Victor Marchetti
Plaintiff’s Exhibit
-10-80-P121-00 E. Howard Hunt, Jr. Plaintiff, v. Liberty Lobby, A D.C.
Corporation. Case No. 80-1121-Civ-JWK
Deposition of Victor L.
Marchetti – Monday July 9, 1984
CIA Historical Record
Review Program Release in Full 1998
Victor Marchetti
wrote:
A few weeks ago, in
March, there was a special meeting at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., the
plush home of America’s super spooks overlooking the Potomac River. It was
attended by several high-ranking clandestine offices and some former top
officials of the agency.
The topic of discussion
was: what to do about recent revelations associating President Kennedy’s
accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, with the spy game played between the US
and USSR.
A decision was made, and
a course of action determined. They were calculated to both fascinate and
confuse the public by staging a clever “limited hangout” when the House Select
Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) holds its open public hearings, beginning
later this month.
A “limited hangout” is
spy jargon for a favorite and frequently used gimmick of the clandestine
professionals. When their wall of secrecy is shredded and they can no longer
rely on a phony cover story to misinform the public, they resort to admitting –
sometimes even volunteering – some of the truth while still managing to
withhold the key and damaging facts in the case…So we will probably never find
out who masterminded the assassination of JFK – or why/ There are too many
powerful special interests connected with the conspiracy for the truth to ever
come out, even now, years after he murder.
But during the next two
months, according to sensitive sources in the CIA and on HSCA, we are going to
learn much more about the crime. The new disclosures will be sensational, but
only superficially so. A few of the lesser villains involved in the conspiracy
and its subsequent cover-up will be identified for the first time – and allowed
to twist slowly in the wind on live network TV. Most of the others to be
fingered are already dead.
But once again the good
folks of middle America will be hoodwinked by the government and its allies in
the establishment news media. In fact, we are being set up to witness yet
another cover-up, albeit a sophisticated one designed by the CIA with the
assistance of the FBI and the blessing of the Carter administration.
A classic example of a
limited hangout is how the CIA handled – and manipulated – the Church
Committee’s investigation of two years ago. The committee learned nothing more
about the assassinations of foreign leaders, illicit drug programs, or the
penetration of the news media than the CIA allowed it to discover. And this is
precisely what the CIA is out to accomplish through HSCA with regards to JFK’s
murder.
Chief among those to be
exposed by the new investigation will be E. Howard Hunt, of Watergate fame. His
luck has run out, and the CIA has decided to sacrifice him to protect its
clandestine services. The agency is furious with Hunt for having dragged it
publicly into the Nixon mess and for having blackmailed it after he was
arrested. Besides, Hunt is vulnerable – an easy target, as they say in the spy
business. His reputation and integrity have been destroyed. The death of his
wife, Dorothy, in a mysterious plane crash in Chicago still disturbs many
people, especially since there were rumors from informed sources that she was
about to leave him and perhaps even turn on him.
In addition, it is well
known that Hunt hated JFK and blamed him for the Bay of Pigs disaster. And now,
in recent months, his alibi for his whereabouts on the day of President
Kennedy’s death has come unstuck.
In the public hearings
the CIA will “admit” that Hunt was involved in the conspiracy to kill Kennedy.
The CIA may go so far as to “admit” that there were three gunman shooting at
Kennedy. The FBI, while publicly embracing the Warren Commission’s “one man,
acting alone” conclusion, has always privately known that there were three
gunman. The conspiracy involved many more people than the ones ho actually
fired at Kennedy, both agencies may now admit….
Now, the CIA moved to
finger Hunt and tie him to the JFK assassination. HSCA unexpectedly received an
internal CIA memorandum a few weeks ago that the agency just happened to
stumble across in its old files. It was dated 1966 and said in essence: some
day we will have to explain Hunt’s presence in Dallas on November 22, 1963 –
the day President Kennedy was killed. Hunt is going to be hard put to explain
this memo, and other things, before the TV cameras at the HSCA hearings.
Hunt’s reputation as a
strident, fanatical anti-communist will count against him. So will his long and
close relationship with the anti-Castro Cuban, as well as his penchant for
clandestine dirty tricks and his various capers while one of Nixon’s plumbers.
E. Howard Hunt will be implicated in the conspiracy, and he will not dare to
speak out – the CIA will see to that.
