The Gemstone File

Must be read to be believed. The real Gemstone File--the letters of Bruce Porter Roberts--to be found at http://realgemstonefile.blogspot.com
Still a work in progress. Stop MMORDIS now!

Beating the war drum
Posted: January 30, 20061:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com

To the casual observer, it might seem utterly ludicrous to imagine that the administration is seriously contemplating yet another invasion of a Middle Eastern nation when it is still losing troops every week in an occupied, but unpacified Iraq. But the war drums are again being beaten by the talking heads and the signs are unmistakable.

One of the most reliable indicators is the inevitable flying of the Hitler flag. Slobodan Milosovic was the first in the recent string of Second Comings of Hitler; after the Serbian surrender the dread title was passed on to Saddam Hussein. Now that he has been unceremoniously removed from power, (and following a brief consideration of fellow Axis of Evil member, North Korea's Kim Jong Il), Hitlerhood has been finally been conveyed upon Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=48561

Will the U.S. switch sides in Iraq?

Several times in the last several months I have hinted at the possiblity that the United States might eventually switch sides in the war in Iraq. The new Shiite goverment in that country has close historical and religious ties to Iran. The Sunni insurgency is deeply concerned about this situation and their ties to Al Qaeda are strained.

Exclusive: Direct Talks—U.S. Officials and Iraqi Insurgents

Feb. 6, 2006 issue - American officials in Iraq are in face-to face talks with high-level Iraqi Sunni insurgents, NEWSWEEK has learned. Americans are sitting down with "senior members of the leadership" of the Iraqi insurgency, according to Americans and Iraqis with knowledge of the talks

They have much to discuss. For one, Americans and Iraqi insurgent groups share a common fear of undue Iranian influence in Iraq. "There is more concern about the domination by Iran of Iraq," says a senior Western diplomat, "and that combination of us being open to them and the dynamics of struggle for domination of violence has come together to get them to want to reach an understanding with us." Contacts between U.S. officials and insurgents have been criticized by Iraq's ruling Shiite leaders, many of whom have longstanding ties to Iran and are deeply resented by Sunnis. "We haven't given the green light to [talks] between the U.S. and insurgents," says Vice President Adel Abdel Mehdi, of the Shiite party, called the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.

www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11079548/site/newsweek/

The next step, I suppose, would be arming the insurgency.

Henry Zapruder Dies

I received the following email from researcher Bruce Adamson (www.ciajfk.com):

Notice Henry Zapruder died on Jan. 24, 2006, he was a lawyer for the Department of Justice in Washington D.C. when his father shot the film of JFK's assassination.

His father belonged to the same CIA organization as the de
Mohrenschildt's The Dallas Council On World Affairs which was founded by Neil Mallon, the classmate of Prescott Bush at Yale. Both Prescott and Mallon were Skull and Bones members.

Mallon held an office in the same building as CIA agent George de Mohrenschildt and the building was under a CIA trust.

bruce c. adamson

Obituary in short is as follows;:

ZAPRUDER, HENRY G.

On Tuesday, January 24, 2006, HENRY G. ZAPRUDER of Chevy Chase, MD. Beloved husband of Marjorie Zapruder; devoted father of Matthew, Michael and Alexandra (Craig Dye) Zapruder; dear brother of Myrna Ries; loving grandfather of Hannah Lilly. Funeral services will be held on Thursday, January 26, 2006, 10:30 a.m. at Temple Micah, 2829 Wisconsin Ave. N.W., Washington, DC 20007. Interment following at Mt. Lebanon Cemetery, Adelphi, MD. Shiva will be observed at the late residence, Thursday evening, Saturday and Sunday evenings. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the American Brain Tumor Association, 2720 River Rd., Des Plaines, IL 60018 or to the Henry G. Zapruder Fund for Education, c/o The Rabbi's Discretionary Fund at Temple Micah.

Our Fearless Leader

The Imperium's Quarter Century

Robert Parry, one of the few real journalists, has an interesting article on the October Surprise, putting it in historical context.

If there is a birth date for today’s American Imperium, it would be Jan. 20, 1981, exactly a quarter century ago, when Ronald Reagan was sworn in as President and Iran released 52 American hostages under circumstances that remain a mystery to this day.

The freedom of the hostages, ending a 444-day crisis, brought forth an outpouring of patriotism that bathed the new President in an aura of heroism as a leader so feared by America’s enemies that they scrambled to avoid angering him. It was viewed as a case study of how U.S. toughness could restore the proper international order.

What’s now known about the Iranian hostage crisis suggests that the “coincidence” of the Reagan Inauguration and the Hostage Release was not a case of frightened Iranians cowering before a U.S. President who might just nuke Tehran.

The preponderance of evidence suggests that it was a prearranged deal between the Republicans and the Iranians. The Republicans got the hostages and the political bounce; Iran’s Islamic fundamentalists got a secret supply of weapons and various other payoffs.

www.consortiumnews.com/2006/011906.html

Sinister vegetarian terrorist

Keeping America safe from Vegans - I know I feel safer

The ACLU of Georgia released copies of government files on Wednesday that illustrate the extent to which the FBI, the DeKalb County Division of Homeland Security and other government agencies have gone to compile information on Georgians suspected of being threats simply for expressing controversial opinions.

