Did Oswald act alone?

[gopiscrap]

129 votes, 9 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	yes
	37 (29%)
	no
	92 (71%)
	9 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
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[anciano]

1. With all due respect,

your poll doesn't offer the option that he didn't act at all, that he truly was a patsy and was set up to take the blame. Just saying.....

[oswaldactedalone]

2. oswaldactedalone

believes, after years of careful consideration, that Oswald acted alone.

[ColinC]

28. I don't believe you

Your profile name lacks the commitment I feel is necessary to truly think you believe this

[underpants]

3. Kennedy was shot from the front.

Probably from a sewer drain down hill. From the umbrella guy on the hill.

[rzemanfl]

4. I will listen to the Rob Reiner podcasts and see what I think after that. n/t

[dflprincess]

11. I've listened through episode three

It's well done.

[rzemanfl]

20. Thank you. I have yet to start on it.

[ProfessorGAC]

5. Define "Alone"

I've always been suspicious of his actions after the shooting.
Slipping out, taking a bus, getting stuck in the traffic, leaving the bus but getting a transfer ticket, taking a cab, but getting dropped off 3 blocks from his room,, going back to his room, changing clothes, getting a gun, leaves on foot, in the direction of a bus stop that leads to a house occupied by Cuban radicals....
This feels like a guy with an exit plan. Getting spotted by Tippett & subsequently shooting him threw sand in the gears.
An exit plan to where, by a guy with no car?
Was he the sole shooter? Probably so.
Did he have allies? A guy with an exit plan would seem to need allies.

[liberalmediaaddict]

17. I read he was hoping to eventually catch a bus to Mexico

But he was such a moron he got on a bus that was headed right back to dealy plaza so he got off.

Then he encountered Officer Tippet and whatever plan Oswald had to evade arrest was done.

[John1956PA]

27. One writer suggested that Oswald intended to revisit Ret. Gen. Walker.

I do not necessarily believe that Oswald was determined to make one last hit by showing up at the front door of Retired General Walker and shooting him with his handgun, but it is possibility, considering the feverish mental state Oswald was in.

[Butterflylady]

6. Oswald was a patsy.

He wasn't smart enough to plan and carry it out. It had to be timed down to the second. He was set up to Take the fall. Ruby was sent in to make sure Oswald didn't talk.

[TwilightZone]

8. I'm not sure why it would require intelligence...

to shoot someone from the building in which one works. He had a gun. The parade route was public information. Doesn't take a master planner to figure that one out.

[Mister Ed]

16. I've always wondered why an innocent patsy would shoot Officer Tippet when confronted.

Is it believed that Oswald was set up to take the fall in that shooting as well?

[Archae]

57. Then other Presidential assassins were "patsys" too.

Lincoln's killer was a rabid Southern sympathizer who used his fame as an actor to recruit fellow losers, radicals and drunks.

Garfield's killer was a religious kook who was convinced God was going to give him a cushy government job.

McKinley's killer was an anarchist loser.

The women who shot at Ford were a radical, and a Manson family groupie.

The guy who shot Reagan was a certified nutcase.
Still is.

So is it so "impossible" for a radical leftist like Oswald to buy a rifle and scope through mail-order and shoot Kennedy with it?
It's been 60 years now.
None of the actual CONFIRMED evidence shows anyone except Oswald.

[moondust]

7. My Pet Theory

Oswald was a nut job.

On April 10, 1963, just seven months before he shot and killed President John F. Kennedy, the inscrutable assassin Lee Harvey Oswald crouched behind a fence in an upscale Dallas neighborhood and aimed his rifle at the window of an ultra-conservative firebrand named Edwin Walker, a former U.S. Army general.
~
(After returning from the Soviet Union), Oswald worked as a typesetter and read Russian-language communist newspapers in the break room. He would have been more than familiar with a figure like Walker, who was one of the loudest anti-Communist voices in Dallas and the country as a whole.
~
https://www.history.com/news/lee-harvey-oswald-other-target

Oswald hated the anti-Communist so much that he found out where the guy lived and tried to assassinate him.

