basically, allthough I hate the USSR and socialist system I still
_think_ marxism can work under different circumstances.”[C7-231] His
second answer to this question was, “No of course not, I have never
even know a communist, outside of the ones in the USSR but you can’t
help that.”[C7-232] His first set of questions and answers indicated
his belief that there were no outstanding differences between the
Soviet Union and the United States, “except in the US. the living
standard is a little higher, freedoms are about the same, medical
aid and the educational system in the USSR is better than in the
USA.”[C7-233] In the second simulated transcript which ended with the
statement “Newspapers, thank you sir; you are a _real_ patriot!!” he
apparently concluded that the United States offered “freedom of speech
travel outspoken opposition to unpopular policies freedom to believe in
god,” while the Soviet Union did not.[C7-234]
Despite the hatred that Oswald expressed toward the Soviet Union after
his residence there, he continued to be interested in that country
after he returned to the United States. Soon after his arrival he
wrote to the Soviet Embassy in Washington requesting information on
how to subscribe to Russian newspapers and magazines and asked for
“any periodicals or bulletins which you may put out for the beneifit
of your citizens living, for a time, in the U.S.A..”[C7-235] Oswald
subsequently did subscribe to several Soviet journals.[C7-236] While
Marina Oswald tried to obtain permission to return to the Soviet Union
she testified that she did so at her husband’s insistence.[C7-237]
In July of 1963, Oswald also requested the Soviet Union to provide a
visa for his return to that country.[C7-238] In August of 1963, he
gave the New Orleans police as a reason for refusing to permit his
family to learn English, that “he hated America and he did not want
them to become ‘Americanized’ and that his plans were to go back to
Russia.”[C7-239] Even though his primary purpose probably was to get to
Cuba, he sought an immediate grant of visa on his trip to Mexico City
in late September of 1963.[C7-240] He also inquired about visas for
himself and his wife in a letter which he wrote to the Soviet Embassy
in Washington on November 9, 1963.[C7-241]
Personal Relations
Apart from his relatives, Oswald had no friends or close associates
in Texas when he returned there in June of 1962, and he did not
establish any close friendships or associations, although it appears
that he came to respect George De Mohrenschildt.[C7-242] Somewhat of a
nonconformist,[C7-243] De Mohrenschildt was a peripheral member of the
so-called Russian community, with which Oswald made contact through Mr.
Peter Gregory, a Russian-speaking petroleum engineer whom Oswald met as
a result of his contact with the Texas Employment Commission office in
Fort Worth.[C7-244] Some of the members of that group saw a good deal
of the Oswalds through the fall of 1963, and attempted to help Mrs.
Oswald particularly, in various ways.[C7-245] In general, Oswald did
not like the members of the Russian community.[C7-246] In fact, his
relations with some of them, particularly George Bouhe, became quite
hostile.[C7-247] Part of the problem resulted from the fact that, as
Jeanne De Mohrenschildt testified, Oswald was “very, very disagreeable
and disappointed.”[C7-248] He also expressed considerable resentment at
the help given to his wife by her Russian-American friends. Jeanne De
Mohrenschildt said:
Marina had a hundred dresses given to her * * * [and] he
objected to that lavish help, because Marina was throwing it
into his face.
* * * * *
He was offensive with the people. And I can understand why, *
* * because that hurt him. He could never give her what the
people were showering on her. * * * no matter how hard he
worked--and he worked very hard.[C7-249]
The relations between Oswald and his wife became such that Bouhe wanted
to “liberate” her from Oswald.[C7-250] While the exact sequence of
events is not clear because of conflicting testimony, it appears that
De Mohrenschildt and his wife actually went to Oswald’s apartment early
in November of 1962 and helped to move the personal effects of Marina
Oswald and the baby. Even though it appears that they may have left
Oswald a few days before, it seems that he resisted the move as best
he could. He even threatened to tear up his wife’s dresses and break
all the baby things. According to De Mohrenschildt, Oswald submitted to
the inevitable, presumably because he was “small, you know, and he was
rather a puny individual.”[C7-251] De Mohrenschildt said that the whole
affair made him nervous since he was “interfering in other people’s
affairs, after all.”[C7-252]
Oswald attempted to get his wife to come back and, over Bouhe’s
protest, De Mohrenschildt finally told him where she was. De
Mohrenschildt admitted that:
if somebody did that to me, a lousy trick like that, to take my
wife away, and all the furniture, I would be mad as hell, too.
I am surprised that he didn’t do something worse.[C7-253]
After about a 2-week separation, Marina Oswald returned to her
husband.[C7-254] Bouhe thoroughly disapproved of this and as a result
almost all communication between the Oswalds and members of the Russian
community ceased. Contacts with De Mohrenschildt and his wife did
continue and they saw the Oswalds occasionally until the spring of
1963.[C7-255]
Shortly after his return from the Soviet Union, Oswald severed all
relations with his mother; he did not see his brother Robert from
Thanksgiving of 1962 until November 23, 1963.[C7-256] At the time of
his defection, Oswald had said that neither his brother, Robert, nor
his mother were objects of his affection, “but only examples of workers
in the U.S.” He also indicated to officials at the American Embassy in
Moscow that his defection was motivated at least in part by so-called
exploitation of his mother by the capitalist system.[C7-257] Consistent
with this attitude he first told his wife that he did not have a
mother, but later admitted that he did but that “he didn’t love her
very much.”[C7-258]
When they arrived from the Soviet Union, Oswald and his family lived
at first with his brother Robert. The latter testified that they “were
just together again,” as if his brother “had not been to Russia.” He
also said that he and his family got along well with Marina Oswald and
enjoyed showing her American things.[C7-259] After about a month with
his brother, Oswald and his family lived for a brief period with his
mother at her urging, but Oswald soon decided to move out.[C7-260]
Marguerite Oswald visited her son and his family at the first apartment
which he rented after his return, and tried to help them get settled
there. After she had bought some clothes for Marina Oswald and a
highchair for the baby, Oswald emphatically told her to stop. As
Marguerite Oswald testified, “he strongly put me in my place about
buying things for his wife that he himself could not buy.”[C7-261]
Oswald objected to his mother visiting the apartment and became quite
incensed with his wife when she would open the door for her in spite
of his instructions to the contrary.[C7-262] Oswald moved to Dallas on
about October 8, 1962, without telling his mother where he was going.
He never saw or communicated with her in any way again until she came
to see him after the assassination.[C7-263]
Even though Oswald cut off relations with his mother, he attempted for
the first time to learn something about his family background when he
went to New Orleans in April of 1963. He visited some of his father’s
elderly relatives and the cemetery where his father was buried in an
effort to develop the facts of his genealogy.[C7-264] While it does not
appear that he established any new relationships as a result of his
investigation, he did obtain a large picture of his father from one of
the elderly relatives with whom he spoke.[C7-265] Oswald’s interest in
such things presents a sharp contrast with his attitude at the time of
his defection, when he evidenced no interest in his father and hardly
mentioned him, even when questioned.[C7-266]
Employment
Oswald’s defection, his interest in the Soviet Union, and his
activities on behalf of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee not only
caused him difficulties in his employment relations, but they also
provided him with excuses for employment failures which were largely of
his own making. Oswald experienced some difficulty finding employment.
