INTERVIEW OF L. FLETCHER PROUTY
Agency: ROCKCOM
Originator: ROCK
Document date: 05/15/1975
Document type: PAPER, TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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JFK Assassination System

Identification Form

Agency Information

Date:

8/27/201

AGENCY: ROCKCOM

RECORD NUMBER:

178-10004-10418

RECORD SERIES:

ASSASSINATION FILE

AGENCY FILE NUMBER: A-11 (F) INTERVIEW OF L. FLETCHER PROUTY

Document Information

ORIGINATOR :

FROM:

TO :

ROCK

TITLE:

INTERVIEW OF L. FLETCHER PROUTY

DATE: 05/15/1975

PAGES:

16

SUBJECTS :

Released under the John F. Kennedy

issassination Records Collection

Act of 1992 (44 USC 2107 Notel.

Gase#:NUl 53244 Date: 06-12-2017

ASSASSINATIONS, FOREIGN LEADERS

ANTI-CASTRO ACTIVITIES

BAY OF PIGS

CIA

CUBAN EXILES

PROUTY, L. FLETCHER

DOCUMENT TYPE: PAPER, TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

CLASSIFICATION: Secret

RESTRICTIONS: IA; 1B; 1C; 4

CURRENT STATUS: Redact

DATE OF LAST REVIEW: 08/15/1993

OPENING CRITERIA:

COMMENTS:

Interview of L. Fletcher Prouty conducted by Marvin Gray of the Rockefeller Commission staff.

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A -II(F)

STAFF INTERVIIW

PrESIDENT'S COMMISSION

ON CIA ACTIVITIES

1 of 2

Thursday, May 15, 1975

Washingten, D. C.

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DELATI

STAFF INTERVIEN

PPESIDENT'S COMMISSION

ON CIA ACTIVITIES

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Washington, D. C.

Thursday, May 15, 1975

The Staff met, pursuant to notice at 1:00 o'clock: p.m.,

at 712 Jackson Place, N. W.,

Mashington D. C.

PRESENT:

MARVIN L. GRAY, JR.,

Staff member

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PROCEEDINGS

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Thereupon,

L. FLETCHER POURTY

called for interview by Counsel for the President's Comnission

on CIA Activities, having been first duly sworn by the Notary

Public, was examined and testified as follows:

'EXAMINATION BY COUNSEL FOR THE COMMISSION

BY MP. GRAY:

sir, would you state your full name for the record?

A. My name is L. Fletcher Pourty.

•8. And you are a retired Air Force Colonel, who for a

substantial period of time, and particularly around the late

1950's and early 1960's served as a CIA appointed liaison

with the Air Force with certain support of a paramilitary nature.

is that correct?

1. But it should be the other way around, I serves

as an

air Force officer in support of CIA, I as in the Air Force.

And your office was in the hir Force?

Yes, my office was in the Pentagon, in the Air Force.

Before the reporter arrived you told me that in

December 1959 or January 1960 or possibly as late as February

1960, you were approached by the Air Division of the Covert

Action Staff of the CIA, who saiu they hau a special joi

requiring Air Force support, and they wanted an I-20, is that

correct?

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A.

Yes.

And I don't think I can repeat what you explained to

me about the I-25, so maybe you had better repeat that.

A.

The L-2d was a special single engine plane that haù

been purched by the CIA called the lelio Courier.

The Air

Force owned a number of these air craft. So we provided

cover for CIA by giving them Air Force insignia and Air Force

designation, the I-28, and Air Force serial numbers. And these

aircraft, or at least some of them, were based at Eglin Air

Force Base in Florida. They were at Eglin Air Force Base

because that is where the CIA kept most of its aircraft in the

country.

2. And how was this mission originally described to you?

1 Originally it was one of a number of missions that we

were operating over a period of time. But it was one of the

few that we operated with I-2e's. The people who came over

from the Air Division stated that they had a place to land the

plane in Cuba on a road, on a small road, and they had a photo-

of it. And they were going to let two men out there and

graph

then fly the plane back with a pilot and copilot to Eglin Air

Force Base. And the men that were being left off would be

equipped with a high powered rifle and a telescopic sight.

They were Cubans. We never saw then, of course. This is what

we were told they were, because we didn 't interfere with whe

was

on the plane, we simply out the plane in the air. But this

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was a normal procedure. And the object of their mission in

Cuba was to go to a building in Havana where one of the men

knew his way around and was pretty sure that he could get into,

and if possible, he would shoot Castro.

Did you recall who told you this?

