About John F. Kennedy’s Assassination

John Fitzgerald Kennedy was the 35th President of the United States from 1961 until 1963. He was very popular, because he was youthful, hopeful, and different from the past presidents. He even tried to help the African Americans with civil rights and desegregation. On November 22, 1963, Americans were devastated after watching the Presidential parade on live television or in person. During the parade, Governor John Connally, Nellie Connally, President Kennedy, and Jackie Kennedy was riding in SS-100-X, the presidential limousine, with the top opened.

While riding through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas, President Kennedy was shot twice: one in the back of the neck and one in the right side of the head. After being rushed to Parkland Memorial Hospital, President John Fitzgerald Kennedy was declared dead at 1:00 p.m. on November 22, 1963. Governor Connally was also shot in the back and arm, but his wounds was not fatal. At 2:48 p.m., Lyndon Baines Johnson, the Vice President, was sworn in as President of the United States.

Lee Harvey Oswald, a former Marine, was arrested for the assassination of President Kennedy by Dallas Police Department at 1:40 p.m. On November 24, Oswald was being escorting by detectives from Dallas Police Headquarters to an armored car, which was planning on going to the county jail. At 11:21 a.m., Jack Ruby, Dallas nightclub operator, shot Oswald in the abdomen at a close range. At the Parkland Memorial Hospital, Lee Harvey Oswald was pronounced dead at 1:07 p.m.

American families were devastated about President Kennedy’s death. Phil Terrell, four years old, and his brother was making a play fort with the couches on November 22, 1963. Louella Terrell, his mom, and his sisters were watching the John F. Kennedy parade. His mom and sisters started crying. Phil did not understand why they were crying. All that he understood was something happened to John F. Kennedy. Later that day, Louella explained to him that the President John F. Kennedy was shot and killed. Phil said,”My life-long quest is to find the reason why this occurred.” After researching, Phil and I believe that Oswald was not a lone shooter, but there are many different theories about this assassination including the official, the mafia, and the United States Intelligence theories.

First, the official theory was the Warren Report. One week after John F. Kennedy’s assassination, President Johnson created a group called Warren Commission to create the Warren Report. The Warren Commission included Earl Warren(Chief Justice of the United States), Richard Russell(United States Senator), John Sherman Cooper(United States Senator), Hale Boggs(United States Representative), Gerald Ford(United States Representative), Allen Welsh Dulles(former Director of Central Intelligence Agency), and John J. McCloy(President of the World Bank Group). The Warren Commision Report was President Johnson’s attempt to calm down America. It concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President Kennedy alone. It also concluded that one bullet hit both President Kennedy and Governor Connally. Warren Commission Report left out a lot of details about his assassination and evidence. Earl Warren was close to the Kennedy family, which interfered with his duties to the Commission. Because Kennedy’s autopsy photos were too disturbing, Warren denied the Commission access to them. Warren also did not allowed the Commission to interview a certain witness whom Oswald may have known in Mexico and tried to stop them from an interview with Jackie Kennedy, the First Lady. The Commission offered no clear evidence of Oswald’s motives. The Commission declared that Oswald’s actions could not be explained if “judged by the standards of reasonable men,” saying only that he was an isolated individual plagued by a life of failure. The report concluded that, “the Commission does not believe that it can ascribe to him any one motive or group of motives.” Most of the Warren Commision Report was false. President Johnson and members of the Kennedy family disagreed with the Warren Commission Report.

Second, the mafia theory was Jimmy Hoffa(the President of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters union and Mafia Boss) and Carlos Marcello(“Tomato Salesman” and Mafia Boss) used Oswald as their scapegoat, a pawn manipulated by higher powers. During the 1950s, Jimmy Hoffa used questionable and unique methods to become the President of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters union, the nation’s powerful labor union for truckers and warehouse workers. Without the union, American economy would be nothing. He combined his Teamsters activities with the criminal activities of the Mafia. Hoffa could support his desires with violences. Robert Kennedy(United States Attorney General) and John Kennedy connected Hoffa’s ties to organized crime. To punish him, they embarrassed, humiliated, and prosecuted Hoffa. He hated the Kennedy brothers for it. In 1962, Hoffa told Edward Partin, Louisiana Teamster Official, about a plan to kill Robert Kennedy: While riding in an open convertible, he would be shot somewhere in the South by someone who has no ties to the Teamsters or the Mafia. He wanted it to be in the South, because the Kennedy brothers are unpopular there and it would be easier to shift the blame for the assassination to someone else. This plan is exactly what happened to John Kennedy. Carlos Marcello covered his criminal activities by pretending to be an enterprising New Orleans tomato salesman. In reality, he was the most powerful Mafia Chief in New Orleans’ History, but the only problem was that he was not a legal resident of the United States. In 1961, Robert Kennedy deported him to Guatemala. On the way to Guatemala, Marcello ranted about this and vowed revenge! He illegally flew back to the United States. He realized that killing the attorney general Robert Kennedy would only make a bigger problem, which was John Kennedy, in his place. Marcello saw his “Kennedy problem” from a broader perspective. According to Edward Becker(former Marcello’s associate), Marcello said this about the Kennedy’s: “The dog will keep biting you if you only cut off its tail. To solve the problem, the dog’s head would have to be removed. The entire dog would die.” In this metaphor, Robert is the tail and John is the head. It means the death of John will neutralize Robert’s effectiveness as an attorney general. After John Kennedy died, Hoffa was overheard saying “Bobby Kennedy’s just another lawyer now.” Did Marcello help Hoffa see his broader perspective?

