And I almost forgot the Number One reason there are so many conspiracy theories:
John Kennedy had managed to piss off an amazing number of people in a short time.
From the Mob and the Teamsters (crackdowns by JFK’s brother Bobby) to the CIA and anti-Castro people and the right-wingers (Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, general problems with him being a liberal) to Castro (Cuban Missile Crisis, Bay of Pigs–shows how you can piss off one side for not supporting it enough and the other side for not stopping it, assassination attempts) to goodness knows who else. Cripes, it’s like an Agatha Christie novel, there are so many people who would feel no sorrow with him dead. That is actually the part of conspiracy buffdom that is the most fun; The X Files pales by comparison for wacky paranoia.
B.F.D. Every president in American history has pissed off tremendous numbers of people. Name a president, any president, and there will be many people who feel no sorrow to see him dead. That’s not evidence of conspiracy–that’s evidence of tinfoil hattery.
Well, that’s not exactly true, not even in this specific case. Conspiracy theories often involve vague motives (the really nutty ones involve motives seemingly understood only by the theorist), and the motives themselves are largely irrelevant. Kennedy happened to have a number of plausible enemies, but the same could be said of any President.
My own guess as to the wide number of Kennedy conspiracy theories would involve:
[ul][li]The spectacular public way in which he was killed;[/li][li]The fact that his assassin wasn’t grabbed on the spot (giving him several hours to run around and inspire a wide range of eyewitness accounts);[/li][li]The checkered past of the assassin; and[/li][li]The fact that the assassin was himself killed in a spectacularly public way.[/ul][/li]
This just cries out for detailed speculation and excessive analysis, like a complicated and popular movie.
From Minty
NutMagnet:
quote:You know Minty, one thing I’ve always liked about you is your non-confrontational style. Can’t you ever discuss something without getting in someone’s face?
[/quote]
Okydokey. Just calm down when you do it. You’ll give yourself an ulcer.
That’s a very nice picture of a bullet. Is that a bullet shot thru soft tissue then into a cadaver’s wrist or the actual bullet, or just a bullet?
OK, so Marina says he practiced. I said he wasn’t trained and he wasn’t. He also wasn’t an expert marksman. You make it sound like he could pick up any old bolt action rifle, “practice a bit” and do what he did. I say it’s questionable. As a lawyer, you should see the distinction between “it’s impossible” and “it’s questionable.” And what make you think that what you believe are “the facts” are indeed so, and why is it so unconcionable to question them?
I’m not complaining. I’m questioning why a guy, out to commit the act of a lifetime, wouldn’t use a better implement that he did. Just seems odd.
It is a bullet fired at a cadaver’s wrist at a velocity of 1100 ft./sec., the approximate velocity of the bullet when it struck Gov. Connally’s wrist. Quite unlike the bullets shown on your site, which appear to have been fired at full force. The mere fact that your guys don’t even acknowledge the apppropriate velocity shows that they don’t know what they’re talking about. (Not to mention that they seem to be functionally illiterate as well.)
Because he was dirt fucking poor. Better guns cost more money, and he wasn’t planning to shoot the president when he bought the gun the better part of a year in advance.
That makes no sense. Oswald had been trained in rifle shooting, and had several months (more than “a bit”, I’d say) to become proficient with this particular rifle. Heck, I’ve never fired a bolt-action rifle, but I’ve been trained to use the automatic C7 (i.e. the M16) and if I practiced for a few months, I have no doubt I could do at least as well as Oswald. He had plenty of time to get used to the bolt action on his particular rifle, and it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if he could fire extremely rapidly with it. The argument that the rifle was too complicated to use is nonsense. Even very complicated tasks can be done smoothly by anyone with enough practice.
Who’s accusing anyone of unconscionable acts on this thread? Rather, people are being accused of spreading the bullshit nice and thick. Pull yourself down from the cross, why don’t you?
Well, Oswald was an odd person generally. But even if he was stone-cold rational, I still don’t see that as contradicted by his willingness to buy a cheap rifle and practice with it until he became a self-taught expert (at the use of that particular rifle) in order to accomplish a task that apparantly wasn’t all that difficult to begin with.
Well, if you’re going to make the unfounded claim that Oswald would have been too nervous to make the kill, we can counter with the equally unfounded claim that he was nervous, and missed his first shot, but then quickly steadied himself to hit with the second and third. Our claim, coupled with the fact the Oswald had months to prepare himself psychologically, makes at least as much sense.
The idea that JFK was whacked by a CIA-right-wing-cabal for being soft/liberal is utterly ridiculous. He was a committed anti-communist who tripled defence spending.
Conspiracy nuts should at least attempt to invent something a little plausible: overambitious soviet sleepers, a cabal of angry husbands, martians, etc.
OT I read an interesting novel called Idlewild. The premise was that JFK survived the assassination (and Marilyn Monroe didnt die)
In this alternate universe, conspiracy nuts claimed that the assassination was faked. And Oliver Stone releases a film called “LBJ”.
