SUSPECTS IN THE JFK ASSASSINATION: by Michael T. Griffith
Raymond
ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and
undernourishment.”
Robert M. Hutchins quotes
SUSPECTS IN THE JFK ASSASSINATION
by Michael T. Griffith
Michael T. Griffith holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Excelsior
College in Albany, New York, two Associate in Applied Science degrees
from the Community College of the Air Force, and an Advanced
Certificate of Civil War Studies and a Certificate of Civil War
Studies from Carroll College in Wisconsin. He is a two-time graduate
of the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California, in Arabic
and Hebrew. He is also a two-time graduate of the U.S. Air Force
Technical Training School in San Angelo, Texas, and holds an
Occupational Instructor Certificate from the Community College of the
Air Force. He is the author of the book Compelling Evidence: A New
Look at the Assassination of President Kennedy (Grand Prairie, TX: JFK-
Lancer Productions and Publications, 1996) and runs the JFK
Assassination website. His articles on the assassination have appeared
in several journals that deal with the case. In addition, he is the
author of four books on Mormonism and ancient texts..
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKgriffithM.htm
Michael T. Griffith
1996
@All Rights Reserved
Revised 10/09/99
Who would have wanted to see President Kennedy dead? Warren Commission
(WC) critics have identified a number of people and groups whom they
suspect were either involved in the assassination or had foreknowledge
of it and did nothing to prevent it because they wanted JFK out of the
way. According to many researchers, the following individuals and
organizations are suspects:
* Lyndon Johnson
* The CIA
* J. Edgar Hoover
* Oil baron H. L. Hunt
* The Mafia
* Anti-Castro Cubans
* General Edward Lansdale
* Richard Nixon
Lyndon Johnson
I suspect Lyndon Johnson may have been involved in the plot to murder
President Kennedy, though I am by no means certain. I believe Johnson
might have known about the plot ahead of time and either sanctioned it
or actively took part in it. Another possibility, in my view, is that
Johnson realized soon after the shooting that Kennedy had been killed
by a conspiracy, and that Johnson had an idea as to who had been
behind it.
In any case, Johnson was a driving force behind the cover-up that
followed. Craig Zirbel assembles circumstantial and anecdotal evidence
that Johnson was involved in the plot in his book THE TEXAS
CONNECTION. Noel Twyman presents evidence along the same line in
BLOODY TREASON. Johnson's former mistress, Madeleine Brown, has said
that Johnson told her shortly before the assassination that after
November 22 he wouldn't have to worry about Kennedy anymore.
The CIA
As a conservative Republican, initially I was flabbergasted by the
accusation that the CIA was involved in JFK's death. My first reaction
was to dismiss the charge as the absurd ravings of die-hard liberals.
But now, a few years and hundreds of hours of research later, I am not
so sure. I dismiss the idea that the CIA's top command was involved in
the plot. However, I believe there is credible evidence that powerful
renegade elements of the CIA took part in the assassination
conspiracy.
When conspiracists speak of the CIA in reference to its alleged
involvement in the assassination, they are referring primarily to the
CIA's covert action personnel, i.e., those agents who deal in
sabotage, propaganda, and assassination. There is evidence that
suggests that some of the Agency's covert operations personnel have
also taken part in drug trafficking (see, for example, 36; 37; 38;
39:164-226; 40; 65:125-127, 132-136, 164-166, 183-185, 234-235;
77:331-343; 78:285-287; 79).
Most CIA personnel are not involved in such activities and would be
appalled at any attempt to harm an elected official. The covert
operations personnel make up a large portion of the CIA, and they,
along with the Agency's top officials, are the most powerful group in
the CIA. Some high-ranking CIA officials have attempted to frustrate
presidential policies and have initiated or sanctioned illegal
operations, to include working with organized crime.
I reject Zirbel's suggestion that the CIA was, if anything, happy with
Kennedy and therefore had no conceivable reason to want to see him
dead. JFK and the CIA were in a virtual state of war from the moment
of the Bay of Pigs disaster until the day he died. JFK did not trust
the CIA and he reportedly intended to dismantle it after the 1964
election. In Vietnam, the CIA refused to carry out instructions from
the ranking American official in the country (4:ix). It also ignored
JFK's orders to stop working with the Mafia. When Kennedy heard the
news that
South Vietnam's dictator Ngo Diem had been murdered by a CIA-backed
coup, against his express wishes, he was outraged. Kennedy was no fan
of Diem's, but he did not want to see him murdered. General Maxwell
Taylor wrote that upon learning of Diem's death JFK "leaped to his
feet and rushed from the room with a look of shock and dismay on his
face" (70:334).
Senator George Smathers reported that Kennedy blamed the CIA for
Diem's murder. According to Smathers, Kennedy said he had to "do
something about" the CIA and that the Agency should be stripped of its
exorbitant power (70:334-335). On another occasion, Kennedy reportedly
said he would scatter the CIA "into a thousand pieces."
One of the more troubling cases of CIA disobedience to presidential
authority was its behavior in relation to Cuba. In September 1963,
long after President Kennedy had ordered a halt to the covert campaign
against Castro, senior CIA staffers, including the deputy director,
Richard Helms, and Desmond Fitzgerald, the head of the Agency's Cuba
unit, approved plans to kill Castro, without seeking presidential
authorization. They also continued other covert operations against
Cuba in violation of the President's instructions. Needless to say,
these CIA officers did not inform the President of their activities;
nor did they inform Congress or the Attorney General, Robert Kennedy.
They didn't even tell then-CIA director John McCone, probably because
he was appointed by President Kennedy following the Bay of Pigs
disaster. In short, as Anthony Summers has observed, "in September and
October 1963--a crucial moment politically--CIA officers were acting
in a way that gravely endangered White House policy" (14:322).
