Former agent Abraham Bolden thinks so. Here’s what he told Susan Cheever in the current issue of Vanity Fair:
“The biggest problem I ran into with the Secret Service when I was an agent was their constant drinking,” he told me. “When we would get to a place one of the first things they would do was stock up with liquor. They would drink and then we would go to work.” On November 22, Bolden says, “their reflexes were definitely affected by, number one, the loss of sleep and, number two, the fact that [some may have] consumed that amount of alcohol.”
via Could the Secret Service Have Saved J.F.K.? | Vanity Fair.
Judging from the protection received on trips abroad, particulary how Irish authorities responded to 3 separate threats to JFK during hus June 1963 visit – Ireland Knew of Threats to Kennedy in 1963 Trip: http://nyti.ms/1bliKSf – it reflects terribly on the Kennedy detail after knowing of threats in Chicago, Tampa & Miami in November. Especially with allegations of late night partying in Fort Worth on the eve of the assassination.
All you need to remember is that someone with enough Juice to protect Mrs. Kennedy while she was in the Limo going through the Kill Zone,the rest is elementary.If you want to know where the snipers were simply plot the limos path no matter where it goes and simply draw lines showing where NOT to shoot to keep her safe,bingo you have reduced the potential spots exponentially,the rest is elementary.
All of the relevant critical data is already in the public domain,no one has put the story together and managed to get it published,its not like it is a mystery any more,it is simply a debate,and this in itself proves the conspiracy component of the issue.There “can be” no debate when only facts are being dealt with,debate is the seed of discontent spawned by conflicting realitys only one of which can be true.The quickest way to find your own answers is to simply go to the hottest debated points and make a judgement call,use your judgement,trust yourself,and accept the truths you define,not the ones others define for you,no rules no legalitys no complicated mathamatical formulas,simply human common sense.The truth is all available,there is not one iota which has not been noted already somewhere,it has simply never been woven together in totality because of the “debates” we see.
You must ovecome the internal debates catalysed by the methods used to supress the truths from you , you must disenfranchise the “debates” for this is the ONLY thing keeping everyone from accepting the same truth.Substitute common sense for technicalitys or “proof” and you are off to the races.Fail to do so and you will never accept the single truth even if it is gifted to you.
I tend to support the efforts put forth by researcher Bob Harris. On the “JFK History Page”, he focuses on the question “Could Oswald have fired all 3 shots?”. He shows us how there were two head shots, coming so quickly together that Oswald couldn’t have fired them both. Common sense, then, tells me that someone else fired the other head shot. That’s two shooters. That’s a conspiracy. Harris doesn’t delve into how it was planned or who the shooters were. With his research and common sense approach, he doesn’t have to.
Photon tells us that there has been no evidence that any SSA members assigned to the motorcade were drinking the night before. This comes after such evidence was just presented to him by way of Warren Commission testimony.
The only “evidence” was a report that 4 agents in the follow-up car attended the Cellar, where alcohol was NOT served.
Where is the proof that any on the detail during the motorcade had consumed any alcohol the night before?
The “Cellar” wasn’t the only place they went. They went to a place where liquor was provided. How about showing US some proof, Photon? Show us that no SS agents had ANYTHING to drink prior to their motorcade duties? I’ve read many accounts of SS agents having a lot to drink, and no accounts that said SS agents didn’t drink any alcoholic beverages that night.
Eleven agents had drinks at the Press Club around and after its normal closing time.
Afterwards, seven agents went to the Cellar, which was officially dry, but which owner Pat Kirkwood admitted years later served alcohol regularly to cops and others.
Photon’s statement that alcohol was NOT served at the Cellar is misleading. On paper that is true. In fact it is false.
Photon wrote:
In the following exchange, Rankin charged Landis, Hill, Ready,
and Bennett with “violation of the Secret Service regulations”
prohibiting the use of intoxicating liquor of any kind.
Rowley’s response acknowledged the charge.
Mr. RANKIN: Now, will you tell the Commission about what the regulation was?
