TX TX - President John F. Kennedy, 46, Dallas, 22 Nov 1963

The single most important cornerstone of the Warren report and official government position on the Kennedy assassination and of Lee Harvey Oswald being the lone assassin rests on what is known as the "Single Bullet Theory" or more often called the "Magic Bullet Theory".

It was first suggested by Arlen Specter, who was in 1964 an attorney working for the Warren Commission investigating the assassination.

The "Theory" was devised to explain the numerous wounds made to both John Kennedy and to Texas Governor John Connally while riding in the Presidential Limo on 22 November 1963. Three bullets had to be accounted for because that was the number of spent shell casings found on the 6th floor of the Dallas School Book Depository Building. This is where Oswald's rifle and shooting position was found.

Using the Zapruder 8 millimeter movie of the motorcade, it was determined that the shots took place in a space of approximately 6 seconds. In that space of time (according to the Commission Report), at least two out of three hits on a moving target were made, producing at least 8 separate wounds. And all with a very clumsy Italian bolt action army rifle with a cheap, poorly mounted Tasco scope sight.

Several controlled shooting tests were later done to try and replicate this feat using an elevated platform, a moving target and several trained, professional marksmen. That is, they tried to fire the rifle three times in 6 seconds and had to score 2 out of 3 hits. Only one man was able to do it. All others failed in one way or another.

The Warren report states this about the three shots:
- The first (and closest) shot completely missed the Limo and its passengers.
- The second "magic" bullet struck Kennedy in the back and exited his throat, then entered the back of Connally, exiting his chest, striking and exiting his right wrist, and finally ending up in his left thigh. It was found almost intact on a hospital gurney at Parkland Hospital.
- The third bullet struck Kennedy in the head and pretty much disintegrated before striking the upper frame of the Limo's windshield.

It is the "Magic Bullet Theory" which has been the basis of much criticism of the Warren report - especially since accompanying drawings were so inaccurate and distorted.

While it might be possible for a bullet from a 6.5mm Carcano round to inflict all the described wounds (given proper victim alignment) the theory seems a convoluted explanation designed to prove that only Lee Harvey Oswald was the shooter. (Three rounds fired and all accounted for.)

The Zapruder film, however, would tend to argue against the Commission's conclusions about the shots, because Kennedy can clearly be seen grabbing for his throat before Connally begins his turn toward him. Was Kennedy hit by the first Carcano bullet, or a fragment of it, or by a separate shot?

Kennedy can be seen reacting to a second hit when his elbows suddenly fly upward, and almost immediately Connally begins to react.

The third "fatal" bullet is clearly seen to strike Kennedy's head, but there is much criticism of the official report regarding this as well. Some point out that Kennedy's head jerks forward and then violently back and to the left - suggesting a shot from behind, followed immediately by a shot from the right of the Limo. Or simply a single shot from the front/side.

Medical witnesses in the emergency room and at the attopsey have come forward to refute official findings that the head wound came from behind.

The controversy is likely to continue for ages. Were mistakes and misstatements made by the Warren Commission in their investigation? Certainly. Did the FBI and Secret Service destroy evidence? Yes, absolutely. Was the single essential finding of the Warren Commission (that the assassination was the work of a lone nut) a forgone conclusion? Maybe, just a little bit.
 
Norman Mailer, in his 1995 book, "Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery", comes to some interesting conclusions, or alternate possibilities.

He does an in depth study of Oswald, his personality, background, etc. and tends to think that it is most likely that Oswald committed the assassination on his own, although he does not totally discount the possibility of other shooters ALSO being present and firing.

Mailer does not buy the Ruby story about being personally distraught, and killing Oswald on impulse.

Mailer suggests that high-ups in the Mob may have actually put out a contract on JFK, and in such a way that there were various "layers" or "levels" of persons in between themselves and whoever would actually do the hit. They would have left all the planning up to professional operatives who would pick the time and place on their own.

On 22 November 1963, upon hearing that JFK had, in fact, been killed and that Oswald had been captured alive and was claiming to be a "Patsy", the Mob bosses, could have concluded that it WAS their hit and that Oswald needed to be silenced.

Who better to be able to get into the Dallas Police station and silence him than one of their own, Jack Ruby? Although he was not a professional hit man, he did have a lot of connections in Dallas and knew many of the cops and other officials.

It is a well written and very interesting book.
 
Norman Mailer, in his 1995 book, "Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery", comes to some interesting conclusions, or alternate possibilities.

He does an in depth study of Oswald, his personality, background, etc. and tends to think that it is most likely that Oswald committed the assassination on his own, although he does not totally discount the possibility of other shooters ALSO being present and firing.

Mailer does not buy the Ruby story about being personally distraught, and killing Oswald on impulse.

