Possible USAF Sources for the Rifle Sling

Possible Sources of the M13 USAF Rifle Sling found on the Sixth Floor

I am going request the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) to check both the sling and the holster found in Oswald’s room at 1026 N. Beckley to see if there are any manufacturer’s serial numbers that can be associated with any USAF allocations of weapons or accessories, as I know they kept a very strict inventory, so one day we may be able to associate the sling and/or the holster with a particular AF unit, plane or officer to whom it was assigned.

Since the M13 sling did not come from Klines, and was not mass produced and resold as surplus, but with it’s accompanying aluminum .38 revolver pistols that were ordered destroyed by the USAF, only a few have survived, less than 50, most of which are now in museums or were taken home by officers before the destruction notice was given. So a few may have been sold at Thrift shops or garage sales by the widows of Air Force SAC officers who were senior enough to take them home upon retirement before they were ordered destroyed.

It would certainly be a coincidence if Oswald purchased such a sling at a garage sale or Thrift shop, and more than likely he obtained it from someone he knew, or it was placed on the rifle by someone other than Oswald.

In looking at the backgrounds of those who befriended Oswald on his return from the USSR, and knew him after he took the backyard photo of the rifle with another sling on it, as it has been determined that the sling was placed on the rifle sometime after the photo was taken and before the assassination.

Of those who knew him, many had connections to the CIA, Army, Marines and Navy – but there are very few former USAF personnel or offices who knew him personally or even enter the assassination narrative.

I can only find a few. For one, Oswald’s half-brother John Pic, who had previously served in the US Coast Guard in New York City, and had enlisted in the USMC Reserves, also entered the US Air Force and was in training at Lackland AFB in Fort Worth at the time of the assassination. But he has no known association with those SAC officers who could have had the sling or pistol in question, and wasn’t known to have even associated with his half-brother Lee at the time.

Two of those who worked at the Downtown Ford Lincoln Mercury dealership where Oswald or someone impersonating took a car for ride, were retired USAF officers, Phil Willis a Major and a Colonel who wrote western novels and shared an office with Jack Lawrence. But they are unlikely to be the source of the M-13 Sling.

NEW ORLEANS

As the FBI suspected, without knowing exactly what the sling was – inquired as to whether Oswald obtained it in New Orleans, where he spent the summer of ’63, from late April until late September.

Since Oswald was known to have associated with his former Civil Air Patrol (CAP) Captain David Ferrie, former FBI Agent Guy Bannister and their crew that summer, a close look at those guys would be appropriate.

In the spring of 1961, while Oswald was in the USSR, Bannister’s crew of misfits – including Ferrie, Gordon Novel, his wife Miss New Orleans Ms. Mancuso, a few Cubans and Thomas Beckman. They withdrew an arms cache of guns, ammo and explosives from the Schulmanger Wells company bunker at the former Navy Air Station at Houma, Louisiana. Some say they broke in and stole the stuff, others say they had a key, but it was owned by a company directed by French-Russian Jean DeMenil, of Texas, one of those who met Oswald when he returned from the USSR.

JFKcountercoup: The Houma Bunker Raid Revisted

They piled the cache into cars and a laundry truck used by one of the Cubans, and took it to Bannister’s office and Ferrie’s home, as depicted in Oliver Stone’s “JFK.”

One of the participants, Thomas Beckman, bore a peculiar similarity to Oswald, being a former Army Reservist who dry fired a carbine, as Oswald was said to have done on his porch in New Orleans.

Beckman also lit sticks of dynomite and threw them out of the window on the way home, which makes me seriously doubt that theses Big Easy Bozos had anything to do with the Dealey Plaza operation, other than to help set up the Patsy as the fall guy, something they didn’t even know they were doing.

Unbelievably, Thomas Beckman had a pass to get on Barksdale Air Force base, in Louisiana, that had a SAC unit stationed there. The pass was attributed to his friend, a Colonel Lowrey (First Name Unknown and it could be spelled Lowry), who just happened to be the commander of “Looking Glass” – a Command and Control post that was flying over Dallas at the very moment of the assassination. We know this because the plane called in to US Army Fort Hood for a radio check at that time.

When testifying before the New Orleans Grand Jury, Beckman was asked how he came to meet Colonel Lowrey. When he replied, “It’s a long story,” the Assistant District Attorney said, “Never mind then.”

It was explained that Colonel Lowrey gave the pass to Beckman because they were business partners in a Thrift Shop, that Lowry and his wife assisted in the payment of rent ($700), helping Beckman much like the Paines assisted the Oswalds.

