Epilogue
This small book began as a review of Epstein’s and Weisberg’s books, and in its first form was written in June 1966. Its present form dates from the summer of the same year, and includes some material brought forth in Mark Lane’s Rush to Judgment. In the few months since I originally stated my views on the subject of Kennedy’s assassination, the whole atmosphere of the discussion has changed considerably, especially in the United States. As of last spring, the critics were mainly amateur sleuths and speculators, disregarded by the “serious” press. Occasionally the public would be reminded by an article by Leo Sauvage or Vincent Salandria that there were doubts as to whether the official theory of the Warren Commission was the final word on the matter, but by-and-large, not much attention was paid to the subject, and the public seemed satisfied that the Warren Commission had done its duty, and that the case, except for some loose ends, had been solved.
It was Epstein’s findings, I believe, that really changed all of this, and his questions, reinforced by those of Lane, Sauvage, Weisberg and myself, have led to a radically new situation, in which articles, reviews, debates, comments, are appearing everywhere. It is no longer a handful of critics and amateur sleuths who are alone calling for a reopening of the investigation of Kennedy’s death. The results of a Harris poll published in the United States in late September 1966 showed that a majority of the American public now doubted the Warren Commission’s explanation. Moreover, serious publications and important persons have been asking for a reinvestigation or a reopening of the investigation, and indications have appeared that at least some unofficial investigations will now take place.
For example, Professor J. W. Liebeler of UCLA, who was a staff lawyer on the Warren Commission, has stated his intention to conduct such an inquiry with the assistance of his students. A story appeared in Newsweek saying that an American foundation is anxious to finance a new investigation. A New York Congressman, Theodore Kupferman, has introduced a resolution in Congress asking for a new inquiry. Whatever comes of these projects, I think it is now evident that the work of the Warren Commission has failed to quiet the fears and rumors, and has proven inadequate to provide a lasting explanation of the events of November 22-24, 1963, in Dallas.
The early attempts to dismiss Epstein and the other critics have failed. Millions of people have read our books, or read about them in magazines and newspapers, and have shown genuine concern. The Commission staff has begun to feel the need to argue with the critics, and to try to explain the points at issue. Two of the staff, Messrs. Griffin and Liebeler, have appeared in debates with various of the critics, including myself. Arlen Specter, the District Attorney of Philadelphia, and one of the authors of the one-bullet hypothesis, has given a fifteen-page interview to U.S. News and World Report (October 10, 1966).
A few others, like Curtis Crawford of New York, have tried to defend various aspects of the Commission’s case against our criticisms. (See, for instance, his answer to me in the New York Review of Books, October 6, 1966.) The New York Times has lamented the fact that it now seems difficult to find defenders of the Warren Commission, and it is easy to find opponents and critics. It seems that the present atmosphere will only be, and can only be, clarified by a new investigation. Many major faults of the Commission’s work have become evident, so that even such defenders, as Judge Fein in the Saturday Review (October 22, 1966), concede pretty glaring weaknesses in the procedure and results. It is clearly not possible to recreate the serene atmosphere (pre-Epstein) through argument with critics of the report. Stony silence certainly will not work. And I, like many others, feel that only a new investigation can lead to any general acceptance of a view as to what happened in Dallas three years ago.
I believe that the affair has now become something between a legal problem and an historical one, and what is most needed is an investigation by both lawyers and historians to evaluate the evidence, for we are not just concerned about whether a court of law would have convicted Lee Harvey Oswald of murdering either or both John F. Kennedy and J. D. Tippit. We are also, and probably more concerned about what the historical judgment will be as to the role of Oswald in the affair.
Many people who were never convicted have been adjudged guilty on the basis of the historical record, and many who were convicted have been later adjudged innocent. The case of Oswald cannot be a court case, but it definitely is an historical problem. As a recent issue of Ramparts points out, there are a great many facts and documents in the case that are not in the public domain, and that are not yet available for serious study and evaluation; and there are definite indications of attempts to prevent some from coming to light (as suggested by the material of Penn Jones, in his Forgive My Grief, and of Ramparts dealing with the intimidation and the startling death rate of witnesses).
What I feel is needed now is an investigation independent of the U.S. government, since it is obviously a party to the dispute in view of the fact that governmental agencies and individuals were involved in the production of the Warren Commission Report. It is hard to conceive of a governmental group that could or would challenge the Chief Justice and the FBI, or could or would be willing to investigate and evaluate their conduct in regard to the inquiry into Kennedy’s assassination. An investigatory group would have to start with the alleged discrepancies raised by the critics.
To perform a genuine historical service, it would have to be willing to consider these points on their merits, and not as challenges to the Warren Commission Report that have to be answered and/or dismissed. The aim of a new investigation, needless to say, should be to arrive at answers and solutions that reasonable men will accept as the best in terms of the evidence available. Many reasonable men now have doubts about the accuracy of the autopsy report in its location of the wound from the first bullet, about the one-bullet hypothesis, about the role and history of bullet 399, and a number of other matters. In view of this, the investigatory body should have the power to call such witnesses as Dr. Humes, Arlen Specter, and J. Edgar Hoover, and to have access to all the material now in the National Archives, plus the still missing autopsy photographs and X-rays.