Seven months later Oswald learned that the leader of the anti-Communist world--JFK--was coming to Dallas and his parade would be passing right under where Oswald worked! Inconceivable coincidence and opportunity! He could take him out without even leaving work! Unbelievable!

He couldn't resist. I believe it was a crime of unimaginable opportunity by a total nut job.

(I don't know about Jack Ruby.)

[GuppyGal]

12. Good Point nt

[LeftInTX]

21. Yes he was.

Maybe he thought he would receive a big payout or would become a Soviet hero.
He was stupid anyway. Who goes and shoots a cop the same day as POTUS? Duh.....

Can't remember the details of his falling out with Soviets.

[moondust]

24. He didn't really fall out with them.

That's why he attacked the anti-Communists.

His Wiki page documents a long history of psychiatric/behavioral problems since at least age 12:

By age 15, he considered himself a socialist.
Court-martialed twice in the Marines and jailed.
Much more...

In the USSR they eventually sent him to Belarus to work as a lathe operator but he got bored with it and decided he didn't want to stay. They didn't make him a hero, damn it!

He was always a basket case.

[exboyfil]

31. Oswald cared more about being a big man

Than anything else. It was the prime motivation in his life. He was pretty much a failure in everything. Not an uncommon motivator for murderers/assassins.

[Poiuyt]

9. Oswald acted alone but shot him from the grassy knoll.

Seriously, the government acted very strangely (taking the body back to Washington for the autopsy, etc). It's not hard to understand why there is so much distrust of the official story.

[intheflow]

58. I just watched a documentary called What the Doctors Saw.

It talked with several of the attending emergency physicians at the Dallas hospital. From their accounts, I’ve changed my mind and believe there were, in fact, two (or more) shooters.

[chouchou]

10. As with any such plan, make sure consistent and confusing realities..

...are wonderfully spewed like a gigantic fire hose.
Akin to throwing a bag full of lotto numbers and guess which ones will fall in a neat row.
No one will never, ever know.

[brooklynite]

13. I don't care...

...any more than I care what happened to Judge Crater.

[Polybius]

14. The dead giveaway is Jack Ruby

No one is going to risk life in prison murdering someone for a person that they didn't even know. It's painfully obvious.

[liberalmediaaddict]

18. Ruby was a manic depressive

He truly believed after he shot Oswald the Dallas police would thank him, give him a medal and let him go. In his manic state Ruby truly believed he was doing something heroic.

[Chainfire]

52. That is not necessarily true.

Ruby made his mark on history. People kill for a lot less than that.

[rickford66]

15. The book Mortal Error is a good read.

Just from the ballistics and eye-witness reports which were ignored, the book proves JFK was shot by Oswald alone and shot by a Secret Service agent by accident. I've read the book twice over the years. It clarifies all the odd actions by officials after the assassination and explains each bit of evidence available. All the other books I've read about this, and I have read almost everyone, each come up with explanations without proof. If anyone else has read this I'd like to hear from you.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortal_Error

[exboyfil]

30. Doesn't match the forensics

The bullet from the head shot broke into pieces and one of the pieces hit the frame of the front windshield. I have an image of a simulated skull with gelatin being hit by a jacket ed Car ano round which has a comparable spray pattern to the Zapruder frame.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

33. I had not heard of this book before.

My library does not have it, so I've ordered it from that big book place.

Over the years I've read various books about the assassination, and NOTHING is remotely convincing that Oswald did anything other than act alone.

[exboyfil]

41. Read Posner for a short read or Bugliosi for a massive tome

Bugliosi's book Reclaiming History is massively sourced.

I read Mortal Error 30 years ago. Once I found out about the evidence that the Carcano bullet fragments were found in the limo and that a fragment had struck the frame of the windshield, it convinced me that the third shot was not a fragmenting bullet like what was used by the Secret Service. Oswald used military grade jacketed rounds.

