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Post by beth on Nov 2, 2009 23:46:58 GMT
There's a new book coming out, The Kennedy Assassination: 24 Hours After - by Steven Gillon of the History Channel. Here are his comments on Huff-Po. A New Wrinkle in the JFK Assassination Story This month will mark the 46th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. A recently declassified oral history by Brigadier General Godfrey McHugh, President Kennedy's military aide on the Dallas trip, sheds new light on the critical hours after the shooting. McHugh makes startling claims about Lyndon Johnson's behavior in the wake of the assassination. The interview with McHugh, originally conducted for the John F. Kennedy Library in 1978, remained closed for 31 years. It was finally declassified in the spring of 2009. I just happened to be working at the Kennedy Library on the day the interview was opened to the public and have used it for the first time in my new book, The Kennedy Assassination -- 24 Hours After. After being informed at Parkland Hospital that Kennedy was dead, Johnson raced back to Air Force One, where he waited for Mrs. Kennedy and the body of the slain president, and made preparations to take the Oath of Office. Back at the hospital, the Kennedy group loaded the body into a coffin, forced their way past a local justice of the peace, and hurried back to Love Field for the long ride back to Washington. It was standard practice for the plane to take off as soon as the commander-in-chief was onboard. Even after McHugh had ordered the pilot to take off, however, "nothing happened." According to the newly declassified transcript, Mrs. Kennedy was becoming desperate to leave. "Mrs. Kennedy was getting very warm, she had blood all over her hat, her coat...his brains were sticking on her hat. It was dreadful," McHugh said. She pleaded with him to get the plane off the ground. "Please, let's leave," she said. McHugh jumped up and used the phone near the rear compartment to call Captain James Swindal. "Let's leave," he said. Swindal responded: "I can't do it. I have orders to wait." Not wanting to make a scene in front of Mrs. Kennedy, McHugh rushed to the front of the plane. "Swindal, what on earth is going on?" The pilot told him that "the President wants to remain in this area." McHugh, like most members of the Kennedy entourage, did not know that Johnson was onboard. They believed that the new president was on his own plane flying back to Washington. If LBJ was on the plane, McHugh wanted to see for himself. Since he had not seen Johnson in the aisle -- and at 6'4" Johnson would be tough to miss -- McHugh assumed that he must then be in the bedroom. When he checked there Johnson was nowhere to be seen. The only place on the plane he had not inspected was the bathroom in the presidential bedroom. What McHugh claimed to have witnessed next was shocking. "I walked in the toilet, in the powder room, and there he was hiding, with the curtain closed," McHugh recalled. He claimed that LBJ was crying, "They're going to get us all. It's a plot. It's a plot. It's going to get us all.'" According to the General, Johnson "was hysterical, sitting down on the john there alone in this thing." I soon discovered that McHugh had told a similar story when he spoke by phone with Mark Flanagan, an investigator with the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA). Ironically, McHugh gave the interview to the HSCA a week before he sat down with the Kennedy Library in May 1978. "McHugh had encountered difficulty in locating Johnson but finally discovered him alone," Flanagan wrote in his summary to the Committee. Quoting McHugh, the investigator noted that the General found Johnson "hiding in the toilet in the bedroom compartment and muttering, 'Conspiracy, conspiracy, they're after all of us.'" Author Christopher Anderson claimed that McHugh shared a similar, although slightly more dramatic, version of this story when he interviewed the General for his book Jackie after Jack, published in 1998. If true, the story is explosive and reveals a completely different side of Johnson than the collected, calm presence he otherwise managed to convey throughout the hours and days following Kennedy's death. But how credible is McHugh's account? It is, of course, impossible to confirm or deny whether a private encounter took place between the two men, both of whom are now dead. There are a number of reasons to doubt McHugh's claim. The General intensely disliked Johnson and was fiercely loyal to JFK, and therefore had some reason to invent such a story. Most glaring, McHugh made no mention of what was surely a very memorable encounter in his long interview with William Manchester in 1964. It also stands to reason that if McHugh had witnessed Johnson in a state of utter breakdown, he would have told the story to others within the Kennedy camp. Surely, given how potentially damaging the story would be to LBJ, Kennedy partisans would have leaked it to the media at some point Although it is impossible to prove, my gut reaction is that McHugh is telling the truth. We know that Johnson was a man capable of dramatic mood swings, and occasional fits of hysteria were not unusual. McHugh's account of LBJ's behavior is similar to RFK's description of a trembling and tearful Johnson at the 1960 Democratic Convention when it appeared that JFK might renege on his promise to include him on the ticket. It was not surprising behavior to those who knew him best. We also know from some eyewitnesses that LBJ's secret service agent, Rufus Youngblood, stood outside the door to the bedroom and controlled the traffic into the room. Aides went in and out, but it is possible that McHugh could have found LBJ alone in the bedroom suite. If true, though, why did McHugh wait until 1978 to tell this story? When Manchester interviewed him in May 1964, McHugh was still in the military, although only a few months away from retirement. Is it possible that he worried the story would be too damaging to his commander-in-chief? We will never know for sure, but McHugh's account is sure to add to the controversy surrounding that tragic November day in Dallas. Huffington Post I wonder who Johnson might have been thinking of as "they".