Mr. ROWLEY: “The use of liquor. Employees are strictly enjoined to refrain from the use of intoxicating liquor during the hours they are officially employed at their post of duty or when they may reasonably expect that they may be called upon to perform an official duty.” The one that applies here–“However, all members of the White House detail and special agents cooperating with them on presidential and similar protective assignments are considered to be subject to call for official duty at any time while in travel status. Therefore, the use of intoxicating liquor of any kind, including beer and wine, by members of the White House detail and special agents cooperating with them or by special agents on similar assignments, while they are in a travel status, is prohibited.”
Mr. RANKIN: Can you tell the Commission how many men were involved in these trips to the Press Club and the Cellar, where these things were done?
Mr. ROWLEY: There were 9 men involved at the Press Club, and there were 10 men involved at the Cellar.
Mr. RANKIN: Now, how many men, of those 10 men, were in the Presidential motorcade on the day of the assassination?
Mr. ROWLEY: Four–four men were in the followup car.
The CHAIRMAN: Who were they?
Mr. RANKIN: Do you know their names?
Mr. ROWLEY: Yes; Landis, Hill, Ready, and Bennett.
Mr. RANKIN: Did you make any investigation to determine whether or not their violation of the Secret Service regulations had anything to do with the assassination of the President?
Mr. ROWLEY: Yes. They performed their duties from the time they departed-in the followup car from Love field until the point of the tragedy in a most satisfactory manner. There was nothing deficient in their actions or their alertness. They went through the heaviest part of downtown Dallas, through the crowds, and performed in an exemplary manner.
On another thread Photon wrote:
On this thread, when provided primary evidence that he denied existed, Photon disappeared faster than a five dollar bill dropped in Times Square.
From A Cruel And Shocking Act by Philip Shenon
Page 375:
The internal (Secret Service) investigation showed that a total of nine agents had been out drinking; three had each downed a scotch, while the others had two or three beers each. The next day, at least four of the agents were assigned to the motorcade, including Clint Hill, the agent who appeared to save Jacqueline Kennedy’s life.
Photon, I think you skimmed over the testimony that scotch and beer was consumed(Rowley)and that a violation had occurred relative to the drinking.
No, maybe, yes. Could the SS have saved JFK? Not with the people they had in place that day. Why did Roberts wave off the agent at love field who normally rode the side of the follow up car. If he admittedly recognized the first shot as a shot why did he not call out in alarm. Why did he call back agent ready when he started to react? Somebody responsible for security for JFK with the authority to called off military support that planned on coming and whose commander was upset over the order (military support that was used in many other motorcades but not in “hostile, “nut country” Dallas). Why was the normal positioning of motorcycle cops altered? Why did Kellerman not feel compelled to jump on JFIK when shots were fired as he was supposed to do? Why was Greer slowed down to 11 mph when the crowds were thinning out and he should have been speeding up. Why did he brake and look back at the first sounds instead of taking off?
Why did Roberts and Ready claim in their reports they were 25′ back doing 25 mph when they were 5′ back going 11 mph?
Yes they might have been able to save JFK if they had done their jobs or been allowed to do so. An agent standing on the rear bumper might have interfered with the back shot. He might have jumped on JFK before the head shot. A motorcycle cop riding along the right front quarter of the limo might have been in the way of any frontal shot(s).
If, if, if. If if’s and but’s were candy and nut’s we’d all have a Merry Christmas. How about why, why, why?
Studying the JFK assassination and its aftermath, and studying events leading up to the assassination, always have been about separating wheat from chaff; incompetence from intention; coincidence from design; veracity from deceit.
No question the Secret Service displayed incompetence. That’s what I’m willing to write off, Photon and timgratz.
Both of you would have everyone here believe the Secret Service was merely incompetent, but you dodge the facts, both those suggesting mere weakness and incompetence and those suggesting a sinister intent. That’s dissembling and misdirection IMO.
