The Event

One of the most impacting moments of my life occurred during my 8^th grade shop class on November 22, 1963.  It was just another fall Friday in the suburbs of Tacoma, Washington, when my classmates and I were asked to go to the school cafeteria. We were told that President John F. Kennedy had been shot in Dallas.  During the weekend that followed I watched Walter Cronkite anchor CBS continuous coverage of assassination related events.  On Sunday, November 24, I watched Jack Ruby shoot Lee Harvey Oswald on live TV.  It was an incredible series of events.  It was like watching a movie except it was real life.

Eventually, the immediate drama associated with the assassination ended.  However, I was always interested in reading about events related to the Kennedy assassination.  I read about the Warren Commission report that determined that Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone gunmen and he was solely responsible for the shots that were fired on Kennedy's motorcade in Dallas.  I read about the police findings that determined that Jack Ruby was solely responsible for the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald.  I never doubted that United States government officials would ever tell the public anything but the truth.  I never doubted that the newspaper reports I was reading were based on facts. 

My father was a career Army officer serving our country on a hardship tour in Saudi Arabia during the Kennedy assassination.  My mother, sister, brother and I were living in a rented house in my mother's home town, and my birth place, while he was overseas.  My father was an honorable Army man that had served in Europe during World War II, served hardship tours before I was born, taken his wife and newborn first child (me) to Germany for three years in the early 1950s and shipped his entire family including my sister and I to Taiwan for two years during the mid 1950s.  I thought everyone in government was honorable, honest and dedicated to meeting their responsibilities like my father.  After my father retired from active duty, our family eventually moved to the Washington, DC area and my Dad become a civilian employee at the Pentagon.  Was there any reason for me to think that our leaders weren't doing what was best for our nation? 

During the height of the Viet Nam War protest period I was in college at Georgia Tech studying Aerospace Engineering.  I was on a mission to graduate on time with good grades and hopefully get a job in the aerospace industry.  I never got involved in any of the antiwar protest activities because I was too busy studying.  Luckily I drew number 310 in the first draft lottery that was held during my sophomore year at Georgia Tech and I never got drafted into the military.  I remember the December night in 1969 when some guys in my dorm put signs with low lottery numbers on their doors.  They were gone after the quarter ended and we never saw them again.  I keep moving forward with my studies.  I was on my own mission.  I had my own goals to achieve.   Engineering school is a very rigorous and time consuming course of study even for people that think they are pretty smart.  I had to stay focused.  And I trusted our government. 

Developing a Broader Perspective

After college I turned my attention to the development of career.  I began as a "rocket engineer" during my first two years after school and have my name on a NASA report to prove it.  As I grew older I changed my career path a couple of times, got married, raised a family with my wife, and dealt with negative events that impact all of us at various points during our lives.  Throughout my adult life I have tried to keep learning about the world around us.  One of the things that I discovered during my early adult years is that I am pretty good at learning new things and synthesizing information from a variety of sources.  I discovered that I wasn't really destined to be an engineer in the truest sense of the word.  I was destined to use my analytical skills to solve problems that were interesting to me and have value to others.  My wife accuses me of thinking like an engineer from time to time.  The fact is that I synthesize and analyze information virtually all of the time.  The difference now is that I have gained 50 years of life experience since the Kennedy assassination in 1963.  I have dramatically improved my ability to create context while analyzing new information.  Time has improved my overall ability to learn and apply my learning.

Over the years I watched and listened as people questioned whether Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone assassin of President Kennedy.  I have seen a number of TV documentaries on the subject.  I have seen Oliver Stone's film JFK.  I read about possible links between Jack Ruby and organized crime.  I learned about concerns people have about a potential conspiracy to murder Dr. Martin Luther King.  Did Sirhan Sirhan actually murder Bobby Kennedy or did others fire the deadly bullet?  During most of my adult life I didn't have a lot of time to think about those events.  I had work to do. Career and family obligations created a heavy workload.  But I always tried to spend some time learning new things.

I know that at this stage of my life that I am only interested in determining was is true and what is not.  Was John F. Kennedy killed in a conspiracy as some have alleged?  If it was a conspiracy why haven't we done everything possible to root out the conspirators?  If we don't have a good understand of the truth about our current day and our past we will have an extremely difficult time planning for our future.

