by J. W Lateer
In 1951, Congress publicly authorized $100 million for covert actions which in 2016 dollars would be $926 million or almost one billion dollars. In 1939, the U.S. had no intelligence department except for solitary military attaches at some foreign embassies which numbered only, at most, 100 persons worldwide. But in less than ten years, the U.S. had authorized almost $1 billion on just covert actions, which were in addition to other more conventional intelligence funds.
Various members of Congress proposed specific covert actions such as “stirring up trouble in China” or “stirring up guerrilla activity in China.” The CIA had revealed a list of 50 covert actions that were going on at that time. CIA Director Walter Bedell Smith often expressed worries to subordinates that covert operations would, in terms of attention and funding, overshadow all other types of intelligence gathering, which were really more fundamental and important.
At this point in history, Congressman Charles Kersten enters the intelligence stage. In August, 1951, Congress approved the Kersten Amendment. This amendment authorized $100 million for covert action against the Soviet Union.
Charles Kersten hated the Truman Administration strategy of containment. After Kersten was first sworn into office in 1947, he chaired a House Subcommittee which wanted to examine education and labor in the Soviet Union. Unfortunately, the USSR denied Kersten and his investigators the required visas to do this. In response, Charles Kersten requested that Secretary of State George Marshall expel all Russian nationals from the U.S. This request was also refused.
Paul Linebarger, who had experience in military intelligence in World War II, wrote an article which was placed in the Congressional Record. The article demanded the beginning of covert operations against the Soviet Union. By way of rebuttal, Secretary of State Dean Acheson said in a speech “we do not propose to subvert the Soviet Union.” Charles Kersten was horrified by this. Per author David M. Barrett in his work on the CIA and Congress, Kersten was working closely with the exiled Russian academics at Washington’s Catholic Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, the same faculty that had motivated Joseph McCarthy to begin his anti-Communist crusade.
Kersten began to introduce resolution after resolution advocating support for dissidents and exiles behind the Iron Curtain who wished to overthrow the governments there. Kersten found his chance when he introduced an amendment to a foreign aid package called the Mutual Security Act. The Kersten Amendment, generated untold controversy. It passed overwhelmingly in the Congress. It called explicitly for “armies of exiles” to be formed in Europe to either overtly or covertly invade and defeat the Soviet Union. It provided $100 million for this purpose.
The international reaction was immediate. The Soviet Foreign Minister, speaking at the U.N., said the Kersten Amendment “pays traitors and war criminals,” which implies that Kersten was possibly in league with former Nazis. In a New York Times article, it was suggested that Kersten himself was concerned that the United Nations would itself label his amendment “terrorism.” In Kersten’s reaction to this, he seemed to be a defender of terrorism. He was quoted saying, “One of the main objectives of real liberation movements is to strike terror into the hearts of communist tyrants.” This statement was read into the House of Representatives record. Per author Barrett, this language referring to terror made some Washington insiders wary of Kersten.
One month after the Kersten Amendment passed, Allen Dulles (Deputy Director of the CIA) felt he had to meet with Kersten and tell him that the CIA had plenty of secret funds available and that publicly voting funds for covert operations was counter-productive. Two members of the House, Mike Mansfield and John Vorys, were attending a United Nations committee meeting when asked about the Kersten Amendment. In that setting, they were forced to lie, telling the General Assembly “there are in this law no aggressive acts or aggressive threats contemplated against the Soviet Union or against any of the countries it dominates.” The real purpose of this Act, they said, was defense of the North Atlantic area.
As soon as Ike became President, he informed Kersten that Congress should not pass laws or resolutions about covert operations. Kersten’s committee planned hearings in Europe some time in 1954. Radio Prague denounced Kersten as “the American organizer of espionage and murder.”
In part because of pressure from Kersten and his allies, Senator Lyndon Johnson (now a party leader) took action supporting U.S. covert activity to overthrow the leftist Arbenz government in Guatemala. House Minority Leader John W. McCormack spoke in favor of LBJ on this issue.