A.

No, I don't, because we were working every day with

these people. And I think if you had a listing of the Air

Division staff at that date I probably could tell you it vas one

of four men, something like that, a Division of maybe 30 men,

it would have been one of three of four, or two of three or four,

The thing was, we were doing these things every day, it was not

an odd thing that came up,

it was something that we were doing

quite regularly.

Q. It surprises

me that the CIA would describe the

mission to you in this much detail, it doesn't seem

consistent

with compartmentation and need-to-know particularly in view of

the sensitive nature of the mission.

A.

That is. an awfully good point you are making.

In

those days it did, because the more urgent part of my job was

to brief my boss, the Chief of Staff, Air. Force, and through

hin the Secretary, Air Force, or the Secretary of Defense,

or whoever,

as required.

Let's go off the record for a minute.

(Discussion off the record.

MR. GRAY: Back on the record.

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THE

WITNESS: And since that was a real serious respon-

sibility, we wouldn't fly the mission unless ve

knew that

it

had

the approval of

the Security Council, or that at least

the overall program had approval of the Security Council.

And

this was understood for years. We had no problen with that at

all.

I don't think that I ever sent out

a mission that we

didn't know what they were going to do and where they were

going.

And this seems, at least in certain applications,

to

have ceased in this day and age. But I think that is due to

other things. But in 1959-60 we would know where it was going -

even to the point that I would want to know when they came bac!:,

I would really want to know if they went where they told me.

We were pretty sure about hot we did it.

BY MP. CRAY:

Do you recall briefing the Chief of staff or any of vour

other superiors on this mission?

1.

Yes. My usual arrangement was to brief the Director

of Plans, the Major General who as my inmediate boss.

Did you renember who that was at that time?

A.

In 1959 I would say that was General Cary, or possibly

General Martin.. Again, it is a question of who was where at

that time. But I think if we put those two names down we will

be awfully close to it.

#las this mission concerned at all as to the proprietary

or morality or whatever? Diù thoughts of that nature concer

you when you heard it?

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A.

The concern that we would have was that the military

would not be involved. We just wouldn't participate in it.

And actually the CIA hau

the same icea at that time. What we wef

doing was helping Cubans. And if the Cubans, with their own

little conmand structure, wanted to operate and could, you

might say, convince CIA that this vas something that was import-

ant to them, or that they thought they could achieve, on their

own, if we would just give them so much as a little help, the

missions would be sent. As a result, ve didn't concern ourselves

with too many of them, for the simple reason, we weren't aske

for. It was almost like mechanics, you linov.. There

were

missions that we turned down, but mostly because we thought

they wouldn't suceed or that we would not be able - the

favorate phrase - to disclair plausibly that the military or the

Government of the U.s. was involved. And we were serious about

that business in those days.

Did you recall anyone else that you briefed on this

raising any questions about this particular mission?

A.

No, with no, what you might say barriers to the

operation, with everything cleared and laid on in a perfectly

normal manner, we got on with other business. We knew right

away that it didn't succeed -- I say right away, within 10

days' -- and there were so many other things going on, it was on

with the rest of it.

a Did you ever lear what happened to interrupt the

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A.

I don't think I have a clear memory about it. Put

all of us in that business kind of felt that most of those

Cubans were not able to do what they thought they could do.

Castro was operating the bloc system, and I think it was

lot more effective than we gave him credit for.

How are you able to place a time as to December 1950

or January 1960 or February 1960? Why are you sure it is in

that two- or three-month period.

A.

I will

tell you why that is pretty easy to figure.

The Agency wasn't running what I would call hard missions until

late in 1959. You know Castro came in at the beginning of 1959.

And things didn't really jell until later in the year.

And

a good reason

for that; the training of Cuban exiles haûn't

produced really professionals in terms of pilots or drop teams

or saboteurs or what have until after they had had quite a bit

of training. At the other end of the calendar, Ceneral Eisenhowe:

had made it very clear to all of us who were operating over-

flights that nothing was to be done. A little later in 1960

when he was supposed to meet at the summit with Khruschchev

and other world leaders, we haulted every overflight. And to

this day I can't understand why the U-? ient out. But all the

flights that I had anything to do with, the Tibetan flight, the

Laotian flights, the Cuban flights, all of that overflight

program we haulted on direct orders. And since the meeting in

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Paris was scheduled for May 1, I doubt if we flew anything

after March 15, or even maybe March 1, because there would

be no interference with it.

So I can put it between those

dates without any trouble.