New Information

Several weeks after I wrote my original article Spin, Lies, Conspiracy and Truth, I was wandering through a book store and happened upon a book about JFK that I had never seen before.  I bought JFK and the UNSPEAKABLE, Why He Died and Why It Matters by James W. Douglas.  The hardcover version of the book was copyrighted in 2008.  The paperback version of the book that I read was updated with new information in 2010 and published in October.  Douglas' book is one of the most up to date analysis of the JFK assassination available.  Douglas develops the entire picture of JFK's presidency and analyzes his internal relationships with the " US national security state" including the US Department of State, Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Department of Defense, the FBI, the CIA, the National Security Council, White House staffers and the corporate elements of the military-industrial complex during the Cold War.  In addition Douglas provides in-depth historical background of Castro's Cuban revolution, the Bay of Pigs fiasco, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the early history of US involvement in Viet Nam and Laos, the early 1960's issues with the USSR over divided Berlin, US involvement in Indonesia and US interference in the affairs of sovereign nations around the world.

As the 50^th anniversary of the JFK assassination approaches I decided that I should learn more about JFK and the assassination.  During the past few weeks I have read three books about different aspects of JFK's life and the assassination.  Seymour M. Hersh's 1997 book, The Dark Side of Camelot, provides incredible insight into JFK's personal life and his relationships with his father, Joseph P. Kennedy (JPK), and his US Attorney General brother, Robert F. Kennedy (RFK), as well his difficulties in dealing with the major issues during his time in office.  I also read Peter Janney's 2013 book, Mary's Mosaic - The CIA Conspiracy to Murder John F. Kennedy, Mary Pinchot Meyer, and Their Vision for World Peace.  Mary's Mosaic addresses the JFK era from the perspective of Mary Pinchot Meyer, a mature women of JFK's generation and one of JFK's lovers during the last couple of years of his life.  Meyer was murdered in 1964 and Janney makes an effective case that she was murdered by the CIA to prevent her from giving the world information she had that was relevant to the JFK assassination investigation.  I also read Mark Shaw's 2013 book, The Poison Patriarch - How the Betrayals of Joseph P. Kennedy Caused the Assassination of JFK.  Most of Shaw's book is focused on Jack Ruby's attorney, Melvin Belli, and his relationship with organized crime.  Shaw expresses his belief at the end of the book that Joseph P. Kennedy set up JFK for disaster through his own lifestyle and the example he set for JFK, his long term relationships with organized crime and by forcing JFK to appoint Robert Kennedy as Attorney General. All of these books present interesting perspectives on JFK's life and his assassination and the authors did unique research to make their points.

As I read the Douglass book I realized I was learning much of the information presented by Douglas for the first time.  I also realized that I did not make a sufficient effort earlier in my life to get a good understanding of what actually happened during the post World War II period in my own country, particularly the Kennedy years.  This is a long book that is extremely detailed and at times difficult to read.  However, it is imperative that one read the entire book, including the 99 or so pages of author's notes after the conclusion of the main text.  The information contained in the book is worth the effort to read and absorb it.  Some of the most important information in the book is in the notes!  Mary's Mosaic and The Dark Side of Camelot are also long books that include an incredible amount of detail.  The Poison Patriarch is a much easier and shorter read than the other three books.

Almost a year after the 50th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination I was walking through a book store and found another book on the Kennedy assassination, A Farewell to Justice - Jim Garrison, JFK's Assassination and The Case That Should Have Changed History by Joan Mellen.  Mellen's book was originally published in 2005 and was updated with new content in 2013.  Mellen focuses primarily on former New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison's highly controversial investigation of the Kennedy assassination and her own research, primarily on the Louisiana aspects of the assassination story.  Mellen makes an overwhelming case that Garrison was on the right track in his investigation.  Lee Harvey Oswald was definitely a CIA operative.  There was a CIA led conspiracy to assassinate President Kennedy.  Unfortunately, Garrison was unable to properly complete his investigation due to interference by the CIA and FBI and others that had a vested interest in Garrison's failure.  Mellen has effectively pursued unfinished aspects of Garrison's investigation and presents very detailed facts fully supporting Garrison's theory.  There is so much relevant information in A Farewell to Justice that it is impossible to effectively summarize the book in a few words.  However, there are some specific points that the author makes that I think are very important.  Robert F. Kennedy knew or knew of Lee Harvey Oswald and his planned role in the Kennedy's planned assassination of Fidel Castro.  The reason the Kennedy family never actively pursued finding out the truth about the assassination is that it would have revealed that JFK and RFK were actively involved in plans to assassinate Castro.  Some of the most intriguing aspects of the book are discussions about US government employees or agents that out right lied in court proceedings.  How does anyone find the truth when government backed people can lie with impunity if it serves the government's purpose? 