In 1954, Charles Kersten, chairman of the House of the Select Committee on Communist Aggression, was defeated in his election. According to Barrett, after the election, Walter Pforzheimer (a long-time CIA icon) who was Legislative Counsel for the CIA, advised Lyman Kilpatrick, Inspector General of the CIA, to alert Allen Dulles about the availability of Kersten to work in intelligence. Kersten wound up, according to Barrett, working as a “consultant” to the White House on “psychological warfare.” Wikipedia reports that Kersten worked for Ike “under Nelson Rockefeller” in that role, but that arrangement is not mentioned in other sources.
After working for the Eisenhower administration in 1955 and 1956, Kersten returned to Milwaukee to practice law.
The next fact known about Charles Kersten is that he served as the lawyer for the family of Ukrainian nationalist Stepan Bandera in the murder trial of Bogdan Stashynsky. From 1956 to at least 1966, Kersten practiced law in Milwaukee.
He apparently ran a general practice in partnership with his brother-in-law Arlo McKinnon. He later brought his son into his law practice. Although his practice was a general one, he represented a Hungarian woman in Ohio who was accused of throwing objects at Soviet Ambassador Andrei Gromyko. He also got involved in vocal opposition to the Committee to Abolish HUAC at a campus rally at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Another such situation was Kersten’s participation in an effort to brand an article in the University of Wisconsin’s student newspaper The Daily Cardinal as being Communist in nature.
But as the pictures in this chapter show, he was far from finished in his role as an activist when it came to issues of politics in Eastern Europe.
In his book TMWKTM, author Dick Russell states that Charles Kersten was America’s chief member of The World Anti-Communist Steering Committee.
This appearance shown in the following photograph, by Congressman Charles Kersten in Toronto received little or no mention in the U.S. press. However, one can easily discern the “ABN” in the background which is the acronym of the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations organization. This group is featured prominently in the discussion of right-wing groups in the book General Walker and the Murder of President Kennedy by Dr. Jeffrey Caulfield. If any right-wing groups had any role in the assassination, the Anti-Bolshevik group would be high on the list of suspected involvement.
And of course, as stated elsewhere in other chapters, on November 7, 1963, just two weeks before the JFK assassination, Charles Kersten sent letters to the three Kennedy brothers warning of the danger of Soviet-sponsored murder. Kersten testified before Congress that he, in fact, had sent these letters (so this apparently happened).
Notes:
For proof that Congressman Charles Kersten sent assassination-related letters to the Kennedy brothers on November 7, 1963, see Investigation of Senator Thomas J. Dodd: Hearings, Eighty-ninth Congress, second session ... pursuant to S. Res. 338, 88th Congress. PT. 1-2 by United States. Congress. Senate. Select Committee on Standards and Conduct. Published 1966, p.313.
For the amazingly close relationship between JFK and Nixon which shaped the Cold War, see Kennedy and Nixon: The Rivalry That Shaped Postwar America, by Christopher Matthews. The relationship of both to Congressman Kersten is described at page 46. Also, at page 52, the dismissive attitude by JFK toward Congressman McCormack is reported.
Information on the Dies Committee and Congressman John W. McCormack, see The Committee: The Extraordinary Career of
the House Committee on Un-American Activities by Walter Goodman at p. 10.
The Contender: Richard Nixon, The Congress Years (1946-1952), by Irving F. Geilman, describes Father Cronin at p. 99 and at p. 124 the author discusses Kersten, Nixon and JFK.
Milwaukee Journal, November 9, 1950. This is the date of the article referred to in the text.
Distinguished Service: The Life of Wisconsin Governor Walter J. Kohler, by Thomas C. Reeves, talks about Kersten and Wisconsin politics at p. 218 and about Kersten’s Senate run in 1956 at page 359.
