“People speculate about LBJ because he gained the most from JFK’s death. But that is not evidence of involvement. I’m skeptical of ‘LBJ did it’ theories because there is no known connection between Oswald and Johnson,” said Morley.
via Murder at the Pitch and Putt & the Mother of All JFK Conspiracies | AustinPost.
LBJ Silent On JFK Death Data (2/17/67)
http://jfk.hood.edu/Collection/Sylvia%20Meagher%20Clips/Sylvia%20Meagher%20Images/SM-007.pdf
The Don Reynolds Testimony and LBJ: http://jfklancer.com/pdf/LBJ-Reynolds.pdf
JFK scorned notion of LBJ as President, according to new book http://huff.to/q75fJT via @HuffPostPol
The New Yorker ran an excellent article on the transition of power following the assassination and the potential for political extinction that LBJ faced in November 1963: The Transition http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/04/02/the-transition via @newyorker
Philip Nelson, the author of LBJ: The Mastermind of the JFK Assassination, has a new book just out, LBJ: From Mastermind to the Colossus. It has a chapter on the Israeli attack on the USS Liberty in 1967. I have just been reading it on my Kindle. He accepts Peter Hounam’s Operation Cyanide theory (LBJ plotted with the Israelis for the Liberty to be sunk with all hands, so that it could serve as a pretext for the U.S. joining in the attack on Egypt). I can’t tell you everything he says, as I am only midway in the chapter.
Phil Nelson’s new book on Lyndon Johnson is now out: LBJ: From the Mastermind to “The Colossus.” Nelson correctly indicts Lyndon Johnson for orchestrating the attack on the USS Liberty (June 8, 1967), murdering 34 Americans and wounding another 171. Once a person understands that LBJ ordered the attack on the Liberty, that he was willing to murder 294 Americans so it could be blamed on Egypt and the USA could then have an excuse to bomb and take out Nasser of Egypt … once one understands that, understanding the JFK assassination is a piece of cake. Obviously LBJ murdered JFK, it’s a no brainer and it was solved by the mid 1980’s when Madeleine, Billie Sol Estes and Barr McClellan went public, as well as with George Reedy’s book which said LBJ was obsessed with RFK’s attempts to destroy him in the fall of 1963.
Web link to Nelson’s Must Read book: http://www.amazon.com/LBJ-Mastermind-Colossus%C2%94-Phillip-Nelson/dp/1628736925/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1415516248&sr=8-2&keywords=phil+nelson
The only connection that I know of between LBJ and Oswald was that LBJ had him murdered on 11-24-63 as a way of closing down investigations in the murder of JFK, which he LBJ orchestrated.
And then I think LBJ was also trying to kill Ruby in jail with cancer injections….
According to Nelson’s account, not only was LBJ willing to kill the whole crew of the USS Liberty, he was willing to set a train of events in motion that could well have resulted in a worldwide nuclear war. All, if Nelson is to be believed, for the sake of rescuing his political career.
Since there were Americans killed in that tragedy, you have to go back to President Woodrow Wilson’s declaration of war against Germany in World War 1 as a slight comparison. I say “slight” because in LBJ’s case, the President of the United States apparently didn’t know that many Americans were on the Liberty, and would thus be killed. A POTUS arranging for the deaths of 34 of his own citizens.
Setting a course for a possible world nuclear war would erase his comments from a few years earlier, where was concerned about 40 million Americans being killed.
“And then I think LBJ was also trying to kill Ruby in jail with cancer injections….”
Since cancers are highly inheritable, it would be interesting to investigate whether the particular type of cancer that killed Mr. Ruby also afflicted any of his relatives.
“Nelson correctly indicts Lyndon Johnson for orchestrating the attack on the USS Liberty (June 8, 1967), murdering 34 Americans and wounding another 171. Once a person understands that LBJ ordered the attack on the Liberty, that he was willing to murder 294 Americans so it could be blamed on Egypt and the USA could then have an excuse to bomb and take out Nasser of Egypt … once one understands that, understanding the JFK assassination is a piece of cake.”~Robert Morrow
Having put a lot of energy into looking into the attack on the USS Liberty a few years ago, I am convinced that these assertions against Johnson are right on the money.
It is also interesting to look upon the deeper sociological ramifications of the so-called “Civil Rights” legislation spearheaded by Johnson, that leads directly to the racial chaos of the present.
The so-called, “Right” charged JFK with being “soft on Communism”, when in fact the dialectical cycle apparent in the historical record shows that the Socialism forced on the US from Woodrow Wilson, through Franklin Roosevelt, to LBJ is no less authoritarian and coercive than Marxist Communism.
When I speak to the dialectical cycle, I refer to the Hegelian false L/R paradigm of social engineering; and the historical march to the Total State.
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Does anyone have details concerning a 1968 Army Intelligence Report about Clemard Josheph Charles? Doug Horne brings this up during his online presentation. According to Horne, it indicates that “Vice President Johnson was a close associate of George de Mohrenschildt.”
If true, it opens a direct line between LBJ-Oswald. We already know de Mohrenschildt was on friendly terms with George H.W. Bush and Jacqueline Kennedy’s family.