After reading Mellen's book I decided to broaden my perspective on the assassination and picked up two more books at a local book store.  Crime of the Century - The Kennedy Assassination from a Historian's Perspective by Michael L. Kurtz was originally published in 1982.  It was updated in 1993 and the third edition was published in 2013. Kurtz spends most of his energy analyzing the details of the assassination of the Warren Report and the US House of Representatives Report of the Select Committee on Assassinations in an attempt to determine if there is sufficient evidence to prove the government's thesis that Lee Harvey Oswald was the sole assassin and there was no conspiracy.  Kurtz goes through the evidence, as documented by the Warren Commission, in detail including a frame by frame analysis of the Zapruder Film and the details of the autopsy.  Kurtz makes an extremely convincing argument that at least four shots were fired in Dealey Plaza from at least two locations.  Kurtz also reaffirms the fact that the Warren Commission ignored important evidence in its effort to prove Lee Harvey Oswald was the sole assassin.  The single-bullet theory was a creation of Arlen Spector that was needed for the Warren Commission to arrive at its predetermined conclusion and never had any basis in fact.  The government has never conducted an investigation that was determined to find out the complete truth of what happened in Dallas.  Kurtz outlines possible conspiracy scenarios and expresses his opinion that Fidel Castro, organized crime and rogue elements of the CIA combined to pull off the assassination.

I also read James T. Tague's book, LBJ and the Kennedy Killing, which was published in 2013.  Tague was an eyewitness to the assassination.  He tells the story of what he saw in Dealey Plaza after being hung up in traffic on his way to a lunch date and his efforts to provide his evidence the local police and the Warren Commission.  He explains the details of the missed shot that hit a street curb near him.  Tague was a car salesman whose life became intertwined with the Kennedy assassination.  In this book he explains what he has learned from his own personal experiences and discussions with other investigators and individuals associated with the assassination.  LBJ and the Kennedy Killing is the culmination of all of his knowledge and experiences.  Unfortunately, Mr. Tague died in early 2014, not long after his book was released.  In the Summary of his book Tague states "Lyndon Johnson and his cronies were behind the assassination of John F. Kennedy and that J. Edgar Hoover was in charge of the cover-up".  Unfortunately, much of what Tague writes about Lyndon Johnson and his cronies is hearsay.  That doesn't make the information wrong.  There is a lot of assassination conspiracy smoke rising from Texas.  Was there a major fire?

After reading Tague's book I decided to read LBJ The Mastermind of the JFK Assassination by Phillip E. Nelson to get another perspective on LBJ's role in the assassination and the cover-up.  One of the great things about Nelson's book is that he incorporates relevant information from other researchers in his book along with his own research.  Nelson book is an effective integration of the work of many researchers and gives a serious student of the assassination a path to investigate all aspects of the people and the events of the assassination period.  Nelson explains how Lyndon Johnson evolved as a person and as a politician in his growth from a country boy in Texas to Senate Majority Leader, Vice President and then President of the United States of America after JFK's assassination.  Nelson states the assassination " could not have happened without bringing Lyndon Johnson and J. Edgar Hoover into the plot before the fact, if they were not themselves the master planners."  Nelson believes that Johnson was the overall architect of the assassination, a crucial element in his life long objective to become President of the United States.  When one looks back at the Congressional investigations that implicated Johnson in illegal activity that were in progress at the time that JFK was assassinated there is no doubt that Johnson was either the luckiest man in the world in terms of the timing of events that saved him from prosecution or he orchestrated the assassination to save himself as well as and put him in the White House.  It appears that Lyndon Johnson had major issues with mental illness his entire life.  As he aged his mental illness got worse.  Nelson makes the case that when Johnson "already was or was rapidly becoming psychotic" when he was President.  After reading Nelson's book I don't believe I need to read any more about JFK's assassination until the remaining government (CIA, FBI and others) documents and evidence and documents held by the Kennedy family are released to researchers.

Analysis

There is so much detailed information in the nine books I have read on this topic that is not possible to summarize everything effectively in a short article.  Therefore, I will present my analysis of the information without the detailed context that is provided in the books.  I urge everyone to read these books and many others that are referenced in the bibliography's of each book so you can put these points in context.

