1ľor of "Crossfire: The Plot That Killed Kennedy."  (Uploaded to Startex by Bob Erwin with
permission from Mr. Marrs. Free to upload to other BBSs and Services)
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   Good morning. My name is Jim Marrs and I am a native of the Dallas-FortWorth Metroplex. I am a journalist and as such I have worked for several Texas newspapers, including more than a decade at the nearby Fort Worth Star-Telegram. During my career I have had the opportunity to meet many of the key characters in the JFK assassination saga. As a college student, I was in the Carousel Club and met Jack Ruby prior to the assassination. I also have interviewed Marguerite Oswald, Marina Oswald, Jeanne DeMohrenschildt, Gen. Edwin Walker, and many others, including Dealy Plaza witnesses, police and government officials. Since 1976 I have taught a course on the Kennedy Assassination at the University of Texas at Arlington. And, my book "Crossfire: The Plot That Killed Kennedy" was a basis for Oliver Stone's film "JFK." 
    As I'm sure you are becoming aware, the JFK assassination is indeed one of the world's greatest murder mysteries.  The more you study this case, the less you know for certain. The medical evidence, which should be the best evidence, is in total disarray. Even eminent medical authorities cannot agree on what this evidence is, much less what it means. Living eyewitnesses have had their testimony challenged due to the number of years that have passed.                      
   Even the physical evidence and primary FBI reports have come under fire --- and rightly so. In my own investigations, I have found numerous instances of FBI reports which do not accurately reflect what witnesses tried to tell them and other activities which were conducted in a manner to incriminate Lee Oswald.
  For example, the day after the assassination, the FBI reported no usable fingerprints anywhere on the rifle. The funeral home director who buried Oswald told me that he was present on Monday following the assassination when FBI agents placed Oswald's dead hand on the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle. Following this incident it was announced to the world that authorities had found his palm print on the rifle.
   As you can see, we all must exercise extreme caution in this case. Nothing is as it seams.    
   But to get the crux of the case---if there is a piece of "smoking gun" evidence available to the public today, I believe it can be found here---on page 193 of the Warren Commission meeting of January 27, 1964. 
   Understand that the Zapruder film established that the shooting sequence occurred within 6 seconds and the FBI lab established that it took 2 seconds just to cock and fire the Oswald rifle. This meant that only three shots were possible within the same frame of the shooting.   One shot struck Kennedy in the head and fragmented, a second shot missedand nicked a bystander named James Tague down at the Triple Underpass. Thisonly leaves one shot to account for seven wounds to both Kennedy and Connally. 
  Now this one bullet strike, known as the single-bullet theory, is ridiculous. No bullet could do that much damage to two men and emerge in a "pristine" condition as we see with Commission Exhibit 399.  However, for the sake of argument, let's look at the government's premise. The Warren Commission Reports states, "President Kennedy was first struck by a bullet which entered at the back of his neck and exited through the lower front portion of his neck..." The bullet passed through Kennedy's neck and struck Connally.   The problem here is that no time did a bullet traverse Kennedy's neck. See Autopsy report, death certificate, Kennedy jacket and shirt, Specter photo, etc.
   And this is why page 193 of the WC transcript is so important. We hear WC chief counsel J. Lee Rankin state to Chief Justice Warren and the others:
   "We have an explanation there in the autopsy that probably a fragment came out the front of the neck, but with the elevation that shot must have come from and the angle, it seems quite apparent now, since we have the picture of where the bullet entered the back, that the bullet entered below the shoulder blade to the right of the backbone, which is below the place where the picture show the bullet came out in the neckband of the shirt in front..."
   By this statement, we know beyond a question that the Warren Commission early on knew that their description of a shot through the neck was not true. And furthermore, since a high-powered bullet cannot change course in mid-flight, the entire "single-bullet" theory was untenable.
   Now I cannot over emphasize the importance of this point because if the"single-bullet" theory fails---as it does based on this statement from the Warren Commission's own chief counsel---than the lone-assassin theory also fail and we are into conspiracy just as the House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded in the 1970's.
   It is this type of information, which has trickled out over the past 31 years, which as lead researchers and the vast majority of the American public to disbelieve the government's lone assassin theory. 