I still tend to feel that Oswald would have made a really excellent fake soviet patsy. In contrast his weird back story makes him a very suspicious lone nut. It seems an odd choice to have a lone nut patsy with such a lot of baggage relating to Soviet Union. Seems an odd choice. If they simply wanted a lone nut and at all costs didnt want it looking like it was a Soviet linked assassination why didnt they chose someone else without the danger of leading back to a trail that involved the marines, defection, seamless return to the US etc? A lone nut could surely have been achieved by simply manipulating some Walter Mitty without the Soviet Union baggage who wanted to play spy into position and then framing him. A lone nut could have been anyone from a genuinely mentally unstable person to a right wing nut – there seem to have been plenty about in that period.
So, I still very much feel that the original plan for Oswald couldnt have been to be to be a lone nut. I am very suspicious that his original role was very much to make him look Soviet linked or have soviet bona fides. As I posted before, things really changed in terms of US-Soviet relations between his return and the assassination. In fact it was like night and day. Clearly the main issues at the time revolved around Cuba and the Soviets.
It would make sense to me that Oswald was sheepdipped to the max for someone who either wanted to be able to get into Cuba or to be made to look like a soviet assassination patsy in the US. The problem with the Cuba thing is the Mexico city doubles. Here is a thought that just struck me – maybe they wanted Oswald;s very potentially useful CV to get into Cuba but not Oswald himself due to his lack of skills at spying or assassination. Oswald had the perfect CV but was not the perfect person to go into Cuba so the simple plan could have been to use his identity and give it to someone rather more experienced in the more ruthless intelligence arts. Could that have been what Mexico City Cuban embassy thing was all about – trying to get a spy/assassin into Cuba using Osqwald’s identity but not Oswald? Regardless, any such Cuban penetration plan failed.
A strong feeling I get is that the military is getting off lightly in discussions about the JFK assassination. I strong suspect they were well aware and possibly the kingpin in it and a lot of deflection onto other angles is covering this up. If you think about it, knowledge of their involvement from the very top would be a lot more shattering and traumatic to the US people than if it was spooks, Cuban exile’s, Mafia etc. A military operation from the very top would rock society and the public a great deal more and would have to be covered up at all costs. The smoke and mirrors about the autopsy and top military people springs to mind. Almost any conclusions would be preferable than it to have been a military coup d’etat Politicians come and go, spooks are well known for dirty deeds and factionalism but a national institution is another matter. The context of the years running up to JFK’s assassination also points that way IMO The military is also the only group where alleged confessions etc have not come from.
I agree with Alan that the military gets overlooked in the JFK assassination. I personally think that we had a domestic coup on November 22, with LBJ helping and benefitting from this power grab. But I also know that CIA, particularly during the 1950’s with the Dulles brothers Alan and John Foster assisting, became integrated in both the State Department and in the four branches of the armed services. For a well-documented read on how CIA worked its way into the armed services (“interwove itself”) I recommend Fletcher Prouty’s classic treatise, “The Secret Team,” first published in 1973(1).
To hear just how ugly the divide became between JFK and his Joint Chiefs, one of whom was downright belligerent to his Commander-in-Chief, I recommend reading and listening to the published JFK White House tapes which ran during the Cuban Missile Crisis (2).
________
(1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Team
(2) http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2207946/Revealed-JFKs-stabbing-generals-mocked-President-battled-avoid-regarded-trigger-happy-Americans-lost-Berlin.html
I have always felt that the Kennedy family have a baffling attitude to the assassination which, unless its self preservation alone, must be telling us something. I presume they have the power to answer a lot of the questions by simply having the body exhumed? Why have the allowed decades of speculation to rage instead of doing the obvious thing?
Putting JFK’s (and RFK’s) bodies under an “eternal flame” was not only a significant way to memorialize the two leaders, but also a clever way (in my opinion) of keeping the graves “eternally sealed”. That said, I believe that when all of the baby boomers and perhaps a few succeeding generations have died off, this gravesite WILL be exhumed, Tutankaman-like, to answer archaeological questions about long ago 20th century American power. The problem today is, too many people are still alive who are grossed out by the thought of “digging up Camelot.” They are emotionally invested in the eternal flame aspect. Eventually the skull of JFK, as it was buried in 1963, will be dug up and re-examined. I’m fairly confident that this will happen someday.
I am sure you are right. There does come a point when even extreme things in history just become abstract with the passing of time. People for example still have a lot of emotion about the two world wars but nobody gets hot under the collar about the Napoleonic wars. Thats around 100 vs 200 years ago.
I think it has to reach a point when noone actually really remembers a personal connection with it. I know when I was a child I talked to my near 100 year old great grandfather who was born in 1880 and he could remember things his father told him dating back to the 1850s and tell me directly. So, 150 years can be spanned by two living people but that is about the maximum.
I think much more than that become ‘time out of mind’ and more detached. So, I would say we all just have to keep fit and well until about 2113 and the truth will be known:0).
I didn’t know RFK’s grave had an eternal flame, too.
