November 22 1963

[CitY of MicA]

fun, fun, fun!

I think I'm probably operating on some of the same levels that cabalist is. I'm open-minded but have never been interested in conspiracy theories. In all honesty, I would like to believe that the U.S. government played no role in the president's assassination. But I can't help it if the government arouses suspicion. Why, if the C.I.A. had no involvement, did they actively (albeit secretly) campaign to discredit conspiracy theories? I don't see how anyone could conclude that their hands were clean as the agency was not willing to release documents concerning the assassination. Or perhaps they really had absolutely no connection with the assassination but are engulfed in a cloud of suspicion due to supreme ineptitude 😀 ...

The first quote is from this Wikipedia article. The second is an addendum to a Frontline interview with G. Robert Blakey, chief counsel for the 1977 HSCA.

Notre Dame law professor G. Robert Blakey, counsel for the House Select Committee on Assassinations, states that the CIA withheld information from the Warren Commission and frustrated the efforts of the Congressional Committee he represented.[102]

According to a 1997 New York Times article, the CIA conducted a covert propaganda campaign to squelch criticism of the Warren Report. The CIA urged its field stations to use their "propaganda assets" to attack those who didn't agree with the Warren Report. In a dispatch from CIA headquarters, the Agency instructed its stations around the world to:

1. counteract the "new wave of books and articles criticizing the [Warren] Commission's findings...[and] conspiracy theories ...[that] have frequently thrown suspicion on our organization";
2. "discuss the publicity problem with liaison and friendly elite contacts, especially politicians and editors;" and
3. "employ propaganda assets to answer and refute the attacks of the critics. ... Book reviews and feature articles are particularly appropriate for this purpose. ... The aim of this dispatch is to provide material for countering and discrediting the claims of the conspiracy theorists..."

G. Robert Blakey's 2003 Addendum to this Interview:

I am no longer confident that the Central Intelligence Agency co-operated with the committee. My reasons follow:

The committee focused, among other things, on (1) Oswald, (2) in New Orleans, (3) in the months before he went to Dallas, and, in particular, (4) his attempt to infiltrate an anti-Castro group, the Directorio Revolucionario Estudiantil or DRE.

These were crucial issues in the Warren Commission's investigation; they were crucial issues in the committee's investigation. The Agency knew it full well in 1964; the Agency knew it full well in 1976-79. Outrageously, the Agency did not tell the Warren Commission or our committee that it had financial and other connections with the DRE, a group that Oswald had direct dealings with!

What contemporaneous reporting is or was in the Agency's DRE files? We will never know, for the Agency now says that no reporting is in the existing files. Are we to believe that its files were silent in 1964 or during our investigation?

I don't believe it for a minute. Money was involved; it had to be documented. Period. End of story. The files and the Agency agents connected to the DRE should have been made available to the commission and the committee. That the information in the files and the agents who could have supplemented it were not made available to the commission and the committee amounts to willful obstruction of justice.

Obviously, too, it did not identify the agent who was its contact with the DRE at the crucial time that Oswald was in contact with it: George Joannides.

During the relevant period, the committee's chief contact with the Agency on a day-to-day basis was Scott Breckinridge. (I put aside our point of contact with the office of chief counsel, Lyle Miller) We sent researchers to the Agency to request and read documents. The relationship between our young researchers, law students who came with me from Cornell, was anything but "happy." Nevertheless, we were getting and reviewing documents. Breckinridge, however, suggested that he create a new point of contact person who might "facilitate" the process of obtaining and reviewing materials. He introduced me to Joannides, who, he said, he had arranged to bring out of retirement to help us. He told me that he had experience in finding documents; he thought he would be of help to us.

I was not told of Joannides' background with the DRE, a focal point of the investigation. Had I known who he was, he would have been a witness who would have been interrogated under oath by the staff or by the committee. He would never have been acceptable as a point of contact with us to retrieve documents. In fact, I have now learned, as I note above, that Joannides was the point of contact between the Agency and DRE during the period Oswald was in contact with DRE.

That the Agency would put a "material witness" in as a "filter" between the committee and its quests for documents was a flat out breach of the understanding the committee had with the Agency that it would co-operate with the investigation.

The committee's researchers immediately complained to me that Joannides was, in fact, not facilitating but obstructing our obtaining of documents. I contacted Breckinridge and Joannides. Their side of the story wrote off the complaints to the young age and attitude of the people.