For example, more than two dozen government surveillance photographs show 22-year-old Caitlin Childs of Atlanta, a strict vegetarian, and other vegans picketing against meat eating, in December 2003. They staged their protest outside a HoneyBaked Ham store on Buford Highway in DeKalb County.

An undercover DeKalb County Homeland Security detective was assigned to conduct surveillance of the protest and the protestors, and take the photographs. The detective arrested Childs and another protester after he saw Childs approach him and write down, on a piece of paper, the license plate number of his unmarked government car.

www.11alive.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=75151

Now, I realize that ham is vital to our national security but really, aren't there other priorities like, oh, I don't know, terrorism?

Protecting the Ham.

The Gun is Smoking:
2004 Ohio Precinct-level Exit Poll Data Show Virtually
Irrefutable Evidence of Vote Miscount
http://electionarchive.org/ucvAnalysis/OH/Ohio-Exit-Polls-2004.pdf

FBI, DoD, NSA: All Spying on You

Over the last several months, it has been revealed that the FBI, the Pentagon and the National Security Agency have each set up apparently independent covert operations to monitor the constitutionally protected political activities of citizens opposed to the Bush administration's war in Iraq.

According to records obtained by the ACLU under a Freedom Of Information Act request, the FBI's targets included people involved in a "vegan community project" in Indianapolis, the Catholic Worker movement and its "semi-communistic ideology," Code Pink, the anti-war coalition United for Peace and Justice, Greenpeace and attendees of the Third National Organizing Conference on Iraq, which was held at Stanford University in May 2005. According to the documents, in some cases the FBI received information about those under surveillance from informers within the targeted groups.

Over at the Pentagon, the Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) office, which was established in 2002, now employees more than 1,000 people. According to the Washington Post, CIFA has what the military calls "tasking authority" over the 4,000 people who work in Army, Navy and Air Force intelligence units. What CIFA does is not exactly clear, but in December, NBC reported it had "obtained a secret Pentagon database that indicates the U.S. military is collecting information on American peace activists and monitoring protests against the Iraq war." A document stamped "secret" reports, "We have noted increased communication between protest groups using the Internet," but not a "significant connection" between incidents, such as "recurring instigators" or "vehicle descriptions," which suggests the Pentagon has been monitoring e-mail and tracking anti-war activists by the cars they drive. The document is 400 pages long and lists 1,500 "suspicious incidents across the country over a 10-month period," including "four dozen anti-war meetings or protests, including one in Hollywood."
www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2474/

Every thousand man-hours spent monitoring Quaker peace groups and Vegans is time and money that could have been spent on protecting our country from terrorism.

Bush must be stopped

In the last poll I saw Bush was at a 36% approval rating. It seems to me that if Bush is to go even lower in the polls it will have to come from his base. I can think of two areas where this might happen:

1) honest and principled conservatives- let's face it: Bush is not a conservative (nor is he honest or principled) but a radical right activist and conservatives who genuinely value the constitution are already grumbling. Case in point, former Congressman Bob Barr:

“The emergence of international terrorism on our shores cannot be allowed to dissolve the carefully constructed structural foundations for preserving our liberty that are required by the Constitution; that very document our soldiers have sacrificed and continue to sacrifice their lives to protect.” --Former Congressman Bob Barr (R-GA), Chairman of Patriots to Restore Checks and Balances

A number of Conservatives have signed a letter to George W. Bush concerning the Patriot Act:

www.checksbalances.org/FINAL%20Letter%20with%20Signatures.pdf

2) The religious right: I know--he's one of them (or pretends to be.) But if more evangelical Christians knew of his involvement with the Unification Church (Moonies) and knew more about that group, I do not think they would approve. Do they know that he sent a statement of support to a group that sponsored a Tear Down The Cross Day?

This wintry season, as the faithful continue to receive alarming reports from the news that Republicans are all that stand between them and the outlawing of Christmas itself by hordes of secular humanists, the two presidents Bush have endorsed a powerful conservative interest group specializing in removing the cross -- not from schools or courthouses, but from churches.

http://gadflyer.com/articles/?ArticleID=258

Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires-a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so.

George W. Bush, April 2004

Under this President we have seen secret prisons, torture, illegal wire-taps, surveillance of peace groups, and an unending stream of lies to the people and the Congress. Now the President, under an obscure doctrine of the "unitary executive" is determined to expand his power even further. We have had one King George in our history and George W. Bush would do well to profit by his example.

Dangers of the Patriot Act

Unfathomed Dangers in PATRIOT Act Reauthorization

by Paul Craig Roberts

A provision in the "PATRIOT Act" creates a new federal police force with the power to violate the Bill of Rights. You might think that this cannot be true, as you have not read about it in newspapers or heard it discussed by talking heads on TV.

Go to House Report 109-333 USA PATRIOT Improvement and Reauthorization Act of 2005 and check it out for yourself. Sec. 605 reads:

"There is hereby created and established a permanent police force, to be known as the 'United States Secret Service Uniformed Division.'"