While Lowrey’s assistance to Beckman was two years earlier than Oswald’s return to New Orleans, if Lowrey was still there and still associated with the Bannister-Ferrie-Shaw crew, he could have met Oswald and took a shine for him like it did with Beckman. And Lowrey would certainly qualify as one of those few SAC officers who would have been assigned a M-13 holster and accompanying aluminum Colt .38 sidearm, as used aboard SAC bombers and kept in the plane’s safe with the nuclear codes.

So while we try to get a manufacturer’s serial number from the sling and the holster, to see if we can positively identify its source, if I was a gambling man with money, I would put my chips down on Colonel Lowrey, as one of those who would have been assigned such a sling, holster and sidearm, and someone who could have associated with Oswald and his pals in New Orleans.

And it just so happened, that while Lowrey’s “Looking Glass” was flying over Dallas at the time of the assassination, Secret Service Agent John W. Rice, Special Agent in Charge (SAIC) of the New Orleans office of the SS was in the Special Investigations Office of Barksdale AFB when the assassination went down. Rice was located there by his office, who said that a SS Agent at the Trade Mart wanted him to check on the background of a suspect in the assassination – John Martin – a Dallas college student from Northern rural Louisiana who was apparently involved in the Stevenson incident and was an early suspect in the assassination – even before Oswald.

For more on Beckman and Looking Glass:

http://jfkcountercoup.blogspot.com/2019/08/looking-glass-x-3-jfk-assassination.html?m=1

Please Support JFKCountercoup Research if you can:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/supportjfkcountercoup

The Rifle Sling - An Ignored Clue?

The Rifle Sling - An ignored clue?

The Rifle Sling found attached to the rifle from the Sixth Floor of the Texas School Book Depository was no ordinary sling. 

None of the Kline advertisments for the Mannlicher Carcano rifle show a sling, and while the Kline employee who mounted the scope on the TSBD rifle was interviewed, the Warren Commission was unable to determine where the sling on the rifle came from or even what it was.

Kline's Gunsmith: JFKcountercoup: Oswald Got Very, Very Lucky - Gunsmith

According to Sylvia Meagher (Accessories After the Fact):

"The Warren Report says that the rifle in the backyard photographs 'seem to be equipped with a homemade rope sling.' In one of the photos (133-A) they decided that the portion of the sling that is visible is too small to establish whether it is rope or leather, but it has the appearance of rope, and its configuration is consistent with the rope sling pictured in 133-B."

The Warren Report says: "The rifle found in the TSBD consisted of two leather straps-not a standard rifle sling but one utilizing what appeared to be a musical instrument strap or a sling from a carrying case or camera bag." (WR 553-554)

The FBI expert Frazier testified that attempts to identify the sling had met with no success and it probably would not be helpful to a marksman using the rifle, since it was "too short", actually, to do more than put your arm through it.... It is rather awkward to wrap the forward hand in the sling in the normal fashion. Later, he said, "the sling would tend to steady the aim even in this crude form."

FBI SA Shaneyfelt described the sling in the photograph: "It has the appearance of being a piece of rope tied at both ends, rather than a leather sling, and it is my opinion that it is a different sling than is presently on the rifle."

Also from the Shaneyfelt testimony: (VOLUME 4, pp. 289-290.)

Mr. Eisenberg. Looking at 133-B, are the observable characteristics of the weapon pictured in the picture-shown in the picture- similar to the observable characteristics of Exhibit 139, the weapon in the assassination.

Mr. Shaneyfelt. Yes, they are less apparent in the photograph because it is a photograph of the BOTTOM, or the BASE of the rifle along the trigger-guard area, but it does show the BOTTOM of the rifle in the photograph.

Mr. McCloy. A bowknot-133-B seems to have a knot at the SWIVELS.
Mr. Shaneyfelt. Yes.
Mr. McCloy. Which doesn't appear on the rifle now.

As Mrs Meagher notes: "Clearly, the men were discussing the rope sling and its attachments to the sling swivels on the BOTTOM of the weapon in the backyard photos. Yet when the alleged murder weapon was found in the TSBD, it had a new leather sling that was attached to the left-side of the rifle and not on the bottom .The sling swivels so clearly visible in the backyard photographs do not exist on the rifle discovered in the TSBD."

"The M 38 Carcano was made in at least four different models.It was made in both 7.35 mm and 6.5 mm. The weapons were identical in appearance except for the sling mountings. Some had mounts only on the bottom of the weapon, others had mounts only on the side, while others had a combination of both bottom and side mounts."

"Marina Oswald did not recognize the sling on the alleged murder weapon (CE 1403) and Ruth Paine did not recall seeing a strap of that nature in her home or anywhere else."

"So, at sometime between April and November, Oswald had changed from a rope sling to a "homemade" leather sling. And from September 25 to November 22, 1963, the rifle was not in Lee's possession. At no time was he seen by anyone carrying the rifle which clearly seemed designed for carrying rather than as an aid in firing."

