Oswald's Motive

[Steve M. Galbraith]

This was his final protest to a world that had ignored him, sometimes mocked him, always failed to acknowledge his superiority.


Robert Oswald, page 214 of “Lee, a Portrait of Lee Harvey Oswald”


And I believe that a large part of his motive had to do with the last part (underlined by me) of Robert’s statement. Robert also indicates that a pattern was apparent to him regarding LHO’s behavior. I will post Robert’s exact words about that pattern when I locate them in the above referenced book.

Michael Paine said something similar in his testimony. He said that Oswald was very bitter, very distrustful of people. But that Oswald placed himself as part of a larger class of people, that it wasn't just himself, that this mistreatment was "institutional", built into the capitalist system. Thus the embrace of the Marxist view of the world: oppressors and oppressed. So it was both personal and political and not either/or.

Mr. PAINE: [Oswald] was extremely bitter and couldn't believe there was much good will in people. There was mostly evil, conniving, or else stupidity--was the description--that was his opinion or would be his description of most people. That's my description, and the best description I can give of him--to call him other psychological names--names of paranoia or paranoid or something like that.
Mr. LIEBELER - What made you pick that particular name?
Mr. PAINE - Well, that kind of suspicion of people expecting them to be consciously perpetrating evil or ill toward him or toward the oppressed people-workers-is perhaps a trait of paranoia.
Mr. LIEBELER - Do you think that he exhibited this trait?
Mr. PAINE - Yes; he did, but it didn't seem to be uncontrollable. He didn't generally take it--I would say he was paranoid if he always took it personally, but he always seemed to transfer it to, or put himself in the class of people who were oppressed, so that's the distinction why I wouldn't call him sick or wouldn't have then called him sick---before the assassination.
Mr. LIEBELER - Because he seemed to describe this feeling of his in institutional terms?
Mr. PAINE - That's right.
Mr. LIEBELER - And in terms of the social structure and the impact the world had on classes and groups of people?
Mr. PAINE - He was in the exploited class.
Mr. LIEBELER - Yes; there was no doubt about that--I mean, as far as his own mind was concerned--that's what he thought?
Mr. PAINE - Yes.

[Bill Brown]

Context also matters.  Walker was targeted by Oswald from all the other public figures because of his high-profile anti-Communist views.  JFK was largely a target of opportunity because his motorcade went by Oswald's place of employment by chance.  I doubt Oswald would otherwise have ever targeted JFK absent the chance falling into his lap.  In other words, Walker was clearly targeted for his political views while JFK was targeted more by opportunity. 

So the specific motivations vary a bit but do come back to Oswald's leftist, anti-American political views.  He certainly was ahead of his time by a few decades in that respect.  In Walker's case, the assassination attempt was clearly a direct political act based on Walker's right-wing views.  Oswald selected and went to his target in that case.  In JFK's case, it was a symbolic act against the US based upon the opportunity that presented itself to Oswald.  The target came to Oswald.

Thanks Richard.  I agree with every bit of that.

[Martin Weidmann]

Opinions, speculations and assumptions.....

Aren't they fun 

And they allow you to come up with any kind of narrative you like... Now isn't that a bonus? 

[Bill Brown]

Bill: I too believe that politics - Cuba specifically - likely had something to do with his act, but it's impossible to untangle what was going through his mind, what motivated him. A mix of personal demons, politics, despair, anger? He was a political person; it's hard to think he suddenly became apolitical on November 22, 1963. About two weeks before the assassination he attended a ACLU meeting where the Bircher threat was discussed. That's not something a non-political person would do I would think.

We have this account from "Marina and Lee". Marina said that when he returned from Mexico City that she asked him what happened, why he wasn't able to get to Cuba. Here's the account (in part):

When she met Oswald "He kissed her and asked if she had missed him? Then he started right in. "Ah, they're such terrible bureaucrats that nothing came of it after all." He described shuttling from embassy to embassy, how each one told him he had to wait and wait, and see what the other did, and how the whole time he had been worried about running out of money. He was especially vociferous about the Cubans - "the same kind of bureaucrats as in Russia. No point going there". Marina was so delighted she could not believe her ears. Indeed, Lee's disenchantment with Castro and Cuba was complete. He never again talked about "Uncle Fidel" nor sang the song "Viva Fidel" as he used to do, nor used the alias "Hidell."

