Well, I suppose your idea is sound, if it’s generous to include the following hypothetical exchange:
Oswald: [while picking some Fair Play For Cuba leaflets] One day, I’m gonna hit the fascists hard.
“José”: [ostensibly pro-Castro, he’s actually secretly anti-Castro and hangs around to gather names and information to disrupt their activities]: Yeah, Lee, you do that.
Most common phrases spoken to LHO:
ETA: Including those phrases in Russian
Throw in some profane versions, too, reflecting his time in the Marines.
In Russia, country leader assassinate YOU!
You guys go ahead and make up your own Full Metal Jacket mashup jokes, they’re so easy there’s no point in actually typing them out.
But you may want to do a better job than I did in post #33. Either no one saw what I did there or no one appreciated it.
…
I’m surprised at the sentiment that LHO could make a PITA out of himself and easily get a Get out of Russia free card for both himself and his wife. Again, there would have been a distinction between his handlers and those with decision-making power. Just like any other large bureaucracy, those in charge don’t really care that their underlings are dealing with an unruly customer. And there was a lot they could do to him/her/her family short of execution. Heck, even if they wanted to they could have and who would have known? They could have denied access or even come up with a cover story at the drop of a hat.
My wife and her family made it out in the mid- to late eighties (she was 17 at the time), and have spent a lot of time talking to them about what life was like. LHO getting out (especially with a wife) was not the norm. Again, it doesn’t need to raise to the level of international intrigue, but it would have taken some doing.
It doesn’t have to be the norm to nevertheless be plausible.
IIRC correctly he was a US citizen throughout his stay in the USSR. He tried to renounce his citizenship, but the embassy where he tried it correctly expected that he would eventually change his mind, and just put his application to renounce on hold until he asked to come back.
It’s not like a native Russian or a Soviet citizen trying to get out of the Rodina. If he wanted to go back and be a loser in the USA, I can see the Russkis saying “fine, go be somebody else’s headache. Not like we don’t have enough whiners already”.
Regards,
Shodan
Except he was an expat American. They didn’t really want to hold him, nor need to hold him, nor was it in their interest. And Russian documents are pretty clear that they were disgusted with him and preferred him well away from Russia.
That’s why Oswald getting out was not extraordinary. And Marina may have been assigned to keep an eye on him. When they got to Texas the Russian emigre community tried to get Marina to leave Lee because like everyone else, they found him annoying. She wouldn’t and eventually they stopped communication with both of them. She might of stayed because she was loyal and faithful, or maybe she was afraid there was a Soviet plant in that group keeping an eye on her.
But there were always quid pro quo exchanges between the USSR and the west. They may have just traded Lee for something of relative value, like a case of toilet paper.
Interesting OP. Someone should make a movie about this!
No chance that Oswald was involved with them. Frustrated by his experience in the Soviet Union, and despondent about life in the US, he eventually got the idea that it was Cuba that was the Marxist paradise he craved.
See - he hadn’t been wrong when he read about the Marxist society that would overthrow buegious (sp?) oppression, inspiring him to lie his way into Russia (falsely claiming to be a student, then overstaying his Visa by slitting his wrists), only to discover it was more oppressive than the States.
He had just gone to the wrong place, where Soviet bureaucracy had corrupted the ideals of socialism. In his mind, Cuba was his new salvation.
And so, shortly before his life ended, he went to Mexico to try to defect to Cuba. Just as he had hoped an American defector to Russia would be greeted warmly (and was disappointed when he arrived), he expected to be made a leader in Castro’s revolution. Sadly (for him - and JFK) they didn’t want him.
Which led him back to Dallas. And, hard as it is to believe, the kismet of working a shitty job in a warehouse where the President of the Fuckin’ United States would jut happen to be driving past.
Just a really bad coincidence.
The Cubans wanted Oswald because if you want an assassin, you definitely look for a flaky guy with mental health problems. Because that’s who you trust because you know he’ll get the job done without screwing up.
You’re assuming that the ex-pat Cubans disclosed their identity as anti-Castro “counter-revolutionaries” to LHO. They could have easily posed as Marxist Cubans to dupe him into doing their bidding.
They could have wanted Oswald because they duped him into thinking he was doing this for Castro’s Cuba. If he succeeded, he’d either be quiet about reasons because of his loyalty to Marxism or blab and set up Castro. If he failed, and was detained, same scenario. It was a win-win.
Did they tell him to try a couple of failed assassination attempts first to throw off suspicion?
This doesn’t explain why you would pick a moody, unreliable guy with a history of poor follow-through as your assassin. I can think of some reasons you wouldn’t.
I don’t really follow. Oswald was not the type who liked following orders - he was someone who thought HE should be in charge. It was part of his delusion of grandeur.
I actually believe - pure speculation - that, in his heart of hearts, Oswald hoped to escape to Cuba. Having killed Kennedy, NOW he’d have demonstrated his “bona fides” as a friend to the revolution. That this is wildly irrational didn’t occur to him.
The thing is, though, that Oswald had little notice - a couple of weeks? Or was it days? - that Kennedy would be driving by his place of work. While he normally obsessively planned his delusional fantasies, he had little opportunity to think this through.
I reckon that’s just a Putin thing though.
Well, once you start playing the “they could have wanted” game without any supporting evidence, you may as well speculate that Martians hired Oswald to kill Kennedy. After all, you can’t prove they didn’t.
Plus the way he wandered around after the shooting (as opposed to, say, hopping a bus or train out of town) suggests he hadn’t really thought it through, let along some mastermind handler had thought it through on his behalf. Where was he going when Tippet confronted him? Why did he, rather stupidly, draw attention by entering a movie theater without paying? It’s easy to make up obscure plans by shadowy conspirators, but the simpler explanation is that Oswald was acting impulsively and thoughtlessly, as by all indications he was prone to do.