISA if she knows the news about KENNEDY’S death. LUISA: is surprised….says it is a lie and asks who? CALLER: in an attempt in Texas. LUISA: further surprise and again asks if news is official and when did it occur. CALLER: yes, it happened at 1300 hours. LUISA: laughs and says how great.42

………. The second call came a half-hour later. If Luisa Calderon exhibits foreknowledge in this call, it is related to Oswald’s death and not Kennedy’s:

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about 1400 hours. YOYA calls to Cuban Embassy and asks LUISA if she heard the news and she says yes. YOYA: what do you think of it? LUISA: Well I don’t know. I still don’t know what opinion to have about it. YOYA: What bruts. A good shot. Direct. Listen. Now they are going to say that it was from here. That it was some Cuban. Kennedy Assassination Chronicles Vol. 7, Issue 4

LUISA: That is possible. Then if they don’t say it; they will die.43

………. It is very hard to believe that the HSCA would have written what it did about Luisa Calderon if HSCA staffers had seen these transcripts, which seem to exonerate Calderon of what was always a pretty weak charge. Was this just a case of bureaucratic snafu, with these earlier transcripts getting lost in the shuffle and overlooked? That too is hard to believe. The CIA Office of Legislative Counsel took the trouble to write Robert Blakey a ten-page letter in 1979, much of it taken up with bickering over the HSCA’s writeup on the Calderon affair.44 Now that the damage was done, and the HSCA led on a wild goose chase into Cuban-conspiracy-land, the CIA was concerned that the HSCA would blow its sources and methods in their writeup. So the letter goes into great detail bickering over the exact wording of the Spanish words which were translated into “I knew almost before Kennedy,” never pausing to mention “Oh, by the way, here are some earlier transcripts that will put the whole business to rest.” It’s of course possible to argue that people at the Office of Legislative Counsel were unaware of the earlier calls, but the idea that the CIA would not know how to look for “the day’s take” of transcripts for November 22 is ludicrous. This episode is very damning of the Agency, adding fuel to the thesis that the Agency was more than happy in the 1970s to do what it had done with Warren Commission 15 years earlier, which is to push Communist conspiracy theories vigorously and divert the investigations from more fruitful avenues of research. A final point about the Calderon affair has to do with the importance of original research using the documents, and being careful of writers with an agenda. I am referring to Gus Russo’s Live by the Sword, a book which generally asserts that Oswald killed Kennedy by himself but a lot of secret sources and interviews conducted by Russo in the 1990s suggest that Oswald may have been dealing with Cuban agents and possibly egged on by them, and then bad Bobby Kennedy had to order a coverup because he and Jack had been going after Castro due to an ego-driven personal vendetta. Russo discusses Luisa Calderon, and even includes some new information from the new documents. Russo repeats the famous “I knew almost before Kennedy” quote, but then adds this: CIA transcripts of the conversation support the source. But they reveal even more detail. JFK Lancer

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The conversation is punctuated by so much laughter, and such joyous disbelief, that the two parties appear giddy. Calderon, through her laughter, said that she couldn’t believe the news of Kennedy’s death, and continually remarked on how great it was. When the caller said that Kennedy was “shot three times in the face,” Calderon exclaimed “Perfect!”45 Russo exaggerates the amount of “laughter” and “joyous disbelief” in the conversation, unless he has been somehow privy to an actual recording and not the transcript in the record that the rest of us can read. But far more interesting is how he conflates multiple conversations into one. Calderon did indeed reply “Perfect” when told Kennedy was shot three times in the face. But she did this during the recently-released 1:30 PM call, the one in which Calderon repeatedly expresses surprise at the news of the assassination, not the 5:30 PM “foreknowledge” call. Russo has conveniently left out the exonerating aspects of this earlier call, and used only the portion that makes Calderon look bad. Readers beware.

The Enigma of Pedro Gutierrez Valencia If the Luisa Calderon story has been cleared up at all, there’s another story that’s about to get more complicated. This one has to do with a man named Pedro Gutierrez Valencia. Mr. Gutierrez was one of the people who saw Oswald take money in or near the Cuban Embassy. His story was quite a bit different from that of Gilberto Alvarado Ugarte, the Nicaraguan undercover agent whose story appears in the Warren Report under the moniker “D,” but Gutierrez’ story was also of great concern to the Commission. Alvarado was ultimately discredited by a lie-detector test and retracted his story. But Gutierrez’ story was never really discredited. In the Coleman-Slawson “foreign conspiracy report” that came to light in the 1990s, Gutierrez was of more concern than Alvarado.46 The gist of the Gutierrez story, as told to the FBI and the Warren Commission is as follows. Gutierrez wrote a letter on December 2, 1963, to President Johnson, which caused him to then be interviewed multiple times by FBI agents during early 1964. In the letter and interviews, he stated that in the course of his duties as a credit examiner he was in the Cuban EmVol. 7, Issue 4

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bassy in Mexico City on September 30 or October 1, 1963. While leaving the Embassy, he bumped into a Cuban who was accompanied by an American—the two were having a heated exchange in which he heard the words “Castro,” “Cuba,” and “Kennedy.” The Cuban was counting out money which he passed to the American, and the two then got into a car and drove away. After the assassination of President Kennedy, Gutierrez viewed pictures of Lee Harvey Oswald and realized that the American accompanying the Cuban had been Oswald.47 Gutierrez was interviewed four times by the FBI in early 1964; reports of these interviews are located in Commission Exhibit 2121 in WH24. Gutierrez’ neighbors reported that he was a serious and trustworthy individual, and his story was taken seriously. Ultimately, it was ignored based on the fact that he didn’t recognized a photo of Oswald when shown one by the FBI, and that he had only gotten a glimpse of Oswald, who was with the Cuban Gutierrez had bumped into. But these were light grounds on which to dismiss a detailed story by a seemingly credible person.

