JFK Assassination System Date: 10/19/20 Identification Form Agency Information AGENCY: HSCA RECORD NUMBER: — 180-10131-10330 RECORD SERIES: SECURITY CLASSIFIED TESTIMONY AGENCY FILENUMBER: 014728 Document Information ORIGINATOR: HSCA FROM: SCELSO, JOHN TO: TITLE: DATE: 05/16/1978 PAGES: 193 SUBJECTS : CIA, ASSOCIATION WITH OSWALD CIA, METHODOLOGY SCELSO, JOHN, TESTIMONY BEFORE THE COMMITTEE OSWALD, LEE, POST RUSSIAN PERIOD, TRAVEL, TRIP TO MEXICO OSWALD, LEE, RUSSIAN PERIOD, DEFECTION TO RUSSIA NOSENKO, YURI DOCUMENT TYPE: TRANSCRIPT CLASSIFICATION: — Unclassified RESTRICTIONS: 3 CURRENT STATUS:  Redact DATE OF LAST REVIEW: 01/01/2003 OPENING CRITERIA : COMMENTS : Box 6 v9.1 1 Docld: 32277215 Page 1
/ ‘Pascione:amt 1-1 EXECUTIVE SESSION ied 3 TUESDAY, MAY 16, 1978 ta U.S. House of Representatives, Subcommittee on the Assassina- tion of John F. Kennedy of the Select Committee on Assassinations, 20024 (202) S5u-24N5 MN | | | Washington, D.C. Y 3 . The Subconmittee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:35 a.m. 1d | , in room 3370, House Annex No. 2, 2nd and D Streets, N.W. Mod . 2 Present: Michael Goldsmith and Dan Hardway. a = ° = = v7 ras = e S — a = oe S = nm a ~ = = na ~ = = ae] Sr nel Mr. Goldsmith. Miss Reporter, will you please swear in we " the witness? Oa The Reporter. Do you swear that the testimony you are about to give in this matter will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God? Mr. Scelso. I do. to la 901784 DocId: 32277215 “Page 2
. a ra) ? a “ a > iW 2 g = 1] aa ‘ a “ =} . = 423 pad ow = = = ta n = 18 <= tw a = is a V7 Ss 18 70) = 19 =~ im . S 24. 21 aw OSS on ma 22 wf Ny, 23 2 a as 32277215 DoctId: tw ‘os in 20024 (202) S54-2345 ou Mr. Scelso? Mr. Mr. | | Mr. | | | | | Mr. Yes. Mr. Goldsmith. Have you been given a copy of the Commit-) tee rules and the Committee resolutions? Mr..Scelso. Yes. : Mr. Goldsmith. Have you had an opportunity to read Mr. | | | Rule Mr. Mr. Mr. _ Goldsmith.. to have counsel present TESTIMONY OF JOHN SCELSO Goldsmith. the record? Scelso. John Scelso. Scelso. S-c-e-l-s-o. Goldsmith. Scelso. I am retired. Where do you live? Goldsmith. Scelso. Abroad. Would you please state your name for Would you spell Scelso? What is your present occupation, Mr. Goldsmith. Mr. Scelso, are you here testifying Scelso. Number 4? Scelso. Yes, I have. Goldsmith. Do you understand Scelso. Yes, I do. Goldsmith. Do you understand here today? Scelso. Yes. erpory fog Wy ee aio ¢ ; DLs! ALDESSON REFCRTING COMPS: before the Committee voluntarily and without subpoena? that rule? that. you have a right 901783 i } i {
Mr. Goldsmith. Do you waive that right? Mr, Scelso. Yes. I am an attorney myself. io Mr. Goldsmith. Do you understand the Committee's rules tw that you have a right to receive a copy of. the. transcript of | the deposition statement that you are about to give today? . i se z= 5 2 | Mr. Scelso. Yes. 2 6h oe Mr. Goldsmith. Are you willing to waive that right/ = 7 | z | “Mr. Scelso. Yes, I waive that. : | Mr. Goldsmith. I gave you, a few minutes ago, a copy rz) yO 1 < ‘o | of a letter written by the Acting Director of Central Intelli-| : | ) gence, Mr. Carlucci, to this Committee. It is in the Commit- | Fa It; ' ; . | tee's record as Exhibit 94, JFK Exhibit 94. | @ g Have you had a chance to read that. letter? | : ; | Mr. Scelso. Yes. | = - Mr. Goldsmith. Do you understand it? : 7 | Mr. Scelso. I do. ! = 16: = a Mr. Goldsmith. For purposes of the record, I would like | £ . | to explain to you that the Committee's mandate is to investi- | 5 ) | gate the assassination of President Kennedy in terms of who | : an ! killed the President. Was there a conspiracy? What was the. : : - performance of the investigative agencies, including the FBI | ARE and the CIA? Also to evaluate the work of the Warren @ aa ‘ : Commission. Do you understand that? .Mr. Scelso. Yes. Bp) Mr. Goldsmith. Mr. Scelso, is it true that you were - : @ a ae | § i in ; { ho in Docld:32277215 Page 4
Doctd: 2 3 4 wt = 5 GN t a wn 6 ~ ~ , = a 7 — ~ = a = ™ s a oO 7 Ft ~ 10 Ss = fl n “ = 14 ir C = _— . Pas | = ta re Pa - = 15 S = té = Vy s i3 in = 19 ~ Cc a s . 20 —» f: fed 22 ne Nn 32277215 formerly employed by the Central Intelligence Agency? Mr. Scelso. Yes, I was. Mr. Goldsmith. For how many years were you so employed? | | Mr. Scelso. Twenty-three years. Mr. Goldsmith. In what capacity? | Mr. Scelso. I was an intelligence officer in the clan- | | t i ! | destine operations side of the organization. | Mr. Goldsmith. For all twenty-three years? Mr. Scelso. Yes, all twenty-three years. ! | Mr. Goldsmith. What position did you have with the Agency at the time you retired? i | | Mr. Scelso. At the time I retired, I was on the foreign | i intelligence staff in-charge of the operations branch respon- | . | sible for reviewing almost all of the foreign intelligence | | and counter-intelligence operations of the Agency and of formulating doctrine with the conduct of such operations. | | I was also a member of a panel which reviewed the total | programs of the Agency abroad and evaluated them. had quite another job. Mr. Goldsmith. That was my next. question. What was your position? Of course, at the time of the Kennedy assassination, I 1 Mr. Scelso. At the time of the Kennedy assassination, I was the chief of a branch responsible for operations in Mexico and Central America, down to and including Panama. Stee 001785 Gael ALDESSON REPORTING COMPANY
DoctlId: wm CO) 7 o wo = & ~ e) ™ t re) , wt fo) ~ ~ , > . a 7 ~ ™ a a 2 N ry fed roy Y a = 10 Ss =~ S = Tl oe) = = ia] y ad rt . = , a 13 ~ ~ 3 ta a e- 1s x i) 7 = Z = 13 = n \7 x = a) ad 19 ~ c ce = 20 32277215 wt i | Mr. Goldsmith. Which branch was that? Mr. Scelso. I think it was called WH-3, Western Hemis- phere 3. The designations change from time to time. Agency the testimony you are going to be giving here today? | i | Mr. Goldsmith. Have you discussed with anyone from the Mr. Scelso. Yes. I was acquainted, very briefly, with ‘as you have summarized it to me today. | the general thrust of the Committee's investigation, which is | I was made aware of the Nosenko case, and I borrowed | . Mr. Epstein's book and read it over the week-end. That is all. Mr Goldsmith. Did you have any involvement in the Nosenko case? Mr. Scelso. No. I knew of the Nosenko case in a very sketchy way. I knew that Nosenko had defected and that he had said that _Oswatd was not a Soviet agent. ! | | | I later heard that Nosenko was discovered to have been | dissembling, not being on the level. That is all. That _information was imparted to me by officers I do not recall in { | | no more than three sentences on the first occasion:and two | | sentences on the second occasion. © Mr. Goldsmith. Was there any particular reason, then, that you read the Nosenko book this week-end? Mr. Scekso. Just that I am very much interested in the Kennedy assassination investigation and it seemed to present a ‘Say ‘ Bb | CaeT 0017 Fage 6 ALDESSON REPORTING COMPANY
lot of new angles. Mr. Goldsmith. Did you think that you might be asked ; { t | | ‘Mr. Scelso. I. suspected that I might. 3 | questions about the Nosenko case? = s Incidentally, the book did raise several points in my 5 3 mind which I would like to discuss with you. | | g 7 | Mr. Goldsmith. Before we do that, other than the general. 3 | briefing that the Agency gave you on the work of our Committee| ; | did anyone in. the Agency suggest to you that you should not . “6 not cooperate with us? | S ! ; g 1 | Mr. Scekso. No. | ¢ a Mr. Goldsmith. Did anyone inform you about the substance | . . | t oe 2 13 of other interviews or statements made under oath by Agency : ta employees to staff of this Committee? , : 7 Mr. Scelso. No, except that I was told in a discussion : 1é ofithe Nosenko case that certain people in the Agency had ! = 13 testified along one side or the other of the Nosenko case. E a | Mr. Goldsmith. You were not informed about the substance : 15 \° any statements made by any CIA person to this Committee? : : ca ; Mr. Scelso. No. | . a Mr. Goldsmith. Before we proceed, you indicated that | | r gal 22) you would like to give us some background information or com- | | | 2 ments on the Nosenko case from the book you have read. Why | do you not take this opportunity to do that now? 25 Mr. Scelso. Well, several points struck me. As you know, a ' : ‘ 4 a Lo. : Cad ew PP BA ts 7
1-7 I was in charge of the investigation of the assassination of President Kennedy for the clandestine services of CIA, of nm . ‘which Mr. Helms was then the Chief. for the first one or two o de in hundreds of papers and a summary report, before I was relieved months,:and I‘ilearned a lot about the case at that time, read of this responsibility. In reading the book, the Epstein book, I noted a couple sy ‘of things. One is that. the Embassy officer in Moscow who au talked to Oswald when he arrived there and wanted to renounce ~o) his citizenship, a man named Schneider, was stated to be an officer of the Central Intelligence Agency. oan If this is true, I did not know it at the time of my | investigation and must conclude that the information was with- held from me, because I discussed the Oswald case with members; of the Soviet Branch at that time,. in the presence of an officer who had been in Moscow at the time of the Oswald defection. 1 i 13 | In this conversation where I was reading the State Depart+ \ | ment. reports written by the officer who had seen Oswald, I was: 400 7TH STREET, SoW ROPORTERS BUETDENG, HASHTHOTON, D.C. 20024 (202) $5%-~2945 a \ so || not told that this man was a CIA agent, CIA officer, or what- 2 4 * | t \ t -ever he was. | I do not know that he was. I only know that the book i | | coat § ( “a ied td | 23 1 said that he was. | | Secondly, the book states that Oswald had been in touch in Dallas or Houston or someplace with the CIA Office of SE PDET 901788 i oun | DocId:32277215 Bage 8 ALDESSON REPORTING COMPANY