Perhaps this was partially because of his lack of any specific skill or
training.[C7-267] Some of his acquaintances, feeling that Oswald tried
to impress people with the fact that he had lived and worked in Russia,
were led to the belief that his employment difficulties were caused by
his telling prospective employers that he had last been employed in
Minsk.[C7-268] While he might have expected difficulty from such an
approach, in fact the evidence indicates that Oswald usually told his
prospective employers and employment counselors that he had recently
been discharged from the Marine Corps.[C7-269]
Oswald obtained a job in July of 1962 as a sheet metal worker with
a company in Fort Worth. His performance for that company was
satisfactory.[C7-270] Even though he told his wife that he had
been fired, he voluntarily left on October 8, 1962, and moved to
Dallas.[C7-271]
On October 9, 1962 he went to the Dallas office of the Texas Employment
Commission where he expressed a reluctance to work in the industrial
field.[C7-272] He indicated an interest in writing. An employment
counselor testified, on the basis of a general aptitude test Oswald
had taken, that he had some aptitude in that area, “because the verbal
score is high and the clerical score is high.”[C7-273] While that
counselor found that he was qualified to handle many different types
of jobs, because of his need for immediate employment she attempted
to obtain for him any job that was available at the time. Oswald
made qualifying marks in 19 of 23 categories included on the general
aptitude examination and scored 127 on the verbal test, as compared
with 50 percent of the people taking it who score less than 100. The
counselor testified that there was some indication that Oswald was
capable of doing college work and noted that Oswald’s verbal and
clerical potential was “outstanding.”[C7-274] Employment Commission
records concerning Oswald stated: “Well-groomed & spoken, business
suit, alert replies--Expresses self extremely well.”[C7-275] Oswald
said that he hoped eventually to develop qualifications for employment
as a junior executive through a work-study program at a local college.
He indicated, however, that he would have to delay that program because
of his immediate financial needs and responsibilities.[C7-276]
On October 11, 1962, the Employment Commission referred Oswald to a
commercial advertising photography firm in Dallas,[C7-277] where he
was employed as a trainee starting October 12, 1962.[C7-278] Even
though Oswald indicated that he liked photographic work,[C7-279] his
employer found that he was not an efficient worker. He was not able
to produce photographic work which adhered with sufficient precision
to the job specifications and as a result too much of his work had to
be redone.[C7-280] He also had difficulty in working with the other
employees. This was at least in part because of the close physical
confines in which some of the work had to be done.[C7-281] He did not
seem to be able to make the accommodations necessary when people work
under such conditions and as a result became involved in conflicts,
some of which were fairly heated, with his fellow employees.[C7-282]
In February or March of 1963, it began to appear that Oswald was having
considerable difficulty doing accurate work and in getting along with
the other employees. It appears that his discharge was hastened by the
fact that he brought a Russian language newspaper to work.[C7-283] It
is not possible to tell whether Oswald did this to provide an excuse
for his eventual discharge, or whether he brought the Russian language
newspaper with him one day after his other difficulties became clear.
It is possible that his immediate supervisor noticed the newspaper at
that time because his attention had otherwise been drawn more directly
to Oswald. In any event, Oswald was discharged on April 6, 1963,
ostensibly because of his inefficiency and difficult personality. His
supervisor admitted, however, that while he did not fire Oswald because
of the newspaper incident or even weigh it heavily in his decision,
“it didn’t do his case any good.”[C7-284]
Upon moving to New Orleans on April 24, 1963, Oswald’s employment
problems became more difficult. He left his wife and child at the
home of a friend, Mrs. Ruth Paine, of Irving, Tex.[C7-285] In New
Orleans he obtained work as a greaser and oiler of coffee processing
machines for the William B. Reily Co., beginning May 10, 1963.[C7-286]
After securing this job and an apartment, Oswald asked his wife to
join him. Mrs. Paine brought Oswald’s family to New Orleans.[C7-287]
Refusing to admit that he could only get work as a greaser, Oswald
told his wife and Mrs. Paine that he was working as a commercial
photographer.[C7-288] He lost his job on July 19, 1963, because his
work was not satisfactory[C7-289] and because he spent too much time
loitering in the garage next door, where he read rifle and hunting
magazines.[C7-290] Oswald apparently concluded that his Fair Play for
Cuba Committee activities were not related to his discharge.[C7-291]
The correctness of that conclusion is supported by the fact that he
does not seem to have been publicly identified with that organization
until August 9, 1963, almost a month after he lost his job.[C7-292]
His Fair Play for Cuba Committee activities, however, made it more
difficult for him to obtain other employment. A placement interviewer
of the Louisiana Department of Labor who had previously interviewed
Oswald, saw him on television and heard a radio debate in which he
engaged on August 21, 1963. He consulted with his supervisor and “it
was determined that we should not undertake to furnish employment
references for him.”[C7-293] Ironically, he failed to get a job in
another photographic firm after his return to Dallas in October of
1963, because the president of the photographic firm for which he
had previously worked told the prospective employer that Oswald was
“kinda peculiar sometimes and that he had some knowledge of the Russian
language,” and that he “may be a damn Communist. I can’t tell you.
If I was you, I wouldn’t hire him.”[C7-294] The plant superintendent
of the new firm testified that one of the employees of the old firm
“implied that Oswald’s fellow employees did not like him because he was
propagandizing and had been seen reading a foreign newspaper.” As a
result Oswald was not hired.[C7-295] He subsequently found a job with
the Texas School Book Depository for which he performed his duties
satisfactorily.[C7-296]
Attack on General Walker
The Commission has concluded that on April 10, 1963, Oswald shot
at Maj. Gen. Edwin A. Walker (Resigned, U.S. Army), demonstrating
once again his propensity to act dramatically and, in this instance
violently, in furtherance of his beliefs. The shooting occurred 2
weeks before Oswald moved to New Orleans and a few days after he had
been discharged by the photographic firm. As indicated in chapter IV,
Oswald had been planning his attack on General Walker for at least
1[C7-297] and perhaps as much as 2 months.[C7-298] He outlined his
plans in a notebook and studied them at considerable length before
his attack.[C7-299] He also studied Dallas bus schedules to prepare
for his later use of buses to travel to and from General Walker’s
house.[C7-300] Sometime after March 27, but according to Marina Oswald,
prior to April 10, 1963,[C7-301] Oswald posed for two pictures with his
recently acquired rifle and pistol, a copy of the March 24, 1963, issue
of the Worker, and the March 11, 1963, issue of the Militant.[C7-302]
He told his wife that he wanted to send the pictures to the Militant
and he also asked her to keep one of the pictures for his daughter,
June.[C7-303]
Following his unsuccessful attack on Walker, Oswald returned home.
He had left a note for his wife telling her what to do in case he
were apprehended, as well as his notebook and the pictures of himself
holding the rifle.[C7-304] She testified that she was agitated
because she had found the note in Oswald’s room, where she had gone,
contrary to his instructions, after she became worried about his
absence.[C7-305] She indicated that she had no advance knowledge of
Oswald’s plans, that she became quite angry when Oswald told her what
he had done, and that she made him promise never to repeat such a
performance. She said that she kept the note to use against him “if
something like that should be repeated again.”[C7-306] When asked if
Oswald requested the note back she testified that:
He forgot about it. But apparently after he thought that what
he had written in his book might be proof against him, and he
destroyed it. [the book][C7-307]
She later gave the following testimony [*indicates that the witness
answered without using the interpreter]:
Q. After he brought the rifle home, then, he showed you the
book?
*A. Yes.
Q. And you said it was not a good idea to keep this book?
*A. Yes.
Q. And then he burned the book?
*A. Yes.
