Deep Politics Timeline

[Tracy Riddle]

• Early August 1962 Paul Gregory begins his course of Russian conversation lessons with Marina.
  
• 8/1962 U.S. intelligence received several reports of Soviet missiles in Cuba during the month, all of which are either linked to SAM or cruise missiles or shown to be incorrect. After late August, numbers of such reports increase, as do reported sightings of MiG-21s and IL-28 s. (The Cuban Crisis, 1962, ca. 8/22/63, pp. 10-11) Photos were taken of SA-2 anti-aircraft missiles being unloaded at Cuban ports. U-2 flights had gone over Cuba since Castro came to power; by 1962 two U-2s a month were being flown over the island.
  
• 8/1/1962 SIOP-63 went into effect on 1 August 1962, thus making it the war plan that was in place during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Only a few weeks before the crisis, on September 14, 1962, President Kennedy received a briefing on the new plan. SIOP-63 gave President Kennedy and Secretary McNamara more options, but it did not give them the flexibility they thought they needed to prosecute a less than "all-out" nuclear war. Years later, Robert McNamara explained that during an East-West military crisis, he would have been able to "cut back on the strike options" to ensure that an attack had the right scale. Nevertheless, McNamara did push for any systematic attempt to restructure the SIOP further; the massive overkill that he had worried about remained in place. It was not until the Nixon administration that White House officials, most prominently Henry Kissinger, began to urge the Pentagon to redo the SIOP. Believing that limited nuclear war was conceivable or at least a useful threat, Richard Nixon was the first president to make direct requests to the Pentagon for limited nuclear options. It took some time, however--the late 1970s and early 1980s--before such options became available to decision-makers.
  
• 8/3/1962 Life magazine published a story about Oral Roberts: "In a Kansas crusade he dreamed up a fund-raising gimmick called a blessing pact' which still accounts for far more than the old-fashioned collection plate. He asked his followers to pledge a certain amount of money each month for his work, and told them that they'd receive the same amount and more from a completely unexpected source within one year…It goes into the Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association, which is a nonprofit organization that does not have to divulge either Roberts' salary or a breakdown of its multi-million-dollar budget."
  
• 8/3/1962 Date of alleged CIA document that claims Marilyn Monroe had been told about UFOs and alien bodies.
  
• 8/4/1962 Probably on this weekend, Lee Oswald and Marina moved to a small apartment at 2703 Mercedes Street. The WR estimated that this occurred in the middle of August, but Albert Newman demonstrates that a subscription order to The Worker shows that they made the move before 8/6. Also in early August, Oswald sent a letter to the Russian embassy and asks how to subscribe to Pravda, Izvestia and other Russian publications. (H 18 486)
  
• 8/5/1962 Marilyn Monroe was found dead in the bedroom of her Brentwood home by her psychoanalyst Ralph S. Greenson after he was called by Monroe's live-in housekeeper Eunice Murray on August 5, 1962. She was 36 years old at the time of her death. Her death was ruled to be "acute barbiturate poisoning" by Dr. Thomas Noguchi of the Los Angeles County Coroners office and listed as "probable suicide". Many individuals, including Jack Clemmons, the first Los Angeles Police Department officer to arrive at the death scene, believe that she was murdered. No murder charges were ever filed. The death of Marilyn Monroe has since become one of the most debated conspiracy theories.
  
• 8/5/1962 USSR resumed atmospheric nuclear tests with an explosion over the Arctic.
  
• 8/5/1962 MLK wrote, "But while it may be true that morality cannot be legislated, behavior can be regulated. The law may not change the heart - but it can restrain the heartless." (Times Magazine)
  
• 8/5/1962 Jamaica gains its independence from Britain.
  
• 8/6/1962 The Senate Internal Security Subcommittee concluded that the State Department had worked to discredit Tshombe and the Katanga independence movement and "pictured all opposition to the UN brutality and atrocities in Katanga as the work of 'ultra-conservatives' and those with financial interests in the Congo." They also faulted the government for refusing to grant Tshombe a visa to visit the US.
  