[The Revolution]

19. Yes

At the end of the day it is the simplest answer. If it was a conspiracy, then they managed to come up with the most convoluted plan possible and also somehow managed to pull it off.

[treestar]

22. He could have

He obtained the rifle on his own. He took advantage of the place he worked at and brought the rifle to work the day of the shooting, after he knew the motorcade would go by. The way he got the job was word of mouth, as he had a neighbor woh had a job at the Book Depository and knew they needed more people to work.

[struggle4progress]

23. I think it was a giant conspiracy involving Nixon, the mob, Jackie, the CIA, LBJ, the Bush family, and

the Soviets

[LeftInTX]

34. Don't forget the Illuminate, UN and UFOs,

[struggle4progress]

35. Sasquatch and Nessie of Loch Ness were also involved through the Trilateral Commission

[Johonny]

25. Booth was an actor not Oswald

Come on now.

[exboyfil]

29. Posner and Bugliosi convinced me Oswald acted alone

[John1956PA]

32. Oswald deservedly got pummeled by police at his arrest at the theater

When Detective Bentley approached Oswald in the theater, Oswald drew his pistol, aimed at Detective Bentley, and pulled the trigger. Detective Bentley instinctively reached for the weapon. The pistol hammer came down on the web of Detective Bentley's hand. Detective Bentley's hand was lacerated by the moving hammer, and he bore a scar therefrom for the remainder of his life. If the web of Detective Bentley's hand had not stopped the hammer's motion, the pistol would have discharged, and Detective Bentley likely would have been killed.

At the time the below photo of Oswald being dragged out of the theater was snapped, he exclaimed that he protested "this police brutality" and that he was "not resisting."

[exboyfil]

40. Same guy you would expect would scream patsy

No self serving statement he made can be given any credibility. The smirk alone showed he was having the time of his life (like so many other murderers).

Even with his so called political philosophy it wouldn't matter who was President at the time. Just like Hinkley stalked both Carter and Reagan, he would have taken the shot because chance put him in position to take that shot. His boss hired two people at the same time - the other went to a different location to work. On such a coin flip history was changed.

[LeftInTX]

36. Forty years from now, they will review episodes from the History Channel and will wonder

"What were they thinking?"

I read a book written by Sam Giancana's nephew. It was so full of BS. Of course Giancanna was long dead. His nephew said they broke into Marilyn Monroe's house at the request of JFK and killed her with a suppository. Then he said they killed JFK because Bobby was pursuing the mob. They said that JFK was owned and bought by the mob. Such BS.

[NoMoreRepugs]

37. If you've never fired a weapon at someone you cannot imagine

the amount of adrenaline pumping through your body. Anybody can hit a paper target. A cheap mail order rifle and a non-professional shooter make for extraordinarily accurate shots at a moving target. Color me skeptical.

[exboyfil]

39. We was a trained Marine and was firing at a slowly receding target (not moving side to side)

The rifle might have been cheap but it was used in the Italian Army for years. The final shot at Kennedy was at 265 feet. When he qualified on the range the distance was 600 feet where he qualified as a Marksman (second tier of qualification) when he was 17. He scored 48 and 49 out of 50.

Lots of other shooters have matched or exceeded him firing at a moving target using the same model rifle (and even the same rifle in some cases). Some doubt as to whether he used his scope or iron sight, but he could have made the shot with either method. He qualified with iron sites, and it would have been easier to acquire the target by that method after exercising the bolt.

[Aristus]

38. Not this shit again.

The Kennedy conspiracy loons and the Shakespeare conspiracy losers should get together and form a club.

For the same reason: The fact the the evidence that Oswald acted alone and Shakespeare wrote the plays attributed to him is not 100% rock solid and airtight doesn’t mean that space aliens with magic bullets killed Kennedy, or that Lord Muck of Dunghill Hall wrote all those plays.

