Important Disclosure about William King Harvey in Recently Released Document

[Tom Graves]

According to the CIA historian, "a highly paid contract source" was Clay Shaw.

Why internet algos do what they do...I understand in theory, but as to this particular topic, I don't know.

But, caveat emptor and draw your own conclusions.

In other words, you don't know, and nobody else, does either.


"Caveat emptor and draw your own conclusions"?


I already have, dude, and I'm not buying what you, Paese Sera, Jim Garrison, Oliver Stone, Jim DiEugenio, and Linda Pease, et al. ad nauseum, are selling.

[Lance Payette]

On the Clay Shaw stuff, I would simply note that:

1. Shaw was an absolutely perfect candidate to be a "source" for the CIA's Domestic Contact Service. He would have been exactly the sort of individual they were interested in and in fact did provide some information during the relevant time period.

2. Domestic contact sources were typically not paid at all, let alone "highly paid."

3. It's hard for me to imagine what Shaw would have done, on either a contact or contract basis, for him to be "highly paid" by the CIA.

4. "Contract source" is odd terminology. There is legal terminology such as a "sole source contract," but to refer to the contractor as a "contract source" would definitely be odd.

5. I once did a considerable search for references to "contract source" and came up empty except for the Shaw stuff. HOWEVER, I did find references to "contact source" in several intelligence contexts. For example, this is from the U.S. Army's "Human Intelligence Collector Operations Manual," https://2009-2017.state.gov/documents/organization/150085.pdf:

Of Potential Interest as a Contact Source. On occasion, especially during stability and reconstruction operations, the HUMINT collector may identify an individual who has the potential to provide information in the future, due to his placement or access. Although the individual may not have information of immediate interest, the HUMINT collector will pass his recommendation to the appropriate office, normally the C/J/G/S2X, provided that source operations are authorized (see Chapter 5).

6. The Shaw memo is such a one-off, long-after-the-fact outlier that I lean strongly toward the interpretation that something simply got lost in translation and he was simply one of thousands of contact sources. I have no clue where "highly paid" would have come from.

[Tom Graves]

I have no clue where "highly paid" would have come from.

Gosh, maybe it's either mis-transcribed from "highly valued" or an indication of input from probable "mole" Bruce Solie?

[Lance Payette]

I did see that Shaw had agreed in 1955 to attend an international conference on behalf of the CIA provided the expenses were borne by the CIA and was referred to at that time as a "valued source." Perhaps McDonald saw some raw dollar figures for travel reimbursement and thought that equated to "highly paid." Shaw was quite wealthy, so perhaps the memo means nothing more than "rich guy cont[r]act source" - not "highly paid by the CIA cont[r]act source." Who cares anyway? Shaw's activities seem pretty well-known and he seems to me right up there with Ruth Paine as an unfairly maligned victim of CT craziness.

[Tom Graves]

I did see that Shaw had agreed in 1955 to attend an international conference on behalf of the CIA provided the expenses were borne by the CIA and was referred to at that time as a "valued source." Perhaps McDonald saw some raw dollar figures for travel reimbursement and thought that equated to "highly paid." Shaw was quite wealthy, so perhaps the memo means nothing more than "rich guy cont[r]act source" - not "highly paid by the CIA cont[r]act source." Who cares anyway? Shaw's activities seem pretty well-known and he seems to me right up there with Ruth Paine as an unfairly maligned victim of CT craziness.

Russophile Ruthie did nothing wrong!!!

Nyet! Nyet! Nyet!

[Lance Payette]

Well, I have been inspired to purchase, for a mere $7.99 in the Kindle version, this massive biography of Clay Shaw: https://www.amazon.com/Man-Million-Fragments-True-Story/dp/0692226419/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_pb_opt?ie=UTF8.

Based on the reviews, my guess is that it will have the same effect as the massive biography of George de Mohrenschildt - i.e., further convince me that the dark and sinister CT speculation is fundamentally nutty. When you think about it, it's almost incredible: So many of the key figures in the JFKA - Oswald, Marina, Ruth Paine, George de Mohrenschildt, Clay Shaw, Allen Dulles and many others - have "CT versions" of themselves that are almost completely at odds with the real people.