Gutierrez and the HSCA Interview

interview itself, though it displays the correct date (June 5, 1978). Instead, it is a tape of a person apparently reading, or re-enacting, the interview, using English instead of the Spanish language that the original interview must have used. Given the dramatic tone of voice employed at various points in the tape, it appears to be an English-language reading conducted by someone listening to the original interview with headphones or perhaps even in person, as there appear to be faint voices in the background. The tape itself does not have any revealing information as to the method by which it was created.49

Same Gutierrez, Different Story

When the HSCA went to Mexico in 1978, Gutierrez was among those interviewed. The Lopez Report notes that he was interviewed on June 5, 1978, after an earlier conversation.48 But of what Gutierrez had to say, the Lopez Report has only this footnote: 1192/ Pedro Gutierrez Valencia claimed that he bumped into Lee Harvey Oswald at the Consulate on September 27, 1963. Valencia was at the Consulate doing a credit check on one of the Cuban employees. There are two curious aspects of this footnote, apart from its brevity. One is the date of the alleged encounter, which is September 27 here, the day Oswald arrived in Mexico City. The other is the claim that Gutierrez bumped into Lee Harvey Oswald, not the Cuban accompanying him. Are these minor inaccuracies, or typos, or changes in the story? As it turns out, they are the tip of a very strange iceberg. I have not yet run across any transcript of the Gutierrez interview, but there is an audiotape on the shelves of the National Archives. It is not a tape of the 4 0

“”While leaving the Embassy, Gutierrez bumped into a Cuban accompanied by an American...he heard the words ‘Castro,’ ‘Cuba,’ and ‘Kennedy.’ After the assassination he realized that Oswald had been the American.”

In the tape, “Gutierrez” told the HSCA that he indeed wrote a letter to President Johnson, and then went on to dispute just about every aspect of the story told in that letter and subsequent interviews.50 After beginning to agree with the story as retold by Ed Lopez, the interviewer, Gutierrez began to express confusion and bewilderment at some of the statements attributed to him. For one thing, in the taped interview he claimed to have bumped into Oswald, but remembered nothing about a Cuban, finally saying: Gutierrez: I just don’t remember him [Oswald] being accompanied by another person. After more confusion by Gutierrez as to the contents of the letter, Lopez then read from the FBI reports, including facts about Oswald taking money from the Cuban and putting it in his left pocket, following both men to their car and watching them get in, and so on. Since Gutierrez said he remembered nothing about a Cuban, he also didn’t remember these aspects of his story either. At one point, Lopez tried to enlist Gutierrez’ help in figuring out how the FBI attributed statements to

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him which he now was denying: Lopez: I’m sorry if I appear to be pressing you, Mr. Valencia…….and also……ensure that the statements that the FBI credits you with were in fact accurate statements………you do not speak any English. I’m wondering now, is it possible that they had a translator present when they interviewed you? Gutierrez: No, they did not have a translator. They spoke broken Spanish and I spoke broken English. The interview kept returning to the Cuban or Cuban-American who was allegedly counting out money and with whom Gutierrez is supposed to have bumped. Gutierrez repeatedly expressed bewilderment: Lopez: Mr. Valencia, let us now go over the description of the CubanAmerican………First of all, you described him of course as Cuban-American, is that correct? Gutierrez: That is an enigma to me. I do not remember him being accompanied by a Cuban-American. In this segment, the translator’s voice displays great incredulity and bewilderment when delivering Gutierrez’ words: Lopez: In Exhibit number 2121, they stated that you described the other man as white, male, Cuban, 33 to 35 years old. Gutierrez: I do not ever remember describing him as such. I don’t remember anything about this Cuban-American. I mean, it could be that I said it and that I’m senile now and I don’t remember, but I do not ever remember mentioning anything about a Cuban. [emphasis in voice on tape] Gutierrez also disputed less important facts, such as who the credit check was for and its ultimate disposition. But the interview kept coming back to whether Gutierrez had bumped into a lone Oswald or into a Cuban who was counting out money for Oswald. I don’t know how a Cuban who didn’t exist could hand money to Oswald, but Ed Lopez kept at it: JFK Lancer