It’s not my job or anyone else’s to recount here which of the SS agents were drinking the night before or when the SS destroyed JFK-related records. You can satisfy yourselves by doing your own research.
It’s your job, if you want to display good faith, to tackle the tough facts including the drinking the night before, Emory Roberts’s behavior on November 22, and the suppression and obfuscation of the historical record by James Rowley, among others.
What drinking? Who?Where? Please, let’s have some facts, not innuendo . Who on the security team at Dallas on Nov. 22 was drinking the night before?
If we present these facts for you, Photon, would you accept them as facts, or factoids? You want us to do the research, but I’d want to be sure I wasn’t wasting my time first.
An allegation was made that Secret Service agents on JFK ‘s detail were drinking the night before the assassination. There has been posted no evidence at all that any members of the team handling JFK’s motorcade security on Nov. 22 were drinking the night before. If you cannot produce that evidence, the statement is false. False claims about the SS actions on Nov. 22 have resulted in one libel suit brought by a former agent present at the scene that resulted in a monetary settlement with the agent. This unsubstantiated drinking claim is nothing but slander.
Secret Service Chief James Rowley testified before the Warren Commission. Excerpt:
Mr. RANKIN: Did you learn in connection with the trip when the assassination occurred that certain of the Secret Service agents had been in the press club and what is called the Cellar, at Fort Worth, the night before?
Mr. ROWLEY: Well, that came to my attention through a broadcast that Mr. Pearson made, that the agents were inebriated .the night before at the Fort Worth Press Club. I immediately dispatched Inspector McCann to Fort Worth to investigate the report, and to interview the agents.
Mr. RANKIN: What did you learn?
Mr. ROWLEY: I learned that there were nine agents involved at the Press Club. And I might say this–the agents on duty throughout that day had no opportunity to eat. When they arrived at Fort Worth, they were informed that there was a buffet to be served at the Fort Worth Club. This is what I ascertained in personal interviews. Upon going over there, they learned there was no buffet, and some of them stayed for a drink. Three, I think, had one scotch, and others had two or three beers. They were in and out–from the time they arrived, I would say roughly around 12:30, until the place closed at 2 o’clock.
Now, after that some of them went to the Cellar. This is a place that does not serve alcoholic beverages. They went there primarily, I think, out of curiosity, because this was some kind of a beatnik place where someone gets up and recites, or plays the guitar.
Mr. RANKIN: Did you learn whether or not there were any violations of the regulations of the Secret Service by these men?
Mr. ROWLEY: Yes; there was a violation. At that time there was a section in our manual in effect that said that during—-
Mr. RANKIN: Will you give us first the number?
Mr. ROWLEY: Section 10.
Mr. RANKIN: Is that chapter 1, page 7?
Mr. ROWLEY: Chapter 1, page 7; yes, sir.
Mr. RANKIN: Now, will you tell the Commission about what the regulation was?
Mr. ROWLEY: “The use of liquor. Employees are strictly enjoined to refrain from the use of intoxicating liquor during the hours they are officially employed at their post of duty or when they may reasonably expect that they may be called upon to perform an official duty.”
The one that applies here–“However, all members of the White House detail and special agents cooperating with them on presidential and similar protective assignments are considered to be subject to call for official duty at any time while in travel status. Therefore, the use of intoxicating liquor of any kind, including beer and wine, by members of the White House detail and special agents cooperating with them or by special agents on similar assignments, while they are in a travel status, is prohibited.”
Mr. RANKIN: Can you tell the Commission how many men were involved in these trips to the Press Club and the Cellar, where these things were done?
Mr. ROWLEY: There were 9 men involved at the Press Club, and there were 10 men involved at the Cellar.
Mr. RANKIN: Now, how many men, of those 10 men, were in the Presidential motorcade on the day of the assassination?
Mr. ROWLEY: Four–four men were in the followup car.
The CHAIRMAN: Who were they?
Mr. RANKIN: Do you know their names?
Mr. ROWLEY: Yes; Landis, Hill, Ready, and Bennett.