This new federal police force is "subject to the supervision of the Secretary of Homeland Security."

The new police are empowered to "make arrests without warrant for any offense against the United States committed in their presence, or for any felony cognizable under the laws of the United States if they have reasonable grounds to believe that the person to be arrested has committed or is committing such felony."

The new police are assigned a variety of jurisdictions, including "an event designated under section 3056(e) of title 18 as a special event of national significance" (SENS).
www.antiwar.com/roberts/?articleid=8434

Sibel Edmonds

Found an interesting piece by W. David Jenkins III on Sibel Edmonds, American heroine.

As Edmonds has stated, the cast of players she stumbled upon during her time at the FBI and some of the very same people that Valerie Plame was investigating involved the actions of top officials in the government and a lot of illegal activities that include multi-billion-dollar drug-smuggling operations, black-market nuclear sales to terrorists and unsavory regimes. In an August 5th interview, Edmonds said, “You can start from the AIPAC angle. You can start from the Plame case. You can start from my case. They all end up going to the same place, and they revolve around the same nucleus of people.”

www.oldamericancentury.org/dave3_039.htm

Imperial America

I have just finished reading Gore Vidal's book of essays Imperial America and thought I would share a few quotes. I do not always agree with him but he is always provocative. Vidal maintains that in America there are really only two political factions; "conservatives, amusingly called liberals" and the radical right.

To assume wartime powers without a war is something new under the American sun, requiring a blizzard of lies.

Without a plurality of the popular vote and without, it would seem, carrying the Electoral College (many Florida votes were never counted at all), Bush was allowed to take office without actually winning the election.

Although there has never been a left wing in the United States, certain gentle conservatives like to think of themselves as liberals, as defenders of the environment, enemies of our dumber wars.

The carnival of our presidential election goes on and on, costing tens of millions of dollars, while the candidates, smile, shake hands, and try to avoid ethnic jokes and the demonstration of any semblance of intelligence.

War with Iran

Obviously there is a major propaganda push to make it seem like Iran is only months away from having nuclear weapons, or may even have them now. Regime Change Iran quotes from a UPI story:

Tehran is planning a nuclear weapons test before the Iranian New Year on March 20, 2006 says a group opposed to the regime in Tehran.The Foundation for Democracy citing sources in the U.S and Iran offered no further information.The FDI quotes sources in Iran that the high command of the Revolutionary Guards Air Force have issued new orders to Shahab-3 missile units, ordering them to move mobile missile launchers every 24 hours in view of a potential pre-emptive strike by the U.S. or Israel. The order was issued Tuesday, Jan. 16.

On December 5 I made a post titled: "U.N.: Iran 'Months' From Having Nuke (oh, really?)", http://coverthistory.blogspot.com/2005/12/u.html, which showed how much of the major media mischaracterized comments by Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency, to claim that Iran was close to having nuclear weapons.

In reality, most intelligence estimates are that Iran is years away from having nuclear weapons, as this story shows:

Iran Is Judged 10 Years From Nuclear Bomb

U.S. Intelligence Review Contrasts With Administration Statements

By Dafna Linzer
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, August 2, 2005; Page A01

A major U.S. intelligence review has projected that Iran is about a decade away from manufacturing the key ingredient for a nuclear weapon, roughly doubling the previous estimate of five years, according to government sources with firsthand knowledge of the new analysis.

The carefully hedged assessments, which represent consensus among U.S. intelligence agencies, contrast with forceful public statements by the White House. Administration officials have asserted, but have not offered proof, that Tehran is moving determinedly toward a nuclear arsenal.

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/01/AR2005080101453.html

Of course even if Iran were to eventually develop ten or twenty nuclear weapons they would be no match for the United States or Israel.

The eventual possibility of a nuclear Iran is a real concern; however, the current propaganda is an obvious pretext for war--a war that would be a catastrophe for this country and the world. Meanwhile Hilary Clinton seems to be trying to move to the right of the Bush administration on this issue, which is troubling, to say the least.

USAID Paper Details Security Crisis in Iraq

By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 17, 2006; Page A13

The U.S. Agency for International Development paints a dire and detailed picture of the Iraq security situation in its request for contractors to bid on its $1.32 billion, 28-month project to help stabilize 10 major Iraqi cities

The breakdown of Iraqi society and "the absence of state control and an effective police force" have let "criminal elements within Iraqi society have almost free rein," the paper states. Iraqi criminals in some cases "have aligned themselves with most of the combating groups and factions to further their aims" and Baghdad "is reportedly divided into zones controlled by organized criminal groups-clans," it states.

washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/16/AR2006011601005.html

The U.S. Agency for International Development (AID) is, of course, very close to the CIA, as is Walter Pincus, for that matter.

Iraqi criticizes secret US contacts with insurgents

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Iraq's national security adviser complained bitterly in an interview published about secret US contacts with Iraqi insurgents, warning that the "policy of appeasement" would undermine security.

