LETTER WITH MEMO ATTACHED: RE BACKGROUND MATERIAL TO QUESTIONS RELATING TO OSWALD AND THE WARREN COMMISSIION.
Agency: CIA
Originator: CIA
From: KNOCHE, E. H.
To: BELIN, DAVID W.
Document date: 05/13/1975
Document type: PAPER-TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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104-10151-10038

CENTRIL INTELLIO!

B. MUENCY

OFFICS OF THiS DIRSCION

ic...

r. David W. Belin

REPROSUCTION

115

ackground materials relating to certain questions

elating to Oswald and the Warren Commission.

Jab A is a classified Secret memorandum

esponsive to your requesi. Tao B is an unclassi-

ed version,

which you can use as you see ilt

I whatever report you are preparing on the subject:

Additional details are available in the Office

i the Inspector General should you wish to pursue

is in greater depth.

Faithfully yours,

stricte

itrachment: a/s

E. H. Knoche

Assistant to the Director

REPRODUCTION

PROMOBI

roche:cra: 5/13/75

ribution:

7- Mr. Belin w/att

OGC

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wolatt

IG

Knocke Chrono

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" Comm Correspondence

Belin Letter Request 15 April

Warren Commission

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14-JUOUU

2 May 1965

SUBJECT

REFERENCE:

:

Review of Agency Holdings

Unidentified Individual

Report

Memorandum

from

Na

dated

15 April

Photograph of

Warren Commission

Mn

to E. Henry Knoche,

1.

In accordance with reference request, we have examined

apd summarized the record concerning a cropped photograph that was

considered by the Warren Commission in the course of its investi-

gation.

The photograph (together with others of the same

individual) originated from an intelligence operation conducted

in October 1963 by the CIA and the Mexican security authorities.

2.

Under the extraordinary press of effort to develop infor-

mation on the assassin and the assassination, copies of the phota-

graph were made available by CIA's Mexico Station Chief on the

afternoon of 22 November to the local FBI representative. Later

that day, assertedly on the decision of the Ambassador, copies

were conveyed by an FBI representative on a special U. S. Naval

Attache flight to the Dallas office of the FBI for possible use

in the ongoing investigation. One photosyaph, cropped by the

FBI, was shown to Mrs. Marguerite OshAaD

(Lee Harvey OSWALD'S

mother) in Dallas on the evening

de 23

ber 1963 by an FBI

agent.

3. The Warren Conmission

port

describes the sequence of

events that ultimately resulted

In Mrs. Marguerite OSWALD'S

allegation that she had been shown a cropped photo of Jack RUBY

the day before he murdered her son. A further complication

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compounding this erroneous conclusio

she had been shown a copy of theishme

before the Conmission, it hat been

fact that, when

ograph in her appearance

by the FBI in Washing-

ton in a slightly different manned

4. Although in no way related to Lee Harvey OSWALD or his

stay in Mexico City from the morning of 27 September 1963 to the

morning of 2 October 1963, at least one set of photographs of the

unidentified man originated during OSWALD's stay there. It is

important; therefore, to an understanding of the acquisition and

handling of the photographs by the Mexico Station to review what.

the Station ascertained and did with the information it developed

about OSWALD in Mexico City, together with Headquarters action on

that information.

5: From all credible evidence known to this time (none,

incidentally, added since the exhaustive work of the Warren Com-

mission), Lee Harvey OSWALD spent fours

(4) full days and two (2)

partial days

-- about 116 hours

in

in Mexico City from about

10:00 a.m. 27 September 1963

a.m. 2 October 1963.

His place of residence

W

rcial traveler hotel, not

• frequented by "gringos"

th

Commercio -- where he was.

registered under alias.

Exhaystive and detailed interviews and

interrogation by the Mexican authorities and the FBI after the

assassination established that, in the recollection of all hotel

personnel, he left and returned late each day of his stay.

6. Allowing for the fact of late arrival and early departure,

and assuming that he slept one-third of the time of his stay

(38 or 39 hours), there remain some 78 hours of activity to be

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'!

accounted for. Overall, CIA's info

Naat

ton can account only for

very brief periods during 28,

29

and 1 October. All

coverage by CIA during the

was technical. The

Station had no live sour

Sigent) coverage.

7. It should be noted that

OSWALD was in no sense "under

investigation." None of the facts of his defection and stay in

the USSR and return to the U. S., 1959 - 1962, were known to the

Mexico. Station or in its files before 10 October 1963. On that

date, the bare bones of his biography were forwarded by. Head-

quarters in response to a Station cabled report of 8 October

which had forwarded, on a routine basis, what appeared to be a

contact by an American for a visa to Cuba in transit to the USSR.

This was indicated and deduced from technically acquired infor-

mation on 1 October, which was the first and only occasion on that

visit in which OSWALD was recorded as identifying himself

(partially) by true name.

