John Orr's analysis of the shots

[Lance Payette]

Found a letter from an Assistant AG to the Director of the FBI concerning Orr's theory: https://aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/other/fragment_tests/NaraFragmentTests.pdf.

Ken Rahn has a page describing what was done, with numerous links: https://kenrahn.com/JFK/Issues_and_evidence/CE_567/CE_567.html.

In a nutshell, "NARA's final report was issued on 21 January 2000. It adds little to the previous reports, and basically states that the fibrous material was cellulose that did not come from the clothing of either Kennedy or Connally, and that the human tissue was too and too damaged old to try to trace to either man. These results did not yield any support for Orr's radical new conspiracy theory and, in fact, were consistent with the conventional view of the bullets, although weakly. ... This should have been the end of it. But in an open letter that was remarkable for its degree of intemperance, Joe Backes jumped in and lashed out at NARA for allegedly botching the tests and at reporter Gullo for allegedly joining them in lying about the results so as to continue to prop up the untenable lone-gunman theory. In other words, Backes saw yet another conspiracy of the authorities against the conspiracy theorists. Unfortunately, Backes seems to have misunderstood that the goal of NARA/FBI's testing was to respond to Orr's specific theory and suggested tests rather than to Backes's view of the assassination. His letter does, though provide a revealing look into the mind of one of the harder-core JFK conspiracists, and in this sense can be educational."

Orr presumably disagrees with this assessment.

A different perspective from Bill Kelly in 2012: https://jfkcountercoup2.blogspot.com/2012/03/re-wc-ce-567-bullet-fragment-found.html.

Well, whatever. I'll get back to this when I finish my biography of Dentist Don, which is already 300,000 words.

[Tom Graves]

Indeed, he did. And I respect him for it. The Armstrong Collection at Baylor University is a goldmine. His theory may be wacky, but his research stands on its own merits. Walt Brown said he kept a copy of Harvey & Lee beside his bed because it is an invaluable resource regardless of what one may think of the theory. I try to be a little more nuanced in my thinking than knee-jerk, one-dimensional wackos like ... well, if the shoe fits, etc., etc.

What size shoes do you wear, Mr. Russia Apologist?

Me? Size 15.

Did you know that the city in Moravia (Gottwaldov -- today's Zlín) that the Traitorous Orange Bird (rhymes with "Xxxx") went to to meet his Czechoslovakian brides' family (including his StB-connected father) in the 1980s is where Tomáš Baťa started his big shoe company for people who are smaller than me (which is like 95% of the American and Czech population)?

Regardless, did your hero steal a pair of dainty slippers for you when he was there?

Speaking of wacko, are you still angry that the Deep State Feds were so heavy-handed in Waco?

[Lance Payette]

The LN narrative is not my religion. Indeed, those for whom the LN narrative clearly is their religion are more difficult for me to understand than are CTers. If the LN narrative were the clear and undisputed Truth, the JFKA would be of little interest to me.

There is a great deal of fundamental weirdness and improbability in the LN narrative:

1. LHO, with two babies he loves, just decides to throw his life away and assassinate JFK, a President he is known to admire; no one really has a good explanation.
2. The best weapon he can come up with is his unlikely Carcano, even though he could've bought a better weapon on every street corner in Dallas.
3. He manages to accomplish his mission even though expert marksmen have a hell of a time trying to duplicate it.
4. One bullet virtually explodes, another remains almost pristine.
5. The SBT is improbable at best.
6. Yada yada yada - not impossible, but an astonishing amount of unlikeliness.

IF there was a conspiracy, the most likely scenario by far is (IMHO):

1. The Mafia was behind it.
2. Oswald for some reason did what the LN narrative posits him doing.
3. There was a far more professional shooter with a far more professional weapon in a location that would produce a trajectory plausibly attributable to Oswald.

If someone of a high level of intelligence does a vast amount of serious work and comes up with precisely the above scenario, I am willing to listen. If Orr's theory is impossible - actually impossible, not "impossible" in the way CTers insist the SBT is impossible - show that it is. That shell on the roof of the County Records Building is just a bit odd, no?

[Lance Payette]

What size shoes do you wear, Mr. Russia Apologist?

Me? Size 15.

Did you know that the city in Moravia (Gottwaldov -- today's Zlín) that the Traitorous Orange Bird (rhymes with "Xxxx") went to to meet his Czechoslovakian brides' family (including his StB-connected father) in the 1980s is where Tomáš Baťa started his big shoe company for people who are smaller than me (which is like 95% of the American and Czech population)?

Regardless, did your hero steal a pair of dainty slippers for you when he was there?

Speaking of wacko, are you still angry that the Deep State Feds were so heavy-handed in Waco?

Ignore City for you, Tom, so save your breath. You have ceased to be amusing. I don't know if others find you amusing, but I find you kind of frightening.

[Tom Graves]

Ignore City for you, Tom, so save your breath. You have ceased to be amusing. I don't know if others find you amusing, but I find you kind of frightening.

You must frighten easily, then, Lance.

Sorry to hear about that.

Are you frightened because I'm so large, or become I'm so well versed on how easy it was for "former" KGB officer Vladimir Putin to install The Traitorous Orange Bird (rhymes with "Xxxx") as our "President" on 20 January 2017?

Hint: He did so with 32 total years (1959 - 1991) of preparation by KGB professionals as well as by "useful idiots" like Jim Garrison and Oliver Stone, both of whom glommed onto the KGB's* disinformation about the CIA and Clay Shaw that was published in "Paese Sera" in March 1967 and whose body politic-rending work culminated in Garrison's 1989 book, "On the Trail of the Assassins" and Stone's self-described mythological ("to counter the myth of the Warren Report") movie, "JFK."