National Security Adviser Mowaffak Rubaie told the Washington Times that the contacts with so-called Iraqi "rejectionists" were being carried out behind the back of the Shiite-dominated government.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060120/pl_afp/usiraqinsurgents

This brings to mind a Time magazine article, "Talking with the Enemy," from February 20, 2005, from which I had previously quoted this excerpt months ago:

The Iraqi's very presence conveys a message: Members of the insurgency are open to negotiating an end to their struggle with the U.S. "We are ready," he says before leaving, "to work with you." (emphasis added).

Negotiating with the insurgents is entirely appropriate, of course, and does not mean that we are preparing to switch sides.

Since today is General Robert E. Lee's birthday I would like to take note of the connections between General Lee and Lee Harvey Oswald. It is not a coincidence that his first name was "Lee" and his brothers first name was "Robert." According to Robert Oswald:

The Oswald family tree dated back to colonial times. He'd learned as a child that he was a fifth or sixth cousin of Gen. Robert E. Lee, which explained why he had been named Robert Edward Lee Oswald Jr., and his little brother Lee Harvey Oswald.
www.ardemgaz.com/prev/oswald/index.asp

Life magazine's February 21, 1964, profile of Oswald quoted Peter F.Connor, who'd served with Oswald in Japan: "He was a real oddball. He used to bring up all this stuff about his name, Lee. He was proud of it because he said he was named after Robert E. Lee. He thought Robert E. Lee was the greatest man in history".
www.acorn.net/jfkplace/03/JA/DR/.m-dr.html

According to one of Oswald's marine comrades he was known, after a few drinks, to loudly proclaim: "Save your confederate money, boys, the south will rise again!"

You won't want to miss this story in Joseph Cannon's blog Cannonfire. I had originally thought to post the story myself, but wanted to interview the woman involved first. When that didn't happen (thanks to an alleged associate of hers who accused me of being a right-wing paid agent for asking a couple of simple questions) I dropped the matter. Fortunately, Joseph Cannon has lower journalistic standards (I jest--we're bloggers for God's sake.)

http://cannonfire.blogspot.com/2006/01/george-w-bush-bill-bennett-and-strange.html

Joseph Cannon did have one reservation about the story:

I cannot help but wonder why a Vegas pro would have anything to do with arranging a tryst between a DC pol and a failed Texas oilman, especially since the two men already knew each other. (You know...back when they were roommates and male cheerleaders.)

I think the point was they needed a discreet source for the black female hooker. Actually, my greatest reservation in this story is that they wanted to hire a woman but then maybe they were looking for something different.

Let me add that I am shocked that a professional dominatrix would so blatantly violate the ethics of her profession by going public with these sordid details about her clients. But then she is running for Governor, certainly a step down ethically from her former vocation.

Since yesterday was the birthday of Martin Luther King, I would like to quote some excerpts from the book by Bille Sol Estes relating to his assassination.

Throughout his prison life, Ray insisted he was working for a Raoul in the gun running business and that he was set up. He stayed with the same story even in his last interview just three days before he died from liver failure.

I do know that Raoul existed and that he was acquainted with Jack Ruby. Raoul and Ruby were in the gun running and pornography business for at least three years in the late fifties and early sixties.

For a period of time I had some investments with Carlos Marcello. Carlos was familiar with the King killing and knew Raoul. As in the Kennedy killing, there was an inside man to make sure Dr. King was outside his room at the Lorraine Motel at the right moment.

Cui Bono?

The theory that Castro was behind the assassination of President Kennedy has been in the news lately. A new book Ultimate Sacrifice argues that the Mafia was the culprit. Joan Mellen's new book A Farewell to Justice links the assassination to the CIA.

One of the oldest theories has not received much attention of late. Was Lyndon Baines Johnson involved in the assassination of his predecessor? Texas wheeler-dealer Billie Sol Estes says yes. His sources were LBJ aides Malcolm "Mac" Wallace and Cliff Carter, as well as Mafioso Carlos Marcello and Vito Genovese. Estes claims possession of taped conversations with the first two but has not made them public. He calls the tapes "life insurance." Here are some excerpts from his book Billie Sol Estes: A Texas Legend.

I understand the final approval was given at a poker game played at Brownies Restaurant on Grand Avenue in Dallas....

According to Cliff, in May 1963, the poker game was in high gear and the subject of killing Kennedy came up again. After some of the lesser players left, the discussion turned serious. As I understand, Cliff, H.L. Hunt, W.O. Bankston, and D.H. Byrd were there. There may have been others but at least they were there. Cliff was given the green light to proceed with the assassination.

Bankston was a personal friend of Dallas County Sheriff, who Estes says was involved in the assassination. D.H. Byrd was a political ally of LBJ and owned the Texas School Book Depository building, from the sixth window of which Oswald was supposed to have shot Kennedy.

Watergater Blames CIA (Dallas, UPI) 5/5/77 San Francisco Chronicle

Watergate burglar Frank Sturgis said yesterday the CIA planned the break-in because high officials felt the then-President Nixon was becoming too powerful and was overly interested in the assassination of President Kennedy.

