Not in Your Lifetime: The Defining Book on the J.F.K. Assassination (57 page)

Ayers: Ayers,
War That Never Was
,
op. cit.
, p. 53; and ints. 1980, 1994, 1995.

Krulak/Kennedy: Ayers,
War That Never Was
,
op. cit.
, pp. 14, 76, 147. (In the book, Ayers called him Kartak.)

298
     Exile leaders talk: AP, May 10, 1963; CRC statement, June 21, 1963.

San Roman: int. 1994. Author also drew on 1994 ints. of Ramón Font, Eugenio Martínez, Eloy Menoyo, Rafael Quintero, Segundo Borges & (courtesy of Lamar Waldron) with Enrique Ruiz-Williams.

299
Note 3
: The document was supplied to the author by David Barrett, a political science professor at Villanova Unversity in Pennsylvania, who located it at the National Archives. (Memos of calls of August 20, 1962, Box 46, Executive Secretariat, State Department Records, NARA & see “McCone’s Telcon Gaffe” by Max Holland & David Barrett, August 22, 2012 & related citations).

Note 4
: See, for example, David Kaiser’s
The Road to Dallas
, p. 302, Brian
Latell,
Castro’s Secrets: The CIA and Cuba’s Intelligence Machine
. (Latell is a former CIA analyst specializing in Latin American affairs, now with the University of Miami), p. 93–, and Gus Russo’s
Live by the
Sword, p. 61–, and Seymour Hersh’s
The Dark Side of Camelot
(New York: Little, Brown, 1997), pp. 3, 291–, 399n.

By contrast Arthur Schlesinger—who had been a Special Assistant to President Kennedy—devoted several pages in his Robert Kennedy biography to rebutting the notion that the Kennedys encouraged the Castro assassination plots. “No one who knew John and Robert Kennedy well,” he wrote, “believed they would conceivably countenance a program of assassination.” More recently, the author David Talbot argued in his book
Brothers
that there was “no compelling evidence” to support the claim that the Kennedys authorized Castro’s assassination. (Schlesinger,
Robert F. Kennedy
,
op. cit.
, p. 488–, & David Talbot,
Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years
, New York, Simon & Schuster, 2007, p. 93–)

Cubela: Sen. Int. Cttee.
Assassination Plot
s, pp. 86– and 174–; author’s int of Rolando Cubela, Havana, 1978; HSCA X.157, 162–; HSCA Report, p. 111–; and author’s perusal of relevant 1994 CIA releases.

300
Note 5
: According to interview notes taken by Assassinations Committee investigators, one of the exiles most favored by the Kennedy administration, Manuel Artime, said weeks before his own death that he “had direct contact with JFK and RFK personally. They in turn contacted the CIA … AMLASH [the CIA cryptonym for the Cubela operation] was proposed by JFK.” (notes of HSCA investigators Al Gonzalez & Gaeton Fonzi, available in HSCA document releases of 1994 as HSCA 014584; ints. with Gonzalez, 1994.)

“traitor” thesis: refs., Latell,
op. cit.

301
     Veteran: HSCA X.65.

Veciana: ints.Veciana, 1978, 1980, 1993; HSCA X.37– and HSCA Report, p. 135–; HSCA IV.476 & ints. HSCA staff; “Dallas, the Cuban Connection,”
Saturday Evening Post
, March 1976; “Who Killed President Kennedy?” article by former HSCA investigator Gaeton Fonzi,
Washingtonian
, November 1980; research by David Leigh for
Washington Post
, June–July 1980; ints. Gaeton Fonzi, 1993; Gaeton Fonzi,
The Last Investigation
, New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 1993.

304
Note 6
: Veciana’s group Alpha 66 was to be linked to the name “Oswald” immediately after the assassination. Early on November 23, a Dallas police detective would report information from an informant that an “Oswald” had attended meetings of an anti-Castro group at an address in Dallas. Cubans had vacated the address in the last few days. It is now known that the address in question had been a local base for Alpha 66. (XIX.534, report of Deputy Sheriff B. Walthers, November 23, 1963, see also CD 1085U. There is confusion over two phonetically similar addresses, but the correct address was probably 3126 Hollandale, in the Farmers Branch area.)

Note 7
: For a discussion of the Committee’s debate on Veciana’s claims, see HSCA volumes as indicated
supra
, and p. 330 of an earlier edition of this book (New York: Paragon, 1989) and in Chapter 24, “Hints and Deceptions.”

Agents seized: Sen. Int. Cttee.,
Performance of
Intelligence Agencies
, p. 12–.