There is no evidence that the agents involved consumed any alcoholic beverages the evening before .
Well Photon, you might need to take that issue up with Newsweek then.
The Drunken Truth About the JFK Assassination: http://www.newsweek.com/drunken-truth-about-jfk-assassination-391613
In violation of Chapter 1, page 7 of the Secret Service manual, four of the agents that rode in Kennedy’s follow-up car had been out drinking the night before the assassination. Clint Hill was drinking scotch, returned to his room around 3:00 AM, and reported for duty at 8:05. John Ready was drinking beer, returned to his room around 3:30 in the morning, and reported for duty at 7:20. Paul Landis was drinking scotch, left a club around 5:00 AM, and reported for duty at 8:05. Glen Bennett was drinking beer, returned to his room around 3:15 in the morning, and reported for duty at 7:20.
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?absPageId=17261
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?absPageId=140479
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?absPageId=140501
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=1135&relPageId=699
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=1135&relPageId=704
To Jordan: The contingency was that Roy Hargraves had constructed a huge bomb that was planted in a car parked near the entrance to Stemmons Freeway. Had the DP shooting been aborted, or if there had been no head shot, the conspirators would have set off the bomb as the limousine passed, presumably taking out the entire limousine.
To Joanathan:
You could write off the drinking the night before? You mean this was not a nefarious plot by the conspirators to slow the responses of the Secret Service agents?
You write off the forcible removal of his body from Parkland? This was done as ordered by Kennedy confidant Dave Powers. It was not Kellerman who made the decision. So–d’ya think Powers was behind the murder of his old friend?
Open windows on the parade route, come on now. Just look at the photographs of numerous other motorcades in which JFK participated. Have you ever done this research? Windows were hardly ever, if ever, closed. I live in Key West. JFK visited here in Nov 1962. There were no closed windows. I challenge you to find ONE motorcade that shows closed windows. If you find one, please post a referenve to which motorcade, city, date.
So when did the SS destroy its records? What year? Were they destroyed before the HSCA was formed?
The Secret Service had nothing to do with the assassination, IMO. There is not a single fact to suggest Secret Service involvement–none.
The limo coming to a complete stop?
timgratz, “There is not a single fact to suggest Secret Service involvement–none.”
Except perhaps for the parade route?
The parade route was the result of political considerations: the Trade Mart vs. the Women’s Building at the Fairgrounds.
It wasn’t set by the Secret Service.
No John, the route was not a result of political considerations, the final destination was. There is a major difference, and yours is an example of burying a critical question in a bravado response that means absolutely nothing.
The Secret Service was involved in determining the precise route once the final destination had been determined. They recognized the hairpin turns and the close proximity to buildings and structures with significant potential for snipers as the entourage was forced to slow down. Did they weigh their responsibility to argue for a safer route against the unpleasantness of annoying the Dallas planning committee, and say to themselves, “we’ve got this covered?”
I understand the motorcade route was determined by Dallas SS agent Winston Lawson, hardly a rookie. Lawson would have been aware of the hairpin turn from Houston onto Elm. He also would have recognized the shooting gallery nature of Elm as it coursed through Dealey Plaza.
I’ve also read there is a photographic film showing Lawson, seated in the lead car, turned around to look back at the presidential limo during the shooting.
You are ignoring the fact that if you want maximum visibility for a motorcade in Dallas (and JFK certainly did) you have to be on Main Street.
The only choice is to go northeast/southwest on Main (which JFK did) or southwest/northwest on Main.
When it was decided that the Trade Mark was the destination, that demanded the route that JFK took.
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/dallas.txt
The Trade Mart was the end of the line….I think this is about the route taken to get there.
I do not know why incompetence always seems to imply guilt to the CT crowd. At the time the positions closest to the President were considered in part on seniority. Nobody seems to have realized that senior people tended to be older, to be less active physically, to be likely to react slower than younger agents. Both Kellerman and Greer had been around a long time; Greer was simply too old or too lax to be the driver. However, the SS had gotten away with the same system for decades; government agencies are loathe to change policies without a reason, particularly those policies that reward experience and rank. As SS salaries in those days were abysmal proximity to the President was a reward.
