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JFK: The CIA, Vietnam and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy
Many were gripped by Oliver Stone's JFK & its premise that the assassination plot originated beyond the highest levels of government. In the film, an advocate of this theory is "X", a character who explains how & why this plot came about. As Stone acknowledged, he wasn't only faithfully depicted, but also as a creative adviser provided fully documented information & analysis that shaped the script. This mystery man wasn't a fabricated character. He's L. Fletcher Prouty, a former top-level military-CIA operative & author of JFK: The CIA, Vietnam & the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy. Now, Prouty presents the explosive thesis that influenced Stone from the time he began reading Prouty in the late '80s. Among his revelations is JFK's plan to change course in the Vietnam conflict & remove all military personnel by the end of '65, creating enormous concern at the core of the military-industrial complex which led to his assassination. Upon receiving the report of the Cuban Study Group from Gen. Maxwell Taylor after the '61 Bay of Pigs, JFK vowed to "shatter the CIA into a thousand pieces." He began by firing Director Allen W. Dulles & top aides. The army set up a full-fledged covert operation derisively named Operation Camelot to thwart efforts to end the war. Pres. Johnson reversed JFK's orders to wind down immediately following the murder. In 3/64 he set course for massive escalation. Brilliantly written & researched over nearly eight years, JFK is riveting. It's the 1st eyewitness account by a top-level insider, a man who had access to the primary documents & personalities-including those in the White House-dating back to '43. Shock waves generated by JFK will shake the halls of government for decades to come.
368 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 1992
88 people are currently reading
1691 people want to read
About the author
L. Fletcher Prouty
13 books38 followersCol. Prouty spent 9 of his 23 year military career in the Pentagon (1955-1964): 2 years with the Secretary of Defense, 2 years with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and 5 years with Headquarters, U.S. Air Force. In 1955 he was appointed the first "Focal Point" officer between the CIA and the Air Force for Clandestine Operations per National Security Council Directive 5412. He was Briefing Officer for the Secretary of Defense (1960-1961), and for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
In this capacity Col. Prouty would be at the nerve center of the Military-Industrial Complex at a time unequalled in American History. He has written on these subjects, about the JFK assassination, the Cold War period, and Vietnamese warfare, and the existence of a "Secret Team". He backs up his his work with seldom seen or mentioned official documents - some never before released.
In this capacity Col. Prouty would be at the nerve center of the Military-Industrial Complex at a time unequalled in American History. He has written on these subjects, about the JFK assassination, the Cold War period, and Vietnamese warfare, and the existence of a "Secret Team". He backs up his his work with seldom seen or mentioned official documents - some never before released.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 75 reviews
January 4, 2012
I find Col. Prouty quite convincing. He was a high-level officer in the military and the CIA, working in the field from late WWII and then in the Pentagon, where he briefed the President and the Joint Chiefs, until he resigned shortly after JFK's death. His commentary is not so much about the assassination, although that is well covered at the end of the book, as about the history of the Cold War, especially Vietnam and Prouty's analysis of the Pentagon Papers. I found some of the details shocking, e.g. there was an enormous U.S. stockpile of U.S. arms on Okinawa in preparation for the invasion of Japan in 1945; when the A-bomb made the invasion unnecessary, the arms were split and given away to North Vietnam (Ho Chi Minh) and North Korea by the military-industrial complex that President Eisenhower warned about, because they (the M-I C) profit from continuing warfare.
Call me a conspiracy nut if you like. It's true I've read quite a few books on those events. If you're convinced Oswald was the lone gunman, I would suggest you avoid this one, at risk of having your ideas severely shaken up. The only source of doubt I have about the author is his association with the Church of Scientology (perhaps the only organization that dared publish his work?).
This book was originally published in 1997, and used as one of the principal sources for Oliver Stone's movie (in which Donald Sutherland as "Mr. X" portrayed him. It was updated in 2009 with a preface by Oliver Stone. (Prouty died in 2001.)
May 26, 2012
There were a lot of interesting facts and correlations in this book. However, I didn't usually like the way the author presented the information. He repeated himself WAY too many times, and didn't really move in a linear fashion, time-wise. I also didn't always agree with his conclusions. But a VERY interesting read.
Note: Also not as focused on JFK's assassination as much as I was expecting/hoping.
Note: Also not as focused on JFK's assassination as much as I was expecting/hoping.