Ww 3 4 4 wt Z 3 ™ i} a P ow ro) ~ ; cS o~ 7 _— x S a se ™ rey 3 a = {¢ 2 S = ft % . = © a '3 = = ta n = 13 = = ts S n Iv e 13 a = 19 x c S 70 oa eo ans ae fa 22 oot, 23 43 Docld: 32277215 sat) MER SR tA a oe rk ti ee Qobas 1-8 Operations Officer, Contacts Branch, named Moore -- MrO7Fo-r ee | Mr. Goldsmith. J. Walter Moore? | he Mr. Scelso. Something like that. | J. Walton Moore was in touch with deMohrenschielt. It asserts that deMohrenschielt claimed Moore had asked him to stay in touch with Oswald. | As I recall, I did not know that Moore had, any officer of the Central Intelligence Agency in the Texas area, had been| |. in touch with Lee Harvey Oswald at any time. } i Mr. Goldsmith. My recollection differs somewhat. My recollection of the book was that it said that Moore had been in touch with deMohrenschielt. I do not think it went into any detail that Moore had been in touch with Oswald. Mr. Scelso. I read the book very hurriedly, and I { | \ | | | thought they were the same party, however, I cannot swear to | that. I just wanted to say that I did not know that. there | had ever been any involvement between the domestic branch of the Central Intelligence Agency that was then called the Office of Operations and their officessaround the states, who interviewed American servicemen going abroad or returning | from abroad, was called the Contacts Branch. I did. not know that anyone in that branch had ever been in contact with the Oswald case, whether with him personally or by requesting people to elicit information from him, and so on. Mr. Goldsmith. Does that surprise you? (901789. Bage 9
1-9 | Mr. Scelso. Yes, because that should have shown up in | the traces and it was, of course, a vital factor in the inves- 3 | tigation. : | | Mr. Goldsmith. When I say does that surprise you, does | = | the fact that no officer from the domestic contacts division, N | . 5 5 |l or domestic contacts service, ever contacted Oswald? Does the g : fact of the absence of such a contact surprise you? | ~ a Mr. Scelso. No, it would not have surprised me, because | : | Oswald was a-security suspect and was a proper subject for : 10 | handling by the Office of Naval Intelligenee and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, not with the Central Intelligence WASHTHGTON , -< to Agency. — a A 2 Mr. Goldsmith. Are.youssaying, then, that it would not | GULELDING, rar be standard operating procedure for the Agency to attempt to in tn ( debrief a. returning defector? REPOAT VES Mr. Scelso. I do not know, really, because the operations Ws: a of the Soviet Branch was something that was very, very exclu- | wT, § & ‘a sively held which I, in my later positions, when I had to _ H . an ! . = | review all of the operations in the world and so on, very ~ i} : 1 é 20 | rarely found out.anything about it. | | - a} Mr. Goldsmith. For the record, I would. like to state | Yd] ay 72 that Dan Hardway has just walked into tne room. ; 23 Dan, this is Mr. Scelso. H f + Mr. Scelso. I know that positively I did not know that | Schneider was a CIA man, if he were; and as far as I recall -- 12 ey d tan are 90% eter RET , 001799 MPARY \ s . Docld:32277215 Page 10 © ALDERSON pti:
and I have never read any of the files since. I was relieved back in early 1964 of the responsibility for the investigation) -- t I do not recall anything about Moore or any CIA direct or 3 @ 4 indirect contact. . | | = § Mr. Goldsmith. When Oswald was in: Russia, he.worked at | Ms 6 | a radio factory for quite some time. Would that fact have S "j= the Agency more interested in interviewing him upon his S am return? 3 7 Mr. Scelso. Yes, it should have, normally -- and I am a i just conjecturing now; I do not actually know what the policy oO of the Office of Operations was about interviewing security VASHENCTON , suspects in the United States, an obvious suspect like an ex- defector. RULE ENG, Paes Mr. Goldsmith. Should there be a statement in Oswald's file that the reason he is not being interviewed or debriefed RUPORTE RS is that he would fall into the proper jurisdiction of Office | aMhe BY of Naval Intelligence or the FBI? “I ------ ee eee . | 1a | Mr. Scelso. On the basic of logic you would think so, ze | uw yo : = 19 | but I do not know anything at all about standard operating ¢ =| scene of the Office of Operations. - | i = ni Mr. Goldsmith. The Office of Operations -- Sn | Ep 22 | Mr. Scelso. -- was a branch of the Central Intelligence | i : 22 Agency which maintained offices around the United States and : briefed and debriefed Americans going abroad and returning das from abroad. (901791 a Docld: 32277215 Page 11 Meaehy
1-11 Mr. Goldsmith. That was now called the Domestic Contacts 1. Service? 2.0 oo enil | i | w i } | Mr. Scelso. Something like that. 4 Mr. Goldsmith. . You indicated that you were present at 3 az a conversation where there was a CIA officer present who was | F 7 in Moscow when Oswald was there? S 7 Mr. Scelso. Yes. | x a | ‘Mr. Goldsmith. Who was that officer? : a Mr. Scelso. Mr. Hugh Montgomery. | : 'g | Mr. Goldsmith. When did this conversation take place? | S g no ‘Mr. Scelso. I presume it was sometime within two months | 2 7 after the assassination. | | , r g 13 Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know whether Mr. Montgomery ever | n | | \ mo | had any contact with Oswald in Moscow? | Mr. Scelso. I do not know that, no. When I talked to him, he wondered whether he might not have been present at 1, REPORTEES MULE Sit x i one of the interviews. ; 13° Mr. Goldsmith. Which interview are you referring to? | : 7 Mr. Scelso. The interview of the State Department officer € 30 who wrote these reports we were going over with Lee Harvey Oswald, and then he reflected on this a minute and said no, he was not, because there were other defectors at the time, you know, “before or. afterwards. Mr. Goldsmith. Did Mr. Montgomery make any other com- t 901792 ments about the Oswald case? Docld:32277215 Page 12 ALDERSON RESOR
Mr. Scelso. No. | | | Mr. Goldsmith. You indicated that you had no knowledge 1 whether or not Mr. Schneider was a CIA officer; if he was would @ 4 | his file reflect that? . | z | Mr. Scelso. Oh, sure. | 5 5 | Mr. Goldsmith. Is it possible that his file would not | g "| indicate his active employment with the Agency? | 7 Mr. Scelso. His files in the State Department? , 7 Mr. Goldsmith. Let's talk first about his files with : | the CIA. | He Mr. Scelso.. I.do not know whether we would have a file | 2 | at the CIA. | Mr. Goldsmith. Let me run this hypothetical with you. Assume that a man works for the Central Intelligence Agency, 1949 for a year, and he leaves and joins the Foreign REPORTEPS BUPLDING, MASHTNGTON, c. JW $ | ie Service, becomes a Foreign Service Officer. Eventually he ' | gets assigned to work in the Soviet Union as a consular His CIA file, let's assume that during this time that i 300 7TH STREET, ‘a the man is working State Department. cover but he is also | 1 H 12 | officer. { i | t { | { \ and the fact that. he was put under State Department cover. 901793 ce 2 CIA. Would the CIA file necessarily reflect the fact that he | “SSS ol, , . ® Tne 22 } is still working for the Agency? 23 | Mr. Scelso. Oh, sure. There would be a file in the @ a4 | Office of Personnel that would show his entire CIA record j | Ore fF DESSON RES TINS COMPANY Docld: 32277215 Bage 13 ALDERSON REPOR eee
1-13. That file would probably be very closely held, even more’ closely held than ordinary files. ind t State Department cover, but still with the Agency, would that rye i | Mr. Goldsmith. Would that indication that. he is under be in’ the subject's main personnel file, or is it possible | that it would be in some other file? | Mr. Scelso. I really cannot answer that authoritatively, ;} because I never saw the file of any officer who was stationed | 20024 (202) S$5"-2345 oo in Moscow. The assignment of CIA officers to Moscow was D.C, ey sonething that was very elaborately prepared, planned in advance, and very closely held. UASHTNOTON, For example, I was once stationed. in an Embassy abroad \ | 1 i where there was an officer, CIA officer, who was just in to 2 . | go to. Moscow as his next assignment. I did not know that this | man was a CIA officer at all, even though I was, for a consid- REPORTCES BULEDEMS , : | | | | | | | | erable period, Acting Chief of the station. I did not know that thisi man, whom I saw occasionally and : © o — ~t who often I had occasion to deal with, he was a State Depart- ment Security Officer. I did not. know he was a CIA man, 308 7TH STREET, oO | “ee he got thrown out of Moscow later on. Mr. Goldsmith. Was this Mr. Angelli? Mr. Scelso. Yes. I think that was his name. ; } Mr. Goldsmith. Is it possible for the Agency to work with i i i } @ “4 an officer overseas without there being any notation in the | officer's personnel file at CIA Headquarters -- in other words, ! : i 901794 Docld:32277215 Page 14
a personnel file would indicate, for example, that the employee retired back, say, in 1955. No connection whatsoever) Ww with the Agency after 1955, and for only a handful of people to know that actually the person is still CIA? an be : i Mr. Scelso. Certainly it. is possible. As I say, I do | not really know the mechanics and the administrative proce- | | dures that accompanies such an assignment. Mr. Goldsmith. Was there any aspect of the Oswald case 20024 (202) S5%-2345 vil a that struck you as unusual when you first had an opportunity D.C, ve) Qa Mr. Scelso. Do you mean after the assassination? | WASHTMNGTON, Mr. Goldsmith. Yes. Did you read the file any time before { 1 | | to first read through the file? ] | the assassination? BUTLDING, Mr. Scelso. No. KEPORTERS | i - Mr. Goldsmith. Then-after the assassination. i | Mr. Scelso. We only had a scan file on Oswald. until he | S.M, was involved in the assassination, merely the fact that he about. this in feports from the Navy and State Department, and 290 PTH STREET, ‘a had been in the Marine Corps and had deserted, and we learned | we had made a:record, I think, a think file of the communica | } tions on him from other government agencies. @ Ma 222 And of course it was the information that had come up { | from Mexico City a few weeks before the assassination. © nature, but even in light of what little material that was in’) aps 901795 Stone! t @ 24 | Mr. Goldsmith. I-understand the file was limited in a | if i Docld:32277215 Page 15 ALDESSON RESORTING COMBAAY
