In the last episode, we covered evidence in support of the idea that Lee Harvey Oswald did, in fact, travel to Mexico City. But we also looked at information that supports Oswald being in Dallas at the same time when the Warren Report says that he was on the way to Mexico. Both of these things can’t be true.
The Warren Report says that Oswald went to Mexico City so that he could get an in transit visa to the Soviet Union through Cuba.[1] But, it’s worth noting that if Oswald wanted to go to the Soviet Union, he could have already done that with the visa he had. (He just couldn’t go through Cuba first with his existing visa.) So, assuming it really was Lee Harvey Oswald who was in Mexico City, either he did not understand the law, or he really wanted to visit Cuba on his way to the Soviet Union, or something else was going on.
In this episode, we look at what Oswald allegedly did in Mexico City, including his visits with Cuban and Soviet diplomats. There were audio tapes and photos that should have been generated to document these incidents. What can we learn from the audio and photo evidence or lack thereof?
Oswald’s Movements
On Friday, September 27th, 1963, around 10:30am, an unknown man called the Soviet Military Attache to ask about getting a visa to travel to Odessa, Russia. He was told to contact the Soviet Consulate and given directions to their office.[2] Minutes later, the same man called the Soviet Consulate and asked to speak to the consul. He was told to call back at 11:30. Both of these calls were intercepted by the CIA and featured speakers who spoke only Spanish.[3]
About 20 minutes after the phone call to the Soviet Military Attache, an unknown man appeared at the Cuban Consulate, which was only two blocks away from the Soviet Consulate.[4] The man spoke exclusively in English to Silvia Duran, an English speaking Mexican citizen who worked as a secretary at the Cuban consulate. The man told Duran that his name was Lee Harvey Oswald and that he wanted a transit visa to Cuba for September 30th for 2 weeks, and after that, he wanted to go on to Russia. Duran told him that he needed to have photos of himself for her to process the visa application.[5]
About two hours later, the man who called himself Oswald returned with four pictures of himself. Sylvia Duran then stapled the photos to the application documents.[6][7] Duran told the man that, even though he now had the necessary photo, he still needed to first get a visa to the Soviet Union for him to be eligible for a travel visa through Cuba. Oswald then asked to see the Cuban Consul Eusebio Azcue, who repeated what Duran had said – that he first needed a Soviet visa.[8]
In 1993, a book was written that detailed interactions with the man who claimed to be Oswald inside of the Soviet Consulate. According to the recollections of Soviet consul officials Paval Yatskov, Valery Kostikov, and Oleg Nechiporenko, Oswald rang the buzzer at the Soviet Embassy around 12:30pm on Friday, September 27th.[9] He then told Nechiporenko that he had come to Mexico City because he didn’t want the FBI to arrest him if he contacted the Soviet Embassy in Washington, D.C. Nechiporenko responded that all visa applications had to be processed at the Embassy of the applicant’s home country. This meant that the Washington D.C. Embassy had to approve it, which would take at least 4 months.
When Oswald heard that it would take another 4 months, he shouted QUOTE “This won’t do for me! This is not my case! For me, it’s all going to end in tragedy.” Oswald was offered the application to fill out so that the Mexican Soviet Embassy could send it on to Washington to be processed. But, Oswald did not fill out the application before leaving the Embassy.[10] The fact that Oswald never submitted a Soviet visa application undermines the Warren Report’s claim that Oswald spent time checking on his application, because the application did not exist.[11]
Around 1:25 on that same Friday, a man the CIA says was Oswald called the Soviet Consulate and asked to speak to the Consul. He was told the Consul would be there the next day between 4:00 and 5:00. This conversation was exclusively in Spanish.[12] This call makes absolutely no sense in light of the fact that Oswald had either just left the Soviet Consulate or was still inside of it when the unknown man placed the call.
