Crossfire: The Plot That Killed Kennedy (31 page)

However, the lethal partnership between the Agency and the crime
syndicate didn't stop until after well after President Kennedy was assassinated, indicating the CIA continued to operate out of control even after the
agency shake-up following the Bay of Pigs disaster.

Whatever the Kennedys' role in Castro assassination plots, they got
nowhere. Castro outlived both Kennedys and there is now some evidence
to suggest that the CIA-Mafia plots may have been nothing more than a
"scam" on the part of organized crime.

The ongoing tension with Cuba took on a more serious and urgent tone
when on October 22, 1962, Kennedy announced that U.S. reconnaissance
aircraft-the same U-2 spy plane that had ended Eisenhower's hopes for the 1960 summit meeting-had photographed offensive missile sites with
nuclear capability being constructed in Cuba.

President Kennedy called for emergency meetings of the United Nations
Security Council and the Organization of American States. He also ordered
a "quarantine" of Cuba and vowed full retaliation against Russia if a
nuclear warhead was launched from Cuba.

As Soviet ships carrying missiles approached the U.S. naval blockade of
Cuba, the world watched and trembled. Nuclear holocaust seemed imminent. Then the Soviets blinked. Their freighters turned back and everyone
breathed a sign of relief. Only much later did the American people learn
that Kennedy had accepted a proposal from Khrushchev that included a
pledge not to invade or support any invasion of Cuba.

But even Kennedy's diplomacy that ended the missile crisis earned him
further rebuke by military and CIA officers who believed the presence of
missiles justified a United States invasion of Cuba and the elimination of
the Castro regime.

These suspicions only made the military and intelligence officers, along
with their Cuban proteges, more convinced that Kennedy was "soft on
communism."

In Miami's Orange Bowl in late December 1962, Kennedy spoke to the
recently returned survivors of the Bay of Pigs invasion. Lashing out at
communism in general and Castro in particular, Kennedy accepted the
Brigade's flag and pledged: "I can assure you that this flag will be
returned to this brigade in a free Havana." Most of those present believed
this statement indicated a continued commitment to overthrow Castro. But
future events dictated otherwise.

In 1976, Cuban Brigade veterans had to hire a lawyer to get their flag
back from the government, which had stored it away in the basement of a
museum. Likewise, beginning in 1963, the Cubans found U.S. government support for their continuing efforts against Castro nonexistent. In
fact, moves were soon under way to stop exile action against Cuba.

The clamp-down on exile activity-whether sincere or official windowdressing-marked the beginning of a new relationship with both Cuba and
the Soviet Union.

Kennedy used Jean Daniel, a journalist with the French newspaper
L'Express as an unofficial contact with Castro. On October 24, 1963,
Kennedy met with Daniel and urged him to pass along his good intentions
to the Cuban premier during a scheduled interview in Havana. Daniel did
meet with Castro and reported that the Cuban leader said:

I believe Kennedy is sincere. I consider him responsible for everything,
but I will say this . . . in the last analysis, I'm convinced that anyone else would be worse . . . You can tell him that I'm willing to
declare [Sen. Barry] Goldwater my friend if it will guarantee Kennedy's
reelection!

Ironically, Daniel was with Castro on November 22, when the Cuban
leader received word of Kennedy's assassination. ''Es una mala noticia"
(This is bad news), Castro said three times, adding:

All will have to be rethought. I'll tell you one thing; at least Kennedy
was an enemy to whom we had become accustomed. You watch and see
I know that they will try to put the blame on us for this thing.

Castro was correct. From the day of the assassination, there was an effort
to lay the blame on him.

But the attempt to reconcile relations with Castro had not been strictly
unofficial. On September 17, 1963, Ambassador Syedou Diallo of Guinea
in West Africa brought word to William Attwood, then a special adviser to
the United States delegation to the United Nations and a former U.S.
ambassador to Guinea, that Castro wanted to reach some sort of understanding with the Kennedy administration. According to Diallo, Castro
was unhappy at being forced to align closely with the Soviet Union and
wanted to normalize relations with the U.S. Attwood reported Diallo's
conversation to his superior, U.N. ambassador Adlai Stevenson, who
telephoned President Kennedy. Kennedy directed Stevenson to have Attwood
meet with Cuban U.N. delegate Carlos Lechuga. This led to discreet
meetings between Attwood and Lechuga, where it was decided that Attwood
would travel to Cuba for direct meetings with Castro.