Yes, those are the words that you said. But but saying them, you also said, by implication, that training would be necessary, or at least important. And it wasn’t. If it’s not important, you’re just clouding the issue by mentioning it. One could also just as accurately say that Oswald had no training in shooting out a window, or that he had not been trained to shoot at a man with a woman sitting next to him.
Yes, absolutely it is possible to fire 3 rounds in 8.4 seconds with a Carcano. Not effectively, but it is possible. Spotting a moving target that is trailing parrallel is actually easy if you are set up. Once you squeeze off the first round you might as well be on horseback if you have to operate a bolt action.
I really don’t want to be in a position of defending the book. That’s the author’s job. What is most compelling about the information (and there is a lot of it) is type of bullets involved. A heavy jacketed bullet (Oswald’s) is designed specifically not to fragment. It tends to pass through an object. This was the result of the 1920 Geneva Convention. If you are familiar with the Civil War you know the weapons tended to make a mess of the individual because they would fragment on impact. If you were hit in the arm it would do so much damage that it was likely you would lose it. A gut shot was almost certainly fatal.
Again, according to the author, the bullet that hit Kennedy the final time was different. It was both high powered, and the ammunition fragmented like a hollow point. This is how an M-16 would behave (AR-15). It is basically a very high-powered .223 caliber weapon using thin-jacketed bullets. It technically passes the Geneva Convention rules for ammunition but in truth, it was designed to make a mess of whatever it hits.
Kennedy’s x-rays show 30+ fragments which suggest the bullet disintegrated on impact. Also, the entrance wound in the skull was SMALLER than the bullets used by Oswald. The exit wound consisted of large pieces of skull, which indicates a bullet that fragmented, creating a shockwave. Unfortunately, all the evidence seems to have grown feet. Kennedy’s brain, and related tissue samples disappeared early on
And, slightly off topic, but didn’t Gerald Ford step forward years ago and ask for a full accounting of the events. I took that to mean it was time to “fess-up”.
This is just blather. I’m sorry, but I can’t make heads of tails of any of it:
The notion that you can assure the type of bullet based on whether it fragments or not is preposterous. Any sort of rifle bullet can fragment or not fragment. Bullets are by their very nature extremely unpredictable; anyone who tells you otherwise is full o’ crap.
I am frankly skeptical that the author has any means whatsoever with which to support his contention that the bullet that hit Kennedy the last time was any different from the previous one.
How can the entry wound from the second hit be smaller than the bullet? The entry wound is the entire right back side of his head; the skull blew apart. Whomever wrote that hasn’t even seen the Zapruder tape or the autopsy photos; it didn’t make a small hole in the back of his skull.
As for your understanding of the M-16, you’re right that it’s a high velocity .223. That’s about it:
A) The notion that it skims the “1920 Geneva Convention” or that it was designed to fragment is false, as the Geneva Conventions have absolutely nothing to do with weapons. You may be thinking of the Hague Declaration, which specifically bans expanding bullets, not fragmenting bullets. All bullets can fragment.
B) Jacketed ammunition most certainly was not a result of the Hague Declaration. It had been the common method of military ammunition production for decades before. Jacketed ammunition has a rather obvious military purpose: it is far more adept at piercing armor.
In any case, the Hague Declaration is sheer fantasy anyway. The propensity for a bullet to cause horrible wounds is as much, if not more, a product of the bullet’s velocity as it is its construction; an M-16’s 5.56mm round with fully jacketed ammunition will cause far more damage to a human being than a lower-velocity 9mm bullet with a lead tip.
C) The M-16 was designed to use smaller bullets for the very simple reason that you can carry more of them and use magazines with more rounds in them. That was, absolutely and without question, the #1, prime, one and only reason to go to the 5.56; it makes the rifle smaller, it makes the rounds smaller, it makes the whole package lighter, and you can carry more bang for your ruck. Infantry ammunition has been getting smaller for two centuries for that reason; smaller bullets = more bullets per soldier = more firepower. The notion that M-16 rounds were designed to fragment to cause more damage, (or were designed to tumble, another one I’ve heard) is absurd. A 5.56 round is a 5.56 round. Believe me, a direct hit from one absolutely WILL remove you from the war, fragmenting or not.
I don’t mean to pick on this, but you repeated a variety of urban legends and historical simplifications and that’s how these issues become conspiracy theories.
By my understanding, jacketed bullets were developed because there is a limit to how fast you can push a lead bullet out of a rifled barrel before you begin stripping lead from the bullet (I think it starts around 1100ft/s?). Not a criticism, just a comment.
Depends. The M-16’s 5.56mm full-metal jacketed bullet travels around 8-12 cm before yawing and breaking apart (whether the older M193 or the newer M855). If the velocity is less than ~2500ft/s it won’t fragment. Until the bullet yaws you’re basically getting shot with a .22.