"We know nothing about where Lee obtained the rifle sling, or the rifle ammunition, or where he practiced shooting the weapon. Nor do we know why Klein's Sporting Goods delivered a 40- inch rifle to the Texas customer who ordered a 36- inch rifle that they advertised in the February issue of the American Rifleman."

"Regrettably, the Warren Commission did not consider it necessary or worthwhile to seek more precise information about the rifle sling."

"It should not have been brushed aside as inconsequential, for it was a clue that might have opened a trail to a person or persons who had conspired with Oswald, OR AGAINST HIM, in the assassination."

---- SYLVIA MEAGHER (Accessories After the Fact p. 112. )

As can be seen on the backyard photos of Oswald holding the rifle, the sling in the photos is all of one shape, size and color, and not the M13 USAF sling, which  must have been added to the rifle sometime after the photo was taken.

The rifle with a different sling. 

Shortly after the photo was taken, Oswald relocated to his hometown of New Orleans for the summer of 1963, and the FBI investigated if that is where he obtained the rifle sling.

The FBI interviewed employees of the William B Reily Company, New Orleans about the rifle sling. Even the vice president of the company, William B Reily, III, was interviewed about it.

N. I. Rains, Chief Warrant Officer, U.S. Marine Corps was interviewed and said he "never saw anything like it and was at a loss to offer suggestion pertaining to its possible use."

One thing for certain is that the sling was not used to carry the rifle or used to steady the rifle while firing it. So there must be something more to it. 

December 24, 1963: "On December 18, 1963, Mr. ADRIAN T. ALBA was contacted at his place of business, Crescent City Garage, Inc., 618 Magazine, New Orleans. At this time he was shown photographs of the device utilized as a sling on the rifle of LEE HARVEY OSWALD. Mr. ALBA said he had never seen OSWALD with the likes of the contraption shown and expressed the opinion that it definitely had never been intended at the time of manufacture to be used as a rifle sling. He reiterated, as on previous occasions, that he and OSWALD had never discussed rifle slings or like devices for use in the firing of a rifle."

THE CONTRAPTION

The so-called "contraption" that was at first dismissed as an ordinary guitar strap, is actually a very rare 1956 Milsco M13 Aircrewman holster sling, manufactured by the Milwaukee Saddlery Company and produced for the USAF 38 Aircrewman revolvers.

As Sylvia Meagher notes: “Well, it turns out that the ‘homemade’ leather sling on the TSBD 40- inch Mannlicher - Carcano was a sling from a United States Air Force holster kit.”

 (see: U.S. Military Holsters and Pistol Cartridge Boxes by Edward Scott Meadows, 1987, p. 376)

More specifically it was a holster sling for the Model 13 Aircrew snubnose revolvers made specifically for the Strategic Air Command (SAC) under specifications requested by General Curtis LeMay.

As a gun collector noted: “The holsters for the Model 13 Aircrew snubs were definitely unique,…The two inch version of this holster is usually encountered in black leather and is marked on the flap USAF. It was intended to carry the Colt and Smith and Wesson .38 Special Aircrew revolvers. These holsters were manufactured by MILSCO, formerlly known as Milwaukee Saddlery…”

The holster was designed by Norris Murray, US patent on the design granted in January 1958. From Dayton Ohio, Murray is believed to have been a civilian employee of the USAF at Wright Patterson AFB in Dayton, where Air Force One is now on public display at the museum.

“In 1947, the US Air Force was carved off from the Army and the new brass realized the need for a modern space age handgun for the occasional aircrew emergency, survival situations, and nuclear weapon’s security breach. In a time when every ounce of weight was sliced from huge bombers like the Convair B-36 ‘Peacemaker’ to allow them to carry atomic weapons to the Soviet Union, the watch word was ‘lightweight.’”

“Colt answered the call for a small and effective, but super lightweight handgun, with a modified version of their then-new Cobra line of snub-nosed revolvers. It was named the Aircrewman.”

“These pistols were issued to aircrews, and some were carried in hip holsters, and some in shoulder rigs….General Curtis LeMay wanted a light weight revolvers to arm SAC crews so the Air Foce had both Colt and S & W (Smith and Wesson) develop special aluminum framed and cylindered snubby revolvers. All were called the ‘Aircrewman.’”

Colt made just 1189 of these special aluminum snub nosed revolvers for the Air Force, 1,123 shipped from 1950-1952, some 255 sent to Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska in 1951. As it is noted, “This is not unexpected as at the time Offutt was the home to the bombers of the US Strategic Air Command, whose crews sat on constant ramp alert to scramble towards the Soviet Union with a cargo of atomic weapons.”