  So now we must treat the subject of conspiracy seriously and for thisreason it is especially important for the Assassination Records Review Board to look closely at the question of conspiracy and the government records which might contain evidence of such.
   I think,  gentlemen, you will find that you are dealing with two conspiracies in this case.   The first conspiracy was the one to kill the president. This conspiracy was quite successful. Who was involved? How many shots were fired and by whom? Who gave the orders? Who raised the money and who passed the money?
   The answers to these questions are still unclear, they are still being debated.
   The second conspiracy was one which covered up the truth ofthe first conspiracy and this conspiracy was not so successful. Today there is an abundance of evidence to show that officials high with the U.S.  government committed acts designed, not to find truthful answers, but rather to hide the truth from the American public. 
   For a moment consider yourselves detectives. You have been called to the scene of a homicide. The uniformed police present you with four suspects.
   By the way, they tell you, we caught suspect number four (1.) destroying evidence, (2.) withholding evidence, (3.) altering evidence, (4.)fabricating evidence and (5.) intimidating witnesses. 
  I ask you, who would you most suspect of the crime? Suspect number 4, of course.  In this case, Suspect number four represents persons within the federal government of the United States. And the crimes mentioned have been documented. So the government that we turn to for information on this case includes the prime suspects.
   We all must watch carefully for misdirection, obfuscation and deceit when dealing with government documents.
   With this in mind, I would like to turn to the one central character ofthe assassination---Lee Harvey Oswald.
   The government and its apologists continue to claim that any investigation into the Kennedy assassination is a waste of time because Lee Oswald, acting alone, was the person responsible for the assassination.
   Gentlemen, if this is true---although i hope that I just disproved this idea---but if this is true, than why should any document still be classified? The Cold War is over. Any undercover agent from the 1960s has already retired? There is no longer any need for secrecy.
   Or is there? Perhaps there remains the need to protect and intelligence operation.  What I will share with you will probably strain your credibility, but let me assure you that there is an abundance of evidence to support my statements.
   First, I would like to share with you two documents---the first is a memo from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to the Office of Secretary of the State Department. It is dated June 3, 1960. In this memo---also sent to the Office of Naval Intelligence---Hoover writes:   "Since there is a possibility that an impostor is using Oswald's birth certificate, any current information the Department of State may have concerning subject will be appreciated."
   What a bombshell!! First we find that no less than J.Edgar Hoover himself was personally aware of Oswald three years before the assassination. And that Hoover has reason to suspect that someone is posing as Oswald, indicative of an intelligence operation. 
   Next listen to the words of Oswald's mother, Marguerite, in an interview reprinted in Exhibit 1808 of the Warren Commission:
   "Lee was 16 years old when he wanted to enlist in the Marines. The circumstances in which he chose this elite branch of service, in my opinion, are in glaring contradiction to reports, according to which, Lee frequented with communists at this time, and was, himself a 'Red' and an admirer of Karl Marx.
    "For my part, and taking into consideration what I know about the life of my son, I think that, on the contrary, he was recruited by the CIA, that he was sent by this organization to Russia, then to Dallas to infiltrate subversive organizations and ---who knows---to expose a conspiracy against Kennedy."
   There is evidence to support this idea, as it is now well documented that Oswald left a note, styled as a warning, with the FBI two weeks prior to the assassination.  Despite claims that the note warned FBI agents to leave Oswald's wife alone or he would take action, it has been established that an FBI official in Dallas ordered the note destroyed after theassassination. This was blatant destruction of evidence and certainly leaves the impression that the note must have contained something other than a threat against the FBI. If it had, it would have been printed on the cover of  LIFE magazine.
   Mrs. Oswald added:
   "This is a theory, but is seems to me that it conforms to my son's conduct from the day in 1954, when he came home accompanied by an officer in uniform."
   "This officer told my that the country needed boys like Lee---alert, educated and loyal---and that I should let him enlist in the Marine, despite his youth. I hesitated a little, then gave my consent.
   This sounds like the start of a career in intelligence and other bits of evidence only give further support to this idea:
   ---The House Select Committee on Assassinations found that the CIA had a 201 file on Oswald. While Agency officials tried to explain this file away, several former CIA officers said a 201 was an employment file, meaning Oswald had some sort of working relationship with the CIA.