You said at times it. was a matter of concern to malie

sure that the operations you had requested to support, or at

least the type of operation, had been approved by the National

Security Council, or whoever else was required. Did you recall

when you made any such inquiries in this case?

A. The way we would work that is, having briefed, you

might say, the fir Force chain of conmand, if I was not told

to stop, it was gone. Again, it was a matter of worling

with

people that I had been with for years. It wasn't one lind.

They knew me, they knew the progran. And if I briefed them

and there was nothing to interfere within a day or two, we

would go. Now; sometimes they would want additional briefings.

But I don't remember one in this case.

• I believe at some point one of the news coverages

had the name of one of the Cubans involved.

A.

I don't put much story in that. I looled up some

notes that I thought might be pertinent, but I don't - we

didn't work with the Cubans - there were a fe Cubans we got

to know, like Artemo, but they were not involved in this kind

of operation.

¿Did you ever get a project name for this, oi is there

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anything

that you can suggest, in other words, that we can go

to the Agency indecies to try to tracl down the paperwork behin

it if any.

A.

No.

You see our overall project was called TAB-6.

That was

the code, an international code, Agency and military.

And if we called it TAB-d, just like a TAD-7 or TE-S in a lot

of documents, people all over the world knew that TAB-s was

certain type program.

And most of the time when. it was like

this, pure

mechanical program, we would just continue calling

it TAB-S, maybe with a date and an airplane nunber, but

nothing else. Now, sometimes a program would be broken off

TAB-6, and we would have a separate code number. This was just

an ordinary flight.

you say the use of the I-28 was fairly rare. Would

there be any Air Force records which would enable us to pin

down any flight this war or pin it down to one of a few,

some-

thing like that?

A.

Well, there were two things I think you would find.

He usually went to élaborate detail to cover the flight. For,

example, if a plane leaves and is not in the air -- if it doesn't

land it is presumed lost. Now, we would put another plane in

the air to cover it, one with the actual numbers of the one

that was supposed to be in the air. He would put that one in

the air from some field where nobody knew it took off.

And

if the one would pick up the flight, come in and land, so that

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control towers, air

tarific controllers could show a record of

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a plane coming in.

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Now, this was normal procedure for the people at Eglin,

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whether the plane was going to Guatemala, or Nicaragua, anything

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what we called black flight would be covered that way.

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I would presume that you have got a record of those,

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or that it could be

available?

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À.

Now, sometimes when the crew would, say, be mercenaries

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like Air America, they would just take off. And they knew we

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had them covered in Air Defense Command. And there would be

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no record at all, nothing, they wouldn't tell anybody where

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they were going. We would have to see what Eglin had on its

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record. But I would think, my personal view would be that they

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ran this very professionally, and you will find there was a

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flight.

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Would that be preserved after 15 years, or be

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A. I say there are two sides of this. The man in the tower

at Eglin would just know plane number 1, 2 or 3 was left, and

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I think it would be dropped

from the book with the others, and

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I think the law requires 90 days or something like that.

The

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other thing is, the Air Defense Command would have a record,

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because it is harder to tell the Air Defense Conmand not to go

after a bogey in the sly than to have them go. But again,

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15 years is a long record.

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What about on the Agency's side, would you be familiar

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enough with their records and records-keeping processes to offer

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any guidance as to how we might try to run this down.

Weil, the Cuban program was a big program that had

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general approval so lone as only Cubans vere involved. And up

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to the point that the Agency was involved, I think you would

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find them very professional, I think you would find that

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they have records. But to say what happened after it left the

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Agency control, then I don't think there would be a record.

10

That is the base program. And of course, I imagine you have

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heard that from other people too, that you have got to disclaim

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plausibly. We went so far as to take the decals off the motors,

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to take the decals off all the engine parts, to tale all

the

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American language fuels classification symbols, or whatever,

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so that the plane was what we call sanitized. Now, if that

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plane went down, everybody would just disclain entirely that

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they had ever even heard

of it anywhere. Which means that you

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don't have any records anywhere, not even the airplane. That

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is the kind of mission the thing was.

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2.

But the pilots would normally at least have been Agency

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people, and not Cubans, is that right?

Л.

In this instance

they would be either Agency contract

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employees

-- not Agency full-time employees, but contract.

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enployees, or Cubans, because that is what we were. doing

in

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Cuatemala, we were training them. You would find either one.

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DELKET

But in either case they would have been people flying, you

might say, under Agency supervision. We never knew what

nationality they vere, whether they were like Air American

pilots, of indeterminate nationality, or whether they were Cubans

I voulú presume, if I look back at it, since th I-23 was very

easy to fly, that it was a Cuban crew.