Later that day around 4pm, Oswald returned to the Cuban Consulate and told Silvia Duran that he now had a Soviet Visa. He just wasn’t able to physically produce it. Of course, this was a lie because he had been told by the Soviets that he had to wait 4 months to process an application. Duran then called the Soviet Embassy and said that an American citizen was at the consulate saying he received a Soviet visa and that he had been assured by the Soviet Consul he spoke with that there would be no problems. Oswald again insisted on a Cuban visa, but was again told that he needed to have a Soviet visa first to get a Cuban transit visa.[13]
On the next day, Saturday, September 28th, CIA transcripts say that Silvia Duran called the Soviet Consulate at 11:51am. She put an unidentified American on the phone who spoke to the Soviet Consulate in broken Russian. The Consulate told the man to come by the Soviet Embassy since it was very close to the Cuban Embassy. According to the translator of this phone call, the American spoke QUOTE “terrible, hardly recognizable Russian.”[14]
As a quick sidebar, the languages spoken by the man alleged to be Oswald raise questions. The man called the Russian consulate at first and spoke exclusively in Spanish – a language that Oswald did not speak. Then, when he spoke to the Cubans in person, he spoke only English, except when he called the Soviet Consulate from the Cuban Embassy, on that occasion he spoke broken Russian. None of this makes sense. There is no evidence that Oswald ever spoke Spanish.[15] Indeed, when he was inside the Soviet Embassy, Valeriy Kostikov says he asked him if he spoke Spanish and the man who claimed to be Oswald shook his head “No.”[16]
If he did, then why do it on the phone to the Russians at first, and then not speak Spanish when visiting the Cubans, whose native language was Spanish? We know Oswald spoke fluent Russian – not broken Russian. Oswald’s Russian was at least good enough for Russian instructor Peter Gregory to give Oswald a letter certifying him as a translator.[17] After all, he did spend over two years immersed in the Russian language when he lived there.
Back to the Saturday morning Cuban Consulate visit where Oswald allegedly had Silvia Duran call the Soviet Embassy…There is some dispute as to whether this phone call ever happened. Silvia Duran said that she did not call the Soviet Embassy on that Saturday because the Cuban Consulate was closed on Saturdays, which was also confirmed by Consuls Azcue and Mirabal.[18] Silvia Duran point blank denied that the call ever happened when speaking to author Anthony Summers.[19] And Nechiporenko, the Soviet Consul, also confirms that there was no phone call from the Cuban Consulate on Saturday because the switchboard was closed and a call could not have gone through.[20] The sole evidence of this phone call, which the participants say never happened, is the CIA’s transcript of the call and a 10 page statement from Silvia Duran while she was under duress.
Saturday Call Transcript
Looking at that transcript, it says that Duran said QUOTE “there is a man here who says he has been to the Russian consulate.” But, the day before Duran, herself, sent Oswald to the Soviet consulate and then confirmed on the phone with Kostikov that he had, in fact, been there. Why would she say “he says” he has been to the Russian consulate when she knew for a fact that he had been there?[21]
Further, the Saturday call from the Cuban Consulate to the Soviet Embassy has no substance. The transcript says that Oswald said to the Soviet Embassy QUOTE “I was just at your Embassy and they took my address…I did not know it then. I went to the Cuban Embassy to ask for my address, because they have it.”[22] This is nonsense talk. How could Oswald not know his address? If he didn’t know his address, then how did he give it to the Soviets in the first place?
Saturday Morning Soviet Embassy Visit
While the Soviet Consulate officials deny that a call between Duran and the Soviet Embassy happened on Saturday morning, they confirm that the man claiming to be Oswald did visit the Soviet Embassy in person on Saturday morning. He arrived at 9:30am when the consulate employees were getting ready for their regular Saturday morning volleyball game. According to Nechiporenko, the man begged to be let in because he said he was being persecuted. The Soviet officials once again explained that there would be about a 4 month waiting period to get the visa. And once again, Oswald did not take the visa application forms that he was offered.[23]
We don’t know what Oswald did on Sunday, September 29th, or Monday, September 30th. But on Tuesday, October 1st, around 10:45am, a man who said his name was “Lee Oswald” apparently spoke on the phone in English to the Soviet Consulate.
The Tuesday call is important because it was the only call where the name Oswald was spoken.[24] But, the challenge with that call is that, according to the Warren Report, Oswald boarded a bus on Tuesday at 8:30am, which he was on at the time the CIA says the call was made to the Soviet Consulate.[25] There were no cell phones back then. But, who knows, maybe he called from a bus stop. Then again, given that Oswald never applied for a Soviet visa, there was nothing for Oswald to call the embassy about.
