JFK: The Smoking Gun

While I think this was an OK documentary, I think his death was inevitable , the family is cursed.

Family incidents led Senator Ted Kennedy to wonder, in a televised statement about the Chappaquiddick incident in 1969, whether there really was a "Kennedy curse." Some of the events endured by the Kennedy clan include: in 1941, Rosemary underwent a non-consensual lobotomy intended to prevent her from embarrassing the family with her violent mood swings, convulsions, and intellectual disability. The operation left her incapacitated for the rest of her life. Joseph Jr. Died in 1944 when the Navy bomber he was piloting exploded in mid-flight. Kathleen died in a plane crash in France in 1948. John and Robert were assassinated, in 1963 and 1968 respectively. In 1964, Ted was nearly killed when his plane crashed in an apple orchard near Southampton, Massachusetts. Legislative aide Edward Moss and the pilot were killed in the crash.) Ted was seriously injured and spent months in a hospital recovering from a severe back injury, a punctured lung, broken ribs and internal bleeding.

In later generations, Robert's son David died of a drug overdose in 1984; and son Michael died from injuries sustained in a skiing accident in 1997; John's son John Jr. Died in a plane crash (along with his wife Carolyn and sister-in-law Lauren) off the coast of Martha's Vineyard in 1999; Kara Kennedy and Christopher Kennedy Lawford died of heart attacks, in 2011 and 2018 respectively; and Saoirse Kennedy Hill died of a drug overdose in 2019.

In April 2020, Robert's granddaughter Maeve Kennedy McKean, a former official in the Obama Administration, and her eight-year-old son, Gideon Joseph Kennedy McKean, disappeared in Chesapeake Bay after embarking in a canoe to retrieve a ball. Maeve McKean's body was recovered the following week, and her son's two days later, about 2.5 miles from her mother's home on the Chesapeake Bay.

I have had a casual interest in the assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy since I was a small child and saw the great (as I remember it) documentary/'trial' of Lee Harvey Oswald in "On trial: Lee Harvey Oswald" (I'll call him "LHO" from now on). Even though the details of that documentary now escape me, I do recall my disbelief that that jury for the trial of Oswald found that he was solely responsible for the assassination. It would be interesting to revisit that documentary in the wake of this definitive documentary. Lastly, I also remember seeing Oliver Stone's "JFK" but the details of that escape me too. Yet again, it would be interesting to revisit that drama in the wake of the puzzle being solved by this current documentary.

So, as a casual observer of this conspiracy theory laden event par excellence, I have to say that "JFK: The smoking gun" is either the starting point or the end point for anyone who wants answers to the mystery of "Who shot JFK?". For some, definitive proof will never be enough, so this documentary should start as a jumping off point for them...as in they MUST heed the findings here, lest they seem obstinate. For example, I think it was in "On trial: Lee Harvey Oswald" where I first heard of "the magic bullet theory". The effect of this theory is to lead one to suppose that any scenario where LHO's bullet is supposed to have hit the targets it was meant to is so ludicrous as to be ruled out of hand. "JFK: The smoking gun" proves that the bullet DID in fact do what it was supposed to have done and it only seems "magic" if the assumptions that you make about the layout of the car are false. So, assuming that the layout presented in "JFK:TSG" is correct, there's just no way in the world you can credibly dismiss that bullet as having "magic" properties. It's just ludicrous to assert that it is anymore.

"JFK:TSG" is presented by an Australian former detective Colin McLaren. He treats the assassination as a 'cold case' and goes through The Warren Commission's report, in the wake of reading a theory by Howard Donahue (a ballistics expert) documented in Bonar Menninger's book "Mortal error: The shot that killed JFK". In the wake of JFK's assassination, Donahue was involved in a TV network's recreation of the assassination to ascertain whether LHO could indeed have fired off three shots in under six seconds. Donahue could...but after three attempts...suggesting that LHO is unlikely to have done so, seeing as he only had one attempt to do this. So, in essence, McLaren's documentary is basically overkill for those for whom ballistics science is inadequate...for whatever reason. McLaren presents testimony to support Donahue's theory.

The basic findings of this documentary are as follow:

01) LHO fired two shots at JFK. His first missed the target BUT, via a ricochet, JFK was hit by debris, which prompted his comment of "My God, I'm hit".

02) LHO fires off his last shot. It hits his target and also injures Governor Connally. Due to the seating layout, the ballistics stack up such that there is nothing "magic" about the bullet's trajectory. It fits.

03) In a car behind JFK, Secret Service agent George Hickey, arming himself with a rifle in the wake of the (potentially) non-lethal shot on JFK picks up an automatic rifle in order to respond to the would be assassin but is knocked back by his car accelerating away, accidentally firing off a shot...the shot which impacts with devastating results on JFK's head.

04) The Secret Service, knowing full well that one of its own killed JFK, systematically covers up this truth at each and every opportunity.

05) The Warren Commission also is a whitewash, with Assistant Counsel Arlen Spector actively derailing any opportunity for the truth to become known about the Secret Service's involvement.

I would add here that what I outline here ties in neatly with LHO famously claiming "I'm just a patsy". He'd know full well that the lethal shot was not fired by him.

Where there is scope for the conspiracy theorists, I'm sure, is the extent to which the Secret Service's killing of JFK was accidental, as well as the usual stuff about who LHO was involved with. This documentary does not answer those questions...it assumes - probably quite rightly - that the lethal shot was accidental and does not delve into who LHO was involved in...perhaps due to that being so murky as far as definitive answers go.

I'm satisfied that the account presented here is accurate and best fits the facts...the ballistics evidence and the testimony of the time all reinforce the account...in ways which the Warren Commission's findings don't. It was staggering to see how unprofessional the Secret Service agents were on the morning/day of the assassination and it's an open question as to how justified their cover-up was in the wake of this tragedy. An implication that I would draw is that the Secret Service would in fact have reason/motive to want LHO dead before he could testify.