December 16, 2010
Colonel Prouty wrote about his personal experience as well as his understanding of CIA history in Asia since WWII ended. His connection to Oliver Stone and the film JFK that shows how the CIA planned the assassination is based on his experience, played by Donald Sutherland in the film. Prouty worked as a military link to the CIA during the Vietnam war so he has the right background to write such a book. His research into how we blundered into Vietnam after arming the communist forces in 1945 is worth pondering. I found the book fascinating because few insiders have ever tackled this sort of revelation. Most of the major participants were part of the top secret group. It would be risky for them to reveal anything. This is the most compelling conspiracy book on the subject.
November 6, 2012
Overall, this was an absolutely amazing book....an awesome addition to my already humongous JFK Assassination collection. My only points of contention: 1)The name of it (and I realize the name needs to attract the reader) should have been The Military Complex / The Power Elite: How it works and it's connection to the JFK Assassination. The first three quarters of this book was all about the High Cabal and the Military complex. Incredibly detailed and compelling reading, but I just could not wait for it to end so we could get to the JFK part. But when it did...BAM! I could not put the book down. 2) This may be minor, but parts were extremely repetitve. I stopped counting how many times he referred to the one million Vietnemese who migrated to South Vietnam. I know he was trying to bang the point home, but it got to a point where it was not needed. 3) Once he got to the assassination itself I truly thought he would get into names...who made up this High Cabal that is more powerful than the President and US Government. I understand this could be dangerous...but a little hint would have been nice. 4) I thought he would get into more detail how the Assassination was pulled off. He drops a lot of hints and possibilities, but never really gives details to his personal thoughts. I cannot believe Mr. Prouty, after all his years serving in the military in the sensitive positions he held, could not come up with some kind of idea. Be that as it my, I truly believe this is as close the truth that we could ever get. I think this give the Why and Who would benefit. But would love even more detail. Maybe that's asking too much... Whether or not you are a JFK Assassination buff...this is truly an amazing read.
February 9, 2011
I thought that perhaps this book would shed some new light on the Kennedy assassination but it was a bit disappointing in that regard. I did however learn a lot about the CIA and its role in the Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba and the run up and conduct of the Viet Nam War. While the author talked about the "power elite" and why they wanted Kennedy out of the way, more disturbing were examples of disregarding or disobeying direct orders from the Commander and incidents where the President was unaware or not told of things that were happening. It makes one wonder if the president is not on the "need to know" list, who is calling the shots. Since the author was on the staff of some high ranking military officials in the Pentagon, he had access to much inside information.
March 6, 2017
This is not only about the assassination but about the history of America at war since WWII, including why we were in Vietnam and Korea.
June 26, 2016
This is a very potent book and a must-read for anyone interested in the assassination of President Kennedy, or the CIA, or the Vietnam War. For the author, these things were all related, and he may very well have been right. Filmmaker Oliver Stone certainly thought so, and used this book as one of the pillars of his film "JFK", and the author as the basis for the character Mr. X. I read through it with great interest, but also some trepidation.
Prouty was a high-ranking pilot and military intelligence officer from World War II up through the Vietnam Era. He knew how the military and the CIA did things, and was privy to a lot of highly classified activity, such as the dark side of intelligence work - assassinations, plots, manipulation of foreign leaders and the like. He personally knew the major players and was present at key meetings. He was convinced that JFK was killed by a group of conspirators at the highest levels of our government and "military-industrial complex", and that the president was knocked off because of his plan to keep the US out of the Vietnam War. He does a fine job of documenting Kennedy's intention to do so and identifies the National Security Action Memo where he orders the withdrawal to begin. He was assassinated not long after this, and President Johnson reversed the action.
Prouty points to a number of things that strongly suggest a conspiracy, and states that while the killing was not pulled off terribly well, the cover-up was. There are people in the corridors of power whose job it is to plan assassinations and spread propaganda in foreign lands - it is not inconceivable that they might do something along those lines in the USA. Tensions were running very high in those days, and Kennedy was in constant bureaucratic conflict with leaders of CIA and the military. For example, Gen. Lemnitzer, head of the Joint Chiefs during part of the Kennedy presidency, once secretly called for false flag terrorist bombings to take place in Miami and New York to provide a pretext for invading Cuba. Kennedy ended up demoting him. However, the book falls short of making a truly convincing case.
What is wrong here? First and foremost, Prouty seems paranoid. He makes numerous references to a shadowy cabal of unnamed people that secretly guides pretty much all world events. His writing should have been better edited - the book is not badly written, but there is a lot of repetition and the organization is shaky. Also, so far as I know, Prouty stands alone. No other similarly situated people have come forward to corraborate his account. And at no time does he claim to have had knowledge of an assassination plot or to have participated in it. Could such a thing have really been accomplished by a small group of plotters, say Johnson, Hoover, Dulles, the head of the Secret Service, and a couple of generals, without the knowledge of their underlings? It is interesting to speculate about this, but speculation is all it is.
