Essay/Term paper: Assassination of jfk

Essay, term paper, research paper:  College Papers

On Friday, November 22nd 1963 at 12:30 P.M. the 35th president of the
United States of America, John Fitzgerald Kennedy assassinated while he
rode in an open limousine though the streets of Dallas. This event, which
abruptly and severely altered the course of history, it has created more
controversy than any other single event. Some haunting questions still
remain. "Who did it?" "Why did they do it?" "How was it done?" "Was there
a cover up" The official answers complied by the Warren Commission have
never satisfied the majority of the world's population. In this following
essay I will try to show who was responsible for the assassination of John
F. Kennedy. I believe the only way to prove that there was a cover up, is
to firstly prove that Lee Harvey Oswald is not the killer.

The Warren Commission consisting of "various outstanding citizens" was
created to "ascertain, evaluate and report upon the facts relating to the
assassination ... and the subsequent violent death of the man charged with
the assassination Lee Harvey Oswald. The purpose of the Commission was to
examine the evidence developed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and
any additional evidence that may hereafter come to light ... to make such
further investigation, as the Commission finds desirable. In less than one

week they found that a 'lone nut' killed JKF.
At no time did the Warren Commission seem to consider the basic legal
rights of Oswald - innocence until proven guilty, the right to legal
representation, or the right to cross-examine witnesses and evidence
against him. There is no way that Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone assassin.
Firstly the paraffin test of Oswald's hands and his right cheek conducted
on November 23, 1963, has been positive for his hands but negative for his
cheek. Generally, this is evidence in Oswald's favor, but the Commission
asserted that the test "is completely unreliable in determining either
whether a person has recently fired a weapon or whether he has not."
Nobody saw Oswald on the 6th floor window after 11:55 on November 22nd. 90
seconds after the assassination, Roy Truly and Police officer M. L. Baker
saw Oswald on the second floor. Oswald had to take the stairs down. But
he had just 90 seconds to hide the rifle in the opposite corner of the
sixth floor, run downstairs 4 floors passing Victoria Adams who never saw
him and reach the second floor where he was encountered to be "calm and
collected". The Warren Commission claimed that Oswald fired three shots
in 5.6 seconds from the sixth floor of the Texas Schoolbook Depository.
The first shot was the 'magic bullet' which made a total of seven wounds
on JFK and Connally . Which appeared later in the Parkland Memorial
Hospital - you can see - in an almost pristine condition. The second shot
missed JFK and hit a bystander in the cheek and the third was the fatal
head. The Warren Commission said the third shot hit JFK from behind,
however his head was pushed backwards and to the left. This means the
bullet must of come from the grassy Knoll. Also many witness thought they
heard shots from there. (See graph) Oswald rifle's had poor capability
(experts tried to do the same what Oswald was claimed to have done, but
only one was able to do that! because he got not familiar with the rifle
and the inaccurate attached scope of the rifle. It was near impossible for
him to make the shot in 5.6 seconds

"If I had to pick one man in the whole United States to shoot me, I'd pick
Oswald. I saw that man shoot and there's no way he could have ever learned
to shoot well enough to do what they accused him of. I'm one of the best
shots around, and I couldn't have done it." --Sherman Cooley (US Marine,
served with Oswald)

If Oswald was not the killer then who would have wanted to see President
Kennedy dead?
Lyndon Johnson (LBJ)

The CIA

J. Edgar Hoover

The Mafia

Anti-Castro Cubans

Richard Nixon

I am convinced Lyndon Johnson may very well have been involved in the plot
to murder President Kennedy. I believe Johnson probably knew about the
plot ahead of time and either sanctioned it or actively took part in it.
Another possibility, in my view, is that Johnson realized soon after the
shooting that Kennedy had been killed by a conspiracy, and that Johnson
had an idea as to whom had been behind it. In any case, Johnson was a
driving force behind the cover-up that followed. However there is only
circumstantial evidence, but there is a lot against LBJ.