Photos, Or Lack Thereof
The Mexico City Station of the Central Intelligence Agency used photographic surveillance on the Soviet and Cuban Consulates, which included the use of photographers and automated cameras that were activated whenever someone came through a surveilled entrance or exit to the buildings.[26]
During August, September, and October of 1963, between 2 and 39 photos were taken each day at the Soviet Compound. But none of those pictures were given to the FBI or Warren Commission. More relevant to our inquiry, the CIA took 16 photos of a person at the Soviet Compound on Friday, September 27th, a day Oswald visited there. But the last picture taken was at 11:46 am, and Oswald arrived about 45 minutes later.[27] So, the CIA surveillance just happened to miss him.
There were three different cameras at different locations around the Soviet compound. In 1978, the House Select Committee on Assassinations asked the CIA for photographic evidence of Oswald being in Mexico City. The CIA then gave the HSCA access to photos from one of the three surveillance sites, which did not have any pictures of Oswald. When the HSCA followed up to ask for photos from the other 2 surveillance sites, they were told that those photos and the logs about the photos had been destroyed.[28] But, CIA personnel corroborated that they did see a photo of Lee Harvey Oswald.[29] This raises the question: if the CIA actually had a photograph of Oswald in Mexico City, why was it destroyed? It would seem to be a major piece of evidence against him if you believe his motive was being a Marxist, America-hater.
So, there are no photographs of Oswald at the Soviet Consulate. What about the Cuban Consulate?
By October of 1963, David Atlee Phillips, among other important roles at the CIA, was responsible for supervising surveillance posts in Mexico City.[30] Phillips told the HSCA under oath that none of the automatic cameras outside the Cuban Consulate were working at the time of Oswald’s visit and that there were no photos available of Oswald in Mexico City.[31] Phillips also said that the automatic pulse camera at the Cuban Consulate had not been installed until December of 1963.
But, Phillips appears to have perjured himself since an internal CIA dispatch from Mexico City station on September 26, 1963 said that the pulse camera was tested and found to be in good working order the day before Oswald first visited the Consulate.[32] Moreover, the HSCA determined that 10 feet of film was taken from one of the CIA cameras pointed at the Cuban Consulate on September 27th and was then developed. Photos of the man who entered the Cuban consulate were on this film. The film has since disappeared.[33]
All of the photos that CIA had from the automatic camera coverage of the Cuban consulate, as well as 5 packages of undeveloped film, were sent from Mexico City to Langley. When the HSCA asked to review this material, the CIA said it could not locate the photos because they were sent as a transmittal manifest, which was a QUOTE “unaccountable document that was not made part of the permanent record, and therefore was not retrievable.[34]
It’s even more strange that the CIA never captured a photo of Oswald, because the Mexico City station chief at the time, Winston Scott, said in his unpublished manuscript QUOTE “Persons watching the [Cuban and Soviet] embassies photographed Oswald as he entered and left each one and clocked the time he spent on each visit.”[35] If Oswald was photographed when he entered and left, and the time was noted, then where are those photographs and notes? The head of the Mexico City Station says they existed, but the CIA representatives who spoke to the HSCA, namely, David Atlee Phillips, steadfastly denied the existence of the photos.
Here's what Richard Helms, who was the Deputy Director of Plans at the CIA at the time of the assassination and would go on to be the Director of the Agency, had to say about the photos:
It’s my recollection that at the time of Oswald’s presence in Mexico City there was something wrong with the cameras that we were using. We were trying to fix it. But the fact remains that there are no photographs of Lee Harvey Oswald taken while he was in Mexico City at that time, and I can’t explain 100% why not.[36]
It turns out that, there are photographs in existence of the man who identified himself as Lee Harvey Oswald in the Cuban Consulate. But, they aren’t from the CIA. These two photos came to light in an August 1978 interview of former Cuban Consul Eusebio Azcue by CBS reporter Ed Rable. Azcue produced photos that were taken from cameras inside the Cuban Consulate that were operated by the Cuban government.[37]Neither of these photographs looks like Lee Harvey Oswald. And it’s not close.