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Lopez: …..it states that you reported that the Cuban-American handed some money over to the American. Is that true, Mr. Valencia……Do you remember declaring it? Gutierrez: I do not ever remember that occurring; I do not remember ever stating that whatsoever. Never. What to make of this? These possibilities present themselves: 1. Gutierrez’ story was fabricated by the FBI in Mexico, and Gutierrez was telling the truth in 1978 . The letter, which had a thumbprint matched to Gutierrez, would be a key piece of evidence in evaluating this possibility. Even apart from the letter, though, the idea is a little far-out. Hoover’s FBI was pushing the lone-nut thesis, not Cuban conspiracies, although the FBI in Mexico might have marched to a different drummer. But this would have had to have been a fairly large conspiracy to sell such a story, which could easily have fallen apart if Gutierrez really wasn’t a part of it. 2. It’s all just a snafu; the story got mixed up and exaggerated innocently, maybe due to language problems. Hard to believe, given four detailed interviews with the FBI. Again, the letter would be important here. 3. Gutierrez was telling the truth in 1963 and 1964, but retracted his story in 1978, probably under pressure to do so. This seems at least as likely as the alternatives. Without a tape recording of the actual Gutierrez interview, though, it’s impossible to even begin to evaluate his demeanor with an eye toward gauging his truthfulness in 1978. Gutierrez is an enigma. His original story of the Cuban counting out money to Oswald seems all too convenient, a tall tale or a truthful story of a staged incident. With the 1978 retraction of most of the story and Gutierrez’ seeming shock at being told his own story, things have only gotten weirder.

Publishing the Mystery Man Photograph The last Mexico City story in this essay concerns the photographs taken of an unidentified person who Vol. 7, Issue 4

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has often been called the “Mystery Man.” New releases contain some items of interest. The man’s identity remains unestablished, though CIA files contain a fair amount of conjecture that he is Yuriy Moskalev, a Soviet scientist whose photograph shows a passing resemblance to the unidentified Mexico City man.51

that she had been shown a photo of Ruby before Ruby killed her son. The Warren Commission understandably wanted to rebut Marguerite’s assertion. In order to do so, the Commission intended to publish one of the “Mystery Man” photos, proving that it wasn’t Jack Ruby. On July 20, 1964, Warren Commission staffer Wesley Liebeler met with Arthur Dooley at CIA. Liebeler had already received affidavits from FBI’s James Malley and Bardwell Odum regarding the photograph, but Liebeler also wanted an affidavit from the CIA regarding the date the photo was taken, and indicated that the Commission would publish the photo.52 Richard Helms supplied an affidavit to Chief Counsel Rankin 3 days later, along with a request that the Warren Commission not publish the photograph, giving as reasons that “…it would jeopardize a most confidential and productive operation” and “It could be embarrassing to the individual involved who as far as this Agency is aware, had no connection with Lee Harvey Oswald or the assassination of President Kennedy.”53 The CIA’s concern for this individual’s privacy is touching, but the Commission did not back down. Two months later, on September 22, Arthur Dooley and Louis Pucket of CIA visited the Commission, where they met with staffers Goldberg and Liebeler, who insisted that the photo must be published, but deferred the final decision as to cropping and other matters to Chief Counsel Rankin.54 CIA Headquarters promptly alerted the Mexico City Station the next day regarding publication of the photo. The possibility that publication would “blow” the photo-surveillance operation was on Headquarter’s mind, and the cable noted: “OUSLER BEING CALLED TO WASH TO GIVE INFORMED OPINION OF POSSIBLE DAMAGE TO LILYRIC OR LIMITED” [the photo surveillance operations].55

The Commission’s Desire But of greater interest than this unlikely identification is the cable traffic surrounding the Warren Commission’s decision to publish a photograph of the Mystery Man in its Exhibit volumes (the photo was published in WH16 as Commission Exhibit 237, titled “Photograph of unidentified man.”). For reasons explained but still not entirely clear, FBI agent Bardwell Odum showed one or more of these photos to Oswald’s mother Marguerite on the evening of November 23, 1963. The man in the photos has a superficial resemblance to Jack Ruby, and Marguerite subsequently asserted before the Warren Commission 4 2

In a follow-up memo the next day, Headquarters invited the station’s comment on possible exposure of the photo surveillance operations, but added “IT IS NOT POSSIBLE HAVE PHOTOS EXCLUDED FROM REPORT.”56

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WC TESTIMONY OF MARGUERITE OSWALD Book I page 152-153 Mrs. Oswald: .... Now, Mr. Hart Odum, the same FBI agent, that insisted upon my daughter-in-law going with him from the Adolphus Hotel, knocked on the door at the Executive Inn. I had had my robe and slippers on, and I pushed the curtain aside when he knocked. He said, “This is Mr. Odum.” So, I opened the door. This is very important. I would like to not talk about it. I would like to show you what I did. This is so important. I opened the door just a little, because I had the robe off and I didn’t want anybody to come in. The door is just ajar. I am going to take my shoes off gentlemen, because I have this worked out. This is my height. He said, “Mrs. Oswald, we would like to see Marina.” I said, “Mr. Odum, I stated yesterday you are not going to see Marina. We are awful tired.” “Well, we just want to ask her one question.” “Mr. Odum, I am not calling my daughter. As a matter of fact, she is taking a bath.” She wasn’t. He said, “Mrs. Oswald, I would like to ask you a question.” I said, “Yes, sir.” The door is ajar. This is my height. I wear bifocals, which enlarges things. And in his hand — his hand is bigger than mine — in the cup of his hand, like this, is a picture. And the two corners are torn off the picture. This is a very glossy black and white picture of a man’s face and shoulder. Now, Mr. Odum wasn’t too tall. I need somebody else. Mr. Odum’s hand with the picture — what I am trying to say — he is facing this way — showing me. So my eyes are looking straight at the picture. And I have nothing else to see but this hand and the picture, because the door is afar. And there is nothing on the picture but a face and shoulders. There is no background or anything. So I can identify this picture amongst millions of pictures, I am so sure of it. It was a glossy black and white picture. So I said, “No, sir, believe me. I have never seen this picture in my life.” With that, he went off. There was another man with him.