The CIA in reference to its alleged involvement in the assassination, are
referring primarily to the CIA's covert action personnel, i.e., those
agents who deal in sabotage, propaganda, and assassination. There is
evidence that suggests that some of the Agency's covert operations
personnel have also taken part in drug trafficking. Most CIA personnel are
not involved in such activities and would be appalled at any attempt to
harm an elected official. The covert operations personnel make up a large
portion of the CIA, and they, along with the Agency's top officials, are
the most powerful group in the CIA. Some high-ranking CIA officials have
attempted to frustrate presidential policies and have initiated or
sanctioned illegal operations, to include working with organized crime.
JFK and the CIA were in a virtual state of war from the moment of the Bay
of Pigs disaster until the day he died. JFK did not trust the CIA and he
reportedly intended to dismantle it after the 1964 election. In Vietnam,
the CIA refused to carry out instructions from the ranking American
official in the country. The CIA ignored President Kennedy's directive
that it not initiate operations requiring greater firepower than a
handgun. It also ignored JFK's orders to stop working with the Mafia. When
Kennedy heard the news that South Vietnam's dictator Ngo Diem had been
murdered by a CIA-backed coup, against his express wishes, he was
outraged. Kennedy was no fan of Diem's, but he did not want to see him
murdered. General Maxwell Taylor wrote that upon learning of Diem's death
JFK "leaped to his feet and rushed from the room with a look of shock and
dismay on his face". Kennedy blamed the CIA for Diem's murder. Kennedy
said he had to "do something about" the CIA and that the Agency should be
stripped of its exorbitant power. On another occasion, Kennedy reportedly
said he would scatter the CIA "into a thousand pieces." One of the more
troubling cases of CIA disobedience to presidential authority was its
behavior in relation to Cuba. In September 1963, long after President
Kennedy had ordered a halt to the covert campaign against Castro, senior
CIA staffers, including the deputy director, Richard Helms, and Desmond
Fitzgerald, the head of the Agency's Cuba unit, approved plans to kill
Castro, without seeking presidential authorization. They also continued
other covert operations against Cuba in violation of the President's
instructions. Needless to say, these CIA officers did not inform the
President of their activities; nor did they inform Congress or the
Attorney General, Robert Kennedy. They didn't even tell then-CIA director
John McCone, probably because he was appointed by President Kennedy
following the Bay of Pigs disaster. In short, as Anthony Summers has
observed, "in September and October 1963--a crucial moment
politically--CIA officers were acting in a way that gravely endangered
White House policy". A key figure linking the Agency to the assassination
was CIA man David Atlee Phillips, who was seen with Oswald a few months
before the shooting. Among many other things, Phillips was the propaganda
chief for the Bay of Pigs operation and later rose to become the chief of
the CIA's Western Hemisphere Division. In 1954 Phillips worked with E.
Howard Hunt and others to overthrow the Arbenz government in Guatemala.
Based on his extensive investigation of Phillips for the Church Committee
and then for the Select Committee, Gaeton Fonzi believes that "David Atlee
Phillips played a key role in the conspiracy to assassinate President
Kennedy". Phillips was in charge of the CIA's Cuban operations in Mexico
City at the time of the assassination, so he was strategically positioned
to frame Oswald, and it is quite possible, if not probable, that he was
involved in the phony Oswald visits to the Cuban embassy. Another former
CIA agent who has come under suspicion is E. Howard Hunt. Hunt, a former
high-ranking covert operator and a propaganda specialist, was a key figure
in the Bay of Pigs invasion. As mentioned, Hunt and David Atlee Phillips
helped to overthrow the Arbenz government in Guatemala. According to
former (and now deceased) CIA operative Frank Sturgis, who knew Hunt well,
Hunt was involved in CIA assassination operations. Hunt has made no secret
of his intense dislike for John Kennedy. To this day, Hunt blames JFK for
the failure at the Bay of Pigs. When Watergate whistleblower John Dean
opened Hunt's private safe, he found bogus telegrams that falsely linked
JFK with the assassination of South Vietnam's corrupt dictator Ngo Dinh
Diem. Where was E. Howard Hunt on November 22, 1963? Hunt has given
conflicting accounts of where he was at the time of the shooting. In his
1985 libel trial in Miami, Florida, the jury concluded Hunt was not being
truthful about his whereabouts on the day of the assassination. Hunt was
believed to be the small "tramp" in the famous "tramp photos." The tramp
photos show three supposed tramps, which were arrested in the railroad
yard behind the grassy knoll shortly after the assassination. The tramps
were found in a freight train that had pulled out from behind the TSBD
without authorization. The railroad tower controller stopped the train
because he knew it did not have permission to depart. The police then
searched the train and found the tramps. In the tramp photos the tramps
are being escorted by some Dallas police officers who are holding
shotguns, presumably on route to the police station. In 1988, 3M's Comtal
Corporation analyzed photos of Hunt and of the third tramp and found a
noticeable resemblance between them. All of this does NOT prove Hunt was
the third tramp, but it is worth noting that he bears a strong resemblance
to a man who was arrested in Dealey Plaza shortly after the assassination.