• 8/6/1962 Oswald re-subscribed to The Worker.
  
• 8/6/1962 Paris: a carload of assassins is held up by a red light and misses a rendezvous that would have led to an assassination attempt on De Gaulle. (Kill De Gaulle)
  
• 8/9/1962 Senate confirmed Max Taylor as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.
  
• 8/9/1962 Soviets rejected new US proposals to break the deadlock in negotiations for a nuclear test ban.
  
• 8/10/1962 Sen. Thurmond said, "the Soviets never accept our initial offers of appeasement. They know we will be back again, with hat in hand, making further concessions toward their position."
  
• 8/10/1962 Robert Oswald picked Marina and Lee up and Marguerite acted hysterical as they drove away. Lee told Marina, "She'll be all right. It's not the first time." (Marina and Lee p231) Their new place was at 2703 Mercedes Street; George De Mohrenschildt called it a "decrepit shack."
  
• 8/10/1962 A meeting of the Special Group (Augmented), also known as Operation Mongoose, indicated that the subject of assassinating Castro was discussed (though RFK was not present.) The meeting is in Rusk's office. A new Lansdale proposal for large-scale sabotage raids called "stepped up Course B" is rejected by the majority of the group. McNamara got up to leave and voiced an opinion that "the only way to take care of Castro is to kill him. I really mean it." McCone testified that "liquidation" or removal of Castro and other Cuban leaders arose at the August 10 meeting in the context of exploring the alternatives that were available" for the next phase of MONGOOSE. He did not recall who made this suggestion, but remembered that he and Edward Murrow took "strong exception" to it. According to Walter Elder, a top aide of McCone, the CIA director shot down the idea of killing Castro as "completely out of bounds." Elder told this to Richard Helms, who was keeping the CIA-Mafia plots secret from McCone, on 8/11 or 8/12/1962. Elder told the Senate Intelligence Committee that he had made it clear to Helms that McCone was against any such assassination plots. Helms told the Committee that he did "not have any recollection of such a conversation...I very seriously doubt that it ever took place." Gen. Lemnitzer later told David Belin that he couldn't recall any talk about killing Castro or other Cuban leaders. (Final Disclosure p125) Harvey's notes show that McNamara and Edward Murrow of the USIA raised the subject of assassination. McCone states in memorandum that at no time did the suggestion receive serious consideration, however, afterwards General Lansdale asks Harvey in a memo: "In compliance with the desires and guidance expressed in the 10 August policy meeting on Operation Mongoose. We will hold an Operational Representatives work session in my office. Papers required from each of you for the Tuesday meeting: Mr. Harvey: Intelligence, Political, including liquidation of leaders." Harvey is furious that the term "including elimination of leaders" has been put to paper and demands it removed. McCone testified to the Senate Committee in 1975 that he called McNamara after receiving Lansdale's August 13 memo: "insisted that the Memorandum be withdrawn because no decision was made on this subject, and since no decision was made, then Lansdale was quite out of order in tasking the Central Intelligence Agency to consider the matter." McCone said that McNamara agreed that Lansdales's Memorandum should be withdrawn for the same reason. McCone 's memoranda reads: "Immediately after the meeting, I called on Sec McNamara personally and reemphasized my position, in which he heartily agreed. I did this because Operation MONGOOSE --- an interdepartmental affair --- was under the operational control of [the Defense Department]" (Senate Committee, McCone, 6/6/75, p39) McNamara confirmed this testimony: "I agreed with Mr. McCone that no such planning should be undertaken." He added: "I have no knowledge or information about any other plans or preparations for a Castro assassination." (Senate Committee, McNamara, 7/11/75, p8) Harvey testified it was his recollection that "the question of assassination was raised by Secretary McNamara as one of shouldn't we consider the elimination or assassination ' of Castro. He told the committee there was "no extensive discussion of it, no back and forth as the whys and wherefores and possibilities"(Harvey, 7/11/75 p30) Victor Lasky: "That Robert Kennedy (and hence his brother the President) well knew about the plot against Castro has been established beyond a reasonable doubt....if such plotting had taken place, then President Kennedy most certainly should have known about it. To say that he didn't is just about as damaging as to say that he did." (It Didn't Start with Watergate)
  
