What If JFK Wasn’t a Conspiracy

[batchaps4me]

We will never be able to know. I believe it was a lot of micro decisions before that day, on that day, and after that made this thing wide open for speculation. And here we are 58 years later hotly debating it.

CYA mode by all governmental agencies that day ensured conspiracies.

I won’t argue against this. I’ll argue what the motivation was that they did it. All agencies like this went into panicked CYA mode after this. The CIA was a weird beast. They might not have even knew for sure if anything could be tied back to them. And they handled it how they knew to handle it.

I’m no fucking fan of the CIA at all. I just don’t see the possible footprints of their explicit involvement in it.

My big Oswald question is why wasn't he arrested when he returned from defecting to the USSR. On the vast majority of days IMHO Oswald acted alone. My distrust of the CIA wins out on some days but they are fewer and further between.

Every time we see Oswald he's wearing light colors but on the day Ruby "shoots" him he is wearing a black sweater and black pants. After he's shot he falls to the floor, he's picked up and brought back into the station. He was reportedly shot in the chest just below the left nipple according to the autopsy the bullet pierced his stomach, spleen, liver, kidney a renal vein, they gave him 15 pints of blood but he bled out yet when he's brought out to the ambulance you see absolutely not a spot of blood anywhere on him or the people bringing him out to the ambulance.

A .22 has enough velocity to bounce around like a pinball when it gets into a thorax. Of all the things that surprise me about this weekend, the effects of Ruby's bullet is not one of them.

 

[RoyMunson]

You don't understand squat.

shooter pulls the trigger on a bolt rifle... is a shell ejected?

shooter cycles the bolt on the rifle... is a shell ejected?

Spoiler: derp

no

yes

 

[beardown07]

Why don't you go find ya some shit to lie about to strangers on the internet?

 

[dbldwn711]

when the shooter cycles the bolt.

if the shooter on the grassy knoll fires 1 shot and doesn't move the bolt, no casing would be found.

ok. Got it.

so you think there was a second shooter on the knoll? That shooter fired only one shot? Did LHO fire any or was he set up? If he fired any shots how many do you think he fired?

 

[DraftNerd]

My big Oswald question is why wasn't he arrested when he returned from defecting to the USSR. On the vast majority of days IMHO Oswald acted alone. My distrust of the CIA wins out on some days but they are fewer and further between.

A .22 has enough velocity to bounce around like a pinball when it gets into a thorax. Of all the things that surprise me about this weekend, the effects of Ruby's bullet is not one of them.

I haven’t dug super deep on this….but I haven’t picked up that citizens defecting and coming back are arrested. I’ve seen story of a soldier who faced a charge of desertion on return (as makes sense) but not citizens.

I get the concept of lack of trust in CIA adds to this. It’s always the main piece that held my mind open. What I struggle with is the why? Why would they take this chance? For me it’s hard to vary too much from credible evidence when I don’t even understand what the end game would have been.

 

[beardown07]

I haven’t dug super deep on this….but I haven’t picked up that citizens defecting and coming back are arrested. I’ve seen story of a soldier who faced a charge of desertion on return (as makes sense) but not citizens.

I get the concept of lack of trust in CIA adds to this. It’s always the main piece that held my mind open. What I struggle with is the why? Why would they take this chance? For me it’s hard to vary too much from credible evidence when I don’t even understand what the end game would have been.

Set a precedent.


Buck the system, and we'll kill your ass on TV, and people will still be debating who dun it 60 years after.

 

[DraftNerd]

i think you are referring to the drawings you posted. He wasn’t shot in the back and it exited his throat. I recall reading an explanation for those sketches but I’m running a bit this morning. Perhaps @Orlando_Eagles who has more insight into this.

I’m still waiting to hear this blood and 15 pints thing. What do you have on that?

The drawings in the Select Commission was drawn by an artist not familiar with the photos or x-rays. There was ridiculous control on who could see the photos and x-rays. They were not entered as evidence, just viewed by some of the committee members. The one drawing this was not one of them.

This was a big issue that fanned these flames so well. The Kennedy’s were utter pains in the asses about the photos and x-rays. They rushed the autopsy in Bethesda by practically standing on top of them. A proper autopsy would have taken 1-2 days. But it was rushed and done in three hours.