The Mafia had the means, the motive, and the opportunity to assassinate

President Kennedy. Prior to the assassination, various Mafia leaders were
heard to threaten JFK's life. The Mafia were believed to of pay JFK's way
into Power. They thought they had someone in the White House, however JFK
began to crack down on Mafia. On November 20, two Mafia men told Rose
Cheramie that it was common knowledge in the underworld that Kennedy was
about to be killed. Mafia-CIA man David Ferrie was very probably involved
in framing Oswald while he was in New Orleans, and Ferrie engaged in
highly suspicious activity shortly after JFK was shot. And, as mentioned,
a Mafia courier named Eugene Hale Brading was arrested in the Dal-Tex
Building overlooking Dealey Plaza immediately after the shooting. Brading
had an FBI rap sheet with about three dozen arrests. He had met with one
of the sons of avowed Kennedy-hater H. L. Hunt the day before, ostensibly
to discuss some oil business. After he was arrested, Brading gave the
Dallas police an alias, and told them he had merely gone into the building
to use the phone. The police released him a short time later. Without
question, a Mafia man, Jack Ruby, silenced Lee Harvey Oswald before he had
a chance to tell his side of the story. Furthermore, right after the
President's visit to Dallas was announced, Ruby began making numerous
calls to important Mafia contacts all over the country. Ruby, like Eugene
Brading, was in H. L. Hunt's offices the day before the shooting.
Convicted Texas hitman Charles Harrelson has been identified as the tall
man in the famous photos of the three "tramps" who were arrested in the
railroad yard behind Dealey Plaza shortly after the assassination. In the
early 1980s, Harrelson was convicted of murdering federal judge John Wood
with a high-powered rifle, and is currently serving his sentence in a
Texas prison. During the standoff that preceded his arrest, Harrelson not
only confessed to killing Judge Wood, but also said he had been involved
in the Kennedy assassination. Harrelson later retracted his statement
about having taken part in the assassination, claiming he had fabricated
it under the influence of cocaine. When arrested, Harrelson was found to
be carrying the business card of R. D. Matthews, who, was acquainted with
Jack Ruby and with other Dallas crime figures. At Harrelson's trial, Joe
Chagra, the brother of the man who was believed to have hired Harrelson,
testified that Harrelson was given the contract to kill Judge Wood after
he claimed to have participated in the JFK assassination. Indicted along
with Harrelson in the plot to kill Judge Wood was the brother of New
Orleans crime boss Carlos Marcello, who was one of the Mafia figures
identified by the Select Committee as possibly having been involved in the
assassination of President Kennedy. The photos of the tall tramp were
compared with pictures of Harrelson. It was likely that they were same
person. Similarly, police officers trained in photo identification have
that Harrelson definitely appears to be the tall tramp. So far federal
authorities have shown no interest in investigating Harrelson in
connection with any role he might have had in the assassination. Why would
the Mafia have wanted JFK dead? Quite simply, because the Kennedy
administration was threatening the very existence of organized crime in
America. Robert Kennedy was waging an unprecedented war on the Mafia, a
war that targeted not just Mafia operations but also Mafia leaders
themselves. Soon after Lyndon Johnson took over, the war on organized
crime came to a virtual halt. Sam Giancana (real name: Momo Salvatore
Guingano) was a Chicago Mafia boss involved in CIA plots to kill Fidel
Castro. Giancana was also the target of attacks by then Attorney General
Robert F. Kennedy, despite the fact that the Attorney General's own
brother, John Kennedy, had been having an affair with Giancana's paramour,
Judith Exner, starting in March 1960. Further infuriating Giancana, Robert
Kennedy ordered the FBI to shadow his every move so closely that other mob
figures kept their distance from him, effectively isolating him from
business and social associates. Later, out of desperation, Giancana went
to court and obtained an injunction against the FBI.

Anti-Castro Cubans could have also been involved in the Assassination of
JFK. The anti-Castro Cubans were admittedly furious with Kennedy over the
failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion but later forgave him because, among
other things, he ransomed 1,200 captured exile troops from Castro. But
there is strong evidence that some anti-Castro Cubans never forgave
Kennedy for the failure at the Bay of Pigs, and many of these same
individuals were furious at Kennedy over his handling of the Cuban Missile
Crisis and over his shutting down of their para-military training camps.
It should be noted that the militant anti-Castro exiles were almost
exclusively under the control of the CIA.

