# Did Lee Harvey Oswald assassinate JFK? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 9, 2007, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950 "2007-08-09T02:28:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![ngant17](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ed8c4c/32.png) [@ngant17](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ngant17)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/161 "2007-08-13T01:13:52Z")
It’s amazing how some people here will continue to deny the facts, even after it hits you like crashing into a brick wall. No one has denied the authenticity of NSAM 271 because it is part of the historical record. NASA history sites typically ignore it or downplay its significance. Like it was something trivial. So trivial that it was a national security secret for 20 years. In one aspect, it was probably fortunate that NSAM 271 was kept secret from the public for so long, because it has helped to prevent the so-called experts like Bugulosi and Posner from making up some idiotic debunking claim about it. Now that this cat is out of the bag, the debunking crowd has a lot of work to do to distort the historical record again. And if they can’t make up some mixed-up nonsense or half-truth about it, they will simply ignore it completely. Yes, I have brought up the whole ‘space race’ debate on the sites I mentioned, even prestigious periodicals like Scientific American tried to address the space race, which they did in a poorly-researched article in the early 1990’s, and it ignores the amount of cooperation in space between the US and the USSR which was already beginning in the early 1960’s under JFK. Apollo-Soyuz happened 10 years later under a Nixon Administration, so where was the space race then? It seems to conveniently disappear into a memory hole. Again, I submit that an Apollo-Soyuz manned mission to the moon would have easily occurred under JFK, just like it was made to happen under Nixon, and JFK would not have allowed a space race to happen anymore than Nixon would have allowed it to happen. It’s true that Khruschev called off the space race in late 1963. Khrushchev’s pursued a doctrine of peaceful coexistence with the West which would have fostered the cooperative moon mission. After JFK’s death, he too was deposed almost a year later by conservative elements in the USSR, essentially from a military coup but not by violent assassination as in the US. BTW, why do you want to discredit some of my postings here just because I posted my own research several years ago at another site? I am repeating it because there is rampant amounts of ignorance here, especially with respect to the significance of NSAM 271. I can’t make you believe historical facts if you don’t want to believe them. Sometimes it’s best to let simple minds live in their own little worlds. The truth can be too much for some people to handle. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/162 "2007-08-13T01:39:18Z")
[QUOTE=ngant17] In one aspect, it was probably fortunate that NSAM 271 was kept secret from the public for so long, because it has helped to prevent the so-called experts like Bugulosi and Posner from making up some idiotic debunking claim about it. Now that this cat is out of the bag, the debunking crowd has a lot of work to do to distort the historical record again. And if they can’t make up some mixed-up nonsense or half-truth about it, they will simply ignore it completely. [/QUOTE] It’s being ignored because it does not in any way demonstrate that Lee Harvey Oswald did not shoot John Kennedy. It’s completely irrelevant to the discussion at hand. Evidence that Oswald did not shoot Kennedy would be some sort of direct evidence that either established that he could not have done it or that someone else did. NSAM 271 doesn’t have anything in it that says “Hey, Lee Harvey Oswald didn’t do it!” By the way, citing _your own Web site_ makes you look really, really bad in a debate. You can’t be your own cite. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/163 "2007-08-13T01:40:30Z")
[QUOTE=ngant17] It’s amazing how some people here will continue to deny the facts, even after it hits you like crashing into a brick wall. [/quote] You can say _that_ again! :rolleyes: [QUOTE=ngant17] So trivial that it was a national security secret for 20 years. [/quote] Do you have proof that it was kept secret? Did I somehow miss that the 20 September 1961 speech Kennedy made at the **United Nations** was _classified?_ [QUOTE=ngant17] Apollo-Soyuz happened 10 years later under a Nixon Administration [/quote] No it didn’t. The mission took place in July 1975. [QUOTE=ngant17] After JFK’s death, he too was deposed almost a year later by conservative elements in the USSR, essentially from a military coup but not by violent assassination as in the US. [/quote] So? [QUOTE=ngant17] Again, I submit that an Apollo-Soyuz manned mission to the moon would have easily occurred under JFK, **just like it was made to happen under Nixon** [/quote] Again, Apollo-Soyuz did not happen under Nixon. Also, it didn’t go to the Moon. It was an orbital mission. [QUOTE=ngant17] BTW, why do you want to discredit some of my postings here just because I posted my own research several years ago at another site? [/quote] Well for starters you’ve made several factual errors, which have been pointed out. Secondly, in a debate you cannot back up your assertations by repeating the assertations. It’s as if I were to argue that the Moon is infested by weevils and cite as proof a website I put up saying that the Moon is infested by weevils. If you make a claim, you need to be able to back it up with references. [QUOTE=ngant17] I can’t make you believe historical facts if you don’t want to believe them. [/quote] Kind of hard to believe historical facts that are not historical facts. [QUOTE=ngant17] Sometimes it’s best to let simple minds live in their own little worlds. The truth can be too much for some people to handle. [/QUOTE] As you illustrate. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/164 "2007-08-13T01:50:12Z")