SECRET oo. i lit, was there anything in there that you found unusual? i i 4 Mr. Scelso. Not to me, because, for many years, I had | 5 | been dealing with cases like this and people like this and, | 4 | to me, it was just a typical defection case. | z 5 | You see, one of the other things I was in the Agency, | ~ é 5 early on, I was the first polygraph operator in the Agency S ‘7 |} and had. polygraphed some hundreds of security suspects. I | x  )atse had been a prisoner of war interrogator in World War II S s 3 | and interrogated some tens of thousands of Germans; and I 2 10 | also had been the counterespionage officer for the European = i : 11 | pivision back in the '50's and dealt with dozens of defection | S 12 | cases and things like that. | e : 13 So Oswald just seemed to me to be a small potatoes | z 14 | aefector. | g I Mr. Goldsmith. What would be the Agency's standard 7 1s | operating procedure with dealing with a defector that returns | ‘4 | Ante the country? : : ce Mr. Scelso. I do not know. By the time that defectors | a = | started coming back, I was no longer in a position to know i S 20 that kind of thing. People like that were handled, of course, sex." | primarily by the FBI or, if there were military defectors, : es! i px 2 | also by _their..branch of service. And I was overseas for | many years, from '52 to '62 -- wait a minute; '55 to '62 -- i iand no case like that had ever come to my attention. Ww tn i I was not. in a position where things came across my desk. - - SECRET 901796 Docld: 32277215 Page 16 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPAKY
SECRET ae Mr. Goldsmith. Oswald defected to the Soviet Union in October, 1959, and early November of '59, the CIA received wo . | cable or a copy of a cable from either the Office of Naval 4 | Intelligence or from the Department of State, I do not recall = § jexactly which. t \ ar) i The substance of the cable reported Oswald's visits to ~ - | x 7 is American Embassy in Moscow and indicated that Oswald =a S 3 j that he was going to defect and also that Oswald was going | cf || to offer military-related information to the Soviets. | = ‘6 | As I said, that cable came in at the beginning of November , e i “se, Under normal operating procedure, should that cable | = | Ps . ¥2 || have triggered the opening of a 201 file? | cS | = . a 13 Mr. Scelso. Again, I really cannot authoritatively speak > | | * _ about procedures. I would imagine so. | = a Mr. Goldsmith. In your opinion, would it be unusual for | = 4 x 's Oswald! s 201 file to have been opened over a year after the = ! rn a . - arrival of that cable? In other words, the file actually was | ae | Ss i383 : = not opened until December, 1960, over a year after the defec- | Sag | | 7 | Would you regard that as unusual? « i | 5 Uti : ra i Mr. Scelso. I cannot tell. I never concerned myself i\ iy f a x pith procedures like that.. When I came back from overseas, n> wu II was put into running a great big branch with revolutions ; ‘going day and night, and I had a large staff of extremely Be SaaS sh “ nw) tJ Ww in ‘capable people who concerned themselves with things like that. - SECRET eaniae iH og = lar t & ¥y Docld:32277215 Pate 17 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANL
SECRET “0 Mr. Goldsmith. We will get back to your work on this | case after the assassination in a while. What I would like mM 4 . do now is go over a series of cables and transcripts per- . @ 4 : taining to the period before the assassination. | z 5 | For the record, I would like to say that all of my ques= | r 6 [eon pertain to the time period of late 1963. | g : In 1963, you were Chief of the Division known as WH-3? x 3 Mr. Scelso. Branch. S : 3 Mr. Goldsmith. Branch known as WH-3? | zZ 16 1 Mr. Scelso. Yes. 2 HW Mr. Goldsmith. And what connection, if any, did you a | $ 12 [have with the Mexico City Station at that time? | @ : 13 ' “ME, Scelso. The Mexico City Station was directly under | ; 14 iny branch. I had a branch and a series of desks under that. | : 15 lone of them was the Mexico desk. _ z Is I was, first in 1962, I was Chief of the Mexico desk | ‘ 7 jsteens and then, a year later, I became Chief of.the Branch | : 8 |which included Mexico and several other countries. | : a E 9 | Mr. Goldsmith. Would the Chief of Station, Mexico City, S 8 |eor example, be a subordinate of yours? | cee Mr. Scelso. Ina sense, “yes, although he reported 4 iss ww mr \ / il ' | ! Le J Lo) on. Every one of the Station Chiefs abroad has three or four b> es idifferent roles. Ww tn Mr. Goldsmith. Was the manner in which he-reported SECRET _ a 101798 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY I i eieeeehy to the Division Chief.and to the. Director, and so i | | i Docld: 32277215 Page 13
DoctlId: ” a sj wn t S664 x | S 7 | City? z Se 23 ce 1 SF | a | . t H = 'C | would -- Ee S i = Wy a = 12) = a, | qe 13 | = ot i Ee 1s 4 2 i Ps | = is: > t nF e. 18} ih — { = 9 | ad c - | = 29 | | an anal a wee | 23 | hd es / Ww Gn 32277215 Page 19 SECRET | [consistent with the manner in which other station chiefs ! ; 2 [reported to headquarters? | Mr. Scelso. Yes. As a matter of fact, and conformance to procedures, and so on, was exemplary. | . 4 absolutely outstandingly managed station and its reporting | Mr. Goldsmith. Who was the Chief of Station, Mexico Mr. Scelso. Winston Scott. Mexico was an Mr. Goldsmith. I guess you have sort of done it, but of Winn Scott's competence as a Station Chief? Mr. Scelso. Winn Scott was, at that time -- probably, Mr. Goldsmith. Why would you say that he had the best in the world? Mr. Scelso. Because of the breadth and depth of their operations, both in the counter-intelligence field and the political action field, and in the espionage field... Mr. Goldsmith. What kind of personal relationship, if any, did you have with Mr. Scott? Mr. Scelso. A fine relationship. He was a great deal SECRET ALDESSON REPORTING COMPANY in view of my later experience surveying all of the stations | | indirectly -- but could you give us your impression | | { ' | | | in the world, .as good aX Station Chief as we had, and you | i] | j could fairly say that he had the best station in the world. J i 001799
SECRET was i | the greatest respect for him, and he also treated me with. 2 | ere greatest respect. 3 | Mr. Goldsmith. Did you and Mr. Scott ever disagree? | 4 Mr. Scelso. During the course of the investigation, { ,) ! : a § jwhen letters and cables were flying thick and fast, there | t { 2 6 lwere a few professional points on which we disagreed, but they & 7 rose eve personal. in matters. They were merely differences | S of judgment and opinion. | 8 > | Mr. Goldsmith.. Do you know Herb Minnell? a | i z 0 | Mr. Scelso. The name is familiar to me, yes. at Mn i Mr. Goldsmith. I believe Mr. Minnell was case officer | pe | . 2 E Mexico City, at that time, who was in charge of Soviet | | = 13 || operations. can | Mr. Scelso.. That's right, yes. — ! . . ts i . | te 4 t ge l3 Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know him? | z * | Mr. Scelso. I do know him, yes. “n 17 ; . ; i Mr. Goldsmith. Can you give us your opinion of his = i competence? 1 : = 194 . | ~ Mr. Scelso. I am looking back here now fifteen years c : ' S 29 | | and since I have retired in 1970, I have had next to no con- , 1 BSE ; tact with anybody in the Agency, especially abroad. I oors : wai 72 |remember Mr. Minnell was picked for this job as a very capable | | and experienced Soviet Operations officer. ® ® However -- in fact, he was personally approved by me, Ww tn f I believe -- butithe standard by which you judged Soviet SECRET 901800 ALDESSON REPORTING COMPANY > ee Docld: 32277215 Page 270
SECRET “1-20 i | operations officers was an extremely controversial matter. 2 | It was like asking Jerry Ford what he thinks of President 3 | Carter, all prejudices aside, what do you think of President 4 (Carter? It is a very difficult question to answer. 2 5 | He was certainly not an incompetent, but he was very \ i “ 4 | well thought of and he was the best man for the job. a | e 7 | Mr. Goldsmith. Do you have any opinion as to his honesty x 3 jan trustworthiness? Cc i 3 3 Mr. Scelso. I had never had any reason at all-to doubt ; a ~ !0 }anything about it. = nh! Mr. Goldsmith. What about Mr. Robert Shaw? > na : : ' < ‘ . { > 425 Mr. Scelso. Mr. Robert Shaw was in the Mexico station. «2 $ : \ = i i ® qe 13 {I recall him. He had been chief of a base up north, I > . : = 14 I'\believe. e 13 | And Shaw was a man whose honesty and loyalty I never = Is |eould question, although he and I disagreed on a number of “ My | Professional things. I do not recall Mr. Shaw as a particularly © 18 'l solid. individual. in ho _ 4 . a = "9 | Mx. Goldsmith. Did any of your disagreements with Mr. | 3 . . . a 20 | Shaw pertain to the Kennedy assassination? | \ wee Mr. Scelso. No | @ ey | Mr. Goldsmith. To the handling of the investigation by | the Mexico City station? @ _ | Mr. Scelso. No. I do not think I ever discussed that ‘with him, or with the other gentleman that you mentioned. SECRET anno ALDERSON REPORTING COM PANY Docld: 32277215 Page 21 °
i Mr. Goldsmith. How about Mr. David Phillips? i) Mr. Scelso. Mr. David Phillips, who has since become 3 |celated to me by marrying a relative of mine, was regarded by se ime, long before this marriage, as one of the absolutely out- ~ ’ = s jstanding officers of the Agency after I visited Mexico City 5 6 lana reviewed his operations soon afiter I took over the E ‘7 — desk. I regard this man as one of the most brilliant, g capable officers that I have ever known, and nothing has : 3 |nappened since then that has changed my judgment. 7 : He Mr. Goldsmith. What about your impression of his honesty) : 1 [integrity? | | = 12 | Mr. Scelso. Well, having known him through thick and | @ : 13 |thin in the Mexico station and when he was later head of | : 14 icuban operations, I. would give him the highest marks. I have | 3 is never known any man of greater. integrity, and few equal, | : 1s jpasea on my experiences | “ "| Mr. Goldsmith.- Have you known Mr. Phillips in his : : 18 |capacity as a propaganda officer ever sent out disinformation | = 4 Jor misinformation concerning the Kennedy Assassination? | = a Mr. Scelso. No, but I can conceive that it might have ! Sex." nappened-in the Mexico station. Perhaps they did, in their : ESe jpropagande efforts which were going full-blast all the time, jput in newspaper articles and so on to discredit somebody, nN wa |some foreign power, in connection with the operation. I do 2 ; ‘not believe that it was ever a policy to do so, but ‘they were ‘ - — SECRET 001802 i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY Docld: 32277215 Page 22 PEERSS ; Ww