As mentioned in the text, this report is the most powerful document which justifies the Cold War of any writing known to this author in all writings on that subject. It is cited as Investigation of Communist Takeover and Occupation of Poland, Lithuania, and Slovakia, Sixth Interim Report: hearings before the United States House Select Committee To Investigate Communist Aggression and the Forced Incorporation of the Baltic States into the Soviet Union, Subcommittee on Poland, Lithuania, and Slovakia, Eighty-Third Congress, second session, on Sept. 30, Oct. 1, 21, 22, 1954.by United States. Congress. House. Select Committee on Communist Aggression. Published 1954 Congressman Kersten deserves complete credit for producing this heart-wrenching expose.
The CIA & Congress: The Untold Story From Truman To Kennedy, by David M. Barrett tells the entire story of Congressman Kersten and his unhelpful actions which impacted the CIA. Especially relevant pages of the work by Barrett regarding Kersten can be found at pps. 95, 103-4,107 and 205.
In The Man Who Knew Too Much, by Dick Russell (TMWKTM), Kersten’s role in the trial of Bogdan Stashynsky is discussed in Russell quotes from Kersten’s summation at the trial of Stashynsky. Kersten, of course, was counsel for the family and this is discussed at p. 596 of TMWKTM by Russell.
Chapter 9
The Two Foiled Plots in November, 1963
The Chicago Plot
In the book Ultimate Sacrifice, John and Robert Kennedy, the Plan for a Coup in Cuba, and the Murder of JFK, by Lamar Waldron, with Thom Hartmann, the reader will find the best presentation of the evidence available about the Chicago Plot.
One of the most important sources for Waldron was former Senate Investigator (and researcher), Bernard “Bud” Fensterwald. Fensterwald was one of the most aggressive early assassination researchers and the author of the book The Assassination of JFK: By Coincidence or Conspiracy. Fensterwald was also at one time a Senate Investigator for the Senate Subcommittee for Privileges and Elections, a subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee under the powerful Chairman J. William Fulbright. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee was related to a committee known as the Gillette Committee. The Gillette Committee investigated Senator Joe McCarthy. In the opinion of this author, since Fensterwald was involved (in real time) with the events spanning the period from the McCarthy era all the way to Watergate, he should be considered a source with a possible vested interest or point of view.
Oswald’s trip to Chicago, which occurred in the weeks after his well-publicized New Orleans incident and prior to the Chicago attempt is something of which most historians are unaware.
Oswald’s trip to Chicago included a brief stop in Atlanta. In the late summer of 1963, JFK had originally planned to visit Atlanta and give a major speech, but local Democrats had urged him to cancel or scale back the appearance because of concerns about JFK’s stance on civil rights. Apparently, plans had already been made for Oswald to visit Atlanta en route to Chicago, and his trip plans remained in place. The author of an investigation into the Ku Klux Klan writes that “one of her sources told her that Oswald, in the summer of 1963, had called on [Klan] Imperial Wizard James Venable in his office in Atlanta seeking the names of right-wing associates.”
Oswald apparently continued on to Chicago, but first stopped at the University of Illinois at Urbana. An FBI memo says Oswald reportedly inquired at the office of the Assistant Dean of Students about Cuban student organizations, and asked the secretary “if…she had ever seen him on TV in New Orleans.” The FBI memo says Oswald “expressed interest in any campus organization advocating humanist views” to the secretary.
Someone wanted to leave a trail connecting Oswald to Chicago, prior to the attempt to assassinate JFK there.
According to Abraham Bolden, (a Secret Service officer whose situation is to be discussed in depth in this chapter) [HSCA 180-10070-10273 interview with Abraham Bolden 1-19-78, declassified 1-5-96], “on or around October 30, 1963…the FBI sent `a teletype message to the Chicago Secret Service office stating that an attempt to assassinate the President would be made on November 2, 1963, by a four-man team using high-powered rifles.”
At some point in 1963, the Secret Service was tipped off about a possible assassination plot against a Kennedy motorcade in Chicago (crediting a Secret Service memo).
“In addition, Secret Service agents were shown four photos of the men alleged to be involved in the plot” There may have been names attached; but Abraham Bolden remembers the names Gonzales and Rodriguez.
The names Gonzales and Rodriguez would also appear regarding the Tampa plot and the Tampa Fair Play for Cuba committee (FPCC) discussed below.