• 8/10/1962 After examining CIA reports on the movement of cargo ships from the Black and Baltic seas to Cuba, John McCone dictates a memo for the President expressing the belief that Soviet MRBMs are destined for Cuba. McCone's memo is sent over the objections of subordinates concerned that McCone has no hard evidence to back up his suspicions. (Chronology of John McCone 's Suspicions on the Military Build-up in Cuba Prior to Kennedy's October 22 Speech, 11/30/62; Recollection of Intelligence Prior to the Discovery of Soviet Missiles and of Penkovsky Affair, n.d.)
  
• 8/11/1962 Memo from Courtney Evans to Belmont; a bug picked up Meyer Lansky talking about RFK having an affair with an El Paso girl; Lansky's wife commented that Frank Sinatra was the one who got the Kennedys all their women. Evans requested permission to "personally bring it to the attention of the Attorney General..."
  
• 8/11/1962 McCone told Harvey that he was opposed to the CIA being involved in assassinations. McCone personally worried about being excommunicated. He had learned that at a high-level meeting the day before on Cuba, there had been talk of assassination. (Church report) Lansdale wrote a memo using the expression, "including liquidation of leaders," but William Harvey persuaded him to delete those four words. (The Missiles of October p163, Thompson)
  
• 8/11-12/1962 Russian space capsules Vostok III and IV are in orbit at the same time, piloted by Andrian G. Nikolayev and Pavel Popovich.
  
• 8/12/1962 Oswald airmails a letter to the Socialist Workers Party in NY: "Please send me some information as to the nature of your party, its policies ect., as I am very interested in finding out all about your programm." (H 19 575)
  
• 8/13/1962 Aleksandr Alekseyev arrives in Havana to take up his post as the Soviet ambassador to Cuba. Alekseyev delivers to Fidel Castro the text of the agreement governing the missile deployment which Raúl Castro had worked out during his June visit to Moscow. Castro makes a few corrections in the text and gives it to Che Guevara to take to Moscow in late August. The text calls for "taking measures to assure the mutual defense in the face of possible aggression against the Republic of Cuba." (The Soviet Bloc Armed Forces and the Cuban Crisis: A Chronology July-November 1962, 6/18/63, p. 6; Alekseyev, p. 10; Draft Agreement between the Government of the Republic of Cuba and the Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on military cooperation for the defense of the national territory of Cuba in the event of aggression)
  
• 8/13/1962 In a nationwide address, JFK said he would propose tax reforms and cuts in 1963.
  
• 8/14/1962 William Harvey submits memo to his new boss, Richard Helms, reporting the Lansdale communication and what Harvey had done about it. Harvey 's memo states "The question of assassination, particularly of Castro, was brought up by Secretary McNamara. It was the obvious consensus at that meeting, that this is not a subject which has been made a matter of official record. Upon receipt of the attached memorandum, I advised that as far as CIA was concerned we would write no document pertaining to this and would participate in no open meeting discussing it."
  
• 8/14/1962 For the first time in 35 years, the Senate voted to stop a filibuster, in this case one by liberal senators who were against the communications-satellite bill.
  
• 8/15/1962 For the first time in history, the national debt exceeded $300 billion.
  