Remember as well the near fight he got into with the Cuban Consul Azcue with Azcue escorting him out with the admonition "the Revolution" doesn't need people like you. From the accounts of the people there, he was loudly complaining about his mistreatment. The letter he sent to the Soviet Embassy also describes this perceived mistreatment.

This account has him giving up on Cuba, viewing it as he did the Soviet Union; that is a betrayal of Marxism, a bureaucrat state. If true then killing JFK for attacking this failed state is hard to understand. On the other hand - there's always two or three of these in this case - I find it hard to believe he would completely abandon Cuba - and give up on Castro - simply because some bureaucrats in an Embassy treated him poorly. What did Castro have to do with that? Is the entire Revolution a failure because some Embassy staffers were incompetent? That makes no sense to me.

Thanks for the comments, Steve.  I understand your points and can't say they are invalid.  I agree with you that it is hard to believe that Oswald would completely abandon Cuba.

No way to know Oswald's motive for sure.  When it comes to a motive for Oswald, all we can do is speculate.  We just have to try to make our admitted speculation make as much sense as possible.

[Bill Brown]

Robert Oswald, in his PBS Frontline interview, said Lee ‘wasn’t a political extremist’ when he returned to the US from Russia:

“When Lee got back from Russia, the way he talked about the Russian system, he didn’t talk about it politically, in the sense that he was wrapped up in communism or Marxism. He was making fun of how inept they were, and he was making fun of them all the time. …
He wasn’t political. He really wasn’t. I say that in all honesty, because he tried to become what he needed to be to achieve his immediate objectives; i.e., he needed to be a Marxist and accept the Russians [to] get the experience in Russia. When he returned to the United States, he didn’t want to be a Russian. He wanted to be an American, to be accepted by the American society, and so wherever he was … he wanted to be accepted. He wasn’t political. He was what’s convenient to be.”

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/interview-robert-oswald/


In 1963, Lee wrote a speech or letter where he criticized the USSR and American communists.

He had no friends or associates in the US who were communists.

The problem with applying political motivation to LHO is that there’s so little evidence of his dislike of JFK or devotion to communism.

Oswald did not believe that Communism is the same as Marxism.  Do you?

[Steve M. Galbraith]

What Bill and others can do is speculate that the CIA killed JFK. Or the Pentagon. Or the FBI. Or Wall Street bankers. Or Texas oilmen.

We can speculate about all sorts of hairbrained conspiracy theories involving all sorts of institutions and figures and persons and forces. Hell, we can speculate about aliens (that is one theory). It's done here nearly every day. Tens of thousands of such posts. All sort of oddball claims and allegations.

And the skeptics here who lecture against "speculation" will not say a word about this. Not one. But speculating based on facts about Oswald's motives? That's simply not allowed.

And they think they are convincing people that they really aren't conspiracy believers. Yes they do.

[Martin Weidmann]

What Bill and others can do is speculate that the CIA killed JFK. Or the Pentagon. Or the FBI. Or Wall Street bankers. Or Texas oilmen.

We can speculate about all sorts of hairbrained conspiracy theories involving all sorts of institutions and figures and persons and forces. Hell, we can speculate about aliens (that is one theory). It's done here nearly every day. Tens of thousands of such posts. All sort of oddball claims and allegations.

And the skeptics here who lecture against "speculation" will not say a word about this. Not one. But speculating based on facts about Oswald's motives? That's simply not allowed.

And they think they are convincing people that they really aren't conspiracy believers. Yes they do.

But speculating based on facts about Oswald's motives? That's simply not allowed.

Why wouldn't that be allowed? It gets dubious when speculation and assumptions are being confused with actual facts.

Btw, how can you speculate "based on facts about Oswald's motives" when - unless you knew the man personally - all you are doing is accepting what you have been told is actually factual, without really knowing that it is.

[Jon Banks]

Oswald did not believe that Communism is the same as Marxism.  Do you?

Communism is derived from Marxism but there are different interpretations of Marxist philosophy as well as different interpretations of socialism and communism.

So yes, I think it's possible for someone to identify as a marxist but not a communist. I also mentioned earlier in the thread that there are anti-Stalinists within marxism who oppose Soviet style communism.

As for the questions of ideology and hate for America, there's no evidence that Oswald disliked JFK but plenty of evidence that right-wing loons in Dallas hated JFK.