I probably should have said that there was a lot more talk about WWII than the cold war from the older folks when I was growing up. I think at the level of ordinary folks the threat of WWIII was just something that nothing could be done about and you had to have a belief that noone was mad enough to destroy the world to ‘win’. So, it was just something out of the little person’s control and really pointless worrying about similar to worrying about some massive meteor or comet hitting the earth with little or no warning. You just dont worry about things that you cannot do anything about and seem unlikely to happen or you would go mad. That is not to say that the politicians, military and intelligence were not actively thinking about it a lot.
Bill I cannot speak for everyone obviously and its primarily the 70s and 80s I remember and WWIII certainly wasnt a topic I heard anyone talk about then other than the very occasional scary documentary. I got to be honest I am not sure about the 60s but I dont recall hearing any talk recalling terror at it from slightly older people. I think it was in the back of the mind but seemed an abstract doomsday scenario rather than likely. I think the main fear was that some error would cause a nuclear war rather than anyone being mad enough to actually do it. Mutually assured destruction and all that.
One think I am not sure about is when did science realise about things like nuclear winters and aspects like that which would make using nukes more world-ending that war-winning. It seems to me that in the 50s and 60s some of the hawk generals had attitudes that suggest they didnt seem concerned about this – or was the science of nuclear winters etc not known at that time?
Goes without saying that I think the two Oswalds idea has a strong basis in fact. I must admit its kind of add the way Armstrong dug up so much amazing info then kind of left his ideas open to ridicule by positing the idea that it went so far back in time. Is it not more credible that the two Oswalds are a relic of a real and a fake back story that was created for a purpose?
Another alternative I have pondered about Oswald is could he really have been a Soviet double that, although the CIA/military was aware of this, they went along with it in order to use him at a later date or feed him false information. The urgency to do this by the time of the end of the missile crisis and test ban may have passed BUT around the time of the Bay of Pigs and multiple attempts on Castro’s life the picture was very different as indeed it was before the resolution of the Cuban missile crisis. The timing of Oswald’s return is just before the missile arrived in Cuba. Could perhaps there have been a genuine attempt to get a double and his wife with alleged KGB links into the US that the intelligence agencies played along with to allow disinformation to pass back or to use at a future date? The chance to use him as a very useful non-participant patsy of course did arise.
One thing I feel strongly is surely the case – Marina must know a lot more than she will ever say. It seems incredibly likely to me that she was KGB given her uncle and the apparent fact she also met Webster. It also remains my suspicion that the Russians also know more. Obviously for a long period the last thing they wanted was a soviet spy, even a non-participant patsy, to be blamed for the assassination. After Yuri Nosenko’s defection and presumably some time before that the US knew the Soviet Union couldnt win a war ith the US and the Soviets knew that the US knew. So, there may have been a strong mutual reason to go along with the Oswald lone nut concept. Still, I have to admit that its harder to see why Russia would still keep up the pretense unless of course some deal was done back when Yeltsin was a friendly leader and the country was in a pretty desperate position.
I’ve not dug too deeply into Armstrong’s book and theory. I do believe Oswald was impersonated more than once, but I’m unsure how far it goes back. Was Oswald impersonated in Mexico City? I have no doubt. The Ford dealership in Boston in 1961?- Well, I didn’t see his name on the receipt, and I’ve seen no other documentation concerning that episode (please point me in the direction of any if it’s extant and available on the internet or in a book). Two Oswalds in school? When I’ve looked at the records on the internet, the picture quality is so bad that I’ve not been able to make out the dates and names, so I cannot comment about the overlap of dates, which could be an administrative error; if one looks at all the errors in documents contemporaneous with these school records, then this is not so far out of the realms of possibility.
The other thing that puzzles me is that the assassination seems to have been done incredibly badly done with so much left to chance and in some ways with huge amounts of suspicious trails left. It does seems things didnt got to plan. In many way it seems about as far from textbook as it can be with far far too many agencies and people involved in it and its coverup. Its about a million miles away from a KGB style poison tipped umbrella type killing.
That type of killing would be too much the hallmark of a foreign agency and would lead to a clamour for a response. By contrast, if there is a clear shot, and a person picked out as a ‘lone nut’ to do the shooting, then the public can be satisfied that no-one else is to blame. This was the ‘WW3’ virus, as Newman calls it, embedded into the plot to enable a change of president, yet with sufficient explanatory purchase to prevent a response that would lead to a huge loss of life.
Feel free to point out if this scenario doesnt work. I have a thick skin and can take it LOL. I only really read into the subject for 8 months in my freetime, maybe 5 or 6 books and a lot of websites so its no big deal if my theory doesnt stand up. I kind of bottomed out and stopped researching a few months back and this was just a flash of inspiration I had when I was day dreaming. Feedback appreciated whether good or bad.
An assumption made by many is that those who created the story that Oswald was a Marxist are those who set him up as the patsy.
I believe that’s a false trail. Someone who knew Oswald was being used or at least monitored by the CIA and FBI set him up, it appears to me, as a way to neuter the CIA and FBI once Oswald was arrested.
So why was he being given a Marxist legend? I dont believe his return from the USSR was just personal reasons etc. Strange that Webster also returned around this time. Seems to me some post-Bay of Pigs plan was afoot involving using these people in some way but the outcome of the missile crisis was completely unforeseen. Surely the Marxist legend related to either a plan to frame Oswald for killing Kennedy or some mission in Cuba. I doubt the latter as Oswald in Cuban embassy looks very very suspicious and more of a sheep dipping by a double. IMO the original plan to kill Kennedy and use Oswald as a Soviet patsy simply must have involved the top brass of the military.
