Stuck in the '60s

A couple of days ago, I told readers that I would not remain mired in the JFK assassination and other scandals from the 1960s. But as the poet said, the past is never really past. So let us revisit history one more time; I promise to keep this sort of thing both brief and rare.

A correspondent offered one fascinating observation about the current attempt to rewrite the Warren Commission's findings in favor of a "blame Fidel" scenario: The last surviving member of the Commission, Gerald Ford, is not in the best of health. Once he passes from the scene, right-wing revisionists will no longer be in the uncomfortable position of arguing with a former Republican president.

A good site dealing with this controversy, and with many related matters, is Covert History. Stupidly, I had not visited that site for some time and thus missed lots of juicy observations, such as this one:

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.

You'll also find a good review of the new book Ultimate Sacrifice by Lamarr Waldron and Thom Hartmann. This book has caused some gnashing of teeth, because it espouses a "mob did it" theory and because Hartmann is a rising progressive star who has done a lot of good work.

Waldron and Hartmann argue that JFK had hoped to back an anti-Castro coup led by Che Guevara, an idea which surely would have horrified any anti-Castro exiles who caught wind of it. I once went over some old (1963-64) copies of Human Events, the John Birch Society journal which then had close ties to the exile community. The magazine published articles hinting of an administration plan to replace Fidel with someone the exiles considered just as bad. Of course, the Birchers thought that JFK and (most of) the CIA had gone bolshie.

As Buell notes, the most important of the Human Events pieces on Cuban matters was written by one John Martino, whose bio can be found here. Even some people who know the case well don't know about Martino, who once made a startling confession:

In an article published in January, 1964, Martino claimed in had important information about the death of John F. Kennedy. He argued that in 1963 Fidel Castro had discovered an American plot to overthrow his government. It was therefore decided to retaliate by organizing the assassination of Kennedy. Martino and Nathaniel Weyl both claimed that Lee Harvey Oswald had been in Cuba in 1963 and had been recruited by Cuban intelligence to kill Kennedy.

Martino told his friend, Fred Claasen, that he was not telling the truth about the Cubans being behind the assassination of Kennedy. He admitted that he had been involved in the conspiracy by acting as a courier delivering money. He also told the same story to his wife Florence Martino.

Shortly before his death in 1975 Martino confessed to a Miami Newsday reporter, John Cummings, that he had been guilty of spreading false stories implicating Lee Harvey Oswald in the assassination. He claimed that two of the gunmen were Cuban exiles. It is believed the two men were Herminio Diaz Garcia and Virgilio Gonzalez. Cummings added: "He told me he'd been part of the assassination of Kennedy. He wasn't in Dallas pulling a trigger, but he was involved. He implied that his role was delivering money, facilitating things.... He asked me not to write it while he was alive."

Fred Claasen also told the House Select Committee on Assassinations what he knew about Martino's involvement in the case. Florence Martino at first refused to corroborate the story. However, in 1994 she told Anthony Summers that her husband said to her on the morning of 22nd November, 1963: "Flo, they're going to kill him (Kennedy). They're going to kill him when he gets to Texas."

Buell adds the following:

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.

So what have we learned, boys and girls? Two things: 1. The current "war" between CIA and the Pentagon actually has a long, long history (although by no means do I consider all Agency personnel innocent of JFK's blood); and 2. The current attempt to blame Castro has a similarly hoary pedigree.

As I said: The past is never past.

Incidentally: If you scroll down further in the Covert History site and you will also find conclusive documentary evidence that Clay Shaw, the only man charged in the assassination, was a well-paid CIA contract agent. Shaw denied under oath that he worked in any way for the CIA.

Stuck in the 1970s: Writer Gary Buell also revives an old interview from 1977 in which Frank Sturgis, the infamous Watergate burglar, insists that Deep Throat was actually Robert Bennett -- then of CIA, now of Capitol Hill. This was also my own belief. As you will recall, Jim Hougan, author of Secret Agenda, also fingered Bennett, and continued to do so even after Mark Felt "outed" himself. The opening words of the '77 article are of some interest:

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.