> [@](#): > > Imagine, if you will, that you are on a jury in a murder trial (not of the president; just some random victim). The prosecutor places the defendant at the scene of the crime, demonstrates that the defendant owned the murder weapon, that he brought a bag that could have contained the weapon to work, that the weapon is found at his workplace, that his prints are on the weapon, that he has had sniper training, that the shot is possible, that he fled the scene, that he shot a police officer who approached him a little while later, that he has an erratic past, et al. > > Would you still be the one to say, “but he once shot himself in the foot when he was a Marine,”, and “I heard that somebody in the government wanted details of the crime right after he was arrested” so “we’ll never know if he did it”? Or, do you so sincerely want to believe in a scandal that any tidbit that satsfies that craving becomes a compelling argument? Hey, don’t knock it. This is the kind of thinking that got O.J. Simpson acquitted. _“Do you want to believe Oswald/Simpson is innocent? Then ignore what the evidence says and vote what you believe should be true.”_ ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/165 "2007-08-13T02:35:08Z")
Ignoring the points made about the space race and all kinds of other stuff that has absolutely nothing to do whatsoever with whether or not Lee Harvey Oswald killed John F. Kennedy, I’d like to get back to the shooting itself. **denquixote** and **ngant17** both make the claim that this shot has never been reproduced by experts. I believe that is entirely possible and also entirely worthless as a point of argument. I’ll openly admit, I don’t indulge in conspiracy theories, I consider them to be “intellectual porn” and to have deleterious effects on the healthy skepticism so necessary to sift through the bullshit of modern life. So I don’t know _much_ about the JFK assassination–I don’t even know the ballistic specifics of where the shots first entered JFK’s body and what the bullets did and et cetera, I’ve seen some CGI representations of what happened a few times and read about it a few times, but not so much that I remember the particulars. Like others who have posted here, I have, in my life, had to qualify with a rifle. As other posters with military experiences have said, you have to be able to successfully hit targets at greater range than Oswald hit Kennedy. This was not an especially difficult shot, weather conditions were okay, Kennedy was moving _very slowly_. I’m not someone who has the accuracy and skills of a sniper, I wouldn’t win any Olympic marksmanship contests, but I’m someone who has been shooting rifles since I was at least 12 years old when my dad took me out to shoot a little .22. I’ve shot at moving targets before, I’ve hit moving targets before–I’m a relatively avid hunter and have hit game while it was moving (at a slow pace through the forest.) All that aside, I could be someone who has never touched a rifle in my life, and what I say would be equally true and equally verifiable. A shot at a target moving under 15 mph at the range and angle from which Oswald made his shot is _very, very, easy_. Give me three shots at such a target and I’d bet you the deed to my home that the person I was shooting at would be struck sans anything getting in my way (like a diving secret service agent somehow.) While I wouldn’t bet my _house_ that the person would be dead after those three shots, I’d be reasonably certain they would be mortally wounded. What I can’t do, and maybe _no one_ can do is reproduce the _exact shot_ Oswald made. Could I have hit and killed Kennedy? Assuming I had the “intestinal fortitude” the desire and the cold heartedness to shoot someone who was no danger to me in cold blood while his wife was riding beside him, yes, I could do the physical act itself–it was no great feat. I can’t guarantee that my bullet would enter Kennedy’s body 2.5 centimeters below the base of his skull and then exit and strike Governor Connally’s leg or whatever and et cetera. That may be _something very hard to impossible to precisely reproduce_. What is easy to reproduce is what happened–killing shots hitting Kennedy. But likewise, put an animal carcass on the road and let me shoot at it from above and I’m willing to bet if you took a team of twenty of the best marksmen in the history of the world they would probably all fail to _exactly reproduce my shot_. Meaning their shots would fail to _exactly reproduce the precise entry point and precisely replicate the effects on the carcass to 100% accuracy_, but they would definitely _hit_ the carcass and could probably hit it very very close to where I hit it. Bullets don’t behave in a perfectly uniform manner when they strike any living body, but the same type of ammunition fired from the same weapon hitting in roughly the same area will _usually behave very very close to the same_. An extremely slight difference in where the