Sturgis also said he believes "Deep Throat" -- a major source for Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward -- was Robert Bennett, a partner in a CIA-front public relations firm in Washington. Bennett, a son of former Senator Wallace Bennett (Rep-Utah), is employed by the Summa Corp., part of the empire of the late Howard Hughes. Hughes was a major client of Mullen Corp., Bennett's old firm.

Sturgis was convicted in the break-in at Democratic headquarters. He said Bennett -- on orders from then-CIA Director Richard Helms -- was fed information by Alexander Haig, Nixon's chief of staff; Alexander Butterfield, who disclosed the existence of Nixon's taping system; and Watergate burglar Howard Hunt.

The Man who should be President

From Al Gore's speech this Martin Luther King holiday:

A president who breaks the law is a threat to the very structure of our government. Our Founding Fathers were adamant that they had established a government of laws and not men. Indeed, they recognized that the structure of government they had enshrined in our Constitution - our system of checks and balances - was designed with a central purpose of ensuring that it would govern through the rule of law. As John Adams said: "The executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them, to the end that it may be a government of laws and not of men."

An executive who arrogates to himself the power to ignore the legitimate legislative directives of the Congress or to act free of the check of the judiciary becomes the central threat that the Founders sought to nullify in the Constitution - an all-powerful executive too reminiscent of the King from whom they had broken free. In the words of James Madison, "the accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny."

Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country. As we drift, purposefully, toward the next war in Iran, and toward the loss of liberty at home, we must call upon the Congress to fulfill its duty to be a check and balance upon the Executive. This is not an issue of the Left--I respect honest and principled conservatives--would that there were some in the Bush administration. Let us hope there are some in the Congress and the Judiciary.

Vampire running for office--and the Bush Connection

I just couldn't resist this story.

MINNEAPOLIS voters, who eight years ago elected a former professional wrestler as their governor, may find a self-proclaimed vampire on the ballot for the office this year.

"Politics is a cut-throat business," said Jonathan "The Impaler" Sharkey, who said he plans to announce his bid for governor on the ticket of the Vampyres, Witches and Pagans Party.

Sharkey also pledged to execute convicted murders and child molesters personally by impaling them on a wooden pole outside the state capitol.

sundaytimes.news.com.au/common/story_page/0%2C7034%2C17809956%25255E1702%2C00.html

On his website he notes:

"To some, Impaling may be medieval. However, history has proved that it is a strong deterrent against those who prey upon the innocent."

On his website also he refers to his "(once) friendship with Jeb Bush and his brother President Bush"

Vampire/Satanist with Jeb Bush

A more recent photograph

The vampire is also planning to run for President in 2008.

This document is from his official website: http://jonathonforgovernor.us/

More on the Castro-did-it Documentary:

First, Tim Gratz has reported that "It is my understanding that within the last week the Miami Spanish TV station had a panel of commentators on "Rendezvous with Death" and that the participants included Felix Rodriguez and Antonio Veciana." Felix Rodriguez is well-known for his involvement in the Iran-Contra affair. Antonio Veciana was a well-known anti-Castro leader in the sixties, founder of Alpha 66, one of the most militant groups. In the seventies he reported that he had seen Lee Harvey Oswald in a meeting with his CIA handler "Maurice (or Morris) Bishop, believed to be the late David Atlee Phillips.

Long-time JFK assassination researcher David Lifton, author of Best Evidence, has weighed in on the new documentary, Rendevouz with Death.

According to a debriefing of someone on the Castro household staff conducted by none other than E. Howard Hunt (and testified to by Hunt during his [security classified] 1978 HSCA appearance):

The burden of her story was that a pall of gloom had settled over the Fidel Castro household on the announcement of President Kennedy’s death because, according to her. . . Mr. Kennedy and Mr. Castro were on the verge of working out some sort of an agreement, a detente, if you will, an arrangement which would permit both countries to live without the tensions that had existed.

Security Classified Testimony of Howard Hunt before HSCA, 11/03/78; Record Number 180 –10131-10342

All this new “Mexico City information” — assuming it to be based on factual data — is nothing more than part of the paraphernalia of the Dallas set-up. That’s what I believe was going on in Mexico City, seven weeks before JFK’s death, and much of what follows stems from research connected with my forthcoming work, FINAL CHARADE:Lee Oswald and the Assassination of JFK.

Oswald (who adored JFK, according to his wife Marina) thought he was on a mission sanctioned by Robert Kennedy, the President’s brother, and then Attorney General. Oswald pretended to be an assassin, at the instigation of those who were manipulating him (and deceiving him) and whom he viewed as legitimate handlers. Essentially, Oswald was on a “dangle” mission, and what he did in Mexico City was no more real than his phony offer of “radar secrets” to the Russians at the time of his defection to the U.S.S.R. four years earlier (October, 1959). In his mind, Oswald’s “real” mission was to detect any evidence of an assassination plot; hence, while in Mexico City, he behaved provocatively, and trafficked in “offers” and conversations about such matters. Hence, the Russo-Huismann “evidence.”

Russo and his filmmaker-partner (Wilfried Huismann) have bought into a completely contrived and well acted out play — let’s call it the Jim Angleton Magic Show — decades after the event (42 years later, to be precise); and they are presently attempting to foist a discredited story on the public, virtually blaming Castro for JFK’s assassination in 2006.