A key figure linking the Agency to the assassination was CIA man David
Atlee Phillips, who was seen with Oswald a few months before the
shooting (14:504-519; 61:128-171, 391-400, 408-409).
Among many other things, Phillips was the propaganda chief for the Bay
of Pigs operation and later rose to become the chief of the CIA's
Western Hemisphere Division. In 1954 Phillips worked with E. Howard
Hunt and others to overthrow the Arbenz government in Guatemala. Based
on his extensive investigation of Phillips for the Church Committee
and then for the Select Committee, Gaeton Fonzi believes that "David
Atlee Phillips played a key role in the conspiracy to assassinate
President Kennedy" (61:409). Phillips was in charge of the CIA's Cuban
operations in Mexico City at the time of the assassination, so he was
strategically positioned to frame Oswald, and it is quite possible, if
not probable, that he was involved in the phony Oswald visits to the
Cuban embassy (cf. 61:292).
Another former CIA agent who has come under suspicion is E. Howard
Hunt. Hunt, a former high-ranking covert operator and a propaganda
specialist, was a key figure in the Bay of Pigs invasion. As
mentioned, Hunt and David Atlee Phillips helped to overthrow the
Arbenz government in Guatemala. According to former (and now deceased)
CIA operative Frank Sturgis, who knew Hunt well, Hunt was involved in
CIA assassination operations.
Hunt has made no secret of his intense dislike for John Kennedy. To
this day, Hunt blames JFK for the failure at the Bay of Pigs. When
Watergate whistleblower John Dean opened Hunt's private safe, he found
bogus telegrams that falsely linked JFK with the assassination of
South Vietnam's corrupt dictator Ngo Dinh Diem (16:79).
Where was E. Howard Hunt on November 22, 1963? Hunt has given
conflicting accounts of where he was at the time of the shooting. In
his 1985 libel trial in Miami, Florida, the jury's forewoman concluded
Hunt was not being truthful about his whereabouts on the day of the
assassination.
Several researchers have identified Hunt as the small "tramp" in the
famous "tramp photos." The tramp photos show three supposed tramps who
were arrested in the railroad yard behind the grassy knoll shortly
after the assassination. The tramps were found in a freight train that
had pulled out from behind the TSBD without authorization. The
railroad tower controller stopped the train because he knew it did not
have permission to depart. The police then searched the train and
found the tramps. In the tramp photos the tramps are being escorted by
some Dallas police officers who are holding shotguns, presumably en
route to the police station.
The tramp in the rear, the third tramp, is the man identified by some
researchers as E. Howard Hunt. I have studied several photographs of
Hunt and compared them with those of the third tramp, and I am struck
by the resemblance between them. In their book COUP D'ETAT IN AMERICA,
which was endorsed by Congressman Henry Gonzalez, authors Alan
Weberman and Michael Canfield provide photographic overlays of Hunt
and the third tramp to demonstrate the marked resemblance between the
two. In 1988, experts at 3M's Comtal Corporation analyzed photos of
Hunt and of the third tramp and found a noticeable resemblance between
them. All of this does NOT prove Hunt was the third tramp, but it is
worthnoting that he bears a strong resemblance to a man who was
arrested in Dealey Plaza shortly after the assassination.
According to lone-gunman theorists, the men in the tramp photos have
been positively identified and had nothing to do with the
assassination. Soon after attention was focused on the tramp pictures
by the movie "JFK," Dallas authorities released police files that
included what were alleged to be the arrest records of the men shown
in the photos. Then, a short time later, the news show A CURRENT
AFFAIR claimed it had found two of the tramps mentioned in the arrest
records, John Gedney and Harold Doyle.
WC defenders assert that the arrest records and the finding of Gedney
and Doyle "finally lay to rest irresponsible theories of conspiracy"
about the tramps. The third man listed in the records is Gus Abrams.
Richard Trask notes that Abrams' sister has identified her brother as
one of the men in the pictures. Thus, says Trask, "the painstaking
discovery of Mr. Doyle, his and the other two mens' stories, and the
evidence of Doyle's own face all come together into a more than
credible explanation" (87:347). However, there are several problems
with the arrest records and with Doyle's and Gedney's stories
(16:347-353).
There are reports that certain CIA operatives had foreknowledge of the
assassination. One of these reports has been related by Gaeton Fonzi,
a former investigator for the House Select Committee on Assassinations
(HSCA). Fonzi reports that a CIA operative code-named Ten-One told him
that one of his fellow CIA operatives dismissed the claim that Oswald
shot Kennedy because "he knows some of the people who were involved"
and that these individuals "were talking about it [the shooting]
before it even happened" (61:238-239).
Fonzi has also written that a close friend of CIA hitman David Sanches
Morales, Ruben Carbajal, told him that Morales once indicated to a
mutual associate, in Carbajal's presence, that he had been involved in
the assassination. Not only was Morales a CIA hitman, but he was
involved with the infamous Phoenix Program in Vietnam. Morales also
took part in the Bay of Pigs invasion and was reportedly violently
angry at Kennedy over the invasion's failure. Carbajal arranged for
Fonzi to interview the man to whom Morales had made his shocking
admission. The man was named Bob Walton, an attorney and a Harvard Law
graduate. Fonzi met with Walton and Carbajal. Walton told Fonzi that
Morales had in fact indicated he had been involved in Kennedy's death.
Says Fonzi,
I looked at Ruben Carbajal, who had remained silent while Walton was
telling me this. Carbajal looked at me and nodded his head. Yes, he
was there, it was true. (61:390)
In 1977 it came to light through a declassified CIA document that a
notorious French assassin who reportedly had links to the CIA and to
the Mafia was in Dallas on the day of the shooting (5:202-209;
71:414-419). The hitman's name was Jean Soutre. As of a few years ago,
Soutre was still alive and had been located. He was about 35 years old
in 1963, which would put him at close to 70 today. Within 48 hours of
the assassination, Soutre was picked up in Texas by U.S. authorities
and immediately expelled.