bullet enters may result in the exact same ultimate outcome (a deceased target), but radically different forensics (for example maybe the bullet will ricochet inside the body off of a bone, maybe it won’t, maybe it will come apart inside the body more in one shot versus another…and et cetera.) Basically what I’m saying is, expert marksmen could reproduce what Oswald did–hitting a target fatally using three shots in a given time span. What they can’t reproduce to 100% accuracy is the exact behavior of the shots that killed Kennedy, but that is an unrealistic expectation. I can prove this if I had the resources by showing that if you let me fire into a propped up animal carcass, then we do forensic testing to see EXACTLY what happened inside that carcass, there’s probably less than 0.5% chance that someone taking the exact same shot can get the EXACT SAME FORENSIC RESULTS, but that is meaningless. All that shows is that when a bullet hits a “weirdly composed target” of muscle, fat, flesh, blood, bones, brain matter et cetera, you’re not going to get 100% uniform results even if you hit the precisely same target at very near the same spot. But that is functionally meaningless because just a failure to reproduce the _precise_ effects of the shot will not discredit the fact that the key feature of the shot (its lethality and its feasibility at that range) can easily be proven. Quibbling over a point like this is, in my opinion, strongly suggestive of 1) ignorance of how bullets behave when they hit a human body or 2) the last stand of people who should know better than to try and argue a point like this. ---
**Author:** ![42fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/4/b487fb/32.png) [@42fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/42fish)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/166 "2007-08-13T03:07:40Z")
[QUOTE=ngant17] Apollo-Soyuz happened 10 years later under a Nixon Administration, so where was the space race then? [/QUOTE] Simple: It was OVER. We’d already beaten the Russians to the moon by that point. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/167 "2007-08-13T04:03:10Z")
[QUOTE=ngant17] It’s true that Khruschev called off the space race in late 1963. Khrushchev’s pursued a doctrine of peaceful coexistence with the West which would have fostered the cooperative moon mission. After JFK’s death, he too was deposed almost a year later by conservative elements in the USSR, essentially from a military coup but not by violent assassination as in the US. [/QUOTE] Ah, I hate to invoke authority here, as mine isn’t that grand, but I’ve taken a look at Khruschev and he wanted notihng of the sort. He knew he couldn’t make it out of a direct military confrontation, so he essentially increased the walling-off of the USSR, including eventually the Berlin Wall. He hated Kennedy after he realized the young President was not going to give in or go for “show projects” of cooperation which the Soviets could manipulate. Eventually he cooled off, but he was never a fan of peaceful coexistance. He just wanted to tone it down and try for a nuke-based defense - too much expense on the regular military.et’s not forget the Cuban Missile Crisis here, either. Now, I’ve gotta say that if anyone would have a conspiracy, it would have been the Soviets. They certainly disliked Kennedy and had ample reason to whack him. However, they would never had chosen a loser like LHO to do the deed. They wouldn’t even have approached him. And moreover, doing something like this was dangerous. If they were found out (and it was pretty darn likely) it might have meant a full barrage of nukes, or if nothing else a campaign of murder against any Communists world-wide. Neither was of real value for a mere bit of revenge, given that JFK’s successors would be just as adamantly opposed to the Soviets. ---
**Author:** ![JHE1967](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3bc359/32.png) [@JHE1967](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JHE1967)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/168 "2007-08-13T04:08:42Z")
I’m firmly in the Oswald acted alone camp but what I want to know is where is the footage the “Babushka lady” shot? It’s amazing that that footage hasn’t turned up. > **[Babushka Lady](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babushka_lady)** > > The Babushka Lady is an unidentified woman present during the 1963 assassination of US President John F. Kennedy who might have photographed or filmed the events that occurred in Dallas's Dealey Plaza at the time President John F. Kennedy was shot. Her nickname arose from the headscarf she wore, which was similar to scarves worn by elderly Russian women (бабушка – babushka – literally means "grandmother" or "old woman" in Russian). > The Babushka Lady was seen to be holding a camera by eyewitne... ---