   ---Several former Marines and a CIA paymaster have claimed that Oswald worked for intelligence.
   ---Recently released documents from the former Soviet Union clearly show that the Russians suspected Oswald of being an American agent.
   ---The ease with which Oswald received passports, both before and afterhis attempted defection to Russia, indicated a special relationship with the government.
   ---The fact that Oswald wrote lengthy reports for the government on both his stay in Russia and his activities in New Orleans in the summer of 1963.
   ---His notebook contained the word "Microdots" a method of photographically reducing information to a small dot, a standard spy method. 
   ---His possession of a tiny Minox camera, traditionally known as a spy camera, which carried a serial number indicating it was not commercially available. Who issued the camera? 
   The evidence continues to grow that Oswald, just as his mother and wife publicly claimed, was an agent working for the U.S. government.
   Furthermore, beginning with the 1960 Hoover warning, we see the very real possibility that Oswald was impersonated---perhaps as far back as thirteen years old.
   Within the Warren Commission volumes are school records showing that during the fall semester of 1953, Oswald attended 89 days at Beauregard Junior High School in New Orleans, missing only one day. Yet there are also records showing that during the same period Oswald attended Public School #44 in New York City. 
   Officially, the Oswalds moved from New York to New Orleans in early 1954 yet there are people, including a Mr. William Timmer who has told us that  as a youngster, he met Oswald when he lived in Stanley, North Dakota, during this time. Now Timmer and the others may have been mistaken. But on two separate occasions---in a Moscow interview with reported Aline Mosby and talking to New Orleans police Lt. Francis Martello in the summer of 1963, Oswald himself refereed to his move to North Dakota. 
   Oswald's Marine records are filled with inconsistencies. His brother Robert testified that Lee went hunting with him in February 1958 while he was on leave. Yet the military records show that Oswald was in the Philippines during this time. No leave is mentioned.
   There are many more instances like this and I think you will agree that one man cannot be in two separate places at the same time. 
   I will leave you with the story of Oswald attending W.C. Stripling Junior High in Fort Worth, Texas.
   Both his mother and his brother, Robert, told the Warren Commission that Lee entered junior high school in Fort Worth. Robert specifically named Stripling Junior High. Yet records presented by the Commission clearly show that Lee entered junior high school in New York, where he and his mother had moved in August 1952. There is no further mention of Stripling Junior High.
   However, just recently, we located and spoke with Mr. Frank Kudlaty, who now lives in Waco. In 1963, Mr. Kudlaty was the assistant principal at W.C. Stripling Junior High. He said that the day after the assassination---a Saturday---his principal ordered him to go to the school and provide FBI agents with the records of Lee Harvey Oswald. He said he handed over a file of school records to the FBI. There is no mention of these records in the  Warren Commission Report or volumes. Mr. Kudlaty also said this was the first time anyone had asked him about these records. 
   The authorities hid these documents away and then acted as if they didn't exist.   You see, there has never been a full and truthful investigation of this assassination.
   You must take this into consideration when viewing the records still held by the government.
   I hope you now see how vital it is to release all records pertaining to Oswald and the assassination. You are not and investigative body. Your job is simply to review the records with an eye toward release to the public.
   But there are thousand of investigators throughout this country---ordinary citizens who are spending their own time and money trying to solve this case.
   They deserve full disclosure from their own government---especially inlight of the fact that the government---and its apologists---still maintain that there is nothing amiss in the assassination story. It was simply a case of a warped individual being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
   I hope in my own small way I have shown you the need to produce the documents necessary to bring the assassination case to truthful conclusion. 
   We particularly need Lee Oswald's early school records---in Fort Worth, New York and in New Orleans. We need all medical records. All military records. All employment, social security and tax records.
   I would urge you to familiarize yourself with the official version of Oswald's life and the assassination---and then look for the documents whichare contradictory.
   The Cold War is over. There can no longer be any justifiable excuse of national security in holding back assassination material. The only possible security involved would be for those within the government who do not want the truth of the assassination revealed to the public.          
   The time for consideration of embarrassment the FBI and CIA or the Pentagon has long passed. It is now the time for the government to open its files on one of the most traumatic events in this nation's history.
   And you are the ones who can effect this turn to full and honest disclosure.   I thank you for your time and attention. 


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