Not in Your Lifetime: The Defining Book on the J.F.K. Assassination by Anthony Summers
Authors: Anthony Summers
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within a few hours of the assassination. It now appears that the police and the FBI were only fully alerted to the Hidell alias after contact with a third force—part of the U.S. intelligence apparatus.
Army Intelligence agents were in Dallas on the day of the assassination, backing up the Secret Service in security operations for President Kennedy’s visit. At San Antonio, to the north of the Texas border with Mexico, Lieutenant Colonel Robert Jones was operations officer for the 112th Military Intelligence Group. As soon as he heard about the assassination, Jones said, he urgently requested information from his men at the scene of the crime. By early afternoon, he had received a phone call “advising that an A. J. Hidell had been arrested.” (Oddly, published information suggests that the call did not mention the name Oswald, although both names were on documents in Oswald’s wallet.) Jones said he quickly located the name Hidell in Army Intelligence files. It cross-referenced, Jones claimed, with “a file on Lee Harvey Oswald, also known by the name A. J. Hidell.” This, in turn, contained information about Oswald’s past, including his time spent in the Soviet Union and the fact that he had recently been involved in pro-Castro activities in New Orleans.
Indeed, according to the Assassinations Committee summary of Jones’ testimony, the file had been opened in mid-1963, “under the names Lee Harvey Oswald and A. J. Hidell,” following a New Orleans police report of Oswald’s activities in support of Castro. With the file in front of him, said Lieutenant Colonel Jones, he promptly got on the telephone to tell the FBI in Dallas about the contents of the Oswald file. One person he spoke to was Agent in Charge Gordon Shanklin. That, Jones has testified, was the end of his role in the matter, apart from writing a report summarizing the day’s developments.
It seems important to know everything possible about Oswald’s use of the name Hidell—not least because it was a mail order in that name which linked him in so damning a fashion to the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle. The Warren Commission asked to see any Army documents that might be relevant to Oswald, but was never shown the file Jones described on oath. For years, independent researchers asked for them, only to be told they could not be found.
In 1978, the Assassinations Committee was informed that the Army’s Oswald file had been destroyed in 1973—as a matter of “routine.” In a masterpiece of understatement, the AssassinationsCommittee report said it found the destruction of the Army Intelligence file “extremely troublesome, especially when viewed in the light of the Department of Defense’s failure to make this file available to the Warren Commission.” The Committee said it found Lieutenant Colonel Jones’ testimony “credible.”
It is apparent that Oswald used the name Hidell only on his pro-Castro propaganda leaflets, at one stage of his stay in New Orleans in the summer of 1963, and on mail-order forms when he sent for the rifle alleged to have been used in the President’s murder and the pistol allegedly used to shoot Officer Tippit. If Jones’ testimony is correct, Army Intelligence had its own independent information about some use of the name Hidell by Oswald. 5 Document releases show this was the case, at least in New Orleans. There is no sign, however, that Army Intelligence advised the Warren Commission of the fact.
When the Assassinations Committee complained about the U.S. Army’s destruction of its Oswald file, it noted that “without access to this file, the question of Oswald’s possible affiliation with Army Intelligence could not be fully resolved.” The suspicion that the alleged assassin had been somehow affiliated to an intelligence agency will be examined in depth in this book. The role of Army Intelligence in the early hours of the investigation remains obscure and poorly documented.
One other source mentioned by
Army Intelligence agents were in Dallas on the day of the assassination, backing up the Secret Service in security operations for President Kennedy’s visit. At San Antonio, to the north of the Texas border with Mexico, Lieutenant Colonel Robert Jones was operations officer for the 112th Military Intelligence Group. As soon as he heard about the assassination, Jones said, he urgently requested information from his men at the scene of the crime. By early afternoon, he had received a phone call “advising that an A. J. Hidell had been arrested.” (Oddly, published information suggests that the call did not mention the name Oswald, although both names were on documents in Oswald’s wallet.) Jones said he quickly located the name Hidell in Army Intelligence files. It cross-referenced, Jones claimed, with “a file on Lee Harvey Oswald, also known by the name A. J. Hidell.” This, in turn, contained information about Oswald’s past, including his time spent in the Soviet Union and the fact that he had recently been involved in pro-Castro activities in New Orleans.
Indeed, according to the Assassinations Committee summary of Jones’ testimony, the file had been opened in mid-1963, “under the names Lee Harvey Oswald and A. J. Hidell,” following a New Orleans police report of Oswald’s activities in support of Castro. With the file in front of him, said Lieutenant Colonel Jones, he promptly got on the telephone to tell the FBI in Dallas about the contents of the Oswald file. One person he spoke to was Agent in Charge Gordon Shanklin. That, Jones has testified, was the end of his role in the matter, apart from writing a report summarizing the day’s developments.
It seems important to know everything possible about Oswald’s use of the name Hidell—not least because it was a mail order in that name which linked him in so damning a fashion to the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle. The Warren Commission asked to see any Army documents that might be relevant to Oswald, but was never shown the file Jones described on oath. For years, independent researchers asked for them, only to be told they could not be found.
In 1978, the Assassinations Committee was informed that the Army’s Oswald file had been destroyed in 1973—as a matter of “routine.” In a masterpiece of understatement, the AssassinationsCommittee report said it found the destruction of the Army Intelligence file “extremely troublesome, especially when viewed in the light of the Department of Defense’s failure to make this file available to the Warren Commission.” The Committee said it found Lieutenant Colonel Jones’ testimony “credible.”
It is apparent that Oswald used the name Hidell only on his pro-Castro propaganda leaflets, at one stage of his stay in New Orleans in the summer of 1963, and on mail-order forms when he sent for the rifle alleged to have been used in the President’s murder and the pistol allegedly used to shoot Officer Tippit. If Jones’ testimony is correct, Army Intelligence had its own independent information about some use of the name Hidell by Oswald. 5 Document releases show this was the case, at least in New Orleans. There is no sign, however, that Army Intelligence advised the Warren Commission of the fact.
When the Assassinations Committee complained about the U.S. Army’s destruction of its Oswald file, it noted that “without access to this file, the question of Oswald’s possible affiliation with Army Intelligence could not be fully resolved.” The suspicion that the alleged assassin had been somehow affiliated to an intelligence agency will be examined in depth in this book. The role of Army Intelligence in the early hours of the investigation remains obscure and poorly documented.
One other source mentioned by
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