SECRET (2-22 thing of his own creation and did not. really conform to the i | pretty much independent in formulating their propaganda. | ! @ 2 | Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know a woman named Ann Goodpasture? 3 Il Mr. Scelso. Yes, but not intimately, not well. I knew — . 4 |her when I visited the Mexico station. | E 5 | “Mr. Goldsmith. Do you. know what her responsibilties were é in the Mexico City station? a 7! Mr. Scelso. She was sort of the personal assistant to & 3 | Winn Scott.. S | 3s F | Mr. Goldsmith. Do you have any opinion as to her? a 7 i = 1G ! Mrs Scelso. She wasvvery capable, extremly hardworking. = 11./A-very loyal person. As far as I know, she has the highest a ' “a ‘ ! =~ 72 | reputation -- recognizing the fact, of course, that there ° i oi : i = 4 | : ‘ ‘ . ty . @ a Is were people in the Mexico station who did. not like the Station = = ,_ | * ‘4 jChief and did not like any part of his hierarchy, because | ae ! i we i | ze 15 | inn Scott was a very hard taskmaster.. | < i | “ts | The one point on which I used to disagree with Winn = nA - i . i “Vs | Scott was his overworking his personnel and low-rating them | =! e their fitness reports. ie] { = 19 |} H 5 ‘| Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know whether.Mr. Scott! maintained = +" Ilan accurate and thorough system of files in the Mexico City a | Giana i ion? BSR | station | we Mr. Scelso,. His file system was legendary. It was a 23! | | system which the Agency had devised. It was really much more ho la | intensive and his officers had to spend an awful lot of time _ SECRET | | 001803 if ALDES EPORTING COMPANY Doclda: 32277215 Page 23 { it | | it {
SECRET 1-23 ft . i i @ ) | | | Mr. Goldsmith. I have heard it said by several that | | l keeping it up. i) e | Mrs Scott never. even threw out any piece of paper. Everything ya - . . | * was filed in the Mexico City Station. . an = 3 Do you think that is an accunate statement? w 6 | Mr. Scelso. I think that would be a figure of speech. | | S ’ |Z think people would say, meaning that he never discarded | e é jan information that came in, that he attempted to have ‘ ’ | everything incorporated in the files, but it is inevitable in | i - 4 5 0 | the intelligence business that you really cannot do this | = y | . = "1100 percent. | 2 | = 4 4 . ® C r2 Mr; Goldsmith. What would have happened to Mr. Scott's = = 613 : : - - . = jsites after his death, to the Mexico City statfén's files | =z is | | a jafter Mr. Scott's death? For example, would the files have 2 | been brought back? any I = 16 ~ Mr. Scelso. His personal files? ! “Is | . a | Mr. Goldsmith. Not his personal. files. The files of = j cig! = the Mexico City station. He had this enormous record-keeping | H i * i system and I would imagine -- I have no direct knowledge of | & | .. i a 29 | oo ; |this because I think.-« I retired before he did. I am not Pear. al at | | as sure of that, and I have no knowledge of that. Ordinarily, nos ay) 34 ; i aw “- e “ ihis retirement or death would have had no effect on it. 23 | L | However, files overseas may be purged from time to time | i { | because of lack of space. Often they are sorted out, and a ia ot of them sent home. That could have been. I have no SECRET “o1s0d _ ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY Docld: 32277215 Page 24 ALDERSS Mean
SECRET j Ino knowledge. ined Mr. Goldsmith. What about Mr. Winn Scott's personal 3 | files? What would have happened to them? , 4 Mr. Scelso. I have no direct knowledge of that. z 6 § | Mr.GGoldsmith. Any indirect knowledge? i 2 6 | Mr. Scélso. No, I never heard a word about it. I only s  - | ~ [em -- I heard that Mr. Scott retired and that he went into o 2 | business of some kind in Mexico and he died of a heart attack.) Loa : : a i. Mr. Goldsmith. In 1963 when you were working in Head- ) | Zs 10 | = | pe oN | from the Mexico City station? < = 12) Mr. Scelso. Yes. quarters, I take it that you. frequently received communicator | | | { | | i I C ® - 13 | Mr. Goldsmith. In what form did those communications = | cake? 7 Mr. Scelso. Cables and dispatches. ; Is Mr. Goldsmith. Were you ever in contact with the Mexico “ a |aty station by telephone? | : ‘3 | Mr. Scelso. Rarely, extremely rarely. The division : E 9 | was very frequently in touch with him by telephone. The | s | asvaston chief and the deputy chief, over my violent objec- | AGE || | tions. . BEF 30 it © oN | Mr. Goldsmith. Who was the Division Chief? | x Mr. Scelso. Colonel J.C. King. | Ww tn Mr. Scelso. Mr. Rayford Herbert. SECRET ALDESSON REPORTING COMPANY 001805 | © Mr. Goldsmith. The Deputy Chéef? 3 | Docld: 32277215 Page 245
SECRET 1-28 Mr. Goldsmith. Mr. Herbert is Deputy Chief of what? nm Mr. Goldsmith. On what occasion did they contact Mr. | . @ | Mr. Scelso. Western Hemisphere Division. | soe by telephone? E 5 Mr. Scelso. In times of crisis where particularly | * I no 4 — operations were going on, where defectors were ¢ 7 ome out or where there was some kind of a crisis with the | e a Mexican government. It used to make my hair stand on end. | 3 > | Mr.. Goldsmith. Why was that? a , i = 10 i Mr. Scelso. Because it was grossly insecure. | i / ae | 5 OW | Mr. Goldsmith. You indicate you received communications | a | ~ 12 | in the form of a cable or dispatch. S @ qe 1 Mr. Scelso. Yes. > | ° 14 Mr. Goldsmith. Under what citcumstances would the 2 15 | Mexico City Station send a cable instead of a dispatch? In | “ Is jother words, more specifically, ‘what would be the criteria for| i. - aN | sending a cable? What would be the criteria for sending a = 3 |dispatcn? ( a qo. i _ i 1 = . Mr. Scelso. Cables were sent if the information was | lof-such a nature that it had to be acted on within a day or Qt eS ia day and a half or two days. Dispatches took so long that Maz 39 | . ; © wR yon really could not take any kind of operational action | predicated on dispatch... You could take administrative ‘i @ | action. | . | ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY ro os w ia Doclda: 32277215 Page 276
SECRET i Thought pieces were sent out in dispatches. Progress 1-26 reports describing the course of an operation over a month's 3 ||period. we das ‘ t @ | 4 Mr. Goldsmith. Is it fair to say that a cable normally | 5 j suggested that something was of the highest priority? | 5 6 | Mr. Scelso. Cables were usually reporting operational S 7 jeverts that required headquarters decisions. Of course, there} S a [vere also cables that transmitted intelligence information : 9 [for dissemination to the community. : 3 , z 10 Mr. Goldsmith. Cables can be broken down into two g 1 categories. = 12 Mr. Scelso. Operational cables and reports cables: | e | © 13 Mr. Goldsmith. The reports cables would be the intelli- | = "4 igence information cables? | & | 5 13 - “Mr. Scelso. Yes. | = Is - Mr. Goldsmith. Can you think of any exceptions to the ! * " Jprsnespa that you just outlined in terms of when cables would : 8 Ibe used? : E | “Mr. Scelso. It was a very flexible matter. In the case 5 lof soviet operations, cables were used much more than in other! Sey" operations. Everything Soviet was of high priority. Cuban : © pe 2 joperations, a lot of cables were sent. | 2 Mr. Goldsmith. once a cable was received in peadquarters, @ * Iwnose responsibility would it be to respond to the cable? : | Mr. Scelso. A cable.would come into the communications ! ET 001807 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPAKY Doclda: 32277215 Page 27
SECRET i jcenter and they would, according to the code words which were | nm at the top, would assign the action to a certain desk branch 3 lor division and that component's name would be atthe top in a-certain position that indicated to everyone that that was Es 3 | the action. addressee and the others were information addressees. 4 4 | This was based on the code names which the sender of the | 5 7 telegram affixed to the top. | | 3 . Mr. Goldsmith. In part, the standard would determine | GF |vouta would receive and respond to a cable? . x z 10 i Mr. Scelso. Yes. e E i | Mr. Goldsmith. . Would the person receiving the cable 2 | = 12 in Headquarters make an independent decision, perhaps, that | ‘3 : : ® 5 13 the cable should go to someone higher up in the Agency? | Ss ; , : ia Mr. Scelso. Yes. Yes, he could, or he could try to : 13 jset the.action assigned to some different component. if he Ps | : is | felt he should not have action. : * ‘ : Mr. Gokdsmith. Under what circumstances would. the cable | 8 [0 to someone of a higher authority? : E a Mr. Scelso. Most cables did go on a reading board for | c ° on higher authority anyway. That is, on the reading boards of : coe the staff chiefs, the Counterintelligence Staff and Foreign : i | | ra 22 i r J a | Intelligence staf, and also the Director of the Office of | | Operations and his Deputy, almost all cables went to ‘them f Mr.. Goldsmith. Under what circumstances. would the DDO or SECRET 001808 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY { yt 4 i a9 | © as an informational matter. . ub ‘| i | 3 Docld: 32277215 Page 23