Conspiracy theories fulfill some kind of strange need, and not all of them are harmful. But God, are they annoying.

[StevieM]

42. I believe Oswald acted alone. But I also believe Edward de Vere wrote Shakespeare's plays.

In both cases I was convinced by the evidence.

[Aristus]

43. Unless there's evidence that he created plays by Ouija board

from 1604 until 1613, when William Shakespeare retired, he couldn’t have. Edward de Vere died in 1604, just as Shakespeare was beginning the most productive part of his career.

[Willto]

44. Alone

I'm not sure why it would require intelligence to shoot someone from the building in which one works. He had a gun. The parade route was public information. Doesn't take a master planner to figure that one out.

Agreed. All the Kennedy assassination proved is that by 1963 the world was too dangerous a place for a sitting president to ride through a major metropolitan area in an open topped convertible.

All of the conspiracy books and documentaries cherry pick the evidence to push whatever narrative they are going for. They often conveniently fail to even mention important facts that completely undermine some of their points. For example, the much lauded "MAGIC BULLET" that supposedly would have had to twist and turn in midair in order make all the necessary wounds on both Kennedy and Connally. In their diagrams of the seating arrangement, they always have Kennedy sitting directly behind Connally and on the same level so that it appears impossible for one bullet to have made the wounds to both. But that's not how they were seated. Kennedy was to the right of Connally and on a slightly elevated seat. When you position them in the correct way no "MAGIC" is needed at all. A single bullet path then lines up perfectly with the wounds created. And the conspiracy pushers "know this" yet they consistently either fail to mention it or even worse intentionally misrepresent how they were seated. In other words, THEY INTENTIONALLY LIE in order to sell what they are pushing.

And let's dispel another myth. That being that this was a difficult shot? Please. We have children here in Alabama that could easily hit you from that window. The longest shot was 88 yards with a scoped rifle from a rested position. Hunters here in my neck of the woods would refer to a shot of that distance on a deer as a "slam dunk".

And for those who believe Oswald wasn't involved at all, I ask why then when approached by him did he shoot officer Tippit later that day? Because there isn't a whisp of a doubt that he did that.

Our minds don't want to let us believe that we live in a crazy world where one lone nut can kill the most powerful man in the world, but we do. Just look at the example of the guy who shot Reagan. Hinckley was severely mentally disturbed and possessed no military or gun training. And yet he put a bullet in Reagan's chest that hit a lung. If he had purchased a larger caliber pistol than the 22 he used he may well have killed Reagan.

[John1956PA]

45. Excellent reply. Reagan came literally within an inch of death.

I believe that I read that Hinckley's bullet missed Reagan's aorta by an inch.

I have visited Dealy Plaza. The shots were not challenging.

Gerald Posner's book explores the order of the shots and the pathes of the bullets. Posner writes about the findings of a firm known as Failure Analysis. According to the firm's findings, the group of three shots took place over an interval of nine seconds. In looking at the Zapruder film, one sees Kennedy in the limousine moving towards the Stemmons Freeway sign which temporarily blocks his appearance on the film. When the president emerges from behind the sign, the president's arms and fists are raised up in an odd appearance. The Failure Analysis conclusion is that the president underwent what is known as the Thornburn Reaction. The second bullet grazed his spinal cord and set off an instantaneous neuorological reaction which caused the president's hands to clench and his arms to rise. Jackie turned to him in astonishment because of his raised arms. It was not apparent that the president had been hit, and no Secret Service agent was drawing any handgun in preparation to discharge it as some conspiracy theories state. As for the tragectory of that second bullet which traveled through the President's neck and struck Governor Connally, the governor related on Larry King Live the sequence of events which explains the bullet's path. The governor heard the first shot. Fearing that the president was hit, he turned to his right to look back to the rear seat of the limousine. At that time, the second bullet was fired, and it traveled through the president's neck, tumbled, and, in a broad-wise position, hit the back of the governor whose body had been turned part-way backward to view the president. To me, this theory is logical. I keep an open mind, and I am willing to process any new information which might come along. However, my opinion is that Oswald was the only shooter in Dealy Plaza that day. Whether some sinister party had prior knowledge of his intentions is another issue, but I strongly lean to the conclusion that this horrific tragedy constituted a crime of opportunity on the part of Oswald.