**Author:** ![Rick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@Rick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/169 "2007-08-13T06:19:21Z")
[QUOTE=ngant17] Yes, I have brought up the whole ‘space race’ debate on the sites I mentioned, even prestigious periodicals like Scientific American tried to address the space race, which they did in a poorly-researched article in the early 1990’s, and it ignores the amount of cooperation in space between the US and the USSR which was already beginning in the early 1960’s under JFK. [/quote] I haven’t read the article, but I got $5 that says they did a better job with it than you have done here. > [@](#): > > Apollo-Soyuz happened 10 years later under a Nixon Administration, so where was the space race then? It seems to conveniently disappear into a memory hole. Again, I submit that an Apollo-Soyuz manned mission to the moon would have easily occurred under JFK, just like it was made to happen under Nixon, and JFK would not have allowed a space race to happen anymore than Nixon would have allowed it to happen. As has been pointed out, it wasn’t ten years later, and it wasn’t Nixon. You owe me $5. Where was the whole space race then? It was over. The fat lady started singing on [December 21, 1968](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_8). The Race was officially over on [July 16, 1969](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11). May I suggest you read Tom Wolfe’s The Right Stuff for more information on the space race. > [@](#): > > It’s true that Khruschev called off the space race in late 1963. Khrushchev’s pursued a doctrine of peaceful coexistence with the West which would have fostered the cooperative moon mission. After JFK’s death, he too was deposed almost a year later by conservative elements in the USSR, essentially from a military coup but not by violent assassination as in the US. Boy there is some powerful stupid in this paragraph. I am guessing that you were not alive during the early 1960s, and only know of cold war from some things you have read. > [@](#): > > BTW, why do you want to discredit some of my postings here just because I posted my own research several years ago at another site? I am repeating it because there is rampant amounts of ignorance here, especially with respect to the significance of NSAM 271. I can’t make you believe historical facts if you don’t want to believe them. Sometimes it’s best to let simple minds live in their own little worlds. The truth can be too much for some people to handle. :rolleyes: :smack: :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![denquixote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9bd4f/32.png) [@denquixote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/denquixote)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 9:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/170 "2007-08-13T09:37:43Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] Ignoring the points made about the space race and all kinds of other stuff that has absolutely nothing to do whatsoever with whether or not Lee Harvey Oswald killed John F. Kennedy, I’d like to get back to the shooting itself. **denquixote** and **ngant17** both make the claim that this shot has never been reproduced by experts. I believe that is entirely possible and also entirely worthless as a point of argument. I’ll openly admit, I don’t indulge in conspiracy theories, I consider them to be “intellectual porn” and to have deleterious effects on the healthy skepticism so necessary to sift through the bullshit of modern life. So I don’t know _much_ about the JFK assassination–I don’t even know the ballistic specifics of where the shots first entered JFK’s body and what the bullets did and et cetera, I’ve seen some CGI representations of what happened a few times and read about it a few times, but not so much that I remember the particulars. Like others who have posted here, I have, in my life, had to qualify with a rifle. As other posters with military experiences have said, you have to be able to successfully hit targets at greater range than Oswald hit Kennedy. This was not an especially difficult shot, weather conditions were okay, Kennedy was moving _very slowly_. I’m not someone who has the accuracy and skills of a sniper, I wouldn’t win any Olympic marksmanship contests, but I’m someone who has been shooting rifles since I was at least 12 years old when my dad took me out to shoot a little .22. I’ve shot at moving targets before, I’ve hit moving targets before–I’m a relatively avid hunter and have hit game while it was moving (at a slow pace through the forest.) All that aside, I could be someone who has never touched a rifle in my life, and what I say would be equally true and equally verifiable. A shot at a target moving under 15 mph at the range and angle from which Oswald made his shot is _very, very, easy_. Give me three shots at such a target and I’d bet you the deed to my home that the person I was shooting at would be struck sans anything getting in my way (like a diving secret service agent somehow.) While I wouldn’t bet my _house_ that the person would be dead after those three shots, I’d be reasonably certain they would be mortally wounded. What I can’t do, and maybe _no one_ can do is reproduce the _exact shot_ Oswald made. Could I have hit and killed Kennedy? Assuming I had the “intestinal fortitude” the desire and the cold heartedness to shoot someone who was no danger to me in cold blood while his wife was riding beside him, yes, I could do the physical act itself–it was no great feat. I can’t guarantee that my bullet would enter Kennedy’s body 2.5 centimeters below the base of his skull and then exit and strike Governor Connally’s leg or whatever and et cetera. That may be _something very hard to impossible to precisely reproduce_. What is easy to reproduce is what happened–killing shots hitting Kennedy. But likewise, put an animal carcass on the road and let me shoot at it from above and I’m willing to bet if you took a team of twenty of the best marksmen in the history of the world they would probably all fail to _exactly reproduce my shot_. Meaning their shots would fail to _exactly