SECRET 1-20 , | his Deputy respond to the cables? wo Mr. Scelso. Intervene or exercise direction, and so assistant, we get a stack of cables every morning about this 3 || on? | | Mr. Goldsmith. Yes. . | = 5 | Mr. Scelso. If it were a matter of great importance, rs 6 | they might immediately call the Division or Branch and say S 7 jot over here, I want to talk to you about this. Frequently | & a j ehat happened. Or, if it were a matter of great importance, | 5 3 jn important difference of opinion with the station, the | : 0 |pivision or Branch would make sure that the DDO or his | : iB | peputy -~ I am using the present terminology; it was not | | 12 [in effect. then -- would sign off on the cable, to make sure | @ : 13 that he approved the action. | 14 That very often happened with Mexico, because we were | : 13 | dealing with all kinds of important matters involving American = is |actectors, American security suspects, risky operations and | a Vy is on. | : : aan Mr. Goldsmith. You made reference before to a reading 7 a E 9 lboara. What is a reading board? | 20 Mr. Scelso. The reading board of the DDO and his | ‘ 4 os yt ye whigh [Indicating] from all over the world, which he would 3) ; isimply get, his assistants read those. He had a couple of roe i aS nD i) 4 95 ar i i i i |administrative assistants who were really medium grade intel- : ; ligence officers with broad experience who would screen these » | | SECRET 001808 h ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY Docld: 32277215 Page 29 ‘| 4 ' i 1 i 4
SECRET 129 i things for him and bring things up for him. Then he was bombarded with telephone calls from the we 3 divisions all the time about this or that cable. I had the same thing when I was the Chief of Foreign Intelligence Es § | Operations. I used to read.a stack of cables that high | z 4 | [Indicating] every morning. That is why I can read these : 7 | things so fast. | : 3 Mr. Goldsmith. That is what you. referred to as a J vl reading boatfd? e i = 0 Mr. Scelso. Reading board, yes. = a | Now, the strange thing is that dispatches were not = = Ve ! similarly distributed. | iSo4 : i @ A 13 | Mr. Goldsmith. Why not? = ‘4 Mr. Scelso. Because it would have been impossible to ! : 3 : read them.. It was completely up to the desk officers who | bard | ' : ts | received dispatches whether they would write it on to senior | > : ig people, or the matters in them taken up by any senior = ; z ‘8 people. That is, the Branch Chief was responsible for see- | = 9 | ing that important dispatches -- sometimes things came in ec i . . = 20 with elaborate discussions of policy recommendations for new | eee priorities and So on, and I would then take this up with the a mr | © vx * ! senior officers in the division. : 23! | Mr. Goldsmith. Incidentially, how many branches were > ya there in the Western Hemisphere Division in 1963? Ww in Mr. Scelso. I think there were five or six. I am not “SECRET ootei0 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY Docld:32277215 Page 30
Doctld: SECRET 1-30 i sure. Then there was Cuba, which was a separate task corce, | 3 as I learned from the Senate Committee; I had forgotten it. : 3 n And later, Cuba came into the Division. 45 Mr. Goldsmith. Turning to Lee Harvey Oswald, when did | = 54 he first come to your attention? 5 é | Mr. Scelso. I first learned of Lée Harvey Oswald on | S 7 | the day of the assassination when his name was mentioned on | é 2 the radio and two minutes later an officer of my branch cane | S s 5 | running in and said, with the telegrams on Lee Harvey caved 2 10 | which we had sent, those telegrams which had gone out some | : I weeks before the assassination. | B 12 ! I had not noticed. I do not know whether -- I probably | : 13 | saw them, but I did not recollect them at that time. | é 1d Mr. Goldsmith. When the name Oswald first came to your 2 18 attention after the assassination, what. action, if any, did | ; Is you take? . . | 4 \7 Mr. Scelso. When it came in, I was not sitting in my , z 18 office. I was up in the Division front offices. I happened a Wo = 9 | to be up there on another matter when the thing came in over | 20 | the radio and within minutes, people from my office were up | “SE a there with the cables. And I do not know exactly what we | pe’ 2 did, but within minutes we had. notified the Division Chief w uw 1 t | | | and the DDP -- that is, the DDO. | > ee Mr. Goldsmith. How soon after the assassination did Ww tn i ‘ i ’ i | | | this officer come on with the Oswald cables? SECRET —— ootsit ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY ' + 32277215 Page 31
SECRET i Mr. Scelso. This was in the mid-afternoon of that day and I think that the assassination was on the radio, someone 1 had a little transistor radio going on with the news on it, wo and suddenly it came over and then in about a half hour after) ree frarenoearaniieiineevesr aera mrruenanrsaarcere eae managed all the records, handled all of the cables from E 5 | the assassination or fifteen minutes hater, then we were 5 7 all listening to this. S 7 | I do not know how long after the actual shooting it | % a | was that Oswald's name became known,» perhaps an hour, hour : ¢ { : 3 ) and a half. Within minutes after that, they were out with | S 10 | the cables in their hands.. | S i . 1 | Mr. Goldsmith. Within minutes of the name Oswald being | § 12 ! on the radio, an officer came in with the Oswald cables? | © : 12 Mr. Scelso. Yes. | z 14 | Mr. Goldsmith. Who was that officer? | 2 15 | Mr. Scelso. I believe it was Mrs. Charlotte Bustos | 2 i = 13 who was the, sort of the Major Domo of the Branch. She | 18 Mexico that dealt with security suspects, or asked for traces on security suspects. | 39 | . 7 _ Mr. Goldsmith. Did you ask her how she was able to | \ c ~ ; ; yal 300 7TH STRENT, SAAC obtain the Oswald cables so quickly? ] ! ! | \ i i ! 1 I ye =t i 5 ize) ‘ to . ! Mr. Scelso. No, I know where she would have gotten them. | i i i Mr. Goldsmith. At that time, did she also have a photo- + i | | We have copies of them right in our Branch. i | | . | graph of Oswald? i . SECRET 001812 i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY Docld: 32277215 Page 32 '
SECRET 1-32 “Mr. Scelso. No, I do not think so. i i i @ 2) Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know whether Charlotte Bustos se 3 ever discovered a photograph of Oswald at CIA headquarters? { | | Mr. Scelso. I do not think so. | 2 5 Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know whether she ever discovered 7 é | a photograph of someone whom’ she thought was Oswald? g 7 | Mr. Scelso. If you are talking about -- are. you talking * a | about the surveillance photo that was taken in front of the | e ; 3 : Embassy, the Russian Embassy? | : 19 | Mr. Goldsmith. We are going to get into that photograph' : 1 | Mr. Scelso. I do not remember any photograph of ovata | $ 12 | at that time, the day of the assassination, or even later. | © : i3 I do not recall that there ever was a photo of Oswald found | : 14 in Agency files. I do remember our asking -- we had to ask | E 13 | ONI for a photo, and so on. As far as I recall, they never z 7 sent us one. | “ 7 | It could be that later on»she found one, but I don't | | e 2 ig recall. : n i = 9 | Mr. Goldsmith. We are now going to start going through | = a a series of cables and other materials that the. Agency has | ccwec | provided for us, and for reference purposes, I am going to | © Fae 2 ! be referring to each piece of paper in the stack that I am | 23 | | particular number that. is stamped on it. The numbers are | I ! holding before me, I am going to be referring to it by the ( | | | assigned to eath particular page by the CIA. - These are all i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY Doclda: 32277215 Page 33 SECRET 901813,
SECRET 233 i | CIA documents and, as a means of allowing the Agency to Ww monitor what they gave us and to make sure that everything 3 | that they gave us will be given back to them, they have ! you? 4 | number-stamped each page. That is also an appropriate way w { = 5 | for us to refer to each page, for purposes of our record, \ \ S 61 because eventually everything will be returned to. the S | | | = 7 | Agency. S 3 In the future, if somebody is trying to reconstruct ™“ 4 Qo 7 | what we are looking at, they just need to turn to the a | z 'G | appropriate page. g a At this time, I would like to refer to CIA-177, and I 2 ; = 14 | . ; _ '# | will ask you to read that. c i | (Pause) = i * 4 | Mr. Scelso. Yes, I remember this cable. ge 134 Mr. Goldsmith. That cable is dated when? = ! an a - | Mr. Scelso. 9 October 1963. . i n oF . Lae C Mr. Goldsmith. You indicated that you remember that - | cable? = 194 . . ~ Mr, Scelso. I remember having seen it two years ago { 7” with the Senate investigation. | 2 | BOS Mr. Goldsmith. On the upper left-hand corner of the ®@ a cable, it says WH-8.. Mr. Scelso.. That means eight coptes went to WH. a> | : Y | Mr. Goldsmith. Would one copy of this have gone toa | { SECRET posta | i ALDESSON REPORTING COMPANY Docld: 32277215 Page 34
SECRET a Mr. Scelso. Yes. 2 | Mr. Goldsmith. In October of '63 when the cable was | . -Mr.-Scelso. Yes. Went to Charlotte Bustos. 3 sent out? | | have been put there? | | i 2, a S| Mr. Goldsmith. You indicated it went to Bustos by ! | a 6 | writing indication on the top of the page. Is that correct? | a | x ‘ ‘Mr. Scelso. Well, iit came to our desk, you see. It | = : | is from Mexico City so we automatically got the action on | “ ‘i Go” | it and the information copies went to counterintelligence = ‘0 | staff, FI staff, Soviet Division, I guess that is Régistry. = m I do not know what "BR" is. | < | E 2 | Mr. Goldsmith. On the bottom right-hand corner of the | z a 120: . e = page, it says 201-289248. Zou | “ il Mr. Scelso. Yes. S i Mr. Goldsmith. What does that refer to? = { ! = 1g | | ~ ° | Mr. Scelso. Probably it refers to Oswald's 201. = i a 17 | ‘ Mr. Goldsmith. I noted in the left-hand corner of the | ez = page, left-hand side of the page, there is a notation that | = 19 | ™ | says D-200-5-41. Do you know. what that means? e 39 | . ° | Mr. Scelso. I have no idea. | Se Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know when that indication would | = | | Mr. Scelso. No. That could be a subject file, refer- ring to the Kennedy assassination, or something like that. Mr. Goldsmith. The second paragraph of this cable makes SECRET 001815 i ALDESSON REPORTING COMPANY Docld: 32277215 Page 35 ;