Although these unprecedented approaches to Cuba were strictly secret, it
is almost certain that people within U.S. intelligence were aware of the
rapprochement. Attorney General Robert Kennedy himself told Attwood
the secret maneuvering was "bound to leak. "

Three days after Kennedy's assassination, Attwood was formally notified that Havana was ready to proceed with a meeting. President Lyndon
Johnson was briefed on the situation, but he turned a cold shoulder. Attwood
sadly told author Anthony Summers: "The word came back that this was to
be put on ice for the time being, and the time being has been ever since . . . "

Outside Miami, the next largest operational area for militant anti-Castro
Cubans was the city of New Orleans, Lee Harvey Oswald's birthplace. It was
in New Orleans that numerous leads have been developed linking the CIA,
the FBI, anti-Castro Cubans, and perhaps military intelligence with Oswald.

Oswald's interest in Cuba went back to his Marine days, when he and
Marine buddy Nelson Delgado toyed with the idea of traveling to Cuba
and assisting Castro in his war against Batista. There was nothing unusual
here. That same idea had crossed the minds of thousands of daydreaming
American schoolboys.

But in Oswald's case, this dream may have taken on some reality.
According to Delgado, the Marine Oswald began receiving letters plainly
stamped with the seal of the Cuban consulate in Los Angeles. Oswald once traveled to Los Angeles with Delgado, saying his purpose was to "visit the
Cuban consulate." There also were reports of Oswald meeting with mysterious strangers, who Delgado believed had to do with "the Cuban business."

But whose side was Oswald really on?

Gerry Patrick Hemming, a Marine with Oswald who was recruited into
the CIA, has told of meeting Oswald in the Cuban consulate. Hemmings,
himself working for Naval intelligence, said Oswald seemed to be "an
informant or some type of agent working for somebody."

On April 24, 1963, less than a year after arriving back in Fort Worth
from Russia, Oswald packed a bag and bought a bus ticket for New
Orleans, telling Marina and friends that he couldn't find a job in Texas.

Shortly before leaving for New Orleans, he had written a letter to the
Fair Play for Cuba Committee (FPCC), a pro-Castro organization
headquartered in New York City and the object of intense scrutiny by
various U.S. intelligence agencies, including the FBI and Army intelligence. Oswald praised Castro and asked for FPCC pamphlets, membership
applications, and advice on tactics. He also mentioned he "was thinking
about renting a .small office at my own expense."

The FPCC director, V. T. Lee, promptly answered, saying the committee faced serious opposition and warned Oswald against provoking "unnecessary incidents which frighten away prospective supporters." It was
advice that Oswald was to totally ignore.

Staying with relatives in New Orleans, Oswald managed to get a job at
the William B. Reily Co., Inc., a coffee manufacturer. The company's
owner, William Reily, was a financial backer of the Crusade to Free Cuba
Committee, one of the many front groups raising money for the Cuban
Revolutionary Council.

Through the spring and summer of 1963, Oswald, an avid reader,
checked out twenty-seven books from the New Orleans Library. His
reading ran from Ian Fleming's James Bond novels to Aldous Huxley and
science fiction. Library records show Oswald also read two books about
John F. Kennedy, Profiles in Courage and Portrait of a President. Oswald
checked out nothing about Cuba.

In fact, it was during this time that a strange incident occurred that
throws further doubt on Oswald's sincerity as a communist sympathizer. In
July 1963, Oswald accompanied his uncle, Charles "Dutz" Murret, to a
Jesuit seminary in Mobile, Alabama, where a cousin was enrolled. Here
Oswald made what audience members thought was a well-constructed speech
against Soviet-style communism. He took the opposite position from his
procommunist public posturing over the previous few months in New
Orleans-further evidence that Oswald was living some sort of dual life.

Back in New Orleans, this duplicity continued. Although Oswald handed
out leaflets for the FPCC and continued to write to the national organization, his New Orleans chapter was a complete fraud. He even had his wife
sign the name "Hidell" as president of his New Orleans Chapter of the
Fair Play for Cuba Committee.