These photos support what Azcue initially said, which was that the man who called himself Oswald had thin blonde hair, was about 5 foot 6 and was over 30 years old. When he saw Oswald on TV he said that he QUOTE “did not even resemble” the man who visited their consulate.[38]
Silvia Duran initially said that the man had blonde hair and blue green eyes. She then signed a 10 page statement under duress saying that the man was Oswald. And, after that, she confirmed again that it was not Oswald years later. (We’ll cover more on Silvia Duran’s ordeal in the next episode.)[39] When the HSCA investigated the case, they spoke with two CIA assets who worked inside the Cuban consulate. Those assets told them that the consensus among employees within the Cuban consulate after the Kennedy assassination was that it was not Oswald who had been there.[40]
The Recorded Phone Calls
We know that at least one conversation between Oswald and the Soviets was recorded because after President Kennedy was assassinated, FBI agents Clements, Bookhout, and Hosty listened to it. The Agents sat in on Oswald’s interrogation at the Dallas Police Department.[41] Those same agents later listened to the CIA tape recording of a call between the man said to be Oswald and the Soviet employee. When J. Edgar Hoover was notified about what was on the recording, he called President Johnson, on November 23rd, 1963 – the day after the assassination. The phone call, which was recorded, was partially transcribed, but the recording itself has gone missing.[42] I’m not going to speculate about what was said that is no longer in the record. But, here is what the relevant part of the official transcript says:
President Johnson: Have you established any more about the visit to the Soviet Embassy in Mexico City in September?
Hoover: No, that’s one angle that’s very confusing for this reason: We have up here the tape and the photograph of the man who was at the Soviet Embassy using Oswald’s name. That picture and the tape do not correspond to this man’s voice, nor to his appearance. In other words, it appears that there is a second person who was at the Soviet Embassy down there.[43]
By the way, Hoover wasn’t the only one who thought someone was pretending to be Oswald in Mexico City. The HSCA’s Lopez Report said that there was not sufficient evidence to firmly conclude that Oswald wasimpersonated in Mexico City, but QUOTE “the evidence is of such a nature that the possibility cannot be dismissed.”[44]
Hoover followed this call up with a 5 page memo to President Johnson that said FBI agents reviewed the tape and concluded the voice was not Lee Harvey Oswald’s.[45] Another memo from Hoover to James Rowley of the Secret Service said QUOTE “Agents who have conversed with Oswald in Dallas have observed photographs of the individual referred to above and have listened to a recording of his voice. These special agents are of the opinion that the above referred to individual was not Lee Harvey Oswald.”[46]
Hoover also underlined his distrust for the CIA in a handwritten note on an FBI report about domestic CIA activities. Seven weeks after Hoover spoke to President Johnson about the Oswald imposter in Mexico City he wrote in the margin of an FBI memo, QUOTE “Ok. But, I hope you are not being taken in. I can’t forget the CIA withholding the French espionage activities in the USA and the false story re Oswald’s trip to Mexico, only to mention two instances of their double dealing.”[47] Yes, J. Edgar Hoover, the Director of the FBI, called the CIA’s version of Oswald going to Mexico a “false story.”
Even though we know the tapes made their way to Dallas and were listened to by the three FBI agents as reported by J. Edgar Hoover to President Johnson, the tapes immediately disappeared after that. On November 23rd, Special Agent Eldon Rudd wrote a memo that said QUOTE “CIA has advised that these tapes have been erased and are not available for review.”[48]
On November 24th, the day Ruby killed Oswald, the Mexico City CIA Station advised CIA HQ that they rechecked the tapes and confirmed that the recordings of Oswald at the Soviet Consulate had already been erased.[49] But, there were transcripts of the tapes, which were provided to Clark Anderson of the FBI, who advised the FBI that the recording had been erased before the assassination, which is not possible if the 3 FBI agents actually heard the tape, as they told Hoover.
The next day, November 25th, Burt Turner, an FBI supervisor in Washington, sent a cable to Agent Clark Anderson in Mexico City that said QUOTE “If tapes covering any contact with Oswald with Soviet or Cuban embassies available forward to Bureau for laboratory examination. Include tapes previous reviewed Dallas if they were returned to you.”[50] This internal FBI memo is yet another acknowledgement that the tape existed after the assassination and was reviewed in Dallas, just like J. Edgar Hoover told President Johnson.