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Post by Liberator on Nov 3, 2009 0:09:48 GMT
It is kind of in keeping that Johnson's good ol' Texan boy image might have covered a more emotional side that he could not allow to be shown. He was certainly capable of showing aggressive emotion and, like a lot of weaker men wanting to show tough, not good at changing policy when it became clear that more of the same just wasn't working in Vietnam and the Saigon government were as dictatorial as Hanoi and crooks with it.
What it does is dispel some of the tales that Johnson might have been involved. If there was reason to cast aspersions on his character, then that is the most likely direction for them fall, not that he had a panic attack. He could not have known conceivably that the assassination might be an act of war. All that was necessary was to get him too and by the time power devolved elsewhere, missiles could have been incoming. Maybe ensuring adequate cover in case somebody had one ready for AF1 was why he did not want to take off immediately. He may not have had any particular 'they' in mind though.
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Post by beth on Nov 3, 2009 1:44:16 GMT
Well, I certainly don't feel critical toward him. It isn't really possible to know what it was like to be right there in the midst of the drama and tragedy of that 24 hours, but it must have been traumatizing.
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Post by Liberator on Nov 3, 2009 4:52:10 GMT
I don't think 'critical' but I think that at that time and place, Johnson's tough Texan image fits covering a more emotional (and intelligent!) interior that he might be more rewarded for showing today. It feels very plausible that he could have imagined the assassination just the start of a plan to take the top out and paralyse the country for an attack in revenge for Khruschev's backing down over Cuba - even for something Cuba planned without Soviet help. The USA does have that weakness of military centralisation that would make it an obvious plan to take the C-in-C out and his deputy leaving no agreed competent chief of staff for the crucial minutes to launch a strike. Even today, a man cannot always admit to being human, but back then they all had to pretend to be out of Marvel Comix. I do think that in his term of office, Johnson displayed the kind of stubbordness that often comes from being afraid to be seen as weak by admitting that we goofed it and trying something else. Isn't Obama getting just the opposite from the same kind of people for being prepared to talk with 'enemies' like Iran instead of dictate to them? But letting your guard down and being prepared to talk is in the end the morally stronger position than shouting the big shout because you have more nukes than he has?
The man with the real power isn't the man threatening with the knife or gun, it is the unarmed man in the suit telling him to do it.
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Post by gabriel on Nov 3, 2009 11:32:44 GMT
Well, I'm not sure what to make of all of this. I don't believe Johnson was involved in Kennedy's assassination. I'm sure he wasn't clear in his thinking after it happened.I'll have to read.
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Post by Liberator on Nov 3, 2009 17:01:12 GMT
The 'theories' trying to claim Johnson was involved were all very weak. This account just confirms that if he had been there is no possible way he could have behaved like that and if anybody at the time with a grudge against him had thought it plausible that they could cast doubt in his direction they would have done so.
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Post by DAS (formerly BushAdmirer) on Nov 6, 2009 2:40:12 GMT
J Edgar Hoover hated the entire Kennedy clan and everything they stood for and they tried to rein him in as well. I think that Hoover found he could not blackmail any of the Kennedies into obedience and worked with organised crime to get rid of them. He was in the perfect position to do it, he was much more concerned about issues of political outlook and sexual habits than the criminal businesses and he had tabs on everybody so he could lean on them That's a pretty bizarre theory Retarsed. I think that's a non starter. I don't think any of the conspiracy theories hold water. True enough, the Mafia may have felt double crossed because Kennedy's father Joe was in their keep for years and obedient to them. LBJ was power mad and stood to gain the most from JFK's demise. Either of them could have had a hand in it but I doubt it. Most likely Oswald acted alone.
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Post by gabriel on Nov 6, 2009 6:04:58 GMT
Let's say Oswald acted alone. I don't think he did. You only have to have 2 people for a conspiracy. But let's say he did. Why? He always denied he did it until Ruby silenced him. He never admitted that he killed Kennedy or that he had anything against JFK. Even the nut who shot Pres Reagan had an agenda - to impress Jodie Foster, or whatever.
