D. H. Byrd, Von Alvensleben and Doolittle
Before the JFK Act of 1992 the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) was the most popular means of obtaining government documents, especially those related to the assassination of President Kennedy.
The law, passed in 1966, allowed ordinary citizens to request records from every branch of government, except Congress, that exempted itself.
Now, with the multiple failures to enforce the JFK Act, the FOIA is making a comeback.
Since the death of former Congressional investigator Harold Weisberg, who made prolific use of the FOIA to accumulate his extensive archive on the assassination (Now available at Hood College ), the Assassination Archives and Research Center (AARC) has been the predominant source of FOIA requests regarding the assassination. The AARC has also been known to sue in civil court in order to enforce its requests.
Originaly founded by the late Bernard Festerwald, Jr., its work has been carried on by attorney Jim Lesar and supported by a number of able volunteers, and assisted by attorney Dan Alcorn. [https://aarclibrary.org/about-the-aarc/ ]
Lesar was the lead attorney on Jefferson Morley’s decade long quest to obtain CIA records on their officer George Joannides – who ran the anti-Castro Cuban Student Directorate (DRE), the organization the accused assassin tried to infiltrate, tangled with on the street, was arrested with, and then appeared on a radio debate with two CIA trained psychological warriors. [ https://aarclibrary.org/update-morley-suit-for-records-on-george-joannides/ ]
More recently Lesar and Alcorn were the lead attorneys on an FOIA request for any CIA records on the July 20,1944 attempted assassination of Hitler by some of his top military officers, an event that CIA officer Desmond FitzGerald told the Joint Chiefs of Staff was being “studied in detail” in order to be adapted against Fidel Castro.
Incredulous at the CIA’s response that they had no records at all, they sued in court and the CIA reluctantly coughed up one propaganda leaflet that attempted to blame the failure of the plot on communists. [ https://aarclibrary.org/cia-responds-to-aarc-foia-suit-on-cias-1963-study-of-plots-to-assassinate-adolf-hitler/ ]
Most recently the AARC requested any and all CIA records on D. H. Byrd, the owner of the Texas School Book Depository at the time of the assassination, and his safari partner German aristocrat Barron Werner Von Alvensleben, as well as another hunting partner Gen. James Doolttle.
Besides owning the TSBD, Bryd was also one of the owners of the LTV company that figures in various aspects of the assassination. And with Cord Meyer, Sr, father of Cord Meyer, Jr., Bryd was a founder of the Civil Air Patrol (CAP), of which the accused assassin was cadet in New Orleans with Captain David Ferrie.
Von Alvensleben’s father is the subject of a World War II Office of Strategic Studies (OSS) report that describes him as an “assassination expert.” Von Albvensleben also wrote a monograph that was distributed among the Germans in Africa that praised and supported the German military’s July 20, 1944 attempt to kill Hitler.
Von Alvensleben established a famed park in Portuguese East Africa – Safarilandia, that was frequented by Byrd, and was where he was at the time of the assassination.
It may only be an irony, but Von Alvensleben’s favorite weapon was a 6.5 Manlicher-Schonauer, made by the same company that made the rifle found on the Sixth Floor of the TSBD shortly after the assassination. It was also used by Hemingway and other famous hunters.
Bryd invited Von Alvensleben to Texas where he visited in December, 1963, adding new heads to Byrd’s trophy room in his expansive home. Bryd also had a window removed from the Sixth Floor and placed in his trophy room as well.
While Doolittle is best known for leading the B-24 carrier based bombing raid against Japan not long after the attack on Pearl Harbor, he also gives is name to the Doolittle Report, the findings of his commission’s evaluation of CIA’s covert intelligence operations.
In 1954 President Eisenhower appointed Doolittle to act as Chairman of the committee “to conduct a study of the covert activities of the Central Intelligence Agency.
This commission also included – Mr. William B. Franke, Morris Hadley, William Pawley, and was under the executive direction of Mr. S. Paul Johnston.
This still highly redacted report, completed in only three months, supports CIA covert intelligence operations, encourages their use, advocates a centralized CIA HQ, and was completed in such a short time by the cooperation of the covert operators themselves.
[ Preview attachment doolittle_report.pdf /REPORT ON THE COVERT ACTIVITIES OF THE CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY ]
So the AARC FOIA request includes records on D. H. Bryd, Weiner Von Alvensleben and General Doolittle, not because of his World War II military actions, but because of his chairmanship of the Doolittle Commission on CIA Covert Intelligence Activities.
Apparently the CIA was even less enthusiastic about responding to this request than they were for Joannides or the Hitler Plot, as months after it was sent via certified mail, the CIA claimed it had not received it. When a post office inquiry was made, it was determined that the CIA officer who signed off on accepting it was “John Smith.”
Well now the CIA has the request, and says that it will respond sometime in February. So after the October 26, deadline for President Biden’s response to enforcement of the JFK Act, and the November 22 anniversary of the assassination events, we can look forward to see what the CIA has to offer on Bryd, Von Alvensleben and Doolittle. And we can look to more frequent use of the FOIA with the increased relaization that the JFK Act will not be properly enforced.
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