SECRET 1-38 reference to a photograph. wo ! Mr. Scelso. Yes. | 4 prior to the assassination? Mr. Goldsmith. Was that. photograph sent to headquarters i i ; | i H 2 5 Mr. Scelso...-.No, I do not. believe it was. It was sent. : P | afterwards. | S 7 : Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know whether that photograph z a depicted Lee Harvey Oswald? < 9 : -  Mr.=Scelso.. No, I do not... This was the famous photo- : 1G | graph that was shown to Oswald's mother, and so on, which : 7 she thought. was Jack Ruby. | 3 12 | Mr. Goldsmith. That is correct. That is the photograph © = 33 | in question. | = i = 14 ’ Do you have any explanation for the photograph which is | : 1§ | commonly referred to as the "Mexico mystery man" photograph? | : iF Do you have any explanation for that? \7 | Mr. Scelso.. They looked at the photographs that they : : 18 | had for the period when the telephone call was made. This ” | = 19 | was the only one that could have conceivably been. him. | S 30 | So they said, they conjectured, concluded, that. if we do have pepe |! a photograph of the man, this is it. 4 ~~ A xv Mr. Goldsmith. On what do you base that explanation? 23 | Mr. Scelso. My knowledgesof the photography operation and talks with station officers before and afterward. They did not get pictures of everyone who entered and exited the SECRET 001816 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY eo °® Docld: 32277215 Page 36 | : {
SECRET SECRET recall anybody from Mexico coming up soon. after the ! ! ! ! } | L : oots17: ; | Soviet Embassy. 2 Mr. Goldsmith. The photograph of the Mexico mystery 3 | man, let's back up for a minute. 4 The Mexico mystery man. was a non-Latin.. Is that correct = 5 | Mr, Scelso. Yes. 5 P | Mr. Goldsmith. Was his picture the only picture of a g 7 | non-Latin taken during that time period? & 3! Mr. Scelso. Ido not know. I never saw all of the e ‘ ; pictures that were taken during that period. : 10 Mr. Goldsmith. If there were pictures of other non- 5 i 2 1 | Latins taken during that period of time, what reason would $ 12 | the Mexico City station have had for. sending that particular @ z 13 picture? ; t4 Mr. Scelso. I do not know, if there were other pictures! : i$ | of non-Latins. I do not. know what other pictures there = i were at all. “ "| Mr. Goldsmith. Who were the case officers that you = 18 ) spoke to down there pertaining to this particular photograph?) a = a Mr.. Scelso. Dave Phillips. Winn Scott. 5 20 | Mr. Goldsmith. Did Phillips tell you that he was ae actually down in. Mexico City at the time during this particular @ ye 22 incident with the Mexico mystery man?- 23 Mr. Scelso. These discussions were after the assassina- r a4 | tion, probably a good deal after the assassination. I do not, 23 | i GN REPORTING COMPANY AL SERS Docld: 32277215 Page aT i | | | | | | |
to ye w z 5 ON i vay “a 6 a a Cc — a “ S 2 Land ™ . 4 oO x a co) & S = a a (o = — =z 1 = = fed ta Say i & 13 9 ze 13 > wn VW e te 3 4 i3 ie) = 19 ~ S 39 oe) aw ero 2 Chace OSS nd fa fas 22 oo 23 Aa a4 Docld: 32277215 Page 36 SECRET | 1-37 assassination. There was a great deal of cables back and forth on this whole business. Mr. Goldsmith. Can you recall anything else that Winn Scott might have said in reference to this photograph? | Mr. Scelso. No. We conjectured that Mexico City, and we conjectured that it was a Mexican seaman. Mr. Goldsmith. The second paragrpah of this cable contains an accurate description of Oswald. Is that a fair statement? (Pause) * Mr. Selso. The description would not apply to Oswald. Mr. Goldsmith. Why is. that? Mr. Selso. Because Oswald was not that old. He was not of athletic build. He was not six feet tall. He did have a receding hairline, and he could have worn anything. But. the description itself is too old, the build is wrong and the height is wrong. Mr. Goldsmith. Do you know whether at any time the Mexico City station obtained a photograph of Oswald? Mr. Selso. No, I never heard that they did. They may have been sent one from Washington, but they did not photo- graph him locally, as far as I know. Mr. Goldsmith. That is what I meant. SECRET (001818 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY
Mr. ow 0 - | 5 33 ~ t t 38 Mr. ~ 3 —N of 7 Mr. : | Gg Fi Mr. a 2 4 cable? eS Hi i qe t2 Mr. = ‘ = i ~ = 4 Mr. x ti zy Mr. sie | Mr. = i el row Mr. oa Ht . = id 4 Mr. —_ a f = | Ss 29 H Mr. | ~ an a : Vy ~h Mr. i 23 «il | J ADTOADP. Docld:32277215 Page, 39 1-38 Scélso. No. Goldsmith. Wet us look, now, at CIA-179. Would you please read through that? (Pause) Have you evér seen this particular cable before? Scelso. Yes. Goldsmith. When was that? Scelso. Probably the day it was written. Goldsmith. Does your name appear anywhere in that Scelso. Yes. Goldsmith. Where is that? Scelso. Right*=here [Indicating]. Goldsmith. AT the bottom of CIA 181? Scelso. Yes. Goldsmith. What is the date of this cable? Scelso. 10 October 1963. | Goldsmith. I believe that you acted as the coordi- nating officer with regards to this cable. Scelso. I was what was called the authenticating since it went out of my Branch, you see. Goldsmith. Does it not indicate here that J.C. King | is the authenticating officer? Scelso.. That is right. It was released by 001819 1 t { i | } ! H !
Mr. Goldsmith. . Thomas Karamessinas? » tw Mr. Scelso. Yes. a nd ee Mr. Goldsmith. What is the purpose of having so many people review a cable? 001829 | 3 ! Mr. Goldsmith. Were . you the coordinating officer? | 4 ! Mr. Scelso. They called me coordinating officer because | | 3 : there is no other place for it. But they came out of my | - 6 Branch, you see. It was written in my Branch, so I have to S "| Sign it before it can even leave the Branch, so I am really | s : an authenticating officer. | : 7 Mr. Goldsmith. What does the term "authenticating ) : 19 officer" mean? | : 7 | Mr. Scelso. An authenticating officer is responsible | = | : 2 | for the content of the cable. He approves the content of | TF 2 2 it and the coordinating officers certify that they have no | = | : . i = 14 objection to it and approve the general tenor of it, but. | is | they are not responsible for its content. | : | Mr. Goldsmith. When you. say responsible for its content, a 7 you mean responsible for its accuracy? | : a | Mr. Scekso. . For its accuracy, and the propriety of | 2 | its recommendations, and so on. | é 0 Mr. Goldsmith. What about a releasing officer? What : ee is his responsibility? | : y ox 22 Mr. Scelso. The releasing officer approves the. briefing, a all of the policy and the factual content. | ‘| i moss =e st 7 Docld:32277215 Page 40 ALQERSON RESORT!
> wa =. S = > ™ ' ve : wt Q A ~ ; = > Pa i — N o a < ™ . ot 3 Y Pat ~° 1G S S = oy te C2 @ =» = ~ = = tea & = te 2 tw ~ c Ey, is > a \7 — 4 be 1S an = i) ~ c c 30 = 20 q1 ~a a aad Pos. Sal 22 oN Docld: 32277215 Page 41 In this particular case, we have had four people. We have had the originating officer. We have an authenticating officer, a coordinating officer, and then the releasing officer. Mr. Scelso. Well, it went up to Mr. Karamessinas. because it involved disseminating information on an American citizen to other U.S. government agencies, you see. At that time -- probably still -- the CIA did not investigate or pass around information on American citizens unless it were requested to by another government agency, either. in that particular case or by some standard operating procedure. In other words, the CIA, seeing an American abroad, @bserving an American abroad, engaging in some skullduggery, would inform the responsible U.S. agency here and sit and wait for instructions before doing anything further. In this case, we were passing on information to other U.S. government agencies in Mexico City and this probably went to other places in Washington as well. Mr. Goldsmith. This particular information was dissem- inated to other agencies without the request of-any other such agency. Is that correct? | | Mr. Scelso. Yes. Mr. Goldsmith. This fit into the other category of cases where disseminations were made? Mr. Scelso. Disseminations would be made to other SAnry SLbknd 8 ALSESSON REZOR GMP ARLE +) OP ee, | teal a ag daa’ 0041821
interested agencies, and any information we came across | | 2 | had action taken to follow up to take further investigative | to “steps ,Digseminstionwould only be taken if another agency requested it, either specifically in that case, or unless it were*a part of standard operating procedure, which would have been agreed upon with another agency. Mr. Goldsmith. Was any follow-up action contemplated by thisccable? ant 20024 (202) $5%~-2345 ~s Mr. Scelo. Yes.. Please keep headquarters advised of 0.C. wp a any further contacts or for positive identification.of Oswalds«. UASH EMC TON , Mr. Goldsmith. | That would be considered a follow-up. Mr, Scelo. Yes. They were instructed to stay alert and report any further evidence of this man's presence. Therefore, Mr. Karamessinas had to sign off. on it. day REPORTERS WUPLDENG, Mr. Goldsmith. M¥. Karamessinas had to sign off on it aU, Oo s “1 _ because follow-up action was contemplated? - Mr. Scelo. With regard to a U.S. citizen abroad. STRENC, oa “Mr. Goldsmith. For purposes of clarification, I think . \ you said that there were two situations where Mr. Karamessinag 390 Vt requested the dissemination? | Mr. Scelo. Yes. No -- not the question of the dissemina- tion. It is a question of operational action being taken. | i ' | a would have to sign off. One would be where another agency | | i Mr. Goldsmith. A request for operational action. What | 001822 Docld:32277215 Page 42
rey 4 < 4 4 wv = 5 o a GN t wT . wa § ~ en c on 7 ~— 2 ~ “ o fol = ~ . Py t3 x aQ * wal = ae] S od Ss = b oeed im Pel << = 14 ta - ‘2 = fo 14 2 is pay road ta io ios a -— & te = in = x = : * lé ~ = wn Iv “ = be (ona vy S i3 nn ef ~ c Cc ~ = 29 Docld: 32277215 1-42 is the second example? : Mr. Scelo. Well -- : i Mr. Goldsmith. Would the Agency itself decide to take | operational action?: ; | Mx... Scelo. Ordinarily, operational action in an ordinary case would not require Mr. Karamessinas'!s>approval at all. interest in an American citizen might come about because of | | . tas . | It was only because an American citizen was involved.?.That | a specific statement of interest about this individual from another U.S. government agency or it might come. about because. of a standard operating procedure.. For example, we had an agreement with the FBI that we - would follow up leads on any American citizen in Mexico City | who appeared around the Soviet. Embassies, and so on, or any~- body who was down there appearing. to defect, which we might learn through our telephone intercepts. t $ | i We could just as well have sent this cable out without . | Mr.. Karamessinas ‘releasing it. I do not know why we did nots! Mr. Goldsmith. In fact, you pointed to something which as high up in the Agency as Mr. Karamessinas was the releasing | | | | I was going to ask you about. I was wondering why somebody officer. Mr. Scelo. It would have been because of the U.S. citizen aspect, because so many other U.S. government agencies were *nvolvedy State Department, FBI and the Navy. i ALDERSON Ss? TING COMP AAY Page 43