[exboyfil]

46. Good summary

Connally's entrance wound and clothing suggest the bullet was tumbling after exiting JFK. Not encountering anything solid until it struck Connally's rib, the round had been slowed considerably. That is why it is flattened on its side (the picture of the pristine bullet from the undamaged side is very deceptive). The biggest problem was how that bullet ended up on a gurney. I am not sure I believe the SS agent's story about finding the bullet in the limo and placing it on the gurney for someone else to find. If it is true, then that guy is a moron.

The final shot, in spite of book's like Mortal Error is pretty obviously from the rear. Reconstructed ballistics (firing into a gelatin filled simulated skull) produced similar skull fragmentation and spray patterns as seen in the recovered pieces of the skull and the image on Zapruder's film.

[John1956PA]

47. Thank you. Your remarks are likewise informative.

The recent revelations by the former Secret Service agent are going to take a good deal of time to parse through. In my brief look at his allegations, I find some confusion and vagueness. Maybe the ghost writer fudged some details. Either way, at this time, I do not want to comment on that particular Secret Service agent or on his book. I would rather comment on well-scrutinuzed findings which have emerged over the course of the past sixty years. Best wishes.

[rickford66]

49. In Mortal Error the bullet comes from the rear.

[exboyfil]

48. Agreed

While he wasn't a top Marine on the range, he still achieved the middle range certification. He did that from a greater distance than the final shot. I personally believe he was using the iron sight on his rifle like he did on the Marine Corps range.

He had the first shot already in the chamber. There were 8.3 seconds to exercise the bolt action twice and take the three shots. There is some speculation that the first shot was deflected either by a branch or a traffic poll. Kennedy was receding slowly directly away from him so the moving target wasn't that great a consideration.

The acoustics argument of a fourth shot is bogus. The film that is out there is deceptive because they have overlayed actual gun shots. Later analysis showed the mic wasn't even in Dailey Plaza but on a different type of motorcycle probably near the Trademark (where you can hear the bell).

He was using an inexpensive but military issue Carcano rifle, a type that had been used in Europe since World War I.

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

50. Nobody asks such a silly question about

Leon Czolgosz or Charles Guiteau. They killed Presidents, too, but none of these idiotic conspiracy theories surround those killings. A few people have conspiracy theories about John Wilkes Booth killing Lincoln, but nobody with a functioning brain takes those seriously.

The US has a history of lone-wolf killers, so why is it so hard to accept that it was one lone-wolf killer who killed JFK?

I don't know why people are so silly about this particular killing, but just because they don't want to believe that it was one person doing the job doesn't mean that those beliefs are true. Wishes don't make anything true; only credible evidence does that.

So far, none of these silly conspiracies have anything backing them up.

[Rustynaerduwell]

51. I don't think he pulled a trigger.

I think he was, as he claimed, a patsy.

[usonian]

53. There's no way an individual could shoot a president, with so many secret service and cops around. (sarcasm)

I count 10 pretty obvious ones.

[Rhiagel]

54. Of course not. Back and to the left.

[republianmushroom]

55. Don't think so, he did have the Warren Commission's help in taking credit, thou.

[Kennah]

56. Oswald - 88 yards; Whitman - 500 yards

Oswald used a 6.5mm rifle to take shots up to 88 yards away.

Whitman used a 6mm rifle to take shots up to 500 yards away.

In terms of the shooting, I don't think one can say with any honesty that Oswald had to be some sort of world-class shooter.