This new investigatory body should be composed of full-time working members who can really take the time to analyze materials, and look into problems. Probably most important, it should include at least one of the critics to satisfy everyone that the present points at issue are thoroughly considered. (A lot of later troubles might have been avoided if the Commission had taken Mark Lane more seriously, and not treated him as a hostile witness and a nuisance, as well as if the Commission had called Leo Sauvage as a witness when he was raising his early critical points.) To construct, finance and operate such an investigation should not be an insurmountable problem. American foundations can probably provide the monetary resources. Some body of concerned, public-spirited citizens could create the investigatory body, and public opinion demanding a new and more thorough investigation may be able to provide the prestige and power.
Since Epstein’s book appeared, a kind of haphazard new investigation has been going on, mainly in terms of newspaper interviewing and questioning (much of which should have been done long ago). In retrospect I think we can now see that Epstein posed a new sort of problem. First, and perhaps most significant of all that his book accomplished, it severely damaged the prestige of the Commission, and destroyed the myth that it had been completely objective, thorough and definitive.
The prestige of its members and its staff could not make up for the defects Epstein revealed in its operations. The information he set forth, supplied in good part by Liebeler, made it difficult if not impossible to believe that the Commission Report settled matters for good, and that its members had really sifted and settled all the problems. Second, Epstein revealed the glaring discrepancy between the official autopsy report and the FBI reports of December 9, 1963, and January 13, 1964, on the location and path of the first bullet to hit Kennedy (a matter which is crucial to the one-bullet hypothesis
).
This discrepancy was not apparent in the Report or the 26 volumes, since these original FBI reports were not published, nor was the matter discussed, even when taking testimony from the autopsy surgeons. The later discovery of the Sibert-O’Neill FBI report of November 26, 1963 (reprinted in this book) makes the discrepancy more forceful, since we seem to have an eye-witness account of the autopsy that directly conflicts with the official findings (though it is consistent with the testimony of the Secret Service agents who were present, with Commission Exhibit 397, drawn at the time by Dr. Humes, and with the holes in Kennedy’s clothes). There is also another Sibert-O’Neill report, dated November 29, 1963, that has turned up, but I have not yet seen it.
This material has led defenders, principally Messrs. Griffin, Liebeler and Specter of the Commission staff, to try to construct satisfactory explanations. These constitute at least a beginning for a new investigation. I have only heard Griffin’s and Liebeler’s answers orally (in a debate with them in New York on September 30, 1966), and since I have no transcript of what was said, I will only describe their views to the extent that I feel certain of my memory. Specter’s are in print in the U.S. News and World Report interview. Griffin and Liebeler dismissed the FBI reports as inaccurate (though I have heard on good authority that J. Edgar Hoover does not accept this view). Specter holds that these reports “reflected the doctors’ comments overheard by FBI agents who were present at the autopsy. Those comments were based on factors which were originally thought to be true on the night of the autopsy, when there was relatively limited information available to the doctors actually performing the autopsy” (p.48). Nevertheless, this still seems to leave the problem: if the Sibert-O’Neill report was an accurate account of what was found that night, is it accurate as to the location of the wound? Specter keeps saying the hole was “at the base of the back of the neck.” The Sibert-O’Neill report does not say this, nor does Exhibit 397 indicate this. Later on, Specter says that he has seen “one picture of the back of a body which was represented to be the back of the President, although it was not technically authenticated. It showed a hole in the position identified in the autopsy report” (p. 53). (As far as I know, this is the first claim that someone has seen photographic evidence on the subject. I have been told that William Manchester, in his forthcoming book, will say that the autopsy photographs confirm or are consistent with the autopsy claims.)
This still does not clarify the mystery of why the FBI reports are in disagreement with the autopsy report, and why this was not taken up in the Warren Commission investigation. Sibert and O’Neill were not called to testify, though they were eyewitnesses to the autopsy. The Commission staff people have said they were aware of the discrepancy as soon as they came to work and saw the FBI reports and the autopsy report. Then why didn’t they clarify this on the record by getting the autopsy surgeons to comment on the FBI’s claims, and Sibert and O’Neill to comment on the doctors’? Why wasn’t Dr. Humes asked what was in the preliminary draft notes he burned? (Was it, after all, an autopsy report much like what is in the Sibert-O’Neill report?) If Dr. Humes had good medical reasons for changing his mind, after his discussion on the telephone with Dr. Perry in Dallas, and after reconsidering the findings, why wasn’t he asked to explain this? One gets the impression that a serious effort was being made to keep the FBI claims out of the record.