1. The Kennedy family had substantial business and personal relationships with members of organized crime beginning with JPK.  JPK may or may not have been a bootlegger or rum-runner in partnership with organized crime during Prohibition.  There appears to be substantial evidence that JPK had substantial relationships with organized crime during this period.  But there is no doubt that JPK had substantial business and personal relationship with members of organized crime related to his liquor distribution business after Prohibition ended.  The Kennedy family expanded their relationship with organized crime over the years including organized crime's support in helping JFK win the Democratic nomination in 1960.  The Kennedy administration recruited members of organized crime to support their efforts to assassinate Fidel Castro.  At the same time RFK substantially increased the effort of the Justice Department to prosecute certain members of organized crime.  It is also clear that elements of the CIA and FBI had extensive working relationships with organized crime members for many years.  The bottom line is that there is no simple analysis of the relationship between the Kennedys, organized crime, the CIA and the FBI.  It is clear that elements of organized crime had clear motivation to kill JFK in its efforts to strike back and neutralize RFK. JFK was also compromised in his relationships with the CIA and FBI because of his extreme sexual promiscuity and drug use, which included pain killers and other drugs.  Several of the books mention his relationship with Dr. Max Jacobson, a New York physician that provided shots containing methamphetamines to JFK and many famous show business people and celebrities in the '50s and '60s. In Dr. Feelgood - The Shocking Story of the Doctor Who May Have Changed History by Treating and Drugging JFK, Marilyn, Elvis, and Other Prominent Figures by Richard A Lertzman and William J. Birnes, the extent of JFK's abuse of methamphetamines is fully exposed and documented.  It is clear that JFK was addicted to methamphetamines the entire time he was president.  It is also clear that he overdosed at least once.  JFK was a drug addict under our current definition of the term. From a national security perspective JFK was compromised by his drug addiction. 

2.  At the end of the Eisenhower administration the CIA was out of control in terms of the covert actions it was taking in many places around the world.  The CIA was making its own foreign policy and executing it.  The CIA had infiltrated many government departments and could be considered a shadow government.  The CIA continued to act in this matter during the Kennedy administration.  There were some elements within the CIA that despised President Kennedy and his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy.

3. When JFK served in the Senate and was elected President he was a cold warrior and fully supported the US national security state that developed in the aftermath of World War II.  The failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba started JFK's turn away from the US national security state to some degree. It is also clear that JFK ignored many of the recommendations of senior DoD executives, the Military and the CIA.  JFK began taking an independent view of a path toward peaceful coexistence with foreign states that had fundamentally different government and social structures from the US.  The resolution of the Cuban missile crisis was critical turning point that convinced JFK that there was a better way forward then engaging the USSR in a nuclear war. However, at the same time he advocated and supported assassination of leaders of some other nations.  The Kennedys back channel relationship with Nikita Khrushchev completely bypassed all normal US government protocol.

4. JFK appears to have been committed to ending the US involvement in the Vietnam War and eliminating US military presence in Vietnam early in his second term as President, possibly as early as 1965.  JFK's idea to withdraw US forces from Vietnam was fought by military leaders, the CIA and other US national security state power players in his administration.  However, the US military build-up was in progress and the President was unwilling to attempt or unable to stop it.  JFK knew that the voters would likely view him as weak on communism if he pulled the US out of Vietnam.  It was more important for JFK to win his reelection in 1964 than to force the issue and stop the build-up of military forces in Vietnam.  JFK evolved into an enemy of the military industrial complex.

5. JFK's changing perspective regarding the US developing relationships with communist nations was completely out-of-sync with the majority of the leaders of the US national security state.  JFK's path towards peace and the end of the Cold War, in particular the development of his personal relationship with Nikita Khrushchev, leader of the USSR, was viewed as traitorous by many leaders of the US national security state.