It is worth pointing out that this book is not only about the JFK situation. It is also a fascinating presentation on the roles of the intelligence services and the U.S. military in the Vietnam War era. It is definitely worth reading, and deserves its place as one of the most intriguing exhibits in the murkiest chapter of all American history.
Prouty was a high-ranking pilot and military intelligence officer from World War II up through the Vietnam Era. He knew how the military and the CIA did things, and was privy to a lot of highly classified activity, such as the dark side of intelligence work - assassinations, plots, manipulation of foreign leaders and the like. He personally knew the major players and was present at key meetings. He was convinced that JFK was killed by a group of conspirators at the highest levels of our government and "military-industrial complex", and that the president was knocked off because of his plan to keep the US out of the Vietnam War. He does a fine job of documenting Kennedy's intention to do so and identifies the National Security Action Memo where he orders the withdrawal to begin. He was assassinated not long after this, and President Johnson reversed the action.
Prouty points to a number of things that strongly suggest a conspiracy, and states that while the killing was not pulled off terribly well, the cover-up was. There are people in the corridors of power whose job it is to plan assassinations and spread propaganda in foreign lands - it is not inconceivable that they might do something along those lines in the USA. Tensions were running very high in those days, and Kennedy was in constant bureaucratic conflict with leaders of CIA and the military. For example, Gen. Lemnitzer, head of the Joint Chiefs during part of the Kennedy presidency, once secretly called for false flag terrorist bombings to take place in Miami and New York to provide a pretext for invading Cuba. Kennedy ended up demoting him. However, the book falls short of making a truly convincing case.
What is wrong here? First and foremost, Prouty seems paranoid. He makes numerous references to a shadowy cabal of unnamed people that secretly guides pretty much all world events. His writing should have been better edited - the book is not badly written, but there is a lot of repetition and the organization is shaky. Also, so far as I know, Prouty stands alone. No other similarly situated people have come forward to corraborate his account. And at no time does he claim to have had knowledge of an assassination plot or to have participated in it. Could such a thing have really been accomplished by a small group of plotters, say Johnson, Hoover, Dulles, the head of the Secret Service, and a couple of generals, without the knowledge of their underlings? It is interesting to speculate about this, but speculation is all it is.
It is worth pointing out that this book is not only about the JFK situation. It is also a fascinating presentation on the roles of the intelligence services and the U.S. military in the Vietnam War era. It is definitely worth reading, and deserves its place as one of the most intriguing exhibits in the murkiest chapter of all American history.
January 28, 2015
This is an important book. Unfortunately, it's also a poorly written one, inferior in organization and composition to his equally important The Secret Team.
One of the infelicities of composition is the amount of repetition. This is accountable by the fact that the basis for this book was a series of articles published for a magazine. Each chapter has an introduction and these are, naturally, repetitious. The text is also studded with retrospective and prospective announcements, presumably additions to the original articles. Interestingly, the magazine in which these articles first appeared is a publication of the Church of Scientology. This dubious association, however, does not appear to have influenced Prouty's arguments.
As regards the substance of this book and his prior one, Prouty writes as an insider, discussing in this case the history of Vietnam policy from 1945 until the U.S. defeat in the seventies. In his view, that war, and all armed conflicts, acknowledged and surreptitious, since the deployment of thermonuclear weapons have been fought primarily to enhance the power of ruling elites, most of whom 'govern' from the shadows. Modern warfare is not to 'win' military victory so much as to enhance profits, despite well-engineered disinformation to the contrary. In his view, Kennedy was murdered for having threatened these powers by, among other things, intending to withdraw from the lucrative Vietnam conflict and to disempower the C.I.A., the convenient mechanism of elite mechinations.
Personally, I don't buy Prouty's arguments--not because they're wrong but because they're incomplete and only circumstantially evident. A similar book might have been written (and some have) focusing on Kennedy policies as regards Cuba, for which much circumstantial evidence is also available. What's clear is that Kennedy had a lot of enemies, many with the motives and means to assassinate him, some of them connected to agencies of his own government, prominent among them the F.B.I. and, especially, the C.I.A., both of whom benefitted from the murder. That various interests in what Prouty, following Eisenhower, calls 'the military-industrial complex' also had motive and also benefitted is also true, but to assign to them agency is, in my opinion, unproven. They are not, after all, a monolith and Kennedy was no socialist.
Such reservations notwithstanding, this is an important and unusually informed position worthy of note and might well be read with other such insider books, such as the more recent Confessions of an Economic Hitman.