In addition to Hunt and
(Frank) Sturgis, another former CIA agent marked for exposure is Gerry Patrick
Hemming, a hulk of a man – six feet eight inches tall and weighing 260 pounds.
Like Sturgis, Hemming once worked for Castro as a CIA double agent, then later
surfaced with the anti-Castro Cubans in various attempts to rid Cuba of the
communist dictator. But there are two things in Hemming’s past that the CIA,
manipulating HSCA, will be able to use to tie him to the JFK assassination.
First, Castro’s former
mistress, Marita Lorenz (now an anti-Castroite herself), has identified
Hemming, along with Oswald and others as being part of the secret squad
assigned to kill Kennedy. And secondly, Hemming was Oswald’s marine sergeant
when he was stationed at the CIA’s U-2 base in Atsugi, Japan – where Oswald
supposedly was recruited as a spy by the Soviets, or was being trained to be a
double agent by the CIA.
In any event, Hemming’s
Cuban career and his connection with Oswald make the Lorenzs story difficult
for him to deny, particularly since the squad allegedly also included Hunt and
Sturgis.
Who else will be
identified as having been part of the conspiracy and/or cover-up remain to be
seen. But a disturbing pattern is already beginning to emerge. All the villains
have been previously disgraced in one way or another. They all have been
closely allied with the anti-Castro Cubans, and they all have “right wing”
reputations. Or they will have after the hearings.
The fact that some may
have had connections with organized crime will prove to be only incidental in
the long run. Those with provable ties to the CIA or FBI will be presented as
renegades who acted on their own without the approval or knowledge of their
superiors.
As for covering up the
deed, that will be blamed on past presidents, either dead or disgraced. Thus
Carter will emerge as a truth-seeker, and the CIA and FBI will have neatly
covered their institutional behinds.
The timing of the
hearings is another clue of what to expect and why. The committee has scheduled
its open sessions on network TV to begin after congress adjourns for the
election campaign. The first order of business will be the Martin Luther King,
Jr. hearings – with James Earl Ray and his family as the star witnesses. Then
there will be a short break and the JFK hearings will begin.
The committee plans to
conclude its work by early October, just a month before the election, perfect
timing to cash in on the publicity the hearings are certain to create. And
perfect timing for the Carterites to get the American public to forget about
inflation, taxes, foreign affairs, and other White House blunders and elect a
congress more indebted and responsive to the presidency.
Victor Marchetti: (The
CIA) “Well, it’s a conglomeration of bureaucrats and human beings with all the
foibles and faults. I mean, it has no life of its own. It’s just a
conglomeration of people, and people make mistakes.”
“I believe the FBI, like
the CIA, has not told the whole story on the assassination, or provided all the
information they could on the assassination. I don’t even know if that
information exists, except in the minds of certain individuals.”
“I think that
revelations of the bureaucratic delays and mishandling of files would shock the
American people…I think so now particularly since for over 20 years they’ve
been stalling, stumbling, fibbing, dissembling and variously taking – taking
various methods to avoid coming clean; and little bits trickle out now and
then, and a little piece comes to light here and there, and the longer it
continues, the more embarrassing it would be for them. Even those who just had
a bureaucratic role in covering up things, preventing things from being
discovered and the like.”
“…The director was
concerned that this Agency had had a realationship (Clay) Shaw in the past and
they didn’t particularly want this to come out. It would be embarrassing….He
asked (Tom) Karamasines ‘how are things going down in New Orleans with the Clay
Shaw trial? And Karamasines mumbled something….The director then said something
like, Are we giving Shaw all the help we can? Words to that effect.”
“If you’ll recall what
happened at the House Committee – there are two interesting things. One, Helms
just came in and stared the committee down and said things like stop asking me
about Oswald the assassination. If I had my way, I’d have just taken a truck
with everything we had on this whole thing and driven up and dumped it on
Congress. So he – that wasn’t part of the hangout. He just said, ‘the hell with
you,’ and walked away.”
“And so, as far as I was
concerned, the ball game was over and my speculation as to what they were going
to do and why they were going to do it was technically – did not come to pass.
But, in essence, it did.”
PLEASE SUPPORT JFKCountercoup:
No comments:
Post a Comment