Legend: The Secret World of Lee Harvey Oswald

by Edward Jay Epstein

A biography of Lee Harvey Oswald, the alleged assassin of President John F. Kemmedy. This book succeeds in finally breaking the legend created for Oswald. It begins by revealing an incredible series of contacts between rival intelligence officers concering the JFK assassination and culminates in a series of events that turn the CIA inside out. Investigative author Edward Jay Epstein managed to obtain Oswald's address book and interview more than 150 people who knew him.

PRAISE FOR LEGEND

"A fascinating, alarming, and enormously significant book on the mystery of Lee Harvery Oswald-- The New York Times Book Review

"One of the year's most important books."-- The Wall Street Journal

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Politics, True Crime, Biography, American History

409 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1978

About the author

Edward Jay Epstein (born 1935) was an American investigative journalist and a former political science professor at Harvard, UCLA, and MIT. While a graduate student at Cornell University in 1966, he published the book Inquest, an influential critique of the Warren Commission probe into the John F. Kennedy assassination. Epstein wrote two other books about the Kennedy assassination, eventually collected in The Assassination Chronicles: Inquest, Counterplot, and Legend (1992). His books Legend (1978) and Deception (1989) drew on interviews with retired CIA Counterintelligence Chief James Jesus Angleton, and his 1982 book The Rise and Fall of Diamonds was an expose of the diamond industry and its economic impact in southern Africa.

Reviews

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

The JFK assassination was announced to us while on recess. After a hastily organized assembly we were all sent home. There, for several days, I was glued to the television. In the months that followed much fruther attention was paid to the event by the media.

The first criticisms I heard of the Warren Commission Report were later, when, during high school, I heard Mark Lane interviewed on radio. It wasn't until years after that, however, that I read anything of book length beyond Marina and Lee.

Oliver Stone's movie, JFK (1991), saw one of my best friends, Michael, commissioned to write a review. This got him into the literature about the assassination. He lived in San Francisco at the time, so I heard about it around a beach fire we had built on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, months later while he was visiting. His survey of the literature got me interested and it took off from there.

Since then I've read dozens of books about the murder of President Kennedy, from critics of the Warren Commission like Garrison, Lane, Prouty, Fonzi etc. to qualified (no one can intelligently defend it across the board) defenders of it like Epstein and, of course, critics of the critics.

This particular contribution by Epstein (I've read, so far, three of his books) focuses on the alleged assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald. Beyond adding biographical information to what the Commission recorded, it is highly dependent upon the claims of a CIA agent and of a very dubious KGB defector. His particular concern is that Oswald may have worked on behalf of the Soviets or the Cubans and he adduces evidence in such directions.

Epstein's more current beliefs are represented in his essay included as the description of this edition.

[Nathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

In spy terminology, a "legend" is a myth created around a person to hide their real intent, or more specifically, their real loyalties. Edward Jay Epstein examines, in Legend: The Secret World of Lee Harvey Oswald, the relationship between the murderer of J.F.K. and the intelligence services of 3 governments. It also touches on conspiracies to assassinate the President and various witness and allegations ignored by the Warren Commission. Most important, though, as a historical document, the book should be considered in the context of the Golitsyn / Nosenko affair. Epstein's book was published in 1974. The Golitsyn / Nosenko affair is still a debate waged today in our intelligence communities, and their connection to the assassination of President Kennedy remains shrouded in mystery. Whether Epstein's ultimate conclusions are ever proven correct or not is irrelevant; the book, and the fact that elements of it are still being proven curious 30 years later in books written by ex-CIA agents (see Tennent Bagley's Spy Wars) is testament to Epstein's zeal as a journalist and investigative reporter. He smelled a story, and his nose was good, regardless of how many details he nailed down perfectly.

NC

[Pete daPixie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Stinker, Sailor, Assassin, Spy. Edward Jay Epstein's 'Legend', published 1978 pitches the JFK assassination reader into the swirling hall of mirrors created by the CIA, FBI, KGB and Cuban counterintelligence agencies. While Angleton struggles with his paranoid search for a mole, high in the structure of the CIA, and the sudden defection of the KGB's Nosenko poses more questions than answers, J. Edgar takes off her dress and removes the max factor. We are left all these years later with a secret world from a LeCarre novel.
Having finished this book, I feel I should begin again and give it a second read. No doubt this is a good edition for my JFK library. Epstein has produced a well written and researched biography of the short life and times of Lee Harvey Oswald, or O.H. Lee, or Alik Hidell, depending on which glass we peer through.
I have not read Epstein's earlier publication 'Inquest', which purports to be 'the book that originally raised questions about the findings of the Warren Commission'. Not sure where E.J.E.'s inquest verdict has altered, because 'Legend' follows Warren very closely.
Now, to really mess the head up, why not try John Armstrong's 'Harvey and Lee' http://spot.acorn.net/jfkplace/09/fp....