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ing on September 25, the Station responded that “STATION UNCLEAR AS TO PURPOSE SERVED BY PUBLICATION PHOTO OF PERSON NOT EVEN INVOLVED IN THIS CASE.” After complaining that Marguerite Oswald could simply be ignored in this matter, the cable went on to add a very curious paragraph: “IF AS MEXI PREFERS TO BELIEVE OF ODENVY SHE SHOWN SPREAD OF CROPPED PHOTOS ALL OF WHICH TO APPEAR, NO OBJECTION HERE TO PUBLICATION OF REF PHOTO. IF THIS INCORRECT AND THIS SOLE PHOTO SHOWN HER AND TO BE PUBLISHED AGAINST MEXI WISHES, REQUEST EXACT ACCOUNT OF WHAT ODENVY TOLD HER.”57 This cable is strange in several regards. For one thing, the testimony of Marguerite Oswald is explicit that she was shown a single photograph by FBI Agent Bardwell Odum, “in the cup of his hand.” And an affidavit signed by Odum on July 10, 1964, refers to his cropping and display of a single photo. So why does the Mexico City station “prefer to believe” that she was shown a spread of cropped photos. And if this is really true, was it a spread consisting of all of the Mystery Man photos flown up from Mexico City (several were indeed supplied), or was it a spread of other photos which included a single Mystery Man photo? If the latter, why would they all have been cropped? Probably the strangest aspect of the cable is that the Mexico City station did not object to an entire spread of photos being published; the objection was if publication was to be of a single photo. This makes no sense if the real objection had to do with blowing the photosurveillance operation (i.e., showing backgrounds which would reveal camera placements to the Cubans and Soviets, etc). The more photographs published, the more likely someone would identify the source. What is going on here? The cable ends with the plea: “STATION WOULD APPRECIATE EFFORT TO DELETE PHOTO FROM PUBLICATION.” Headquarters replied the same day, confirming that the FBI had indeed shown Marguerite Oswald an entire spread of photos, “BUT SUBJECT PHOTO ONLY ONE WHICH ATTRACTED ATTENTION.”58 And again on the same day, Mexico City Station responded, announcing its plans to evacuate the photosurveillance stations in anticipation of publication of the offending photograph. But the detailed plans for such evacuation were preceded by the most curious statements in all of these cables, reproduced below:

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From the Warren Commission’s 26 volumes of Evidence, book 11, page 468

AFFIDAVIT OF BARDWELL D. ODUM The following affidavit was executed by Bardwell D. Odum on July 10, 1964. PRESIDENT’S COMMISSION ON THE ASSASSINATION OF AFFIDAVIT PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY STATE OF TEXAS, County of Dallas, ss : I, Bardwell D. Odum, having first been duly sworn, depose as follows: I am presently a Special Agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Department of Justice, and have been employed in such a capacity since June 15, 1942. On November 23, 1963, while acting officially in my capacity as a Special Agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, I obtained a photograph of an unknown individual, furnished to the Federal Bureau of Investigation by the Central Intelligence Agency, and proceeded to the Executive Inn, a motel, at Dallas, Texas, where Marina Oswald was staying. In view of the source of this picture, and, in order to remove all background data which might possibly have disclosed the location where the picture was taken, I trimmed off the background. The straight cuts made were more quickly done than a complete trimming of the silhouette and I considered them as effective for the desired purpose. I desired to show this photograph to Marina Oswald in an attempt to identify the individual portrayed in the photograph and to determine if he was an associate of Lee Harvey Oswald. It was raining and almost dark. I went to the door of Marina Oswald’s room and knocked, identifying myself. Marguerite Oswald opened the door slightly and, upon being informed that I wished to speak to Marina Oswald, told me that Marina Oswald was completely exhausted and could not be interviewed. Marguerite Oswald did not admit me to the motel room. I told her I desired to show a photograph to Marina Oswald, and Marguerite Oswald again said that Marina was completely exhausted and could not be interviewed due to that fact. I then showed Marguerite Oswald the photograph in question. She looked at it briefly and stated that she had never seen this individual. I then departed the Executive Inn. The conversation with Marguerite Oswald and the exhibition of the photograph took place while I was standing outside the door to the room and Marguerite Oswald was standing inside with the door slightly ajar. Attached hereto are two photographic copies of the front and back of a photograph.* I have examined these copies and they are exact copies of the photograph of the unknown individual which I showed to Mrs. Marguerite Oswald on November 23, 1963. Signed this 10th day of July 1964. (S) Bardwell D. Odum, BARDWELL D. ODUM.