Q. Did you ask him why he had not destroyed the book before he
actually went to shoot General Walker?
A. It never came to me, myself, to ask him that
question.[C7-308]
Marina Oswald’s testimony indicates that her husband was not
particularly concerned about his continued possession of the most
incriminating sort of evidence.[C7-309] If he had been successful and
had been apprehended even for routine questioning, his apartment would
undoubtedly have been searched, and his role would have been made clear
by the evidence which he had left behind. Leaving the note and picture
as he did would seem to indicate that he had considered the possibility
of capture. Possibly he might have wanted to be caught, and wanted his
involvement made clear if he was in fact apprehended. Even after his
wife told him to destroy the notebook he removed at least some of the
pictures which had been pasted in it and saved them among his effects,
where they were found after the assassination.[C7-310] His behavior was
entirely consistent with his wife’s testimony that:
I asked him what for he was making all these entries in the
book and he answered that he wanted to leave a complete record
so that all the details would be in it.
* * * * *
I am guessing that perhaps he did it to appear to be a brave
man in case he were arrested, but that is my supposition * *
*[C7-311]
The attempt on General Walker’s life deserves close attention in any
consideration of Oswald’s possible motive for the assassination and
the trail of evidence he left behind him on that occasion. While there
are differences between the two events as far as Oswald’s actions
and planning are concerned, there are also similarities that should
be considered. The items which Oswald left at home when he made his
attack on Walker suggest a strong concern for his place in history.
If the attack had succeeded and Oswald had been caught, the pictures
showing him with his rifle and his Communist and Socialist Worker’s
Party newspapers would probably have appeared on the front pages of
newspapers or magazines all over the country, as, in fact, one of
them did appear after the assassination.[C7-312] The circumstances of
the attack on Walker coupled with other indications that Oswald was
concerned about his place in history[C7-313] and with the circumstances
surrounding the assassination, have led the Commission to believe that
such concern is an important factor to consider in assessing possible
motivation for the assassination.
In any event, the Walker incident indicates that in spite of the belief
among those who knew him that he was apparently not dangerous,[C7-314]
Oswald did not lack the determination and other traits required to
carry out a carefully planned killing of another human being and was
willing to consummate such a purpose if he thought there was sufficient
reason to do so. Some idea of what he thought was sufficient reason for
such an act may be found in the nature of the motive that he stated for
his attack on General Walker. Marina Oswald indicated that her husband
had compared General Walker to Adolph Hitler. She testified that Oswald
said that General Walker “was a very bad man, that he was a fascist,
that he was the leader of a fascist organization, and when I said that
even though all of that might be true, just the same he had no right to
take his life, he said if someone had killed Hitler in time it would
have saved many lives.”[C7-315]
Political Activities
Oswald’s political activities after his return to the United States
center around his interest in Cuba and in the Fair Play for Cuba
Committee. Although, as indicated above, the Commission has been
unable to find any credible evidence that he was involved in any
conspiracy, his political activities do provide insight into certain
aspects of Oswald’s character and into his possible motivation for
the assassination. While it appears that he may have distributed
Fair Play for Cuba Committee materials on one uneventful occasion in
Dallas sometime during the period April 6-24, 1963,[C7-316] Oswald’s
first public identification with that cause was in New Orleans. There,
in late May and early June of 1963, under the name Lee Osborne, he
had printed a handbill headed in large letters “Hands Off Cuba,” an
application form for, and a membership card in, the New Orleans branch
of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee.[C7-317] He first distributed
his handbills and other material uneventfully in the vicinity of
the U.S.S. _Wasp_, which was berthed at the Dumaine Street wharf in
New Orleans, on June 16, 1963.[C7-318] He distributed literature in
downtown New Orleans on August 9, 1963, and was arrested because of a
dispute with three anti-Castro Cuban exiles, and again on August 16,
1963.[C7-319] Following his arrest, he was interviewed by the police,
and at his own request, by an agent of the FBI.[C7-320] On August 17,
1963, he appeared briefly on a radio program[C7-321] and on August 21,
1963, he debated over radio station WDSU, New Orleans, with Carlos
Bringuier, one of the Cuban exiles who had been arrested with him on
August 9.[C7-322] Bringuier claimed that on August 5, 1963, Oswald had
attempted to infiltrate an anti-Castro organization with which he was
associated.[C7-323]
While Oswald publicly engaged in the activities described above, his
“organization” was a product of his imagination.[C7-324] The imaginary
president of the nonexistent chapter was named A. J. Hidell,[C7-325]
the name that Oswald used when he purchased the assassination
weapon.[C7-326] Marina Oswald said she signed that name, apparently
chosen because it rhymed with “Fidel,”[C7-327] to her husband’s
membership card in the New Orleans chapter. She testified that he
threatened to beat her if she did not do so.[C7-328] The chapter had
never been chartered by the national FPCC organization.[C7-329] It
appears to have been a solitary operation on Oswald’s part in spite of
his misstatements to the New Orleans police that it had 35 members,
5 of which were usually present at meetings which were held once a
month.[C7-330]
Oswald’s Fair Play for Cuba activities may be viewed as a very
shrewd political operation in which one man single handedly created
publicity for his cause or for himself. It is also evidence of Oswald’s
reluctance to describe events accurately and of his need to present
himself to others as well as to himself in a light more favorable
than was justified by reality. This is suggested by his misleading
and sometime untruthful statements in his letters to Mr. V. T. Lee,
then national director of FPCC. In one of those letters, dated August
1, 1963, Oswald wrote that an office which he had previously claimed
to have rented for FPCC activities had been “promply closed 3 days
later for some obsure reasons by the renters, they said something
about remodeling ect., I’m sure you understand.”[C7-331] He wrote that
“thousands of circulars were distrubed”[C7-332] and that he continued
to receive inquiries through his post office box which he endeavored
“to keep ansewering to the best of my ability.”[C7-333] In his letter
to V. T. Lee, he stated that he was then alone in his efforts on behalf
of FPCC, but he attributed his lack of support to an attack by Cuban
exiles in a street demonstration and being “officialy cautioned” by
the police, events which “robbed me of what support I had leaving me
alone.”[C7-334]
In spite of those claims, the Commission has not been able to uncover
any evidence that anyone ever attacked any street demonstration in
which Oswald was involved, except for the Bringuier incident mentioned
above, which occurred 8 days after Oswald wrote the above letter to
V. T. Lee.[C7-335] Bringuier, who seemed to be familiar with many
anti-Castro activities in New Orleans, was not aware of any such
incident.[C7-336] Police reports also fail to reflect any activity
on Oswald’s part prior to August 9, 1963, except for the uneventful
distribution of literature at the Dumaine Street wharf in June.[C7-337]
Furthermore, the general tenor of Oswald’s next letter to V. T. Lee,
in which he supported his report on the Bringuier incident with a copy
of the charges made against him and a newspaper clipping reporting
the event, suggests that his previous story of an attack by Cuban
exiles was at least greatly exaggerated.[C7-338] While the legend
“FPCC 544 Camp St. NEW ORLEANS, LA.” was stamped on some literature
that Oswald had in his possession at the time of his arrest in New
Orleans, extensive investigation was not able to connect Oswald with
that address, although it did develop the fact that an anti-Castro
organization had maintained offices there for a period ending early
in 1962.[C7-339] The Commission has not been able to find any other
indication that Oswald had rented an office in New Orleans. In view of
the limited amount of public activity on Oswald’s part before August
9, 1963, there also seems to be no basis for his claim that he had
distributed “thousands” of circulars, especially since he had claimed
to have printed only 2,000 and actually had only 1,000 printed. In
addition, there is no evidence that he received any substantial amount
of materials from the national headquarters.[C7-340]
In another letter to V. T. Lee, dated August 17, 1963, Oswald wrote
that he had appeared on Mr. William Stuckey’s 15-minute television
program over WDSU-TV called “Latin American Focus” as a result of
which he was “flooded with callers and invitations to debate’s ect.
