16. 17. Most accept that this photograph shows Oswald holding the rifle later retrieved at the scene of the assassination. One copy, which showed up years later, bore the words, in Russian: “Hunter of fascists, ha-ha-ha!!!” (below) Though the dedication appears to be Oswald’s, the handwriting does not resemble that of the alleged assassin.
18. 19. A spontaneous incident, or was it staged? Cuban exiles appeared to clash with Oswald as he handed out pro-Castro leaflets in New Orleans. It may, though, have been a phony incident, part of a U.S. intelligence operation against the Fair Play for Cuba Committee.
20. Fidel Castro. Some still suspect he was behind the President’s assassination. Others think there was an effort to fabricate information linking him to the crime.
21. Santo Trafficante, said to have forecast that the President was “going to be hit.” Oswald’s killer, Ruby, knew several Trafficante associates and may himself have visited the Mob boss.
22. John Roselli, a close Trafficante associate, was used by the CIA in its plots to kill Fidel Castro. He was murdered before Senate Committee questioning resumed. Did Trafficante order the hit?
23. Teamsters leader Jimmy Hoffa, who was close to Mafia boss Carlos Marcello, long feuded with Robert Kennedy and reportedly favored killing both brothers.
24. New Orleans mob chieftain Carlos Marcello, quoted as having spoken before the assassination of “setting up a nut to take the blame” and – long afterwards – as boasting that he had “had the son of a bitch” – the President – “killed.”
25. Allen Dulles, former CIA Director, served on the Warren Commission. He did not tell his colleagues about the CIA’s plots to kill Castro – and privately advised CIA officers on how to respond to questions as to Oswald’s possible links to the CIA.
26. James Angleton, CIA Counterintelligence chief, urged “waiting out” the Commission on a key matter, and later ordered the seizure of key documents – which were then suppressed.
27. Richard Helms, a senior CIA official in 1963, later shrugged off the failure to acknowledge the Castro assassination plots with: “It’s an untidy world.”
28. William Sullivan, an FBI Assistant Director, spoke of an “internal problem” over a note Oswald had left at the Dallas FBI office – the note had been ordered destroyed.
29. 30. 31. 32. 33. A crossroads for conspirators? The building at 544 Camp Street, in New Orleans, housed Guy Banister (top right) and was frequented by David Ferrie (below) both anti-Castro activists. How come, then, that the 544 address was stamped on a pro-Castro document Oswald handed to the FBI? Banister’s employee Delphine Roberts (below) said Oswald used the office with Banister’s connivance.
34. Proof that Ferrie knew Oswald? This photo, not discovered until 1993, appears to show Oswald (circled, far right) and Ferrie (circled, far left) eight years before the assassination, in a Civil Air Patrol group.
35. 36. 37. Mystery in Mexico. Agents filmed and bugged the Cuban and Soviet missions in Mexico City for the CIA – and were watched and photographed in turn by Castro’s intelligence service. A CIA message implied that the stocky man (top right) had used Oswald’s name at the Soviet consulate. CIA station chief Winston Scott (right) wrote that his cameras got photos of the real Oswald, but none ever surfaced. 38. 39. Did the man who was CIA’s chief of Cuba operations in 1963, David Phillips, operate as “Maurice Bishop,” the name allegedly used by an officer said to have met with Oswald before the assassination and – afterwards – to have sought to fabricate evidence linking Oswald to Cuban diplomats in Mexico City?
40. 41. Testimony that could not be ignored. Silvia Odio in Dallas. She and her sister later recalled a visit by anti-Castro activists, one of whom – they believed – had been ‘Oswald’. The activists’ leader later spoke of the Oswald figure with Odio in a way that seemed designed to incriminate him. Loran Hall (right), who became part of this scenario, was an associate of Mob boss Santo Trafficante.
42. 43. Carlos Bringuier (left), who clashed with Oswald in New Orleans, was one of a group of anti-Castro activists handled by CIA case officer George Joannides (right). Joannides later hid this connection from the House Assassinations Committee.