Interestingly, the Shaw book has an Amazon review by Carlos Bringuier:

Dr. Carlos J. Bringuier
5.0 out of 5 stars A TRUE BIOGRAPHY OF A VICTIM
Reviewed in the United States on June 30, 2013

I met Clay Shaw the day of his acquittal. This man won the trial but lost his life persecuted by a deranged, communist, District Attorney who for some reasons wanted to destroy a leader of the community. I hope that one day a Hollywood producer decides to do justice to the memory of Clay Shaw and make a real movie about this poor man. Oliver Stone should be ashamed of his JFK movie where he depicted Jim Garrison as an honest District Attorney.

The references to me in this book are accurate and not distorted. I congratulate Donald H. Carpenter in his very good job writing this book

[Steve M. Galbraith]

Well, I have been inspired to purchase, for a mere $7.99 in the Kindle version, this massive biography of Clay Shaw: https://www.amazon.com/Man-Million-Fragments-True-Story/dp/0692226419/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_pb_opt?ie=UTF8.

Based on the reviews, my guess is that it will have the same effect as the massive biography of George de Mohrenschildt - i.e., further convince me that the dark and sinister CT speculation is fundamentally nutty. When you think about it, it's almost incredible: So many of the key figures in the JFKA - Oswald, Marina, Ruth Paine, George de Mohrenschildt, Clay Shaw, Allen Dulles and many others - have "CT versions" of themselves that are almost completely at odds with the real people.

Interestingly, the Shaw book has an Amazon review by Carlos Bringuier:

Dr. Carlos J. Bringuier
5.0 out of 5 stars A TRUE BIOGRAPHY OF A VICTIM
Reviewed in the United States on June 30, 2013

I met Clay Shaw the day of his acquittal. This man won the trial but lost his life persecuted by a deranged, communist, District Attorney who for some reasons wanted to destroy a leader of the community. I hope that one day a Hollywood producer decides to do justice to the memory of Clay Shaw and make a real movie about this poor man. Oliver Stone should be ashamed of his JFK movie where he depicted Jim Garrison as an honest District Attorney.

The references to me in this book are accurate and not distorted. I congratulate Donald H. Carpenter in his very good job writing this book

If you want a Reader's Digest version (the book is enormously detailed) look up the footnotes on Hunter Leake (right, Leake). He was the CIA Domestic Contacts agent that Shaw communicated/worked with. Carpenter says that Shaw's information (all economic matters) over the eight years (1948-56) of the relationship generated eight CIA reports with six still around.

All of Shaw's activity with the CIA apparently ended in 1956 when he also stopped traveling abroad while promoting the Trade Mart. Apparently the last contact was in 1956 when it seems Leake (or someone with the CIA) approached Shaw about helping them find out about shipments of mercury from Spain and Italy to the Soviet bloc. Shaw offered to write letters to companies in Italy and Spain about the question. The CIA later said it wasn't needed. Carpenter doesn't mention anything about Shaw being "highly paid."

As you point out, Shaw would have been an ideal person to use by the CIA for economic information. But there's nothing indicating he did anything more than that.

[Benjamin Cole]

Shaw had a position in an international trade mart that would allow him to use that facility to move goods or documents, and have eyes and ears in a lot of places.

It may be the CIA did not spend its money wisely---after all, they are not a private-sector company, and thus had to get a measurable return on its investment.

In the military and intel worlds, a lot of people are paid to "stand and wait." In case they are some day needed. Some people are reimbursed based on their status and potential value, and perhaps not actual worth.

If a CIA historian in a prepared report---not a memo, or causal conversation---referred to anyone as a "highly paid contract source," and never retracted the statement, I would consider that to be a true statement.

The fact that the CIA historian's statement was made regarding an individual who had, very publicly, been prosecuted for the JFKA makes its doubly unlikely that the "highly paid contract source" description of Shaw is in error.

The probable truth that Shaw was in fact a "highly paid contract source" hardly proves the JFKA was perped by the CIA, or even that there was a JFKAC. My take is Shaw had nothing to do with the JFKA.

Perhaps Shaw was asked to figure out who was LHO, someone who would be reasonably regarded as a suspect character. Maybe Shaw never even met LHO---but Shaw was still a highly paid contract source.

CT'ers and LN'ers both tend to regard evidence they do not like as "faked" or in error. Usually CT'ers, but it can go both ways.

As I always say, caveat emptor, and draw your own conclusions.