Why We Still Don’t Have the JFK Assassination Files

[Jon Banks]

Politico: Why We Still Don’t Have the JFK Assassination Files

Newly released internal correspondence from the National Archives and Records Administration reveals that, behind the scenes, there has been a fierce bureaucratic war over the documents in recent years, pitting the Archives against the CIA, FBI and other agencies that want to keep them secret.

The Archives correspondence shows that, while much of the still-classified information is only indirectly related to the assassination, some of it comes directly from the FBI’s “main investigative case files” about the president’s murder. That includes the all-important case files on Lee Harvey Oswald, Kennedy’s assassin, and Jack Ruby, the Dallas strip-club owner who murdered Oswald two days after Kennedy’s death.

The Archives paperwork shows that the FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration have fought particularly hard to protect the identity of informants in organized-crime investigations — an argument that will intrigue conspiracy theorists who believe the Mafia was behind Kennedy’s death. Many assassination researchers argue that the assassination was blowback for the so-called war on organized crime waged by the president’s brother, then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy.

In fact, the correspondence shows the overwhelming majority of the documents that the FBI has withheld from the public in recent years somehow involved organized-crime investigations. Of the nearly 7,500 documents that the FBI kept classified at the time of the 2017 deadline, 6,000 were from “various files of members of organized crime or La Cosa Nostra.”

The DEA made a special plea to black out the names of six confidential informants identified in assassination-related files involving organized-crime investigations: “Given the well-documented propensity for violence by the Mafia, it is reasonable to expect the individuals, if alive, remain in significant danger of retaliation for their assistance,” the agency said in a 2018 letter to the Archives.

It also includes tape recordings of six interviews conducted in 1964 with Jacqueline Kennedy and former Attorney General Robert Kennedy by the journalist William Manchester, who was authorized by the Kennedy family to write a history of the assassination. Those tapes were turned over to the Archives by the Kennedy family in exchange for an agreement they would not be made public until 2067 — the 100th anniversary of the publication of Manchester’s bestselling book The Death of a President. The law also exempted the public release of what the Archives index describes as five “very personal letters” that Mrs. Kennedy wrote to President Johnson, including at least three she sent to him in the week after the assassination.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/11/15/jfk-assassination-files-conspiracy-fbi-00066780


There probably won't be a Smoking Gun hidden in the still classified documents but the fact that so many documents relate to organized crime is intriguing.

[Joe Elliott]

The U. S. Government is (probably) keeping information related, or possibly related, to the President Kennedy assassination a secret is because governments always keep secrets.

The U. S. Government kept secrets that were possibly about the President Lincoln assassination a secret for over 75 years. This fact was used to argue that elements of the U. S. Government must have been involved in the assassination. Eventually the documents were released and nothing of great relevance was found.

All governments, not just the U. S., withhold secrets. Innocent people might be hurt of all secrets are revealed. Like if all information related to the Civil War were released, the names of Southerners who provided information to the Union Army would be known and those people endangered. One can carefully go through all the information, but this would be an enormous undertaking and if a mistake was made about what to release, someone could die. It is always far simpler to just hold on to all the information, at least for 75 or more years, to insure all who might be hurt will be beyond reach. Although not their children. Or grandchildren.

If one is going to use the standard of judgment, that:
    if a government is hold secrets related, or possibly related, to some crime, but refuses to release all the information
then:
    that government must be guilty of that crime.
one will always conclude that the government was guilty, or partly guilty, of the crime. Always.

If one has a standard of reasoning that always reaches the same conclusion, then one needs a different standard of reasoning.

 * * * * *

Let me give an example. One may conclude that Bigfoot must be real. Because the odds of all the thousands of witnesses lying, or being mistaken, are astronomical. On the surface, this seems like pretty good reasoning. But if I accept this reasoning, and I am consistent with my reasoning, I must also conclude the UFO's, witchcraft, witchcraft being found in the late middle ages, ghosts, etc., all must be real. And the judgments made to burn to death of thousands of suspected witches was, at least in some cases, justified.

So if a reported phenomenon, which may be caused by nothing more than the common beliefs of millions of people, and hence causes thousands to witness it, I must always conclude that the phenomenon is real, because so many people have witnessed it. Methods of reasoning that always lead to the same conclusion must be considered faulty.

Does anyone disagree with this?

If so, let's hear some arguments.

[Richard Smith]

There is nothing to be gained from the perspective of an intelligence agency from releasing information.  They are always overly secretive and reluctant to do so.  This gives the appearance of covering up to the more paranoid types.  I'm all for releasing every document so long as it does not endanger anyone who is still living or their families. 

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

Hickey's AR15 blew jfk's brain out at Z313 -- thats why.

[Steve M. Galbraith]

The U. S. Government is (probably) keeping information related, or possibly related, to the President Kennedy assassination a secret is because governments always keep secrets.