2. ONLY REMAINING HOPE WOULD APPEAR BE TO GET ASCHAM PREVAIL ON COMMISSION NOT ONLY RETOUCH BACKGROUND IN PHOTOS BUT ALSO RETOUCH FACE TO DEGREE OBVIOUSLY NOT IDENTIFIABLE WITH

1. REFS OBVIOUSLY CROSSED. IN STATION VIEW DANGERS PARA 3, LARGELY RECOGNIZED IN REF A, STILL APPLY. 4 4

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RUBY BUT ALSO NOT WITH ACTUAL SUBJECT OF PHOTO.59 This cable is remarkable. The “dangers para 3” refer to the earlier Mexi cable’s assertion that “CANNOT PREDICT SECURITY EFFECT OF PUBLICATION WITHOUT ANSWER PARA 2,” where paragraph 2 is the strange assertion previously shown, i.e., that the Mexi station was fine with publication of an entire spread of photos, but not of the single Mystery Man shot. What is yet more remarkable here is the Mexico City Station’s request to retouch not only the background but also the face of the unidentified man. The Warren Commission had agreed to strip out every stitch of background at CIA’s request—now the CIA, or at least the Mexico City Station, abruptly urged a photo alteration to avoid revealing (to whom?) the identity of the supposedly unknown Mystery Man. It strains credulity that such a request was made by people who did not know the identity of the man in the photograph. There is at least one albeit cryptic indication in the record that they did. After arrangements were made on November 22 to send the photos to Dallas, Mexico City CIA Station Chief Win Scott wrote a letter to J. C. King, Chief of the Western Hemisphere division of CIA. The letter begins:

Dear J.C.: Reference is made to our conversation of November 22 in which I requested permission to give the Legal Attaché copies of photographs of a certain person who is known to you.60

ASCHAM And who is ASCHAM, who might prevail upon the Commission to perform this retouching of the face in the photo? The requesting cable does not reveal the identity of this obviously important person. But another document in released DDP (Deputy Director for Plans) files is a seven-page writeup of a meeting between ASCHAM and an unidentified high-level Mexican official, brokered by CURTIS (CIA Station Chief Win Scott). The memo of this meeting, which took place on January 14, 1961, uses JFK Lancer

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pseudonyms throughout, but there are enough clues to provide a reasonable guess as to ASCHAM’s identity. ASCHAM was a high-level U.S. official. ASCHAM had a brother who was also a high-ranking U.S. official and who was “very sick” in 1958. In the memo of the meeting, ASCHAM seems closely allied with both the CIA and with U.S. business interests. ASCHAM is almost certainly Allen Dulles, whose brother John Foster was Secretary of State under Eisenhower until his death by cancer in May 1959.61 Whether Dulles was contacted or not, the Warren Commission did go on to publish the Mystery Man photograph, and CIA photo-surveillance operations were momentarily disrupted. The face in the photo was not retouched. Why did it need to be? Who was this man? Who in CIA knew who he was? Was his photo really sent to Dallas as a mistaken picture of Oswald, or was he thought to be an accomplice, or was something else entirely at work here?

Conclusion Mexico City remains an enigma wrapped in a mystery inside a riddle, or however it goes. The 1976 Tarasoff interview is one of the keys to a deeper mystery not revealed for the most part in “the record,” which increasingly smacks of coverup. But a coverup of what? Not a Cuban or Soviet conspiracy, in my view, but rather of a false Communist conspiracy, one which had more seemingly legitimate evidence supporting it than there now appears to be. And one which was somehow wrapped in a “legitimate” CIA operation, perhaps a staged provocation involving Oswald or “Oswald” at the Cuban Embassy, that was hijacked into an assassination plot. In such a scenario, the CIA’s ability to untangle itself from the Kennedy assassination per se may have been an impossible task, necessitating an Agency coverup. Problematic for the CIA also is that some Agency insiders may very well have been in on the assassination plot. Anne Goodpasture, author of the 133-page Mexico City Chronology62 and right-hand aide to CIA Mexico City Station Chief Win Scott, knew more about the real goings on during the “Oswald” visit than most. What does it mean, then, that she put the following in the lengthy Mexico City Station History, which was apparently written in 1969 and 1970? In 1963 the routine reporting of an operational Vol. 7, Issue 4

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lead by LIENVOY developed into a long investigation. A man with a US accent, speaking broken Russian, telephoned both the Soviet and Cuban Embassies on 26 September and 6 October 1963. He identified himself as Lee Oswald and Harvey Oswald.63

Goodpasture interrupted her HSCA interviewers before they had barely asked a question, to let them know that she might say things that conflicted with the record:

If the record is to be fully believed, then the paragraph shown above is replete with errors. Both dates are wrong, and no call to the Cuban Embassy was made. And the caller never referred to himself as “Harvey Oswald,” a name that keeps showing up in the record like an unwanted relative.64 Not surprising then, when in 1978 Anne

Miss Goodpasture: I am just concerned that some of my testimony may be in conflict with records. Mr. Goldsmith: I understand. Miss Goodpasture : Through faulty memory.65 Faulty memories, perhaps. Faulty records, more than likely. Faulty history, for certain.