Interestingly, George Hickey waited two years before suing Menninger over the contents of his book. It was dismissed due to the statute of limitations. When the book was later re-released in paperback, he sued again. The publisher etc. settled out of court...Hickey had ground out a 'win' for himself. I'm not sure that 'victory' is good for history. I hope that Jackie Kennedy knew the truth of what happened too and that it was 'only' the public who were 'protected' from this awful truth.

I watched the documentary JFK: THE SMOKING GUN and it was very disturbing. Yes, it was compelling and convincing that the bullet that explored JFK's head was from a different weapon other than the rifle LHO supposedly used. It was also very compelling that one of the secret agents in the car immediately following JFK fired that lethal shot. But to further say and conclude that the agent, George Hickey, did so "accidentally" is silly and an insult to normal intelligence. In that same show it was revealed that Robert Kennedy asked the agents, "Did you kill my brother?" Even RFK himself sensed this was an "inside" job.

McLaren's teary eyed and choking statement at the end that this really was a "tragic accident" was, to me, contrived and phony.

What was the premise and goal of this documentary? It only raised more questions than to put "closure" on the matter. If it attempted to shut out all conspiracy theories it failed. In fact it opened it up all the more.

One thing is obvious. If the project or action to assassinate JFK was to "kill" him, it blatantly failed. JFK is much more alive now than ever. That bullet in Dallas did not terminate him, on the contrary, it immortalized him, made him "eternal".

This documentary explores another theory of the JFK assassination.

In this theory, there were two shooters, Lee Harvey Oswald and a Secret Security agent named George Hickey in the other car.

I can't say whether or not it's any truer than anything else, but I'll say this. These documentaries always make compelling stories. Why? Because they take a moment, a statement, a situation, and make a decision about it, usually that it has an ulterior motive, and build a conspiracy theory around it.

For instance, at the hospital in Dallas, the Secret Service would not allow the doctor there to perform the autopsy. They demanded the body be returned to Washington. EVIL COVER-UP. Give me a break. This is the President of the United States, and they're going to let a local doctor do the autopsy?

Here's another one -- There were all these photographs taken by various people who were there that day, and the Secret Service took the photos and never returned them. HELLO. This was the assassination of a U.S. President, not May Day photos of children dancing around a pole with flowers. OF COURSE they took the photos, every single photo had to be examined.

My favorite - eyewitness accounts that fly in the face of what was said by other witnesses who testified at the Warren Commission hearings. Ever asked a bunch of witnesses of a crime what the culprit looked like? You're telling me that shots were fired, people hit the ground, screamed, and then are able to give reliable testimony? They counted the shots? They watched someone stand up in a car?

Here's another and it was mentioned constantly. All the chaos in the room at the hospital, all the yelling, all the people, the jostling. RIGHT. THE PRESIDENT HAD JUST BEEN SHOT. You're expecting total silence while people are trying to find out if he's alive or dead, make arrangements to swear in Johnson, get some sort of announcement together for reporters, keep news from getting out before there are definitive answers, keep people who don't belong there away from the body? Chaos. Gee, wouldn't have expected that with the President's body there.

So did the Secret Service guy fire a third shot? The theory here is that it was friendly fire and they wanted to cover up that fact. Others on this board think it wasn't an accident, he was aiming at the President.

Now, if he was aiming at the President, they really needed to terminate him and put him in prison. Why wouldn't they have done that? All the Secret Service hated JFK and wanted to see him dead? What is the point of covering up what this guy did, if he did it?

Covering it up to the public -- okay, yes, I can see that. We pay their salaries. But why close ranks to help a traitor? Also, do we honestly think this was the fatal shot? I'm sorry, the poor man was hit in the back and the head before this third shot. Not sure if he would have survived and if he had, I doubt he would have been able to hold the office of President.

I go into this type of thing skeptical because there are so many conspiracy theories about absolutely everything, and it seems like someone can go through the literature and come up with an alternate idea of what happened.

It's always the same thing: Elvis is alive and living over a bowling alley; JFK survived and is probably living with him; Hitler survived; Princess Diana was murdered; we didn't get the real story of 9/11; etc. Meanwhile, try to get your doctor's office to fax something, or ask an office to find the fax you've sent five times, or have someone read your email correctly and give you the info you asked for -- how can you have a conspiracy when everybody is always screwing up?

Do I think the Warren Commission gave us the real story? No, of course not. We are much more savvy today and we know that the government lies, and whatever the commission couldn't explain, it pretended it didn't happen. Eighty witnesses say 65 different things, you go with the fifteen who said the same thing.

Do I believe that the Dallas police really cared if anyone shot Oswald? Obviously they were hoping someone would come along and kill him while they were meandering through a parking space on the way to a truck that was obviously not close to where they came from.

This theory is just as viable or ridiculous as any other one. We won't ever know what happened. It's a tragic time in history, people find the different investigations compelling, I loved the movie JFK, but in the end, we're all just spinning our wheels. See Four Days in November, have yourself a good cry, and watch these documentaries with a skepticism and detachment.

So after Oswald fired his first shot, Hickey identified that JFK was shot, looked up at the 6th floor, reached down for the AR-15, lifted it from his car floor, released the safety, turned the rifle toward JFK rather than the 6th floor, and accidentally shoots JFK.

And he does all this in under 6 seconds! Yeah, right.

The movie also doesn't talk about the type of bullet the AR-15 fires and if there is any indication of that bullet entering the back of JFK's head at the proper angle. This theory is so bad that I suspect it is a deliberate fake that can be proven wrong. I'm sure the assassination was a conspiracy, but not this.