Last, the United States Intelligence theory is the part of the CIA sponsored Oswald and told him to kill John Kennedy. If the entire government agencies like CIA, FBI, and the Secret Service had been involved, too many people would have known about the plot to carry it out undetected. This means individuals of the government agencies could have decided on their own to kill John F. Kennedy. The people from CIA motive could have been the Bay of Pigs. In 1959, Fidel Castro took over Cuba. Oswald was a follower of Castro. Castro established ties with the Soviet Union. For America, Cube becoming a soviet base was intolerable. Kennedy and Cuba Leaders did not have the best relationship. In April of 1961, a group of American CIA-trained Cuban guerrillas failed in an attempted counterrevolution against Castro’s government. This was called the Bay of Pigs. Kennedy refused to send backup, because the CIA was so sure that this was going to work. The CIA reacted bitterly; they felt that Kennedy had betrayed their mission. John F. Kennedy vowed to “splinter the CIA into a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds!” If this is their motive, participants of the Bay of Pigs would be involve. They could have turned to a man who helped with the Bay of Pigs and was memorable for lack of hair: David Ferrie. He is a man who spoke about the benefits of killing John Kennedy. This was alarming because of his close relationship with CIA. He worked as a contract officer for CIA, but he was involved in criminal activities, too. Before he was scheduled to be arrested in an assassination conspiracy investigation, David Ferrie was found dead in his apartment. Ferrie was not in the declassified files, so he could have been a big role in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Ferrie could have been the one, who sponsored Oswald. Oswald was relatively uneducated and poor. Usually, someone like him would not be interested in world travel or their relative poverty would keep them from traveling, but this did not apply to Oswald. He traveled through many countries with ease and without a second through about expenses. Oswald’s 1959 defection to the Soviet Union could have been a part of a CIA program to get United States spies there in daylight. He could have been a low-level CIA operative before President Kennedy’s assassination. To travel to Mexico, the travelers had to get a tourist card to enter the country. On September 17, 1963, he applied and received a tourist card in New Orleans, where Carlos Marcello lived. Because of the Warren Commission’s request, the FBI investigated Oswald’s tourist card application in the consulate’s files. They noticed that one was missing. It belonged to William G. Gaudet, who was a long-time CIA information on Latin American affairs. He traveled to Mexico the same time Oswald did. Why would they travel to the same place and at the same time? CIA denied having any prior information about Oswald, but they lied. Oswald also had left a threatening note for an FBI agent at the Bureau’s office in Dallas, but the FBI destroyed the note and the agent’s name from a typewritten transcript of Oswald’s address book provided to the Warren Commission. They kept a “201” file, usually kept on anyone who might be able to provide significant information that would affect the United States national Security, on Oswald. First, the government denied Oswald’s 201 file existence. Second, the original date was 1960, but the file’s entries referred to events that did not happen until 1962. Why would the government be so sketchy about this information?

The government has been sketchy with a lot of things including this assassination. The President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act of 1992 is a public law, which was passed by the United States Congress on October 26, 1992 around 25 years ago, to release all of the John F. Kennedy’s assassination files to the public in 25 years. In 2017, President Trump only released some of the records, because the government told him not to release some records. Some records were kept classified due to “identifiable national security, law enforcement, and foreign national security,” according to a White House memo. This is very sketchy!

However, many people still believe that Oswald alone killed John F. Kennedy. President Kennedy was shot by a 6.5?—52mm Carcano Model 91/38 infantry rifle. When you shoot a gun like this, it would have left residue on the shooter’s cheeks. A paraffin test is to test you to see if you shot this gun. After the assassination, Oswald was paraffin tested, but he tested negative. Some of the FBI marksmen that was giving a paraffin test tested positive. The Warren Commision Report said that Oswald was could shoot very well. When Sherman Cooley, his friend from the Marines, saw this, he laughed. Cooley said,”If I had to pick one man in whole United States to shoot me, I’d pick Oswald. I saw that man shoot, and there’s no way he could have ever learned to shoot well enough to do what they accused him of.” Some even questioned where he was during the shootings. How could he have done it alone? In conclusion, Oswald was not alone assassination. The Mafia theory and/or United States Intelligence theory could be the truth about the John F. Kennedy’s assassination.

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