Doctld: ww iy ae bad 1 A 3 | GN i a , wa 8 ~ a | = 7} —_ rs : if ~ if N . i .S) 3 i = ‘| GC ! rs ry ad rroogt a i a i" = rit ie) : | ‘2 i = : — $33 = i. | = Hi} = son i z i pm 4 = 1S i S it Eo. is | = | “ V7 i{ . | re ig | tue | a = 13 | = | f) < an! = 29.} \ i OS aya Rav 22 oot (ey nr — Ww ta 1-43 I suppose one of these things is the Navy. One of them could be the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Mr. Goldsmith. Let me attempt to summarize again. | Karamessinas would be responsible for signing off on this 1 { L | because operational action pertaining to an American was being . taken? Mr. Scelo. Yes. | Mr. Goldsmith. Either pursuant. to the request of another government agency or pursuant to some standard operating procedure of the Agency itself. | Mr. Scelo.s Yes. Mr. Goldsmith. Any other reason that. you can think of? Mr. Scelo. No. ; | Mr. Goldsmith. I believe you indicated that there was | an arrangement, or an agreement, with the FBI that any activities by Americans around. the Soviet Embassy or Cuban | Embassy would be reported and followed up on by the Agency. Was that agreement in writing? Mr. Scelo. I do not know. It probably was.-in writing somewhere, It antedated my tenure, and the agreement was not! in the files. It would have been in the files of the DDP of of the CI. staff. Mr. Goldsmith. Would there have been a similar arrange-' ment with military intelligence? Mr. Scelo. Yes, but probably not formalized. We had 001824. 32277215 Blage 44 ALSERSON iene “NG a comeasiy
Bod a4 Sages 4 1-44 rary worked on a number of cases in Mexico involving military defectors. As you know, they had been detected, arrested nN “and taken back to the United States and convicted. we @ \ Mr. Goldsmith. Turning to this cable, I believe that Ses = 5 it contains a correct description of Mr. Oswald in the first # 5 | paragraph. Is that not true? | S 5 | Mr. Scelo. Well, I would not think he was 165 pounds. % | Mr. Goldsmith... Other than that? 3 oh Mr. Scelo. I would say it is accurate. I do not know | | 2 | = 19 | the color of his eyes. | S i = n | Mr. Goldsmith. It is apparent from paragraph one of | = | i an i > this cable that there is some variation in description between @ = 4] | this cable and the one which was sent from the Mexico City 2 = i — i = ,, | station? = : i = | Mr. Goldsmith. “Did: you.or anyone else at Headquarters: ‘A IT | ever receive any response from the Mexico City station with = 13 regard to the discrepancy in the description of the Oswald = 13 | person. ¢ | Mr.-Scelo. Of the person in the photograph? | Mr. Goldsmith. Yes-« ai > atl Mr. Scelo. I am sure we did, but I do not know what OL ~ WwW ee _ oo EF dey /4 g.) b> oy Ly form it was in. Do you have all the cables, or just some of them.. > + Mr.’ Goldsmith... We have seen what the Agency has told us | | CEPRET | 001825. Docla:32277215 Page 45 — - ALSSSSON REPORTING COMPARIY
t's 1-45 i is all of the cable traffic. I am confining my question now | 4 to the period before the assassination. i 2 | Prior to the assassination, did the Mexico City station | | ’ ever respond to this cable, specifically with regards to this | E 7 question of the man who was identified as Oswald? . | é 4 Mr. Scelo. _ 1 dosnot recall that it did. : 7 Mr. Goldsmith. You indicated a few moments ago that | S the Mexico City Station sometimes did respond? | ; : Mr. Scelo. Yes. | ! : os Mr. Goldsmith. When was that? | : 7 Mr. Scelo. After the assassination. I do not remember | | af what form it was in. It could have been in one of the phone ; @ = 13 calls.. | = i | 2 tA Mr. Goldsmith. Telephone calls after the assassination? | : | Mr. Scelo. Yes. I am sure that there were a.lot of | z 7 telephone calls made after the assassination. : "| Mr. Goldsmith. Why was that? Why were telephone calls : : oe made instead of cables being sent? | 13 | Mr. Scelo. It. was the propensity of senior division : = 20 | | | a the Station Chiefs which was a terrible practice. Mc. Goldsmith. Do you recall if you ever? Mr. Scelo. I think I did on one or two occasions. | u officers to call over the Western Hemipshere by telephone to =. | | | | Mr. Goldsmith. For what purpose? ibe y 7 tn Mr. Scelo. I think probably at the time of Presidential | 001826 Ww { i 4 ! i i a Docld:32277215 Bage 46 ALDERSON 2S2catT ING COMPANY
1-46 trips to Mexico and to Costa Rica, maybe Panama. There were wo times when things came in=arid we telephoned -- I think I was ! ordered to telephone. This was at a time when, of course, | : i President Kennedy was flying to Mexico City and a million : | telephone calls were going back and forth from government | agents and so on. | ire ' Mr. Goldsmith... What about immediately after the assas- | ree) sination? 20024 €202) SS"-23n5 Mr. Scelo. I do not think I made any telephone calls Hic, We) oO although I cannot exclude it. I remember in the course of heavy debates with the station about the reports of this CASUTNGTON, ~* way rather than make telephone calls. ¢ be | | | | | Nicaraguan fabricator, instead of~going over to flash cables { | | | | ) 7 | Mr. Goldsmith. Turn to paragraph 5 of this cable. It | { ta indicates: "Please keep headquarters advised of any further ee REPORTERS BUEEEING, —y contacts or positive identification of Oswald." MW, S st i?) Do you recall whether the Mexico City station ever kept oo headquarters advised in the matter requested? Mr. Scelo. I do not recall and I assume that. they did | JN PTH STRERT, o not pick up any further information about himp:-although they did, did they not? | Mr. Goldsmith. They did, yes. Mr. Scelo. It just comes to me they did. Mr. Goldsmith. We will go into that in a little while. ! bd 7 45 : Mr. Scelo. -I do not recall whether they sent any further | : ra . : eri on eT | CRE | 001827 Docld: 32277215 Page 47 ALRESSON Belen SH 2A COMPBARLY
1-47 4 | cables. , As I say, although I did sign off-on these-cables ~ the day of the assassination, I had: no recollection of the 3 | name Oswald, although I have a very, very good memory. You | : can imagine. Thousands of names were crossing my desk every : 3 3 | month. ) | ! “ ' Mr .:.Goldsmith.. Charlotte Bustos remembered. | g 7 “Mr. Scelo. She remembered, and so did other people, | fs 7 the girls who typed the things and so on remembered this S 7 and immediately pounced upon it in our files. | = 10 | Mr. Goldsmith. Charlotte Bustos probably came across ! : 7 as Many names as you did. Is that a fair statement? | a : = 2 | Mr. Scelo. Yes. She was concerned only with Mexico and 2 : 1 I had five or six other countries to work with as well. She | : is has a fantastic memory. | | is | Mr. Goldsmith. What is your impression of Charlotte : = ie | Bustos as far as competenvé-and integrity? 4 7 | Mr. Scelo. Charlotte Bustos in her job as the manager | Pa E al of records, traces and files, in this Mexico desk, was an | z + | state officer to whom I. gave, in one of her fitness ! 5 7: reports, the highest evaluation, outstanding, number 6 and so. . ae on, that can be given, that was very rarely given at that aaa | time. _— ne Her work was pretty near flawless and she also was an outstanding trainer of new employees. Mr. Goldsmith. I notice that this cable refers to oswald i Aare Docld:32277215 Page 48 ALDERSON RESOCRTING COMPANY
DocId:32277215 Page 49 ALDERSON  REPORTIN te} ww =z 3 ron) ~ GN 1 “ : wa 3 ~ ™ , Ss o 7 ~~ S a = ™ . a a 7 a = i s g = 71 a « = : a le uz = 19 = 12 = = 2 1 ood a - = 13 S = => n 17 = ‘ S 3 in = 19 ~ ¢ e 30 3 4 qa] ORES ws -+ af aN 1-48 | as "Lee Henry Oswald" in the first paragraph of that cable. Is there any way that you can explain that error in terms of . | the incorrect name? | . Mr. Scelo. I have heard after the fact that, in some book of records, that this was a mistake in the 201 file. — | Mr. Goldsmith. Did you. ever check that yourself? Mr.-Scelo. No. It was straightened out immediately in the néxt cable. | Mr. Goldsmith. Why would Charlotte Bustos have been the originated officer of this cable? Mr. Scelo. Because she wrote it. The person who actually composed the wording of the cable wrote his name up i there, and she was, on an important case like this, compli- cated:.. she frequently did the tracing and so on-herself. . Lesser. matters may be handled by any number of other analysts. Mr. Goldsmith. Why was this an important case? Mr. Scelo. Because it involved an American security | | suspect. | Mr. Goldsmith. The fact of Oswald's appearance at the | Soviet Embassy in Moscow would not have been considered an insignificant matter? © ; | Mr. Scelo. No. But, as I say, what went on in the | | Soviet Union and what the CIA officers in the Soviet Union | did, is something: that: completely escaped my knowledge and scope and view at that time. _— 901829 SEGRE :
1-49 As a matter of fact, in an Agency like ours, at that time, you heard all kinds of scuttlebut from all over the i | ' | place, but you just did not hear anything about who was in | a | Moscow or what they were doing there. You did not hear any- thing. in } Even when I was in my later positions where I saw every~ | thing in the world, I did not see that. It is one of the ou 20024 (202) 554-2305 “ t | reasons I retired,bbecause they refused to give me access. | t i They gave me the responsibility for evaluating operations p.c. vey | i worldwide and no insight into our Soviet and satellite recruit! ments.. . VASHTHGTON , 1 i t | Mr. Goldsmith. Staying with oswala's appearance at the Embassies in Mexico City, the fact that Oswald was’an Amer ican defector and showed up at these embassies was considered by | the Agency as being significant? | | | Mr. Scelo. Yes. REPORTERS BUPELDTNG, ta | | | “Mr. Goldsmith. Stepping back for a moment, at the time i : . that Oswald made the appearance at the embassies. would the Mexico City station have considered his contact with the embassies to be significant? Joo 7TH STRERT, orn 7 41: Mr. Scelo. Oh, yes. Mr. Goldsmith. Even though they did not necessarily know that he had been a defector, they just knew that Oswald had contacted the embassies? r re Mr. Scelo. Yes. The fact that he was an American ~SEGReT 001830 a ALDERSC a] REPORTING COMPANY Docld: 32277215 Page 50