“Whereas the Detective Special was 21-ounces and the Cobra was 16-ounces, the superlight Aircrewman tipped the scales at just 11-ounces with six rounds of 38-Special loaded….So yeah, the Aircrewman was about as light as you can get.”

“Curtis LeMay was an advocate of Air Force personnel being very well trained in small arms, and as such was a driving force in the AR15 design, survival arms and Air Force competition.”

As one former Aircrewman noted on a gun collector web site: “That was the holster rig we had in SAC alert aircraft. They were locked in the combat mission boxes with the mission data. You normally only saw them if you were involved in the box inventory. Otherwise the box was locked and the boxcar sealed.”

“In October 1959, both the Colts and Smiths were recalled to their depots and crushed, their frames deemed unsafe. To quote the USAF order at the time: ‘Because of the peculiarities of the M13 revolver, i.e. requirement for special ammunition, limited use and potential danger if used for other than the purpose for which it was designed (SAC Aircrew survival), all M13 revolvers excess to Air Force requirements will be mutilated to prevent further use as a weapon. Residue will be disposed of as scrap.”

“Though most ended up demolished, a few guns, already in the hands of retired flight officers escaped the wholesale slaughter….Today it is thought that less than fifty surviving Colt Aircrewmen exist. Many of these are in museums such as Autry, and the Springfiled Armory Museum but a few are in private circulation. To say they are counted as one of the most collectable of all Colt revolvers is something of an understament. One Colt Aircrewman recently sold for over $25,000 at auction…. ‘Property of US Air Force’is marked along the backstrap.,..and on the buttstrap is a second, USAF-issued serial number between ‘AF1 and AF-1189.’”

USAF M13 PILOTS AIRCREWMAN 38 HOLSTER W/ SHOULDER STRAP | #149944804

(115) Colt M13 Aircrewman Revolver: So Light it was Unsafe - YouTube

Not only are the Colt Aircrewman revolvers rare, but the sling is as well, going against the idea that such slings were commonly sold at Army and Navy Surpus stores and readily available. One collector with a M13 sling identical to the one on the rifle said to be used in the assassination has made careful replicas that he sells to those collectors who have purchased the Manlicher Carcano and want to duplicate the sling as well.

A leather holster was found in Oswald's room at 1026 N. Beckley, and both the strap on the rifle and the holster should be checked to see if either has a manufacturer's serial number that could be checked to see who it was issued to, as the USAF kept very good records on the distribution of weapons and accessories. 

So while we don’t know exactly where the rifle sling was obtained, we know where it came from – the USAF Strategic Air Command. 

SAC pilot entering plane with Colt Aircrewman 38 strapped to his waist. 

Please Support this research if you can:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/supportjfkcountercoup

Flipping the Coup Coin

FLIPPING THE COUP - The Other Side of the Coin 

In his presentation at the Dallas CAPA in November 2019, former CIA intelligence officer Rolf M. Larsson offered a number of different and unique ways to analyze the assassination of President Kennedy, making note of the fact that if we are correct, and the assassination was not just a conspiracy but a more distinct covert intelligence operation and coup d’etat, then are suspects are limited.

While there were many people who hated JFK with a passion, there were only a few who had the guts to kill him and the power t get away with it – LBJ, J. E. Hoover, General LeMay, Jimmy Hoffa and the Mafia to name a few.  

As for conducting the actual operation, among those capable of “masterminding”such a coordinated attack were also few – Allen Dulles, William Harvey, James Jesus Angleton, David Atlee Phillips, Desmond FitzGerald, Cord Meyer, Jr., and Larsson throws a relatively obscure name into the batch – Jacob Esterline, the mastermind of the Guatemalan Coup of 1954 and the failed Bay of Pigs, who went on to dismantle the JMWAVE station after the assassination, where many believe the assassination plan was hatched, planned and practiced.

Instead of going directly to the evidence, witnesses and suspects on the street and follow them up the chain latter, as we have been doing for years, the coup coin is flipped and we go directly to the top and see if we can follow the chief suspects down the pole to the street level.

Many years ago John Judge had former Air Force Colonel Fletcher Prouty appear on a National Public Radio show out of American University, when it was acknowledged that Prouty was the real “Mr. X” played by Donald Sutherland in Oliver Stone’s movie “JFK.”

For a number of years, including at the time of the assassination, Prouty served a strategic liaison post at the Pentagon, just down the hall from the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Prouty was the first person to mention the key role of General “Brute” Krulak USMC, who served as the officer responsible for military assistance to the CIA’s covert operations against Cuba.