44. The end of the interrogation, the moment Jack Ruby shot Oswald dead.
45. 46. Trafficante associate John Martino (left) said “The anti-Castro people put Oswald together…They had Ruby kill him.” The author was told in 2007 that Herminio Diaz, who had worked for Trafficante and was a known assassin, (far left in photo below) admitted having “taken part in the death of the President of the United States.”
Illustration Credits
1. John Fitzgerald Kennedy by Aaron Shikler, The White House Historical Association (White House Collection). 2. R. W. ‘Rusty’ Livingston Collection/The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza. 3 & 4. Jack Weaver. 5. Corbis. 6. Courtesy of Jeff Wallace. 7 & 8. Courtesy of US Government Printing Office/Assassinations Committee files. 9 – 11. Warren Commission Exhibit. 12. Courtesy of Jeanne de Mohrenschildt. 13–19 Warren Commission Exhibits. 20. Bettmann/Corbis. 22. Clark Co. Sheriff’s Office, Las Vegas mugshot. 23 & 24. Bettmann/Corbis. 25–27. CIA. 28. FBI. 33. Ronan O’Rahilly 34. John Ciravolo. 35. Courtesy of Cuban Government. 36. CIA. 37. Courtesy of Michael Scott. 38. House Assassinations Committee. 40. Courtesy of Silvia Odio. 41 & 42. House Assassinations Committee 43. CIA. 44. National Archives. 45. Courtesy of Mrs Martino. 46. Granma, Cuba. 47. Niall McDiarmid/Alamy.
Acknowledgments
The mainstream media has long tended to treat serious Kennedy assassination researchers as though they are mere cranks or sensation-seekers. Cranks do, of course, fool around on the fringes of all controversial events, not least in the age of the Internet, and they obscure credible work. In the Kennedy case, there has also been the scholarship and persistence of a number of committed citizens, whose work filled the gap left by official investigation and neglectful journalism. It was largely their work that led to fresh investigation by congressional committees—including the House Assassinations Committee, which concluded in 1979 that the President’s death was probably the result of a conspiracy. A further reward, in 1992, was the passing of the John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Act, which secured the release of millions of pages of previous withheld documents. A handful of citizens can still budge a resistant establishment.
Many independent researchers, and some of those who headed or staffed the congressional probes, have been of great assistance to me. Two, in particular, gave me access to their unique fund of knowledge and research material—and guided me away from red herrings. They were the late Mary Ferrell, in Texas, and—to this day—Paul Hoch in California. Mrs. Ferrell was known to reporters and researchers around the world for her tireless and meticulous research. Over almost the entire period since the assassination, Paul Hoch has deservedly earned a reputation for fine scholarship and innovative insight. I am indebted to them both for their friendship and guidance. Paul, for his sins, has read and annotated the drafts of all editions of this book.
A mere handful of professional reporters have ever worked on the case with lasting diligence. One is Jefferson Morley, formerly of the Washington Post, who has been generous with collegiate help on this latest lap. During an earlier phase, there was Earl Golz, formerly of the Dallas Morning News, who worked the story remorselessly—often in the face of editorial reluctance—and the late Seth Kantor of the Atlanta Constitution, whose 1978 book on Jack Ruby remains an essential resource. During the current work, author Gus Russo has helped lasso some FBI material.
Thanks for help during work on this edition are due to Rex Bradford, a research dynamo, and Bill Kelly, who runs the blog JFKCounterCoup. The late Sylv
ia Meagher, whose book Accessories after the Fact helped convince Congress that the case should be reopened, gave generously of her time in the 1970s. Others who helped selflessly have been Dan Alcorn; Mark Allen; Professor Peter Dale Scott; Robert Dorff; the late Bernard Fensterwald and James Lesar of the Assassination Archives and Research Center in Washington, DC; Jones Harris; the late Larry Harris, who focused above all on the Tippit case; Harry Irwin; Tom Johnson; the late Penn Jones; David Lifton; Gary Mack; Dick Russell; Gary Shaw; the late Kevin Walsh; Alan Weberman; the late Harold Weisberg and Jack White; and Mark Zaid.
