Despite all the evidence to the contrary, Kennedy has come to be seen as an ally of – even a hero of – the Black Liberation Movement. In fact, he opposed both the goals and actions of that movement from early in his term when terrorists were beating unarmed and vastly outnumbered Freedom Riders, to the final months of his life when four young girls were blown up in an Alabama church.

When black moderates announced plans for an action in Washington in 1963, Kennedy worked overtime to derail it, with significant success, mainly by strong arming black moderates eager to remain in good with the White House. As a result, the planned direct action protest with civil disobedience morphed into a march and the moderates went so far as to force the day’s most radical speaker, John Lewis of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, to drop portions of his speech critical of the administration.

As for Southeast Asia, many in the mainstream have argued that Kennedy was about to withdraw U.S. troops and leave the Indochinese to fight their own battles when he was assassinated. This fixation on what he might have done is understandable, for the historical record – what JFK actually did – is quite horrifying and laid the groundwork for the decade of slaughter that followed.

First was the escalation of U.S. aggression in Laos, accompanied by diplomatic shenanigans that undermined coalition governments that included the Pathet Lao revolutionaries despite their being the most popular force in the country. The goal, as always with empire, was all out victory and the annihilation of anyone who favored national liberation.

In Vietnam, a similar approach led to massive devastation. In the winter of 1961-62, Kennedy initiated the full-scale bombing of those parts of South Vietnam controlled by the National Liberation Front (all but Saigon and its immediate surroundings). The justification that bombing was needed to defeat the revolution masked the indiscriminate nature of the aerial assault, which resulted in casualties that were overwhelmingly civilian. And so the tone was set for the next eleven years of war.

It was also Kennedy who authorized the first use of Chemicals of Mass Destruction in Southeast Asia, with napalm the best-known and most deadly. Never had chemical warfare been used so extensively, though the U.S. had also used napalm in Korea in the early 1950’s. Again, the tone was established as massive amounts of phosphorous, Agent Orange and other chemicals were used for the rest of the war, chemicals the deadly affects of which are being felt to this day throughout Indochina.

And it was under Kennedy that the notorious strategic hamlets were set up throughout South Vietnam. “Strategic Hamlets” is a term worthy of Orwell at his best or Madison Avenue at its worst, designed to induce thoughts of happy, grateful peasants gathered around a campfire. The more accurate phrase would be Concentration Camps, as Vietnamese by the thousands were rounded up at gunpoint and forced to live behind barbed wire. Anyone who resisted was beaten or worse; anyone attempting to escape was shot. The aim was to separate the people from the NLF though the result, not surprisingly, as with the bombing and the chemical weapons, was the opposite, as ever larger segments of the population became supporters of the revolution.

As each of these moves failed and the NLF grew stronger, Kennedy ordered ground troops to Southeast Asia in the spring of 1962, the number of which he gradually increased until his death. There is no evidence to indicate any plan for withdrawal short of victory, the myth-making of Oliver Stone, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. and so many others notwithstanding.

One way to get a handle on the JFK withdrawal myth is to recall another assassination in November of 1963, that of South Vietnamese dictator Ngo Dinh Diem. For much of 1963, Diem threatened to undermine empire’s goals by pushing for a negotiated peace with the NLF and a U.S. withdrawal. In response, Kennedy did what his kind frequently do in such circumstances: he authorized a hit on Diem and replaced him with generals willing to follow orders.

For all the wishful thinking about what Kennedy would have done in Indochina had he lived, the inescapable truth, as opposed to the fantasy, is that he escalated the war and initiated increasing levels of terror that eventually resulted in the deaths of millions. Significantly, there is no mention of withdrawal short of victory in the many Camelot memoirs, biographies and histories until after the tide had turned dramatically against U.S. aggression. Only then did the myth of “Kennedy the Peacemaker” emerge.