• 8/15/1962 Letter from Marina Oswald to Reznichenko at the Russian embassy; she says the necessary documents were forwarded 7/22 and expresses concern over whether they were received. (H 18 489-90)
  
• 8/16/1962 Oswald is interviewed by FBI agents John Fain and Arnold J. Brown in their car after work. During these first two interviews, he was described in reports as being arrogant and belligerent, though he promised to tell the FBI if any Soviet representatives contacted him. He denied being a Soviet agent. (WR 13) He refused to talk about why he had gone to the USSR, and again denied telling the Soviets he would give them any military secrets. Oswald said he didn't know any reason why Soviet intelligence would want to talk to him. (H 17 736) Gerald Posner says that Oswald did not tell Marina or his family about the first FBI interview. Though the FBI was essentially done with him after the second interview (according to Posner), Oswald thought his troubles were just beginning: "Now it's begun. Because I've been over there, they'll never let me live in peace. They think anyone who's been there is a Russian spy." (Marina and Lee p232) At this time he began to write the Soviet Embassy, perhaps with the idea of returning to the USSR. (CE 986) Harold Weisberg: "To obtain Oswald's agreement to report any Soviet approaches, an utter irrationality, would have required minutes only. It cannot and does not explain the 8/16/62 interview." (Whitewash IV 150) Hosty says that during this second interview Oswald was "radically different...He was polite and calmly answered the questions put to him...In Fain's mind, Oswald seemed a reasonable young man." (Assignment Oswald p45) Fain told the WC, "He had actually settled down…He wasn't as tense. He seemed to talk more freely with us." (H 4 421)
  
• 8/16/1962 While in Fort Worth, the Oswalds "were introduced to a group of Russian-speaking people in the Dallas-Fort Worth area." They were primarily interested in helping Marina, and had little use for Oswald, who was still a devoted Marxist. (WR 13) Gerald Posner: "most of them middle- or upper-middle class, politically conservative, and staunchly anti-Communist...They were always curious about current conditions inside the USSR...[they] tolerated Oswald because they liked Marina and felt sorry for her predicament." (Case Closed p78,83) They began helping Marina with baby clothes, food, etc. George Bouhe recalled that Oswald seemed to resent this implication that he was not able to care for his family. (H 8 372) Elena Hall recalled that Oswald got "real mad" when Bouhe bought groceries for them. (H 8 394) Anna Meller also said that Oswald was angry when "people tried to help Marina...He was against everything..." He once broke into "a rage" when Bouhe brought them a playpen for the baby. (H 8 383-4)
  
• 8/16/1962 James Phelan revived the issue of the Howard Hughes-Donald Nixon loan in The Reporter.
  
• 8/17/1962 US press reports that Russian troops are gathering in Cuba, some 18,000-20,000 landing since 7/29.
  
• 8/17/1962 On the basis of additional information, McCone states at a high-level meeting that circumstantial evidence suggests that the Soviet Union is constructing offensive missile installations in Cuba. Rusk and McNamara disagree with McCone, arguing that the build-up is purely defensive. (Chronology of John McCone's Suspicions on the Military Build-up in Cuba Prior to Kennedy's October 22 Speech, 11/30/62)
  
• 8/20/1962 Maxwell Taylor, the chairman of the SGA, informs President Kennedy in a memo that the SGA sees no likelihood that the Castro government can be overthrown without direct U.S. military intervention. Taylor reports that the SGA recommends a more aggressive OPERATION MONGOOSE program. Kennedy authorizes the development of aggressive plans aimed at ousting Castro, but specifies that no overt U.S. military involvement should be made part of those plans. (Alleged Assassination Plots Involving Foreign Leaders, 11/20/75, p. 147)
  
• 8/20/1962 Memo from Courtney Evans to Belmont; RFK denied that he had ever been to El Paso and denied having an affair with a girl there.
  
• 8/20/1962 McCone told JFK that the Soviets were building installations for offensive missiles in Cuba. (Missiles of October p163, Thompson)
  
• 8/22/1962 In a news conference, JFK partly confirms Cuba buildup story, saying there is evidence of arrival on the island of supplies and large numbers of Soviet technicians.
  
• 8/22/1962 Administration officials tell the NY Times that there are 20,000 communist guerillas in South Vietnam and a stalemate may have developed.
  
• 8/22/1962 Newsweek's Francois Sully reported that the war was "a losing proposition" and Diem's government was inadequate. Diem exploded over the article and forced Sully to leave the country 9/1962. He had also described Madame Nhu as a "detested" figure in Vietnam.
  