True, in that the bullet was neither design to tumble or fragment (most bullets tumble, and fragmentation wasn’t seen as a big wounding factor at the time). False, in that a hit from a 5.56 is guaranteed to remove you from combat . Mogadishu was a lesson with that.
Not trying to nitpick either. Wound ballistics has been an on-again/off-again hobby of mine for a number of years now.
I corresponded a number of years ago with a guy who was pushing the “M-16 killed Kennedy” angle. The problem is that few people understand that bullets can easily break apart if they hit bone, whether hollow-point or not. Since the skull is a nice solid container, any cavitation effects within are rather dramatic.
I stopped reading this thread about halfway down the second page as I’m not terribly interested in a rehash of the various theories I’ve been ignoring for years.
I did search the page for “kgb” and turned up nothing, so I suspect no-one has mentioned the Mitrokhin Archive. Yes, I’m sure people are already checking me for a tinfoil hat, but according to former KGB archivist Vasili Mitrokhin, the KGB falsified evidence and planted newspaper stories to implicate the CIA in Kennedy’s death. Max Holland’s article on the disinformation: http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/sii.htm unsurprisingly, Oliver Stone doesn’t believe a word of it: http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/CIA/JGarrison_KGB_CIA_OStone.html
Considering that the KGB was suspected, even assumed by a lot of people (I can’t find the cite since I’m ultrabusy at work, but I recall reading that Kruschev called the head of the KGB to ask if they had done it), to have been involved from the beginning I can’t blame them for trying to point the suspicion elsewhere and the CIA make a GREAT villain. Granted, not quite up there with the Gestapo, but all the KGB had at the time.
Wait–I just realized that I don’t think I’ve ever seen the Mossad blamed for the assassination. Could there possibly be something the Great International Jewish Conspiracy hasn’t been blamed for? I mean, Jack Ruby was originally named Jacob Rubenstein. I think I have a new path of investigation–book deal here I come!
Ironikit, I enjoyed reading your links. The prosecution of Clay Shaw is to me one of the saddest aspects of the assassination events. Clay was the model upstanding citizen, a business leader, and all-around good guy. And he was railroaded by Garrison, who I believe was truly insane, and Clay’s reputation was forever tarnished.
A friend of mine has a C&R lisence and has bought dozens of bolt-actions over the years. A few years back he aquired one so we went to the local gun range very early in the morning and set up a target at the correct distance for the final shot (not a moving target, we couldn’t do that). We all gave it a few tries simulating Oswald.
Several things came to mind:
It wasn’t that far to the target.
The bolt-action was fine, smoother than the Mauser I’d used (the Carcano bolt was based on the Mauser). Only the straight-pull Enfield was easier, IMHO.
We did not have a scope on the rifle.
Remember also that it wasn’t exactly “get three shots in 8 seconds”. It was "take a shot, then get two more within 8 seconds. A huge difference.
I’m a lousy shot and I got 2 out of 3 in 8 seconds.
Most of us hit with little or no problem. As we were doing the test a redneck hunter guy and his kid came to the range. He was teaching his kid to shoot (and berating him in a manner worthy of a pitting). He came over and asked what we were doing, we told him.
Redneck hunter guy thought it was cool and asked if he could give it a try. No problem. He sat in the shooting chair and we redied to stopwatch.
Well, BLAMBLAMBLAM , he got three shots off in 4 seconds. All dead hits. We stopped the stopwatch and checked the target and told him his results. HE just replied nonplussed “Shoot! that weren’t hard, I’ve heard it was hard. Anyone could fucking do that.” He almost seemed angry, like a guy who’d heard and believed a bunch of lies all his life. He didn’t say much about the whole JFK assasination, but like most Americans he’d probably heard parts of the conspiracy stories.
Good input but I would add that the Carcano 6.5mm was a heavy jacketed bullet while an AR-15 5.56mm would use a thin wall design. I disagree that they would act the same. The bullet that passed through Kennedy and Connally remained intact despite striking bone. The bullet that hit his skull fragmented. An Ar-15 bullet also travels about 1000 fps faster than a Carcano. It is packing more energy into a smaller round. Combined with a thinner wall, it is more likely to fragment and it will impart all that energy when it does.
When you consider the size of the entrance wound it is hard to imagine a 6.5mm bullet creating a 6mm hole. You would expect a slightly larger hole, not smaller. The Warren Commission’s own test showed a Carcano bullet would produce something close to an 8mm hole.
Where are you getting the idea that the entry wound was 6mm? The autopsy report says nothing like that. It actually describes “a 7 x 4 millimeter oval wound,” which, of course, simultaneously larger and smaller than both Oswald’s 6.5mm ammo and your favored 5.56mm AR-15.
Clearly, further evidence is called for–but just as clearly, it was not simply a 6mm hole, as you asserted.
