Category: Angleton

Tricky Dicks: Watergate and the CIA

A friend writes: “I’m recommending a fantastic chat between Aaron Good and Jefferson Morley, two of the most cogent and relevant analysts of the Cold War’s domestic political legacy. It’s “about” Watergate, but it covers so much more than that. Take the time and have a deeper understanding of the break-in, the burglars,….

Listen here.

CIA tradecraft & JFK’s assassination: A veteran officer analyzes the death of a president

Rolf-Mowatt-Larssen
Former CIA station chief Rolf-Mowatt-Larssen addressed a conference of JFK researchers in Dallas in November 2019. (Credit: Jefferson Morley)

(This article, titled “Under CIA Eyes,” first appeared in Counterpunch, Vol. 25 published in January 2020.).

“I was struck by the intimacy and the smallness of the whole surroundings,” said retired CIA officer Rolf Mowatt-Larssen after his first visit to Dealey Plaza in November 2019.

Dealey Plaza, a grassy Art Deco entry point to downtown Dallas, is where President John F. Kennedy was shot and killed on November 22, 1963. Hundreds of thousands of people still come from around the world to see the spot where the popular liberal president was ambushed. Many of them have the same reaction to the crime scene: the intimacy, the smallness.

Mowatt-Larssen was not just any tourist.

The Audiobook of The Ghost is on sale

The Ghost

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Oswald letters intercepted by CIA. Where are they?

This is a follow up to my earlier post about how the CIA read Lee Harvey Oswald’s mail before President Kennedy was killed.

I’m trying to figure out if any of the letters that were captured by the Agency’s HTLINGUAL mail surveillance program are publicly available. The final report of the Assassination Records Review Board does not mention any. Does that mean no Oswald letters were intercepted?

If you have any insight/knowledge into this issue, send me an email.

Nothing in the JFK files? Take a look at Birch O’Neal.

Birch O'Neal
Birch O’Neal as a young man. A counterintelligence officer, O’Neal opened the CIA’s Oswald file in November 1959.

As for those 14,000+ JFK files that still contain redactions, some friends tell me, “There’s nothing in there of significance.” This is reassuring. But is it true?

We may find out later this year. President Biden has ordered all JFK files to released by December 15, 2022. I’m looking forward to seeing the unredacted files of those CIA officers most knowledgable about Lee Harvey Oswald before JFK was killed.

For example, Birch Dilworth O’Neal. O’Neal’s 224 page CIA personnel file, released in April 2018, still has scores of redactions.

Why is Birch O’Neal significant?

The CIA Was Reading Lee Harvey Oswald’s Mail

Excerpt from a declassified 1975 Senate memo listing of Americans whose mail was illegally opened by the CIA between 1959 and 1975. Note that the dates are rendered in DAY/MONTH/YEAR format, not MONTH/DAY/Year)

One of the most significant JFK disclosures in recent years is a declassified memo stating that the CIA opened, read, and copied the correspondence of Lee Harvey Oswald, the man who supposedly killed President Kennedy.

This spying was conducted by a super secret office in the Counterintelligence Staff, known as the Special Investigations Group, or CI/SIG.

JFK in Ireland

From the Secret JFK Files, Praise for a CIA Officer Who Monitored Oswald

The secret JFK assassinations files now under review at the White House include the records of senior CIA officers who knew about the supposed assassin Lee Harvey Oswald before President Kennedy was killed on November 22, 1963.

The Public Interest Declassification Board, which advises the president on historical issues, has urged President Biden to insure “maximum disclosure” in JFK files, set for release on October 26. Sabato’s Crystal Ball has examined the uneven enforcement of the JFK Records Act. WhoWhatWhy asks, “Will Biden Follow the Law?”

I want to share with readers, reporters, and Twitter, what is on the public record about these officers, individually and collectively. These files may shed light on the breakdown of presidential security in Dallas on November 22, 1963.

James Angleton

Some Thoughts on the JFK Anniversary

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HariOUxAhY&feature=youtu.be

I’d never heard of Tommy Carrigan, an enthusiastic podcaster with a taste for military and intelligence books, before he invited me on his show to talk about THE GHOST, my biography of James Angleton, chief of CIA counterintelligence.

We spoke on the day after the 57th anniversary of the assassination of the President John F. Kennedy, and naturally the JFK story came up.

Read on here.

CIA tradecraft & JFK’s assassination: ‘I’m not privy to who struck John’

[ICYMI: Part I : A veteran officer analyzes the death of a president / Part II: ‘The very top people.’ / Part III: The making of a patsy ]

The killing of Lee Harvey Oswald is another key to Rolf Mowatt-Larssen’s JFK analysis. He argues that one of the conspirators had to have had access to the Mafia bosses who could induce Jack Ruby to eliminate the accused assassin as a witness.

New JFK documents show CIA had ‘very intensive’ interest in Oswald before JFK assassination: 

I’m re-upping this post from two years ago, because the point needs emphasizing and praise is due.

The Canadian Broadcasting Company–more than any U.S. media organization–recognized the single most important finding to come out in the very incomplete JFK document release  in  2017-18.

The Fifth Estate show on CBC News understood a fact that leading  historians resist: Accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was not a “lone nut.” He was the target of CIA surveillance for four years before Kennedy was killed.

Documents released recently by the U.S. National Archives on President John F. Kennedy’s assassination suggest the CIA was watching Lee Harvey Oswald much more closely than previously thought before the fatal shot was fired in Dallas, an author tells The Fifth Estate.Former Washington Post reporter and author Jefferson Morley told The Fifth Estate the official story was that Oswald came out of nowhere and shot the president on Nov. 22, 1963.  “What the files show is that’s a cover story. It’s not true. High level CIA officials were paying attention to Oswald from 1959 to November 1963,” said Morley, author of several books on the assassination, the CIA and a JFK website.

The highest of those officials was counterintelligence chief James Angleton.

For the full story on the legendary Angleton, go here.

Source: New JFK documents suggest CIA had ‘very intensive’ interest in Oswald before assassination: Fifth Estate | CBC News 

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