I am indebted to the late Dr. Vincent Guinn, the metals analyst whose work on the ballistics evidence was central to the House study. Dr. Cyril Wecht, the combative forensic pathologist from Pennsylvania, corresponded over many months—though I have not necessarily agreed with his theories! Former British Detective-Superintendent Malcolm Thompson helped with photographic expertise. In the intelligence area, I thank John Marks of the Center for National Security Studies; the late Ray Cline of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who gave good advice; Marion Johnson of the National Archives, who was endlessly patient during the writing of the first edition of this book; and Amy De Long, who gave assistance in 2013. The late Dave Powers, Curator at the John F. Kennedy Library, was helpful. The work done by former Army intelligence analyst John Newman, who contributed a postscript to the previous edition of this book, has continued to be helpful.
David Kaiser, former professor of history at the Naval War College, whose 2008 book contains some of the best recent scholarship on the assassination, courteously responded to me. David Barrett, professor of political science at Villanova University, generously shared a key document.
Senator Richard Schweiker of the Intelligence Committee, and the late Judge Richardson Preyer, chair of the House Assassinations Committee, gave patient help and advice. So, more recently, has the former chief counsel of the House Assassinations Committee, G. Robert Blakey—professor emeritus of law at the University of Notre Dame—with whom I shared a stimulating research expedition in 2007. A number of dedicated congressional staff who spoke with me must remain anonymous. It is an honor, however, to mention Gaeton Fonzi, a man of courage and integrity with whom I had the privilege of working after his work for the House Assassinations Committee was done. His colleagues’ nickname for him was “Ahab”—and he never let up until the illness that led to his too-early death in 2012.
In Cuba, officials were cooperative and generous with facilities. I was neither credulous nor cynical about what they told me—an attitude I learned, in this case, also to take with U.S. officialdom.
My work on the case began in 1979 when—with the able Michael Cockerell—I made a television documentary that was shown on the BBC and around the United States. Independent filmmaker Ronan O’Rahilly provided further research opportunities and encouragement. Neither of those film operations could have been achieved without the skill and comradeship of my friends from long-ago days of danger in Vietnam and the Middle East, cameraman Raymond Grosjean and his sound engineer, the late Georges Méaume. In 1993, the producers of the Frontline program gave me the opportunity to follow Oswald’s trails in Russia and Mexico. Personal thanks, for his part in that project, to my old BBC colleague Bill Cran.
Gratitude, too, to Vanity Fair magazine, which commissioned me to write a major 1994 article on the case. Editor Graydon Carter, and his colleagues Wayne Lawson and Robert Walsh, steered the piece to press with an attention to accuracy that remains so lacking in the handling of this story by most of the media.
Since 2006, in connection with developing new information, I thank Charles Cardiff, Libia Winslow, and Siobhán Murray—for translation from Spanish—Emer Reynolds of Crossing the Line Films in Dublin, and Gordon Winslow in Miami. Professor Sanjeev Chatterjee of the University of Miami School of Communication generously provided a film crew. I thank, too, Sra. Marta Martínez for her hospitality and—later, after her husband’s death—her courteous help.
Friends who helped and encouraged over the years included Fenella Dubes; Mariko Fukuda; Esme and Larry Gottlieb; Willie and Bríd Henry; and, sadly gone now, Jane Bradbeer, Vicky Mason, and James Villiers-Stuart. Susan Hart, who typed the original manuscript, was an unfailing source of help. Cynthia Rowan urged me on and applied an eagle eye to the first draft. For this edition, the trusty Sinéad Sweeney produced essential transcripts at short notice. Publishers Simon Thorogood at Headline in the UK, and Jane Friedman at Open Road Media in New York, have been ever supportive. Stephanie Gorton and Pete Beatty at Open Road steered this edition to completion. Lauren Chomiuk and Joan Giurdanella were super-thorough copyeditors, and James Edgar designed the UK cover.
My gratitude, as always, to the literary agent who keeps bread on our table in these tough times for the publishing industry, Curtis Brown chairman Jonathan Lloyd. The serenity of his assistant, Lucia Rae, keeps everyone sane.
