Last Word: My Indictment of the CIA in the Murder of JFK

by Mark Lane

  I still begin each morning with a cup of coffee and The New York Times, and I assure you it is not due to some latent charitable instinct on my part. When I think of that newspaper, of course I still remember its past villains, including reporter John Crewdson, Lewis and Gupte, but I also recall with affection and respect the finest journalist I ever met, Peter Khiss, and during the early days of my law practice, Jack Roth, who covered the Criminal Courts Building in Manhattan, and the many friends of mine who worked for that institution. When we talked about the Warren Report, most seemed ashamed of the position taken by the newspaper. I know also that institutions do not have an irrevocable persona, but tend to reconsider positions with a new generation of reporters and editors. I believe the Times owes, if not an apology, an explanation to its readers.

  The intelligence agencies and their assets in the media had made it clear that anyone who pursued the truth about the death of the president did so at some personal cost and risk. The fact that these forces made it difficult for many of the researchers, investigators and authors to obtain and publish information that did not conform to the orthodox perception, however, should be noted.

  The CIA and the Media

  After the CIA had widely distributed its then-secret memorandum instructing its assets to destroy critics of the Warren Report, including me, and offered specific language for book reviewers, columnists and interviewers to employ in those efforts, it developed a method for making the false charges appear to originate elsewhere. A survey of the language that the assets used reveals how many of them utilized the methods and even precise and identical language that had been provided to them.

  This is the method now employed. An independent publication is chosen to mask the source. A CIA puppet is placed there and given an impressive title. The CIA then provides the propaganda. It appears as an independent concept when published. The CIA, employing its official website, cia.gov, then cites the “independent” writer and the “independent” publication as the source as it spreads its false allegations throughout the world. In the intelligence world some refer to this as sheep-dipping. Their wolf had been dipped into a sheep’s bath and came up smelling quite neutral.

  In 2002 Max Holland, describing himself as a “Nation contributing editor” with that publication’s consent and approval, published disinformation in Studies in Intelligence, either because The Nation declined to publish it or because it was not offered to it. Since then the modus operandi of the CIA’s mole has been refined and is a bit more sophisticated, and, therefore, more obscure.

  During 2006, Max Holland struck yet again. This time his article was published first in the Nation, apparently at the behest of the Central Intelligence Agency, and then widely publicized through the use of the official website of the CIA, describing the article as one written by a “contributing editor” of The Nation. At the outset, Holland informs the readers of The Nation that Norman Redlich, “a Nation contributor since 1951,” was a member of the Warren Commission “staff.” Holland also states that there were “twenty-seven people” on the commission staff. Redlich was not a staff member; he was one of the fourteen lawyers listed as “Assistant Counsel.”54 There were twelve people listed as “staff members;” Redlich was not one of them. In addition, there was a General Counsel, who also was not a staff member.

  The article was entitled “The JFK Lawyers’ Conspiracy.” It claimed that four attorneys had entered into a conspiracy to place “the Warren Report into undeserved disrepute.” The four lawyers referred to were New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison, Senator Gary Hart, G. Robert Blakey, “who was a professor at Cornell Law School when he became chief counsel and staff director of the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA),” and me. The word conspiracy has a precise meaning and definition. According to the standard, Black’s Law Dictionary (8th ed.), a conspiracy is “An agreement by two or more persons to commit an unlawful act, coupled with an intent to achieve the agreement’s objective, and (in most states) action or conduct that furthers the agreement; a combination for an unlawful purpose. 18 USCA § 371.” If Holland is neither an attorney, nor has access to a copy of the dictionary, it would have been a good idea for him to have consulted one or the other. He might also ask a lawyer the meaning of the word “defamation.”

  The first count in Holland’s fanciful “conspiracy” was my suggesting that there be a thorough investigation into the assassination, which Holland states began in 1964. He falsely claims that I was involved in spreading “innuendo” about an ostensibly sinister delay in the Warren Commission’s investigation and that I wrote Rush to Judgment two years later, changing my position. I did not criticize the time spent by the commission in its inquiry; I criticized its inaccurate conclusions. The title, Rush to Judgment, rests upon my observation that on the very day of the assassination, J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the FBI, stated that Oswald was the assassin and that he had acted alone. Those statements made by Hoover were made before any investigation had begun. When the Warren Report was published in 1964, it adopted the conclusions that Hoover had proclaimed as fact almost two years before. It is very difficult to find a single truthful assertion in Holland’s article, although one exists.

  I called for an inquiry, conducted my own investigation, and subsequently published Rush to Judgment, all done before I ever met Senator Hart, Jim Garrison or Blakey. In fact, I have not yet met Senator Hart. The only time I met Blakey was after he had been appointed counsel for the HSCA thirteen years after my work had begun. It was a formal meeting that lasted a very short period of time in which Blakey made clear that he preferred to ignore evidence of a conspiracy and to utilize the CIA’s second line of defense that if Oswald didn’t act alone, organized crime did it. I clearly pointed out my opposition to Blakey’s concepts and left the hearing room. I met Jim Garrison some time after I completed writing Rush to Judgment. The facts do not exactly add up to the “conspiracy” of four lawyers meeting and agreeing to discredit the Warren Report.