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/lifton.htm

Our Fearless Leader

As veterans and soon to be veterans, you have placed the nation's security before your own lives. You took an oath to defend our flag and our freedom, and you kept that oath underseas [sic] and under fire.

www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/01/20060110-1.html

Castro and the Assassination

Veteran journalist Anthony Summers, author of one of the best books on the Kennedy assassination Conspiracy, later updated in an edition titled Not in Your Lifetime, has responded to the German documentary alleging that Castro was behind the JFK assassination. A few excerpts:

On July 18, 1962, soon after Oswald’s return to America from the Soviet Union, Vladimir Kryuchkov, a future KGB chief, sent a telegram about Oswald to the head of Cuban intelligence, Comandante Ramiro Valdes. Though Oswald was “unstable”, he said, the Cubans should take a look at him.

Señor Valdes’ staff did as their Soviet counterparts suggested, and had their first contact with Oswald in November, a few weeks after the Cuban missile crisis. More contacts followed — directed, according to the documentary, by Rolando Cubela, then a trusted Castro associate. Oswald was supplied with modest sums of money, and acquired a file at Havana headquarters in a section assigned to “Foreign Collaborators”.

There have been reports that Cubela--the CIA assassin whose code-name was AMLASH--was a double-agent. The best evidence against that would be that he spent a number of years in a Cuban prison. Whoever he was really working for it would certainly be interesting if he met Oswald.

The pivotal encounter, the episode most incriminating to the Cubans, took place less than two months before the assassination. Fabián Escalante, a future chief of intelligence, and his nephew Aníbal, the son of a former president of the Cuban Communist Party, are named in the programme as having met Oswald. To support the claim that the future State Security chief Señor Escalante was involved, Huismann presented a document provided by the late Marty Underwood, an aide who served both the murdered President and Johnson.

“Early on the morning of November 22, 1963,” a key extract reads, “a small Cuban airplane landed at the Mexico City airport. The single occupant transferred to another plane that was waiting at the far end of the airport. It immediately took off for Dallas, Texas. “Later that evening the plane returned from Dallas and the occupant transferred back to the Cuban airplane. After many months of checking we are confident that the occupant was Fabian
Escalante.”

Escalante denies these charges but then he would, wouldn't he? Escalante himself has a book out on the assassination, JFK: The Cuba Files : The Untold Story of the Plot to Kill Kennedy. Escalante, of course, blames the CIA.

William Coleman, a former assistant counsel, had told me before Christmas of a mission that he carried out on the orders of the US Chief Justice, Earl Warren. He had flown to a secret location for a meeting with Señor Castro — a rare event indeed for an American official, even more so given the nature of the discussion. What Mr Coleman learnt, he said, satisfied him — and the Chief Justice when he reported back — that “Castro’s regime had nothing to do with the President’s murder”.

Mr Coleman had spoken clearly, and in the presence of a third party. This week, however, I received a letter from him denying that the meeting with the Cuban leader had ever taken place. This is hard to explain, unless perhaps one notes that Mr Coleman — himself a former Cabinet member — is close to senior officials in the Bush Administration. Perhaps the Bush people, who take a hard line on Cuba, prefer that dark rumours about Señor Castro remain unrefuted. www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,11069-1974173,00.html

A Cuban journalist has also responded to this documentary:

www.granma.cu/ingles/2006/enero/vier6/03kennedy-i.html

New Documentary Says Castro Killed Kennedy

Filmaker Wilfried Huismann has a new documentary airing in Germany called Rendezvous with Death, developed in conjunction with Gus Russo, author of Live By the Sword, which presents evidence that Fidel Castro was behind the Kennedy assassination.

The film, shown to journalists in Berlin on Wednesday, says Oswald traveled to Mexico City by bus in September 1963, seven weeks before the Kennedy shooting, and met agents at the Cuban embassy there who paid him $6,500.

This would seem to refer to the long-discredited allegations of Nicaraguan intelligence officer Alvarado Ugarte Gilberto, who recanted his story after it fell apart under investigation.

Cuban and Russian sources interviewed in the film say the KGB alerted the Cubans to Oswald in mid-1962 after he left the Soviet Union, where he had lived for three years, and returned to the United States with his Soviet wife and their daughter.

Cuban intelligence first made contact with Oswald in November 1962, according to the film. Huismann also unearthed a U.S. intelligence report shown to Johnson which said Cuban secret service chief Fabian Escalante flew via Mexico City to Dallas on the day of Kennedy's assassination, and back again the same day.

Tracked down by the film maker, Escalante denied he had been in Dallas and evaded questions about Cuba's alleged role. "What is truth, what are lies?" he said, smiling.
abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory?id=1469721

A principal source is an alleged former agent of the Cuban secret service G2 named Oscar Marino.

Oscar Marino, who fell out with the Castro regime, said the Cubans were desperate to eliminate Kennedy, an opponent of the revolution who wanted to kill Castro.