As for what actually happened and the whole lone nut patsy thing – you are right. It is possible he was used by people who were not aware that he was also a person who had been groomed as a soviet assassin patsy which was aborted by summer 63 at the latest. There is no doubt that that original role I am suggesting would have gone to the top of the military and had the Bay of Pigs as its background.
So, someone wanted JFK dead even if by then it no longer had any remaining value as a means of justifying first strike or some other war with the Soviets or Cuba. Some elements just wanted him dead anyway. My feeling is it was the CIA while the original plan to use Oswald as a Soviet JFK assassination patsy probably went to the top n the military.
Jonathan. I agree, and an evaluation of references to Oswald as a “Marxist,” “lefty communist bastard,” and variations on the theme in the early hours and days after the assassination exposes the faces of those involved in the most critical stage of the cover up. It is a relatively short list. Deep research supports the argument that some may have been hired and others manipulated thru professional ambition.
The name of Jackie Kennedy will appear on that list. She was young, frightened, impressionable, and she had very powerful military and government officials (she moved into Averill Harriman’s Georgetown townhouse in the immediate aftermath) managing her in the days and months following the appalling experience of holding portions of her husband’s brain in her lap.
Neutering the CIA and FBI writ large was ingenious. Only those on the inside would know how fundamental that neutering would be to the successful cover up of the conspiracy let alone how to go about it.
I have often thought that there is something weird about Jackie and indeed Bobby Kennedy and other members of the family. Something seems odd about the Kennedies in the aftermath and long after – almost like they knew that digging into the assassination would expose some of them badly too. I even get that feeling today.
Would JFK’s back channel contact with Khrushchev have been known to intelligence at the time and would that have been seen as treasonous by the public if exposed at the time? Would that have been enough to not want to dig too deep?
As a European I find it hard to get inside the head of US cold warriors and just how intense the cold war and anti-Soviet feeling was in the US. Over here the public always sort of saw it as being a fairly helpless post-war western Europe stuck in the middle of a stalemate of great powers rather than an life or death ideological struggle. Noone I knew ever really thought anyone would be mad enough to actually start WWIII so there was little fear. I find the idea of hawks wanting first strike nuclear war etc as incredibly absurd but having read into this I am kind of amazed that the ‘nuke the bastards’ generals were actually real. I just thought that they were parodies like Dr Strangelove.
alan November 3, 2014 at
Alan, I think you have to go back in American history a bit to understand these “bomb the bastards” generals. They came to power under Eisenhower’s “New Look” strategy and they agreed with this strategy (at least in public) or they would have been retired/fired. I’ve lost count of the generals that Obama has fired.
Ike’s “New Look” said we have the bomb and we will use it. Ike saw this as being much cheaper and effective than a conventional military. Of course our conventional military suffered a lack of money and attention during this time. One of the first things JFK did was to correct this imbalance, thank god.
So for these generals to discuss using the nukes was simply shop talk to them. They had them and they wanted to use them, just as they had been trained.
I’ll have to say that in the 1950s and 1960s America believed that the USSR was indeed thinking about a nuclear first strike on the U.S.. I think we were very afraid of the Russian Bear. I’m surprised to learn that Europe didn’t share that fear.
Bill Clarke, I agree with your take. Furthermore, Americans generally were scared by “On the Beach”, Strontium 90 in milk, the Rosenberg spy trial, the development of a mega H-bomb by the Soviets, the ongoing nuclear testing, and the seeming ever-pressnt precipice of nuclear war.
I agree with Bill’s take too. But there was a divide, according to my father, who helped install MRBMs (medium-range ballistic missiles) also called “theatre-missiles” in Europe in the late fifties. Back then you didn’t have all the protests like in the eighties over the Pershings. But you had one side in our military that saw the MRBMs (and ICBMs over in N.America) as being a healthy deterrent. NOT to be used except if we were attacked first. Another side, a more reckless, cowboy mentality, held by Curtiss LeMay and others, advocated for a first strike nuclear assault. This was entirely different from the “armed deterrence” crowd at the Pentagon. JFK thought both sides were flawed, because even the deterrence crowd could fail to see an accidental escalation—-which really happened in October of 1962. On top of that, JFK (and Khruschev) were worried about hardliners within their own nations who might try to go around their leaders and pull the trigger, in a small way, to bring about rapid retaliation and escalation. Keeping the lid on accidental nuclear war was a prime motivation for back channel peace talks between the USSR and USA in 1963.
Incidentally I find it hard to believe that West Europeans were not worried about nuclear weapons fifty or more years ago. I knew of many who later told me that they were scared, but in those days didn’t want to protest or rock the boat. It would take the 1968 atmosphere in Paris and other cities (coinciding with Soviet brutal aggression in Czechoslovakia) to change that.
i understand the Warren Commission has been suggested as having the hallmarks of a shift from a blame the soviets to ‘for god’s sake do not blame the Soviets’ stance. Either someone sane realised the science of a full nuclear war would end the US too OR in the months after the missile crisis and continuing to the missile test ban in August 1963 and friendly relations would have made a fake soviet assassination of JFK totally without credibility. Certainly by the August test ban this would have been absurd so any original plan to use Oswald as a fake Soviet sponsored assassin of JFK would have to be scrapped, IMO certainly by August 1963. The difference between the credibility of such a soviet assassination of JFK at the start and at the end of the Cuban Missile Crisis would have been enormous.