 

[RoyMunson]

ok. Got it.

so you think there was a second shooter on the knoll? That shooter fired only one shot? Did LHO fire any or was he set up? If he fired any shots how many do you think he fired?

yes. yes. both. If he didn't police his brass he could have fired up to 4 times.

 

[Nosferatu]

The Warren Commission (WC) said that JFK had a wound of entrance at the base of his neck. The House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA), based on an analysis of disputed autopsy x-rays and photos, moved the wound about two inches downward. However, the evidence indicates this alleged "neck wound" was actually five to six inches below the neck, considerably lower than where the WC, and quite possibly a little lower than where the HSCA located it.

Clearly, the back wound's placement is vital because it foundationally concerns the single-bullet theory; and if the single-bullet theory is wrong, then there had to be more than one gunman firing at President Kennedy. According to this theory, a bullet (often referred to as the "magic bullet") struck JFK near or on the neck, exited his throat, and then went on to cause all of Governor John Connally's extensive injuries. Without the single-bullet hypothesis, there can be no lone-gunman scenario.

Just what is the evidence that the bullet in question struck the President at least five inches down in the back, and not in or near the neck?

* The holes in JFK's shirt and coat place the wound five to six inches below the collar line. The claim that his coat and shirt were hunched up on his back when the bullet struck in such a way as to make the proposed higher back wound line up with the clothing holes is not only far-fetched, but, in my opinion, is refuted by the photographic evidence, as even lone-gunman theorist Jim Moore concedes. This bunched-clothing theory will be dealt with at greater length further on in this article.

* Dr. Boswell's autopsy face sheet diagram shows the wound five to six inches below the neck. That face sheet, by the way, was marked "verified."

* The President's death certificate places the wound at the third thoracic vertebra, which corresponds to the holes in the coat and shirt. This document was also marked "verified."

* Dr. John Ebersole, who got a look at the back wound during the autopsy, said the wound was near the fourth thoracic vertebra (63:721). This is even slightly lower than where the death certificate places the wound.

* Secret Service agent Clint Hill, who was called to the morgue for the specific purpose of viewing Kennedy's wounds, said the entrance point was "about six inches below the neckline to the right-hand side of the spinal column" (18:77-78). Hill's placement of the wound corresponds closely to the location of the holes in the President's shirt and coat.

* The FBI's 9 December 1963 report on the autopsy, which was based on the report of two FBI agents who attended the autopsy (James Sibert and Francis O'Neill), located the wound below the shoulder (i.e., below the top of the shoulder blade) (18:83, 149-168).

* Three Navy medical technicians who assisted with the autopsy, James Jenkins, Paul O'Connor, and Edward Reed, have stated that the wound was well below the neck. Jenkins and O'Connor have also reported that it was probed repeatedly and that the autopsy doctors determined that it had no point of exit (10:260, 262, 302-303; 63:720).

* Floyd Riebe, one of the photographers who took pictures at the autopsy, recalls that the back wound was probed and that it was well below the neck (10:162-163, 302).

* Former Bethesda lab assistant Jan Gail Rudnicki, who was present for much of the autopsy, says the wound was "several inches down on the back" (10:206).

The correct placement of the back wound destroys the single-bullet theory. Given the fact that the bullet entered JFK's back at a sharply downward angle, and at a point five to six inches below the neck (and thus well down on the back), there is no way it could have exited his throat, unless perhaps if it struck bone, but the chief autopsy doctor said he found no evidence that the missile had done so, and the HSCA's own medical panel agreed (69:272; 8:328; 6 HSCA 56). The only other way the missile could have exited Kennedy's throat is if JFK had been leaning far forward when the bullet struck. But photos show that the President was sitting more or less upright before the bullet hit him in the back. The Select Committee's own trajectory consultant said that Kennedy was leaning forward by no more than 18 degrees when the bullet struck.

 

[DraftNerd]

The Warren Commission (WC) said that JFK had a wound of entrance at the base of his neck. The House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA), based on an analysis of disputed autopsy x-rays and photos, moved the wound about two inches downward. However, the evidence indicates this alleged "neck wound" was actually five to six inches below the neck, considerably lower than where the WC, and quite possibly a little lower than where the HSCA located it.

Clearly, the back wound's placement is vital because it foundationally concerns the single-bullet theory; and if the single-bullet theory is wrong, then there had to be more than one gunman firing at President Kennedy. According to this theory, a bullet (often referred to as the "magic bullet") struck JFK near or on the neck, exited his throat, and then went on to cause all of Governor John Connally's extensive injuries. Without the single-bullet hypothesis, there can be no lone-gunman scenario.