In April of 1964, Warren Commission attorneys, David Slawson, William Coleman and Howard Willens went to Mexico City and learned for the first time the CIA had intercepted and recorded phone calls at the Soviet Compound. Here is David Slawson talking about the tape:
My best recollection is they offered to us to listen, it was Win Scott, who said would you like to listen to the tapes. And so, they played a little bit of it for us.[51]
Both Slawson, as you just heard, and William Coleman, have expressly stated that they listened to the Oswald tape in April of 1964 in Mexico City – which is one more thing that confirms J. Edgar Hoover’s story that the tape did, in fact, still exist.[52]
When Winston Scott, Former Mexico City Station Chief, died on April 26, 1971, CIA counterintelligence chief James Angleton was at his house to retrieve the contents of his safe before his funeral. Angleton took a manuscript, photos, and a vinyl tape recording that Scott told his wife was of Lee Harvey Oswald.[53]
It appears that a tape of the man who said he was Oswald did exist, and was then destroyed, and lied about. The only counterpoint is that the CIA said the tape was erased. Given the facts here, one would have to have unflinching trust in the CIA to believe the Agency’s representations instead of J. Edgar Hoover, the 3 FBI agents who were present in Dallas (Clements, Bookhout, and Hosty), Agent Burt Turner, Warren Commission Investigators David Slawson and William Coleman, and Mexico City CIA Station Chief, Winston Scott.
NEXT TIME ON SOLVING JFK: We continue to examine the Mexico City saga, including what Marina Oswald said about it and a letter to the US Soviet Embassy that was allegedly from Oswald. We also examine the way that the Mexico City incident was used by President Johnson to recruit members to his commission on the assassination of President Kennedy, which was eventually known as the Warren Commission.
[1] Warren Report at 734.
[2] Lopez Report, at 73.
[3] Id.
[4] John Armstrong, Harvey and Lee, at 629.
[5] CE 2464, at 39 - https://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh25/pdf/WH25_CE_2464.pdf
[6] Lopez Report at 192.
[7] CE 2464, at 39; see Armstrong at 638. (The FBI looked to try to find where Oswald had these photos taken, but it was not able to find anywhere Oswald could have had photos made that quickly near the Cuban Embassy or Oswald’s hotel.)
[8] CE 2464, at 39.
[9] Oleg Nechiporenko, Valery Kostikov, Paval Yatskov, Passport to Assassination, at 66.
[10] John Newman, Oswald & the CIA, at 357-58. See also Warren Report at 734.
[11] Warren Report at 299-301.
[12] Armstrong at 639.
[13] Id. at 641-42.
[14] Lopez Report, at 76-77.
[15] Armstrong at 639.
[16] Nechiporenko at 76.
[17] James DiEugenio, Destiny Betrayed, at 353.
[18] Armstrong at 648.
[19] Silvia Duran interview with Anthony Summers, 1/31/95.
[20] Newman at 368.
[21] Id. at 365.
[22] Newman at 364.
[23] Nechiporenko at 79.
[24] Newman at 373.
[25] Warren Report at 736.
[26] Lopez Report, at 13 - https://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/hsca/lopezrpt_2003/html/LopezRpt_0026a.htm
[27] Armstrong at 640.
[28] Lopez Report, at 44.
[29] Lopez Report, at 23.
[30] Armstrong at 631.
[32] Lopez Report at 18.
[33] Lopez Report at 18.
[34] Armstrong at 644.
[35] Winston Scott, The Foul Foe, p 273.
[37] Armstrong, CD-Rom, Mex 63-22, Mex 63-23.
[38] Armstrong at 646.
[39] Fonzi at 289.
[40] HSCA Vol 3, at 136, 139; https://spartacus-educational.com/JFKduranS.htm; Gaeton Fonzi, The Last Investigation at 293-294.
[41] Armstrong at 651.
[44] Lopez Report at 250.
[45] LHM From Hoover to President Johnson; National Archives, FBI 124-10018-10369 HQ 62-109060-1123.
[46] FBI Memo from J. Edgar Hoover to James Rowley, 11/23/63.
[47] Probe, Vol 6, No. 6, at 29; https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/oswald-the-cia-and-mexico-city/#return16
[48] SA Eldon Rudd wrote a memo to Dallas SAC, November 23, 1963
[49] Armstrong at 652.
[51] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYI4PqtIyE0&rco=1, at 1:09:00.
[52] Gaeton Fonzi, The Last Investigation, at 286-287.
[53] Peter Dale Scott, Deep Politics 2: The New Revelations in U.S. Government Files, 1994-1995: Essays on Oswald, Mexico and Cuba, p 12.
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