  And now for an accurate statement by Holland. He complained that “Lane’s basic allegation (was) that the government was indifferent to the truth.” All along, I had been led to believe that shibboleth was the motto of The Nation and a concept that defines the role of the people and the press in a democratic society.

  Holland also makes false statements and draws false conclusions about the role of Jim Garrison in the prosecution of Clay Shaw. It was, he claims, a “legal farce.” He also asserts that “if Shaw hadn’t died prematurely in 1974,” he would likely have brought legal action against Garrison. In Louisiana, as in all of the states, the statute of limitations determines when a lawsuit may be brought. The Shaw trial ended in 1969. A visit to the possibly applicable law discloses that a lawsuit for defamation is time-barred after one year, a lawsuit for fraud is time-barred after one year, and a lawsuit for professional malpractice is time-barred after one year. Shaw had access to numerous attorneys and did not bring an action against Garrison for five years. His death, premature or otherwise, had no impact upon any right that he knowingly allowed to expire.

  After Clay Shaw was acquitted, with the permission of the court, I interviewed many of the trial jurors. I saw them each individually and asked them their views of the evidence. Of course, they all knew that Jim Garrison had repeatedly stated that the CIA had killed President Kennedy. They also listened attentively to the evidence and many considered that Shaw’s conduct had been suspicious, and that witnesses who testified against him were, in some instances, credible. Most of the jurors told me that they were troubled by the prosecution’s failure to present evidence demonstrating that Shaw had been related to the Central Intelligence Agency. Since Shaw, his attorneys, and the CIA all claimed that there had been no such relationship, they concluded that Shaw’s guilt had not been established beyond a reasonable doubt. That trial was concluded in 1969.

  After the publication of the Holland article, I contacted The Nation and stated that I would bring legal action agai
nst it for defamation unless The Nation published my letter disputing the article. I was informed that there was an enforceable word limit upon letters to the editor and that the editors of the publication reserved the right to edit it, delete portions and modify it in any way they wished for purposes of “clarity.” I thought my letter was quite clear.

  I was a member of an organization in Charlottesville, Virginia, comprised of readers of The Nation. A number of those readers drafted and signed a petition requesting that my letter be published in full. It was signed by most of the members, including two professors at the University of Virginia. The response nationally was similar, with some scholars using the Internet to call for a boycott against The Nation. I did not support that call because I believe in the extension of the First Amendment, which provides publications with the right to print dubious statements. Many readers were outraged that The Nation had betrayed its traditions.55

  On February 10, 2006, I sent to The Nation a letter for publication. I suggested that they publish it as it was written or that they notify me of the name of their litigation counsel. The letter follows; it was published as it was written.

  Ms. Katrina vanden Heuvel

  Editor and Publisher

  The Nation

  33 Irving Place

  New York, NY 10003

  Ms. Katrina vanden Heuvel:

  It began with a CIA document classified “Top Secret.” How do I know that? A decade after the assassination of President Kennedy, with the assistance of the ACLU, I won a precedent-setting lawsuit in the United States District Court in Washington, D.C. brought pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act. The court ordered the police and spy organizations to provide to me many long-suppressed documents.

  The CIA document stated that it was deeply troubled by my work in questioning the conclusions of the Warren Commission. The CIA had concluded that my book, Rush to Judgment, was difficult to answer; indeed, after a careful and thorough analysis of that work by CIA experts, the CIA was unable to find and cite a single error in the book. The CIA complained that almost half of the American people agreed with me and that “Doubtless polls abroad would show similar, or possibly more adverse, results.” This, “trend of opinion,” the CIA stated, “is a matter of concern” to “our organization.” Therefore, the CIA concluded, steps must be taken.

  The CIA directed that methods of attacking me should be discussed with “liaison and friendly elite contacts (especially politicians and editors),” instructing them that “further speculative discussion only plays into the hands of the opposition.” The CIA stressed that their assets in the media should “Point out also that parts of the conspiracy talk appear to be deliberately generated by Communist propagandists.” Further, their media contacts should “use their influence to discourage” what the CIA referred to as “unfounded and irresponsible speculation.” Rush to Judgment, then the New York Times number one best selling book, contained no speculation.

  The CIA in its report instructed book reviewers and magazines that contained feature articles how to deal with me and others who raised doubts about the validity of the Warren Report. Magazines should, the CIA stated, “employ propaganda assets to answer and refute the attacks of the critics,” adding that “feature articles are particularly appropriate for this purpose.” The CIA instructed its media assets that “because of the standing of the members of the Warren Commission, efforts to impugn their rectitude and wisdom tend to cast doubt on the whole leadership of American society.” The CIA was referring to such distinguished gentlemen as Allen Dulles, the former director of the CIA; President Kennedy had fired Dulles from that position for having lied to him about the Bay of Pigs tragedy. Dulles was then appointed by Lyndon Johnson to the Warren Commission to tell the American people the truth about the assassination.

