10-05-2018, 01:45 AM
Prouty's book is the only one out of 180 JFK books that I have read twice. The good thing about it is his vantage point from inside the Pentagon in November, 1963 and his obvious honesty, intelligence and sincerity.
The downside is that even with the view you get from the Pentagon, you miss most of the details because the plot was segmented and compartmentalized. And also worldwide.
Thus, Prouty hypothesizes some businessmen sitting at a table at the country club and deciding "Kennedy has to go." But which businessmen? And in what country? He blames the "military-industrial complex" which is an easy, fat target and hard to miss completely. But his tie to the corruption in procurement and the TFX contract is too limited.
This theory has also been suggested by Clark Mollenhoff in "Despoilers of Democracy." Mollenhoff was a close friend of RFK and a reporter at the Des Moines Register. Also, you can read "The Case Against Congress" by Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson, making much the same argument.
According to Dr. Caufield in "General Walker...", Jim Garrison was conflicted because he had represented the murderous segregationists in his role as State's Attorney in 1962. I would suggest a similar limitation on Prouty's viewpoint. He blames the villians with which he had battled and with which he was familiar.
But, for instance, he staunchly defends General Lyman Lemnitzer (his former commanding officer) as being "the old-style patriotic Army guy" and non-political. When you read Lemitizer's biography, he doesn't look quite that good. He was actually a covert-ops oriented guy and a back-biter on the Bay of Pigs issue. He was not an old fashioned Eisenhower or George C. Marshall type as described by Prouty.
From his job description at the Pentagon, Prouty had no dealings with the Mafia, Operation Mongoose and all of the CIA (outside pentagon) related activities, i.e. in Italy, etc. etc. To me, it's strange he doesn't mention anything about NATO in the Pentagon.
NATO was certainly a big presence there in the Pentagon.
I have read that people at the CIA eat lunch with a friend/co-worker every day for 20 years but they still have no clue what that friend/co-worker does for the CIA. Recognizing that principle, just because Prouty was CIA-Pentagon liaison, that didn't mean he had access to the lion's share of bad stuff being done both at the Pentagon and at the CIA. I think that if Prouty actually knew everything, he would have got the word out. He would have told us everything. And he didn't have all the pieces.
I think that what we saw from Prouty was what you would get from Prouty. Period. Beyond what was right in front of his eyes, Prouty didn't know as much as the average well-read JFK buff living today in 2018.
James Lateer
The downside is that even with the view you get from the Pentagon, you miss most of the details because the plot was segmented and compartmentalized. And also worldwide.
Thus, Prouty hypothesizes some businessmen sitting at a table at the country club and deciding "Kennedy has to go." But which businessmen? And in what country? He blames the "military-industrial complex" which is an easy, fat target and hard to miss completely. But his tie to the corruption in procurement and the TFX contract is too limited.
This theory has also been suggested by Clark Mollenhoff in "Despoilers of Democracy." Mollenhoff was a close friend of RFK and a reporter at the Des Moines Register. Also, you can read "The Case Against Congress" by Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson, making much the same argument.
According to Dr. Caufield in "General Walker...", Jim Garrison was conflicted because he had represented the murderous segregationists in his role as State's Attorney in 1962. I would suggest a similar limitation on Prouty's viewpoint. He blames the villians with which he had battled and with which he was familiar.
But, for instance, he staunchly defends General Lyman Lemnitzer (his former commanding officer) as being "the old-style patriotic Army guy" and non-political. When you read Lemitizer's biography, he doesn't look quite that good. He was actually a covert-ops oriented guy and a back-biter on the Bay of Pigs issue. He was not an old fashioned Eisenhower or George C. Marshall type as described by Prouty.
From his job description at the Pentagon, Prouty had no dealings with the Mafia, Operation Mongoose and all of the CIA (outside pentagon) related activities, i.e. in Italy, etc. etc. To me, it's strange he doesn't mention anything about NATO in the Pentagon.
NATO was certainly a big presence there in the Pentagon.
I have read that people at the CIA eat lunch with a friend/co-worker every day for 20 years but they still have no clue what that friend/co-worker does for the CIA. Recognizing that principle, just because Prouty was CIA-Pentagon liaison, that didn't mean he had access to the lion's share of bad stuff being done both at the Pentagon and at the CIA. I think that if Prouty actually knew everything, he would have got the word out. He would have told us everything. And he didn't have all the pieces.
I think that what we saw from Prouty was what you would get from Prouty. Period. Beyond what was right in front of his eyes, Prouty didn't know as much as the average well-read JFK buff living today in 2018.
James Lateer