Now, specifically which agents were drinking? Where? When?
Kellerman ‘s forcible removal of the body? You neglect to mention WHO would never leave without the body.
Photon:
The reason incompetence is so suspicious is because is was not limited to any one aspect of the case.
You want to argue that the actions of everybody involved in JFk’s protection, the Dallas police, the FBI, CIA, intelligence agencies, the people who did the autopsy, etc., all were incompetent in how they did their jbs related to JFK. Yeah, stuff can happen and things don’t always line up neatly.
But to take incompetence of everybody at face value — well, that’s not how the world works, and you know it. At some point, the number of mistakes piles up and becomes suspicious. Why did everybody make mistakes? Who benefited from these mistakes? Is there a pattern to the mistakes? Taken as a whole, blind naïveté is just not a logical option. But of course you know that as well.
The problem with this argument, Paul, is that the incompetence is not nearly so pervasive as conspiracists think, after the factoids are taken out.
And what is the baseline? How did the “dream team” do when getting O.J. Simpson off? The LA cops seemed to make at least as many mistakes as the Dallas cops in 1963.
How much incompetence have we seen with the Ebola outbreak, or the Obamacare website, or the Iraq War?
How much incompetence did the U.S. military show at Pearl Harbor?
Then there is the fact that no historical event in history has been examined with such minute scrutiny as the JFK assassination.
My argument is there has been minute examination of the JFK assassination because there are so many holes in the official story as well as rational reasons to be suspicious.
John:
What you just said contradicts just about everything you say elsewhere on the site. Anytime someone points out the voluminous discrepancies in the case, you scoff and say, “well, nobody is perfect, stuff happens.”
Now on one hand you want to argue that incompetence was not so pervasive. But then again you say everybody is incompetent all the time. Which is it? Maybe you should actually stick to one line of argument. Otherwise it looks like you are just disputing whatever pro-conspiracy people say.
And again you want to change the subject to other events that are irrelevant. Whatever happened at Pearl Harbor or 9/11 or Ebola (huh?????) has nothing to do with JFK’s murder. How much incompetence there is normally in avenues of life is a futile and deeply unserious question.
Again, the way this played out was riddled with improprieties that makes it impossible to believe it was all a coincidence. Oswald was killed in police custody and to this day nobody knows how. Nobody knows what he said while in custody. The medical evidence was botched. The intelligence agencies interfered with the investigation.
Since most of those things were deliberate and planned, not as the result of honest mix-ups, I don’t know how to argue for incompetence.
There is no contradiction in saying:
1.) There was less incompetence than conspiracists claim, since many of these claims rest on factoids, and . . .
2.) The level of incompetence there was is consistent with what we normally see in any government endeavor.
All of that is relevant in establishing the baseline level of incompetence we should expect from government.
You seem to be assuming that government always shows sterling competence, and the fact that it didn’t in the JFK case shows a conspiracy.
No, they weren’t.
The unqualified autopsists were the result of the fact that nobody in the Kennedy entourage understood the need for a forensic autopsy.
Ruby’s shooting of Oswald was a failure of security in Oswald’s transfer.
As for “botched” medical evidence: I hope your are not buying Horne’s nonsense. The medical evidence as it exists quite clearly shows the nature of Kennedy’s wounds.
John:
Even discussing “baseline levels of incompetence” is ridiculous. It’s not a serious discussion, and it’s a way to distract from real issues.
And you keep making up statements that are totally unsupportable. Nobody in the Kennedy administration understood the need for a forensic autopsy? Even if that were true, and it would be impossible to establish, every murder results in a forensic autopsy. That the president of the US doesn’t get the same level of investigation as a botched drug deal is hard to fathom and impossible to shut off as “just one of those things.”
But we know exactly how and why that happened. Read Manchester.