8.. At no time during his st

xico City did the CIA

acquire a photo of OSWALD.

A

iew of all coverage --

technical as well. as photo

conducted by the Station

on 22 and. 23 November 19

assassination, including

materials back to August 1963

This confirmed that there was no

CIA photo coverage of OSWALD at any time during his

Mexico trip

or stay in Mexico City. Moreover, although it had made a cabled

request on 15 October, the Mexico Station had no photo of OSWALD

in its records, nor did it receive one from Headquarters - which

did not have.one either.-- before 22 November 1963.

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9. It must be stressed that

chnical information the

Station had was not (and normally

Riptocessed in "real

time." The means of acquisi

volume of the infor-

mation preclude anything

reporting of items judged

to be of more than ordinary int

rest

and, therefore, noted in

summary logs. Full texts of selected items require consultation

of the tape and either a full transcription or full translation

or both.

Photo coverage tends to become available in quantity

lots

which requires scanning and selection on a rapid and

accelerated basis in four or five day "peaks." One of the

"triggers" that normally operates to focus and accelerate more

speedy review and reporting of this kind of raw intelligence is

the

mention of a name. This was precisely what occurred in the

second of two conversations on 1. October, during which the

speaker said he was "Lee OSWALD." It was this information

reported by the Station to Headquarters in its first

indication

on OSWALD on 8 October 1963.

10. The Mexico Station did one

thing in its & October

report on Lee OSWALD based on the

information: it

coupled the data with descr

ion it had acquired

from a sensitive source!

h of a male individual,

apparently an American, who

observed entering an Embassy

on I October. The Station reported this detail on the 8th as

a matter of coincident fact. The Station did not assert or

suggest that the data led to any deduction that the photo was in

fact OSWALD of, indeed, was in any way related to OSWALD.

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11. One additional element of backy

ound must be

stipulated now as the final precondit?

to understanding the

relevance (or irrelevance) of the photo.

e unknown

individual placed in the chang

on 23 November in

Dallas by the FBI agent:

wh

Waso

totality of CIA Mexico's

coverage of OSWALD's activity as of

the afternoon of the 23rd

when all available coverage had been checked?

12. The totality of Mexico Station coverage on or reasonably

inferable to be OSWALD consisted of five (5) voice intercepts.

Each of these items, including the text of the raw intercepts,

were read by, discussed with, and examined by Warren Commission

staffers, in Headquarters and at the Mexico Station during a stay

fron 8-13 April 1964. All were made available promptly to

the FBI.

13. At about mid-day. on I October, the camera registered

the entry into an Embassy of a white-shirted individual. In the

opinion of the Station, among all the persons photographed that

day, he appeared to be the only non

and possibly American

who entered. On the chance that

uld be an association

between the identification

da

om

the voice inter-

cept and the descriptive

rOm

the photograph, the

Station reported the two

el emer

кут

as

separate facts in its cable

to Headquarters on 8 October.

14. The Station's action was not unusual and really amounted

to an analytic "quantum leap," in terms of the primitive status

of the OSWALD identification. Many examples of a similar kind of

thing can be found in the day-to-day record of Station-Headquarters

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• 15. On 22 November 1963 the Mexico Station cabled Head-

quarters at 22292 time after learning of

arrest of Lee H.

OSWILD, age 24, possibly in connection

the assassination,

and referenced its carlier messagest of

115 October and

Headquarters' repty of I0 octobal

tion requested by:

"priority pouch a ph

to

VALD

so that Station

can

check all recent coverage for OSWALD. Forward-

ing soonest copies of only visitor on 1 October iho

could be identical with OSWALD."

I6. This obviously was for comparison at the Station

• which had estimated the age of the unidentified male whose

photograph it had selected as having the "apparent age of 35."

17. The Station meanwhile had begun an exhaustive and

accelerated review of all its technical and

photographic intel-

ligence. A dispatch was prepared in accordance with the

indication given in the cable of 22 November. The dispatch

noted that photo coverage of the unidentified individual had

turned up on 4 and 15 October. The text

of the 22 November 1963

pouched dispatch read:

"1. Attached are copie

obtained...on

an American.

Lsam

nly photographs

which appeared to be

Visited [anj Embassy on

4 October 1963.

"2. Copies of these photographs were shown to the

U. S. Ambassador on 22 November 1963 and a

copy of

each of the two photographs was given to Chief FBI,

Mexico, on that date...

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"p. S. Photographs dated 158

1965 were

inserted after typing of

These were

taken as [thel person

embassy."

18. The "Unidentified

Indivi

remains to this day

unidentified. There is still

cedible evidence, as far as

CIA is avare, that the individual in the photograph had any

connection with Lee Harvey OVALD or the assassination at

President Kennedy.

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