as well as people interested in joining the F.P.C.C. New Orleans
branch.”[C7-341] WDSU has no program of any kind called “Latin American
Focus.”[C7-342] Stuckey had a radio program called “Latin Listening
Post,” on which Oswald was heard for less than 5 minutes on August 17,
1963.[C7-343] It appears that Oswald had only one caller in response to
all of his FPCC activities, an agent of Bringuier’s attempting to learn
more about the true nature of the alleged FPCC “organization” in New
Orleans.[C7-344]
Oswald’s statements suggest that he hoped to be flooded with callers
and invitations to debate. This would have made him a real center of
attention as he must have been when he first arrived in the Soviet
Union and as he was to some extent when he returned to the United
States. The limited notoriety that Oswald received as a result of the
street fracas and in the subsequent radio debate was apparently not
enough to satisfy him. He exaggerated in his letters to V. T. Lee in
an apparent attempt to make himself and his activities appear far more
important than they really were.
[Illustration: OSWALD DISTRIBUTING FAIR PLAY FOR CUBA HANDBILLS IN NEW
ORLEANS, AUGUST 16, 1963--INSETS SHOW SAMPLES OF HIS HANDBILLS ON
WHICH HE HAD STAMPED HIS NAME AND THE NAME OF “A J HIDELL”
COMMISSION EXHIBIT 2966 A
COMMISSION EXHIBIT 2966 B
GARNER DEPOSITION EXHIBIT 1]
His attempt to express himself through his Fair Play for Cuba
activities, however, was greatly impeded by the fact that the radio
debate over WDSU on August 21, 1963, brought out the history of his
defection to the Soviet Union.[C7-345] The basic facts of the event
were uncovered independently by William Stuckey, who arranged the
debate, and Edward Butler, executive director of the Information
Council of the Americas, who also appeared on the program.[C7-346]
Oswald was confronted with those facts at the beginning of the debate
and was so thrown on the defensive by this that he was forced to state
that Fair Play for Cuba was “not at all Communist controlled regardless
of the fact that I had the experience of living in Russia.”[C7-347]
Stuckey testified that uncovering Oswald’s defection was very important:
I think that we finished him on that program. * * * because
we had publicly linked the Fair Play for Cuba Committee with
a fellow who had lived in Russia for 3 years and who was an
admitted Marxist.
The interesting thing, or rather the danger involved, was
the fact that Oswald seemed like such a nice, bright boy and
was extremely believable before this. We thought the fellow
could probably get quite a few members if he was really indeed
serious about getting members. We figured after this broadcast
of August 21, why, that was no longer possible.[C7-348]
In spite of the fact that Oswald had been surprised and was on the
defensive throughout the debate, according to Stuckey: “Mr. Oswald
handled himself very well, as usual.”[C7-349] Stuckey thought Oswald
“appeared to be a very logical, intelligent fellow,” and “was arrested
by his cleancutness.”[C7-350] He did not think Oswald looked like the
“type” that he would have expected to find associating with a group
such as the Fair Play for Cuba Committee.[C7-351] Stuckey thought that
Oswald acted very much as would a young attorney.[C7-352]
Following the disclosure of his defection, Oswald sought advice
from the Communist Party, U.S.A., concerning his Fair Play for Cuba
activity.[C7-353] He had previously sent, apparently unsolicited, to
the Party newspaper, the Worker, samples of his photographic work,
offering to contribute that sort of service without charge.[C7-354]
The Worker replied: “Your kind offer is most welcomed and from time to
time we shall call on you.”[C7-355] He later wrote to another official
of the Worker, seeking employment, and mentioning the praise he had
received for submitting his photographic work.[C7-356] He presented
Arnold Johnson, Gus Hall, and Benjamin J. Davis honorary membership
cards in his nonexistent New Orleans chapter of the Fair Play for Cuba
Committee, and advised them of some of his activities on behalf of the
organization.[C7-357] Arnold Johnson, director of the information and
lecture bureau of the Communist Party, U.S.A., replied stating:
It is good to know that movements in support of fair play for
Cuba has developed in New Orleans as well as in other cities.
We do not have any organizational ties with the Committee, and
yet there is much material that we issue from time to time that
is important for anybody who is concerned about developments in
Cuba.[C7-358]
Marina Oswald said that such correspondence from people he considered
important meant much to Oswald. After he had begun his Cuban activity
in New Orleans “he received a letter from somebody in New York, some
Communist--probably from New York--I am not sure from where--from some
Communist leader and he was very happy, he felt that this was a great
man that he had received the letter from.”[C7-359] Since he seemed to
feel that no one else understood his political views, the letter was of
great value to him for it “was proof * * * that there were people who
understood his activity.”[C7-360]
He anticipated that the full disclosure of his defection would
hinder him in “the struggle for progress and freedom in the United
States”[C7-361] into which Oswald, in his own words, had “thrown”
himself. He sought advice from the central committee of the Communist
Party, U.S.A., in a letter dated August 28, 1963, about whether he
could “continue to fight, handicapped as it were, by my past record
* * * [and] compete with anti-progressive forces, above-ground or
weather in your opion I should always remain in the background, i.e.
underground.”[C7-362] Stating that he had used his “position” with what
he claimed to be the local branch of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee
to “foster communist ideals,” Oswald wrote that he felt that he might
have compromised the FPCC and expressed concern lest “Our opponents
could use my background of residence in the U.S.S.R. against any cause
which I join, by association, they could say the organization of which
I am a member, is Russian controled, ect.”[C7-363] In reply Arnold
Johnson advised Oswald that, while as an American citizen he had a
right to participate in such organizations as he wished, “there are a
number of organizations, including possibly Fair Play, which are of
a very broad character, and often it is advisable for some people to
remain in the background, not underground.”[C7-364]
By August of 1963, after a short 3 months in New Orleans, the city in
which he had been born and had lived most of his early life, Oswald
had fallen on difficult times. He had not liked his job as a greaser
of coffee processing machinery and he held it for only a little over 2
months.[C7-365] He had not found another job. His wife was expecting
their second child in October and there was concern about the cost
which would be involved.[C7-366] His brief foray on behalf of the Fair
Play for Cuba Committee had failed to win any support. While he had
drawn some attention to himself and had actually appeared on two radio
programs, he had been attacked by Cuban exiles and arrested, an event
which his wife thought upset him and as a result of which “he became
less active, he cooled off a little.”[C7-367] More seriously, the
facts of his defection had become known, leaving him open to almost
unanswerable attack by those who opposed his views. It would not have
been possible to have followed Arnold Johnson’s advice to remain in
the background, since there was no background to the New Orleans FPCC
“organization,” which consisted solely of Oswald. Furthermore, he had
apparently not received any letters from the national headquarters
of FPCC since May 29, 1963,[C7-368] even though he had written four
detailed letters since that time to Mr. V. T. Lee[C7-369] and had also
kept the national headquarters informed of each of his changes of
mailing address.[C7-370] Those events no doubt had their effects on
Oswald.