Perhaps the plan to use Oswald as a fake Manchurian candidate/double agent is linked to one of those crazy generals who wanted first strike and an excuse for it. Its hard to pinpoint at what point in time the plan was hatched but it must have been after Oswald had left for Russia as a simple fake defector spy and done a poor job. Oswald’s original role in Russia was surely as a spy and clearly was not originally to do with JFK as he was not a factor till November 1960 when Oswald was already in the USSR.
It seems to me that the main thing between Oswald’s departure and return was the Bay of Pigs although the Cuban missile crisis roots began soon after Oswald returned. Seems connected to me. Maybe the return was originally to send Oswald to Cuba with his pro-Soviet looking sheepdip. However, the other strong possibility to me is that his US handlers decided that their fake defector Oswald would be an ideal fake Soviet assassin in the US.
Maybe the plan changed. Regardless, Oswald would have been a very very good fabricated Soviet assassin. Why else would he be allowed to return rapidly with a wife who might have had links to the KGB. If Webster had met Marina in his stay from 1959 to May 20th 1962 and returned to US at a very similar time as Oswald then surely during debriefing would have become aware that Marina had met both men and therefore was highly suspicious. It would seem incredible if the handlers didnt ask Webster about Marina. It seems to me that they must have known Marina was suspicious but was worth letting in to make the setting up of Oswald as a fake Soviet assassin extra convincing.
The question for me then is when was this rather impressive bit of sheep dipping of Oswald start and end. I think the wish to kill JFK commenced at the Bay of Pigs period in April 1961. The concept of framing Oswald as a fake Soviet sponsored assassin to justify first strike would have seemed logical to the hawks during the period between the Bay of Pigs and the end of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The context of late spring to summer 1962 when Oswald returned is just before the Cuban missile crisis. Did the missile crisis and change of policy to the Soviets by JFK mean that the original plan for Oswald as a fake Soviet assassin of JFK was dropped as it was no longer believable that the Soviets would assassinate a US president after a peaceful resolution of the crisis. However they still wanted to kill JFK.
So when he was used as patsy and lone nut the problem was the trail of the original legend of a fake double agent/Manchurian Soviet assassin already already had been created and was not erased fully. Could a fabricated back story and legend for Oswald be the reason why it appears that there were multiple Oswalds.
There appears to me to be a clear pattern of Oswald being originally a fake defector US spy then made to look like a Soviet sponsored assassin followed by a change of plan to make him a lone nut.
I’ve been very interested in LHO in the past year, too. I think he’s the key to the assassination and probably the most enigmatic figure of the 20th century. Who else had his Russian language training in the marines, was let into the USSR, got back unaided, was linked to pro and anti-Castro Cubans, was impersonated more than once, was linked to deeply shady characters, and had a high media profile (why was he filmed fighting in the streets of New Orleans, for instance?).
Your theory about a change of policy/use for LHO after the Cuban Missile Crisis is plausible; I’ve not really thought about it from that angle.
So does nnyone have any thoughts on the suggestion that Marina knew both Oswald and Webster. Could this really have not come to the notice of their handlers on return to the US? That is really very odd. Its almost as if they knew this but for some reason decided not to act. Marina along with Paine must know a great deal more than has ever been revealed.
I am nowhere near you experts in knowledge but I have read a lot of books and stuff on the web about it over the last year and am particularly interested in Oswald. I always struggled to understand why in some ways Oswald and especially Marina looks like a Soviet plot but in detail it clearly isnt. Last night after about a years being into this subject it struck me that Oswald and his weird double identities must have been relics of a plan to make Oswald look like a Soviet Manchurian candidate/double agent and blame the USSR but for some reason the plan was scrapped late in the day. This has led to a lot of confusion because his legend was already largely created but then they changed their mind and had the problem of the fake legend/paper trail left behind. Someone somewhere maybe finally realised that WWIII was going to be bad for their health too.
Jack Ruby “The answer is the man in office now”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsZ59X2_46M
Truth or something else? You decide.
CIA William Casey was asked by his nephew who really killed JFK and he answered “LBJ’s fingers were in the soup bowl.” Roger Stone ran into the nephew of Casey on his book tour and got that anecdote.
Nixon, Barry Goldwater, the KGB, Gen. Joseph J. Cappucci (head of Air Force counterintelligence, close to Hoover) all thought LBJ murdered JFK as did numerous critical LBJ insiders: Madeleine Brown, Billie Sol Estes (LBJ’s cut out for taking kickbacks), Barr McClellan.
Texas Ranger Clint Peoples thought so as well.
Not to mention the cream of scores of JFK researchers: Ed Tatro, David Lifton, Phil Nelson, Craig Zirbel, Roger Stone, James Fetzer and numerous others. And one of the greatest of them all Joechim Joesten solved the JFK assassination in the 1960’s, 20 years before the big breaks came out. Forgot to add CIA E. Howard Hunt who indicted both LBJ and the CIA. And LBJ indicted Texas oil in Dallas and the US intelligence.