Just what is the evidence that the bullet in question struck the President at least five inches down in the back, and not in or near the neck?

* The holes in JFK's shirt and coat place the wound five to six inches below the collar line. The claim that his coat and shirt were hunched up on his back when the bullet struck in such a way as to make the proposed higher back wound line up with the clothing holes is not only far-fetched, but, in my opinion, is refuted by the photographic evidence, as even lone-gunman theorist Jim Moore concedes. This bunched-clothing theory will be dealt with at greater length further on in this article.

* Dr. Boswell's autopsy face sheet diagram shows the wound five to six inches below the neck. That face sheet, by the way, was marked "verified."

* The President's death certificate places the wound at the third thoracic vertebra, which corresponds to the holes in the coat and shirt. This document was also marked "verified."

* Dr. John Ebersole, who got a look at the back wound during the autopsy, said the wound was near the fourth thoracic vertebra (63:721). This is even slightly lower than where the death certificate places the wound.

* Secret Service agent Clint Hill, who was called to the morgue for the specific purpose of viewing Kennedy's wounds, said the entrance point was "about six inches below the neckline to the right-hand side of the spinal column" (18:77-78). Hill's placement of the wound corresponds closely to the location of the holes in the President's shirt and coat.

* The FBI's 9 December 1963 report on the autopsy, which was based on the report of two FBI agents who attended the autopsy (James Sibert and Francis O'Neill), located the wound below the shoulder (i.e., below the top of the shoulder blade) (18:83, 149-168).

* Three Navy medical technicians who assisted with the autopsy, James Jenkins, Paul O'Connor, and Edward Reed, have stated that the wound was well below the neck. Jenkins and O'Connor have also reported that it was probed repeatedly and that the autopsy doctors determined that it had no point of exit (10:260, 262, 302-303; 63:720).

* Floyd Riebe, one of the photographers who took pictures at the autopsy, recalls that the back wound was probed and that it was well below the neck (10:162-163, 302).

* Former Bethesda lab assistant Jan Gail Rudnicki, who was present for much of the autopsy, says the wound was "several inches down on the back" (10:206).

The correct placement of the back wound destroys the single-bullet theory. Given the fact that the bullet entered JFK's back at a sharply downward angle, and at a point five to six inches below the neck (and thus well down on the back), there is no way it could have exited his throat, unless perhaps if it struck bone, but the chief autopsy doctor said he found no evidence that the missile had done so, and the HSCA's own medical panel agreed (69:272; 8:328; 6 HSCA 56). The only other way the missile could have exited Kennedy's throat is if JFK had been leaning far forward when the bullet struck. But photos show that the President was sitting more or less upright before the bullet hit him in the back. The Select Committee's own trajectory consultant said that Kennedy was leaning forward by no more than 18 degrees when the bullet struck.

What are the references in parenthesis above?

 

[batchaps4me]

I haven’t dug super deep on this….but I haven’t picked up that citizens defecting and coming back are arrested. I’ve seen story of a soldier who faced a charge of desertion on return (as makes sense) but not citizens.

I have found only one other defector to the USSR that was allowed to return to the states during the time of Oswald. LHO announced that he was going to turn over military secrets to the Soviets so at least he should have been thoroughly debriefed. Nothing about his return to the states makes any sense for the time period. Remember that then you would get blacklisted for having leftist affiliates, the CIA was testing LSD on unsuspecting citizens and the FBI director was not above trying to get MLK to commit suicide just a few years later. Our intelligence agencies were in total war with communism as was much of the rest of the federal government.

I get the concept of lack of trust in CIA adds to this. It’s always the main piece that held my mind open. What I struggle with is the why? Why would they take this chance? For me it’s hard to vary too much from credible evidence when I don’t even understand what the end game would have been.

Fallout from the Bay of Pigs. JFK thought the JCOS and CIA were trying to make him go to war with the Soviets over Cuba ... please keep in mind that the intel services were in a total war mode ... JFK responded by taking covert ops away from the CIA and that is a loss of a lot of dark money and power. That does not mean that the CIA was involved with assassination but they damned sure had the motive, resources, and connections to pull it off.