• 8/22/1962 French President Charles De Gaulle was the target of an assassination attempt, organised by the French paramilitary group of OAS. As De Gaulle's black Citroën official limousine sped through Petit-Clamart, a Paris suburb, it was met by a "barrage of submachine-gun fire". De Gaulle and his entourage, which included his wife, survived the attempt without any casualties or serious injuries, while the attempt's perpetrators were subsequently all arrested and put to trial. Two motorcycles preceded his car and a second Citron followed him. DeGaulle, his wife, his son-in-law, and a chauffeur were in the first car. When submachine guns opened fire on the vehicles, the well-trained drivers continued on as if nothing were happening. De Gaulle himself did not even deign to duck until after Colonel Alain de Boissieu, his son-in-law, shouted at him twice. De Gaulle leaned forward just as bullets flew past the back of his head. 12 bullets hit his car, with one narrowly missing his head; the rear window was shattered. De Gaulle's wife was by his side and was similiarly unfazed by the whole incident. The attack was delayed, and then rushed because of the rainy weather, which made it difficult for them to spot De Gaulle's car. A motorcycle escort was killed in the fusilage of about 100 bullets fired. Though the limo's rear ties were shot out, the chaffeur sped away; a vehicle meant to block the limo failed to stop it. Most of the conspirators were quickly rounded up because they had been rather sloppy. Most OAS rebels were amnestied in 1968, but ringleader Colonel Bastien-Thiry was shot by firing squad, primarily because De Gaulle was upset that his wife had nearly been killed.
  
• 8/23/1962 President Kennedy calls a meeting of the National Security Council (NSC) to air John McCone's concerns that Soviet missiles were in the process of being introduced into Cuba. Although Dean Rusk and Robert McNamara argue against McCone's interpretation of the military build-up in Cuba, Kennedy concludes the meeting by saying that a contingency plan to deal with a situation in which Soviet nuclear missiles are deployed in Cuba should be drawn up.
  
• 8/23/1962 Kennedy's instructions are formalized in National Security Action Memorandum (NSAM) 181, issued this same day. Kennedy directs that several additional actions and studies to be undertaken "in light of the evidence of new bloc activity in Cuba," and assigning studies on Berlin, Cuba, and Mongoose problems stating: "What actions can be taken to get Jupiter missiles out of Turkey?" With regard to MONGOOSE, Kennedy orders that "Plan B Plus," a program aimed at overthrowing Castro without overtly employing the U.S. military, be developed "with all possible speed." (Document 12, National Security Action Memorandum 181, on Actions and Studies in Response to New Soviet Bloc Activity in Cuba, 8/23/62)
  
• 8/23/1962 McCone left Washington for his honeymoon, and while in Europe received daily briefings on the situation. He sent telegrams back to the CIA 9/7, 10, 13 and 20/1962 expressing his growing concern about the Cuban situation.
  
• 8/24/1962 Attempted assassination of Castro by CIA-backed Cuban Student Directorate fails. (The Fish is Red) Two exile motorboats had slipped into Havana Bay at night and shelled the Hotel Icar where Castro was known to have dinner.
  
• 8/25/1962 The Oswalds meet George Bouhe and various Russian immigrants at a dinner party given by Peter Gregory and his wife, probably on this date.
  
• 8/25/1962 New York Times reported that large Soviet ships were being unloaded at night in Cuba, using forty-foot cranes and closed trucks.
  
• 8/26/1962 Che Guevara, Cuba's Minister of Industries, and Emilio Aragonés Navarro, a close associate of Fidel Castro , arrive in the Soviet Union. On August 30, Guevara and Aragonés meet with Nikita Khrushchev at his dacha in the Crimea, where Guevara delivers Castro's amendments to the Soviet-Cuban agreement governing the deployment of missiles in Cuba. Although Guevara urges Khrushchev to announce the missile deployment publicly, the Soviet premier declines to do so. The agreement is never signed by Khrushchev, possibly to preclude the Cuban government from leaking it. Following additional talks in Prague, Guevara and Aragonés return to Cuba on September 6. (Evidence of Soviet Military Commitment to Defend Cuba, 10/19/62; Visit to the Soviet Union by Che Guevara and Emilio Aragones, 8/31/62; Alekseyev, pp. 9-10; Garthoff 1, p. 25)
  
• 8/26/1962 More Cuban exile boats shelled the Havana shoreline.
  