contacting the Cubans and the Russians, especially in the context of which they knew it, because they had détails of | i the telephone conversations,. signalling this to them, that this was a very important case. ‘Mr. Goldsmith. Were Americans frequently contacting either the Soviet or Cuban Embassy? ree) many cases like ~-- of course they were. On the Soviet 2002" (202) SSn-2345 ; i "| Mr. Scelo. I do not know about the Cuban Embassy. Not | Oo Embassy, a significant number of American military. people N.C. involved in sensitive, highly-classified military activities VTON , in the southwestern United States attempted to defect to WASHTY the Russians in order to pass information to them and were Q détected by our surveillance means and were apprehended. That had happened before this. Mr. Goldsmith. Every time that an American contacts REPORTERS ROELDING, one of these embassies, would a cable be sent? JW, s Mr. Scelo. If you were identified, yes. Mr. Goldsmith. A cable would be sent insteadd of a dispatch, because the matter. would be considered important? 390 TT STRENT, ray | Mr. Scelo. Yes. Mrs Goldsmith. I presume,.then, if we were to review all of the Mexico City cable traffic for, let's say, half a year prior to the assassination, we would come across other | contacts by Americans:.who.were identified, Americans who would ' : have visited these embassies? . ALDESS5N REPORTH Docld: 32277215 Page 51
al a Pale | ER 4 1-51 7 Mr. Scelo. I do not want to imply that these contacts | 2 | were. detected every week or every month. af Mr. Goldsmith. I understand. | S| Mr. Scelo. They were detected enough so that J. Edgar z s | Hoover used to glow every time that he thought of the Mexico | : | station. This was one of our outstanding areas of coopera- : ~ { 5 " tion with the FBI. S i Mr. Goldsmith. Let me see if we can reconstruct this s 5 | somewhat. Oswald's initial contact to the embassies in : 0 Mexico City would, in the eyes of the Mexico City station, | : nl be considered significant because it was a contact by an | nn Fi | 5 2 American? | ® - 12 ' Mr. Scelo. Yes.. . _ | z | Mr.cGoldsmith. Then the Mexico City station receives | : is | information that Oswald was a defector, had been:a defector? | z ig | Mr. Scelo. Yes. 3 ‘ 17 | Mr. Goldsmith. I am not sure if this made reference to ! : 18 | his offering to give military secrets or not. : : 9 | Mr. Scelo. I think he did. | S 20 | Mr. Goldsmith. No, it. does not.. ! {yt “a PT 3 In any event, they know he is an American contacting N J | : 1 | (Pause) ae a | | { ! the Soviet and Cuban embassies and they know that he is a | b> we former defector, so that would elevate the significance of i Y il . -- » his contact. Is that correct? | 001832. SLbne | i oe “5s wens TTS YN Docld: 32277215 Page 52 ALDERSON RESORT. COMP AM
Mr. Scelo. Yes. i 7 Now,.:-why did they not report everything they found..cut? a | Mr. Goldsmith. Answer your own question. | ~ 4 | Mr. Scelo. The telephone center envoy was manned by | ! = z principally Mexican supervision of an American, or Mexican- | 2 é | American. These people were just. inundated with. information 5 Z and apparently did not extract this and transmit it back to = 3 7 Washington. | v 2 | The later contacts with the Cuban Embassy, and so on, | z ne) which only were divulged after the assassination. It. is an | : 4 enormous problem. Mexico had one of the biggest and most : = = 12 active telephone intercept operations in the whole world ©. z 13 and the job of processing this material is just. impossible. | : 14 Mr. Goldsmith. Let's go through this step by step, | : is although I was not going to do this at this time. I am going, 5 Is | to modify the line of inquiry somewhat .. | “ "| Do you know how many telephone intercepts there were : 8 in the Mexico City station? n H : = a Mr. Scelo. How many lines were being tapped? | = 20 | Mr. Goldsmith. Yes, at the Cuban and then at the Soviet. Mr. Scelo. I think there are about 30 lines being tapped altogether. That is just the number that sticks in my mind. | i ; i Mr. Goldsmith. Thirty meaning a total of thirty from t \ : | both the Soviet and the Cuban? a Mr. Scelo. And various security suspects. CET 001833 ‘ae REPORTING COMEFARY v3 ms: i ALOERSON Docld:322772715 Page 453 ALS ¥
1-53. Mr. Goldsmith. Would the security suspects to related to the Soviet or Cuban? — tw Ww es | | , Mr. Scelo. Some of them were American Communists | living there whom we tapped at the.specific request of J.. | 5 i Edgar Hoover. 5 é | Mr. Goldsmith. Of those thirty lines how many, at your | 5 "| best estimate, would have been for the Soviet and Cubans? | < a Mr. Scelo. However many outside telephone lines they aS had. | : 10 Mr. Goldsmith. You think just. about every outside | : 1 | phone? . $ 2 Mr. Scelo. I think they tapped all the outside lines. |  ) : 14 Mr. Goldsmith. How certain of that are you? | FE td Mr. Scelo. Well, this is just based on my» recollection; 2 i : 3 | going back 15 years. : = a Mr. Goldsmith. In any event, your earlier comment was : 3 7 | that the telephone surveillance operation in Mexico City ! : a was one of the most extensive in. the world? : : 7 Mr. Scelo. Yes. And of course, they taped a great : é 2 deal which they could not exploit. They could not later | i . H “TE at | listen to it; they did not. have time. They used. to listen | © es 22 to it sort of spottily, you see, and attempt then to exploit | 2 : what was. the most. important. > 7 Vn Mr. Goldsmith. Your answer to my earlier question as to why the information on Oswald was not sent to the _SECR eRe 901834 Docld:32277215 Page 54
1-54 headquarters prior to the assassination. I think that the ta 7 fact that. Oswald's other telephonic contact with the Embassy | | was not knowrm is that an accurate summary? oe Mr. Scelo. I think they did have other information on 3 : this later telephonic -- | | : S| Mr. Goldsmith. Why was it not reported? | 5 : Mr. Scelo. A question of too much material to process : S a and too many important priorities. And possibly they would | Re ¢ 7 have gotten around to doing it, you see. They have a backlog. | = 0 They would have gotten around to it. | = no Mr. Goldsmith. We have already established a few things. 7 = 2 One, Winn Scott is a very demanding and competent station i cS : i : @ a 12 chief. | = al Mr. Scelo. Yes. : : a Mr. Goldsmith. We have established that. Oswald's ! — = IE | contact was initially important and the importance became : 4 7 somewhat elevated when they found out that he had been a : : ia | defector? | | ai 2.1 | Mr. Scelo. Yes. | 5 . Mr. Goldsmith. Which Suggests not only he had been a | mee defector but formerly had served in the Marines? : EET | Mr. Scelo. Yes. | Mr Goldsmith. It is possible that his contacts with oS te the embassies was for the purpose of attempting to defect again, and yet there is no communication from the Mexico City: SEGHE, 001835 Docld:32277215 Page 55 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY
DoctId: ce ta a Seude 3 1+55 station to headquarters concerning any of Oswald's. other 2 contacts. yo 2 | Mr. Scelo.. You see, they had reels and reels of tape t : ; to go over. The monitors would monitor certain lines and | Es ae record. other lines and when they had time, they had to scan 5 7 the other lines to see who was calling what, and they could | g 7 have missed it. And, of course, maybe they just had a back- : S 2 | log which they were going to process later. ! : | I do not remember when his latest contacts were. They : = | were right in the dame period or within a few days, were | : nl they not? | 3 i | = 12 | Mr. Goldsmith. Yes. | 5 12 Mr. Scelo. When was he first. in Mexico City anyway? | z 14 What was the time of that? | é is | Mr. Goldsmith. .I believe, according to the Warren ! © i 2 1s Commission, he arrived in Mexico City on September 26th or 3 a in 27th? | , : Mr. Scelo. Yes. Mr. Goldsmith. Excuse me for a moment. (Pause) 3n0 VTU STRERT, Ww -~ = oO ve) oo ~ pee US (A brief recess was taken.) ast = : . . ' pe 22 \ -Mr. Goldsmith. Mr. Scelo, I am going to show you some | 21" transcripts to review in a minute. Before I do so, though, | | 24 | I would like to ask you to read CIA No. 162, 161, specifically 451 the section marked "Liaison Coverage." arp eT 901836 32277215 Page 56 ALDERSON win Vibh ae EC seatey
DoctId: Ww i i 7 3 j 2 | = si 7 ~ 3 ~ | 4 i = i 2 4 wy w 6 i “ | Cc ~ 7 | ~ | ne 2! o a4 = | ™N | tt . 4 o 7 |! S - tn H = Nw, sc ! = i oe oi = if = i a fej = i = i ei : i fe re = iv u ° it a i| lol ra t = le. ~ i = | “ \7 i - i ~~ j = 174 ~ { _ { 9 - \ a 20 | | 21 i Om ri Ma 22 3 Ve ~\ 23 i ! | | | ie a ‘ 32277215 Page 57 ALDERSON REPORT! if (Pause) Mr. Scelo. Yes. Mr. Goldsmith. I have a few questions to ask you on that. This refers to the envoy operation that was the joint operation conducted by the Mexicans and the Americans and I believe this indicates that there were 30 lines, in fact, connected at one time, so that your early eestimony was, in all likelihood, accurate. | I am going to have to ask you also tomead the section marked number 3, Oswald coverage. Mr. Scelo. What is that report, if I may ask? Mr. Goldsmith. This is taken Erom the 1977 Inspector General Report. Mr. Scelo. I see. Mr. Goldsmith. Please read the section marked Oswald Coverage through to the end of the paragraph on page 162. ¢ (Pause) On page 161, the section where it says: “Oswald Cover- age. In mid-62, the Mexican officer in charge of the envoy, ‘the joint tap operation, asked the American officer at the envoy listening post for the telephone numbers of the Soviet, Cuban and satellite embassies in anticipation of possible coverage." The question I have for you is as follows. It would seem, from the earlier paragraph, that the liaison operation | 001837