Interest in Cuba
By August of 1963, Oswald had for some time been considering the
possibility of leaving the United States again. On June 24, 1963, he
applied for a new passport[C7-371] and in late June or early July
he told his wife that he wanted to return to the Soviet Union with
her. She said that he was extremely upset, very unhappy, and that he
actually wept when he told her that.[C7-372] He said that nothing
kept him in the United States, that he would not lose anything if he
returned to the Soviet Union, that he wanted to be with her and that
it would be better to have less and not have to be concerned about
tomorrow.[C7-373]
As a result of that conversation, Marina Oswald wrote the Soviet
Embassy in Washington concerning a request she had first made on
February 17, 1963, for permission for herself and June to return to
the Soviet Union.[C7-374] While that first request, made according to
Marina Oswald at her husband’s insistence, specifically stated that
Oswald was to remain in the United States, she wrote in her letter
of July 1963, that “things are improving due to the fact that my
husband expresses a sincere wish to return together with me to the
USSR.”[C7-375] Unknown to his wife, however, Oswald apparently enclosed
a note with her letter of July in which he requested the Embassy to
rush his wife’s entrance visa because of the impending birth of the
second child but stated that: “As for my return entrance visa please
consider it _separtably_.”[C7-376]
Thus, while Oswald’s real intentions, assuming that they were known to
himself, are not clear, he may not have intended to go to the Soviet
Union directly, if at all.[C7-377] It appears that he really wanted to
go to Cuba. In his wife’s words:
I only know that his basic desire was to get to Cuba by any
means, and that all the rest of it was window dressing for that
purpose.[C7-378]
Marina Oswald testified that her husband engaged in Fair Play for Cuba
Committee activities “primarily for purposes of self-advertising. He
wanted to be arrested. I think he wanted to get into the newspapers, so
that he would be known.”[C7-379] According to Marina Oswald, he thought
that would help him when he got to Cuba.[C7-380] He asked his wife to
help him to hijack an airplane to get there, but gave up that scheme
when she refused.[C7-381]
During this period Oswald may have practiced opening and closing the
bolt on his rifle in a screened porch in his apartment.[C7-382] In
September he began to review Spanish.[C7-383] He approved arrangements
for his family to return to Irving, Tex., to live with Mrs. Ruth
Paine.[C7-384] On September 20, 1963, Mrs. Paine and her two children
arrived in New Orleans from a trip to the East Coast[C7-385] and left
for Irving with Marina Oswald and June and most of the Oswalds’ effects
3 days later.[C7-386] While Marina Oswald knew of her husband’s plan
to go to Mexico and thence to Cuba if possible,[C7-387] Mrs. Paine was
told that Oswald was going to Houston and possibly to Philadelphia to
look for work.[C7-388]
Oswald left for Mexico City on September 25, 1963, and arrived on
September 27, 1963. He went almost directly to the Cuban Embassy and
applied for a visa to Cuba in transit to Russia.[C7-389] Representing
himself as the head of the New Orleans branch of the “organization
called ‘Fair Play for Cuba,’ he stated his desire that he should be
accepted as a ‘friend’ of the Cuban Revolution.”[C7-390] He apparently
based his claim for a visa in transit to Russia on his previous
residence, his work permit for that country, and several unidentified
letters in the Russian language. The Cubans would not, however, give
him a visa until he had received one from the Soviets, which involved a
delay of several months. When faced with that situation Oswald became
greatly agitated, and although he later unsuccessfully attempted to
obtain a Soviet visa at the Soviet Embassy in Mexico City, he insisted
that he was entitled to the Cuban visa because of his background,
partisanship, and personal activities on behalf of the Cuban movement.
He engaged in an angry argument with the consul who finally told him
that “as far as he was concerned he would not give him a visa” and that
“a person like him [Oswald] in place of aiding the Cuban Revolution,
was doing it harm.”[C7-391]
Oswald must have been thoroughly disillusioned when he left Mexico City
on October 2, 1963. In spite of his former residence in the Soviet
Union and his Fair Play for Cuba Committee activities he had been
rebuffed by the officials of both Cuba and the Soviet Union in Mexico
City. Now there appeared to be no chance to get to Cuba, where he had
thought he might find his communist ideal. The U.S. Government would
not permit travel there and as far as the performance of the Cubans
themselves was concerned, he was “disappointed at not being able to
get to Cuba, and he didn’t have any great desire to do so any more
because he had run into, as he himself said--into bureaucracy and red
tape.”[C7-392]
Oswald’s attempt to go to Cuba was another act which expressed his
hostility toward the United States and its institutions as well as a
concomitant attachment to a country in which he must have thought were
embodied the political principles to which he had been committed for
so long. It should be noted that his interest in Cuba seems to have
increased along with the sense of frustration which must have developed
as he experienced successive failures in his jobs, in his political
activity, and in his personal relationships. In retrospect his attempt
to go to Cuba or return to the Soviet Union may well have been Oswald’s
last escape hatch, his last gambit to extricate himself from the
mediocrity and defeat which plagued him throughout most of his life.
Oswald’s activities with regard to Cuba raise serious questions as
to how much he might have been motivated in the assassination by a
desire to aid the Castro regime, which President Kennedy so outspokenly
criticized. For example, the Dallas Times Herald of November 19, 1963,
prominently reported President Kennedy as having “all but invited
the Cuban people today to overthrow Fidel Castro’s Communist regime
and promised prompt U.S. aid if they do.”[C7-393] The Castro regime
severely attacked President Kennedy in connection with the Bay of
Pigs affair, the Cuban missile crisis, the ban on travel to Cuba, the
economic embargo against that country, and the general policy of the
United States with regard to Cuba. An examination of the Militant, to
which Oswald subscribed,[C7-394] for the 3-month period prior to the
assassination reflects an extremely critical attitude toward President
Kennedy and his administration concerning Cuban policy in general as
well as on the issues of automation and civil rights, issues which
appeared to concern Oswald a great deal.[C7-395] The Militant also
reflected a critical attitude toward President Kennedy’s attempts to
reduce tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union. It
also dealt with the fear of the Castro regime that such a policy might
result in its abandonment by the Soviet Union.
The October 7, 1963, issue of the Militant reported Castro as saying
Cuba could not accept a situation where at the same time the United
States was trying to ease world tensions it also “was increasing
its efforts to ‘tighten the noose’ around Cuba.”[C7-396] Castro’s
opposition to President Kennedy’s attempt to reduce world tensions was
also reported in the October 1, 1963, issue of the Worker, to which
Oswald also subscribed.[C7-397] In this connection it should be noted
that in speaking of the Worker, Oswald told Michael Paine, apparently
in all seriousness, that “you could tell what they wanted you to do *
* * by reading between the lines, reading the thing and doing a little
reading between the lines.”[C7-398]
The general conflict of views between the United States and Cuba was,
of course, reflected in other media to such an extent that there can
be no doubt that Oswald was aware generally of the critical attitude
that Castro expressed about President Kennedy. Oswald was asked during
the New Orleans radio debate in which he engaged on August 21, 1963,
whether or not he agreed with Castro that President Kennedy was a
“ruffian and a thief.” He replied that he “would not agree with that
particular wording.”[C7-399] It should also be noted, however, that
one witness testified that shortly before the assassination Oswald had
expressed approval of President Kennedy’s active role in the area of
civil rights.[C7-400]
Although Oswald could possibly have been motivated in part by his
sympathy for the Castro government, it should be remembered that his
wife testified that he was disappointed with his failure to get to Cuba
and had lost his desire to do so because of the bureaucracy and red
tape which he had encountered.[C7-401] His unhappy experience with the
Cuban consul seems thus to have reduced his enthusiasm for the Castro
regime and his desire to go to Cuba.