Judge was fond of saying how he started out running down the evidence at street level while Prouty started out at the top and worked his way down, and they met at the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

For starters you need to begin with a little text book “Coup d’etat – A Practical Handbook,” by Edward Lutwak, that gives you the basic requirements of pulling off a real coup. While Lutwak had third world countries in mind, and the Guatemalan Coup fits his pattern well, as it was primarily a “Psychological” operation, with the psych warfare aspects of the coup run by David Atlee Phillips. Phillips controlled the radio stations that broadcast false reports of the rebel army approaching the capital, so believable that the powers that be fled, much like Batista fled Cuba as Castro’s army made its way down the mountains.

Eisenhower was very impressed with the Guatemala coup – code named Operation SUCCESS, and ordered the same strategy be used against Castro in Cuba.

The basic elements are the same when applied to the attempted coup and assassination of Hitler in July 20, 1944 and the assassination of President Kennedy, with a few new twists.

As Desmond FitzGerald explained to the Joint Chiefs of Staff in his September 1963 presentation on CIA covert operations against Cuba, the "detailed study" of the German military plot to kill Hitler was part of their "psychological operations" and propaganda, and was not under the CIA "Security" section as it was under Eisenhower. 

The five basic elements utilized were 1) utilization of standard covert intelligence operational plans, procedures and tactics; 2) getting the intended victim to approve the operational plan; 3) use of the Home Guard – Army Reserves to carry out the operation; 4) control communications and media; 5) blame communists for the conspiracy.

While each of these will be analyzed separately and in detail, the last will be dealt with first because in the course of the debate it is the one that has prevented proper analysis of the others.

In order to move further in a proper CI investigation of the crime, it is necessary to dispose of Oswald, and in the end, it doesn’t really matter what his role was – that of lone shooter or Patsy, as he was just a minor pawn in a much bigger game – The Great Game.

If you can please support this research: https://www.gofundme.com/f/supportjfkcountercoup

Ending the Great Debate

ENDING THE GREAT DEBATE – DISPENSING WITH OSWALD - THE PATSY

The Great JFK Assassination Debate isn’t over but can be. No I don’t mean the Single Bullet Theory, whether the Zapruder Film or the autopsy photos were altered, whether Prayer Man is Oswald or over whether you belive Judyth Vary Baker or not.

I mean we can end the great debate over whether the Warren Commission conclusions are correct, so we can once and for all, put to rest the debate over whether one man alone was responsible for the murder of the President. Part of the difficulty in resolving the outstanding issues related to the assassination is the idea that the crime is solved and one man alone – Lee Harvey Oswald, was responsible for the crime.

Determining the role of the accused assassin is essential before we can move on to figuring out what really happened at Dealey Plaza and determining exactly who killed the President, how they did it and why.

Before you can even begin to search for the true killers of the President, you have to deal with the official conclusion that Lee Harvey Oswald killed JFK, and get past that by dispensing with Oswald.

It’s not a speed bump, it’s a brick wall you have to get around, over, under or bulldoze through, but to get further you need to dispose with Oswald, and that can be done.

As long as one reasonable person can contend that Oswald did the dirty deed all alone you can’t move on to resolve the other issues. And there is a way around that roadblock. If you can’t win it be analysis and debate, it can be eleminated by deciding it really doesn’t matter what the role of the accused assassin was – shooter or Patsy, because he was just a pawn in a much bigger game.

This can be done in a number of ways, including clearly demonstrating that Oswald was not in a position to be on the Sixth Floor at the time of the shooting, was not the sniper in the window, and was what he claimed to be – framed as the Patsy. “Don’t believe the so-called evidence,” he said, and we should take that advice.

https://jfkcountercoup.blogspot.com/2013/07/the-doors-of-perception-why-oswald-is.html

It can also be done by recognizing that whatever you believe happened at Dealey Plaza, Oswald was a covert intelligence operative, utilized trained covert operational techniques and procedures, and fits the Covert Operative Personality profile (COP), so what occurred at Dealey Plaza was a covert intelligence operation and can only be resolved by a Counter-Intelligence Operation rather than a regular criminal investigation.

As Bill Simpich (See: State Secret) has observed, you begin to understand what happened at Dealey Plaza when you recognize it as an operation – a covert intelligence operation, and then everything begins to fall into place.

If the person you believe killed the President was Lee Harvey Oswald – the one born in New Orleans, served in the Civil Air Patrol (CAP) with David Ferrie, tested as a Passive-Aggressive personality in the MMPI, attended Arlington Heights High School in Fort Worth, enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps, was trained in radar and communications and the Russian language, served at Atsugi, Japan and San Diego, was given an early discharge, assigned to the USMC Reserves, made his way to Moscow via Helsinki, defected to the Soviet Union, worked in a radio factory in Minsk, married a Russian women, the niece of a Soviet military colonel, returned to the Texas where he associated with George deMohrenschildt, Col. Lawrence Orlov, George Bouhe, Jean deMenil and other anti-Communist White Russians, was introduced to Volkmar Schmidt at a special party set up for the Oswalds to meet the Paines, ordered a rifle and pistol through the mail using a P.O. box and alias, took a pot shot at General Walker, relocated back to his hometown of New Orleans in the summer of 1963 where he associated with Guy Banister, David Ferrie, Jack Martin and Clay Shaw, attempted to obtain a job and voter registration in Clinton, La., visited the Cuban and Soviet embassies in Mexico City attempting to get a visa to Cuba, returned to Texas where his wife Marina lived with Ruth Paine, who assisted him in obtaining a job a the Texas School Book Depository, from where he is accused of shooting and killing the President and wounding Governor Connally. That Lee Harvey Oswald?

