JFK Assassination Forum

No way. I might be able to guess the names of one or two CIA officers from among the guys I worked with, but not six. (Obviously, this does not include the one or two guys who I later learned were CIA.)

As I think about it, I can only remember one instance where I later learned that someone who worked in my department was CIA, and that was at an NSA site in the 1990s.

For the full story on Richard Case Nagell, I recommend the second edition of Dick Russell's book The Man Who Knew Too Much.

Barring some future self-evident and undeniable disclosure on Nagell, WC apologists are never going to admit that Nagell was a high-level intel operative, much less that his story about Oswald and foreknowledge of the assassination is credible. They're just never gonna do it. They'll nit-pick and offer one lame excuse after another to reject Nagell and his account.

Here's a helpful article about Nagell:

https://spartacus-educational.com/JFKnagell.htm

Here are three podcasts about Nagell:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-183-richard-case-nagell-part-1/id1551161613?i=1000626006851

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-184-richard-case-nagell-part-2/id1551161613?i=1000626714968

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-185-richard-case-nagell-part-3-bonus-episode-1/id1551161613?i=1000627085094

Here are two of Richard Russell's presentations on Nagell:

If you read Lee Bowers testimony about cars coming in and out of the parking lot, he specifically mentions the Elm Street extension.

It sounds like, as a result of your work, you could easily compile a list of 6 or more CIA officers.

No way. I might be able to guess the names of one or two CIA officers from among the guys I worked with, but not six. (Obviously, this does not include the one or two guys who I later learned were CIA.)   

If you doubt me, talk to anyone who has worked in joint assignments in the intel field and who had at least a TS clearance. They will tell you it is astonishing that Nagell knew the names of six CIA personnel, not to mention that he wrote them down.

Nagell's notebook contained names of six persons who would much later be identified as CIA personnel. (The names were submitted by the FBI to the CIA in October '63 and were eventually verified by the CIA as being names of actual employees.)

And while it might seem odd to you to have written down their names in a notebook, if you were someone like Nagell who suffered from mental problems, you can see how Nagell might have written their names down in a notebook in case he ever wanted to make contact with the CIA.

Nagell had an excellent memory, as we'll see in a moment. There is a big difference between having neurological issues due to brain trauma (plane crash) and being insane. There is a big difference between excessively suspicious and being crazy. Nagell was quite lucid and intelligent. Nagell also had a drinking problem off and on. So did William Harvey. So did many other intel personnel.

The psychiatric exam reprinted in the CIA OS file notes that Nagell was "of superior intelligence and shows a remarkable memory for dates and names" ("Psychiatrist's Report on Richard Case Nagell," October 29, 1968, p. 3). Nagell admitted that he was prone to be "highly suspicious" of others, which he himself also described as "chronically paranoid," and that he tended to "impute intentions where none may exist." Trust me: Lots of counter-intel guys fit this description to a tee, but they are most certainly not insane. The psych exam concluded that Nagell showed "no overt evidence of psychosis" (p. 4), and that "he is not psychotic and seems competent in a legal and psychiatric sense" (p. 5).

The CIA said that Nagell might of known of Parker, Churchill and Guthrie through their work in the far east.

Oh, come on, Fred! Occam's Razor! No ordinary Army CI guy working in the Far East would have known the names of three CIA officers. He might, might, might have known the name of one officer, if that officer was his POC or operational handler at the time, and that's assuming the CIA officer was using his real name.

Nagell lived in LA as did Leibacker and Davanon - he might have had some contact with the Domestic Contact Office.

Again, come on! More reaching and straining and avoidance of Occam's Razor. Fred, you have no idea what you are talking about. You don't understand how stove-piped and carefully guarded CIA operations were at the time (and largely still are). Contact between Army intel offices and CIA offices was strictly regimented by "need to know" protocols.

The problem is that you are determined, no matter what, to dismiss Nagell as an unimportant nut who had no high-level intel connections.

