What If Grassy Knoll Sounds And Smoke Were "Only" A Diversion?--A Fun Update!

[Dan DAlimonte]

Dan--

Thanks for reading and you sensible commentary. Of course, what you suggest makes sense--if the diversion was poorly timed and too early---it would alert the Secret Service and others.

I posit the diversionist was told something along the lines of, "Wait until you hear gunshots. Then, do your diversion." After the first gunshot, the Secret  Service is alerted anyway (well, they should have been).

So, I think a diversion plan holds water, if the diversionist is told to hold his shot-and-smoke show until after the first "real" shot.

BTW, this diversion action may explain why so many witnesses describe the first shot as not as loud as subsequent shots.

Hey, Ben.  Despite the few knuckleheads who frequent this place, I do hope you decide to stay.
You (like most of us) do seem to want to discuss this case in a sane and rational manner.
At any rate.here's my take on this.  To me, there's two types of diversion tactics which a group could use
to commit murder.  The first is like what happened to Malcolm X.   He had started to or was about to start  a speech to a seated crowd in a hall of some sort when a fake fight broke out.  As everyone's attention was drawn to that fake fight a gunman approached Malcolm and shot him dead and then he (like everyone else, innocent or guilty alike) bolted.  This type of diversion was meant to increase the odds of committing the crime. 
The second type of diversion, as you suggest, is not to increase the chances of successfully committing
the crime but was designed to allow the real assassin(s) to flee and there is a difference.  Again, I really don't think the group would have spent so much time planning to fake shots when they could have had real shots aimed to kill

[Benjamin Cole]

Dan-

Thanks again for reading, and I enjoy your observations.

Yeah, that is a good point: Why not just take a real shot at the President from the Grassy Knoll-pergola area and then run away. It would be both a diversion from the main assassins and another chance to kill the target.

Well, I think a few reasons.

The limo is running left to right from anyone standing in the Grassy Knoll area (the Zapruder film view, for example). If one wishes to remain hidden from view, that means crouching down behind the pergola or the stockade fence (remember Secret Service eyes forward from the motorcade). 

A shot at the horizontally moving target with a handgun is possible, but probably not reliable.

So a sensible to-kill Grassy Knoll shot means pointing a long rifle at the president, but no credible witness saw a rifle that day near the Grassy Knoll. None has shown up on photos, or movies. None was found tossed aside after the event. Some have pointed out that a shooter behind the stockade fence has his view of the motorcade blocked by the pergola-monument "until the last moment."

I can imagine carrying a break-apart rifle to ground-level along motorcade route. But how to run away carrying a rifle? But no rifle found at the scene.

So I deduce no rifle was used on the Grassy Knoll.

Another thought: The real assassins are hired and they survey the scene. They are in the Dal-Tex building, and they are not affiliated with Oswald. They say, "Nice layout, we are shooting from behind the president, and he is more or less moving in a straight line from us. But we need to escape after the act. So plan a diversion near the Grassy Knoll, but wait until our first shot."

The Dal-Tax shooters have semi-automatics, so it will be fast after the first shot anyway

Also, not every plan is a perfect plan. Maybe the diversion was a "bad idea." It risked exposure before the real shots were fired. It risked capture of the Grassy Knoll diversionist, who might confess. The more confederates in a conspiracy, the more chances for leaks, bumbling, extortion (one might wonder how long the diversionist lived after Nov. 22).

But the "Grassy Knoll" diversion plan fits the events. It was the plan they went with. People make plans, and plans have flaws. They have to work with available resources, the topography at hand, and personnel. Might have had only a week or two for on-the-ground for planning. They planned a diversion.

Anyway, that is my reasonable conjecture on the Grassy Knoll smoke-and-shot show.

[Gary Craig]

Funny how those witnesses closest to the fence corner (like Hudson and Sitzman) totally missed the "copious gunsmoke" and diversionary gun shot/firecracker sound.

Right Jerry. That's why the majority of the people closest to JFK's limo when he was shot ran toward the

grassy knoll.  Almost none of the people at the corner of Houston and Elm, the alleged source of the shots,

ran toward the TSBD looking for a shooter. 

-------------

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=35&relPageId=304

Mr. Hargis: I was at the left-hand side of the Presidential Limousine.

Mr. Stern: Riding next to Mrs. Kennedy?

Mr. Hargis: Right.

....Well at the time it sounded like the shots were right next to me. There wasn't
anyway in the world I could tell where they were coming from but at the time there
was something in my head that said that they probably could have been coming from the
 railroad overpass, because I thought since I had got splattered with blood-I was just
a little back and left of-justa little back and left of Mrs. Kennedy, but I didn't know.
I had a feeling that it might have been from the Texas Book Depository. and these places
was the primary place that could have been shot from....

....I ran across the street looking over towards the rairoad overpass and I remembered
seeing people scattering and running and then I looked--...

.....and then I looked over to the Texas School Book Depository Building, and no one that
was standing at the base of the building was--seemed to be looking up at the building or
anything like they knew where the shots were coming from,so.....