The U. S. Government kept secrets that were possibly about the President Lincoln assassination a secret for over 75 years. This fact was used to argue that elements of the U. S. Government must have been involved in the assassination. Eventually the documents were released and nothing of great relevance was found.

All governments, not just the U. S., withhold secrets. Innocent people might be hurt of all secrets are revealed. Like if all information related to the Civil War were released, the names of Southerners who provided information to the Union Army would be known and those people endangered. One can carefully go through all the information, but this would be an enormous undertaking and if a mistake was made about what to release, someone could die. It is always far simpler to just hold on to all the information, at least for 75 or more years, to insure all who might be hurt will be beyond reach. Although not their children. Or grandchildren.

If one is going to use the standard of judgment, that:
    if a government is hold secrets related, or possibly related, to some crime, but refuses to release all the information
then:
    that government must be guilty of that crime.
one will always conclude that the government was guilty, or partly guilty, of the crime. Always.

If one has a standard of reasoning that always reaches the same conclusion, then one needs a different standard of reasoning.

 * * * * *

Let me give an example. One may conclude that Bigfoot must be real. Because the odds of all the thousands of witnesses lying, or being mistaken, are astronomical. On the surface, this seems like pretty good reasoning. But if I accept this reasoning, and I am consistent with my reasoning, I must also conclude the UFO's, witchcraft, witchcraft being found in the late middle ages, ghosts, etc., all must be real. And the judgments made to burn to death of thousands of suspected witches was, at least in some cases, justified.

So if a reported phenomenon, which may be caused by nothing more than the common beliefs of millions of people, and hence causes thousands to witness it, I must always conclude that the phenomenon is real, because so many people have witnessed it. Methods of reasoning that always lead to the same conclusion must be considered faulty.

Does anyone disagree with this?

If so, let's hear some arguments.

If we could go back in time at the start of this controversy, say 1964 or '65, and tell the conspiracy believers that over the next half century there would be the release of millions of pages of government documents, multiple government investigations by several generations of Americans both Republican and Democrat, and multiple media investigations by major news organizations and then ask them if they would be satisfied with the results they would say "Yes, that would be sufficient."

But here we are after all of this and it's not sufficient. How much more needs to be done? They want these files released. Okay, release them. Would that be enough? They wanted another investigation after the WC and got one. Did they accept it? They wanted the media to look independently into the assassination since "the government" was not a impartial investigator and got one. Many investigations in fact. Do they accept them? There are no falsifiable claims that they make, nothing that will lead to an answer they accept.

It won't be enough in large part because their reasoning is faulty. They each start or begin with their own conspiracy conclusion and THEN find evidence for that conclusion second. Instead of the other way around - evidence first, explanation second - the way we normally do with investigations. It's why if you listen/read to 15 different conspiracy hobbyists or "professionals" they will give you 15 different explanations as to what happened. They all differ to some degree. None even agree on who killed JFK. The CIA? The Pentagon? FBI? Anti-Castro Cubans? Texas oilmen? Who? They disagree.

So why are there so many different conspiracy explanations? It only happened one way, the evidence for a conspiracy (if one occurred) only shows one. It's because, again, they are not looking at the evidence first; they are looking for evidence that confirms their conclusion. And with each person having his or her own theory they all disagree.

So here they and we are. Telling people there is no white whale and they won't accept it.

[Jon Banks]

“Who” killed JFK isn’t as important as understanding “Why” he was killed.

As long as the government remains secretive about the Kennedy assassination and tries to gaslight us on their reasons for keeping secrets after almost 60 years, people have good reason to suspect that there was a conspiracy.

[John Iacoletti]

"The thing I am concerned about, and so is Mr. Katzenbach, is having something issued so we can convince the public that Oswald is the real assassin."

Conclusion first, evidence second.

[Joe Elliott]

“Who” killed JFK isn’t as important as understanding “Why” he was killed.

As long as the government remains secretive about the Kennedy assassination and tries to gaslight us on their reasons for keeping secrets after almost 60 years, people have good reason to suspect that there was a conspiracy.

Question 1:

The government was secretive about it's Civil War secrets, some of which, may, have been related to the Lincoln assassination. Is this a good reason to strongly suggest the U. S. government was involved in the Lincoln assassination?

Since governments always keep secrets, is a good idea to judge the probably truth on whether or not the government keeps secrets? The government might want to keep secrets about who helped the Union army in the 1860's. The government might want to keep secrets about who helped, or might be willing to help, the U. S. government in Cuba in the 1960's.

Question 2:

Since using this form a reasoning "Does the government keep secrets?" always results in the same verdict, Yep, the government is likely guilty, is this a good form of reasoning?

What is my reasoning?

The side that generally dodges questions is probably not the side that has the overall truth on it's side.