 

[DraftNerd]

I have found only one other defector to the USSR that was allowed to return to the states during the time of Oswald. LHO announced that he was going to turn over military secrets to the Soviets so at least he should have been thoroughly debriefed. Nothing about his return to the states makes any sense for the time period. Remember that then you would get blacklisted for having leftist affiliates, the CIA was testing LSD on unsuspecting citizens and the FBI director was not above trying to get MLK to commit suicide just a few years later. Our intelligence agencies were in total war with communism as was much of the rest of the federal government.

Fallout from the Bay of Pigs. JFK thought the JCOS and CIA were trying to make him go to war with the Soviets over Cuba ... please keep in mind that the intel services were in a total war mode ... JFK responded by taking covert ops away from the CIA and that is a loss of a lot of dark money and power. That does not mean that the CIA was involved with assassination but they damned sure had the motive, resources, and connections to pull it off.

I can’t say whether he was debriefed or not is something we can ever know. Much like the FBI with the memo from LHO to agent Hosty…..many instances of an agency having contact with him were expunged in a CYA panic. That takes away the ability to confirm, and adds oxygen to the conspiracy fire. I get it.

Where I land on the Soviet defection is that they might have felt he could have some value. They learned fast he did not. They couldn’t be happier to be rid of him and ignored all his requests to come back. Yes, that could all be cover. But I’ve never been able to square up that the Soviets had any interest in taking JFK out. That’s straight up war with a nuclear aspect hanging over it.

The answer on CIA MO is a good one. Thanks for sharing. I’m sure if we measured our mistrust of the CIA we would find it very close. I just think much the same for them as the Soviets…too much risk in doing this. I recognize that can seem naive, and the wide open canvas for conspiracy that exists here begs for them. I just have never been able to see it.

 

[Nosferatu]

I would like to quote from Henry Hurt's 1985 summary of the medical evidence as it relates to the single-bullet theory. Hurt, a former Rockefeller Foundation fellow, spent years investigating the assassination, and I believe his analysis of this issue is superb and cogent:

One of the most fragile underpinnings of the official version of President Kennedy's murder is the proposition that a bullet entered his back, passed through his body, exited from his lower neck, and went on to pass through Governor Connally. Official medical experts largely agree that this is what happened. If it did not happen this way, it is generally agreed, then there was a second assassin, and thus a conspiracy. The whole flimsy case becomes unglued. Enormous official effort has gone into trying to prove this particular point. Comedy has flashed through the outrageous as doctors arbitrarily moved the location of the back wound several inches upward so that it could be high enough to manage a logical exit from the front of the neck--even though the bullet, which the Warren Commission said hit no bones in Kennedy, was supposedly moving at a sharply downward angle when it entered Kennedy's back. It was a tough case to make, and few people ever believed the government's feeble account. Still, though, it is the official version.

Government officials and their supporters have worked over the years to maintain this legend. Some apparently perjured themselves in service to their cause. Meanwhile, a lone citizen was pursuing the question from quite a different angle. Of the millions of Americans who believed the official version to be a lie, Harold Weisberg set out to prove it so. Alone, he has come far closer to making his case on this point than the whole United States government has in defending its.

Weisberg did not focus on the location of the back wound. He accepted that the body chart drawn and later disavowed by Commander Boswell was correct in showing the back wound to be between five and six inches below President Kennedy's collar line. . . . Weisberg was far more interested in the wound in the front of the neck that was supposed to be the exit for the bullet in the back. The autopsy report, which was embraced by the Warren Commission, described this wound as being in the "low anterior neck."

That front neck wound, of course, was largely believed to have been one of entry by those experienced observers at Parkland Hospital. That was the thrust of their initial impressions and was stated several times at a press briefing at the hospital by a White House official. But the official version ruled that it was a wound of exit and suggested that the exiting bullet caused the nick on the side of the knot of the President's tie. The government version also suggested that the slits through the front of the neckband of the President's shirt were caused by an exiting bullet.

The initial difficulty with the government's case was that the FBI laboratory--after spectrographic analysis--could find no metal traces on the tie or the neckband of the collar, traces that should have been there if a bullet had caused the damage.

The second major problem was one that often plagued the commission: a highly credible witness who saw and said things that contradicted the larger picture. Dr. Charles Carrico, the doctor who examined Kennedy in the emergency room before his shirt and tie were removed, testified to the Warren Commission (and later confirmed in an interview) that the anterior [front] neck wound was above the knot of his tie. A wound location this high in the front would render fatuous the whole teetering premise of the Warren Commission. (The commission ignored Dr. Carrico's testimony on this point, even though he was the doctor in the best position to have any direct knowledge.)

