Soviet File Given to Luna Proves a KGB Operation

[Michael T. Griffith]

Yes, we (led by me) got side-tracked to the Belarus/KGB files and whether Oswald was used as a KGB asset. I thought that the Hunt letter was shown to be a forgery about 20-30 years ago? Or dismissed as not reliable? Seems the conspiracy crowd ignored it and they have very low standards when it comes to evidence. At least evidence they like. In any case, this should close the question. That Paese Sera disinformation about Shaw can be the next nonsense to be tossed into the garbage.

One last (hah) post about Oswald and the KGB: We've had numerous sources - defections and reports - supporting the conclusion that the KGB didn't use Oswald, that they viewed him as too risky and unreliable (Q: Has Marina been lying all of these decades? She was a KGB "swallow"?). And that Nosenko for all of his problems *was* truthful when he said this. He may or may not have been a legitimate defector (I think the evidence at this point is he was); but he was truthful when he said the KGB didn't use Oswald.

Oleg Nechiporenko, one of the KGB officers who Oswald talked to in Mexico City, said he reviewed Oswald's file in Moscow and it showed that the KGB had no interest in using Oswald. Too unreliable. He also quoted in his book "Passport to Assassination" from a report that the then head of the KGB, Vladimir Semichastny, sent to the Politburo after the assassination saying the same thing: the KGB didn't recruit Oswald. Oleg Kalugin, the head of KGB counterintelligence, said Nosenko was legitimate (he was seen as a drunken, womanizing buffoon but he was indeed an agent) and the KGB didn't use Oswald. Vitaly Yurchenko, the agent who defected and then changed his mind, said the same thing. Et cetera, et cetera.

Quotes from Semichastny's memo are here: https://www.drivehq.com/file/DFPublishFile.aspx/FileID12897371455/Key2b656lhgowhe/nechiporenko%20and%20semichastny.JPG

If you want to believe they all lied - Semichastny lied to Khrushchev? - and that all of the files were whitewashed and everything was faked by the "inner" KGB as part of a "Monster Plot" then, well, there's nowhere to go. Whatever evidence that is produced that shows the KGB didn't use Oswald will be viewed as evidence that they did use him. This is the "CIA killed JFK" view where everything showing they didn't kill JFK is evidence they did. Since it's all faked.

Up is down and down is up and we'll just go in circles.

Right, because intel agencies would never, ever cover up illegal and/or controversial operations by destroying files, creating fake paper trails, planting false leads, etc., etc. Oh, no! Never!

The degree of gullibility and naivete in the lone-gunman camp is a sight to behold.

And, no, the "Dear Mr. Hunt" note has not been proven to be a forgery. In 1977, the Dallas Morning News had the note analyzed by three handwriting experts, and all three concluded the handwriting was Oswald's (Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt, pp. 235-236; Dallas Morning News, February 6, 1977, April 2, 6, 1977, September 26, 1978).

The HSCA handwriting experts were "unable to come to any firm conclusion regarding this particular document," were not able "to accurately determine that it is specifically a forgery and at the same time not able to accurately determine whether or not it corresponds to all of the other writings that we have identified" (4 HSCA 359).

However, speaking for the handwriting panel, Joseph McNally acknowledged that "the writing pattern or the overall letter designs are consistent with those as written" on the other Oswald documents" but that the handwriting in the note "is much more precisely and much more carefully written" than most of Oswald's other writings (4 HSCA 358).

McNally admitted that this precision was not markedly out of the ordinary from other Oswald documents but only "a little bit out of the ordinary," and that the note showed "no great deviation" from Oswald's handwriting in letter design forms:

There is no great deviation from the writing of Oswald insofar as individual letter design forms are concerned. However, it is the method of writing that is so precise and so careful, it is a little bit out of the ordinary from most of the writing that I have seen. (4 HSCA 358)

Let's remember that in that note, Oswald asks a "Mr. Hunt" for information on his next "assignment," and that Jack Ruby visited one of the offices owned by oil billionaire and ardent right-winger H. L. Hunt the day before the assassination. The Hunts were known virulent Kennedy haters. H. L. and his sons Lamar and Nelson paid for a large anti-Kennedy ad in the Dallas Morning News on the day of the assassination that accused JFK of aiding the Communist cause and of being dangerously soft on the Soviet Union and Cuba. I can hear you folks now: "This is all just an incredible, cosmic coincidence! Such wildly unlikely and seemingly mind-boggling coincidences happen all the time! Nothing to see here!"

Finally, it bears repeating that you guys are the ones who are in the decided minority on the JFK case, and that those who reject your lone-gunman fantasy in this forum are among those in the 2/3 to 3/4 majority of the Western world who believe JFK was killed by a conspiracy--not to mention the fact that the percentage of people who agree with you is not very much larger than the percentage of people who believe 9/11 was an inside job.

You guys talk like you're in the mainstream majority, when in fact you're in the decided minority. When a political candidate loses an election and gets only 1/4 to 1/3 of the votes, he is viewed as having lost in a "landslide." If he had any sense, he wouldn't go around talking like he had barely lost, much less like he had won.

[Tom Graves]

Right, because intel agencies would never, ever cover up illegal and/or controversial operations by destroying files, creating fake paper trails, planting false leads, etc., etc. Oh, no! Never!

Dear Comrade Griffith,

I'm sure your beloved KGB* would never do that sort of thing.

*Today's SVR and FSB

-- Tom

[Tommy Shanks]

And, no, the "Dear Mr. Hunt" note has not been proven to be a forgery. In 1977, the Dallas Morning News had the note analyzed by three handwriting experts, and all three concluded the handwriting was Oswald's (Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt, pp. 235-236; Dallas Morning News, February 6, 1977, April 2, 6, 1977, September 26, 1978).

The HSCA handwriting experts were "unable to come to any firm conclusion regarding this particular document," were not able "to accurately determine that it is specifically a forgery and at the same time not able to accurately determine whether or not it corresponds to all of the other writings that we have identified" (4 HSCA 359).

If you had bothered to read Fred Litwin's original blog post, you'd know that the printed text of the "Mr. Hunt" letter was cleverly copied and pasted directly from a real letter Oswald tried to mail while living in Russia, which the KGB intercepted and NEVER shared until now. So, yes, it's Oswald's handwriting, but made to look like a fake letter he never actually wrote. Do you get it now?

[Tom Graves]

If you had bothered to read Fred Litwin's original blog post, you'd know that the printed text of the "Mr. Hunt" letter was cleverly copied and pasted directly from a real letter Oswald tried to mail while living in Russia, which the KGB intercepted and NEVER shared until now. So, yes, it's Oswald's handwriting, but made to look like a fake letter he never actually wrote. Do you get it now?

John M. Newman, in his 1995/2008 book, Oswald and the CIA, took Oswald's alluding in a letter to an earlier letter he had sent to the U.S. Embassy about returning to the U.S. (which first letter the Embassy never received) as an indication that the KGB had intercepted it.

This recent revelation corroborates his theory by telling us that the text and actual handwriting of the first letter was used by the KGB to create the fake "Dear Mr. Hunt" letter.