While some of Castro’s more severe criticisms of President Kennedy
might have led Oswald to believe that he would be well received in Cuba
after he had assassinated the American President, it does not appear
that he had any plans to go there. Oswald was carrying only $13.87 at
the time of his arrest, although he had left, apparently by design,
$170 in a wallet in his wife’s room in Irving.[C7-402] If there was no
conspiracy which would help him escape, the possibility of which has
been considered in chapter VI, it is unlikely that a reasoning person
would plan to attempt to travel from Dallas, Tex., to Cuba with $13.87
when considerably greater resources were available to him. The fact
that Oswald left behind the funds which might have enabled him to reach
Cuba suggests the absence of any plan to try to flee there and raises
serious questions as to whether or not he ever expected to escape.
Possible Influence of Anti-Kennedy Sentiment in Dallas
It has been suggested that one of the motivating influences operating
on Lee Oswald was the atmosphere in the city of Dallas, especially an
atmosphere of extreme opposition to President Kennedy that was present
in some parts of the Dallas community and which received publicity
there prior to the assassination.[C7-403] Some of that feeling was
expressed in the incident involving then vice-presidential candidate
Johnson during the 1960 campaign, in the treatment of Ambassador Adlai
Stevenson late in October of 1963 and in the extreme anti-Kennedy
newspaper advertisement and handbills that appeared in Dallas at the
time of the President’s visit there.[C7-404]
The Commission has found no evidence that the extreme views expressed
toward President Kennedy by some rightwing groups centered in Dallas
or any other general atmosphere of hate or rightwing extremism which
may have existed in the city of Dallas had any connection with Oswald’s
actions on November 22, 1963. There is, of course, no way to judge
what the effect of the general political ferment present in that city
might have been, even though Oswald was aware of it. His awareness is
shown by a letter that he wrote to Arnold Johnson of the Communist
Party U.S.A., which Johnson said he did not receive until after the
assassination. The letter said in part:
On October 23rd, I had attened a ultra-right meeting headed by
General Edwin A. Walker, who lives in Dallas.
This meeting preceded by one day the attack on A. E. Stevenson
at the United Nations Day meeting at which he spoke
As you can see, political friction between “left” and “right”
is very great here.
Could you advise me as to the general view we have on the
American Civil Liberties Union?[C7-405]
In any event, the Commission has been unable to find any credible
evidence that Oswald had direct contact or association with any of
the personalities or groups epitomizing or representing the so-called
rightwing, even though he did, as he told Johnson, attend a meeting
at which General Walker spoke to approximately 1,300 persons.[C7-406]
Oswald’s writings and his reading habits indicate that he had an
extreme dislike of the rightwing, an attitude most clearly reflected by
his attempt to shoot General Walker.
Relationship With Wife
The relations between Lee and Marina Oswald are of great importance
in any attempt to understand Oswald’s possible motivation. During the
period from Oswald’s return from Mexico to the assassination, he and
his wife spent every weekend but one together at the Irving, Tex.,
home of Mrs. Ruth Paine, who was then separated from her husband. The
sole exception was the weekend of November 16-17, 1963, the weekend
before the assassination, when his wife asked Oswald not to come to
Irving. During the week, Oswald lived in a roominghouse in Dallas, but
he usually called his wife on the telephone twice a day.[C7-407] She
testified that after his return from Mexico Oswald “changed for the
better. He began to treat me better. * * * He helped me more--although
he always did help. But he was more attentive.”[C7-408] Marina Oswald
attributed that to their living apart and to the imminent birth of
their second child. She testified that Oswald “was very happy” about
the birth of the child.[C7-409]
While those considerations no doubt had an effect on Oswald’s attitude
toward his family it would seem that the need for support and sympathy
after his recent rebuffs in Mexico City might also have been important
to him. It would not have been the first time that Oswald sought closer
ties with his family in time of adversity.[C7-410]
His past relationships with his wife had been stormy, however, and it
did not seem that she respected him very much. They had been married
after a courtship of only about 6 weeks, a part of which Oswald
spent in the hospital. Oswald’s diary reports that he married his
wife shortly after his proposal of marriage to another girl had been
rejected. He stated that the other girl rejected him partly because
he was an American, a fact that he said she had exploited. He stated
that “In spite of fact I married Marina to hurt Ella [the girl that had
rejected him] I found myself in love with Marina.”[C7-411] Many of the
people with whom the Oswalds became acquainted after their arrival in
the United States thought that Marina Oswald had married her husband
primarily in the hope that she would be able to leave the Soviet Union.
Marina Oswald has denied this.[C7-412]
Marina Oswald expressed one aspect of her husband’s attitude toward her
when she testified that:
* * * Lee wanted me to go to Russia, and I told him that if he
wanted me to go then that meant that he didn’t love me, and
that in that case what was the idea of coming to the United
States in the first place. Lee would say that it would be
better for me if I went to Russia. I did not know why. I did
not know what he had in mind. He said he loved me but that it
would be better for me if I went to Russia, and what he had in
mind I don’t know.[C7-413]
On the other hand, Oswald objected to the invitation that his wife
had received to live with Mrs. Ruth Paine, which Mrs. Paine had
made in part to give her an alternative to returning to the Soviet
Union.[C7-414] Marina Oswald wrote to Mrs. Paine that: “Many times he
[Oswald] has recalled this matter to me and said that I am just waiting
for an opportunity to hurt him. It has been the cause of many of our
arguments.”[C7-415] Oswald claimed that his wife preferred others to
him.[C7-416] He said this about members of the Russian-speaking group
in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, whom she said he tried to forbid her from
seeing,[C7-417] and also about Mrs. Paine.[C7-418] He specifically made
that claim when his wife refused to come to live with him in Dallas as
he asked her to do on the evening of November 21, 1963.[C7-419]
The instability of their relations was probably a function of the
personalities of both people. Oswald was overbearing in relations with
his wife. He apparently attempted to be “the Commander” by dictating
many of the details of their married life.[C7-420] While Marina Oswald
said that her husband wanted her to learn English,[C7-421] he made no
attempt to help her and there are other indications that he did not
want her to learn that language. Oswald apparently wished to continue
practicing his own Russian with her.[C7-422] Lieutenant Martello of
the New Orleans police testified that Oswald stated that he did not
speak English in his family because he did not want them to become
Americanized.[C7-423] Marina Oswald’s inability to speak English also
made it more difficult for her to have an independent existence in this
country. Oswald struck his wife on occasion,[C7-424] did not want her
to drink, smoke or wear cosmetics[C7-425] and generally treated her
with lack of respect in the presence of others.[C7-426]
The difficulties which Oswald’s problems would have caused him in any
relationship were probably not reduced by his wife’s conduct. Katherine
Ford, with whom Marina Oswald stayed during her separation from her
husband in November of 1962, thought that Marina Oswald was immature
in her thinking and partly responsible for the difficulties that the
Oswalds were having at that time.[C7-427] Mrs. Ford said that Marina
Oswald admitted that she provoked Oswald on occasion.[C7-428] There
can be little doubt that some provocation existed. Oswald once struck
his wife because of a letter which she wrote to a former boy friend in
Russia. In the letter Marina Oswald stated that her husband had changed
a great deal and that she was very lonely in the United States. She was