reproduce the precise entry point and precisely replicate the effects on the carcass to 100% accuracy_, but they would definitely _hit_ the carcass and could probably hit it very very close to where I hit it. Bullets don’t behave in a perfectly uniform manner when they strike any living body, but the same type of ammunition fired from the same weapon hitting in roughly the same area will _usually behave very very close to the same_. An extremely slight difference in where the bullet enters may result in the exact same ultimate outcome (a deceased target), but radically different forensics (for example maybe the bullet will ricochet inside the body off of a bone, maybe it won’t, maybe it will come apart inside the body more in one shot versus another…and et cetera.) Basically what I’m saying is, expert marksmen could reproduce what Oswald did–hitting a target fatally using three shots in a given time span. What they can’t reproduce to 100% accuracy is the exact behavior of the shots that killed Kennedy, but that is an unrealistic expectation. I can prove this if I had the resources by showing that if you let me fire into a propped up animal carcass, then we do forensic testing to see EXACTLY what happened inside that carcass, there’s probably less than 0.5% chance that someone taking the exact same shot can get the EXACT SAME FORENSIC RESULTS, but that is meaningless. All that shows is that when a bullet hits a “weirdly composed target” of muscle, fat, flesh, blood, bones, brain matter et cetera, you’re not going to get 100% uniform results even if you hit the precisely same target at very near the same spot. But that is functionally meaningless because just a failure to reproduce the _precise_ effects of the shot will not discredit the fact that the key feature of the shot (its lethality and its feasibility at that range) can easily be proven. Quibbling over a point like this is, in my opinion, strongly suggestive of 1) ignorance of how bullets behave when they hit a human body or 2) the last stand of people who should know better than to try and argue a point like this. [/QUOTE] So then why are you arguing it? Ad nauseum, with reference to innumerable facts which you yourself say don’t even matter? ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/171 "2007-08-13T09:47:57Z")
[QUOTE=denquixote] So then why are you arguing it? Ad nauseum, with reference to innumerable facts which you yourself say don’t even matter? [/QUOTE] No clue what you’re referring to here, try to respond directly to the point you are countering, the post you’re quoting doesn’t end in a manner in which your response makes sense. Or, maybe it does and I’m just misunderstanding you. My assumption is you’re responding to something _somewhere_ in my post, I just don’t know what. If you have a genuine desire to get your question here answered, try asking it again in a more direct, precise, and easily understandable manner and I’ll do my best to comply–by which I mean chopping my post up and quoting the exact part you’re referring to with this question. If you meant to refer to the whole post, then again, I don’t “understand” what you’re asking. Maybe that’s my fault, but either way our discussion won’t continue until you clarify. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/172 "2007-08-13T13:26:15Z")
[QUOTE=ngant17] A short quote from the links: “I would like you to assume personally the initiative and central responsibility within the Government for the development of a program of substantive cooperation with the Soviet Union in the field of outer space, including the development of specific technical proposals. I assume that you will work closely with the Department of State and other agencies as appropriate.” JFK’s secret **NSAM 271 to NASA, dated 12 Nov. 1963.** [/QUOTE] (bolding mine.) > [@ngant17](#): > > I am repeating it because there is rampant amounts of ignorance here, especially with respect to the significance of NSAM 271. Do you actually think LBJ and the ex-Nazis (band name!) could have put the whole plan together in 10 days? If Kennedy wanted a joint U.S./USSR mission to the moon, if the Soviets would have gone along with it, and if there were people within the government and NASA who opposed the idea, was this really so important to them that they would have killed the president over it? > [@ngant17](#): > > Herr von Braun was probably seething mad at Kennedy at that moment, you can almost see it in that photo, and as the Torbitt Document exposes, he likely was directly involved with other ex-Nazis who were plotting JFK’s death which occured almost a week later in Dallas. Even if von Braun wanted to kill Kennedy, what part would he have played in a conspiracy? He was a rocket scientist, true, but what expertise could bring to a plot to assassinate the president? ---