The Kennedy family and entourage had the power (largely based on the fact that nothing exactly like this had happened before) to bypass normal criminal procedures.
I actually agree with this argument to a degree. I don’t think Pearl Harbor was a conspiracy for example. The JFK assassination to me compares more in the way of O.J. killing his wife and getting off with skilled lawyer$ and a sucker jury, the same way LBJ I think got off with a skilled lawyerly team (Warren Commission) and a sucker public who bought the cover up.
But John is correct when he says that ineptitude is common, and one cannot use it alone to find “conspiracy” in everything. That’s my big gripe with the blowhards at FOX “News” who, Pravda-like, smear the Democrats to find “conspiracy” over Benghazi. What a joke! There were mistakes, just as there were prior to 9/11, Reagan’s deployment of US Marines to Lebanon, etc. But these were not conspiracies.
Before I actually sat through a number of trials, I might have agreed to some degree. However, the skill of the lawyers involved is way overrated. The bigger factor is the reputation of the defendant.
And OJ and JFK have literally nothing in common. Not the murder, not the investigation and certainly not the trial, since there was no JFK trial.
I think people who believe JFK was killed as a result of a conspiracy should avoid bringing in other events because it serves no purpose.
There is of course a lot of reason to believe Pearl Harbor was the result of a conspiracy.
But, whether or not it was, scapegoats — Adm. Kimmel and Gen. Short — were found and punished for Pearl Harbor. Nobody was punished for the incompetence displayed in Dallas. In that way, it was more like 9/11 than like Pearl Harbor.
Photon, did the DPD exhibit incompetence when they arrived on the scene of the Tippit murder and within minutes arrested their prime suspect in the Kennedy assassination, LHO at the Texas Theatre and within a few hours tied the two deaths together? Did DA Henry Wade display incompetence when he said emphatically ‘we have our man,’ or did the Dallas legal system display incompetence when one Judge was within driving distance of Parkland to ensure the t’s were crossed and i’s were dotted and that same Judge was available to arraign Oswald within a few hours of Kennedy’s death? A high degree of competence when you need it, and a great foil of pure, fumbling, human incompetence when you need it more.
Since when were the local Dallas authorities members of the Secret Service?
How can you compare 2 independent groups and claim that the level of incompetence of one group should be seen in the other group?
What I mentioned was that the SS policy of putting senior agents who tended to be older closer to the President was a fundamental flaw that had been unrecognized. That flaw explains the reactions of the limo driver, or lack thereof, not some grand SS plan to leave JFK defenseless
Photon:
Wow, so the age of the SS agent driving the car accounted for his bizzare response? Do you care to back that up with any, you know, science? Now you are an expert in physics? Is that like your experience with autopsies?
Let’s look at that assertion, though. If the driver was 10-15 years older than the average agent, how would that affect the response to the sound of a gunshot? Maybe the average person of his age would react a fraction of second less quickly than the average person? Is that really the issue?
The real issue is not that the driver reacted slowly, it is the fact that he failed to do the proper protocol and take evasive action. In fact he slowed down. Which means that the reaction time and age is kind of irrelevant here.
I have no idea whether the driver or any of the SS agents were involved in the assassination. I kind of doubt that they had any direct role. But it is interesting that they failed to do what they were trained to do, and no, it had nothing to do with age.
photon, surely you are not arguing that a 54 year old – Greer’s age – looses his or her capacity for rapid response? And Kellerman was 10 years younger. At what age do you draw an arbitrary line? 43?
Aside from the agism implied, this is one of the more desperate arguments you have made Speak to anyone of that age now and ask if – or in fact run some tests to determine if – they would fail to react to gun shots with a high degree of evasive skill, particular having had years of training and experience.
So now the question you are left with, what happened?
Psychology and Aging , 2006, volume 21, No 1, pp 62-73.confirms exactly that reaction time increase with age, particularly after age 50.
Want more?
Yes, studies limited to a specific category of skills: law enforcement, jet pilots, yachtsmen, air traffic control. Whether or not someone responds to a buzzer, or a slightly more complex series of tests in a clinical setting does not factor in training and experience. As usual, you turn to academia and disregard real world scenarios.