If so then THAT Oswald fits the Covert Operational Personality (COP) profile – as every intelligence analyst in the world immediately recognized as the information about him became available.

Therefore, rather than a traditional criminal investigation, the assassination of the President requires a counter-intelligence investigation to determine exactly what occurred at Dealey Plaza that day.

The difference is a standard criminal investigation obtains evidence and witness testimony that can be introduced into a court of law, while a counter-intelligence operation utilizes every means at its disposal to obtain information on what occurred in order to determine the total truth.

And that is what we are trying to do.

If you can please support this work:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/supportjfkcountercoup

Archivist of the US Recommendations Re: Continued With Holdings of JFK Records

AOTUS RECOMMENDATIONS TO POTUS RE: CONTINUED JFK ACT WITH HOLDINGS 

BK NOTES: Many thanks to our friends at Government Attic, who got this response. I had emailed a request for these documents and was denied. They are still withholding two of the letters of recommendations from the Archivist to the President, documents what we will eventually get to read someday, but as they say here, not for "the time being."

NARA-NGC-2020-OOO185 has been processed with the following disposition: Partial Grant/Partial Denial.

January 21, 2020

VIA FOIA online

Re: Freedom of Information Act Request: NGC20-124

This is in response to your Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request dated December 28, 2019 and received in our office on the same day. Your request has been assigned the above tracking number in addition to your FO/Aonline tracking number NARA-NGC-2020-000185. In your request , you stated:

a copy of each letter sent by the Archivist of the United States to the President of the United States between January 1, 2017 and the present.

After conducting a search, we were able to locate four letters responsive to your reqeuest. One letter from the Archivist to the President concerning the John F. Kennedy Assassinations Records Collection Act, dated March 26, 2018, contains eight attachments, totaling 18 pages and two spreadsheets. We are releasing the letter and three of the attachments in full with no redactions: Tab 6 (letter from the Archivist to the President dated September 26, 2017, enclosed), Tab 7 (spreadsheet, enclosed) and Tab 8 (spreadsheet, located on our webpage: 

http://www.archivies.gov/foia/electronic-reading-room). 

Five of the attachments (Tabs 1 through 5) are being withheld in full ursuant to 5 O.S.C. &552(b)(S), under the deliberative process privilege, which protects the decision making processes of government agencies.

The other two letters from the Archivist to the President, dated October 4, 2017 and October 12, 2017, and totaling four pages, also concern the John F. Kennedy Assassinations Records Collection Act and are being withheld in full pursuant to 5 U.S.C. &552(b)(S), under the deliberative process privilege, which protects the decision making process of government agencies.

This completes the processing of your FOIA request……

Thank you for contacting the National Archives and Records Administration

Sincerely,

Jodi L. Foor

Deputy FOIA Officer
Office of General Counsel

NARA …..Archivist of the United States

David S. Ferriero

26 March 2018

Memorandum For: The Honorable Donald J. Trump President of the United States

From: David S. Ferriero Archivst of the United States

Subject: Recommendation Concernting Certification of Certain Records Related to the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

This memorandum is in response to your memorandum of 26 October 2017, which asked that I provide you with my recommendation regarding proposals by departments and agencies  (“agencies”) to withhold particular records from public disclosure under section 5(g)(2)(D) of President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act of 1992 (44 U.S.C. 2107 note) (the “JFK Act”).

The following agencies provided the enclosed reports to NARA as of 12 March 2018 requesting continued postponement of particular records:

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Tab 1

Department of Defense (DoD) Tab 2

Department of Justice

-          Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Tab 3

-          Drug Enforcement  Agency (DEA) Tab 4

Department of State (State) Tab 5

In addition, we have enclosed our own request for continued postponement of the Social Security Numbers of living individuals (Tab 6).

We have also enclosed a list of 80 Record Identification Form (RIF) numbers that were identified by agencies when the collection was assembled in the 1990s, but for which we have not been able to associate with a specific record, and which we therefore believe require further postponement pending their resolution (Tab 7).

Finally, we have enclosed a spreadsheet of all of the items proposed for continued postponement under section 5(g)(D) of the Act (Tab 8).