.....Well, then, I thought since I had looked over at the Texas Book Depository and some
people looking out of the windows up there, didn't seem like they knew what was going on,
but none of them were looking towards or near anywhere the shots had been fired from.....

[Gary Craig]

?Motorcade Cop Tells How It Happened,? Sunday News (New York), 24 November 1963
p.25:

Dallas, Nov. 23 (Special) - B. W. Hargis, 31, Dallas motorcycle patrolman who was riding
in President Kennedy?s motorcade, gave this account today of the assassination:
 
?We turned left onto Elm St. off Houston, about half a block from where it happened. I was
right alongside the rear fender on the left hand side of the President?s car, near Mrs. Kennedy.
 
When I heard the first explosion, I knew it was a shot. I thought that Gov. Connally had been
hit when I saw him turn toward the President with a real surprised look.

The President then looked like he was bent over or that he was leaning toward the Governor, talking to him.
 
As the President straightened back up, Mrs. Kennedy turned toward him, and that was when he got hit in the side of his head, spinning it around.

I was splattered with blood.
 
Then I felt something hit me. It could have been concrete or something, but I thought at first I might have been hit.

Then I saw the limousine stop, and I parked my motorcycle at the side of the road, got off and drew my gun.
 
Then this Secret Service agent (in the President?s car) got his wits about him and they took off. The
motorcycle officer on the right side of the car was Jim Chaney. He immediately went forward and announced to the chief that the President had been shot.?

[Ray Mitcham]

Really? The Newmans never ran there. Bill described the shots as coming from a "garden" that was located to the east of the Pergola.

Bill Newman

First day affidavit
?I thought the shot had come from the garden directly behind me, that it was on an elevation from where I was as I was right on the curb. I do not recall looking toward the Texas School Book Depository. I looked back in the vacinity [sic] of the garden.?

FBI report

?NEWMAN first thought the President and Governor were playing some kind of a game and suddenly realized they had been shot and that he was perhaps in the line of fire because officers started running toward the arcade directly back of him and his wife.?

Shaw trial

?Q: Now would you push the microphone aside and step down to the aerial photograph and identify that general area, just the general area from which the sounds came.
A: In my opinion, the sounds of the shots sounded as if they had come from directly behind me (indicating). I was standing near this light standard here, and I thought the shots were coming from back here, and apparently everybody else did because they all ran in that direction. ?

?Newman: (Indicating) ?This is all the grassy knoll area, and it was my opinion or my thought from the noise, that the shots were coming from directly behind in here. I would say that the shots could have been fired from here, but the further this way you go, the less likely it would have been. ?
BY MR. DYMOND:
Q: I see. Now from the parking lot area behind the grassy knoll -- I am referring to the area north of the building here (indicating) --
A: Yes, sir.


Bill Newman and his wife were too busy protecting their children to run up the grassy knoll.

[Gary Craig]

?Motorcade Cop Tells How It Happened,? Sunday News (New York), 24 November 1963
p.25:

Dallas, Nov. 23 (Special) - B. W. Hargis, 31, Dallas motorcycle patrolman who was riding
in President Kennedy?s motorcade, gave this account today of the assassination:
 
?We turned left onto Elm St. off Houston, about half a block from where it happened. I was
right alongside the rear fender on the left hand side of the President?s car, near Mrs. Kennedy.
 
When I heard the first explosion, I knew it was a shot. I thought that Gov. Connally had been
hit when I saw him turn toward the President with a real surprised look.

The President then looked like he was bent over or that he was leaning toward the Governor, talking to him.
 
As the President straightened back up, Mrs. Kennedy turned toward him, and that was when he got hit in the side of his head, spinning it around.

I was splattered with blood.
 
Then I felt something hit me. It could have been concrete or something, but I thought at first I might have been hit.

Then I saw the limousine stop, and I parked my motorcycle at the side of the road, got off and drew my gun.
 
Then this Secret Service agent (in the President?s car) got his wits about him and they took off. The
motorcycle officer on the right side of the car was Jim Chaney. He immediately went forward and announced to the chief that the President had been shot.?

"I was splattered with blood.
 
Then I felt something hit me. It could have been concrete or something, but I thought at first I might have been hit."

How does a bullet fired from 60 feet in the air (6th floor) to the right and rear of JFK splatter Hargis with

blood and debris? He's to the left and behind the limo.

[Ray Mitcham]

"I was splattered with blood.
 
Then I felt something hit me. It could have been concrete or something, but I thought at first I might have been hit."

How does a bullet fired from 60 feet in the air (6th floor) to the right and rear of JFK splatter Hargis with

blood and debris? He's to the left and behind the limo.

Gary, you forgot ...it's a magic bullet.

[Allan Fritzke]

?Motorcade Cop Tells How It Happened,? Sunday News (New York), 24 November 1963
p.25:

Dallas, Nov. 23 (Special) - B. W. Hargis, 31, Dallas motorcycle patrolman who was riding
in President Kennedy?s motorcade, gave this account today of the assassination:
 
?....