Weisberg pressed his case in court to have the National Archives release clear photographs of the President's shirt and tie, because the pictures that had been provided by the FBI to the Warren Commission were unclear and virtually worthless. The photographs finally disclosed to Weisberg show that the suggested bullet holes in the shirt's front neckband are not bullet holes at all. They are slits made by scalpels used by nurses to cut off the President's necktie. One nurse who cut off the clothing confirmed this, adding impressive evidence to Weisberg's observations. The other astonishing confirmation is that the bullet hole in the back of the shirt is precisely where the first body chart placed it. That chart had been ignored by the commission and disavowed by the doctor who prepared it.

The testimony of Dr. Carrico, combined with the revelations in the photographs, shows with absolute certainty to almost any layman that the bullet that entered Kennedy's back nearly six inches below his collar at a sharply downward angle could not possibly have exited from Kennedy's neck, above the collar, where Dr. Carrico saw the wound.

 

[DraftNerd]

I would like to quote from Henry Hurt's 1985 summary of the medical evidence as it relates to the single-bullet theory. Hurt, a former Rockefeller Foundation fellow, spent years investigating the assassination, and I believe his analysis of this issue is superb and cogent:

One of the most fragile underpinnings of the official version of President Kennedy's murder is the proposition that a bullet entered his back, passed through his body, exited from his lower neck, and went on to pass through Governor Connally. Official medical experts largely agree that this is what happened. If it did not happen this way, it is generally agreed, then there was a second assassin, and thus a conspiracy. The whole flimsy case becomes unglued. Enormous official effort has gone into trying to prove this particular point. Comedy has flashed through the outrageous as doctors arbitrarily moved the location of the back wound several inches upward so that it could be high enough to manage a logical exit from the front of the neck--even though the bullet, which the Warren Commission said hit no bones in Kennedy, was supposedly moving at a sharply downward angle when it entered Kennedy's back. It was a tough case to make, and few people ever believed the government's feeble account. Still, though, it is the official version.

Government officials and their supporters have worked over the years to maintain this legend. Some apparently perjured themselves in service to their cause. Meanwhile, a lone citizen was pursuing the question from quite a different angle. Of the millions of Americans who believed the official version to be a lie, Harold Weisberg set out to prove it so. Alone, he has come far closer to making his case on this point than the whole United States government has in defending its.

Weisberg did not focus on the location of the back wound. He accepted that the body chart drawn and later disavowed by Commander Boswell was correct in showing the back wound to be between five and six inches below President Kennedy's collar line. . . . Weisberg was far more interested in the wound in the front of the neck that was supposed to be the exit for the bullet in the back. The autopsy report, which was embraced by the Warren Commission, described this wound as being in the "low anterior neck."

That front neck wound, of course, was largely believed to have been one of entry by those experienced observers at Parkland Hospital. That was the thrust of their initial impressions and was stated several times at a press briefing at the hospital by a White House official. But the official version ruled that it was a wound of exit and suggested that the exiting bullet caused the nick on the side of the knot of the President's tie. The government version also suggested that the slits through the front of the neckband of the President's shirt were caused by an exiting bullet.

The initial difficulty with the government's case was that the FBI laboratory--after spectrographic analysis--could find no metal traces on the tie or the neckband of the collar, traces that should have been there if a bullet had caused the damage.

The second major problem was one that often plagued the commission: a highly credible witness who saw and said things that contradicted the larger picture. Dr. Charles Carrico, the doctor who examined Kennedy in the emergency room before his shirt and tie were removed, testified to the Warren Commission (and later confirmed in an interview) that the anterior [front] neck wound was above the knot of his tie. A wound location this high in the front would render fatuous the whole teetering premise of the Warren Commission. (The commission ignored Dr. Carrico's testimony on this point, even though he was the doctor in the best position to have any direct knowledge.)

Weisberg pressed his case in court to have the National Archives release clear photographs of the President's shirt and tie, because the pictures that had been provided by the FBI to the Warren Commission were unclear and virtually worthless. The photographs finally disclosed to Weisberg show that the suggested bullet holes in the shirt's front neckband are not bullet holes at all. They are slits made by scalpels used by nurses to cut off the President's necktie. One nurse who cut off the clothing confirmed this, adding impressive evidence to Weisberg's observations. The other astonishing confirmation is that the bullet hole in the back of the shirt is precisely where the first body chart placed it. That chart had been ignored by the commission and disavowed by the doctor who prepared it.