Mailer suggests that high-ups in the Mob may have actually put out a contract on JFK, and in such a way that there were various "layers" or "levels" of persons in between themselves and whoever would actually do the hit. They would have left all the planning up to professional operatives who would pick the time and place on their own.

On 22 November 1963, upon hearing that JFK had, in fact, been killed and that Oswald had been captured alive and was claiming to be a "Patsy", the Mob bosses, could have concluded that it WAS their hit and that Oswald needed to be silenced.

Who better to be able to get into the Dallas Police station and silence him than one of their own, Jack Ruby? Although he was not a professional hit man, he did have a lot of connections in Dallas and knew many of the cops and other officials.

It is a well written and very interesting book.
Interesting. I've been reading The Reporter Who Knew Too Much, about Dorothy Kilgallen. For those who don't know (I didn't until recently), Dorothy was an investigative reporter and friend of JFK. She died under suspicious circumstances a couple of years after the JFK assassination. Just before her death, Dorothy told a friend that she was about to publish a manuscript that would blow the lid off the JFK investigation. After Dorothy's death, the manuscript disappeared.

I have another book, Denial of Justice, which I'll read next. It's also about Dorothy Kilgallen's research into the JFK case and the circumstances of her death. I became interested in Dorothy and her connection with JFK after watching some YouTube videos. I don't know that we'll ever find out the whole truth behind the JFK assassination because so much evidence has been lost and so many people close to the investigation died soon afterwards.
 
Interesting. I've been reading The Reporter Who Knew Too Much, about Dorothy Kilgallen. ...
... I became interested in Dorothy and her connection with JFK after watching some YouTube videos. I don't know that we'll ever find out the whole truth behind the JFK assassination because so much evidence has been lost and so many people close to the investigation died soon afterwards.

Almost everyone in America who had a Television set in the 1950's and 60's knew Dorothy Kilgallen through her regular appearances on the show "What's My Line?" Of course, she was also a well known writer with a regular newspaper column.

She had interviewed Jack Ruby in Dallas in 1965, and intended to write about what he had told her, but she died shortly afterward at age 52 in her home in Virginia.

It is true that we probably will never know the full story about the assassination, even with all the books and articles which have been written about it over the years.

Cover-ups, mishandling of witnesses and suspects, disappearance of evidence etc, all began immediately following JFK's murder. The Secret Service started by completely cleaning up the crime scene (the Presidential Limo) at Parkland Hospital before Kennedy was pronounced dead, and immediately moved it to the airport for transportation back to Washington DC. It was completely renovated and returned to the Presidential fleet, but never used by Johnson as his Limo. Today it resides at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan.

Dallas medical examiners were denied a chance to even look at the body, as that too, was immediately removed and flown to Washington, where an autopsy was conducted by Navy doctors (who had never done an autopsy before) at Bethesda Naval Hospital. Those doctors and technicians have since stated that official reports falsified what they saw.

The FBI had been monitoring Lee Harvey Oswald before the assassination, and immediately destroyed a letter he had hand delivered to their Dallas office. So much more... all detailed in numerous books.

The Warren Commission's report on the Assassination was a very comprehensive document which contained 26 volumes of evidence description, interviews, findings, etc. But - it was all compiled and organized with the end goal in mind of proving that Lee Harvey Oswald, and he alone had planned and carried out the murder.
 
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The 6.5mm x52 Mannlicher-Carcano M 91/38 short rifle with the serial number C2766 was produced in 1940 in the Terni Arsenal.

LINK:
https://www.quora.com/Was-Lee-Harve...-of-inflicting-the-injuries-it-supposedly-did

A book about this rifle:

https://www.amazon.com/gun-biography-that-killed-Kennedy/dp/0670357634
 
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The official explanation from the Warren Commission is not completely reliable.
The Single bullet theory looks like a comedy sketch...
Anyways there's no way we'll know what happened to JFK, at least not in the near future.
Some people wouldn't be pleased to know what really happened, even if more than 50 years have passed.
Maybe after the year 2063...
 
I don't know why everyone here is depending on everyone else's work. Do your own, the FBI files even if redacted have been declassified and released. There's thousands of pages of documents to go through, quite frankly I don't accept any of the main stream theories. I'm looking for my own.
 

Lee Harvey Oswald
In handcuffs following his arrest on 22 November 1963 by Dallas Police

Here is a 2019 interview with Ruth Payne who knew Lee and Marina Oswald in which she talks of Lee Oswald's personal life and his last days.

LINK:
 
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Lee Harvey Oswald is shot on national television by Jack Ruby, 24 November 1963.
 
In 1977, a movie starring Lorne Greene (of Bonanza fame) about how a murder trial of Lee Harvey Oswald might have gone, had Oswald lived.