305
     Lacombe:
ibid
., and
New Orleans States-Item
, May 5, 1963; (Ferrie) James & Wardlaw,
op. cit.
, p. 131; (McLaney)
Washington Post
, August 1, 1963; HSCA X.185, X.72–.

Note 8
: Author Gus Russo quotes three interviewees as having alluded to Ferrie’s role at camps near New Orleans, and reporter Jack Wardlaw cited a
New
Orleans
States-Item
reference to Ferrie’s role at Lacombe. (Russo,
op. cit.
, p. 187, Rosemary James and Jack Wardlaw,
Plot or Politics: The Garrison Case and Its Cast
, New Orleans: Pelican, 1967, p. 131, Russo,
op. cit.
, p.187.)

Raid & McLaney:
Washington Post
,
August 1, 1963, HSCA X.185, X.72–.

Note 9
: Mike
McLaney had owned the International Casino in Havana. In 1973, in sworn testimony to the Senate Subcommittee on Investigations, a witness stated that McLaney “represents Meyer Lansky”—the man dubbed the “finance minister of the Mob.” The same witness claimed McLaney had plotted the assassination of Bahamian leader Lynden Pindling. McLaney denied the allegation, and the Assassinations Committee found no evidence that the McLaney operation in Louisiana was linked to the CIA or to the crime syndicate. (HSCA X.185)

Bringuier: memo, FBI New Orleans to HQ, May 11, 1964.

Interpen:
New York Times
, September 16, 1963.

Sturgis group financing: Fensterwald,
op. cit.
, p. 505.

Hall: (detained) Weisberg,
Oswald in New Orleans
,
op. cit.
, pp. 161, 273, 274, 276, and HSCA X.22; (Cuban detention) int. of Hall by Harold Weisberg, p. 92; Most stung by clampdown: HSCA X.13.

306
     “Those individuals”: Sen. Int. Cttee.
Assassination Plots
, p. 13.

“At peace”: AP, July 31, 1963.

Oswald at time of “Bishop” meeting: chronology of Oswald’s activities based on Warren Commission documents, by researchers Mary Ferrell & Arch Kimbrough.

O
swald at Mexican Consulate: XXIV.549, 685; XXV.17, 811. Passport: XXII.12; XXIV.509;

307
     Knight:
New York Times
, March 23, 1966.

Tourist card numbers: FBI report November 30, 1963, File no. SA89-67; CD 21; CD 75; CD 88; CD 613; CD 652.

Gaudet: ints. 1977, 1978; int. by Bernard Fensterwald, 1975, by Allen Stone (WRR, Dallas), May 7, 1975; HSCA Report, p. 218–; John Newman,
op. cit.
, p. 346–, CIA Advice of Project Action 00-48-50, February 15, 1950, & 00-32-51, June 21, 1950; Asst . Dir. Ops to Chief, Inspection & Sec., January 5, 1950 & attachments, Secrecy Agreement, March 2, 1950, CIA 1993 releases.

309
Note 10
: Gaudet said, too, that, “Another vital person is Sergio
Arcacha Smith. I know he knew Oswald and knows more about the Oswald affair than he ever admitted.” As the first New Orleans representative of the Cuban Revolutionary Council, Arcacha—mentioned earlier in the Notes for Chapter 17—had previously had an office at 544 Camp Street. The author knows of no link between Arcacha and Oswald.

Gaudet saw Oswald/Banister: int. Gaudet, 1978; HSCA Report, p. 219n.

Note 11
: Interviewed after her husband’s death, Gaudet’s widow said he had known Banister, though not well. (int. Mrs. C. K. Gaudet, 1993)

310
     “Giving some thought”: Papich to Brennan, September 13, 1963, FBI 97-4196-861, www.maryferrell.org; Sen. Int. Cttee.,
Performance of
Intelligence Agencies
, p. 65.

Oswald summary of achievements: Report, p. 731.

311
     Oswald leaves New Orleans: XI.462–; XXIII.715; CD 170.4, 8; HSCA X.21.

312
     Frontier stamp: XXV.16 and 819; XXIV.663.

IV. ENDGAME: Deception and Tragedy

19. Exits and Entrances in Mexico City

315
     “Oswald’s visit”: AARB Report, p. 86.

Passengers on bus: (Mumford & Winston) XI.215, ints. with both, 1993; (M
cF
arland) XI.214.