“sorry that I had not married him [the Russian boy friend] instead,
that it would have been much easier for me.”[C7-429] The letter fell
into Oswald’s hands when it was returned to his post office box because
of insufficient postage, which apparently resulted from an increase in
postal rates of which his wife had been unaware.[C7-430] Oswald read
the letter, but refused to believe that it was sincere, even though
his wife insisted to him that it was. As a result Oswald struck her,
as to which she testified: “Generally, I think that was right, for
such things that is the right thing to do. There was some grounds for
it.”[C7-431]
Although she denied it in some of her testimony before the
Commission,[C7-432] it appears that Marina Oswald also complained
that her husband was not able to provide more material things for
her.[C7-433] On that issue George De Mohrenschildt, who was probably as
close to the Oswalds as anyone else during their first stay in Dallas,
said that:
She was annoying him all the time--“Why don’t you make some
money?” * * * Poor guy was going out of his mind. * * *
We told her she should not annoy him--poor guy, he is doing his
best, “Don’t annoy him so much.” * * *[C7-434]
The De Mohrenschildts also testified that “right in front” of
Oswald Marina Oswald complained about Oswald’s inadequacy as a
husband.[C7-435] Mrs. Oswald told another of her friends that Oswald
was very cold to her, that they very seldom had sexual relations and
that Oswald “was not a man.”[C7-436] She also told Mrs. Paine that she
was not satisfied with her sexual relations with Oswald.[C7-437]
Marina Oswald also ridiculed her husband’s political views, thereby
tearing down his view of his own importance. He was very much
interested in autobiographical works of outstanding statesmen of the
United States, to whom his wife thought he compared himself.[C7-438]
She said he was different from other people in “At least his
imagination, his fantasy, which was quite unfounded, as to the fact
that he was an outstanding man.”[C7-439] She said that she “always
tried to point out to him that he was a man like any others who were
around us. But he simply could not understand that.”[C7-440] Jeanne De
Mohrenschildt, however, thought that Marina Oswald “said things that
will hurt men’s pride.”[C7-441] She said that if she ever spoke to her
husband the way Marina Oswald spoke to her husband, “we would not last
long.”[C7-442] Mrs. De Mohrenschildt thought that Oswald, whom she
compared to “a puppy dog that everybody kicked,”[C7-443] had a lot of
good qualities, in spite of the fact that “Nobody said anything good
about him.”[C7-444] She had “the impression that he was just pushed,
pushed, pushed, and she [Marina Oswald] was probably nagging, nagging,
nagging.”[C7-445] She thought that he might not have become involved in
the assassination if people had been kinder to him.[C7-446]
In spite of these difficulties, however, and in the face of the
economic problems that were always with them, things apparently went
quite smoothly from the time Oswald returned from Mexico until the
weekend of November 16-17, 1963.[C7-447] Mrs. Paine was planning a
birthday party for one of her children on that weekend and her husband,
Michael, was to be at the house. Marina Oswald said that she knew her
husband did not like Michael Paine and so she asked him not to come
out that weekend, even though he wanted to do so. She testified that
she told him “that he shouldn’t come every week, that perhaps it is
not convenient for Ruth that the whole family be there, live there.”
She testified that he responded: “As you wish. If you don’t want me
to come, I won’t.”[C7-448] Ruth Paine testified that she heard Marina
Oswald tell Oswald about the birthday party.[C7-449]
On Sunday, November 17, 1963, Ruth Paine and Marina Oswald decided to
call Oswald[C7-450] at the place where he was living, unbeknownst to
them, under the name of O. H. Lee.[C7-451] They asked for Lee Oswald
who was not called to the telephone because he was known by the other
name.[C7-452] When Oswald called the next day his wife became very
angry about his use of the alias.[C7-453] He said that he used it
because “he did not want his landlady to know his real name because
she might read in the paper of the fact that he had been in Russia and
that he had been questioned.”[C7-454] Oswald also said that he did not
want the FBI to know where he lived “Because their visits were not
very pleasant for him and he thought that he loses jobs because the
FBI visits the place of his employment.”[C7-455] While the facts of
his defection had become known in New Orleans as a result of his radio
debate with Bringuier,[C7-456] it would appear to be unlikely that
his landlady in Dallas would see anything in the newspaper about his
defection, unless he engaged in activities similar to those which had
led to the disclosure of his defection in New Orleans. Furthermore,
even though it appears that at times Oswald was really upset by visits
of the FBI, it does not appear that he ever lost his job because of
its activities, although he may well not have been aware of that
fact.[C7-457]
While Oswald’s concern about the FBI had some basis in fact, in
that FBI agents had interviewed him in the past and had renewed
their interest to some extent after his Fair Play for Cuba Committee
activities had become known, he exaggerated their concern for
him. Marina Oswald thought he did so in order to emphasize his
importance.[C7-458] For example, in his letter of November 9, 1963, to
the Soviet Embassy in Washington, he asked about the entrance visas for
which he and his wife had previously applied. He absolved the Soviet
Embassy in Mexico City of any blame for his difficulties there. He
advised the Washington Embassy that the FBI was “not now” interested
in his Fair Play for Cuba Committee activities, but noted that the FBI
“has visited us here in Dallas, Texas, on November 1. Agent James P.
Hasty warned me that if I engaged in F.P.C.C. activities in Texas the
F.B.I. will again take an ‘interrest’ in me.”[C7-459] Neither Hosty
nor any other agent of the FBI spoke to Oswald on any subject from
August 10, 1963, to the time of the assassination.[C7-460] The claimed
warning was one more of Oswald’s fabrications. Hosty had come to the
Paine residence on November 1 and 5, 1963, but did not issue any such
warning or suggest that Marina Oswald defect from the Soviet Union
and remain in the United States under FBI protection, as Oswald went
on to say.[C7-461] In Oswald’s imagination “I and my wife strongly
protested these tactics by the notorious F.B.I.”[C7-462] In fact, his
wife testified that she only said that she would prefer not to receive
any more visits from the Bureau because of the “very exciting and
disturbing effect” they had upon her husband,[C7-463] who was not even
present at that time.[C7-464]
The arguments he used to justify his use of the alias suggest that
Oswald may have come to think that the whole world was becoming
involved in an increasingly complex conspiracy against him. He may
have felt he could never tell when the FBI was going to appear on the
scene or who else was going to find out about his defection and use it
against him as had been done in New Orleans.[C7-465] On the other hand,
the concern he expressed about the FBI may have been just another story
to support the objective he sought in his letter.
Those arguments, however, were not persuasive to Marina Oswald, to whom
“it was nothing terrible if people were to find out that he had been
in Russia.”[C7-466] She asked Oswald: “After all, when will all your
foolishness come to an end? All of these comedies. First one thing and
then another. And now this fictitious name.”[C7-467] She said: “On
Monday [November 18, 1963] he called several times, but after I hung up
on him and didn’t want to talk to him he did not call again. He then
arrived on Thursday [November 21, 1963].”[C7-468]
The events of that evening can best be appreciated through Marina
Oswald’s testimony:
Q. Did your husband give any reason for coming home on Thursday?
A. He said that he was lonely because he hadn’t come the
preceding weekend, and he wanted to make his peace with me.
Q. Did you say anything to him then?
A. He tried to talk to me but I would not answer him, and he
was very upset.
Q. Were you upset with him?
A. I was angry, of course. He was not angry--he was upset. I
was angry. He tried very hard to please me. He spent quite a
bit of time putting away diapers and played with the children
on the street.