The new data and explanations may accurately reflect what happened, but still do not account for the discrepancy, or for the reason why it was kept from public view until Epstein revealed it. But even at this late date, it certainly is helpful to have the views of some of the Commission staff on this basic problem. How much more helpful it would be to have the views of Doctors Boswell, Finck and Humes and of FBI agents Sibert and O’Neill, and to have the autopsy photographs and X-rays available. (Specter is asked in the U.S. News interview if the photographs would not clear up the question “beyond all doubt” as to whether the hole in the back was higher or lower than the hole in the front. He answers, “They would corroborate that which is already known, which, in my opinion, has cleared up that question once and for all …. The photographs would, however, corroborate that which the autopsy surgeons testified to” [p. 53]. Since no one, except Specter, as far as we know, has seen any photographs, it is hard to see on what he bases this, except his faith in the integrity of the doctors.)
On this front, then, some further investigation has brought answers from some Commission personnel on some of the questions. I for one don’t find the answers adequate, and I believe that only by having the data (the photographs and X-rays) available, and by the questioning of witnesses (the doctors and the FBI agents), will we ever have a satisfactory resolution of this fundamental basis for doubting. (At the New York debate in September 1966, Mr. Griffin posed the problem of whether we critics, who doubted the autopsy surgeons, would be any more satisfied by any additional expert testimony. For myself, I would be, if three or more eminent pathologists at leading medical schools examined the photographs and X-rays and gave their opinions.)
On the matter of the one-bullet hypothesis and bullet 399 some further investigation has also ensued. During the New York debate, Liebeler offered tentatively a different hypothesis, namely that Kennedy was shot much earlier, around Zapruder frame 180-190, and that Connally was hit by a separate bullet. This removes the inconsistency in time, and is consistent with Governor Connally’s testimony. Yet this hypothesis seems to pose several problems: for example, it would then have required four bullets, two to hit Kennedy, one for Connally, and the shot that missed. Since three shells were found by the sixth floor window, where did the fourth shell go? Also, if 399 remains the bullet that struck Connally (on this theory), what became of the first bullet that struck Kennedy?
Specter insists the one-bullet hypothesis is not “a prerequisite to the Commission’s conclusions that Oswald was the sole assassin.” (p.56) (In this he seems to be in disagreement with some of his colleagues from the Commission.) He then claims that one can’t tell when Connally was struck, so the time factor problem can’t be a crucial issue. However there appears no evidence as to when Connally could not have been struck, and this does raise the problem again. A more intriguing theory is being developed by Mr. Curtis Crawford, a one-and-a-half-bullet hypothesis. To account for the condition of 399 and for Connally’s wounds, Crawford suggests that Connally was wounded by both 399 and a fragment of the bullet that struck Kennedy’s head and shattered. I think this would still not explain 399’s pristine condition, nor does it seem entirely consistent with either the medical testimony or with the testimony of Governor and Mrs. Connally.
The recent Ramparts article cites some new data, which if accurate, may be very important. The authors report that they talked to a Mr. William Stinson who is an aide to Governor Connally. Stinson was present in the operating room on November 22, 1963, when the Governor was operated upon. Stinson was not interviewed by the Warren Commission. He told Ramparts, “The last thing they did was to remove the bullet from the governor’s thigh” (pp.48-49).
If this is true, then bullet 399 did not come out of the governor, and the problem arises again, where did it come from? Ramparts checked with Dr. Charles Baxter, who assisted in the operation on Connally’s thigh, and asked him about this. (Dr. Baxter was not questioned on this matter when the Commission interviewed him.) “He told us that bullet fragments, not an entire bullet, had been removed from the thigh” (p.49). If this is the case, it makes it more certain that 399 can’t be the bullet that did the damage to Connally, since the fragments in Connally’s wrist were sufficient to make the experts doubt that 399 could have been the bullet that wounded him.
Additional fragments in the thigh would really be too much, even for miraculous 399. This would force a reconsideration of the provenance of 399. It would seem that the possibilities would come down to either considering 399 as the bullet that wounded Kennedy in the back, but which did not penetrate his body (the original the
ory reported in the Sibert-O’Neill document), or the theory I offered, that 399 was a plant, and that it functioned as part of a conspiracy.
There has been little development on the speculation about the nature of a possible conspiracy. We critics have been attacked by various commentators because we do not agree on this score. However, I think that there is nothing surprising in disagreement given the present state of knowledge on the subject. We agree that there are fundamental weaknesses and inconsistencies in the Warren Commission case, and that something else must have happened. Our speculations as to what this something else might have been are severely restricted because of the limited data on this score collected by the Warren Commission, and the difficulty in obtaining additional data by private means.
However, I think all of us are struck by the double-Oswald material, and see in it a basis for theorizing. I have offered one possibility for interpreting this data, which I believe allows for explanation of more of the facts than other current theories. Obviously my hypothesis requires far more exploratory effort and examination before it can be considered a thorough explanation of what happened. And, of course, better explanations may come to light.
At this stage it is only to be expected that each of us working .independently will come up with different suggestions, all of which deserve consideration, and all of which may throw new light on the subject. If all critics agreed, the exploration of possibilities other than the Warren Commission’s might be seriously inhibited.
The Second Oswald Page 9