316
Note 1
: On the bus, Oswald sat next to a much older man who spoke with an English accent. An extensive search eventually led investigators to a person who had traveled under the name of John Bowen, but denied having sat next to Oswald. He claimed that he was a “missionary” who traveled extensively and that his most recent trip, begun just before the Kennedy
assassination, had included France and Spain. Intensive frontier checks revealed no record of entrance to either country. This man might not seem worth noting at all were it not that when tracked down he was using the name “Osborne.” In New Orleans, the name Osborne had twice been used to order the printing of Fair Play for Cuba Committee material. This is likely a mere coincidence. (Bowen: XI.220; XXIV.576; XXV.42, 45, 75; Report, p. 733; “Osborne”: see Notes for start of Chapter 16)

Hotel Cuba: XI.223

Note 2
: A long-ago foray to a border town while on leave from a Marines base aside, the heavily documented record of Oswald’s life shows no previous visits to Mexico. Guy Banister’s secretary, Delphine Roberts, however, told the author in 1978 that she believed—on the basis of what Banister told her—that Oswald made more than one trip to Mexico in the summer of 1963.

Hotel Comercio: Report, p. 733; and Robbyn Swan’s int. manager Guillermo García Luna, 1993.

Note 3
: The Warren Commission had trouble documenting the bus travel by Oswald. Establishing how he returned to the United States remained unresolved until the production in August 1964 of a bus ticket allegedly found by Marina Oswald while working with the author Priscilla McMillan. The Warren Commission’s Senator Russell was less than satisfied on this point. Oswald’s re-entry to the United States was initially reported to have been by “automobile.” Had that been the case, and as Oswald did not drive and had no car, questions would arise as to who might have traveled with him. Further, on its face strong, evidence that Oswald did travel to Mexico was a copy of a letter he apparently wrote on November 9—following the trip—to the Soviet Embassy in Washington, DC. Both the content of this letter and the circumstances of its writing have raised questions about its purpose and authenticity. What Lee and
Marina Oswald had to say on the subject of Mexico will be reported later in this chapter. A useful research tool on the overall Mexico episode is researcher Rex Bradford’s paper “Not a Shred of a Speck of Evidence for Conspiracy: Vincent Bugliosi on the Mexico City Impostor,” 2007, updated, supplied to author; Nov. 9 letter: infra., Chapter 20, Jerry Rose, “Gifts from Russia: Yeltsin and Mitrokhin,”
Fourth Decade
, 7.1, & HSCAVIII, 233–, 237–, 351–, 358; Marina: HSCA I.27–50, XI.150, 155,) Mexico activity: (except where indicated) Report, p. 299– and HSCA Report, pp. 121–, 248–.

Oswald in Mexico: (seen with Cubans) XXVI.672; (exile haunt) Anson,
op. cit.
, p. 251.

317
     Durán: ints. 1978, 1993, and other contacts; XXV.586, 634; XVI.33; XXIV.590; HSCA III.6.

Durán re. phony?: HSCA III.35, 58; int. John Newman, 1995.

318
     Azcue: XXIV.570; XXIV.563; author’s research in Cuba; HSCA III.127; Report, pp. 301, 734–.

319
Note 4
: According to Cuban Intelligence defector Vladimir Rodríguez Lahera, Mirabal was—while fronting as a consular official in Mexico City—also a senior Cuban Intelligence officer. (Debriefing of AMMUG-1, April 1964, NARA 104-10183-10284)

Communist Party card: HSCA III.176, 155, 142.

Note 5
: A CIA document, however, was to state that Oswald returned to the Cuban Consulate the following day—Saturday, September 28—and that Durán assisted him in telephoning the Soviet Embassy. Durán has insisted that was not so, that she did not work on Saturdays. (Helms to Rankin & attachment, January 31, 1964, NARA 104-10009-10212.)

KGB officials: ints.Valery Kostikov, Pavel Yatskov, & Oleg Nechiporenko, 1993.

CIA surveillance: HSCA report, “Oswald, the CIA, and Mexico City,” by Edwin Lopez and Dan Hardway, released with redactions, 1993; David Phillips’s speech to National Military Intelligence Association, June 1976; David Phillips,
The Night Watch
, New York:
Atheneum, 1977; ints. with Cuban Ministry of the Interior officials, 1978 (including Nilvio Labrada, electronics specialist).

320
Note 6
: The Warren Report referred to this information euphemistically as having come from “sources of high reliability available to the United States in Mexico.” What we now know of that will be the basis of much of this chapter. (Report, p. 305)

Surveillance:
New York Times
, September 21, 1975;
Washington Post
, November 26, 1976; Secret Service document 104; State Department telegram 1201, November 28, 1963; Assassination Information Bureau briefing document, “Oswald’s Alleged Contacts with the Cuban and Soviet Embassies in Mexico City, 1978”; (with Soviets) Report, p. 734; XXVI.149, 667–; CD 1084d.5; CD 1216; and CD 347 reported in Coleman-Slawson draft.