Perhaps the JFK cult can be explained by the odious legacies of his two immediate successors, Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, both of whom massively escalated the carnage in Indochina and ultimately abdicated in disgrace. Odious their legacies may be but there’s no way around the fact that Kennedy’s legacy smells just as foul. Such an explanation also obscures the fact that it was Kennedy who established the terms for the domestic conflict that would rage throughout the 1960’s – outraged hostility on the part of the ruling class to the democracy movements that shook the empire to its foundations. It is those movements that will be remembered and celebrated long after the JFK cult hopefully, eventually, finally, finds its rightful resting place in the proverbial dustbin of history.

Andy Piascik is a long-time activist and writer for Z, Counterpunch and many other publications. He can be reached at andypiascik@yahoo.com.

Photo by Cliff1066

What do MLK, JFK and RFK share in common?

Indeed, all three of them had undeniable charisma which directly and emphatically threatened the powers that be. Each demanded a presence with their sheer character, possessing an uncanny ability to embody the words they spoke rather than simply acting as another suit-and-tie with a political platform pre-scripted by some other PR suit-and-tie.

All three had the ability to enact change at a fundamental level, because they were personally convicted and committed to dissenting against war in a world that had become hellbent on destruction and violence.

But there is a further striking similarity between these three charismatic leaders: all of them were assassinated after focusing their critiques against the war machine.

In his formative stages, MLK was a radical proponent of non-violent protest against segregation and racism. He orchestrated sit-ins and marches in order to fight on behalf of African-Americans and the deprivation of their basic civil liberties as stamped in the Constitution. Nowadays, MLK is known for his success as a civil rights champion in regards to race equality. But later down the road, he had a stark realization which radically shifted the way he thought about political dissidence. This change of heart is what I wish to underscore, in remembrance of MLK and what he was willing to stand – and die – for.

We’re all familiar with MLK’s “I Have a Dream Speech” speech that he delivered in 1963 in Washington, D.C., culminating his March on Washington protest. In the speech, MLK envisions a day when racial inequality is no more, replaced by an egalitarian, racially colorblind America. However, in April of 1967, some four years later, Martin Luther King had a different culprit in mind – American foreign policy. In a speech entitled “Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence” delivered at Manhattan’s Riverside Church, King excoriates the military industrial complex and sees it as a fundamental wrong that ought to be first and foremost on our minds. King begins by addressing himself, critiquing his own “silence” on matters of foreign policy:

“Over the past two years, as I have moved to break the betrayal of my own silences and to speak from the burnings of my own heart, as I have called for radical departures from the destruction of Vietnam, many persons have questioned me about the wisdom of my path. At the heart of their concerns this query has often loomed large and loud: “Why are you speaking about the war, Dr. King?” “Why are you joining the voices of dissent?” “Peace and civil rights don’t mix,” they say. “Aren’t you hurting the cause of your people,” they ask? And when I hear them, though I often understand the source of their concern, I am nevertheless greatly saddened, for such questions mean that the inquirers have not really known me, my commitment or my calling. Indeed, their questions suggest that they do not know the world in which they live.” 

He then goes on to say, in some of the most moving words I have ever heard:

“As I have walked among the desperate, rejected and angry young men, I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems. I have tried to offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that social change comes most meaningfully through non-violent action. But, they asked, what about Vietnam? They asked if our own nation wasn’t using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to bring about the changes it wanted. Their questions hit home, and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today, my own government.

For those who ask the question, “Aren’t you a Civil Rights leader?” and thereby mean to exclude me from the movement for peace, I have this further answer. In 1957 when a group of us formed the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, we chose as our motto: “To save the soul of America.” We were convinced that we could not limit our vision to certain rights for black people, but instead affirmed the conviction that America would never be free or saved from itself unless the descendants of its slaves were loosed from the shackles they still wear.

Now, it should be incandescently clear that no one who has any concern for the integrity and life of America today can ignore the present war. If America’s soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read “Vietnam.” It can never be saved so long as it destroys the deepest hopes of men the world over.”