Photon:
Yeah, tell me exactly how much difference n time there is between the average reaction time to a gunshot between a 50-year-old and someone 10-15 years younger. It ain’t much. And then test the actual people involved.
I used to be able to run 16-minute 5ks, now I’m 50-something and am dong 20 minutes and battling injuries. I know that 50 isn’t 20 or 30 physically.
But again, that isn’t the point. As we all know, you are trying to waste time with ridiculous issues. The problem with the driver wasn’t that he responded slowly, it is that he didn’t follow protocol and take evasive action. Absolutely nothing to do with reaction time.
Vince Palamara has written JFK would have left Dallas alive if the Secret Service had done its job properly. Vince’s opinion is worthy of respect because of the research he’s done on the SS.
I could write off a lot of things: the drinking the night before; Kellerman’s forcible removal of the body from Parkland; the open windows along the parade route; the failure of any SS agent to move to protect JFK in the motorcade. I could write these things off as human weakness and error.
Except that the SS destroyed its records of prior JFK motorcades so that the ARRB couldn’t compare its protective measures in those motorcades with the apparently complete lack of protective measures in Dallas. That destruction bespeaks knowledge of something that went terribly wrong with the SS in Dallas.
My #1 suspect in the positioning of JFK to be murdered is William Greer. His admitted failures to take evasive action (admitted at Parkland to Jackie), his slowing of the limo in the kill zone, his turns to look at JFK rather than to drive evasively, all combined to make JFK a sitting duck.
My #1 suspect in the wake of the assassination is James Rowley. Rowley mishandled the limo and the bullet recovered by Daryl Tomlinson from a Parkland stretcher (the bullet is today called C.E. 399, the magic bullet). Rowley more than any other individual blurred the facts of the shots taken at JFK.
I certainly agree with you about Greer, Jonathan. I have to wonder why he looked back at JFK, rather than drive fast to avoid any further danger. The KGB report on the assassination called that a breach of SS protocol.
It’s long been known that Greer was an Ulster Protestant. But it has come out recently that he was also a member of the Orange Order.
I am of the opinion that there were contingencies in place in case of a failure to kill JFK in Dealey Plaza.
The Trade Mart would have presented opportunities for such eventuality, amomg other locales and events of that day.
As much more recent incidents have shown, such mis-behaviours of the SS personnel continue today.
I read recently, I think in Jim Marrs’book CROSSFIRE, that the backup plan was for someone to detonate a bomb, if the limo passed under the Triple Underpass with JFK still alive. That, of course, would have killed everyone in the limo, including Governor Connally. I don’t think LBK would have liked the idea of losing his buddy the Governor, but perhaps he would have said, “Well, at least Kennedy is dead and I’m President”.
What would a bomb have done to LBJ in the following car?
How big was the bomb? A 500 pounder would have killed him. Perhaps a 250 pounder would have likewise killed him. One hundred pounds I doubt it since the LBJ car was behind the follow up car so some distance from the presidents car. Anything from 100 pounds down probably wouldn’t have hurt LBJ too much. Split his ear drums and make his nose bleed and make him change his pants.
This is based on the JFK car triggering the bomb.
You’re right indeed, Bill..LBJ was two cars behind. I didn’t recall any details about the bomb in terms of weight…will have to review. But that was “Plan B”.
LBJ wasn’t in the following car. He was several cars back. In any event,JFK wasn’t leaving Texas alive. The Trade Mart luncheon was next on their schedule, it was loaded with more high rafters and hidden observation points then Dealey Plaza & Ford’s Theatre combined. If nothing happened there; Jack and Jackie were going to LBJ’s Ranch for the weekend. A hunting trip was scheduled which would have presented a convenient yet dramatic tableau for an assassination. Johnson was not going to let his nemesis leave Texas alive. He knew the consequences if Kennedy managed to evade this carefully laid trap.