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Post by ♫anna♫ on Nov 6, 2009 6:41:56 GMT
Most likely Oswald acted alone. With all respect Bush Admirer if Oswald fired the fatal shot from his vantage point why did JFK's skull fragments bounce backwards onto the trunk of the car! This defies everything we know about ballastics and physics..
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Post by gabriel on Nov 6, 2009 11:29:16 GMT
Most likely Oswald acted alone. With all respect Bush Admirer if Oswald fired the fatal shot from his vantage point why did JFK's skull fragments bounce backwards onto the trunk of the car! This defies everything we know about ballastics and physics.. That magic bullet did amazing things. Absolutely, I don't believe that Oswald and only Oswald fired at and hit JFK. Forget conspiracies and consider the laws of physics. Connelly was hit from the front. JFK was hit from the front and probably by Oswald from behind. He wasn't a klutz with a rifle, that's certainly correct. But that rifle, from that angle, that far away. Oswald wasn't that good. And JFK was hit from the front. Anyway, who likely assassinated JFK is an interesting topic.
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Post by Liberator on Nov 7, 2009 1:11:00 GMT
I'm sure that Oswald was involved but I don't feel anything either way as to whether he thought he was assassinating Kennedy or protecting him. Compared to alternatives, Kennedy was the least aggressive to Communists, but assassins are rarely rational.
I think Hoover dunnit with Mafia connivance, but that is a thesis looking for proof, not a deduction derived from what few facts we know. I never thought the LBJ connivance stood up and this view of Great Macho Texan Man crying his eyes out in 'a blue funk' in the bog confirms that for me - (and makes LBJ rather more 'human' than I've been accustomed to thinking of him).
In all honesty, though JFK was the Obama of his day and he did get the USA into modernity, I find him a repellent character while LBJ was crude and crass but honest. Kennedy is a man I think would screw any woman he could buy, LBJ would make love with any woman who thought him worth enjoying to make love with. Thereby lies the difference.
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Post by gabriel on Nov 14, 2009 11:13:48 GMT
On Nov 22 The History Channel is showing a docu called 'In JFK's Car' or something like that. It's going to trace the bullets and possible shooting sites. I'll be watching.
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Post by beth on Nov 15, 2009 3:22:41 GMT
Thanks for the heads up, Gabriel. I'm going to watch it, too.
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Post by gabriel on Nov 15, 2009 10:47:53 GMT
Oh yeah beth. I'll be watching. To see if they can shed any new light on this murder. I don't believe Oswald acted alone and I don't believe Oswald alone killed JFK. Like I've said before, it only takes 2 to make a conspiracy.
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Post by DAS (formerly BushAdmirer) on Nov 20, 2009 1:21:51 GMT
Gosh Lin, I've always wanted to be a womanizer like those guys but I kept getting turned down. Rats!
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Post by gabriel on Nov 20, 2009 11:56:27 GMT
You mean the Kennedy's? For sure, big time womanizer's and I feel for you bro if you're not getting enough action. But that's not the point of this thread.
Will we ever know who killed JFK? Probably not but it's still interesting to speculate.
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Post by Big Lin on Nov 20, 2009 16:07:12 GMT
Has anyone come across the theory that Kennedy committed suicide? I found it on the internet (where else?) about 18 months ago but haven't managed to track it down since. I think it was on some nutter (or maybe wind-up merchant's) blog.
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Post by Liberator on Nov 20, 2009 20:38:35 GMT
Naa Lin - faked it and went to join Elvis at Tesla Marconi and Von Neumann's alien embassy under the Andes.
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Post by gabriel on Nov 22, 2009 21:23:41 GMT
Well, I watched the docu on JFK's assassination and it was really interesting. From their tests it had to be Oswald alone on the 6th floor. They went into a lot of research with blood splatter. trajectory, even including the incline of the road and the wind coming directly from in front of the car. They knocked over the 2 stories of him being shot from on top of the underpass, I agree absolutely. But....they had a world champion sharpshooter and a stationary target. They also didn't have an Oswald crouched behind boxes where he could have been disturbed (didn't happen but he could have been, adrenaline probably pounding). So I'm not totally comvinced.
However, they are making me rethink the grassy knoll. The shot as they enacted it would have killed Jackie.
Dunno.
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Post by beth on Nov 23, 2009 0:16:41 GMT
They gave us a lot to think about. But, I've always thought Oswald was a shooter - just not the only shooter.
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