The testimony of Dr. Carrico, combined with the revelations in the photographs, shows with absolute certainty to almost any layman that the bullet that entered Kennedy's back nearly six inches below his collar at a sharply downward angle could not possibly have exited from Kennedy's neck, above the collar, where Dr. Carrico saw the wound.

The point on the photos I would need to think about some. But, here is something that irks me with theorists (and I don’t lay it heavily with Hurt, who I don’t see doing it purposefully here).

The Doctor attending most to the President in the emergency room is certainly a most credible witness, right? That just seems basic logic. Until you listen to all the doctors that were there that day.

Finely trained people with excellent skill and a sharp eye, no doubt. But also humans who literally went from a sleepy quiet emergency room to all hell breaking loose instantly. Carrico also mentioned he faltered for a moment when the President was lain in front of him. Shock took him for a few moments. Who could blame him.

They had a complete mess to try to decipher. They admit themselves that in the rush to establish and stabilize vitals they were really only seeing the head wound. They hadn’t turned him over to check. They did see the neck wound of course, and in hindsight they have said that should give pause in what you were assessing. But….again….their job is to try to stabilize the patient ASAP. They walked right past the neck wound, and even cut through it to set a tube in to get him oxygen, further marring the front neck wound for future analysis.

IIRC correctly Carrico was at his head and reported in the moment only knowing about the head wound.

Feel free to bash me on speculation, but I’m doing it as little as possible, and basing it on accounts the attending doctors gave. What they reported post treatment, with the heat of the moment still bleeding off came be given some leeway for accuracy IMO.

It’s when these credible professionals had time to reflect on it all that their input matters most to me. Yes, I’m away that “time to reflect” can also be “time to threaten and manipulate”…. I just don’t believe that happened here with the attending doctors.

I do believe it was the case that the naval doctors that did the autopsy was manipulated, just not by CIA or some other conspiracy. They were manipulated by the Kennedy’s trying to rush the autopsy.

 

[Rex Racer]

The point on the photos I would need to think about some. But, here is something that irks me with theorists (and I don’t lay it heavily with Hurt, who I don’t see doing it purposefully here).

The Doctor attending most to the President in the emergency room is certainly a most credible witness, right? That just seems basic logic. Until you listen to all the doctors that were there that day.

Finely trained people with excellent skill and a sharp eye, no doubt. But also humans who literally went from a sleepy quiet emergency room to all hell breaking loose instantly. Carrico also mentioned he faltered for a moment when the President was lain in front of him. Shock took him for a few moments. Who could blame him.

They had a complete mess to try to decipher. They admit themselves that in the rush to establish and stabilize vitals they were really only seeing the head wound. They hadn’t turned him over to check. They did see the neck wound of course, and in hindsight they have said that should give pause in what you were assessing. But….again….their job is to try to stabilize the patient ASAP. They walked right past the neck wound, and even cut through it to set a tube in to get him oxygen, further marring the front neck wound for future analysis.

IIRC correctly Carrico was at his head and reported in the moment only knowing about the head wound.

Feel free to bash me on speculation, but I’m doing it as little as possible, and basing it on accounts the attending doctors gave. What they reported post treatment, with the heat of the moment still bleeding off came be given some leeway for accuracy IMO.

It’s when these credible professionals had time to reflect on it all that their input matters most to me. Yes, I’m away that “time to reflect” can also be “time to threaten and manipulate”…. I just don’t believe that happened here with the attending doctors.

I do believe it was the case that the naval doctors that did the autopsy was manipulated, just not by CIA or some other conspiracy. They were manipulated by the Kennedy’s trying to rush the autopsy.

Something interesting about your comment that has almost nothing to do with the comment itself, but points to the larger picture of the unworthiness of eyewitness testimony. Maybe unworthiness is a bit harsh, but I'm sure you get my point. The book that you read and most other theories are formulated using hard evidence that is bolstered by the testimony of eyewitnesses yet we know that such testimony is often unreliable.