**Author:** ![BJMoose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5fc32e/32.png) [@BJMoose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BJMoose)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/173 "2007-08-13T14:23:02Z")
[QUOTE=Chris Moise] I’m firmly in the Oswald acted alone camp but what I want to know is where is the footage the “Babushka lady” shot? It’s amazing that that footage hasn’t turned up. > **[Babushka Lady](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babushka_lady)** > > The Babushka Lady is an unidentified woman present during the 1963 assassination of US President John F. Kennedy who is speculated to have photographed or filmed the events that occurred in Dallas' Dealey Plaza at the time President Kennedy was shot. Her nickname arose from the US Army headscarf she wore, which was similar to scarves worn by elderly Russian women. Babushka (Russian: бабушка) literally means "grandmother" or "old woman" in Russian. The Babushka Lady was seen to be holding a came... [/QUOTE] It’s impossible to say where it is, short of her or an heir coming forward and telling us. It’s possible she was so sickened by what she was that she dropped the film in the trash. We just don’t know. There can be no doubt that there are photographs and perhaps film in private hands that we do not know about and may never know about. A few years back somebody donated some photos to the Sixth Floor Museum that had been mouldering in a closet for decades. That particular collection was of no forensic consequence, but who knows what is still out there. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/174 "2007-08-13T14:41:16Z")
[QUOTE=ngant17] No one has denied the authenticity of NSAM 271 because it is part of the historical record. NASA history sites typically ignore it or downplay its significance. Like it was something trivial. So trivial that it was a national security secret for 20 years. [/QUOTE] It seems like the Johnson administration tried to follow up with the proposals in NSAM 271. See NSAM 285, along with the following letter from Mc George Bundy to President Johnson, on Feb. 29th, 1964: > [@](#): > > This good report from the Administrator of NASA is in response to your request made in November to study and report on possible projects for substantive cooperation with the Soviet Union on outer space. The report represents a consensus among NASA, State, Defense, CIA, the Science Advisor, and the Executive Secretary of the Space Council. > > In brief, the report contains guidelines to govern negotiations with the Soviet Union that have a reasonable chance of success, yet protect our national interests. It proposes a graduated approach calculated to develop mutual confidence, exchange information, and lay the foundation for consultative planning of specific projects. Careful consideration has been given to cultivating favorable Congressional and public attitudes. The specific proposals now being considered all relate to a joint program of unmanned flight projects to support a manned lunar landing. > > No immediate public action is recommended because we are in need of Soviet performance on present agreements. We will continue to show interest, through the existing Dryden-Blagonravov channel, in obtaining a positive Soviet answer to the proposals for cooperation already made by President Kennedy and by you. Meanwhile, we will watch the performance of the Soviet Union under existing agreements. > > The Administrator is keeping this program under his continuing personal review and clearly understands your interest in it. He will keep you advised of progress and may call upon you for further initiative sometime around the first of May; by then the Soviet Union will have had ample opportunity to make clear its intentions. ---
**Author:** ![BJMoose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5fc32e/32.png) [@BJMoose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BJMoose)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/175 "2007-08-13T15:01:49Z")
While I’m loathe to jump into this from-beyond-the-right-field-stands conspiracy theory, the Bundy letter cited above raises an interesting question: Given that Vice-president Johnson was involved in the space program, could it be that _he_ had suggested or maybe even championed some of the stuff in NSAM 271? If so, he likely wouldn’t have objected to it; and the folks who opposed it would gain nothing by killing Kennedy since Johnson could be expected to follow the same tack. ---
**Author:** ![denquixote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9bd4f/32.png) [@denquixote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/denquixote)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/176 "2007-08-13T15:28:36Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] . A shot at a target moving under 15 mph at the range and angle from which Oswald made his shot is _very, very, easy_. Give me three shots at such a target and I’d bet you the deed to my home that the person I was shooting at would be struck sans anything getting in my way What I can’t do, and maybe _no one_ can do is reproduce the _exact shot_ Oswald made. Could I have hit and killed Kennedy? Assuming I had the “intestinal fortitude” the desire and the cold heartedness to shoot someone who was no danger to me in cold blood while his wife was riding beside him, yes, I could do the physical act itself–it was no great feat. I can’t guarantee that my bullet would enter Kennedy’s body 2.5 centimeters below the base of his skull and then exit and strike Governor Connally’s leg or whatever and et cetera. That may be _something very hard to impossible to precisely reproduce_. What is easy to reproduce is what happened–killing shots hitting Kennedy. Bullets don’t behave in a perfectly uniform manner when they strike any living body, but the same type of ammunition fired from the same weapon hitting in roughly the same area will _usually behave very very close to the same_. An extremely slight difference in where the bullet enters may result in the exact same ultimate outcome (a deceased target), but radically different forensics (for example maybe the bullet will ricochet inside the body off of a bone, maybe