We could call this MLK’s “I Have A Nightmare” speech, as King begins to realize that the systemic evils involved in racism are also found in the roots of militarism. After transitioning his critique from domestic to foreign policy, King was shortly thereafter assassinated.

Likewise, JFK lived out the beginning of his first term acquiescing to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the CIA in their bid to prevent the dominoes from falling in favor of Communism, orchestrating coups and military operations in different regions of the world so to spread the seed of democracy and fulfill the long held tenants of Manifest Destiny. Like MLK, over time JFK eventually transitioned his aim toward the end of his first term, threatening to remove troops from Vietnam, negotiate an arms-treaty with Russia, and call for peace with Cuba, all of which would have effectively shut down the military machine. JFK was assassinated shortly thereafter.

Furthermore, RFK, who in his early years as the Attorney General to JFK was quite hawkish in regards to covert operations against Cuba, platformed his own presidential bid on fulfilling his brother’s wishes for peace, not war. RFK was also assassinated shortly thereafter.

Is it simply a coincidence that all three of these charismatic leaders were snuffed out by psychotic, nutty lone assassins whilst activating their political stance to reappropriate a republic that had been hijacked by aggressive militarism? In the case of MLK’s assassination, a Memphis, Tenn. grand jury in 1999 ruled his death not as the result of a lone nut but rather a government conspiracy, warranted by an enormous amount of evidence.

Fast forward to today, with Obama being another charismatic possessing the ability to sway an entire nation with his rhetorical skills. He too started out like JFK in critiquing the war machine, but after getting into office wholly relented to the military-industrial complex. In similar fashion to JFK’s unsanctioned war crimes, Obama’s drone policy has claimed the lives of many innocent human beings and so-called “terrorists,” strikes which are happening without Congressional oversight and thereby subject to the rubric of a war crime per international law.

Will we perhaps see a pang of conscience in Obama like we’ve seen with the aforementioned charismatics? Maybe. But let’s not forget, JFK committed his own war crimes even though he’s often heralded as an agitator of peace. Early on in his presidency, he was directly responsible for authorizing operations like Operation Mongoose, and the coup of South Vietnam’s president. Yet in the end, JFK had the spine to face up to his own atrocities and instead promote peace and democracy.

Although, it’s important to note that JFK made reform late in his first term, whereas Obama has dutifully served his corporate paymasters and war mongers all the way through his first term and so far into his second.

A considerable amount of evidence points to the simple fact that our presidents are only figureheads. They hold very little political power in any actual, substantive sense, because their financial backers and corporate lobbies are the ones ultimately calling the shots. Nevertheless, U.S. Presidents do retain the highest office in the land and thus have a media platform unlike any other individual. They are able to reach the masses immediately with a single speech.

While Obama has demonstrated himself to be an agent of illegality, we as political dissidents must not fall into the trap of demonizing him. Russian novelist and Nobel Prize winner, Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn, once said:

“If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?”

In the same vein of JFK, Obama retains the ability to choose to turn against the military machine and stand up for what is right and just and good. In similar fashion to MLK, Obama still has the chance to look deep within himself and break the betrayal of his own silence.

Will Obama use his undeniable charisma and fight back against the corporate masters that currently play him like a puppet, as did some of his predecessors? Or will he continue to live up to his placard of hope and change in name only, nothing more than a nice-looking, smiley suit-and-tie on strings?

One thing is for sure: if Obama were to cut the strings and stand up for what’s right, there could very well be a heavy price to pay.

Written by Mike David Micklow

Photo by flickr user Jason Rosenburg

Although it benefits the whole if there is a sense of unity among the population, the false belief that an arbitrary national border makes one human better than the other is socially destructive. Not only is this isolated worldview of American exceptionalism insulting to non-Americans, it’s a propaganda tool used to manufacture consent for the US government’s disastrous and hypocritical policies.

Throughout the last half century, the United States has acted as military arbitrator of the world, policing other countries in the name of “freedom” while constantly waging war to undermine other nations’ democracies.