They were certainly right about one question: the committee's researchers did not trust the Agency. Indeed, that is precisely why they were in their positions. We wanted to test the Agency's integrity. I wrote off the complaints. I was wrong; the researchers were right. I now believe the process lacked integrity precisely because of Joannides.

For these reasons, I no longer believe that we were able to conduct an appropriate investigation of the Agency and its relationship to Oswald. Anything that the Agency told us that incriminated, in some fashion, the Agency may well be reliable as far as it goes, but the truth could well be that it materially understates the matter.

What the Agency did not give us none but those involved in the Agency can know for sure. I do not believe any denial offered by the Agency on any point. The law has long followed the rule that if a person lies to you on one point, you may reject all of his testimony.

I now no longer believe anything the Agency told the committee any further than I can obtain substantial corroboration for it from outside the Agency for its veracity. We now know that the Agency withheld from the Warren Commission the CIA-Mafia plots to kill Castro. Had the commission known of the plots, it would have followed a different path in its investigation. The Agency unilaterally deprived the commission of a chance to obtain the full truth, which will now never be known.

Significantly, the Warren Commission's conclusion that the agencies of the government co-operated with it is, in retrospect, not the truth.

We also now know that the Agency set up a process that could only have been designed to frustrate the ability of the committee in 1976-79 to obtain any information that might adversely affect the Agency.

Many have told me that the culture of the Agency is one of prevarication and dissimulation and that you cannot trust it or its people. Period. End of story.

I am now in that camp.

 

[cabalist]

cabalist, I will stop trying to change your mind about the assassination, if only because, as you say yourself, this isn't an issue of such great interest to you as it is to me.

But I do have one last point.



It is a "general" theory to suggest there may be political motive and a conspiracy behind a political assassination. In a world where all things are general and all things are equal, that is very much true.

But the Kennedy assassination, or any other assassination for that matter, does not exist in a vacuum. There are people involved, facts and evidence to be discovered and suspects to eliminate or confirm. Once you take that first step past "generalizing" the real and true facts of a case will become clear. And they will inevitably, and invariably, point in only one direction.

We can generalize and theorize all we want, but the facts cannot be ignored and they will give you an answer. One need not be a mindreader, nor does one have to "have been there" to figure it out.

"An" answer may or may not be the "right" or "true" answer. Obviously, in this case you believe that "your" answer is "the" answer. However, as suggested by the information posted above by CitY of MicA, among other things, not everyone has/will come to the same conclusion based on the known facts. And one fact is that we have little choice with regard to whether to "ignore" facts which remain unknown, and which may, for all we now know, remain forever unknown.

I commend your desire to look at all sides, but at some point you have to decide which side is the right side.

Was I a juror in a court proceeding related to this case, or operating in an official fact-finding capacity (again, such as in the quote in CitY of MicA's above post), then I might well "have to" decide which was/is the "right side", even if "in my heart of hearts" I might feel forever uncertain. As it is, not being in such a position, I can't agree that I, or anyone else, "must" decide what did happen, when it may well be that sufficient facts may never be known to establish "the whole truth" with absolute certainty.

If, in fact, you feel that you have more information upon which to base a certain conclusion than did the above-quoted chief counsel for the HSCA, perhaps you should inform him and the rest of us as well. Otherwise, while you may feel that the facts are sufficient to convince you, I don't think they're sufficient to prove your claim beyond all reasonable question or doubt to anyone not so easily convinced. And until further relevant facts may be forthcoming, which may or may not ever happen, there will always remain room for a "reasonable doubt" in this case. While I realize that the lack of absolute proof that there wasn't a conspiracy doesn't equate to proof that there was, I think there is, and always has been, more than enough room for doubt in this case that I'm "comfortable" with believing that the "absolute truth" may never be known with absolute certainty, and that, along with probably many other historical events, as the path grows colder through time, all the facts if anything perhaps only becoming more difficult to uncover with certainty as time goes on, there may well forever remain a reasonable basis for speculation.

Edit: While of course I don't expect you to reveal personal information in a public forum (as I might be reluctant to myself), unless you're "personally involved" in some way in this "case", I'm not sure why you would feel that it might be so important to "decide" with certainty "which side is the right side." Is it not possible to reasonably conclude that there may be some things which may never be known with certainty -- i.e., beyond all reasonable doubt?

