~ BA —~ The most striking example of the CIA's direct offer of support to AMLASH reported by the 1967 IGR states “it is likely that at the very Moment President Kennedy was shot a CIA officer was meeting with a Cuban agent in Paris and giving him an assassination device for use against CASTRO." (Ibid.) | The 1967 IGR offered no firm evidence confirming or refuting Castro's knowledge of the AMLASH operation prior to the assassination of President Kennedy. The 1967 IGR did note that in 1965 when AMLASH was | tried in Havana, press reports of Cuban knowledge of AMLASH's association with the CIA were dated from November 1964, approximately one year after President Kennedy's assassination) (Ibid. p. 111) The Church Committee in Book V of its Final Report examined the AMLASH operation in great detail. (SSC, Book V, pp. 2-7, 67-69) The Church Committee » concluded: | The AMLASH plot was more relevant to the ~ Warren Commision work than the early CIA assassination plots with the underworld. Unilke those earlier plots, the AMLASH
= 85 - operation was in progress at the time of the assassination; unlike ‘the earlier plots, the AMLASH operation could ‘clearly be traced to the CIA; and unlike the earlier plots, the CIA had endorsed AMLASH's proposal for a coup, the first step to him being Castro's | assassination, despite Castro's threat to retaliate for such plotting. No one directly involved in either investigation (i.e. the CIA and the FBI) was told of the AMLASH operation. No one investi- gated a connection between the AMLASH operation and President Kennedy's assassination. Although Oswald had been in contact with pro-Castro and anti- Castro groups for many months before the assassination, the CIA did not conduct a thorough investigation of questions of Cuban government or Cuban exile involvement in the assassination. (Ibid. p. 5)
- 86 — In 1977, the CIA issued a second Inspector General's Report concerning the subject of CIA sponsored assassination plots. This Report, in large part, was intended as a rebuttal of the Church Committee's findings. The 1977 IGR states: The Report (of the Church Committee) assigns it (the AMLASH operation) characteristics that it did not‘have . during the period preceding the assassina- tion of JFK in order to Support the SSC view that it should have been reported to the Warren Commission. (1977 IGR p. 2) The 1977 IGR concluded that prior to the assasSination of President Kennedy, the AMLASH operation was not an assassination plot. Nevertheless, the 1977 IGR did state: It would have served to reinforce the credibility of (the Warren Commission) its efforts had it taken a broader view of the matter (of normal avenue of investigation). The CIA, too, could have considered in specific terms what most then saw in general terms-- — the possibility of Soviet or Cuban involvement in the assassination because of the tensions of the time. It is not enough to be able to point
The nO - - 87 - to erroneous criticisms made today. The Agency should have taken broader initiatives then as well. That CIA employees at the time felt--as they obviously did--that the activities about which they knew had no relevance to the Warren Commission inquiry does not take the place of a record of conscious review. (Ibid. p. 11) Richard Helms, as the highest level CIA employee in contact with the Warren Commission on a regular basis, testified to the Rockefeller Commission that he did not believe the AMLASH Operation was relevant to the investigation of President Kennedy's death. (Rockefeller Commission, Testimony of Richard Helms, 4/24/75 pp. 389~391,392) In addition, Mr. Helms testified before this Committee that the AMLASH operation was not designed to be an assassination plot (Exec. Sess. Test. of Richard Helms, 8/9/78, pp. 26-27). A contrasting view to the testimony of Mr. Helms was offered by Joseph Langosch who in 1963 was the Chief of Counterintelligence for the CIA's Specialy, Affair Special Affairs Staff was the CIA component Staff responsible for CIA operations directed against the Government of Cuba and the Cuban Intelligence Services (HSCA Class. Affidavit of Joseph Langosch,