This classified history of America is deeply explored in a ten-part documentary Showtime series called The Untold History of the United States, a film adaptation of the joint book authored by Academy Award-winning director Oliver Stone and prolific historian Peter Kuznick.

The epic saga looks back with a critical eye at historical events that went under reported at the time, but ended up crucially shaped America over the 20th century. From the dropping of two atomic bombs over Japan to the Cold War and the fall of Communism, this in-depth, provocative documentary series challenges many Americans’ long held political paradigms.

Oliver Stone and historian Peter Kuznick have corrected American history on Breaking the Set before. Recently, they came on again to discuss the truth behind everything from JFK’s legacy to Obama’s expansion of the surveillance state.

Abby

***

Abby Martin Breaks the Set with Oliver Stone and Historian Peter Kuznick.

***

LIKE Breaking the Set @ http://fb.me/BreakingTheSet
FOLLOW Abby Martin @ http://twitter.com/AbbyMartin

“The Warren Commission blew it. I’m not going to be part of that. I’m not going to be part of looking at information only partially. I’m not going to be part of just coming to quick conclusions. I’m not going to be part of political pressure to do this or not do that.”

The most obvious fact, to indicate that the true story of John F. Kennedy’s slaying is not as the government has presented, is the cover-up itself. Elaborate cover-ups spanning 50 years cannot orchestrate themselves, and there must be compelling reasons for hiding the truth from the American people, or else it would simply be declassified and revealed.

If the killing of the president was committed by a lone nut single shooter named Lee Harvey Oswald, because of his great love of Marxism, there would be no compelling reason to keep his files secret five decades after the fact. Quite the opposite, Mr. Oswald’s clear guilt and personal history would have been useful propaganda material in the ideological battle between the Western world and the Soviet bloc. The ongoing and arguably illegal suppression of assassination evidence by the US government should be taken as a clear indicator of some level of official complicity in the original assassination.

Despite the US government and major media pressing the official story for the last half decade, relatively few Americans still believe it. By 2004, 74 percent of Americans thought there was a “cover-up of the facts” about the assassination of JFK. Today, polls show a majority firmly behind the conspiratorial view, with the Associated Press finding that 59 percent of Americans think multiple people were involved in a conspiracy.

Of course, the 1979 House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) determined the killing was “probably” a conspiracy, with a pathetic guess to their final determination. The committee was “unable to determine” the identities of other shooters or the “extent of the conspiracy.” This is more evidence of a cover-up, especially given the sheer number of documents to be released after 1979, and, even more damaging, those that remain secret to this day. We know of at least 1,100 multi-page records related to the JFK hit that remain classified.

Among those still classified records are details of the CIA’s surveillance of Lee Harvey Oswald prior to the assassination. Other characters kept shielded from public scrutiny include Bill Harvey, who headed an assassination team for CIA code named “ZR-RIFLE,” and CIA operative David A. Phillips, who was allegedly seen with Oswald in Dallas two months before the slaying of a president. At least 332 hidden pages of classified text concern E. Howard Hunt, a CIA thug and Nixon “plumber” (plugged leaks) involved in Watergate. Hunt would confess on his deathbed to being part of the JFK hit, as published in Rolling Stone, although specifics of his story may be inaccurate. In his confession, E. Howard Hunt named Cord Meyer, Bill Harvey, David Morales, David A. Phillips, Frank Sturgis and then Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson as other culpable players.

The 1979 HSCA investigation in no way got to the truth of the matter, and nowhere is this more clearly shown than in its failure to interview Jerrol Custer when it addressed whether the Kennedy X-rays were forgeries or not. Custer was the x-ray technician who took the pictures, and yet he was not brought in to clarify that the images were authentic. Custer testified in 1997 to the Assassinations Records Review Board: “[W]hen I looked into the skull – I remember seeing an apparatus in there… It was non-human. It had – I’m not sure if it was metallic or plastic…” His commanding officer, Dr. Ebersole returned late that night with additional skull fragments from Dallas. “High-ranking people had talked to [Ebersole]. And he suggested to me that everything I see from now on, I should forget” (ARRB, “Deposition…” p146).