My staff reviewed each of the records proposed for further postponement on a page-by-page basis, with the exception of those submitted by the CIA and FBI and those found at Tab 7. For CIA and FBI, the volume and time allotted for review required that we instead conduct a sample. We sampled approximately ten percent of the records from CIA and approximately 25 percent  of the records from FBI. In addition to our sampling, we have had extensive discussions with CIA and FBI since 26 October 2017 regarding their review methodology and our assessment of prior reviews. During the course of our review, we identified questions or concerns, and adjustments were made by DoD as well as CIA.

Based  on the results of the further review by agencies, an additional 5,821 records are being released in their entirety. 13,922 documents contain specific information that is proposed for further postponement under section 5(g)(2)(D) of the JFK Act. No records remain denied in full (other than the 80 identified in Tab 7 for which we have not been able to associate the RIF number with a specific record) under section 5(g)(2)(d) of the JFK Act. The National Archives is prepared to make available online the records with new releases no later than 26 April 2018.

Based on our review of submissions from the agencies, I believe that the enclosed proposals are consistent with the requirement s outlined in section 5(g)(2)(D) of the JFK Act. Accordingly, I am able to recommend to you that the information identified by agencies warrants continued postponement, for the time being.

I further recommend that you only certify further postponements through 26 October 2021, contingent upon any further recommendations for postponement being made in writing, on a document-by-document basis, by 26 April 2021 (to allow sufficient time for review by NARA and consideration by the President.)

Thank you for consideration of my recommendations,

cc: General John F. Kelly (Ret.) Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff

Donald F. McGahn II, Assistant to the President and Counsel to President

LTS H.R. McMaster, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs

Signed

DAVID S. FERRIERO

Archivist of the United States

26 September 2017

MEMORANDUM FOR THE PRESIDENT 

THROUGH: THE ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT FOR NATIONAL SECURITY AFFAIRS
FROM: THE ARCHIVIST OF THE UNITED STATES 

SUBJECT: Continued Postponement of Records in the President John F. Kennedy Assassinations Records Collection Act of 1992 (JFK Act)

The purpose of this memorandum is to request continued postponement beyond October 26, 2017, of the social security numbers of living persons that are contained in 211 documents from the records of the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) that were included in the JFK Assassinations Records Collection (Collection).  Pursuant to section 5(g)(2)(D) of the JFK Act, continued postponement of these social security numbers is necessary because of “an identifiable harm to ….law enforcement,…and the identifiable harm is of such gravity that it outweighs the public interest in disclosure.” (A list of 211 documents, with the associated “record identification form” (RIF) number, is attached.)

The HSCA investigated the assassinations of President Kennedy and Martin Luther King from 1977-1979. The JFK Act included in the definition of “Assassination record” any record “related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, that was created or made available for use by, obtained by, or otherwise came into the possession of” the HSCA. Section 3(2)(E), codified at: 44 U.S. C. & 2107 note. Among the HSCA records in the Collection are personnel and payroll records of HSCA staff, which include their social security numbers (SSN). The Assassination Records Review Board released these records during its tenure (1994-1998), and only withheld the SSNs pursuant to Section 6(3).

I believe that release of social security numbers of living persons would cause identifiable harm to law enforcement by increasing the possibility of identity theft and  related crimes, which would necessitate a law enforcement response. Moreover, there is no discernible public interest that would outweigh the grave harm that could result from such disclosure. The General Counsel of the House of Representatives supports our request for continued postponement of these SSNs. I note that earlier this month, the President signed into law the Social Security Number Fraud Act of 2017, Pub. L. 115-59, which serves to limit the transmission of SSNs by agencies through the mail and requires “the partial redaction of social security account numbers where feasible.”

I also reccommeend that the postponement of each of these records should extend until either the death of the individual, or 75 years from the conclusion of the HSCA investigation (2054), whichever occurs first.

If your staff has questions regarding this request, please contact William J. Bosanko, Chief Operating Officer, at 301-837-3604 or william.bosanko@nara.gov.

Sincerely,
Signed

DAVID S. FERRIERO

Archivist of the United States.

For the complete response with attachments see: 

Letter from the Archivist of the United States to the President concerning the John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act, including three attachments, March 26, 2018

If you can, please support this work:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/supportjfkcountercoup

The Hunt's Kansas City Chiefs

The Hunt’s Kansas City Chiefs

Congratulations to Andy Reid and the Kansas City Chiefs for their Superbowl victory. When I saw Andy on stage standing next to some beautiful women wearing sweaters with the word “HUNT” embroidered on them I was reminded of how the Chiefs got to Kansas City, Missouri.

