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28 Did Castro OK The Kennedy Assassination?

Did Castro OK The he thought so little of? Because he would not be him toward the axis mundi of the G2, the KGB,
able to receive a new, updated passport before and the CIA: Mexico City. It was not only a
Kennedy Assassination? that debt was cleared, and apparently he might place where all had embassies (and the
soon be doing some traveling. attendant spies) in close proximity, it was also
Oswald was more optimistic about his the G2's staging point for Cuban terrorists and
Continued from Page 27 chances of becoming a Cuban spy than were his assassins. It appears that Oswald's G2 contacts
G2 contacts. He became an aggressive “self- were cursory at this point, perhaps because he
recruiter,” and his first attempt to impress had could not have been a reliable operative but
When he was asked when the Cuban its genesis at a February 13, 1963, party in Fort more of a wild card useful only for
secret service first made contact with Oswald, Worth, thrown by Russian immigrants. One of "disposable," one-off actions. Oswald thus
Oscar flinched and gave a long pause, gazing the other guests, a German intellectual, appears to have felt pressed to take more direct
out a window at the tops of some mimosa trees. inadvertently inspired Oswald in his plans to action to gain their trust.
“It was in the fall of 1962,” he finally said with impress the Cubans. As the party guests grew So, in late September 1963, weeks
certainty. He had seen Oswald's name on a increasingly concerned over Oswald's before he murdered President Kennedy, Oswald
foreign collaborators list. He had also been aggressive remarks about President Kennedy, spent five days amid the spy intrigue of Mexico
present during high-level discussions on how to the German attempted to divert Oswald's hatred City. The CIA, which had peppered the
make contact with Oswald. According to the toward a local race-baiter—and fervid anti- opposition's embassies with hidden
KGB document, a Cuban operative met Oswald Castroite—the retired Gen. Edwin Walker, who microphones, phone taps, and surveillance
“repeatedly, several times,” with the first lived in Dallas. One month later Oswald cameras, claimed after the assassination that no
rendezvous at the end of 1962—exactly when ordered a cheap pistol and an Italian rifle by photos or tapes of Oswald in Mexico exist.
Oscar Marino said it had been. mail. After much reconnaissance of Walker's Lyndon Johnson had spoken: federal
The Cubela liaison occurred during a upscale home, Oswald took a shot at him from investigators were constrained from following
period of exceptional marital discord for the his fence line on April 10, 1963, as Walker sat up on any leads that might produce evidence for
Oswalds, a couple whose relationship existed inside by a window. foreign conspirators. Four decades later,
on the emotional edge. Adding to the tension Oswald thought he had killed Walker, however, it has become clear that Oswald spent
were their perpetually strained finances. but in fact he had missed by inches, and he was at least half of his time in the company of Cuban
According to recent inter-views, some G2 never a suspect in the assault, which remained spies.
money may have appeared at just the right time. unsolved until Lee was arrested for killing He had arrived at the Cuban and Soviet
Lee's cash outlays for that period exceeded his Kennedy. Even then, it was seen as just another embassies without warning. His behavior was
known income: every three or four weeks, example of his political derangement. But when so erratic, so green and yet desperate, that they
starting in August 1962, he'd send the State the authors interviewed a former Soviet spy refused his request for a visa to Cuba. That
Department a money order (or cash) for about who had reviewed the KGB's Cubela file in night, we now know, Oswald went to a
$10 toward repayment of a $396 loan he had 2005, the clear implication was that Oswald saw university and tried to enlist the help of some
made upon his return to the United States. In the the Walker incident as a more serious "audition" Mexican radicals. They took him out on the
seven weeks between December 11, 1962, and for his Cuban G2 contacts. town, but when one of their leaders interceded
January 29, 1963, however, he paid off the In the awful suspense that followed the on his behalf the next day at the Cuban
balance of the loan in three large amounts Walker shooting, Marina suggested that Lee Embassy, he was told to forget it. The American
($106, $100, and $190). Given that Oswald's leave town for a while—maybe go back to New was unstable. It was not until Oswald went back
known expenses from October to January, based Orleans, where he had lived as a boy and still to make a last stand at the embassies later that
on a laborious reconstruction by the Warren had some relatives. After a few days of mulling afternoon—not until he broke down, pulled a
Commission, were $537, and his earnings were it over, Lee came to agree with her. Besides, gun, wept, and finally claimed that he would
$892, paying off the loan would have left him there were a lot of Cuban exiles down there to prove his revolutionary loyalty by killing “that
$101 in the red—making this a rather strange talk with, so on April 24 he set out for the Big bastard, Kennedy”—that the doors to his
time to settle a major debt, unless he had a Easy. Communist utopia suddenly opened to him.
secret source of funds. Over the next four months, Oswald's As the old G2 men have described it, he
Where this money came from has been a attempts to infiltrate the local anti-Castro exiles was embraced. The authors learned that one low
source of speculation for nearly half a century. apparently impressed no one in that city or in level G2 agent saw him repeatedly in the Cuban
According to Oscar Marino, the money was Havana, where he most desired to make an Embassy garage, out of sight of CIA cameras,
provided by the Cubans, who preferred to impact. But he did learn some things on the meeting with an elite G2 operative, a red-haired
recruit “true believers,” not men who could be streets, most notably that the Kennedys were black man. Others, including a Mexican
bought for big money. The small payments gave planning another invasion of his beloved Cuba. insurance investigator there on business, would
Lee some fiscal breathing room, and he did not It now appears that Oswald was communicating also see him.
spend conspicuously—just enough, on specific with the G2 that summer.
needs. Why would he have spent some of that Increasingly, however, the hemisphere's
money paying off a loan from the government vortex of international intrigue began to pull (Continued on Page 30)