  The purpose of the CIA was not in doubt. The CIA stated: ”The aim of this dispatch is to provide material for countering and discrediting the claims” of those who doubted the Warren Report. The CIA stated that “background information” about me and others “is supplied in a classified section and in a number of unclassified attachments.”

  With this background we now turn to the article by Max Holland published by The Nation in its February 20, 2006 issue. It states that there was a “JFK Lawyers’ Conspiracy” among four lawyers, Sen. Gary Hart, Professor Robert Blakey, Jim Garrison the former District Attorney of New Orleans and later a state judge in Louisiana, and me.

  Before I wrote Rush to Judgment I had never met any of the other three “co-conspirators.” I still have not had the pleasure of meeting Sen. Hart and I know of no work that he has done in this area. I met Prof. Blakey only once; he had been appointed chief counsel for the House Select Committee on Assassinations and at that meeting I told him that I was disappointed in his approach and methods. Not much of a lawyer’s conspiracy.

  Each of the other statements as to alleged fact are false and defamatory. Mr. Holland states that I am not scrupulous, that I am dishonest and that I spread innuendo about the sinister delay in the Warren Commission investigation, an assertion not made by me but fabricated in its entirety by Mr. Holland. As a silent echo of his CIA associates, Mr. Holland does not point to one assertion as to fact, of the thousands I have made about the facts surrounding the death of our president that he claims is inaccurate.

  Finally, Mr. Holland strikes pay dirt. He uncovers, are you ready for this, the fact that I had asserted that “the government was indifferent to the truth.” I confess. Is that now a crime under the Patriot Act? Isn’t that what The Nation is supposed to be asserting and proving?

  Mr. Holland states that the KGB was secretly funding my work with a payment of “$12,500 (in 2005 dollars).” It was a secret all right. It never happened. Mr. Holland’s statement is an outright lie. Neither the KGB nor any person or organization associated with it ever made any contribution to my work. No one ever made a sizable contribution with the exception of Corliss Lamont who contributed enough for me to fly one time from New York to Dallas to interview eye-witnesses. The second largest contribution was $50.00 given to me by Woody Allen. Have Corliss and Woody now joined Mr. Holland’s fanciful conspiracy?

  Funds for the work of the Citizens Committee of Inquiry were raised by me. I lectured each night for more than a year in a Manhattan theatre. The New York Times referred to the very well-attended talks as one of the longest running performances off Broadway. That was not a secret. I am surprised that Mr. Holland never came across that information, especially since he refers to what he calls “The Speech” in his diatribe.

  Apparently, Mr. Holland did not fabricate the KGB story; his associates at the CIA did. There is proof available for that assertion, but I fear that I have taken too much space already.

  Am I being unfair when I suggest a connection between Mr. Holland and the CIA? Here is the “CIA game plan:” Fabricate a disinformation story. Hand it to a reporter with some liberal credentials; for example, a contributing editor to The Nation. If the reporter cannot find a publication then have the CIA carry it on its own website under the byline of the reporter. Then the CIA can quote the reporter and state,“ according to … ..”

  Mr. Holland writes regularly for the official CIA website. He publishes information there that he has been given by the CIA. The CIA, on its official website, then states “According to Holland … ” If you would like to look into this matter of disinformation laundering enter into your computer—“CIA.gov + Max Holland”. You will find on the first page alone numerous articles by Mr. Holland supporting and defending the CIA and attacking those who dare to disagree as well as CIA statements attributing the information to Mr. Holland.

  A question for The Nation. When Mr. Holland writes an article for you defending the CIA and attacking its critics, why do you describe him only as “a Nation contributing editor” and author. Is it not relevant to inform your readers that he also is a contributor to the official CIA website and then is quoted by the CIA regarding information t
hat the agency gave to him?

  An old associate of mine, Adlai Stevenson, once stated to his political opponent, a man known as a stranger to the truth,—if you stop telling lies about me I will stop telling the truth about you. I was prepared to adopt that attitude here. But I cannot. Your publication has defamed a good friend, Jim Garrison, after he had died and could not defend himself against demonstrably false charges.

  You have not served your readers by refusing to disclose Mr. Holland’s CIA association. The Nation and Mr. Holland have engaged in the type of attack journalism that recalls the bad old days. If I fought McCarthyism in the 1950s as a young lawyer, how can I avoid it now when it appears in a magazine that has sullied its own history. The article is filled with ad hominem attacks, name calling, fabrications and it has done much mischief. I will hold you and Mr. Holland accountable for your misconduct. I can honorably adopt no other course.

  To mitigate damages I require that you repudiate the article and apologize for publishing it. That you publish this letter as an unedited article in your next issue. That you do not publish a reply by Mr. Holland in which he adds to the defamation and the damage he has done, a method you have employed in the past. That you provide to me the mailing addresses of your contributing editors and members of your editorial board so that I may send this letter to them. I am confident that Gore Vidal and Bob Borosage, Tom Hayden and Marcus Raskin, all of whom I know, and many others such as Molly Ivins, John Leonard and Lani Guinier who I do not know but who I respect and admire, would be interested in the practices of The Nation. In addition, I suggest that ethical journalism requires that in the future you fully identify your writers so that your readers may make an informed judgment about their potential bias.