I thank those loyal Americans, especially those in intelligence, who agreed to talk—albeit on occasion off the record. In a true democracy, loyalty is due ultimately not to bureaucracies and formal oaths of secrecy, but to personal conscience and the public interest.
I could not have done worthwhile work on this case, at any point in the past twenty years, without the professional skills and the love of the most indispensable colleague of all, my wife and professional partner, Robbyn. For this edition in particular, her hard work and wisdom has been vital.
Sources and Notes
Abbreviations
If not described in full, source books are referred to here under the authors’ names and the notation. Full details of these can be found in the bibliography.
Information deriving from research done by the author and Robbyn Swan for their December 1994 Vanity Fair article, “The Ghosts of November,” will be referred to by the abbreviation VF.
Citations referring to official reports will be abbreviated as follows:
Warren Commission Report, Report, p. –.
Material in the twenty-six volumes that accompany the Warren Commission Report are referred to by volume and page, e.g., XXII.25.
Warren Commission Exhibits are referred to as, e.g., CE 2021.
Warren Commission Documents are referred to by document number, e.g., CD 16.
The Report of the House Select Committee on Assassinations (1979) is referred to as, e.g., HSCA Report, p.–.
The twelve Kennedy volumes of Hearings and Appendices of the House Select Committee on Assassinations are referred to by volume and page number, e.g., HSCA V.250.
References to documents held by the National Archives and Records Administration are cited as NARA and their record number, e.g., NARA 124-10193-10468.
The Interim Report (1975) of the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, United States Senate—Alleged Assassination Plots Involving Foreign Leaders is referred to as Sen. Int. Cttee., Assassination Plots.
The Final Report of the above Select Committee (1976), entitled The Investigation of the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy: Performance of the Intelligence Agencies, is referred to as Sen. Int. Cttee., Performance of Intelligence Agencies.
Assassinations Records Review Board citations are referred to as AARB.
All the above are published by the U.S. Government Printing Office and listed in the bibliography to this book. Most are available online at MaryFerrell.org.
Preface
x From the start: Prof. Sheldon Appleton, “The Mystery of the Kennedy Assassination: What the American Public Believes,” The Public Perspective, November/December 1998.
2013 poll: Conservative Intelligence Briefing, January 25, 2013.
2009 poll: CBS News, February 11, 2009.
“probably” HSCA Report, p. 1.
Warren: New York Times, February 4 & 5, 1964; Washington Post, February 4,
1964; Los Angeles Times, February 5, 1964; Dallas Morning News, February 5, 1964.
xi Note 1: Until the collapse of the Soviet Union, certainly, intelligence information involving the Soviets was highly sensitive. Most of the information about the KGB defector Yuri Nosenko, and his claim to have knowledge of how the KGB had handled Oswald in the Soviet Union, was long top secret (see Chapters 8 and 10). CIA operations in or against Castro’s Cuba—especially where they involve living people—may yet be sensitive. The Mexican authorities’ part in CIA surveillance operations in Mexico City (see Chapter 19) may still be seen as politically sensitive within Mexico.
Army Intelligence files: See Chapters 5 & 16.
Secret Service destroyed: ARRB Report, p. 149 & see p. 64–
Naval Intelligence files: ibid., p. 157, “The Railroading of LCDR Terri Pike,” by William Kelly, www.jfkcountercoup.blogspot.com, corr. William Kelly, transcript int. CDR (USNR) Robert. D. Steele, February 1, 2013, HSCA XI.541
Archives Stated: Gary M. Stern, General Counsel to Jim Lesar, Assassination Archives & Research Center, June 12, 2012.
Blakey: (“bureaucratic jargon”) Salon, June 14,2012; (“playing”) Robert Blakey to Paul Hoch et al., February 11, 2013.
xii “unless the President”: Stern to Lesar, supra.
1. Ambush
5 Poem: Poems by Alan Seeger (Charles Scribner & Sons, 1916).
Not in Your Lifetime: The Defining Book on the J.F.K. Assassination Page 41