Q. How did you indicate to him that you were angry with him?
A. By not talking to him.
Q. And how did he show that he was upset?
A. He was upset over the fact that I would not answer him.
He tried to start a conversation with me several times, but
I would not answer. And he said that he didn’t want me to be
angry at him because this upsets him.
On that day, he suggested that we rent an apartment in Dallas.
He said that he was tired of living alone and perhaps the
reason for my being so angry was the fact that we were not
living together. That if I want to he would rent an apartment
in Dallas tomorrow--that he didn’t want me to remain with Ruth
any longer, but wanted me to live with him in Dallas.
He repeated this not once but several times, but I refused. And
he said that once again I was preferring my friends to him, and
that I didn’t need him.
Q. What did you say to that?
A. I said it would be better if I remained with Ruth until
the holidays, he would come, and we would all meet together.
That this was better because while he was living alone and I
stayed with Ruth, we were spending less money. And I told him
to buy me a washing machine, because two children it became too
difficult to wash by hand.
Q. What did he say to that?
A. He said he would buy me a washing machine.
Q. What did you say to that?
A. Thank you. That it would be better if he bought something
for himself--that I would manage.[C7-469]
That night Oswald went to bed before his wife retired. She did not
speak to him when she joined him there, although she thought that he
was still awake. The next morning he left for work before anyone else
arose.[C7-470] For the first time he left his wedding ring in a cup on
the dresser in his room.[C7-471] He also left $170 in a wallet in one
of the dresser drawers. He took with him $13.87[C7-472] and the long
brown package that Frazier and Mrs. Randle saw him carry and which he
was to take to the School Book Depository.[C7-473]
The Unanswered Questions
No one will ever know what passed through Oswald’s mind during the week
before November 22, 1963. Instead of returning to Irving on November 15
for his customary weekend visit, he remained in Dallas at his wife’s
suggestion because of the birthday party. He had argued with her
over the use of an alias and had not called her after that argument,
although he usually telephoned once or twice a day. Then on Thursday
morning, November 21, he asked Frazier for a ride to Irving that
night, stating falsely that he wanted to pick up some curtain rods to
put in an apartment.[C7-474]
He must have planned his attack at the very latest prior to Thursday
morning when he spoke to Frazier. There is, of course, no way to
determine the degree to which he was committed to his plan at that
time. While there is no way to tell when he first began to think
specifically of assassinating the President it should be noted that
mention of the Trade Mart as the expected site of the Presidential
luncheon appeared in The Dallas Times Herald on November 15,
1963.[C7-475] The next day that paper announced the final approval
of the Trade Mart as the luncheon site and stated that the motorcade
“apparently will loop through the downtown area, probably on Main
Street, en route from Dallas Love Field” on its way to the Trade Mart
on Stemmons Freeway.[C7-476] Anyone who was familiar with that area
of Dallas would have known that the motorcade would probably pass the
Texas School Book Depository to get from Main Street onto the Stemmons
Freeway. That fact was made precisely clear in subsequent news stories
on November 19, 20, and 22.[C7-477]
On November 15, 1963, the same day that his wife told him not to come
to Irving, Oswald could have assumed that the Presidential motorcade
would pass in front of his place of work. Whether he thought about
assassinating the President over the weekend can never be known, but
it is reasonably certain that over the weekend he did think about
his wife’s request that he not come to Irving, which was prompted
by the birthday party being held at the Paine home. Oswald had a
highly exaggerated sense of his own importance, but he had failed at
almost everything he had ever tried to do. He had great difficulty in
establishing meaningful relations with other people. Except for his
family he was completely alone. Even though he had searched--in the
Marine Corps, in his ideal of communism, in the Soviet Union and in his
attempt to get to Cuba--he had never found anything to which he felt he
could really belong.
After he returned from his trip to Mexico where his application to go
to Cuba had been sharply rejected, it must have appeared to him that
he was unable to command even the attention of his family. He could
not keep them with him in Dallas, where at least he could see his
children whom, several witnesses testified, he seemed to love.[C7-478]
His family lived with Mrs. Paine, ostensibly because Oswald could not
afford to keep an apartment in Dallas, but it was also, at least in
part, because his wife did not want to live there with him.[C7-479] Now
it appeared that he was not welcome at the Paine home, where he had
spent every previous weekend since his return from Mexico and his wife
was once again calling into question his judgment, this time concerning
his use of an alias.
The conversation on Monday, November 18, 1963, ended when Marina Oswald
hung up and refused to talk to him. Although he may long before have
decided on the course he was to follow and may have told his wife the
things he did on the evening of November 21, 1963, merely to disarm
her and to provide a justification of sorts, both she and Mrs. Paine
thought he had come home to make up after the fight on Monday.[C7-480]
Thoughts of his personal difficulties must have been at least partly
on his mind when he went to Irving on Thursday night and told his wife
that he was lonely, that he wanted to make peace with her and bring his
family to Dallas where they could live with him again.
The Commission does not believe that the relations between Oswald
and his wife caused him to assassinate the President. It is unlikely
that the motivation was that simple. The feelings of hostility and
aggression which seem to have played such an important part in Oswald’s
life were part of his character long before he met his wife and such a
favorable opportunity to strike at a figure as great as the President
would probably never have come to him again.
Oswald’s behavior after the assassination throws little light on his
motives. The fact that he took so little money with him when he left
Irving in the morning indicates that he did not expect to get very far
from Dallas on his own and suggests the possibility, as did his note
to his wife just prior to the attempt on General Walker, that he did
not expect to escape at all. On the other hand, he could have traveled
some distance with the money he did have and he did return to his room
where he obtained his revolver. He then killed Patrolman Tippit when
that police officer apparently tried to question him after he had left
his roominghouse and he vigorously resisted arrest when he was finally
apprehended in the Texas Theatre. Although it is not fully corroborated
by others who were present, two officers have testified that at the
time of his arrest Oswald said something to the effect that “it’s all
over now.”[C7-481]
Oswald was overbearing and arrogant throughout much of the time between
his arrest and his own death.[C7-482] He consistently refused to
admit involvement in the assassination or in the killing of Patrolman
Tippit.[C7-483] While he did become enraged at at least one point in
his interrogation, the testimony of the officers present indicates that
he handled himself with considerable composure during his questioning.
He admitted nothing that would damage him but discussed other matters
quite freely.[C7-484] His denials under questioning, which have no
probative value in view of the many readily demonstrable lies he told
at that time[C7-485] and in the face of the overwhelming evidence
against him which has been set forth above, only served to prolong the
period during which he was the center of the attention of the entire
world.
Conclusion
Many factors were undoubtedly involved in Oswald’s motivation for the
assassination, and the Commission does not believe that it can ascribe
to him any one motive or group of motives. It is apparent, however,
that Oswald was moved by an overriding hostility to his environment.
He does not appear to have been able to establish meaningful
relationships with other people. He was perpetually discontented with
the world around him. Long before the assassination he expressed his
hatred for American society and acted in protest against it. Oswald’s
search for what he conceived to be the perfect society was doomed from
the start. He sought for himself a place in history--a role as the
“great man” who would be recognized as having been in advance of his
times. His commitment to Marxism and communism appears to have been
another important factor in his motivation. He also had demonstrated a
capacity to act decisively and without regard to the consequences when
such action would further his aims of the moment. Out of these and the
many other factors which may have molded the character of Lee Harvey
Oswald there emerged a man capable of assassinating President Kennedy.