The President then looked like he was bent over or that he was leaning toward the Governor, talking to him.
 
As the President straightened back up, Mrs. Kennedy turned toward him, and that was when he got hit in the side of his head, spinning it around.
...
I was splattered with blood.
Then I felt something hit me. It could have been concrete or something, but I thought at first I might have been hit.

Then I saw the limousine stop, and I parked my motorcycle at the side of the road, got off and drew my gun.
 
Then this Secret Service agent (in the President?s car) got his wits about him and they took off. The
motorcycle officer on the RIGHT side of the car was Jim Chaney. He immediately went forward and announced to the chief that the President had been shot.?

If everyone agrees that the TSBD was downwind of the assassination, you can smell smoke if shots came from a revolver close by or at the front of car to be more precise!  Right or Left. If you believe his perspective, it would be a more difficult observation than Chaney's.  What his story!

We can now debate also whether this policeman was on JFK's side or Jackie's side.  I would say he was on JFK's side as if you would follow his testimony as he gave it.  His perspective would be from the right rear side of the limousine since you were following it with your motorcycle and it would make more sense.  Was this Hagis possibly.  We did see some other footage of a motorcycle cop coming off his bike on the other side of the road!  In fact,  the cars following the limousine pull over to where the assassin rolled into the grass.  There were lots of people fleeing the scene in that footage as well, getting into cars and speeding off before the crowds came!

This policeman's account backs up my hypothesis.  He said the President straightened backed up before he was shot. That coincides rather nicely with frontal bullet coming in through the windshield at z-322 and z-329.  Curiously, these frames and z-331 don't find there way here.
https://www.jfkassassinationgallery.com/displayimage.php?album=6&pos=66

They are conveniently not there in the analysis!  You have to look at Costella frames or Lightbox Zapruder frames to see them.

You can clearly see the President raise his arm and move back in his seat after z-313 and z-314.   Remember, those drawn in shots were necessary to support the lone gunman theory and a shot from behind.  To me, they never existed as Jacqueline does not react until the "real" head shot at z-329 and the red paint spot again drawn in at z-331, this time not as big!    I could only imagine a very different reaction from her coinciding with a "plume of brain matter and blood" spraying 6 feet in the air at z-313.  She has no reaction for more than a second from that and continued to look right at JFK for the next series of frames - no sign of immediate horror!   Obviously didn't see anything until later.

So, yes being that all other vehicles are downwind, a close pistol shot from the front bumper of the limo will send the smoke from those two shots downwind in the direction of the TSBD.   I would suspect all passing through would smell it.   Two revolver shots in 1/2 a second from same spot sure would concentrate the odor. 

I believe too, based on the initial account of Jean Hill before she talked to the FBI, that she heard 2 shots ring out when the President grabbed his neck.  Again, best shot is from the umbrella man located "in front of sign" out of view of Zapruder's filming of the event.   

Who ran the diversion?  It was well coordinated and likely a "distractive" noise just slightly before actual neck shot and causing crowd to look in that direction!  Need some proof?

Two  guys are peeking over the background wall with their heads visible.  What are they hiding from?  Why not just stand there and watch?  What secret are they taking part of?   Look through the Costella slides.  These are the best frames showing this. 


Their heads disappear below and THEN out comes a "red cone" placed on the wall.  This is not a red dress folks just so happens to be coincidental with the neck shot!



Pretty simple analysis in my view.  You want a sure shot that doesn't kill or hurt anyone other than the President.   No one else involved in the plot wants to die.  The more direct and closer the shots can come, the more accurate it is.    If I were part of the plot, I certainly wouldn't want trust a sniper taking pot shots at someone in the car if I was riding in the car and knowing what is going on!    That neck shot was not a high powered rifle shot.  You also have to contend with someone using an umbrella on this day (front of sign) and the so called "Cuban"next to him waving his arms at the President and Connally, begging "look at me!!"  These two anomalies were present and unusual.  Who else was out that day with umbrellas open and standing next to him  vertically motioning at JFK and Connally with his arm fully stretched upwards!  He wasn't clapping but trying to obtain JFK's attention!

There is a 35 mm slide  coming from Phil Willis Copyright 1964.  Why copyright 3 years later than event and not brought forth immediately?    It show a scene taken from the other side of the road.  It show a VERY elevated road sign well above the umbrella man's level and everyone else.   Compare that to the Zapruder film.    This slide shows  an umbrella man "behind" the sign (not in "front") and "below" not beside. I also can't see the  "Cuban" waving his hand at the side either.  This single frame was supposed to coincide with the neck shot!    That is very bizarre and reeks of misinformation!    His one slide is given more credibility than the entire Zapruder filming introduced 3 years earlier!!   A lot more talent is required to edit a film and make it contiguous again - than a "single still frame" shot in my opinion!   

Remember the whole Zapruder Film was held for 12 years without allowing the public to see it?  Why was that and who allowed that to happen and for what reason?   The film was just too morbid I can only assume!