While there has been no documented evidence that-letters aside-Oswald
was in contact with any pro-Castro group, he definitely was in touch with
anti-Castro Cubans. On August 5, 1963, Oswald entered a store owned by
Cuban militant Carlos Bringuier, a man with connections to both the CRC
and the CIA. Oswald told Bringuier and friends that he was a Marine
veteran with experience in guerrilla warfare and offered to train Cuban
exiles. Pushing his point, Oswald returned the next day with a Marine
training manual that he left with Bringuier. He again repeated his desire to
join the fight against Castro.

Bringuier already was on guard. In his Warren Commission testimony,
he said that some time earlier he had been interviewed by FBI agent
Warren De Brueys, who had told him the Bureau might try to infiltrate his
anti-Castro organization.

Three days later, Bringuier was shocked when a friend rushed into his
store and said that the same man who had wanted to train exiles was on the
New Orleans streets passing out pro-Castro literature. Bringuier and others
sought out Oswald and confronted him. A crowd gathered as Bringuier railed
against this "communist" who had tried to infiltrate the exiles. Displaying
a loss of temper, Bringuier cursed Oswald, threw his leaflets into the air,
then drew back his fist as if to strike. Oswald, who kept smiling throughout this episode, said: "Okay, Carlos, if you want to hit me, hit me."

But there was no fight. Police arrived and took Oswald, Bringuier, and
two others into custody. All were charged with disturbing the peace.
Oswald tried to contact his uncle for the twenty-five dollars bail money but
failed. His uncle's daughter, however, contacted a family friend, New
Orleans gambler Emile Bruneau, who put up the money.

However, before leaving the New Orleans police station, Oswald oddly
asked to speak to an FBI agent. Despite being outside normal business
hours, Agent John Quigley soon arrived and spent more than a hour with
Oswald.

It is interesting to note the impression of Oswald by the New Orleans
police. Speaking of the Bringuier episode, Lt. Francis Martello later said:
"He seemed to have them set up to create an incident." While Sgt.
Horace Austin recalled: "[Oswald] appeared as though he is being used by
these people ... "

After this brush with the law, Oswald's pro-Castro stance became even
more public. He was soon on New Orleans radio and television telling his
pro-Castro story to a wider audience. The radio interview is significant in
that it was widely used after the assassination to "prove" his procommunist
credentials. One of these interviews may have provided an accidental peek
at Oswald's real identity. Tipped off to Oswald by Bringuier, radio
reporter William Stuckey allowed Oswald to expound about his thoughts
on Cuba and South America.

A few days later, armed with information obtained from the FBI,
Stuckey and right-wing broadcaster Ed Butler verbally ambushed Oswald in another radio interview. Oswald was suddenly confronted with his
attempted defection to Russia. The pro-Castro Oswald, self-proclaimed
secretary of the New Orleans Chapter of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee, was suddenly revealed to have been a communist sympathizer who
had tried to renounce his American citizenship. Caught off guard, Oswald
stammered: "I was under the protection of the . . . uh ... that is to say, I
was not under the protection of the American government . . . but I was at
all times considered an American citizen."

Could this slip of the tongue have revealed Oswald's true role as an
agent of the U.S. government while in Russia?

It is also interesting that the radio newsmen handily obtained this
derogatory information on Oswald so quickly and from such sources as the
FBI and, according to Butler, the House Un-American Activities Committee.

It has been documented that both the CIA and the FBI at that time were
making efforts not only to penetrate the FPCC but also to discredit the
pro-Castro organization. Was this revelation of Oswald's Soviet life part of
this program?

But the most intriguing aspect of Oswald's stay in New Orleans centered
around a meeting place for anti-Castro militants, CIA and FBI agents, and
organized-crime figures-544 Camp Street.

It was at 544 Camp Street in an old, three-story office building that the
paths of Lee Harvey Oswald, the FBI, the CIA, anti-Castro Cubans, and
organized crime figures all crossed.

Until a few months prior to Oswald's arrival in New Orleans, the aging
building housed the offices of the Cuban Revolutionary Council (CRC),
the umbrella anti-Castro organization that was created by CIA officer E.
Howard Hunt.