The CIA document mentions that Soutre received mail from a dentist
named Alderson. The FBI located this individual, Dr. Lawrence
Alderson, who had met Soutre while stationed in France as a first
lieutenant in the U.S. Army. Dr. Alderson told former Rockefeller
Foundation scholar Henry Hurt that the FBI agents who interviewed him
informed him that the FBI felt Soutre "had either killed JFK or knew
who had done it" (71:418). When he spoke with Hurt, Dr. Alderson
produced a snapshot of Soutre that he took when he was stationed in
France. To make a long story short, the FBI dropped the ball in the
investigation of Soutre and essentially swept the whole thing under
the rug.
J. Edgar Hoover
J. Edgar Hoover strongly disliked, and in fact hated, John Kennedy.
Hoover began collecting smear material on Kennedy's personal life when
young Jack was in the Navy, and he continued to monitor JFK's private
affairs until the day of the assassination. There is evidence that
Hoover provided LBJ with derogatory information on Kennedy that
enabled Johnson to blackmail his way onto the ticket (64:271-273).
In 1979 the HSCA discovered that the FBI had recorded conversations in
1962 and 1963 between various Mafia leaders and their subordinates in
which threats to kill JFK and wishes to see him murdered were
expressed (28:290; 56). Incredibly, Hoover never reported these
threats to the Secret Service. Even more disturbingly, he did not
mention them to President Kennedy, nor to Robert Kennedy, who was the
Attorney General (and Hoover's boss) at the time. And, after the
assassination, Hoover saw to it that little if any evidence of Mafia
involvement in the shooting reached the Warren Commission
(28:281-303).
Hoover's principal motive for wanting President Kennedy dead is fairly
obvious: He knew JFK was not going to reappoint him as the director of
the FBI after the 1964 election. In addition, Hoover felt Kennedy was
an immoral, bleeding-heart liberal who was endangering America and the
free world. (In point of fact, Kennedy was quite conservative on
economic matters and had shown a willingness to stand up to Soviet
aggression. Furthermore, under Kennedy's economic policies, which
included generous tax cuts, the economy performed well, as even
conservative leaders like Jack Kemp and Donald Lambro have noted.)
For more information on Hoover's role in the assassination, I would
recommend Mark North's book ACT OF TREASON: THE ROLE OF J. EDGAR
HOOVER IN THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT KENNEDY.
Oil Baron H. L. Hunt
Conspiracy theorists are generally suspicious of the late Texas oil
billionaire H. L. Hunt. Hunt was a rabid right-wing extremist with
intelligence connections. According to one of Hunt's special
assistants, Hunt's top aides often heard him say that America would be
"much better off without Kennedy" (5:277). On one occasion Hunt
reportedly expressed his desire to see JFK shot (21:215).
The day before the assassination, Eugene Hale Brading, a Mafia man
with a long arrest record, visited Hunt's office building in Dallas.
Brading was arrested in Dealey Plaza on the day of the shooting when
he was found to have taken an elevator to the ground floor of the Dal-
Tex Building shortly after the shots were fired. Brading was released,
however, because he gave the police an alias. While in Dallas, Brading
stayed at the Cabana Hotel.
Jack Ruby visited that hotel, and Hunt's office building, on November
21. Moreover, according to Hunt's former chief aide, John Curington,
Marina Oswald met with Hunt two days before the shooting.
On November 23, Hunt asked his chief aide to see what kind of security
the police had for Oswald. The aide reported that Oswald had very
little protection and that security was very lax at police
headquarters where Oswald was being kept. Hunt flew to Washington,
D.C., shortly after receiving this report. Oswald was killed on
November 24.
Dick Russell's book THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH contains an important
examination of H. L. Hunt's troubling activities before and after the
assassination, as does Livingstone's KILLING THE TRUTH (see also
5:276-278 and 10:568, 573-574).
A few years after the assassination, a disturbing handwritten note
surfaced. The note was addressed to a "Mr. Hunt" and was signed "Lee
Harvey Oswald." Three independent handwriting experts retained by the
DALLAS MORNING NEWS concluded the note was written by Oswald. In the
note, which is dated November 8, 1963, Oswald asks about his
"position" and requests a meeting before "any steps are taken by me or
anyone else."
Was the "Mr. Hunt" oil giant H. L. Hunt? Or, was it E. Howard Hunt of
the CIA? Documents declassified in 1983 revealed that the FBI
apparently believed the note was addressed to H. L. Hunt's ultra-
conservative millionaire son, Nelson Hunt.
The Mafia
Zirbel takes the view that the "Mafia assassination theory is not
logical" (21:66). Zirbel believes the Mafia had enough compromising
information on the Kennedys that it did not need to kill JFK. Zirbel
further says that only small-time Mafia men were involved in the
assassination. In my opinion, Zirbel's position is contradicted by the
evidence. While the Mafia did indeed have some embarrassing
information on John and Robert Kennedy, I think the record is clear
that the Mob had strong motives for wanting the President dead. There
is evidence of Mafia involvement in the assassination. Even the ultra-
cautious HSCA concluded the Mafia had the means, the motive, and the
opportunity to assassinate President Kennedy. Prior to the
assassination, various Mafia leaders were heard to threaten JFK's
life.
