Klaus Wiegrefe: New Film Offers Strong Theory but Weak Evidence About JFK Assassination
A German TV station will broadcast a documentary on Friday that wants to clear up the murder of US President John F. Kennedy. But does the film prove its own thesis? A critical analysis.
On the morning of Sept. 27, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald stepped out of a bus in Mexico City after a long ride from the American border. The lanky southerner stayed in the Mexican capital at least four days, and if you believe film director Wilfried Huismann (Rendezvous With Death, airing on ARD on Jan. 6 at 9:45 pm), this visit is the key to the most important political murder mystery of the 20th century: The assassination of United States President John F. Kennedy by Oswald in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.
The fruits of Huismann's investigation have captivated not only the German director himself, but also the heads of public broadcaster ARD: "This new information will revolutionize Kennedy research," claims regional public broadcaster WDR on its Web site (WRD helped fund the documentary). "Lee Harvey Oswald was the final pawn in a murderous feud between Fidel Castro and the Kennedy brothers." The director himself adds: "For me, the essence has been explained."
But does the movie really provide what its authors claim -- the solution to the most spectacular political murder of the 20th century? Legions of investigators, historians, and journalists have worked on this puzzle in vain since Kennedy's death. So now it's been pieced together?
Huismann argues that a 24-year-old Oswald -- an avid supporter of Fidel Castro and his revolution -- received orders in the Cuban embassy in Mexico City to assassinate Kennedy. Castro's motive: Kennedy had already tried to kill Cuba's Maximo Lider because he feared the bearded revolutionary would grant the Soviet Union a strategic opening in the Caribbean. Castro, in Huismann's theory, acted in self-defense.
The thesis isn't new. The faction of people who have long believed in Castro's involvement in the murder reaches from President Lyndon B. Johnson to former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO (and US Secretary of State) Alexander Haig.
Huismann believes he can supply missing pieces to this theory, and at first glance his collection of evidence looks overwhelming: segments of tapped phone conversations from the Cuban Embassy in Mexico City; documents from Russia's intelligence agency, the KGB; statements from several current and former Cuban intelligence agents. But under close scrutiny, the links in this chain of proof look weak.
None of Huismann's witnesses were involved in the supposed operation. It's not clear exactly how the Cubans may have helped Oswald. Many of the witnesses are recognizable figures in Kennedy-research circles -- although
Huismann gives the opposite impression -- and many of their statements have been rejected by investigative committees or historians. What Huismann has freshly cobbled together raises a lot of questions -- which will have to be answered before anyone rewrites history.
In the end it's just hearsay that Cuban security services contacted the young Oswald in 1962....
Read entire article at Spiegel Online
On the morning of Sept. 27, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald stepped out of a bus in Mexico City after a long ride from the American border. The lanky southerner stayed in the Mexican capital at least four days, and if you believe film director Wilfried Huismann (Rendezvous With Death, airing on ARD on Jan. 6 at 9:45 pm), this visit is the key to the most important political murder mystery of the 20th century: The assassination of United States President John F. Kennedy by Oswald in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.
The fruits of Huismann's investigation have captivated not only the German director himself, but also the heads of public broadcaster ARD: "This new information will revolutionize Kennedy research," claims regional public broadcaster WDR on its Web site (WRD helped fund the documentary). "Lee Harvey Oswald was the final pawn in a murderous feud between Fidel Castro and the Kennedy brothers." The director himself adds: "For me, the essence has been explained."
But does the movie really provide what its authors claim -- the solution to the most spectacular political murder of the 20th century? Legions of investigators, historians, and journalists have worked on this puzzle in vain since Kennedy's death. So now it's been pieced together?
Huismann argues that a 24-year-old Oswald -- an avid supporter of Fidel Castro and his revolution -- received orders in the Cuban embassy in Mexico City to assassinate Kennedy. Castro's motive: Kennedy had already tried to kill Cuba's Maximo Lider because he feared the bearded revolutionary would grant the Soviet Union a strategic opening in the Caribbean. Castro, in Huismann's theory, acted in self-defense.
The thesis isn't new. The faction of people who have long believed in Castro's involvement in the murder reaches from President Lyndon B. Johnson to former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO (and US Secretary of State) Alexander Haig.
Huismann believes he can supply missing pieces to this theory, and at first glance his collection of evidence looks overwhelming: segments of tapped phone conversations from the Cuban Embassy in Mexico City; documents from Russia's intelligence agency, the KGB; statements from several current and former Cuban intelligence agents. But under close scrutiny, the links in this chain of proof look weak.
None of Huismann's witnesses were involved in the supposed operation. It's not clear exactly how the Cubans may have helped Oswald. Many of the witnesses are recognizable figures in Kennedy-research circles -- although
Huismann gives the opposite impression -- and many of their statements have been rejected by investigative committees or historians. What Huismann has freshly cobbled together raises a lot of questions -- which will have to be answered before anyone rewrites history.
In the end it's just hearsay that Cuban security services contacted the young Oswald in 1962....