REAL HISTORY
by Stephen E. Lewis
At 12:30 p.m., CST, in Dealey Plaza,
Dallas, Texas, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th President of the
United States, was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald from the sixth floor of
the Texas School Book Depository.
Often referred to as the "Crime of the
Century", there have been more than 2,000 books and articles published to date
surrounding the events on that seminal day in American history. Unfortunately, the majority of these works
deal with conspiracy. In a span of over
thirty years, no one has produced a single piece of hard evidence to support a
conspiracy, small or large. Conspiracy buffs take a misstatement, a word out of
context, or a blur on an old photograph and turn it into a book that puts a lot
of money in their pockets. All this
accomplishes is a distortion of the truth. There will always be misstatements,
words out of context, and fuzzy photographs to contend with, but that does not
justify conspiracy. The Warren
Commission made mistakes, no doubt, but they did the best they could under the
circumstances. Their findings were
sound, then and now. William
Manchester, author of THE DEATH OF A
PRESIDENT, did extensive research beginning shortly after the assassination
while witness memories were fresh. He
reached the same basic conclusions as the Warren Commission Report. Gerald Posner, author of the national
bestseller, CASE CLOSED, repeated the
research using documented evidence and modern scientific advances in
technology. His investigation proved
likewise. Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone
on that tragic day in November. The
facts are indisputable.
Black is black, and white is white. Strip away the "well, I think" theories and
the testimony of less than credible witnesses and you will find that the truth
jumps out at you. Oswald told Buell
Frazier that he had curtain rods in the package he was carrying the morning of
November 22nd. If so, what
happened to them? He carried a parcel
into the Texas School Book Depository, but all that was found was the package
the curtain rods were supposedly in and a Mannlicher-Carcano rifle that was
later proven to be the weapon used in the assassination. Howard Brennan saw Oswald standing in the
sixth floor window a few minutes before the first shot rang out. He looked up again and horrifyingly watched
Oswald fire the second [i]and
third shots in the direction of the motorcade.
He was 93 feet away. Conspiracy
buffs have attempted to discredit Brennan by saying that he had poor eyesight. He did not.
In fact, he was farsighted, meaning that he could see very well at
distances. They also said Oswald was a
poor shot. He was not. He qualified as a sharpshooter in the
Marines and only after he received his second courts martial did he become
lackadaisical in his military marksmanship.
Through the 4X scope mounted on the rifle, his target appeared no more
than 25 yards away. One school of
thought tries to discredit the "lone assassin" conclusion by insisting that it
was impossible for Oswald to be so accurate in the limited time span. What accuracy? His first shot missed the motorcade completely; with 3.5 seconds
to reload and aim, his second shot was low and not fatal; and, with 5 seconds
to reload and steady his aim, his third shot hit JFK high on the right rear of
his head. An inch and a half higher or
to the right and Oswald would have failed.
The buffs try to use the Zapruder film as their "proof of a conspiracy"
by insisting that because President Kennedy's head moves back and to the left
at the instant he is hit by the fatal bullet, he must have been shot from the
front. If he had been shot from the
front, his head would have moved forward.
For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. His head moved back and to the left as a
result of the force of the right temporal area exploding outward. A close look at the film clearly shows no
damage to the back of the President's head.
A frontal shot would have caused extensive damage to the rear of his
head. Of course, the buffs also contend
that the Zapruder film has been altered to hide evidence that Kennedy was shot
from the front. This is nothing more
than another feeble attempt to misconstrue the truth.
Dealey Plaza is a contained area that was
swarming with over 300 people that day.
How could anyone fire a high-powered rifle from the grassy knoll or
railroad overpass without being seen or heard?
Not one single witness saw anything to indicate a second shooter. A few witnesses thought they heard shots
from the grassy knoll and that is understandable. Dealey Plaza is like an echo chamber. One loud shot can sound like three or four, coming from different
directions. Compound this with shock
and fear and you have mass confusion and conflicting testimony.
Lee Harvey Oswald was a pathological liar
and a sociopath. He could barely hold even a menial job and then not for very
long. Frequent episodes of spouse abuse, the attempted assassination of General
Edwin Walker in April 1963, and the murder of Dallas Police Officer J. D. Tippit
demonstrated his penchant for violence. His disillusionment with life in the
United States and the Soviet Union only intensified the fires raging in his own
psyche. This, however, is not mentioned
as a motive for murder. The reasons for
his actions went with him to the grave. He was called a "nut". He was not.