On November 20, two Mafia men told Rose Cheramie that it was common
knowledge in the underworld that Kennedy was about to be killed. Mafia-
CIA man David Ferrie was very probably involved in framing Oswald
while he was in New Orleans, and Ferrie engaged in highly suspicious
activity shortly after JFK was shot. And, as mentioned, a Mafia
courier named Eugene Hale Brading was arrested in the Dal-Tex Building
overlooking Dealey Plaza immediately after the shooting. Brading had
an FBI rap sheet with about three dozen arrests. He had met with one
of the sons of avowed Kennedy-hater H. L. Hunt the day before,
ostensibly to discuss some oil business. After he was arrested,
Brading gave the Dallas police an alias, and told them he had merely
gone into the building to use the phone. The police released him a
short time later.
Without question, a Mafia man, Jack Ruby, silenced Lee Harvey Oswald
before he had a chance to tell his side of the story. Furthermore,
right after the President's visit to Dallas was announced, Ruby began
making numerous calls to important Mafia contacts all over the
country. Ruby, like Eugene Brading, was in H. L. Hunt's offices the
day before the shooting (71:124).
Convicted Texas hitman Charles Harrelson has been identified as the
tall man in the famous photos of the three "tramps" who were arrested
in the railroad yard behind Dealey Plaza shortly after the
assassination. In the early 1980s, Harrelson was convicted of
murdering federal judge John Wood with a high-powered rifle, and is
currently serving his sentence in a Texas prison. During the stand-off
that preceded his arrest, Harrelson not only confessed to killing
Judge Wood, but also said he had been involved in the Kennedy
assassination. Harrelson later retracted his statement about having
taken part in the assassination, claiming he had fabricated it under
the influence of cocaine. When arrested, Harrelson was found to be
carrying the business card of R. D. Matthews, who, according to the
HSCA, was acquainted with Jack Ruby and with other Dallas crime
figures. At Harrelson's trial, Joe Chagra, the brother of the man who
was believed to have hired Harrelson, testified that Harrelson was
given the contract to kill Judge Wood after he claimed to have
participated in the JFK assassination. Indicted along with Harrelson
in the plot to kill Judge Wood was the brother of New Orleans crime
boss Carlos Marcello, who was one of the Mafia figures identified by
the Select Committee as possibly having been involved in the
assassination of President Kennedy. Researcher Gary Mack asked an
anthropologist to compare photos of the tall tramp with pictures of
Harrelson. The anthropologist reported it was likely they were same
person. Similarly, police officers trained in photo identification
have advised Harrison Livingstone that Harrelson definitely appears to
be the tall tramp. So far federal authorities have shown no interest
in investigating Harrelson in connection with any role he might have
had in the assassination.
Why would the Mafia have wanted JFK dead? Quite simply, because the
Kennedy administration was threatening the very existence of organized
crime in America. Robert Kennedy was waging an unprecedented war on
the Mafia, a war that targeted not just Mafia operations but also
Mafia leaders themselves.
Anti-Castro Cubans
In speaking of anti-Castro Cubans, I am referring only to those exiles
who were associated with the Bay of Pigs invasion or who were involved
in other CIA-backed anti-Castro activities.
In Zirbel's view, the anti-Castro Cubans were admittedly furious with
Kennedy over the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion but later forgave
him because, among other things, he ransomed 1,200 captured exile
troops from Castro (21:57). But there is strong evidence that some
anti-Castro Cubans never forgave Kennedy for the failure at the Bay of
Pigs, and many of these same individuals were furious at Kennedy over
his handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis and over his shutting down of
their para-military training camps. It should be noted that the
militant anti-Castro exiles were almost exclusively under the control
of the CIA.
Zirbel cites Kennedy's support of the post-invasion efforts to get rid
of Castro as another reason that the Cuban exile troops would have
forgiven JFK. However, Zirbel fails to deal with the fact that Kennedy
subsequently tried to shut down the anti-Castro training bases and
that he ordered an end to the covert operations against Castro.
Anthony Summers' books CONSPIRACY and NOT IN YOUR LIFETIME contain
thorough analyses of the possible role of some militant anti-Castro
Cubans in the assassination (14:268-339, 386-429; see also 5:135-155).
Major General Edward Lansdale and the Military
One figure who has come under close scrutiny by some conspiracists is
the late Major General Edward Lansdale, U.S. Air Force. Lansdale is
undoubtedly the unnamed "General Y" in Oliver Stone's movie "JFK."
Lansdale was a special operations officer with links to the CIA. His
professional patron was CIA director Allen Dulles. The character of
the shady political manipulator, Colonel Hillindale, in the famous
novel THE UGLY AMERICAN, was based on Lansdale's activities in the
Philippines in the early 1950s, where his operations reportedly
included torture and political assassination (37:25). In Vietnam,
during the Eisenhower administration, Lansdale managed several
ruthless internal security programs for South Vietnam's corrupt and
oppressive dictator, Ngo Dinh Diem. These programs later developed
into the CIA's infamous Phoenix program, which was responsible for the
execution of over 20,000 Vietnamese and for the death and torture of
countless civilians (37; 43:79-80; 7:40).
It is clear that Lansdale schemed and plotted "to capture the emerging
Vietnam policy apparatus" (42:36), and he was a major player in the
effort to subvert Kennedy's Vietnam policy. Lansdale tried to get
Kennedy to appoint him the new ambassador to Vietnam, but his plan was
foiled when Secretary of State Dean Rusk learned of Lansdale's covert
credentials and shady reputation from the Assistant for Far Eastern
Affairs, J. Graham Powers.
Was Lansdale involved in the plot to kill JFK? Lansdale was surely
angry at Kennedy for refusing to introduce U.S. combat troops into
Vietnam and for balking at further escalation of the conflict. One can
only imagine his reaction when he learned of Kennedy's withdrawal
plan. It was Lansdale who reportedly ordered Colonel L. Fletcher
Prouty, one of Kennedy's strongest military/security supporters, on a
useless two-week trip to the South Pole eleven days before the
assassination, placing him thousands of miles from Dallas on the day
of the murder (43:103). Col. Prouty has identified Lansdale in a
picture taken in Dealey Plaza shortly after the assassination. Prouty
also reports that Lansdale told him he would be in Dallas on November
22.