Hell we could line up 10 different Hoopnation posters and have them watch a dramatic event and immediately ask them to write down, in detail what they just saw. I'd be willing to bet the we'd be lucky to get 2 people to give the same exact version of the incident.

 

[batchaps4me]

I can’t say whether he was debriefed or not is something we can ever know. Much like the FBI with the memo from LHO to agent Hosty…..many instances of an agency having contact with him were expunged in a CYA panic. That takes away the ability to confirm, and adds oxygen to the conspiracy fire. I get it.

Where I land on the Soviet defection is that they might have felt he could have some value. They learned fast he did not. They couldn’t be happier to be rid of him and ignored all his requests to come back. Yes, that could all be cover. But I’ve never been able to square up that the Soviets had any interest in taking JFK out. That’s straight up war with a nuclear aspect hanging over it.

Of all the usual suspects, the USSR is at the very bottom of the list, right after Switzerland. I have zero doubt when I say that they were not involved nor did they benefit from JFK's death. IF LHO was an agent of an intelligence agency, he was one of ours and I have no evidence of that.

The answer on CIA MO is a good one. Thanks for sharing. I’m sure if we measured our mistrust of the CIA we would find it very close. I just think much the same for them as the Soviets…too much risk in doing this. I recognize that can seem naive, and the wide open canvas for conspiracy that exists here begs for them. I just have never been able to see it.

I just had my noon and bake so read further at your own risk ... I don't thank it is naive at all. IMHO their involvement in the assassination is just post fact CYA actions supporting other themselves and other agencies. Even though I don't think they did it, I think they were fully capable of pulling it off.

 

[dbldwn711]

I would like to quote from Henry Hurt's 1985 summary of the medical evidence as it relates to the single-bullet theory. Hurt, a former Rockefeller Foundation fellow, spent years investigating the assassination, and I believe his analysis of this issue is superb and cogent:

One of the most fragile underpinnings of the official version of President Kennedy's murder is the proposition that a bullet entered his back, passed through his body, exited from his lower neck, and went on to pass through Governor Connally. Official medical experts largely agree that this is what happened. If it did not happen this way, it is generally agreed, then there was a second assassin, and thus a conspiracy. The whole flimsy case becomes unglued. Enormous official effort has gone into trying to prove this particular point. Comedy has flashed through the outrageous as doctors arbitrarily moved the location of the back wound several inches upward so that it could be high enough to manage a logical exit from the front of the neck--even though the bullet, which the Warren Commission said hit no bones in Kennedy, was supposedly moving at a sharply downward angle when it entered Kennedy's back. It was a tough case to make, and few people ever believed the government's feeble account. Still, though, it is the official version.

Government officials and their supporters have worked over the years to maintain this legend. Some apparently perjured themselves in service to their cause. Meanwhile, a lone citizen was pursuing the question from quite a different angle. Of the millions of Americans who believed the official version to be a lie, Harold Weisberg set out to prove it so. Alone, he has come far closer to making his case on this point than the whole United States government has in defending its.

Weisberg did not focus on the location of the back wound. He accepted that the body chart drawn and later disavowed by Commander Boswell was correct in showing the back wound to be between five and six inches below President Kennedy's collar line. . . . Weisberg was far more interested in the wound in the front of the neck that was supposed to be the exit for the bullet in the back. The autopsy report, which was embraced by the Warren Commission, described this wound as being in the "low anterior neck."

That front neck wound, of course, was largely believed to have been one of entry by those experienced observers at Parkland Hospital. That was the thrust of their initial impressions and was stated several times at a press briefing at the hospital by a White House official. But the official version ruled that it was a wound of exit and suggested that the exiting bullet caused the nick on the side of the knot of the President's tie. The government version also suggested that the slits through the front of the neckband of the President's shirt were caused by an exiting bullet.

The initial difficulty with the government's case was that the FBI laboratory--after spectrographic analysis--could find no metal traces on the tie or the neckband of the collar, traces that should have been there if a bullet had caused the damage.

The second major problem was one that often plagued the commission: a highly credible witness who saw and said things that contradicted the larger picture. Dr. Charles Carrico, the doctor who examined Kennedy in the emergency room before his shirt and tie were removed, testified to the Warren Commission (and later confirmed in an interview) that the anterior [front] neck wound was above the knot of his tie. A wound location this high in the front would render fatuous the whole teetering premise of the Warren Commission. (The commission ignored Dr. Carrico's testimony on this point, even though he was the doctor in the best position to have any direct knowledge.)