 

[Bugman]

I did not expect this thread to get more then a handful of replys.I just want to thank everyone for some intresting reading.😀

 

[CitY of MicA]

I did not expect this thread to get more then a handful of replys.I just want to thank everyone for some intresting reading.😀

Thank you, bugman, for starting it. When I saw your name appear on the discussion board in response to this thread, I thought 'uh oh.' I felt like we had maybe ventured astray a bit. Anyway, thanks again.

Here is a link to the C.I.A. memo that was mentioned in my previous post. It's even worse when you read it in its entirety (cut and paste):

http://www.name base.org/foia/jfk01.html

I find myself agreeing a lot with cabalist's sentiments. My own personal philosophy, pertaining to this and any other subject, is that people can and should make up their minds for themselves. Maybe Kennedy shot himself 😉 . Far be it from me to tell someone what to think. I will try to supply information, and they can decide for themselves.

I was born several years after the day in question (so I couldn't have been involved ). I didn't use to have any interest in the case, nor did I see its potential implications. I'm coming around to certain ideas in a bit of a backward manner- it stems from the parties involved who I find to be believable and on the level. I would imagine there are people who have done a lot of research on this case, who are honest in their work, and have come to vastly different conclusions (as cabalist alluded to). People who didn't agree with the governmental findings and version of events were brave, in my opinion, to publish their findings. This idea of them being crackpots- well, now I understand where that came from. Not everyone wants to discuss the case on its merits.

What aggravates me a bit is the suggestion that the case is closed. Good. Then let's have a full governmental accounting. Let the C.I.A. and the F.B.I. release all their records pertaining to the assasination, Oswald, all their agents that had connections to him, etc. Maybe someone who was in the C.I.A. can explain why they stonewalled, obstructed justice, conducted covert PR campaigns, and tried to paint people who didn't agree with governmental findings as nutcases. Let all the investigative congressional panels release their findings in full. Assessments could be made about how to proceed once all that information is available to the public. I'd be happy to see the issue put to rest. Who knows- it might even happen in my lifetime.

 

[cabalist]

Hmm...it seems we have another CIA mole in our midst....



😉



But seriously, the logical holes in your argument are so obvious I don't think anyone needs me to point them out.

 

[cabalist]

Probably because if anyone tried to point out the so-called "holes" in my logic, that person would be revealed as the one who is truly illogical.

Though I do find it interesting that you consider incontravertible evidence and fact to be "illogical".

Is this supposed to be an example of "incontravertible evidence"?

They could "release all the files" or burn them, it matters not one whit. Oswald did it, and he did it alone.

Hmm.....

By the most elementary logic, the fact that a "conspiracy" hasn't been proven doesn't constitute "incontravertible evidence" that there wasn't one. It only means it may not have been proven. Big difference. While "a lack of sufficient evidence" may be enough to satisfy you, logically, it doesn't disprove a conspiracy. At best, it proves that if there was one, the evidence of it was sufficiently well-hidden/destroyed.

We're not talking about alien abduction here, nor a conspiracy requiring a massive "cover-up" on the scale of a faked moon landing. A successful assassination conspiracy isn't at all an implausible concept, nor would it likely be a first.

 

[cabalist]

I am curious, what do you find illogical about determining Oswalds sole guilt from what I provided?

I don't find a belief in Oswald's guilt "illogical". As I said above, what is illogical is your so "positive" conclusion that he acted "alone" only because it hasn't been proven otherwise.

No proof of anyone elses complicity has surfaced in 45 years.

And as I said (months ago), the more years which elapse, if anything the less likely a proof of complicity might be found. Again, that doesn't prove that it didn't exist. Many things have likely happened long ago which can now not be proven. Evidence grows "cold" with time. But I find it interesting that you seem so willing to dismiss the secrecy still surrounding the case even so many decades after the fact.

What other possible conclusions could come from the above 3 basic facts of the assassination?

I think I've answered this.

Or do you just think all the evidence was faked? If so, please provide your "logical" evidence that this occured.

You're missing my point. And creating a straw man. I never said the evidence was a faked, although it's certainly possible that some of it could have been. Again, I'm merely saying that the fact that a conspiracy hasn't been proven logically doesn't constitute proof that there wasn't one.

A man may not be proven guilty in court, in which case the judge or jury is obligated to acquit him (or possibly the case may even be dismissed) -- even if they feel sure that he committed the crime. That is, without sufficient evidence against him, it's their obligation to find him not guilty. However, logically that doesn't prove that he didn't commit the crime. It just means that there's insufficient evidence to legally prove it. It's the same simple logic.