Ditto Jack Ruby.
Here’s LBJ wanting so bad to be POTUS, and yet he ends up saying he won’t run for a second term. I wonder how many Presidents announced that? Good history brain teaser.
LBJ was a shrewd politician. if he wanted to remove JFK from presidency or make him have to resign, all he had to do was get his buddy Hoover to spill the dirt on JFK.
I believe this was a revenge murder by cuban exiles and that government had to cover it up because it would have led back to the Castro assassination attempts, mafia stuff and other intelligence methods/operations.
Larry I urge you to read some material around the case which isn’t derived from your mainstream media or anti Kennedy. A good book I recommend is Stones book: the case against LBJ. I seriously have to disagree with you that LBJ was shrewd. He was an evil monster obsessed with being president and he is linked to 6 murders. On the very same day JFK was murdered LBJ was being implicated in a court of law over corruption charges and taking back hand payments. RFK and JFK were on the verge of exposing LBJ and he was on the verge of being arrested! That all changed the day jfk died because he became president whilst stood next to the dead presidents body. You’re presidents head has just been blown off and his wife is stood next to you covered in his blood whilst you are being sworn in….you then turn and give a huge smile to your advisor who winks back at you. Google it LBJ wink. It tells a thousand words. LBJ got his presidency he’d been rigging since 1948, the military got it’s war and the mob got to hang loose. Win, win, win. Wake up.
For anyone who doubts LBJ was smiling at Thomas’ wink, just look at LBJ’s left cheek. It’s pointed outward. That would appear to be a smile.
I think the purpose of having such a public execution was to intimidate anybody who might want to follow JFK’s policies in the future, or who might choose to dispute the official version of events. The public might be left in the dark, but the insiders would know what really happened.
A brother of mine who lived and worked in D.C. at the time told me that the common talk there was that LBJ was behind the assassination.
I think John Edgar Hoover was going to spill the dirt anyway, as a means to keep him from being re-elected.
I had always thought that J. Edgar had dirt on politicians (even Lone Nutters would agree with that), but that CIA and others had dirt on Hoover (homosexual acts) as well, so it was like “mutually assured destruction” that pointed both ways.
Is this something we can all agree upon, or is it even “unacceptable” for the John McAdames out there to accept that this power play went on?
Confession of Howard Hunt. Truth or something else? You decide.
https://www.maryferrell.org/wiki/index.php/Confession_of_Howard_Hunt
I don’t think LBJ would’ve rode in the motorcade behind JFK if he knew what was going to happen on 11/22. If he were involved or had any prior knowledge I think he’d find a way to avoid being so close to bullets flying.
April 63,
Shimon engaged his daughter, alerting her to how VP LJ had been intent on getting more security than President Kennedy.
“What’s he afraid of?” Toni wondered out loud, only to conclude moments later: ” Something’s going to happen and Johnson knows about it” she blurted out.
Mary’s Mosaic, Peter Janney p383.
That would certainly be my thoughts.
“I don’t think LBJ would’ve rode in the motorcade behind JFK if he knew what was going to happen on 11/22”.
Fact: LBJ practically hit the deck before the first shot happened. This is proven by photo/ video footage. Not only that but SS agent has since admitted he was told by LBJ to say he dived on him and pushed him down?If you don’t believe me research it yourself it happened. 2nd fact: LBJ and JFK argued on the morning of 22nd as LBJ wanted to change the seating plan with the limo. He wanted his good friend Connolly sat with him at the last minute but JFK refused. The case against LBJ is so telling. If you believe his ex mistress who I believe is still alive today- on the evening of 21st November LBJ left a meet which included hoover and Ruby and said to her “after tomorrow those son’s of bitches won’t embarrass me again”. There are many other pieces of information which paint a picture showing LBJ to be the murdering beast he was. If you disbelieve one piece of information there are many more which substantiate the claim- you can’t run away from it! Americans are still asleep to the facts. Why? Is it because they are ashamed? Those tools which were in place on 22/11/63 are still in place today and will remain until the American people stop swallowing the LHO did it crap.
Madeleine Brown died in 2002.
If LBJ had refused to participate in the motorcade, isn’t it likely that JFK would have ruled that there be no motorcade at all? (Remember, the whole purpose of the trip to Texas — at least in JFK’s mind — was to heal the rifts in the Texas Democratic Party. That’s why JFK insisted that Connally should ride in the car with him, so that LBJ would have to ride together with Sen. Yarborough.)
Neil, your post brings up two LBJ items I’ve read about a lot(pertaining to the assassination). One being that LBJ was adamant in his desire to have Connally ride with him, instead of in the JFK limo. The other being that LBJ supposedly ducked in his limo right as it turned onto Elm(or practically right when the first shot rang out). In both cases, did LBJ know there was going to be a killing on 11-22-63 at the time it happened?
If the Lipton-Horne thesis is proven to be true, then the military is involved. The horrific autopsy and the edited AF-1 calls probably made that evident and that’s why one can’t find an unedited version of the tapes.