The CIA OS file documents that Nagell was an Army counter-intel officer. He attended and graduated from the Army Intelligence School at Fort Holabird, Maryland. That school later moved to Fort Huachuca, Arizona, and I myself attended that school and had friends who were instructors there. When you graduate from that school, you become part of the Army's intelligence corps (aka command). The CIA OS file also confirms that Nagell worked in counter-intelligence assignments in Korea and Japan. Military counter-intel guys sometimes work with CIA guys, but only if they are working as part of a CIA-controlled operation. The CIA oversees military counter-intel operations, just as NSA oversees military signals intelligence operations.

And then there is the fact that Nagell had a military ID with Oswald's name and signature on it but with Nagell's photo on it. Where and how did Nagell get this ID card?

You argue that the Nagell-Oswald military ID was not found on Nagell when he was arrested because it is not listed in any of the property reports. However, we know that the police and SS property lists are not complete: The police report doesn't mention a military ID, yet the SS report does. And, neither the police report nor the SS report mentions the notebook, much less that it listed six CIA agents. Yet, someone clearly knew that he possessed the notebook when he was arrested because the CIA OS file acknowledges that he did. Thus, it is not a convincing to argue, as you do, that he did not have the Nagell-Oswald military ID when he was arrested because it's not listed in the police property list and is not expressly listed in the SS property list (although the SS list does include a military ID).

Nagell told the Satsi he was CIA.

It didn't take long for them to realize he was bat-shit crazy. If he was really CIA, they would have traded him to the west. Instead they just
let him go.

Here is a llnk to his Stasi file.

https://www.onthetrailofdelusion.com/post/richard-case-nagell-s-stasi-file

CIA documents show that Bruce Solie hid Office of Security files on Lee Harvey Oswald and Richard Case Nagell from the HSCA.

One wonders if Solie's withholding Oswald's file had anything to do with the fact that in late 1959, all of the incoming non-CIA cables on Oswald's defection were routed to Solie's office rather than to where would have normally gone -- the Soviet Russia Division.

The following is the first document in Richard Case Nagell’s 221-page Office of Security file (RIF: 104-10305-10005)


23 August 1978

MEMORANDUM FOR THE RECORD

From: Bruce L. Solie
Chief, Security Analysis Group [formerly known as the Security Research Staff's Research Branch]

Subject: Nagell, Richard Case
#264 170

1. This memorandum identifies those Office of Security files which were reviewed by the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) staff members in conjunction with the HSCA's investigation into the deaths of President John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

2. Under procedures established with the HSCA, certain items of information were not reviewed by HSCA staff members [emphasis added].  These items were placed in envelopes, sealed, appropriately identified, and put back into the Security file prior to HSCA’'s review. Office of Security personnel reviewing these files should maintain the integrity of each envelope below so that interested parties may know what was and what was not reviewed by HSCA staff members.

3. In some instances, the above files contain material marked in the lower right-hand corner with a green circular dot. This mark should alert Office of Security personnel to the fact that this material was located and placed in the file at the time of the HSCA review and was seen by an HSCA staffer(s). This material should not be removed from the file.

4. Attached to this memorandum is a review sheet which identifies the name of the HSCA reviewer(s) and the date of his review.

5. Questions regarding the above procedure and or the HSCA's review should be redirected to the Security Analysis Group.

-- Bruce L Solie



My comments:

1. Other than a different date and the replacement of Nagell's name and OS file number (Nagell, Richard Case #264 170) with Oswald's (Oswald, Lee Harvey #351 164), the first page of the Office of Security's file on Oswald reads exactly the same as the one for Nagell (see above).

2. It's interesting to note that at the bottom of a January 1997 memo from ARRC's David G. Maxwell to CIA's John Pereira (Director of the Historical Review Group, Center for the Study of Intelligence, CIA) there is a footnote that says, "One Office of Security file on Oswald (or relating to Oswald) may have been numbered 351-164. In addition, Margaret Stevens [Solie's assistant] may have held an Office of Security "MS-" file on Oswald."