JFK’s Assasination

One of the most well-known conspiracy theories circles around the assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963. Dallas wasn’t the place where President Kennedy was the most popular, which is specifically why he wanted to convince political enemies his re-election in 1964 was the right thing.

Now here’s a semi-official account of what happened; the details of the events are highly disputed by even reasonable reports. On around 12:30 pm that day, Kennedy’s limousine slowly entered Elm Street. Abraham Zapruder at the time pointed his camera on the unfolding events, making a now famous famous film. We can see Kennedy being wounded by gunshots. Kennedy was brought to the Hospital where he died of the terminal shots. The assassin was made out to be Lee Harvey Oswald, who supposedly shot the President with a rifle. Oswald denied these accusations, but was himself shot to death by Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby. Years later, Jack Ruby died of from pneumonia (he died in Parkland Hospital, the same where Kennedy and Lee Harvey Oswald died).

Was it really Lee Harvey Oswald who assassinated John F. Kennedy? Oswald, the communist loner, without people in his background that helped him execute the plan? Many don’t think so. For one thing, documentaries often point out that no single sniper could have shot so many bullets in a row. Some of the witnesses also heard shots coming from more than just one side. It’s also fishy that certain autopsy photos of Kennedy are missing, and his corpse was quickly transferred back to Washington (which was illegal) – the location of Kennedy’s brain remains unknown today.

In one of the conspiracy theories, mainly popularized through Oliver Stone’s 1991 movie JFK, the people behind Kennedy’s assassination are the FBI, CIA, the US military and the defense industry (which gains from an aggressive foreign strategy). Possibly, even groups behind JFK competitors Lyndon Johnson or Richard Nixon were in the mix. In 1979, the House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded that Oswald was part of a larger conspiracy, but these HSCA reports remain to be sealed until 2029. Will the conspiracy theories be validated 23 years from now?

Sources:
Wikipedia: Kennedy assassination theories
Wikipedia: John F. Kennedy assassination
Wikipedia: Jack Ruby

Philipp Lenssen on Wednesday, Mar 1 2006 reg. Conspiracy Theories.