Was Lansdale the only senior military officer who was possibly
involved in the plot to kill President Kennedy? Sadly, the answer to
this question might very well be no. Several generals were known to
view Kennedy as almost dangerous to the free world. Kennedy's
relations with a number of senior military officers were reportedly
about as bad as his relations were with the CIA. Some senior military
officials attempted to give JFK a misleading, inaccurate picture of
the true state of affairs in Vietnam, as John Newman discusses in his
highly acclaimed book JFK AND VIETNAM.
During the Cuban Missile Crisis, one very high-ranking general took
the unbelievably irresponsible step of ordering a missile to be fired,
WITHOUT Kennedy's authorization. The missile was unarmed, but the
launching could have triggered a Soviet response. A recent episode in
the BBC 2 documentary series TIME WATCH detailed how during the '50s
and '60s leading generals were anxious to go to war with the Soviet
Union and wanted to launch a "preventive" nuclear first strike. Even
President Eisenhower distrusted some senior military officers, and at
the end of his second term spoke out against the threat posed by an
unchecked military-industrial complex. There is sworn testimony, from
one of the autopsy doctors, that a senior military officer prevented
him from performing a standard but crucial autopsy procedure during
the autopsy.
Richard Nixon
As a conservative Republican, I was even more shocked by the
suggestion that Richard Nixon was involved in the assassination than I
was by the idea that the CIA had played a role in it.
However, it is no secret that Nixon was one of the most corrupt
presidents in the history of our republic. If nothing else, I believe
Nixon might have had foreknowledge of the assassination (and obviously
did nothing to prevent it). Actually, though, I am more inclined to
believe that Nixon had no direct involvement in the assassination but
that after the shooting he had some idea about who had been involved.
Nixon believed Kennedy had stolen the election from him and that
therefore JFK's election was illegitimate.
Most Americans are familiar with the Watergate scandal, which led to
Nixon's resigning in disgrace in 1974. What is not as well known is
the degree to which Nixon aided the Mafia during his tenure in the
White House. This is not surprising, given the fact that Nixon's
friends, and even some of his appointees, included several people who
had important Mafia connections.
The Nixon administration repeatedly intervened to quash prosecutions
and investigations of criminal activity in Mafia-dominated labor
unions. Nixon was involved in a number of highly questionable--and, in
some cases, Mob-connected--financial dealings. Nixon pardoned
organized crime figures after the government had spent millions of
dollars to put them in jail. Among those pardoned was Mafia killer
Angelo DeCarlo. On one occasion, recorded on a 1971 Watergate tape,
Nixon and his aides discussed using Mob thugs to attack anti-war
protestors. Not surprisingly, by all accounts the Mafia warmly
endorsed and supported Nixon's campaigns. John Davis, an authority on
organized crime, has said, If ever there was a candidate for the
presidency whom the mob wanted elected, it was Richard Nixon. Since
the earliest days of his political career in California, Nixon had
seemed to walk hand in hand with the Mafia, functioning with the
family bosses in an apparent symbiotic relationship that was to last
right down to his resignation from the presidency in 1974, and perhaps
even beyond. (28:397)
David Scheim presents an extensive, well-documented discussion on
Nixon and the Mafia in chapter 22 of his book THE MAFIA KILLED
PRESIDENT KENNEDY.
A study of the Nixon presidency reveals a consistent pattern of
serious corruption and suspicious deaths, as several authors have
discussed in detail. Former Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill said the
following:
. . . I've been around politics for a long time, and I can say with
assurance that what went on during the Nixon presidency was unlike
anything I had ever seen, or even heard of. We're talking about
blackmail and corruption in the highest office in the land. (24:280)
O'Neill went on to relate that several wealthy businessmen who had
previously supported Democratic presidential candidates were suddenly
giving money to Nixon because the Nixon administration was using the
IRS and other agencies to blackmail them into donating (24:281-286).
The businessmen were first threatened with all sorts of investigations
and inspections; then, they were led to understand that if they would
donate to the Nixon campaign, they wouldn't have anything to worry
about.
Harrison Livingstone writes,
I feel that the real reason Nixon was pursued over the Watergate break-
ins was that there were a series of murders connected with Richard
Nixon's presidency.
Not only was the liberal-centrist leadership that represented the
majority of Americans crippled, but numerous others--witnesses,
journalists, lawyers, bureaucrats, and ordinary people were
liquidated. Watergate itself saw a number of deaths, including an
entire planeload of people in a crash onto the streets of Chicago
under very strange circumstances. (10:421)
Those who would summarily dismiss Livingstone's claims here (and he is
by no means alone in making them) would do well to examine chapter 19
of his book HIGH TREASON 2. Therein he discusses some of the murders
reportedly connected with Nixon's presidency.
The plane crash victims to whom Livingstone refers were on Flight 553.
The plane crashed under very suspicious circumstances on December 8,
1972, a few months after CIA agent E. Howard Hunt and other
intelligence operatives had broken into the Democratic Party's
campaign headquarters at the Watergate Hotel. Among the aircraft's
passengers were Hunt's wife, Dorothy, and CBS correspondent Michelle
Clark. According to Watergate witness and Hunt associate James McCord,
by the time Mrs. Hunt died in the crash, she was upset at having to
bribe witnesses and defendants, and wanted out. It was rumored at the
time that she was about to leave Hunt and perhaps even turn on him.
Reportedly, when Dorothy Hunt boarded the flight, she was carrying
documents that were very damaging to her husband and to the Nixon
presidency. (After the crash, columnist Jack Anderson said the
documents were returned to Hunt in August 1972.) Law enforcement
officials were quoted as saying that ten thousand dollars was found in
Mrs. Hunt's purse. Other reports put the figure at well past $100,000.