LINK:

 
The movie did more to twist the facts than good
 
I am from Dallas. I was in college when this happened. Many of my friends and classmates were there to see the President of the United States. For me, I consider it a life time memory. One thing that amazed me and I thought suspicious was how quickly they found Oswald. It was as if they knew who they were looking for and where he was going. Dallas is a big city and there were thousands of people there for the parade. How did they identify him so quickly and know he took a bus to Oak Cliff when he could of gone anywhere??

I'm not saying I don't believe Oswalt took a shot at JFK, but I'm not convinced he wasn't just a distraction in the assassination plan. I can say from personal knowledge, 3 hours after the event, Dallas streets were wide open and there were no road blocks, no yellow tape at the school book depository, and not an abundance of police presence.

I have other knowledge of the events from first hand information. My family had ties to Parkland Hospital's ER docs as well as the hospital administration. My cousin worked for O'Neal Funeral home and drove the hearse. He was in the room when last rites were spoken and personally moved the President to the hearse and drove to the airport. It was a trauma he never forgot or got over. It was compounded for him because he was a wounded Viet Nam Veteran.

Just a few personal comments from someone who lived it. It was a horrible sad day in Dallas in 1963 and one people still talk about and relive. Personal accounts are where many answers are and not trajectory of bullets and reenactments. This is just my personal opinion from discussions with people who were there. No links.
 
I am from Dallas. I was in college when this happened. Many of my friends and classmates were there to see the President of the United States. For me, I consider it a life time memory. One thing that amazed me and I thought suspicious was how quickly they found Oswald. It was as if they knew who they were looking for and where he was going. Dallas is a big city and there were thousands of people there for the parade. How did they identify him so quickly and know he took a bus to Oak Cliff when he could of gone anywhere??

I'm not saying I don't believe Oswald took a shot at JFK, but I'm not convinced he wasn't just a distraction in the assassination plan. I can say from personal knowledge, 3 hours after the event, Dallas streets were wide open and there were no road blocks, no yellow tape at the school book depository, and not an abundance of police presence. ...

Thank you for your personal recollections and comments. I think anyone who was living at the time remembers exactly where they were on 22 November 1963, when hearing that President Kennedy was shot.

In regard to Dallas Police picking up Oswald so quickly, that has been something many have questioned. According to most accounts, Lee Harvey Oswald was encountered by a Dallas policeman on the second floor of the Texas School Book Depository Building within a minute of the shots being fired. Oswald is said to have walked out of the building, walked a block and boarded a bus which took him BACK in the direction of the Book Depository. When the bus was stopped in traffic, he left the bus after requesting a transfer slip, and went to a taxi for a ride to take him a block past his boarding house.

One wonders if Oswald would have been caught so quickly if he simply stayed in his room at the boarding house. But instead, he donned a light color jacket, pocketed a .38 revolver, and began walking away. Not exactly a man with a plan. He was stopped by Dallas Policeman J. D. Tippet. Oswald shot Officer Tippet several times in front of witnesses, and then fled on foot to the Texas Theater where he was subsequently captured.

The story was that Tippet stopped Oswald because he fit a broadcast description of the assassin.

In response to the logical question of where that "description" came from, it was stated that after the shooting, the manager of the School Book Depository held a muster of all personnel, and only Oswald was missing. But many employees stated that there was no such muster. They were denied entrance back into the building, and most simply went home in shock without returning to work.

Where, then, did the accurate description of Oswald come from? And how was it that a patrol car just happened to be in Oswald's neighborhood so far, and yet so soon after the shooting?

At least one witness claimed that a patrol car paused in front of the Boarding House and honked its horn prior to Oswald fleeing it on foot. This would indicate that police already knew who to pick up and where he would be.

When questioned by a reporter in the Dallas Police Department building, Oswald stated on camera, "I'm just a patsy". That remark has sparked much speculation regarding his connection to the assassination.

Certainly, Oswald's actions before and immediately after the assassination seem incriminating, but so many questions remain.



Officer J. D. Tippet, killed 22 November 1963

LINK:
J. D. Tippit - Wikipedia
 
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Photo of Lee Harvey Oswald holding his 6.5mm Italian Manlicher Carcano rifle and a Communist Party Newspaper. Note the .38 pistol sticking out of his right pocket. This photo was reportedly taken in the back yard of the Texas boarding house where Lee and Marina Oswald were living in the spring of 1963.

Although Oswald was killed by Jack Ruby and never stood trial for killing either Kennedy or police officer J.D. Tippit, the Warren Commission and others have used this photo to link Oswald to the weapons that he allegedly used in those murders, and in the earlier attempted murder of General Edwin Walker.

LINK:

JFK conspiracy: Controversial photograph of Lee Harvey Oswald holding rifle deemed 'authentic'


Edwin Walker
 

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