it won’t, maybe it will come apart inside the body more in one shot versus another…and et cetera.) Basically what I’m saying is, expert marksmen could reproduce what Oswald did–hitting a target fatally using three shots in a given time span. What they can’t reproduce to 100% accuracy is the exact behavior of the shots that killed Kennedy, but that is an unrealistic expectation. I can prove this if I had the resources by showing that if you let me fire into a propped up animal carcass, then we do forensic testing to see EXACTLY what happened inside that carcass, there’s probably less than 0.5% chance that someone taking the exact same shot can get the EXACT SAME FORENSIC RESULTS, but that is meaningless. All that shows is that when a bullet hits a “weirdly composed target” of muscle, fat, flesh, blood, bones, brain matter et cetera, you’re not going to get 100% uniform results even if you hit the precisely same target at very near the same spot. But that is functionally meaningless because just a failure to reproduce the _precise_ effects of the shot will not discredit the fact that the key feature of the shot (its lethality and its feasibility at that range) can easily be proven. **Quibbling over a point like this is, in my opinion, strongly suggestive of 1) ignorance of how bullets behave when they hit a human body or 2) the last stand of people who should know better than to try and argue a point like this.**\*\* [/QUOTE] I tried to remove the extraneous verbiage, but could not get it all so I gave up. I can’t believe there is another human being on the face of the earth who believes that reproducing Oswald’s supposed shots means to hit Kennedy in the same spot as Oswald did after first missing the car completely. Why not have the shooter be required to hit the street with his first shot and injure a bystander? To me, reproducing the shots means going to the book depository, getting the Mannlicher-Carcano, loading it, and then firing 2 out of 3 accurate shots at a moving limousine, with passengerts in the appropriate places and secret service agents running alongside or whatever they were doing, with the same noise and distractions, with some allowance made for the tree which no longer exists, in 8 or so seconds, mortally wounding the target. No one has done it on his first atttempt as far as I know. Noone expects the simulator to actually kill Kennedy, Kennedy is already dead. Your last paragraph, within my asterisks, makes it sound, to me, as if you think arguing about these issues is stupid and pointless since these facts should be obvious to all and those who fail to admit that your insight here is universal are merely denying reality and I respond by saying “If it is so obvious and unworthy of response then why waste all that space responding.” Actually I cannot imagine a subject of less interest than how bullets behave when they enter a human body, but one coroner /forensic pathologist who wrote on this subject is Cyril Wecht. He has done thousands of autopsies and states that the single bullet theory is flat out wrong. He believes that Kennedy was struck by bullets from 2 different directions. It is true that his voice is virtually alone in expressing his views, but he has a level of experience that is virtuallly unparallelled and frankly I think he is more knowledgeable than you. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/177 "2007-08-13T16:20:18Z")
> [@](#): > > To me, reproducing the shots means going to the book depository, getting the Mannlicher-Carcano, loading it, and then firing 2 out of 3 accurate shots at a moving limousine, with passengerts in the appropriate places and secret service agents running alongside or whatever they were doing, with the same noise and distractions, with some allowance made for the tree which no longer exists, in 8 or so seconds, mortally wounding the target. No one has done it on his first atttempt as far as I know. It doesn’t matter how many times you repeat this, you are still wrong. I am, once again, telling you flat out that it’s an easy shot. I could make that shot on the first attempt and so could virtually anyone who has ever fired a rifle. > [@](#): > > Actually I cannot imagine a subject of less interest than how bullets behave when they enter a human body, but one coroner /forensic pathologist who wrote on this subject is Cyril Wecht. He has done thousands of autopsies and states that the single bullet theory is flat out wrong. He believes that Kennedy was struck by bullets from 2 different directions. It is true that his voice is virtually alone in expressing his views, but he has a level of experience that is virtuallly unparallelled and frankly I think he is more knowledgeable than you. Again I suspect bullshit. No way is Cyril Wecht’s experience unparallelled - there are surely hundreds of pathologists who have just as much experience as he has. And, as you admit, none of them are supporting Wecht. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/178 "2007-08-13T17:33:28Z")
[QUOTE=ngant17] Sometimes it’s best to let simple minds live in their own little worlds. The truth can be too much for some people to handle. [/QUOTE] This is exactly what I’d expect: ngant: speculation others: casual refutation ngant: wild speculation including new elements at best tenunously related to Oswald others: casual refutation, analysis of new elements, questions about relevance ngant: even wilder speculation, dragging in elements that are even further removed from Oswald others: casual refutation, analysis of new elements, questions about relevance ngant: frustration, insults. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/179 "2007-08-13T17:51:17Z")