Hunt claimed his wife was taking the money to her cousin to invest.
Charles Colson, Nixon's counsel, later told TIME magazine, "I think
they killed Dorothy Hunt."
Michelle Clark was actively pursuing an investigation into the
Watergate scandal. She reportedly had learned from inside sources that
the Hunts were considering blowing the whistle on the Nixon White
House. If so, Clark's sources were on target. In late 1972 Hunt began
to demand payoffs from the Nixon White House, and in early 1973 he
blackmailed Nixon for one million dollars.
One of the most disturbing things about Flight 553 is that the plane
appears to have been sabotaged. Not only that, but somehow swarms of
FBI agents (at least 50) just happened to be near the crash site well
BEFORE the plane went down. In fact, the FBI agents reportedly were in
the crash area before the firemen arrived, even though the fire
department had received an emergency call within one minute of the
crash.
The day after the crash, Nixon appointed Egil Krogh Undersecretary of
Transportation. Krogh had previously headed up Nixon's "plumber's"
unit, which employed E. Howard Hunt and was involved in the Watergate
break-in. Krogh himself later went to prison for burglarizing a
psychiatrist's offices. As Undersecretary of Transportation, Krogh was
in a position to supervise the two government agencies responsible for
investigating the crash of Flight 553, the National Transportation
Safety Board (NTSB) and the Federal Aviation Agency (FAA), and
witnesses later testified that he played a "leading role" in at least
one attempt to intimidate members of the NTSB when it was
investigating the crash.
Eleven days after Flight 553 went down, Nixon named Alexander
Butterfield head of the FAA. Butterfield had worked for the CIA and
was the White House aide in charge of secretly taping presidential
conversations and phone calls. Livingstone presents a thorough
analysis of the case of Flight 553 in chapter 20 of HIGH TREASON 2.
It is now known that Nixon delayed the withdrawal from Vietnam for
political reasons, causing the needless deaths of thousands of
American troops. In a speech in the U.S. House of Representatives on
May 26, 1994, Congressman Pete Stark observed,
Mr. Speaker, I speak today about the murderous actions of the late
former President Richard Nixon and his national security advisor Henry
Kissinger in the early 1970's.
The Nixon administration, elected with a pledge of having a secret
plan to end the Vietnam war, took credit in the 1972 elections for the
withdrawal from Vietnam and the wind down of the war. The just-
published HALDEMAN DIARIES, however, reveal that the withdrawal was
delayed for raw, gross political reasons--to look better in the 1972
elections. . . .
Each day that we delayed our withdrawal, American servicemen died
needlessly. Kissinger advised against early withdrawal for election
reasons in December of 1970. According to Department of Defense
statistics, 2,412 men died in 1971, another 767 in 1972, and 65 more
in 1973. In total, 3,244 men died while the withdrawal was delayed for
the purposes of ensuring the re-election of Richard Nixon and the
sinecure of Henry Kissinger.
One hundred and forty slabs of stone carry the names of 58,191 dead
servicemen at the Vietnam Memorial. If Nixon and Kissinger had
considered the lives of their fellow Americans instead of their own
political victories, 7 stones would not have been needed. The next
time you visit the Wall, think about it--1 out of every 20 names would
not be there if we had pulled out quickly and decisively when
Kissinger first discussed it. One out of every 20 names is there to
help win an election for CREEP. The blood of 3,244 servicemen is an
enormous burden on the soul to take to your grave. (88:E1116-1117)
What about Nixon and the assassination? For one thing, there is some
evidence linking him to Jack Ruby. It was reported in a 1947 FBI
document that Jack Ruby had performed "information functions for the
staff of Congressman Richard Nixon" (5:269). Nixon flew to Dallas on
November 20, 1963, two days before the assassination. Asked later why
he had come, he said he was there to attend a board meeting of the
Pepsi-Cola Company. Yet, a subsequent review of Pepsi-Cola corporate
files revealed there was no record of any Pepsi-Cola board meetings in
Dallas in 1963 (5:270).
Nixon left Dallas on the morning of the assassination. However, during
an FBI interview in early 1964, he said the only time he had been in
Dallas in 1963 was two days before Kennedy was killed (16:84; 5:271).
It has been said that Nixon must have been the only adult at the time
who could not remember where he was on November 22, 1963. Why did
Nixon tell the FBI he had not been in Dallas on the day of the murder?
What exactly was he doing there from November 20 till the morning of
the assassination?
According to none other than Nixon's chief of staff, H. R. Haldeman,
Nixon attempted to force the CIA to assist in thwarting investigations
into Watergate by threatening to expose the CIA's role in the Kennedy
assassination (43:110-111; 16:329-330; 28:402-404; cf. 5:272-273;
16:87-92). In connection with this, it is worth mentioning again that
E. Howard Hunt of the CIA was able to blackmail Nixon for a million
dollars. What did Hunt know?
Several of the people who were hired or considered for employment by
the Nixon White House during Watergate had been connected with the
Warren Commission (3:273-274; 28:410-414). Was this just a
coincidence? In addition, some of the operatives and Cuban exiles who
were involved in the Bay of Pigs operation later turned up in the
Watergate affair (16:80-82; 28:402-410).
Final Thoughts
In my opinion, the principal individuals and forces behind the
assassination were fanatical right-wing elements in the CIA and in the
military, J. Edgar Hoover, oil barron Hunt, and possibly Lyndon
Johnson. I believe CIA and Mafia operatives, to include disaffected
anti-Castro Cubans, constituted the largest part of the on-the-ground,
operational arm of the plot. I believe that members of the Dallas law
enforcement community were involved in the Dallas end of the cover-up,
and that some of them knowingly allowed Jack Ruby to murder Oswald. I
believe that FBI agents, along with J. Edgar Hoover, played a major
role in most aspects of the cover-up.