Dallas oilman H. L. Hunt had controlling interests in two Texas teams – the Dallas Cowboys and the Texans, but since they both couldn’t play in Dallas, one had to go.  Curington was Hunt’s right hand man, and as he relates in his book Hunt had him look on a map for the largest city without a NFL football team, and that was Kansas City. So Hunt gave the Cowboys to one son and the other team to Lamar, and that’s why the Chiefs are in Kansas City.

Hunt’s partner in the Cowboys was another Dallas oil man Clint Merchison, and their lawyer was McKennzie, whose office was in the Southland Building (Henry Baer-Wynne, McKenzine, Jaffe, Tinsley), who also represented Robert Oswald and Marina when they testified before the Warren Commission.

The Southland Building is certainly a place of interest to assassination researchers for a number of reasons including the fact that Oswald visited there to apply for a job with one of George deMohrenschildt’s pals, it is where Antonio Veciana ostensibly met Oswald and David Atlee Phillips (“Maurice Bishop”) in September 1963. The Southland Building is also the home of an exclusive private club where many of the major players enjoyed themselves, and the Sheraton Hotel, where George H. W. Bush stayed the night before the assassination, as did the Secret Service, and where the White House Communications Agency (WHCA) set up their remote station for monitoring the motorcade security channel, the recordings of which have never surfaced.

The Southland Building is directly on the path to where Oswald was heading after leaving the Texas School Book Depository before getting on a bus heading back in the opposite direction.

Oswald enjoyed football, watched the Dallas Cowboys on TV, and may have even tried out for the Arlington Heights High School football team, which included the Hale twins, son of famous Texas collegate football star I.B. Hale, who could have played in the NFL, but joined the FBI instead. After working for the FBI the senior Hale worked in Security at General Dynamics, which was in a heated war with Boeing for the F-111 TFX jet fighter-bomber contract.

Although General LeMay said that the Boeing plane was clearly much better, General Dynamics got the contract because of politics, which is how they try to explain why the Hale brothers were observed by an FBI stakeout team breaking into the Vegas apartment of Judyth Campbell Extner. That had nothing to do with the assassination, they say.

Oswald didn’t make the team, ridiculed by the Hales, so he dropped out of school and enlisted in the Marines soon after his birthday.

NFL owners are a close and peculiar bunch, always playing poker with each other, and very selective about who they let in their high stakes club, keeping Trump out when he wanted in.  Besides the Hunts, another major NFL owner who comes into play is Carroll Rosenbloom, the owner of the Baltimore Colts, whose beachside home near Atlantic City was LBJ’s secret hideaway during the 1964 Democratic National Convention.

Rosenbloom exchanged the Colts for the LA Rams and then they were moved out of Baltimore to Indiana. Rosenbloom was found drowned on a Florida beach, another suspicious death.(BK Notes: Thanks to Mike for correcting me re: Rosenbloom moving the team.)

I know all about Rosenbloom because of his gambling and golfing, and will repost an article I wrote on Conspiracy Golf sometime soon.

Gambling is a big part of the NFL and golf action, and an undercover informant told the FBI that he knew Jack Ruby took bets on the Cowboys from high stakes players, including his pal radio station owner Gordon McLendon.

Since all such big bets had to be “laid off,” we know who Ruby laid off his bets with – the Campisis, who owned the Egyptian Lounge on Mockingbird Lane, where Ruby had dinner the night before the assassination.

As for the Kansas City Chiefs - I would be remiss if I didn't mention the repeated requests from T. Carter and others who love Native Americans to remove the name of the Chiefs and Redskins from their NFL team names, as they consider it degrading. 

Getting back to Kansas City, I think of the song, “Kansas City,” – they have some foxy women there, and I’m gonna get me one. Going to Kansas City, Kansas City here I come.”

And now there’s going to be a JFK assassination conference in Kansas City, of all places, come April, and will include such respected names as Dr. Wecht, John Newman, Gary Aguilar, Dick Russell, and Lisa Pease, as well as Larry Rivera, who will argue that it’s Oswald in the doorway photo – not Lovelady, and that Jack Ruby didn’t shoot Oswald, but an impostor, posing as Ruby did the job, a theory seriously promoted by Ralph Cinque for the Oswald Innocence campaign. Well Oswald was certainly innocent of killing JFK, but not for the reasons they promote.

In any case, Kansas City is the place to be, and I’ve yet to decide if I am going, but I’m glad Andy Reid finally got his Superbowl ring and for reminding me of all these interesting associations.

Oh, yea, and another thing - NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is the son of former Senator Goodell who New York Governor Rockefeller assigned to replace the assassinated RFK. 

My review of Curington’s book:

http://jfkcountercoup.blogspot.com/2018/09/hl-hunt-motive-and-opportunity-book.html

If you can please suport JFKCountercoup:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/supportjfkcountercoup