Sources and Notes: 1 See the article The Fourteen Minute Gap, available online at http://www.history-matters.com/essays/frameup/FourteenMinuteGap/FourteenMinuteGap.htm. 2 The phone call transcript is available from the LBJ Library and at

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/lbjlib/phone_calls/Nov_1963/html/LBJ-Nov-1963_0029a.htm. 3 FBI Report of November 23, 1963. Available in Church Committee records, RIF #157-10014-10168.

4 Anne Goodpasture ARRB testimony of December 15, 1995, pg. 27. See http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/cia_testimony/Goodpasture/html/Goodpasture_0148a.htm. 5 David Slawson Warren Commission report entitled “Trip to Mexico City”, April 22, 1964, 104-10011-10097, at

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcmemos/Trip_To_Mexico_City/html/104-1001110097_0001a.htm. 6 Taped HSCA interview of William Coleman, August 2, 1978. Audio available at

http:// www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/unpub_testimony/audio/HSCA_Coleman.htm. 7 Ibid. 8 MFR of Thomas Hall of meeting with David Slawson, May 5, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10404-10115. 9 Transcripts of both conversations are in MEXI 7025, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10413-10159. 10 Warren Commission Document 347, p. 10. 11 Phone call between Lyndon Johnson and Richard Russell, November 29, 1963, 8:55 PM. Available from the LBJ Library and at

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/lbjlib/phone_calls/Nov_1963/audio/LBJ-Russell_11-29-63_2nd.htm. 12 Ibid. 13 Oswald and the CIA, John Newman, 1995, Carroll & Graf, pp. 369-377. 14 Oswald Offered Soviets Data for Trip, AP story of November 27, 1976. In Russ Holmes Work File among set of newspaper clippings at 104-10400-10010. 15 Hill Panel Probing Oswald Call, Washington Post story of November 27, 1976, by Ronald Kessler. Also in 104-10400-10010. 16 HSCA testimony of David Phillips, November 28, 1976, pp. 39-40. This and other CIA Security Classified deposition transcripts (Tarasoffs, Rocca, Helms, and others) are all available online at

http:// www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/secclass/contents.htm. 17 Ibid, p. 51. 18 Oswald, the CIA, and Mexico City (aka Lopez Report), p. 82. 19 Ibid, p. 83. 20 Ibid, p. 86. 21 HSCA Tarasoff testimony, November 30, 1976, summary material. 22 Ibid, pp. 22-23. 23 HSCA testimony of Ray Rocca, July 17, 1978, p. 84. 24 Quoted in Deep Politics II, Peter Dale Scott, p. 9. 25 Letter from HSCA Chairman Louis Stokes to DCI Stansfield Turner, October 13, 1978, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-1040610425. 26 Though it should be noted that the earliest post-assassination records, including the November 23 FBI memo to the White House and

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Secret Service, refer to an October 1 call. 27 See Deep Politics II, Peter Dale Scott, p. 15. 28 There are many indications that FBI Director Hoover and more than one CIA Director taped their own phone calls, though such tapes have not been released and may well be destroyed. 29 HSCA testimony of Ray Rocca, July 17, 1978, pp. 277-278. There are 53 redactions in this transcript, which was last reviewed in 1997. 30 HSCA testimony of Richard Helms, pp. 51-52. 31 Rocca HSCA testimony, pp. 217-218. 32 Mexico City Station History Excerpts, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10414-10124. The three HSCA investigators who were allowed to look at even the sanitized excerpts were Chief Counsel G. Robert Blakey, Deputy Counsel Gary Cornwell, and Michael Goldsmith, who conducted most of the Mexico City-related depositions. 33 Ibid. Operations against the Cuban Embassy are covered in pages 226 through 298. 34 MEXI 7115 of Nov 28, 1963. In Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10404-10159. 35 See also MEXI 7615 of Jan 2, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10404-10130. 36 John Newman has identified one of the informants as Luis Alberu. See Oswald and the CIA, chapter 18. According to Newman, Alberu is also the informant to whom, in 1967, Sylvia Duran admitted a sexual relationship with Oswald. 37 DIR 85670 of Nov 29, 1963. In Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10404-10144. 38 Gaeton Fonzi, The Last Investigation, Thunder’s Mouth Press, 1993, p. 294. 39 The conversation, sinister as it could appear to some, had its comic aspects as well. The phone connection was terrible, and most of the conversation is spent with the two parties trying desperately to make themselves understood. The vigorous promotion of the idea that a conspiracy to kill the U.S. President had been conducted by parties who couldn’t even make a phone call to each other has its amusing side. Perhaps the connection was so bad because of too many taps on the line. An excerpted transcript was sent from Mexico City to CIA HQ on November 26, 1963, document is MEXI 7068, in the Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10404-10175. A complete version, which includes the comical inability of the parties to communicate, was sent to the Warren Commission on May 22, see RIF #1964 104-1000910183 in the 1996 ARRB releases. 40 HSCA Report, Appendix XI, p. 494. 41 Handwritten note and transcript in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10162. 42 104-10400-10162, p. 22. 43 104-10400-10162, p. 23. 44 Letter of February 15, 1979, from OLC to Robert Blakey, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10157. 45 Gus Russo, Live by the Sword, Bancroft Press, 1998, p. 226. 46 HSCA document #180-10096-10364. Pages 98 through 102 discuss the Gutierrez allegation. This report is available online at