In my view, the main reasons President Kennedy was killed were (1) he
refused to further escalate American involvement in Vietnam, (2) he
was moving to end the Cold War, and (3) his monetary reforms posed a
serious threat to certain international bankers. Just below these
reasons, I would list J. Edgar Hoover's hatred of JFK and his desire
to remain director of the FBI, the Mafia's outrage over the Kennedy
war on organized crime, Kennedy's reported intent to drastically
reorganize or dismantle the CIA, and possibly LBJ's well-known all-
consuming lust for power.
I believe Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King were killed by the
same forces that murdered President Kennedy. I believe RFK and Dr.
King were targeted because they had begun to pose a serious threat to
the continuation of the Vietnam War. Their deaths, like President
Kennedy's, have yet to be adequately investigated and give every
indication of having been the result of a conspiracy. I believe the
plotters decided they had to act against Robert Kennedy once it became
apparent that he was on his way to becoming the next President of the
United States. RFK was murdered shortly after he convincingly won the
all-important California primary.
----------------------------------------------------------------
About the Author: Michael T. Griffith is a two-time graduate of the
Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California, and the author of
four books on Mormonism and ancient texts. His articles on the
assassination have appeared in DATELINE: DALLAS, in DALLAS '63, in THE
ASSASSINATION CHRONICLES, and in the JFK-DEEP POLITICS QUARTERLY. He
is also the author of the book COMPELLING EVIDENCE: A NEW LOOK AT THE
ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT KENNEDY (Grand Prairie, TX: JFK-Lancer
Productions and Publications, 1996).
Bibliography
4. Mark Lane, RUSH TO JUDGMENT, Thunder's Mouth Press Edition, New
York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1992.
5. Jim Marrs, CROSSFIRE: THE PLOT THAT KILLED KENNEDY, New York:
Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1989.
9. James DiEugenio, DESTINY BETRAYED: JFK, CUBA, AND THE GARRISON
CASE, New York: Sheridan Square Press, Inc., 1992.
10. Harrison Edward Livingstone, HIGH TREASON 2, New York: Carroll &
Graf Publishers, 1992.
11. Dick Russell, THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH, New York: Carroll & Graf
Publishers, 1992.
12. G. Robert Blakey and Richard Billings, FATAL HOUR: THE
ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT KENNEDY BY ORGANIZED CRIME, Berkley Books
Edition, New York: Berkley Books, 1992. Although Blakey and Billings
do posit a conspiracy in the assassination, they also provide a lot of
misinformation, and they support a number of the WC's claims.
14. Anthony Summers, CONSPIRACY: THE DEFINITIVE BOOK ON THE JFK
ASSASSINATION, Updated and Expanded Edition, New York: Paragon House,
1989. An extensive revision of the book was recently published under
the title NOT IN YOUR LIFETIME.
15. Matthew Smith, JFK: THE SECOND PLOT, Edinburgh, England:
Mainstream Publishing Ltd, 1992.
16. Alan J. Weberman and Michael Canfield. COUP D' ETAT IN AMERICA:
THE CIA AND THE ASSASSINATION OF JOHN F. KENNEDY, Revised Edition, San
Francisco, California: Quick American Archives, 1992.
19. Jim Garrison, ON THE TRAIL OF THE ASSASSINS, Warner Books Edition,
New York: Warner Books, Inc., 1988.
21. Craig Zirbel, THE TEXAS CONNECTION, New York: Warner Books, 1992.
24. Tip O'Neill, with William Novak, MAN OF THE HOUSE: THE LIFE AND
POLITICAL MEMOIRS OF SPEAKER TIP O'NEILL, New York: St.Martin's Press,
1987.
25. David S. Scheim, THE MAFIA KILLED PRESIDENT KENNEDY, London,
England: Virgin Publishing Ltd, 1992. First published under the title
CONTRACT ON AMERICA: THE MAFIA MURDER OF PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY,
New York: Shapolsky Publishers, 1988. The retitled 1992 edition is a
revised and updated version of the 1988 original.
28. John Davis, MAFIA KINGFISH: CARLOS MARCELLO AND THE ASSASSINATION
OF JOHN F. KENNEDY, Signet Edition, New York: Signet, 1989.
36. Victor Marchetti and John D. Marks, THE CIA AND THE CULT OF
INTELLIGENCE, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974.
37. Douglas Valentine, THE PHOENIX PROGRAM, New York: Avon Books,
1990. A disturbing history of a CIA covert action program in which
thousands of Vietnamese civilians were killed, tortured, and
imprisoned, all without even the semblance of due process of law.
38. Brian Freemantle, CIA, New York: Stein and Day, 1983.
39. Jonathan Vankin, CONSPIRACIES, COVER-UPS AND CRIMES, New York:
Dell Publishing, 1992.
40. Leslie Cockburn, OUT OF CONTROL, London: Bloomsbury Publishing
LTD, 1987.
42. John M. Newman, JFK AND VIETNAM: DECEPTION, INTRIGUE, AND THE
STRUGGLE FOR POWER, New York: Warner Books, 1992.
43. Mark Lane, PLAUSIBLE DENIAL: WAS THE CIA INVOLVED IN THE
ASSASSINATION OF JFK, New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1991.
56. Mark North, ACT OF TREASON: THE ROLE OF J. EDGAR HOOVER IN THE
ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT KENNEDY, New York: Carroll & Graf, 1991.
61. Gaeton Fonzi, THE LAST INVESTIGATION, New York: Thunder's Mouth
Press, 1993.
63. Harrison Edward Livingstone, KILLING THE TRUTH: DECEIT AND
DECEPTION IN THE JFK CASE, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1993.