Richard Nixon was one of the most corrupt residents in the history of our
republic. If nothing else, I believe Nixon might have had foreknowledge of
the assassination (and obviously did nothing to prevent it). The Nixon
administration repeatedly intervened to quash prosecutions and
investigations of criminal activity in Mafia-dominated labor unions. Nixon
was involved in a number of highly questionable--and, in some cases,
Mob-connected--financial dealings. Nixon pardoned organized crime figures
after the government had spent millions of dollars to put them in jail.
Among those pardoned was Mafia killer Angelo DeCarlo. On one occasion,
recorded on a 1971 Watergate tape, Nixon and his aides discussed using Mob
thugs to attack anti-war protestors. Not surprisingly, by all accounts
the Mafia warmly endorsed and supported Nixon's campaigns. John Davis, an
authority on organized crime, has said, For one thing, there is some
evidence linking him to Jack Ruby. It was reported in a 1947 FBI document
that Jack Ruby had performed "information functions for the staff of
Congressman Richard Nixon". Nixon flew to Dallas on November 20, 1963, two
days before the assassination. Asked later why he had come, he said he was
there to attend a board meeting of the Pepsi-Cola Company. Yet, a
subsequent review of Pepsi-Cola corporate files revealed there was no
record of any Pepsi-Cola board meetings in Dallas in 1963. While in
Dallas, Nixon made comments to the city's newspapers to the effect that
he, unlike President Kennedy, did not need Secret Service protection.
Several researchers believe that this taunting might have contributed to
the decision not to have the Plexiglass bubble top placed on his limousine
on the day of the assassination. He is also believe to have influenced the
mayor of Dallas to change the route of the limousine. The route of JFK's
car was changed for an unknown reason to a more dangerous route. (See map
of route) Nixon left Dallas on the morning of the assassination. However,
during an FBI interview in early 1964, he said the only time he had been
in Dallas in 1963 was two days before Kennedy was killed. It has been said
that Nixon must have been the only adult at the time who could not
remember where he was on November 22, 1963. Why did Nixon tell the FBI he
had not been in Dallas on the day of the murder? What exactly was he doing
there from November 20 till the morning of the assassination?

According to none other than Nixon's chief of staff, H. R. Haldeman, Nixon
attempted to force the CIA to assist in thwarting investigations into
Watergate by threatening to expose the CIA's role in the Kennedy
assassination. In connection with this, it is worth mentioning again that
E. Howard Hunt of the CIA was able to blackmail Nixon for a million
dollars. What did Hunt know? As discussed earlier, several researchers
have accused Hunt of complicity in Kennedy's death, and Hunt has given
conflicting accounts of where he was on the day of the shooting.

Also several of the people who were hired or considered for employment by
the Nixon White House during Watergate had been connected with the Warren
Commission. Was this just a coincidence? In addition, some of the
operatives and Cuban exiles who were involved in the Bay of Pigs operation
later turned up in the Watergate affair.

In my opinion, the principal individuals and forces behind the
assassination were fanatical right-wing elements in the CIA and in the
military, J. Edgar Hoover and Lyndon Johnson. I believe CIA and Mafia
operatives, to include disaffected anti-Castro Cubans, constituted the
largest part of the on-the-ground, operational arm of the plot. I believe
that members of the Dallas law enforcement community were involved in the
Dallas end of the cover-up, and that some of them knowingly allowed Jack
Ruby to murder Oswald. I believe that FBI agents, along with J. Edgar
Hoover, played a major role in most aspects of the cover-up. I believe
Oswald was setup by LBJ, Hoover and the CIA. The magic bullet found
mysteriously, later in the Parkland Memorial Hospital in an almost
pristine condition was planted to match Oswald's rifle. .

In my view, the main reasons President Kennedy was killed were
(1) He refused to further escalate American involvement in Vietnam
(2) He was moving to end the Cold War
(3) Mafia's outrage over his war on organized crime.

Just below these reasons, I would list LBJ's lust for the presidency, J.
Edgar Hoover's hatred of JFK and his desire to remain director of the FBI
and Kennedy's reported intent to drastically reorganize or dismantle the
CIA.

By G Taylor


Bibliography

Jim Marrs CROSSFIRE: THE PLOT THAT KILLED KENNEDY, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers,
1989.

James DiEugenio, DESTINY BETRAYED: JFK, CUBA, AND THE GARRISON CASE, New York:
Sheridan Square Press, Inc., 1992.

Harrison Edward Livingstone, HIGH TREASON 2, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1992.

www.ourworld.compuserve.com/homepage/MGriffith/suspects.htm

J.F.K. & the cold war

Urs Schwarz, John F. Kennedy, C.J. Bucher Ltd 1964

Elizabeth Greenup, Case Studies in Modern History, 1987