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcmemos/Oswald_Foreign_Activities/contents.htm. 47 The story is told in slightly greater detail in the Oswald Foreign Activities report cited previously. The yet more detailed FBI reports are in CE 2121. 48 Lopez Report, p. 271. 49 The tape is HSCA record number 180-10131-10396, also labeled tape Z-25. It is available online at

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/unpub_testimony/audio/HSCA_Gutierrez.htm. 50 I have not been able to locate a copy of the letter itself. 51 Documents theorizing that Moskalev is the mystery man include 104-10413-10055 and 104-10413-10077, among others. 52 Memorandum of Arthur Dooley of July 20, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10293. 53 Memo from Helms to Rankin, July 23, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10292. 54 Dooley memorandum of September 25, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10279. 55 DIR 51937 of September 23, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10291. 56 DIR 52398 of September 24, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10290. 57 MEXI 1011 of September 25, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10286. 58 DIR 52774 of September 25, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10287. 59 MEXI 1018 of September 25, 1964, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10288. 60 Letter from Win Scott to J.C. King of November 22, 1963, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10400-10302. 61 Memo of meeting between ASCHAM, CURTIS, and WITHHELD, in DDP files at 104-10310-10001. 62 Several copies exist, one is RIF #104-10086-10001, available online at

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/cia/80T01357A/104-10086-10001/html/104-10086-10001_0001a.htm. 63 Mexico City Station History Excerpts, in Russ Holmes Work File at 104-10414-10124, p. 43-44. 64 See Appendix II: The Documentary Life of Harvey Lee Oswald, in Peter Dale Scott’s Deep Politics II. 65 HSCA testimony of Anne Goodpasture, November 20, 1978, p. 6. Editor’s Note: The deposition of Anne Goodpasture is available through both JFK Lancer Online Resources

http://www.flash.net/~jfklancr/Transcripts_Depos.html and History-Matters.com Read the transcript of John Newman’s November In Dallas presentation on “Mexico City and the “Oswald” Tape” at

http://www.jfklancer.com/backes/newman_1.html

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Trauma Room One: The JFK Medical Coverup Exposed Charles A. Crenshaw, M.D. with J. Gary Shaw, D. Bradley Kizzia, J.D., Gary Aguilar, M.D., and Cyril Wecht, M.D., J.D. Foreword by Oliver Stone Paraview Press, 2001 Conspiracy, 287 pages Trade Paperback, $16.99

CHARLES A. CRENSHAW, M.D.

ABOUT THE BOOK The doctors who tried to save President John F. Kennedy at Parkland Hospital in November of 1963 agreed--either out of respect or fear--not to publish what they had seen, heard, and felt. Then in 1990, one of the Dallas surgeons who worked on JFK in Trauma Room One, Dr. Charles Crenshaw, decided after much deliberation that the American people ought to know the truth. “The wounds to Kennedy’s head and throat that I examined were caused by bullets that struck him from the front, not the back, as the public has been led to believe,” says Crenshaw. When the first edition of this book was published in 1992, under the title JFK: Conspiracy of Silence, Crenshaw revealed what he never had to opportunity to tell the Warren Commission. In the aftermath, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) called Crenshaw’s book “a fabrication.” But JAMA’s claim did not hold up in court and Crenshaw subsequently prevailed in a defamation suit against JAMA. In the process, a number of new medical disclosures and discoveries have emerged on the startling medical cover-up of the JFK assassination. Charles Crenshaw: Trauma Room One Excerpt: Forward by Oliver Stone http://www.paraview.com/crenshaw/crenshaw_excerpt.htm JFK Lancer

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DOUG HORNE MEMOS TO THE ARRB AND STAFF D130. approx. 65 pages $7.00 * A. Regarding supplementary brain examination(s) following autopsy on JFK. * B. Wrapping up ARRB efforts to "clarify the record" Re the medical evidence

D131. approx. 246 pages $25.00 Questions raised by John Armstrong and Carol Hewett about LHO tax and earnings records.

D 132. approx. 80 pages $8.00 Oswald's DD 1173 ID Card (Uniformed Services Identification and Privilege Card)

D133. approx. 93 pages $10.00 * Examination of Z film original and selected copies, LMH company Z films in the office of Jamie Silverberg on 4/10/97, * Interviews with former NPIC employees about their involvement with the Z film In Nov. 1963, * Independent third party examines Z film, * Kodak pro bono work with autopsy photos.

D 135. approx. 35 pages $4.00 * Chronology Re: The formulation of US foreign policy on Cuba (as of 10/27/97) * Chronology Re: The formulation of US foreign policy on Vietnam (as of 10/27/97)

D 136. approx. 38 pages $4.00 * Air Force One audiotapes from Nov. 22, 1963. * Texas trip (and Dallas Motorcade) planning milestones.