Three days after Kennedy’s killing, and just one day after Lee Harvey Oswald was also gunned down – while in police custody and having never confessed to anything – the assistant Attorney General of the United States, Nicholas Katzenbach, wrote a memo to a White House aide that included this point: “The public must be satisfied that Oswald was the assassin; that he did not have confederates who are still at large; and that the evidence was such that he would have been convicted at trial.”

Clearly, at this early juncture there was no way for Nicholas Katzenbach to know these things as facts. In explaining his memo, Katzenbach told the House Select Committee on Assassinations that his emphasis was on full disclosure and not on pressing the lone assassin theory. Katzenbach’s premature memo also noted some conspiracy theories that the Soviets were behind the Kennedy killing or that the extreme right wing was behind it in order to blame it on leftists. “Unfortunately, the facts on Oswald seem about too pat, too obvious.” So even as he relayed the premature determination that Oswald was solely responsible, Katzenbach expressed a reservation that it seemed “too obvious” that Oswald was so blatantly linked to the Soviet bloc.

We see an official policy to stick to the lone assassin theory, and specifically not to blame the JFK hit on the Soviets or Cuba, even from President Johnson. During a phone call one week after the slaying to Senator Richard Russell, Johnson said, “[W]e’ve got to take this out of the arena where they’re testifying that Khrushchev and Castro did this and did that and kicking us into a war that can kill 40 million Americans in an hour…” The direct threat of nuclear war supposedly took precedent rather than full disclosure, at least from the mouth of President Johnson. This rationale for covering up the facts was already established and on the record, inside the White House, one week after President Kennedy’s murder.

Discrepancies with the Oswald legend would emerge later. Particularly curious is this bit of skullduggery: “In one taped conversation, Oswald — or someone saying he was Oswald — called the Soviet embassy. Then-FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover listened to the tape and told President Lyndon Johnson that it wasn’t Oswald’s voice.” That tape disappeared forever. Perhaps Katzenbach’s “too obvious” speculation was spot on.

Oliver Stone’s JFK film included another spot on point. As Associated Press states plainly, “Pamphlets Oswald had in his possession bore an address of a local anti-Castro operation connected to a former FBI agent with ties to organized crime.” So was Lee Harvey Oswald supposed to be pro-Castro, anti-Castro, or undercover?

Check out Breaking The Set‘s report on the assassination of JFK:

***

50 Years Later: Exposing the Truth on JFK’s Life & Death

***

A cognitive dissonance surrounds this issue, particularly in the corporate media. Investigators routinely report highly suspicious facts only to attempt to spin them away and diminish their importance. An example of this behavior is former Washington Post reporter Jefferson Morley, who has taken on the Kennedy case. Claims Morley: “This is not about conspiracy, this is about transparency… I think the CIA should obey the law.”

The definition of conspiracy is when multiple parties, or an organization such as CIA, break the law. Establishment journalists are so terrified of accusing the government of conspiracy, that they even seem prepared to attack the English language rather than to open themselves up to accusations of being a dreaded “conspiracy theorist.”

The CIA made its propaganda agenda clear in April of 1967 in a document entitled, “Countering Critics of the Warren Report.” Therein, the agency sought to, “employ propaganda assets to answer and refute the attacks of the critics” (Nurnad). That meant “book reviews” and “feature articles” as well as “friendly elite contacts (especially politicians and editors).” Countering critics of the Warren Report with propaganda was a clear breach of the CIA’s charter, and operating domestically was and remains illegal. That propaganda effort, similar to the more formal “Operation Mockingbird,” would constitute additional official conspiracies peripherally related to the killing of President John F. Kennedy. In other words, official cover-ups tend to veer into technically criminal activities.