6.  JFK was assassinated in Dallas by a covert operations team.  Some combination of members of organized crime and individuals within the CIA were involved in planning and arranging the assassination.  JFK was shot in a crossfire from multiple locations in Dealey Plaza.  It is not clear who fired the shots that killed JFK.  Members of the assassination team may have included Cuban exiles desiring revenge for JFK's inactions during the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba.  JFK suspected or knew he was an assassination target.  The event that occurred in Dallas was not the first attempt of the group to murder JFK.  The cover-up of the assassination plot was supported by virtually all the government organizations involved in the investigation.  As part of the cover-up of JFK's assassination, critical witnesses were murdered or received death threats in the years after the assassination to prevent the public from finding out the truth.  Mary Pinchot Meyer was murdered because she knew too much about what JFK knew was happening around him prior to his death.  She was very tied in to the leadership of the CIA through her longstanding personal relationships with senior CIA officials and their wives.  Her diary was stolen by the CIA as part of the cover-up.  In all of the documentaries that I have seen the primary justification for the official version of the assassination is the Zapruder film.  When analyzed in detail the Zapruder film provides the underlying evidence that shots were fired from multiple locations.

7. There is no doubt that the work of the Warren Commission was compromised by the FBI, CIA and others in government (including Lyndon Johnson) that didn't want a full and complete investigation of the Kennedy assassination.  The Warren Commission had no interest in delivering the truth in its report.  The Warren Commission simply wanted to create a believable story for public consumption.  The Warren Commission report is not credible.  The House Select Committee on Assassinations work was also compromised by the FBI and CIA and they purposely avoided pursuing the truth.

8. Lee Harvey Oswald was a CIA and FBI operative and served as the fall guy or patsy in the assassination plot.  It is highly likely that a double for Lee Harvey Oswald was used by the assassination team to create evidence against him and to falsely establish motive.  Jack Ruby, also a CIA operative with associations with organized crime, was directed to kill Oswald by the assassination team.  Jack Ruby's lawyer, Melvin Belli, purposely conducted Ruby's defense to ensure that Ruby was convicted of murder and stayed in jail.  Belli, although a famous lawyer, was not even qualified to handle a murder defense trial.  Belli was assigned his task by members of organized crime.

9.  The US government has never disclosed all of the relevant information in its possession concerning JFK's assassination even though 50 years have passed since the event.  Some documents that have been released have substantial amounts of redacted information.  Other documents known to exist have never been released.  By failing to fully investigate JFK's assassination to a final conclusion and refusing to order the complete release off all the relevant documentation regarding the assassination, the Congress of the United States and those holding the office of President in recent decades have failed to discharge their responsibilities in this matter.

10.  The cloud that has existed for 50 years over the CIA, FBI, the Department of Defense, the military-industrial complex and the rest of the US national security state continues to exist to this day.  Ultimately, one must question the motivations of the individuals leading all of these organizations during the past 50 years.  Are they tainted in some way by the assassination of JFK and its aftermath?

Many people that have worked diligently to determine the truth about JFK's assassination.  There have been hundreds of books, articles and video documentaries that have attempted to address the entire assassination story or pieces of it.  Some of the world's best covert operations people made the assassination happen and many people have done their best to eliminate evidence and suppress the truth.  It has not been a simple matter to sort fact from fiction and develop the details of the assassination story.  None of the investigators have every particular detail of the assassination plot correct.  But at some level they may all be right.

Conclusion

It is unlikely that we will ever find out with certainty the identity of the individuals that fired the shots in Dealey Plaza in Dallas on November 22, 1963 that killed JFK.  It is not clear that Lee Harvey Oswald fired any of the shots that day.  It is possible that he didn't fire any.  It may be possible that we can determine which persons in the CIA and organized crime were the assassination team leaders.  It is likely that one or more senior members of the US national security team knew about the planned assassination and did nothing to stop it.  We know the names of the most senior people in key positions at the time of JFK's assassination.  It is not appropriate for me to guess if one or more of those individuals was directly involved in the approval of the assassination without direct evidence linking them to the assassination plot.  Some of the authors of the books I have read believe the evidence is strong enough to identify specific people as part of the assassination conspiracy, including Lyndon Johnson.  During the past 50 years most of the senior individuals have died due to the natural end to their lives.  Hopefully, one day we will find out which individual(s) were ultimately responsible for the assassination of JFK.

We need a final resolution of JFK's assassination in order for all US citizens to get a full understanding of the extent our government was operating inappropriately in the aftermath of its victory during WWII, to apply those lessons to our current situation and to use those lessons to help guide the future development of US policy.  The US can't claim to be a superior state to any nation on the planet if it is not willing to fully address its most serious problems and punish those they have violated our laws in the most extreme manner.

The US government needs to release the remaining classified documents held by the FBI, CIA and other agencies now.  There is no reason for any information to be withheld from the public any longer. The US government must allow independent investigators to determine the truth, if it is unwilling to perform this important task itself. 

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