D 134. approx. 190 pages $20.00 * Chain of custody discrepancy re: original copy autopsy protocol, * More of chain of custody, Questions posed by apparent anomalies in the digitized autopsy photo #43, * Requested list Re: ARRB medical witnesses not previously in JFK collection. * Questions RE: the camera used at JFK autopsy, Chain of custody study of autopsy photos and xrays.

POSTERS: 719. SET OF THREE COLORED POSTERS $10.00 1: 12" X 18", "WELCOME PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY" 2: 16" X 25", "JOHN F. KENNEDY FOR CONGRESS 11TH DISTRICT" 3: 13" X 18", "KENNEDY FOR PRESIDENT- LEADERSHIP FOR THE 60'S"

725. JFK: 1960 DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION, "Time For Greatness” IN COLOR! Norman Rockwell poster 15 X 24" $25.00 726. JOHN F. KENNEDY PRESS CONFERENCE, 27.5" X 19.5" black & white poster.$25.00 5 2

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Kennedy Assassination Chronicles Vol. 7, Issue 4

D121. FBI WITNESS STATEMENTS, 71 pages $7 37 FBI statements not published in the Warren Commission volumes: Howard Brennan, Mrs. R.A Reid, Emmet Hudson, Elise T. Dorman, Victoria Adams, Jane Berry, Jack Frazen, Otis Neville Williams, Mrs. Donald Sam Baker (V.Rackley), Seymore Weitzman, Bonnie Ray Williams, James Jarman, Mrs. Eric Walther, James Richard Worrell, Robert Edwards, Ronald Fisher, Royce Skelton, Frank E. Reilly, John F. Dolan, Jack E. Dougherty, James W. Powell, Ruth Smith, Lillian Mooneyham, James N. Crawford, Mary Ann Mitchell, Steven F. Wilson, Richard Randolf Carr, E.R. Caddy, Peggy Joyce Hawkins, J.W. Foster,James Eliot Romack, John Martin Jr., James Altgens, Mr. and Mrs. Philip Willis Bonus: the handwritten statement of William Randolf Carr, 2-3-64

D119. JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF DOCUMENTS ON VIETNAM, 220 pages. The long sought after records of the 8th Sec Def Conference of May 6, 1963 held in Hawaii. These documents show JFK had ordered McNamara to pull out of Viet Nam and McNamara was complying with that order. This consists of a detailed record of the "discussions and decisions reached" at the conference and the documents include budgets, projections, schedules, etc.$25

D123. JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF South Vietnam, US Military Assistance Personnel planning for South Vietnam central files apprx. 675 pages $70.00 D118. JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF DOCUMENTS ON US-CUBAN WAR PLANS AND COVERT OPS, 2310 pages. The National Archives released pages of previously classified files from the Joint Chiefs of Staff. These documents (formally called Records Group 218 and records Group 335) have also been called the Califano Collection, and include materials originally classified "Top Secret/Sensitive" and in sections labeled "JCS Central Files," Lemnitzer Papers," "Taylor Papers;""Wheeler Papers;" and "Califano Papers." The documents deal with contingency plans to topple the Castro regime (and to invade Cuba) in the period 1961 - 64. Included are documents pre-Bay of Pigs (i.e., the JCS approval of the original invasion plan), then post Bay of Pigs material as to what went wrong; then plans to oust Castro in 1962; and finally plans to oust him in 1963 and 1964, under the guise of a U.S.-inspired coup. The news stories released in mid November -which focused primarily on some rather hare-brained "James Bond" type schemes really do not capture the full extent of what is in this collection.

D 127 A-E DEPOSITIONS AND MEDICAL EXHIBITS. Complete set $150.00 or individually priced: * * * * *

D 127A Boswell Deposition pages 223 $18.00 D 127B Groden Deposition pages 167 $15.00 D 127C Humes Deposition pages 242 $18.00 D 127D Master Set of Medical Exhibits index. includes 24 pages of exhibits 1907 pages $100.00 D 127E Set of Manuscript Depositions Includes: Jerrol F. Custer, Dr. Pierre A. Finck, Frances X. O'Neill, Edward F. Reed Jr., Floyd A. Reiebe, James W. Sibert, Saundra K. Spencer, and John T. Stringer. 317 pages $25.00

ALSO ON CD-ROM

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November In Dallas Conference

Video Specials for KAC Subscribers Only! We are very pleased and proud to offer video tapes of the presentations given at the November In Dallas Conferences. These presentations are from the foremost JFK assassination researchers with amazing new evidence and research that you won't want to be without.

NID-96 Set of 12 Videos for $199.00 SAVE $100 off the individual prices! Over 25 hours of JFK evidence presentations.

NID-98 Set of 13 Videos for $199.00 That's $100.00 off the individual prices! Over 32 hours of JFK materials presented.

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NID 2000$199.00 Total of 20 1/2 Hours Allow 2 weeks for video orders • Add $5.00 S/H Check the web site for individual video information.

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