The motorcade route was published in the two local newspapers on Tuesday
and Wednesday. He had the weapon. He
had the opportunity. The President drove right past his work. He knew exactly what he was doing. He
obviously did not have an organized escape plan. After a head count, Oswald was
the only employee not accounted for at the Texas School Book Depository
following the assassination. Officer
Tippit most likely stopped him simply because he fit the physical description
provided to the police by Howard Brennan.
Many other people were stopped that same day for the same reason. Twelve eyewitnesses identified Oswald as the
murderer of Officer Tippit. He drew
even more attention to himself by sneaking into the Texas Theater without
paying the seventy-five cents admission. When arrested, he had $13.87 in his
pocket. Does this sound like a player
in a major conspiracy or simply a murderer on the run? Oswald's wife, Marina, visited him in jail and
knew in her heart that he had done it just by the look in his eyes, as she
testified later to the Warren Commission.
On the morning of Sunday, November 24th,
1963, as they approached the fifth-floor elevator of the Dallas Jail, Police
Officer James Leavelle said to Oswald, "If anybody shoots at you, I sure hope
they are as good a shot as you are."
Oswald "kind of laughed" and said, "Nobody is going to shoot at
me." Three minutes later, he lay
mortally wounded – shot through the abdomen by Jack Ruby on national
television. Ruby was a troubled man, just like Oswald. He had his own furies to contend with and in
a spontaneous act of rage started what were to become the roots of the
conspiracy theories. The only reason their paths crossed that morning was
because Oswald stopped to put on a sweater.
If that had not occurred, he would have been transferred minutes before
Ruby entered the Dallas Jail basement. Again, the buffs contend that Ruby was
ordered to kill Oswald to silence him.
He had several opportunities prior to Sunday to eliminate Oswald if that
were the case. Why would the
conspirators wait so long? The more
time Oswald spent in custody, the more chances he would "talk". Ruby honestly
believed that he would be hailed a hero for killing Oswald and would not spend
one minute in jail. If he were part of
a conspiracy, do you think the perpetrators would have allowed him to live as
long as he did? He was quite the
talker. He granted many interviews
during his time in jail, died there in 1967, and was apparently quite insane at
the time of his death.
Why is it so difficult to accept the truth?
William Manchester said in a letter to the Editor of THE NEW YORK TIMES, and I quote, "Those who desperately want to
believe that President Kennedy was the victim of a conspiracy have my
sympathy. I share their yearning. To employ what may seem an odd metaphor,
there is an esthetic principle here. If
you put six million dead Jews on one side of a scale and on the other side put
the Nazi regime – the greatest gang of criminals ever to seize control of a
modern state – you have a rough balance: greatest crime, greatest
criminals. But if you put the murdered
President of the United States on one side of a scale and that wretched waif
Oswald on the other side, it doesn't balance.
You want to add something weightier to Oswald. It would invest the President's death with meaning, endowing him
with martyrdom. He would have died for
something. A conspiracy would, of
course, do the job nicely. Unfortunately,
there is no evidence whatsoever that there was one." Gerald Posner said, and I quote, "The desire to find a conspiracy
in the Kennedy assassination will continue to be answered for years by more
"confessions", witnesses who change their testimony to recall disturbing
events, the appearance of papers of dubious authenticity, and by writers and
researchers who present cases of guilt by association supported by rumor and
innuendo. But for those seeking the
truth, the facts are incontrovertible.
They can be tested against credible testimony, documents, and the latest
scientific advances. Chasing shadows on
the grassy knoll will never substitute for real history."
Real history…what a concept. Why must we continue to search for the truth
when it is right before our eyes?
Historians and authors have reviewed the remaining "classified"
documents relating to the Kennedy assassination and proclaim that there is
absolutely nothing there to alter the original findings. Grasp reality and discard perception. With the indisputable facts in hand, we know
what really happened in Dealey Plaza on November 22nd, 1963. To believe otherwise, in the words of Gerald
Posner, is to absolve a man with blood on his hands, and mock the President he
killed.