64. Anthony Summers, OFFICIAL AND CONFIDENTIAL: THE SECRET LIFE OF J.
EDGAR HOOVER, London: Victor Gollancz, 1993.
65. Linda Hunt, SECRET AGENDA: THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT, NAZI
SCIENTISTS, AND PROJECT PAPERCLIP, 1945-1990, New York: St. Martin's
Press, 1991.
70. Herbert S. Parmet, JFK: THE PRESIDENCY OF JOHN F. KENNEDY, New
York: Penguin Books, 1984.
71. Henry Hurt, REASONABLE DOUBT: AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE
ASSASSINATION OF JOHN F. KENNEDY, New York: Holt, Rinehart, and
Winston, 1985.
77. Paul Eddy, Hugo Sabogal, and Sara Walden, THE COCAINE WARS, New
York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1988.
78. John Prados, PRESIDENTS' SECRET WARS: CIA AND PENTAGON COVERT
OPERATIONS SINCE WORLD WAR II, New York: William Morrow and Company,
Inc., 1986.
79. Alfred McCoy, with Cathleen Read and Leonard Adams, THE POLITICS
OF HERION IN SOUTHEAST ASIA, New York: Harper & Row, 1972.
87. Richard Trask, PICTURES OF THE PAIN: PHOTOGRAPHY AND THE
ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT KENNEDY, Danvers, Massachusetts: Yeoman
Press, 1994.
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http://karws.gso.uri.edu/JFK/the_critics/griffith/Suspects.html
Coondog
> coup, against his express wishes, he was outraged.
What a large pile of crap. For time and space let us look at just
those pertaining to Vietnam that my advanced search has turned up.
There is ample evidence that the coup was approved by JFK and no one
with even small knowledge disputes this. This is another case of the
CIA being blamed for assisting in carrying out their boss’s policy.
>
> Fonzi has also written that a close friend of CIA hitman David Sanches
> Morales, Ruben Carbajal, told him that Morales once indicated to a
> mutual associate, in Carbajal's presence, that he had been involved in
> the assassination. Not only was Morales a CIA hitman, but he was
> involved with the infamous Phoenix Program inVietnam.
A lot of people claim to have been in “black ops” in Vietnam. A lot
of these have never seen Vietnam. Do we have some evidence here?
> The character of
> the shady political manipulator, Colonel Hillindale, in the famous
> novel THE UGLY AMERICAN, was based on Lansdale's activities in the
> Philippines in the early 1950s, where his operations reportedly
> included torture and political assassination (37:25).
Well he must have been good at it because his PI policy is viewed as a
rare success. A shame he couldn’t do it in SVN.
InVietnam,
> during the Eisenhower administration, Lansdale managed several
> ruthless internal security programs for SouthVietnam'scorrupt and
> oppressive dictator, Ngo Dinh Diem.
Yes, I believe this to be true. It is a mean old world out there.
Did you get the name of the communist that headed up the communist
program of assassinations of village chiefs and school teachers?
> These programs later developed
> into the CIA's infamous Phoenix program, which was responsible for the
> execution of over 20,000 Vietnamese and for the death and torture of
> countless civilians (37; 43:79-80; 7:40).
Be advised, the communist tax collector didn’t travel alone. He went
with armed escort and they didn’t give up easily. Over 80% of those
killed were killed in firefights, not executions.
> Was Lansdale involved in the plot to kill JFK? Lansdale was surely
> angry at Kennedy for refusing to introduce U.S. combat troops intoVietnamand for balking at further escalation of the > conflict.
Kennedy had combat troops in SVN unless you think the 400 Special
Force troops he sent there went to play tennis and poor ole Prouty is
a flaming nut.
> about as bad as his relations were with the CIA. Some senior military
> officials attempted to give JFK a misleading, inaccurate picture of
> the true state of affairs inVietnam, as John Newman discusses in his
> highly acclaimed book JFK ANDVIETNAM.
I don’t think most historians think Newman’s book is all that highly
acclaimed. The Camelot shiners are another case. True, JFK was
poorly served by the military high command. But since JFK bought
Taylor out of retirement and Taylor put Harkins in the Vietnam command
you have to qualify this.
> Each day that we delayed our withdrawal, American servicemen died
> needlessly. Kissinger advised against early withdrawal for election
> reasons in December of 1970. According to Department of Defense
> statistics, 2,412 men died in 1971, another 767 in 1972, and 65 more
> in 1973. In total, 3,244 men died while the withdrawal was delayed for
> the purposes of ensuring the re-election of Richard Nixon and the
> sinecure of Henry Kissinger.
>
> One hundred and forty slabs of stone carry the names of 58,191 dead
> servicemen at theVietnamMemorial. If Nixon and Kissinger had
> considered the lives of their fellow Americans instead of their own
> political victories, 7 stones would not have been needed. The next
> time you visit the Wall, think about it--1 out of every 20 names would
> not be there if we had pulled out quickly and decisively when
>
> Kissinger first discussed it. One out of every 20 names is there to
> help win an election for CREEP. The blood of 3,244 servicemen is an
> enormous burden on the soul to take to your grave. (88:E1116-1117)
What the hell are you talking about? Over 20,000 of the names on the
wall come under the Nixon term.
>
> In my view, the main reasons President Kennedy was killed were (1) he
> refused to further escalate American involvement inVietnam,
This simply isn’t true. I hope Mikey can get his money back for all
those degrees.
Bill Clarke
Turban Joe Balasootoe
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
If Hoover forced LBJ on the ticket thru blackmail, "We've
Got A Bigger Problem Now" and the two probable
culprits. RFK remains a massive obstacle to any
CT, though. If he suspected anything, why he
busted his way into the contest for POTUS?
Mafia
CIA
others are biggie-phail. Lots of folk hate every
POTUS---they usually don't resort to murder.