"You ask why we took Oswald?" he said to the German film maker Wilfried Huismann. "Oswald was a dissident: he hated his country. He possessed certain characteristics.

"There wasn't anyone else. You take what you can get. . . Oswald volunteered to kill Kennedy."
news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/01/04/wkenn04.xml

Castro's intelligence service was and is highly rated and the notion that they could not have found anyone else is preposterous. Moreover, the idea that they would use someone who could be traced back to them, a man who had met with officials at both the Soviet and Cuban embassies, is absurd. The Cubans were well-aware that both embassies were closely monitored by the CIA.

Marino said Oswald was recruited to the secret service organisation by the same agent who had been recruited to kill Castro, a year before the Kennedy assassination.

"In other words the very man Robert Kennedy recruited to kill Fidel Castro hired his brother's murderer," Huismann said.

KGB files released in Moscow document a meeting between Oswald and the Cuban, who is now a retired surgeon living in Madrid.

Interviewed for the film, however, he denied any connection to Oswald, calling it an "outrageous lie".

news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtmlxml=/news/2006/01/04/wkenn04.xml

This would be Rolando Cubela, who was intimately involved in the CIA's plots to kill Castro. If Oswald met with Cubela it would be interesting indeed.

Acccording to Gus Russo, in his statement posted yesterday by Bill Kelly on John Simkin's Forum, the film contains first-ever interviews with:

• Former senior G-2 agent (Cuban Intel)
• Former G-2 employee who had access to the G-2’s HQ files on Oswald

• The G-2’s former HQ file archivist
• Former G-2 security officer at Cuba’s Mexico City Embassy
• A source inside the Russian Secret Service Agency FSB, with access to the “encrypted” KGB and G-2 files on Oswald (heretofore unknown in the West), located in the KGB’s Moscow HQ Archives
• The family of Pedro Gutierrez; he saw Oswald leave the Cuban compound with Cuban intel officers.
• Laurence Keenan, the FBI man sent to Mexico City by Hoover days after the assassination.
• Elena Garro de Paz, who attended a Mexico City party with Oswald and Cuban officials

More Candy Barr:

Candy Barr and Joan Collins

Candy Barr and Mickey Cohen

Candy Barr and a Big Hat

Ultimate Sacrifice: A Review

The authors of the new book Ultimate Sacrifice, Lamar Waldron and Thom Hartmann, which I read over the holiday break, allege that the Kennedy administration had a very closely-held plan to invade Cuba on or about December 1, 1963, after a coup which was to be led by a hero of the Cuban revolution, who is clearly Che Guevara.

They further maintain that the Mafia--particularly Johnny Rosselli, Santo Trafficante, and Carlos Marcello--gained knowledge of that plan (called AMWORLD by the CIA), and used that knowledge to manipulate Lee Harvey Oswald, as well as CIA officials, and Kennedy administration figures, including Robert Kennedy, to provoke a massive cover-up after they assassinated the President on November 22. The authors do portray one CIA official, David Morales, as likely being involved in the assassination, although even here they leave open the possiblility that he was guilty only of shooting off his mouth in drunken conversations with Mafioso Johnny Rosselli. Otherwise, the authors clear the CIA.

In particular, they clear David Atlee Phillips (for information from his nephew see my first-ever post on this blog. They do take note of this information, citing this blog.) They write:

"Phillips and the CIA had their own agenda for Oswald, an agenda that had nothing to do with JFK's assassination and everything to do with a US operation directed against Castro."

Thus, they bring the conspiracy to kill Kennedy up to the door of the CIA, but do not knock.

Some reviewers of this book have expressed skepticism as to the "plan" to invade Cuba in late 1963, which the authors call C-Day, a term of their own invention which is meant to evoke D-Day. They point out that Robert McNamara, Kennedy's Secretary of Defense, has stated that he had no knowledge of such a plan.

Researcher Gus Russo, with close intelligence ties, has recently commented on C-Day, in a statement sent to researchers and friends and posted by Bill Kelly on John Simkin's forum. His conclusions:

1) that there was indeed a massive push by the Kennedys to resolve the “Cuban problem” before the fall 1964 US presidential election; 2) that massive staging camps were being funded in Central America for that purpose; 3) that things would get underway as soon as AMLASH (Cubela) succeeded in hitting Fidel, 4) that Manuel Artime’s Nicaraguan buildup was a key component, and; 5) that the Pentagon had drafted OPLANS on the assumption that there would likely be a new invasion in October 1964, IF (and this is an important IF) all the preceding points had moved to fruition. Interestingly, all of Artime’s aides that I spoke with agreed with these conclusions. I also interviewed the late Miami Station Chief Ted Shackley over three lunches in Georgetown. Shackley oversaw the CIA-funded Cuban exile ops and agreed that nothing was imminent when JFK was killed, but that anything could happen in the upcoming year.

Russo further states:

1) His key operation AMWORLD is not a new revelation; it was one of the many codes released by NARA, and seen by me, and doubtless others, in 1998 and thereafter. Just yesterday, a NARA JFK archivist assured me that these documents have been available all along and Lamar has to know it – they have “Released by CIA 1998” in bold stamp. Type in AMWORLD into the NARA JFK online search, and you get 17 hits. Archivist Martha Murphy laughed and said that that databasehadn’t been updated in years.