Jefferson Morley, who already disparaged the idea of a JFK conspiracy earlier in the AP article, presented another curious revelation: “The idea that Lee Harvey Oswald was some unknown quantity to CIA officers was false… There was this incredible high-level attention to Oswald on the eve of the assassination.”

On the eve of the assassination, says Morley, as in prior to the killing in Dallas by the alleged lone nut assassin who just decided out of the blue to murder a president passing by below his place of employment. There was not only attention to Oswald, it was “high-level attention,” which was “incredible.” Morley’s evidence is hard to locate, as his sourcing was not included in his story.

What is known is that anti-Castro Cuban exiles, working with the CIA, were monitoring Lee Harvey Oswald three months prior to the JFK assassination. A lawsuit was filed to release records connected with George Joannides, who was the “chief of the CIA’s anti-Castro ‘psychological warfare’ operations in Miami.” What makes Joannides even more relevant to the cover-up is that he served as the Central Intelligence Agency’s “liason” to the HSCA in 1978-9, but he never revealed to the investigation his own involvement in 1963. George Joannides was, of course, an expert in psychological warfare, the art of disinformation – which is plentiful in this particular murder case. He was later accused of obstructing justice by deceiving the congressional committee.

The fact that there has been a cover-up of the JFK assassination is undeniable. The conflicting conclusions of the two main investigations, Warren vs. HSCA, establish that a one has taken place. Ongoing suppression of evidence by the CIA further establishes this cover-up. Defenders of the official story would attribute such illegal behavior to institutions avoiding embarrassment or hiding negligence. Establishment journalist Jefferson Morley is an example of this view, as his own conspiracy theory suggests that: “release would show the CIA trying to keep secret its own flawed performance before the assassination.”

The majority of the American people don’t see it that way, however. They believe a far more sinister explanation is likely, and for good reasons. The CIA has a history of criminal activity including overthrowing democracies, torture and politically-motivated murders. The Kennedy killing would not have been an aberration in tactics, only in the choice of target.

Written by Joe Giambrone for Media Roots

***

Works Cited

Assassination Records Review Board, Assassination of John F. Kennedy, “Deposition of Jerrol Francis Custer,” Miller Reporting Company Inc., Washington DC, 28 Oct.1997, hosted at www.aarclibrary.org, The Assassination Archives and Research Center, Web, 10 Nov. 2013.

Federation of American Scientists (FAS), “The Evolution of the U.S. Intelligence Community-An Historical Overview,” Page INT022, 23 Feb. 1996, Web, 10 Nov. 2013.

Katzenbach, Nicholas, “Memorandum For Mr. Moyers,” FBI 62-109060 JFK HQ File, Section 18, US Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation, 25 Nov. 1963, hosted at maryferrell.org, The Mary Ferrell Foundation, Web. 10 Nov. 2013.

Nurnad, Clayton P., “Countering Critics of the Warren Report,” CIA no. 1035-960, US Government, Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), reprinted in Stone, Oliver and Sklar, Zachary, “JFK: The Book of the Film (Applause Screenplay Series) First Edition,” Applause Theatre & Cinema Books, 1 Feb.2000, p.550.

Select Committee on Assassinations of the U.S. House of Representatives, “Volume VII, Section IV: Authenticity,” Report of the Select Committee on Assassinations of the U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1979, hosted at John McAdams’ Web Site, Marquette University, Web, 10 Nov. 2013.

After leaving the world of wrestling, Ventura ran for mayor and then Governor of Minnesota as an independent candidate, proving that defeating the two-party monopoly is possible. Since his gubernatorial run, he’s hosted a popular television show and written several best-selling books.

His latest book is called ‘They Killed our President: 63 Reasons to Believe There was a Conspiracy to Assassinate JFK.’ With the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination, Ventura joined me on Breaking the Set to discuss the evidence of a government conspiracy and the potential for a 2016 presidential run with radio host Howard Stern.

Abby

***

Jesse Ventura on Breaking the Set

***