Is there anything else you can think of that would

give us more lead on running this down, either through the

Agency of through the Air Force or some other suitable source

A. I have been looking through the New York Times

micro film. I have a little flickering memory that there was a

little announcement from Havana. I must adnit that it was only

a light recollection, and I have been trying to find it in the

New York Times micro film myself since I talked with Dan Shore.

To date I haven't found it. But that kind of thing -- Havana

used to blaze every time they got one of those. And that was

one way we knew how far they got sometimes:

If you find that, would let me know?

A. . I certainly will.

0.

Aside from this instance, was there any other similar

operation, Agency operation that you knew of, similar to the

one that appeared to be designed to assassinate a foreign

leader of support an assassination attempt upon a foreign

leader?

Well, I don't know how deep you go into these subjects.

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But I know what you might call the anatomy of an assassination

doesn't begin with the assassination. If you can remove

the

government or

assist people who are probably going to renove

it inevitably, a successfül one, and not assassination -- there

are

number of those called coup détats. There

were quite

few of those things where,

for many reasons, the Agency would

be keeping in touch with a group who were not in power, but

who, with the run of events, or with a little assistance,

even in some cases up to the point where if the man doesn't

leave he may be killed -- he doesn't have much choice - sure,

the Agency was involved in that, there has been a record of

that for years.

What specific one do you have in mind?

A.

I think one that is pretty clear is that over a period

of time the Agency worked rather diligently with General Rene

Barrientos in Bolivia when he made his move. Dr. Victor Paz

Estenssoro, who was President of Bolivia left. So there was

no assassination, he took over.

The Agency for a long time had worked with Barrientos.

Now, I doubt if the Agency ever got to the point with any of

them where they said, if he doesn't go by tomorrow we will have

Ito shoot that guy, because events roll up, you see.

Another case where this kind of development tool: place

was one removed from Trujillo - I believe Trujillo was

followed by Juan Boscit -- it might have been Bleager -- but I

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ILKEt

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think Juan Bosch. Juan Bosch, I recollect, vas replaced by

Donald Reid Kabaral. Now, kabaral was in my office in the

Pentagon

at about 7:00 o'clocl: in the evening the day before

he became President of the Dominican Republic. Now, the onl!

reason he was there was because somebody in the Agency sent him

there. And we gave him a little bit of help that he needec.

He took an

Eastern Airlines plane out of Washington for San

Juan that night, I think at 8:30, and transferred out of San

Juan for Santo Domingo. The change of government. took place

that night, and he was the President. of the Dominican

Republic the next day. And nobody was killed.

but that iw really -- you know, the Agency can say,

and the government can say, that an assassination is not our

business. An assassination is when everything else fails.

Or like in the case of Dien, the President of South

Vietnam, where the government went to every extreme to persuade

him and his brother to go to Europe. Madame Nhu was already

in Europe.

and they had brought tickets or arranged his flight

to Europe, and they had arranged for him to make a speech and

all that. But he didn't go. Nell, what happens when you expose

the palace guard like that, they all know that thousands of

people hate them. Any palace guard is hated in most cases.

And they leave, they run for their own lives. And so when it.

Diem came back to the palace there was nobody there to protect

him. He made a mistake. And when he realized that he went in

the

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tunnel,

and they found him at the other end of the tunnel, and

he was killed.

There was

no assassination plan. All that tall

about the assassination of diem is by people who don't linow the

inside.

There was no assassination of Diem. But there was a

removal of Diem. And when it didn't work he got assassinated

by others. And that was, I think, the reasonably spontaneous.

Once another government knows that the support of the

CIA, or the support of this government, is being removed, then

many, many people are exposed, and they begin to run. Just as

ie saw in Saigon. And if they don't run, they get killed.

So where a lot of people make a mistake is - and I

Iworked on so darned many of these -- is that you don't start with

a plan to assassinate, that is what is wrong, that is why the

Agency says, no, we don't do that. Now, in that fine sense,

could agree with the Agency. But all the rest of the machinery

is there. And it gives the people on the outside the initiative

to go further. And a lot of time the initiative improves the

gun and the bullets after everything

else.

Assassination has to

be treated wisely, or it becomes complete aberration.

MR. GRAY: We will conclude here.

(Whereupon at 4:30 p.m., the interview was concluded.

SEGRET

Photocopy

from

Gerald R. Ford Library

NW 53244 DocId:32105600 Page 17

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