• 8/26/1962 Fort Worth Star-Telegram: "US Impounds Two Boats Used in Shelling of Havana."
  
• 8/27/1962 The 24th Amendment to the Constitution, barring the poll tax in federal elections, was approved by Congress.
  
• 8/27/1962 Oswald receives requested literature from the Socialist Workers Party
  
• 8/27/1962 Sen. Homer Capehart claimed that most of the Russians arriving in Cuba were combat troops; Capehart demanded an invasion of the island.
  
• 8/27/1962 US space probe Mariner II reached vicinity of Venus. 12/14 it passed within 21,000 miles of that planet and transmitted radio signals back to earth.
  
• 8/28/1962 Felix Frankfurter resigned from the Supreme Court due to ill health.
  
• 8/28/1962 Oswald airmailed to the Socialist Workers Party an order for a pamphlet on Trotsky. (H 19 571)
  
• 8/28/1962 Reznichenko's consular section of the Russian embassy acknowledges receipt of Marina's documents, says passport will be returned in near future. (H 18 491-2)
  
• 8/29/1962 JFK named Arthur Goldberg to the Supreme Court.
  
• 8/29/1962 JFK gave the film The Manchurian Candidate a special screening at the White House. (Brothers, Talbot)
  
• 8/29-10/7/1962 the spy plane program over Cuba was increased to seven flights. Kennedy claimed publicly that there was no evidence of Soviet long-range missiles being placed in Cuba; this claim was mostly based on what he was being told by the intelligence community. A U-2 flight today provides conclusive evidence of the existence of SA-2 SAM missile sites at eight different locations in Cuba. Additional reconnaissance shortly thereafter also positively identifies coastal defense cruise missile installations for the first time. However, U-2 photography of the area around San Cristóbal, Cuba, where the first nuclear missile sites are later detected, reveals no evidence of construction at this time.
  
• 8/29/1962 U-2 photograph showing no construction at San Cristobal. U-2 photograph showing no construction at Guanajay. U-2 photograph of SA-2 surface-to-air missile (SAM) site under construction at La Coloma.
  
• 8/29/1962 JFK told reporters, "I'm not for invading Cuba at this time...I think it would be a mistake to invade Cuba...could lead to very serious consequences for many people." Kennedy repeats that he has seen no evidence that Soviet troops were stationed in Cuba and stated that there was "no information as yet" regarding the possible presence of air defense missiles in Cuba.
  
• 8/30/1962 JFK named Willard Wirtz to succeed Goldberg as Secretary of Labor.
  
• 8/30/1962 Chicago and North Western railroad was shut down by a strike of 1000 telegraphers.
  
• 8/30/1962 James B. "Smiling Jim" Donovan flew to Cuba on behalf of JFK to talk to Castro about releasing prisoners from the Bay of Pigs. Castro told him he wanted $2.9 million for prisoners already released, plus $25 million in the form of food and medicine for the rest. But Congress, led by Sens. John J. Williams (R-Delaware) and John Stennis (D-Miss.) refused to give money to Castro. The Kennedy administration then went around Congress to raise the money. (The Missiles of October p235-7, Thompson).
  
• 8/30/1962 Caribbean islands of Trinidad and Tobago became an independent nation.
  
• 8/31/1962 Sen. Keating told the Senate that he had evidence of Soviet "rocket installations in Cuba." He also stated that 1200 uniformed Soviet troops had arrived in Cuba between 8/3 and 8/15. Government sources denied possessing any data to back up that claim.
  
• 8/31/1962 Kennedy is informed that the August 29 U-2 mission has confirmed the presence of SAM batteries in Cuba. (Sorensen, p. 670)