*Yes, today's SVR and FSB

Adios, Lance.

PS You never were even amusing.

[Tom Graves]

1. LHO, with two babies he loves, just decides to throw his life away and assassinate JFK, a President he is known to admire; no one really has a good explanation.

Oswald, disillusioned with both systems, was a self-described Marxist* with no future, Marina had apparently given up on him, and he was probably fed up with being jerked around by both the CIA and the KGB.

*Some Marxists believe in personally "advancing the Dialectic" if they can. Oswald may have seen LBJ as someone who would be more divisive for the country (and less attractive to Third World countries) than JFK, and who, therefore, would inadvertently hasten the collapse of "late-stage Capitalism."

2. The best weapon LHO can come up with is his unlikely Carcano, even though he could've bought a better weapon on every street corner in Dallas.

Buying his Carcano from a mail order company and under an assumed name afforded Oswald some anonymity.

His Carcano was a bit longer than what he ordered, but it was fine for his purpose of killing General Walker (and he would have done so if the bright light inside Walker's house hadn't prevented him from noticing the wooden cross-piece in the window).

The advantage of the Carcano to Oswald was that it was inexpensive, it was quite accurate, and the bullets it fired were very stable-in-uninterrupted flight and very penetrating.

3. He manages to accomplish his mission even though expert marksmen have a hell of a time trying to duplicate it.

Did those expert marksmen take 10.2 seconds to fire all three shots as Oswald did?

4. One bullet virtually explodes, another remains almost pristine.

The bullet that "virtually exploded" probably struck the hardest part of JFK's head while travelling about 2000 fps whereas the bullet that ended up "almost pristine" was travelling at a greatly reduced velocity when it struck the only hard bone it hit (JBC's wrist bone), and it did so not nose-first but with the rear one-third of its length while it was twirling.

5. The SBT is improbable at best.

JFK and JBC can be seen in the Zapruder film to react almost simultaneously even though JFK's spinal column was nicked and JBC's wasn't.

The SBT is less improbable than any other scenario.

[Tim Nickerson]

Orr posits four shots: Oswald hits JFK in the back at Z204, the bullet exits the throat at a slight upward angle and dents the windshield.

I agree with Charles. That first shot scenario is ridiculous. Just the slight upward angle is ridiculous enough. The "bullet denting the windshield" aspect is laughable.  The bullet exited JFK's throat travelling at about 1800 ft/s. At that velocity, it would have passed through the windshield.

Mr. SPECTER - Mr. Frazier, assume certain facts to be true for purposes of expressing an opinion on a hypothetical situation, to wit: that President Kennedy was struck by a 6.5 millimeter bullet which passed through his body entering on the rear portion of his neck 14 centimeters to the left of his right acromion process and 14 centimeters below his mastoid process, with a striking velocity of approximately 1,904 feet per second, and exited after passing through a fascia channel in his body, through the lower anterior third of his neck with an exit velocity of approximately 1,772 to 1,779 feet per second; and that bullet had then traveled from the point where it exited from his neck and struck the front windshield in some manner. What effect would that have had on the front windshield and the subsequent flight of the missile?
Mr. FRAZIER - It would have shattered the front windshield. It would have caused a very large, relatively large hole, approximately three-eighths to an inch in diameter with radiating cracks extending outward into the glass for several inches, even to the side of the glass.
Mr. DULLES - It would have penetrated the windshield?
Mr. FRAZIER - Yes, sir.
Mr. SPECTER - Would the missile then have proceeded in a forward direction?
Mr. FRAZIER - Yes, sir; it would.
Mr. SPECTER - Do you have an opinion as to how far it would have gone?
Mr. FRAZIER - Until it struck some other object in the area of approximately a mile.

[Steve M. Galbraith]

I agree with Charles. That first shot scenario is ridiculous. Just the slight upward angle is ridiculous enough. The "bullet denting the windshield" aspect is laughable.  The bullet exited JFK's throat travelling at about 1800 ft/s. At that velocity, it would have passed through the windshield.

Mr. SPECTER - Mr. Frazier, assume certain facts to be true for purposes of expressing an opinion on a hypothetical situation, to wit: that President Kennedy was struck by a 6.5 millimeter bullet which passed through his body entering on the rear portion of his neck 14 centimeters to the left of his right acromion process and 14 centimeters below his mastoid process, with a striking velocity of approximately 1,904 feet per second, and exited after passing through a fascia channel in his body, through the lower anterior third of his neck with an exit velocity of approximately 1,772 to 1,779 feet per second; and that bullet had then traveled from the point where it exited from his neck and struck the front windshield in some manner. What effect would that have had on the front windshield and the subsequent flight of the missile?
Mr. FRAZIER - It would have shattered the front windshield. It would have caused a very large, relatively large hole, approximately three-eighths to an inch in diameter with radiating cracks extending outward into the glass for several inches, even to the side of the glass.
Mr. DULLES - It would have penetrated the windshield?
Mr. FRAZIER - Yes, sir.
Mr. SPECTER - Would the missile then have proceeded in a forward direction?
Mr. FRAZIER - Yes, sir; it would.
Mr. SPECTER - Do you have an opinion as to how far it would have gone?
Mr. FRAZIER - Until it struck some other object in the area of approximately a mile.

Yes, but Orr argues that the first shot hit the "chrome strip" above the windshield not the windshield itself.

Still, I would think a bullet traveling that fast would have gone through the strip and not just dented it.

Frazier testified that: "This [dent] was made by a projectile not having the weight or velocity of a whole bullet moving at, in the range of a thousand to 1,500 feet per second or more."