An Introduction to the JFK Assassination

The United States Government is one of the most highly regarded and feared institutions known to man. It controls the most powerful nation on the face of the earth, and it has influence over everyone who inhabits the world. John Fitzgerald Kennedy was no exception. His time-honored role as President was halted forever by the government he represented. John Fitzgerald Kennedy s assassination was not the act of a lone gunman with radical ideas, but rather the work of a right wing government conspiracy. On April 17, 1961, a group of CIA sponsored Cuban exiles attempted a hostile takeover of Fidel Castro s Cuba. The operation was code named Operation Zapata. The plot failed. The President at the time, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, promised vital air support to the troops but withdrew it in the 11th hour.

The withdrawal resulted in the death of thousands of men and caused great humiliation to the CIA. What the CIA wanted more than anything was to get revenge for what the President had done to them (Norton). The Dallas motorcade, it was hoped, would evoke a demonstration of the President's personal popularity in a city which he had lost in the 1960 election (Warren 1). At the intersection of Houston and Elm Streets there stood a large brick building, the Texas School Book Depository. After the motorcade turned the corner at approximately 11 miles per hour, shots resounded in rapid succession. The President's hands moved to his neck. He appeared to stiffen momentarily and lurch slightly forward in his seat (Warren 3). Seconds later, Secret Service members were radioing for help, and the Presidents limousine was proceeding at high speeds to the Parkland Memorial Hospital, 4 miles away (Warren 4). Several eyewitnesses in front of the building reported that they saw a rifle being fired from the southeast corner window on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository. One eyewitness, Howard L. Brennan, had been watching the parade from a point on Elm Street directly opposite and facing the building. He promptly told a policeman that he had seen a slender man, about 5 feet 10 inches, in his early thirties, take deliberate aim from the sixth-floor corner window and fire a rifle in the direction of the President's car (Warren 5).

This mysterious man would be later identified as Lee Harvey Oswald. The police detained him approximately forty-five minutes after the shooting. Oswald liked being alone and reading. As a part of his Marine training he took an intelligence test. The results of the test showed that he had an above average intelligence. From these characteristics the government assessed that he would fit the personality of an assassin (Duffy). Prior to his move to Dallas, Oswald told his boss that he was moving to Dallas because of a job opening at the Texas School Book Depository (Dorman 3). At 12:30 p.m. on November 22, 1963, three shots were fired from the Texas School Book Depository. One missed, the other two hit their target. The second shot was thought to be the fatal shot (Warren 9). Oswald owned an Italian Mannlicher-Carcano 6.5-millimeter rifle. The bullets retrieved from the President matched the rifle perfectly (Duffy). There was one thing left to speculation. The doctors performing the autopsy found fragments of another bullet casing, which did not match the rifle Oswald owned (Duffy). The Warren Commission had tapes of the motorcade from the time it started until the time the President was shot. Careful and critical analysis, now possible due to current technology, shows that there were actually four shots fired.

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The Mannlicher-Carcano 6.5-millimeter rifle has a maximum rapid firing succession of 6.3 seconds for 3 shots, averaging 2.1 seconds a shot. In the films, four shots were fired in 6.9 seconds. The only possible explanation would be the existence of a second gunman (Thomas 45). Many people to this day will testify that they saw smoke coming from the grassy knoll. They believe this came from a second gunman contracted by the same agency as Oswald (Gordon 9). The second gunman was there only as a backup, if Oswald had failed. He was to operate on a signal that was given to him by a man known only by the nickname Umbrella man (Gordon 9). If his umbrella was up the person stationed at the grassy knoll was to fire. If it was not, he should not fire. In the confusion, the Umbrella man thought that Oswald had missed the first and second times, so he raised his umbrella. The person on the knoll fired. The Umbrella man, and the man stationed on the knoll were never seen again (Gordon 9). In September of 1963, E. Howard Hunt, a member of the CIA, organized a meeting with several powerful and influential men (Norton).

Hunt had a personal vendetta against President Kennedy for the embarrassments that the President caused from the 11th hour air support withdraw. Hunt told his family that he was going on vacation two days prior to the secret meeting (Warren 11). Recently, a secret government document was released proving that Lee Harvey Oswald was seen in Dallas with a U.S. Intelligence agent about two months before the murder (Dorman 1). The assassination of President Kennedy took place on November 22, 1963, almost exactly two months following the meeting. It is very unlikely that three people would try to assassinate the President on the same day, at the same spot. The CIA had an integral part in coordinating and recruiting the members for the assassination, and it was successful. John Fitzgerald Kennedy s assassination was not due to a lone gunman with radical ideas, but rather the work of a right wing government conspiracy.

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