2) I had some of these docs, and now, after a quick trip to the Archives have all of them. It is abundantly clear that they refer to Artime’s Central American operation, but have nothing to do with a December “coup,” or “C-Day” as Lamar refers to it. Interestingly, my Miami friend, Nilo Messer, is noted as an “AMWORLD representative” and Artime’s personal secretary – and yet Lamar doesn’t appear to have spoken to him about the coup. I did, over a 1999 dinner at the Hotel Intercontinental, and he said there was no coup planned for December. And he would have known.

3) The AMWORLD docs span from June 28, 1963 (inception) to Jan 3, 1965. A 2-9-64 AMWORLD memo says that the purpose of the Artime operation, like the other “AMs”, was, hopefully by late 1964, to “mount small, simple, quick in and out ops, such as low risk sabotage, abduction or assassination, release and exfil of prisoners, etc.” An undated memo defines AMWORLD thus: “This was Agency support to the Revolutionary Recovery Movement headed by Dr. Manuel Artime dedicated to bringing about the overthrow of the Castro Government. Operations against Cuba were tentatively scheduled for December 1963, but most strikes took place in November 1963.” This is a clear reference to the fact that AMWORLD was about “strikes,” not coups. A 2-9-64 AMWORLD memo says: “AMWORLD is a generally sound approach to developing the personnel and physical assets they will require for effective operations…[and] if a solid foundation for the entire program could be laid down, the payoff in the long run would be much more. However, it must be pointed out that AMWORLD will have to have successful operations before the people and support they will require are forthcoming in sufficient numbers to perform their ultimate mission.” Doesn’t sound much like a Dec 1963 coup to me. In fact, it reads like one of countless other AM docs discussing general sabotage – which is why I ignored it in 1998.

A primary source for Ultimate Sacrifice was Harry Williams, a prominent Cuban exile. I do not doubt his claims that the Kennedy administration was in discussions with Che Guevara regarding a possible coup in Cuba, and that there were plans for that contingency.

The authors present a fairly strong case for Mafia involvement in the JFK assassination, although most of their evidence is not new. That the same Mafia leaders were conspiring with the CIA to kill Castro is a matter of historical fact. That some of these CIA co-conspirators were involved in the JFK assassination is likely, in my opinion.

It is clear from this book that some anti-Castro activists, particularly those out-of-the-loop on AMWORLD, as well as some in the CIA were not particularly happy with the Kennedy approach to the Castro problem. Carlos Prio, a former President of Cuba, who worked with both the CIA and the Mafia, spoke of a plan to replace Castro with a "Tito-type government." Some exiles reported what they called "Operation Judas," US recognition of a "Communist" regime. John Martino, who confessed to his role in the JFK assassination, wrote in a December 1963 article in Human Events that the plan had been to establish a "left-wing coalition" in Cuba. This approach, which some in the exile community called "Fidelism without Fidel" would not have been popular with the more extreme-right anti-Castro forces--or with some of their CIA allies. Considering that JFK was pursuing a two-track policy, and that the other track involved dialog with Castro himself, a CIA connection to the assassination is not unlikely. Richard Cain, a high official in the Cook County Chicago Sheriff's office, as well as a CIA asset and a "made" Mafia member, spoke of an exile force sponsored "by the Pentagon which is in competition with CIA." David Phillips himself said shortly before his death that the assassination likely involved "rogue" intelligence agents, although he did not admit to being one of them.

There is new evidence in this book. The authors interviewed a Naval Intelligence investigator who revealed that Oswald had been under "tight surveillance" in the months before the assassination. After Kennedy was killed Navy Intelligence engaged in massive destruction of documents, although their own secret investigation concluded that Oswald was not the shooter on November 22.

Both the CIA and the Kennedys were trying to solve the problem of a Soviet client state only 90 miles from our shore. The Kennedys were willing to accept a left-progressive government as an alternative to Castro, as well as being willing to negotiate a detente with Castro himself. The CIA preferred, of course, a right-wing dictatorship, involving the most corrupt and regressive exiles, including individuals such as Mafia-connected, former death-squad leader Rolando Masferrer.

The authors are strangely reluctant to name names. Not only do they not explicitly name the "coup leader" (Che Guevara!) but they are coy about naming others as well. Harry Williams is taken to meet Mafia boss Trafficante by "a CIA official later involved in Watergate." A list of associates of the three Mafia leaders who also knew of C-Day includes "a CIA operative."

By all means, read this book. The material on former Secret Service agent Abrahan Bolden alone--who was imprisoned to prevent his testimony before the Warren Commission--is worth the price of the book. Then read Joan Mellen's book A Farewell to Justice, which not only knocks on that door labeled CIA, but goes inside.

Candy Barr Dies

The legendary Candy Barr, stripper, porn star and poet, born Juanita Dale Slusher, died Friday at age 70. Candy was alleged to have had affairs with Jack Ruby, gangster Mickey Cohen, and fellow stripper Jada. My kind of girl.