The Mafia at Dealey Plaza

 The Mafia at Dealey Plaza 

The Mafia and the Mob are two different things. The Mafia is a very distinct, Italian organized criminal group, while the mob can be any group of organized criminals. 

The Mafia came into the JFK assassination picture even before JFK was president. It was during the Eisenhower administration when the CIA's Richard Bissell had his agent James O'Connell visit Las Vegas in order to see if they could develop mutual plans to kill Cuban premier Fidel Castro. 

O'Connell first checked in with former FBI agent Robert Maheu, who told O'Connell that the man to see was John Rosselli, the right hand man of Chicago mafia boss Sam Giancana, who controlled all the illegal rackets west of Chicago. 

Rosselli and O'Coonnell agreed, though Rosselli explained he would have to run the idea past his boss Giancana, who said that since it was a Havana operation, it had to include Santo Traficante of Tampa and Havana. Traficante said he could arrange for Castro to be poisoned by a chef who ran a restaurant that Castro frequented. The CIA passed the poison and $10,000 in cash to the expected executioner, but nothing happened. 

After considering other exotic methods of murder including exploding cigars and sea shells and a tainted wet suit that was to be given to Castro, it was decided to have snipers shoot Castro in the head when he drove by in an open jeep, as he often did. Castro did visit the former Xandau Dupont estate on the north shore east of Havana, and there was only one road to it that ran through the resort town of Veradero. The plan was called the Pathfinder Plan. 

And it just so happened that Dr. Rolando Cubella (AMLASH) reportely had an apartment in Veradero that could be used as a staging area. 

The Pathfinders were the most elite of the Bay of Pigs brigade, and especially trained to infiltrate Cuba before the invasion and lay the ground work among the local dissidents. When the invasion failed, some of the Pathfinders were rounded up, killed or imprisoned, but some escaped back to Florida where the reunited at the CIA's JMWAVE base at the University of Miami. 

There they were given additional training by CIA trainers John Harper, an explosives and sniper expert, infiltration and exfiltration expert Carl Jenkins, and the Mafia's John Rosselli, who was dressed in a US Army officer uniform and went by the names of Colonel Rawliins. 

Rosselli's CIA case officer, James O'Connell, was replaced by William Harvey, the head of the CIA's ZR/RIFLE assassination project, and he arranged for Rosselli to help train the anti-Castro Cubans including the Pathfinders. 

Two US Army Ranger Captains, Bradely Ayers and Edward Roderick, were also cross posted to the CIA by USMC Gen. Brute Krulak, who was responsible for the Pentagon's assistance to the CIA for covert operations, especially those in Cuba and Vietnam. 

They set up remote bases in the Florida everglade swamp to continue the training in small boat handling, and at Point Mary near Key Largo to train the snipers. 

Even after William Harvey was fired as head of the Cuban desk by RFK, Harvey continued to act as Rosselli's case officer, and they last met in the spring of 1963 in Miami, with Harvey picking up the tabs for their hotel, meals and drinks, using the ZR/RIFLE account to pay those bills. 

FitzGerald briefed the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon on their covert operations in Cuba, and Gen. Krulak's aide Col. Higgins took notes, which reflected the fact that FitzGerald said the CIA had studied the German military's Jully 20 1944 Valkyrie plot to kill Hitler in detail, in order to develop 

Harvey was replaced by Desmond FitzGerald, who also acted as the case officer for Cubella (AMLASH), who was meeting with CIA agents including FitzGerald himself to plan the assassination of Castro. 

MORE TO COME ON THIS.