[Davy Bennett · Rating 3 out of 5]

I finished the book.

It was pretty decent overall. I liked the parts about Oswald in Japan and his secret clearances because the U2 operated out of his base. Francis Gary Powers and his U2 was then shot down while LHO was defected in the USSR.

Epstein is sort of an Establishment guy poking around, but careful not to upset the mainstream version of events too much. You don't stay at Harvard, MIT, or UCLA very long if you are too much of a pain.

I think with the Soviet defector Noshenko EE thought he was on to something, but events played out that listening to him was a waste of time. Too much of this book deals with this paper tiger.

DeMorenschildt was a key player in all this and there was some interesting info on him here. Pretty sure he was CIA as were the Paine's. George killed himself during a break in a big interview with the author Epstein. Some say it was murder, a recording picked up footsteps just before the shot, per EE in this book.


ORIGINAL REVIEW:

Only halfway done reading.
Now that I am further into this book I have decided to finish it.
I do like all the details about Oswalds service in Japan. No way dude wasn't involved with the CIA.

Good if you don't believe the WC, it was a complete hack job.

Summary of WC:

LBJ. Here's your conclusion Earl, backtrack and make it work.

Earl Warren: CIA Devils Chessboard guy Dulles who JFK had fired is on the team, he'll insure this happens and they dont cooperate.

Dulles: Gerald, wanna be Prez some day, jump on this train.

G. Ford: Arlen, how's this magic bullet work again?

[AC · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nosenko was a liar (perhaps...); LHO was a Russian agent 'simpliciter' (bull). Epstein basically allowed himself to become the vehicle for Helms and Angleton to whack their enemies with (starting with JEdgar).

[Joe Nicholl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Legend (1978) by Epstein is a very interesting, captivating read when it centers on Oswald....but...when it veers off tract, like the very, very long prologue & epilogue, it gets to be very tedious & boring. Also, it sticks to the 'lone, crazed gunman' theory which has since be shown to be a fairy-tale (I believe in revisionist history...why? Because the history is looked at with a clean set of glasses while propaganda has quieted down...got it?) This is worth a read though for the authors view on Oswald...get it while you can, books about Lee & Jack Ruby are being scrubbed....3.5 outta 5.0...

[Harold Martinez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Makes one think.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second time I read this book. Both time were enjoyable, though it took the second time to really get the message. The probability that Oswald was working for the Russians in the assassination of JFK is extremely high. Because the FBI could have been held responsible for errors in tracking Oswald, the information was buried, the CIA counterinsurgency department members that had the correct assessment of related information, were disposed of / replaced, and someone who was actually a Russian agent subsequently was further used as a consultant feeding false information to the USA security agencies. Russia appears to have mastered the spy game quite extensively, while the USA powers-that-be were content with false appraisals, and keep their jobs.

UPDATED VIEW December 2013
Since having read this book, I have encountered other reasons why JFK was killed or by whom. CIA? Per wikipedia article Operation Northwoods described a proposed false flag operation that JFK prevented that reads just like 9/11. Per YouTube videos there were people including LBJ that were very angry at JFK and knowledgeable of the assassination ahead of time. That shortly after taking office LBJ stopped the printing of US treasury notes and we reverted to Federal Reserve (private bank) notes. Multiple players and multiple motivations--how many?

Re the book, I vaguely remember that it was Oswald that provided the Russians with the actual altitude that the U2 spy plane was actually flying at to allow them to aim a lot higher.

At last reading, I enjoyed the book. Since then I encountered a different book that was so bad that I questioned how it could have even have been published, and that kept me reading any books for a long time. Time for more critical thinking.

[Sean Macaluso · Rating 3 out of 5]

Would LHO ultimately been a mass shooter if he lived in a world with access to AR-15s? He certainly saw himself as an agent of historical importance, so if not for the President visiting Dallas in that exact period would he have eventually attacked a political gathering? Seems the propulsion of his life was leading him towards something dangerous and that it was entirely possible.

Otherwise a book that was interesting to me after reading Delillo's Libra, but a bit laborious at times.

[Cws]

327.12

[Edward Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting look into the life of Lee Harvey Oswald and the FBI and CIA's encounters with him BEFORE November 22, 1963. I Highly recomend

[Janne Kautto · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written book. He made a good case that Oswald was the lone gunman. But still at the end he left things open because some new evidence might come to light that changes things.