[QUOTE=denquixote] I tried to remove the extraneous verbiage, but could not get it all so I gave up. I can’t believe there is another human being on the face of the earth who believes that reproducing Oswald’s supposed shots means to hit Kennedy in the same spot as Oswald did after first missing the car completely. Why not have the shooter be required to hit the street with his first shot and injure a bystander? [/quote] Well, the problem is, the thing conspiracy theorists focus on is the actual path of the bullet and **precisely** where it strikes Kennedy and what said bullets do after the strike. > [@](#): > > To me, reproducing the shots means going to the book depository, getting the Mannlicher-Carcano, loading it, and then firing 2 out of 3 accurate shots at a moving limousine, with passengerts in the appropriate places and secret service agents running alongside or whatever they were doing, with the same noise and distractions, with some allowance made for the tree which no longer exists, in 8 or so seconds, mortally wounding the target. No one has done it on his first atttempt as far as I know. Noone expects the simulator to actually kill Kennedy, Kennedy is already dead. Your last paragraph, within my asterisks, makes it sound, to me, as if you think arguing about these issues is stupid and pointless since these facts should be obvious to all and those who fail to admit that your insight here is universal are merely denying reality and I respond by saying “If it is so obvious and unworthy of response then why waste all that space responding.” Actually, people in this very thread have told you this _has been done_ and that the claims that it hasn’t are spurious. The only leg the CT’s have to stand on is that people can’t reproduce exactly what happened with the bullets, people have reproduced the shot, several times. > [@](#): > > Actually I cannot imagine a subject of less interest than how bullets behave when they enter a human body, but one coroner /forensic pathologist who wrote on this subject is Cyril Wecht. He has done thousands of autopsies and states that the single bullet theory is flat out wrong. He believes that Kennedy was struck by bullets from 2 different directions. It is true that his voice is virtually alone in expressing his views, but he has a level of experience that is virtuallly unparallelled and frankly I think he is more knowledgeable than you. Whether or not he is more knowledgeable than me about forensics is a moot point, I wasn’t arguing that I knew anything special about forensics. My argument was that it would be impossible to _perfectly reproduce_ the forensic evidence that was present at the Kennedy shooting, regardless of whether or not Oswald was the lone gunman. If this pathologist believes for some reason that there were two shooters, then I wonder why he is the only pathologist to believe that? Is his experience so unparalleled that he is able to deduce something, that even when he explains it to **other pathologists** they are unable to grasp it? Also, a funny little tidbit about the good Dr: > [@](#): > > He has served as the president of both the American Academy of Forensic Science and the American College of Legal Medicine, and currently heads the board of trustees of the American Board of Legal Medicine. He served as the coroner and, later Medical Examiner of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania **until January 2006, when he was indicted on various fraud charges.** The case has not yet gone to trial. It also appears he has taken the “out there” angle on many high profile killings since the 1960s. It seems to me like he’s an accomplished pathologist who likes making appearances in the media and getting attention by arguing a non-mainstream interpretation of an event. ---
**Author:** ![plnnr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@plnnr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/plnnr)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950/180 "2007-08-13T18:02:55Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] Actually, people in this very thread have told you this _has been done_ and that the claims that it hasn’t are spurious. The only leg the CT’s have to stand on is that people can’t reproduce exactly what happened with the bullets, people have reproduced the shot, several times. [/QUOTE] Actually, they haven’t ever reproduced the exact shot. No one, to my knowledge, has shot another human (much less the President of the United States), under the exact same circumstances (or as close as they can have them and still be shooting the President of the United States.) I happen to believe LHO shot the Kennedy, but I don’t believe he acted alone. I have absolutely no proof of that. That being said, shooting the same rifle, from the same spot, at a target moving at the same speed is one thing. Taking the same gun, from the same spot, and shooting another person (much less the President) is another. LHO was no sniper and I don’t believe he was so cool, cunning, and professional as to be one. Nerves, fear, etc. etc etc. have to come into play when you’re about to shoot the most powerful man in the world, in broad daylight. LHO has been portrayed as a flake, a loser, and a loon. It doesn’t add up (to me). YMMV [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-lee-harvey-oswald-assassinate-jfk/414950.md?page=10)