I guess the question is whether the military were operational only, or whether they worked in tandem with “establishment figures” like Acheson or Bundy or the Rockefellers.
I also think it is possible that Angleton & Dulles worked with some key military figures (LeMay? Lemnitzer?)to sponsor the whole thing.
Lemnitzer (like Harvey) had been shunted off to Europe by 1963.
who besides LBJ could have covered up the Marshall Murder? Who else besides LBJ could have granted a security clearance for a murderer Malcolm Wallace? Who was a friend of the owner of the TSBD? Commander James Humes lead pathologist at the Autopsy according to Doug Horne, in his Inside The ARRB series, wanted it stricken from the record that he had received cuff links from LBJ. There is a heckuva lot of suspicious material on LBJ, in LBJ Mastermind Of The Assassination( by far the best of the LBJ books that has an excellent summary of Intelligence suspects. Much more suspicious stuff for example than on Dulles, or Helms specifically, where there is no hard evidence I’ve seen.There is no smoking gun on paper directly incriminating Johnson, nor good Samaritans fingering him as those types don’t usually know something about Assassination plots. I’m just tired of the attitude “I don’t think the mob was involved or LBJ”, therefore opinion becomes fact in the person’s mind.
Jeff, I take it you don’t hold highly Barr McLellan’s book that is seen in the article? I think it can be said that LBJ didn’t need to have a connection with Oswald, yet still could have known the assassination was going to happen.
All that the conspirators would have needed was knowledge that LBJ was on board with the general idea, and they could then have gone ahead and taken care of the operational details, confident that LBJ would assist in a coverup. (Although LBJ ended up doublecrossing them to the extent that he didn’t follow up on the indicators the conspirators provided that the assassination involved Cuba and the Soviet Union.)
I’ve come to disbelieve the purpose for killing JFK was to provoke a war with Cuba (or the USSR). The plotters surely would have read LBJ in advance of his becoming president. LBJ as senator or V.P. never beat the drums for a war with Cuba or the Soviet Union.
Agreed the plotters would have wanted LBJ to be on board. Imagining he was on board is easy. Clearly though he did not play the role of chief plotter. He was a third-party beneficiary in my estimation.
At this point, it’s clear to me that uncovering the reason JFK was killed would uncover the arrow of guilt pointing toward the guilty parties. Many researchers believe and assert they know why JFK was killed; the usual reason is Viet Nam, and the arrow of guilt therefore points at the military and the CIA.
I don’t know why he was killed and am not disposed to accept the ready or allegedly obvious reasons. If I had to guess, I’d guess the reason was rooted deep in foreign policy and that the genius behind the assassination and cover-up was McGeorge Bundy.
I think the same. They wanted war with Russia/Cuba. After the Bay of Pigs the military also wanted JFK dead. They came upon the idea of using Oswald as a non-aware/non-involved patsy assassin very much like he was later used but the twist is IMO that his original legend or back story was to be that he was a Soviet controlled assassin/manchurian.
I believe that wheels were set in motion to create the legend of Oswald (actually a false defector US spy in the USSR)the Soviet agent but that the way the missile crises ended in a friendly way and finally with the test ban treaty in August 63 would have made a Soviet assassination of Kennedy laughably implausible so the plug was pulled on the original plan by at least August.
However, while the blame the soviets idea was dropped, the assassination plan went ahead as planned with Oswald a CIA asset who was not part of the assassination placed in the building as a patsy. The only but crucial difference was the lone nut image was used instead. However, the original plan which was similar but would have seen Oswald framed as a Soviet agent, had already been planned and various steps to build the legend were already done. Even after this plan had to be dropped, traces of this remained and explain the odd doubling of Oswald.
So, yes I think the plan was to kill two birds with one stone and kill JFK due to his Bay of Pigs policies, to frame this as a Soviet assassination using a patsy and to thus create a major pretext for war with the Soviet Union. However things got too friendly with the USSR by summer 63 for that to look at all credible.
That is not “the mother of all JFK” historical conspiracy narratives.
That mom is currently being C-sectioned by David Talbot and involves the CIA.
The media’s much greater willingness to print narratives involving LBJ in a causal role– as compared with with CIA– might be illuminating.
There are not many stories censored by BOTH MSM and the Capitalist Foundation funded “alternative??” media. JFK and his relations with CIA and JCS is certainly one of that small group of stories that is doubly roped off. In fact it might be triply when one observes how the worst POLICY disinformation re JFK v. National Security State is explicitly aimed at the left. This should be seen in light of CIA’s history of using periodicals aimed at the left in order to keep small but influential audiences off the grassy.
The much more censored CIA narrative is the more legitimate mom, in my view.
All signs point to operational involvement by the CIA.
While there is little proof at this that LBJ had a direct role in the murder, he was clearly a major architect of the coverup.
erratum “While there is little proof at this time…”
I seriously doubt that LBJ was not involved in the assassination as well as the cover up. I’m not saying he was the only one involved, but his actions on that day suggest someone to be held in suspicion by historians. It could be just a coincidence, but his being on the chopping block of Bobby Baker and Billy Sol Estes scandal review shouldn’t be just swept under the rug. His pattern of corrupt “end justifies the means” way of grabbing power, particularly his crooked election stealing against Coke Stevenson and dirty Mac Wallace dealings prior to Nov. 22 1963 would make him (in my eyes at least) a VERY SUSPICIOUS character. My dad and some of his friends also said so before they died. I think Barry Goldwater held some suspicions regarding LBJ too, although we don’t have him on tape as saying so.