Weisberg pressed his case in court to have the National Archives release clear photographs of the President's shirt and tie, because the pictures that had been provided by the FBI to the Warren Commission were unclear and virtually worthless. The photographs finally disclosed to Weisberg show that the suggested bullet holes in the shirt's front neckband are not bullet holes at all. They are slits made by scalpels used by nurses to cut off the President's necktie. One nurse who cut off the clothing confirmed this, adding impressive evidence to Weisberg's observations. The other astonishing confirmation is that the bullet hole in the back of the shirt is precisely where the first body chart placed it. That chart had been ignored by the commission and disavowed by the doctor who prepared it.

The testimony of Dr. Carrico, combined with the revelations in the photographs, shows with absolute certainty to almost any layman that the bullet that entered Kennedy's back nearly six inches below his collar at a sharply downward angle could not possibly have exited from Kennedy's neck, above the collar, where Dr. Carrico saw the wound.

it seems like you are finding credence with several different theories involving a conspiracy to kill Kennedy. This one, by hurt, is from his book Reasonable Doubt. Earlier, you mentioned something about no blood in the ambulance carrying Oswald (I’m still waiting for you to give me the details there). You also are putting forth questions about “why” certain things happened.

I’m trying to understand what you think about this case. Do you ascribe to some theory about what happened or do you just think “hey… look at all this different theories that raise all these different issues” and because of that there is no way LHO acted alone.

You’ve made it very clear that you don’t believe either of the official versions. What do you believe happened?

 

[DraftNerd]

Something interesting about your comment that has almost nothing to do with the comment itself, but points to the larger picture of the unworthiness of eyewitness testimony. Maybe unworthiness is a bit harsh, but I'm sure you get my point. The book that you read and most other theories are formulated using hard evidence that is bolstered by the testimony of eyewitnesses yet we know that such testimony is often unreliable.

Hell we could line up 10 different Hoopnation posters and have them watch a dramatic event and immediately ask them to write down, in detail what they just saw. I'd be willing to bet the we'd be lucky to get 2 people to give the same exact version of the incident.

You’re absolutely correct. I kept a fair head while I read this. He pointed out well that some witnesses (like Jean Hill we discussed yesterday) arent credible and why they weren’t. But the author explained why another witness was credible, and if he couldn’t he didn’t try to stretch it too often.

This was an issue from the moment of the shots and it’s only become more of an issue as time goes by. I mentioned it yesterday….this is never being solved. People will land where they will land on it. My aim here wasn’t to put tHoop on the map by finally solving this…..it was just to have some discussion and debate on it.

 

[dbldwn711]

Of all the usual suspects, the USSR is at the very bottom of the list, right after Switzerland. I have zero doubt when I say that they were not involved nor did they benefit from JFK's death. IF LHO was an agent of an intelligence agency, he was one of ours and I have no evidence of that.


I just had my noon and bake so read further at your own risk ... I don't thank it is naive at all. IMHO their involvement in the assassination is just post fact CYA actions supporting other themselves and other agencies. Even though I don't think they did it, I think they were fully capable of pulling it off.

hahaha

enjoy your afternoon.

FWIW, I agree (and appreciate) your last comment. I think it’s right on the money. I don’t think the CIA killed Kennedy but I agree they were capable of doing it if they wanted to. I do think there is major CYA going on AFTER the fact and it’s not just them. The SS, the FBI and others are all to blame for obvious lapses which allowed this to happen. However, CYA after the fact does not mean there is a conspiracy.

What do you think happened that day?

 

[dbldwn711]

Something interesting about your comment that has almost nothing to do with the comment itself, but points to the larger picture of the unworthiness of eyewitness testimony. Maybe unworthiness is a bit harsh, but I'm sure you get my point. The book that you read and most other theories are formulated using hard evidence that is bolstered by the testimony of eyewitnesses yet we know that such testimony is often unreliable.

Hell we could line up 10 different Hoopnation posters and have them watch a dramatic event and immediately ask them to write down, in detail what they just saw. I'd be willing to bet the we'd be lucky to get 2 people to give the same exact version of the incident.

I also agree with this and with what @Orlando_Eagles said about it. Each witness must be taken on their own and assessed. That’s not to say cherry pick them but simply evaluate each one on their own merits.

What do you think happened that day? How many shooters? How many shots?