The Secret Service found the four men mentioned above staying at a rooming house in Chicago, which because of the transient nature of most rooming houses, is another indication that at least some of the men were not local.
An unconfirmed source from the Cuban community claimed that the men had Montreal connections. Also, according to Bolden, the Secret Service blew the surveillance of the four subjects. Apparently, for some reason, the Chicago Police had not wished to be involved or in any way to supplement the surveillance.
The HSCA report also states that “on October 30, 1963, the Secret Service learned that an individual named Thomas Arthur Vallee, a Chicago resident who was outspokenly opposed to President Kennedy’s foreign policy, was in possession of several weapons.” Secret Service agents interviewed Vallee and found him to have M-1 rifles and ammunition. According to Edwin Black, Vallee’s place of employment looked “out over the Jackson Street exit ramp where Kennedy’s limousine would have been” traveling during the motorcade. There were numerous sources that confirmed that Vallee worked in a location where he would have had a straight shot at the President’s slowing motorcade.
Thomas Arthur Vallee, according to Edwin Black of the Chicago Daily News, was an ex-marine, had returned to Chicago in August 1963 and had been involved, like Oswald, in training anti-Castro Cubans.
According to a Warren Commission document Vallee was discharged honorably by the Marines as being a paranoid schizophrenic with homosexual features, yet was allowed to re-enlist only 1½ years later. [This sounds, very much like the mysterious, almost random type of paperwork gyrations within the military records of Lee Harvey Oswald]. This only adds credence to the theory that Oswald was only one of many possible similar agents being run by military intelligence at the time. Since Vallee was a supposed John Birch Society type, he could have been an ideal candidate to be of use in infiltrating right wing groups in that period.
In Waldron’s book Ultimate Sacrifice, at page 630, he attributes information to researcher Vince Palamara which says, “Mr. Vallee claimed he was framed by someone with special knowledge about him, such as his ‘CIA assignment to train exiles to assassinate Castro.’”
On or about Thursday, October 31, 1963, just one day after the Chicago agents’ pretext interview of Vallee. “Vallee’s landlady called the [Secret] Service office and said that Vallee was not going to work on Saturday,” according to the testimony of Agent Edward Tucker to Congressional investigators. The agent testified that because Saturday was “the day of JFK’s visit to Chicago,” this information “resulted in the [Secret] Service having the Chicago Police Department surveil Vallee.”
Author Waldron questions why the Secret Service wouldn’t have asked for surveillance if the landlady hadn’t called … [because Vallee] “would have been at his job with a clear shot at JFK’
s motorcade. …Secret Service agents kept watch on two members of the four-man assassin team. But … the surveillance … was blown.”27[HSCA 180-10070-0273 interview with Abraham Bolden 1-19-78, declassified 1-5-96].
[Ultimate Sacrifice, p. 633] With their surreptitious surveillance blown, the Secret Service felt it had no choice but to go ahead and detain the men. Black writes that “the two men were taken into custody (but not actually arrested or booked) in the very early Friday hours and brought to the Secret Service headquarters. There are no records that any weapons were found in their possession or back at the rooming house.[Black, op. sit.]
[Ultimate Sacrifice, p. 646] Although the Warren Commission was aware of both Vallee and the rumors of the four-man threat, they never bothered to interview Vallee, and neither did the HSCA or any other government committee investigating the JFK assassination.… Even today, dozens of Secret Service files on Vallee have not been released (more than a decade after his death) and they are deemed so sensitive that they can’t even be released in heavily censored versions, as many documents have been.
[Ultimate Sacrifice, p. 648] Yet even with all Vallee’s weapons, and the reported threats against JFK, Vallee was only convicted a month and a half after JFK’s death of “Unlawful use of a weapon and in addition was imposed a $5 suspended fine on a traffic violation.”
Abraham Bolden, the first black Secret Service officer, went public with his knowledge of certain facts related to the JFK assassination. His revelations got him into severe trouble with authorities who were apparently motivated by a desire to cover up the truth about the assassination. As a result, Bolden was framed for a crime and sent to prison.