Who was running CIA covert operations in Mexico City in 1963?

MEXI operations
Sensitive source: A newly-released JFK file still conceals a key name.

Fifty five years later, this remains a highly sensitive question.

Take a look at page 9 of this lightly-redacted 1977 CIA memo, released last month by the National Archives. The name of a CIA officer who was running covert operations along with David Phillips in 1963, has been postponed for release until 2021.

Anne Goodpasture
Anne Goodpasture, CIA officer (Photo credit: Jefferson Morley)

The memo, composed by veteran operations officer Ann Goodpasture, describes the staffing and assets of the Mexico City station, where she worked for many years. Goodpasture wanted to prepare her colleagues in Langley for the questions they would likely face from the House Select Committee on Assassination.

We know a lot about David Phillips, the other officer running covert operations in the station at the time. One of Phillips’ Cuban agents, Antonio Veciana, says he saw Phillips with Oswald in Dallas in September 1963.  Phillips had a hard time keeping his JFK stories straight. In November 1976, he told the Washington Post reporter Ron Kessler that CIA surveillance had captured Oswald offering help to the Cubans. The next day Phillips testified under oath to the HSCA and all but recanted the story.

JFK researchers will wonder if the other CIA officer running covert action operations in 1962-64 could shed more light on the question of Oswald in Mexico

Is the name postponed because the person is still alive? I put that question to the CIA and a spokesperson said the Agency would not answer it.

I asked National Archives for an unclassified explanation for postponement of the document, as required by the JFK Records Act. I was told the explanation was previously published in the Federal Register.

I asked the Federal Register how to find the notification for Goodpasture’s memo, identified in the National Archives with RIF number, 104-10427-10044. I got this response.

You can search historical editions of the Federal Register here using keywords or phrases, the issuing agency (Assassination Records Review Board), or perhaps that RIF number.  However, anything published prior to 2000 may require a manual search because those documents do not include extensive markup tags necessary for reliable searches.  I’m sorry, but OFR does not have the resources to perform research for external parties.  You can also seek assistance at a Federal Depository Library.

I searched without success. So I’m putting this to readers.

Can you find the Assassination Record Review Board’s determination for postponing the three names in Goodpasture’s Feb. 10, 1977 memo. The RIF number is 104-10427-10044.

Thanks.

 

15 thoughts on “Who was running CIA covert operations in Mexico City in 1963?”

  1. Pingback: May 2018 Links @ Prayer Man

  2. It’s a pretty short timespan, could it be GW? I mean who is alive that they’d need to protect?

    William Kent was in D.C. at that time, correct?

  3. Notice page 234 is missing, presumably to avoid mention of official Mexican co-operation.

    Of the 3 names, one is Deputy Chief of Station. This would logically make him a contemporary of Scott as to DOB. Another served 1966-68.

    My _recollection_ is that John B Smith’s PORTRAIT OF A COLD WARRIOR has a hostile depiction of Oleg Nechiporenko from their time together in Mexico City. Should memory be correct, perhaps he is redacted here–a published author?!

  4. ” I put that question to the CIA and a spokesperson said the Agency would not answer it. ”

    if that name is E. Howard Hunt, you can bet the Agency would never answer it

    1. Hunt was the chief of the covert action staff in the early 1950s and the agency did release his name. I doubt very much that Hunt is the redacted name.

  5. The CIA is in CYA (cover your ass) mode. It looks like the coup d’etat theory from Stone’s “JFK” is closer to the bone than we realized.

    1. Absolutely or they wouldn’t have had their attack dogs in the 4th estate attempt to destroy Stone and pillory Garrison (for the millionth time). If it’s a crazy bullshit theory ignore it. But they didn’t and still don’t.

    2. I recently commented on a previous thread on this site that the CIA/FBI refusal to comply with the law after nearly 55 years almost certainly indicates a secret so sinister and so dark that they don’t dare come clean on JFK’s murder plot—-ever. After decades of research and study I’ve come to the inescapable conclusion that it was indeed a coup d’ etat by the National Security State acting on behalf of themselves and their corporate/criminal sponsors. Even J. Edgar Hoover once remarked that “If I told you what I knew about the assassination it would destroy the country,” or words to that effect. Indeed. Ironically, maintaining the secret after more than half a century may have already done just that.

  6. Richard Turnbull, J.D.

    I want to see concrete, credible evidence that might stand up under
    cross-examination that Lee Harvey Oswald was ever in Mexico City from the get-go. Not only did Oswald not shoot anyone on 11/22/1963, where is the reliable testimony HE was in Mexico City?

    1. I agree wholeheartedly and there is overwhelming evidence that someone posing as LHO was in Mexico City. Moreover, to this day, no one can put Oswald in the 6th floor window when the shooting occurred yet there is extremely credible evidence that he wasn’t.

  7. Randy Robertson

    Jeff If the National Archives said that it was published in the Federal Register then go back and ask them when. They have the knowledge that it was published. I seriously doubt that the CIA was publishing any explanations prior to 2000 and probably have not done so for any specific documents since then.

  8. Matt “hit man” Scheufele

    I am going to guess we can figure this one out from looking at the JFK Library’s public record of the itinerary from JFK’s trip there. It listed the people and contacts of everyone under diplomatic cover. If I find it again, I will post it here. It has helped me with a few things in my research.

  9. Can any of you tell how many letters are redacted under David Phillips’s name? If yes, any educated guesses (based on the number of spaces redacted) whose name it may be?

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