Yes, and he received help on that role from his lawyer Ed Clark.
Jeff, do you maintain Oswald fired the shots that killed JFK? Your statement indicates you do.
Do you believe Oswald was consciously part of an operation — a rogue CIA operation — to kill JFK? This is not a speculative or idle question, given your lawsuit and your efforts to free the CIA files.
I think it’s important for commenters here to know the biases of the site owner.
“I think it’s important for commenters here to know the biases of the site owner.”
“Jeff, do you maintain […]”
Jonathan, out of curiosity: how long how you been around this site?
For starters, none of us knows with certainty a lot of what happened. The most we can do is speculate, investigate scenarios, produce hypotheses and assign probabilities (weights) to each.
I’ve posted here since sometime in 2013.
Agreed that no one here knows for sure what happened. Jeff’s statement suggests strongly he thinks Oswald shot JFK. Jeff doesn’t purport to have knowledge this is true. He appears, however, to have reached this conclusion.
If that’s the case, I think everyone here should be aware of it. Such a fundamental conclusion on the part of the site owner, could, for exsmple affect moderation policy and choice of diary topics.
Jonathan, one would hope that you’ve gleaned enough from your time visiting this site to know that that is not Jeff’s position. Oswald was involved somehow… even if he was just the patsy set up to take the fall. What I believe Jeff’s saying is that he hasn’t seen any connection between LBJ and Oswald, whereas there is a lot of intelligence ties to Oswald.
Peter, to say there were no (at least obvious) ties between LBJ and Oswald and to give that as a reason for disbelieving LBJ had a hand in the assassination is what caught my eye.
The one does not follow from the other unless the proponent maintains Oswald shot JFK. Jeff isn’t given to non sequiturs.
Jonathan:
We need to keep in mind the unique situation of Jeff Morley. Unlike any of us (who are free to make all kinds of statements from the sensible to the absurd: “It was the flying saucer that kidnapped Elvis and Princess Diana!!”) our host has actual interaction and credibility, not only with the media but with the authorities, the Keepers of Secrets.
Jeff cannot afford to be seen as somebody with a preordained agenda. His only interest is The Truth, whichever it may be.
“Such a fundamental conclusion on the part of the site owner, could, for example affect moderation policy and choice of diary topics.”
I think you are confusing this site with the newsgroup censored by Prof. McAdams. You see, Liberals believe in “Liberty” while Conservatives attempt to conserve (i.e. block).
For reasons known to himself only, the good professor decided to ban me. The only way I can post there is under an assumed alias.
I’ve really missed you.
You have never been banned.
If you insulted somebody, you might have had a post rejected.
If you doubt me, try posting something.
Ramon, I hope you didn’t miss the biting satire of my first message.
You didn’t did you?
Let me say 4 things:
It is possible that Oswald fired the shot that killed the president but I doubt it.
It is possible Oswald fired a shot at the limousine that did not kill JFK
I see no evidence that Oswald was consciously part of a conspiracy to kill JFK.
If there was a CIA conspiracy Oswald did not know of it.
“If there was a CIA conspiracy Oswald did not know of it.”
Lee was in a different conspiracy. The one thing that nobody can deny is this:
In regards to expected outcome, there were 3 groups:
(1) The general public. They were surprised since what transpired was unexpected and shocking. They had NO advance information about what was about to happen.
(2) The plotters. They had plenty of previous information and were not a bit surprised. Things happened exactly as planned. They were prepared in advance for the next steps.
Note: The number of people in this group may possibly be zero, the empty set! This is the claim of the LNs.
(3) Lee. He was THE most shocked of all, because he thought he knew what was going to happen (had advance info, unlike those in group (1)), but something completely different happened.
In short: What happened that day was COMPLETELY unexpected by Lee. That is the only logical explanation for his behavior. Otherwise, he would have had the gun and shirt with him. The last place on earth he wanted to be was his room.
Thanks.
Your points raise some bewildering questions to my mind, Jeff.
Let’s just say all you said above is true. That means if there was a CIA conspiracy in the death of JFK, Oswald could’ve just been in the building at the time or COULD have been manipulated or COULD have taken it upon himself to shoot the president, but either way the CIA knew where he would be and when and engineered the kill shot, presumably from the grassy knoll.
That’s one helluva magic trick if that’s what went down. Wilderness of mirrors is about right.
Jeff, in terms of alleged LBJ involvement consider these links and/or associations:
D. H. Byrd
– founder of Civil Air Patrol n 1940s (Oswald & Ferrie)
– owner of the TSBD from 1930s-70s (Oswald)
– close ties to Sam Rayburn, LBJ & Connally
– part of Big Oil group in Dallas with Clint Murchison, H.H. Hunt and Sid Richardson
See following for more details: The Men Who Killed Kennedy – Part 9 – The Guilty Men (2003) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgNfQYpS1gQ&sns=tw via @youtube