One of the infelicities of composition is the amount of repetition. This is accountable by the fact that the basis for this book was a series of articles published for a magazine. Each chapter has an introduction and these are, naturally, repetitious. The text is also studded with retrospective and prospective announcements, presumably additions to the original articles. Interestingly, the magazine in which these articles first appeared is a publication of the Church of Scientology. This dubious association, however, does not appear to have influenced Prouty's arguments.
As regards the substance of this book and his prior one, Prouty writes as an insider, discussing in this case the history of Vietnam policy from 1945 until the U.S. defeat in the seventies. In his view, that war, and all armed conflicts, acknowledged and surreptitious, since the deployment of thermonuclear weapons have been fought primarily to enhance the power of ruling elites, most of whom 'govern' from the shadows. Modern warfare is not to 'win' military victory so much as to enhance profits, despite well-engineered disinformation to the contrary. In his view, Kennedy was murdered for having threatened these powers by, among other things, intending to withdraw from the lucrative Vietnam conflict and to disempower the C.I.A., the convenient mechanism of elite mechinations.
Personally, I don't buy Prouty's arguments--not because they're wrong but because they're incomplete and only circumstantially evident. A similar book might have been written (and some have) focusing on Kennedy policies as regards Cuba, for which much circumstantial evidence is also available. What's clear is that Kennedy had a lot of enemies, many with the motives and means to assassinate him, some of them connected to agencies of his own government, prominent among them the F.B.I. and, especially, the C.I.A., both of whom benefitted from the murder. That various interests in what Prouty, following Eisenhower, calls 'the military-industrial complex' also had motive and also benefitted is also true, but to assign to them agency is, in my opinion, unproven. They are not, after all, a monolith and Kennedy was no socialist.
Such reservations notwithstanding, this is an important and unusually informed position worthy of note and might well be read with other such insider books, such as the more recent Confessions of an Economic Hitman.
August 16, 2011
I read this story hoping to get some additional depth and information behind the character portrayed as X (played by the uber-creepy Donald Sutherland) in the movie JFK by Oliver Stone. The author, Col. Fletcher Prouty was the real X, and one of the people who worked with Stone on the movie. Prouty worked in the military during the time Kennedy was assassinated. He was also with the administration before Kennedy became the president.
There is a lot of detailed background on the cold war and explanation on what leads up to Kennedy's assassination. If you liked the Stone movie, you will learn a lot more detail on the Vietnam War and Cuba connection as well as what threat Kennedy played to other powerful figures in government at the time. With a few minor exceptions (a chapter on Vietnam) the book is presented more like reading a long Wikipedia article. Those that prefer non-fiction to be more story-like might be bored by this format.
As for learning specifically who pulled the trigger, if it wasn't Oswald?
I took one star away because Prouty's narrative is repetitive at times. There is an index and footnotes provided.
Overall, I enjoyed this book and plan to read the other two books used as sources for the JFK movie. It's unusual that I see a movie and want to read the book (usually the other way around) but the JFK assassination--whatever happened November 22, 1963--is both a tragic and fascinating part of American history.
There is a lot of detailed background on the cold war and explanation on what leads up to Kennedy's assassination. If you liked the Stone movie, you will learn a lot more detail on the Vietnam War and Cuba connection as well as what threat Kennedy played to other powerful figures in government at the time. With a few minor exceptions (a chapter on Vietnam) the book is presented more like reading a long Wikipedia article. Those that prefer non-fiction to be more story-like might be bored by this format.
As for learning specifically who pulled the trigger, if it wasn't Oswald?
I took one star away because Prouty's narrative is repetitive at times. There is an index and footnotes provided.
Overall, I enjoyed this book and plan to read the other two books used as sources for the JFK movie. It's unusual that I see a movie and want to read the book (usually the other way around) but the JFK assassination--whatever happened November 22, 1963--is both a tragic and fascinating part of American history.
December 6, 2010
A hesitant rating. I couldn't stop reading this book (and calling my dad to discuss since he recommended it to me). Although sounding credible, I can't shake the feeling of this telling being a bit "one sided". Yet, the book does significantly form my understanding of the very powerful at work in the world. As my dad inscribed to me: Read at you own risk! You probably won't feel the same about your country for the rest of your life after you do.
Prouty is confusing when describing "the enemy" during the 30 year Vietnam conflict...but perhaps that is purposeful. Death of a Generation would be a resource to compare.
This book sits nicely on my bookcase alongside Huey Long, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, and Death of a Generation...Dr. Mary's Monkey, a distant but intriguing fourth.
Prouty is confusing when describing "the enemy" during the 30 year Vietnam conflict...but perhaps that is purposeful. Death of a Generation would be a resource to compare.
This book sits nicely on my bookcase alongside Huey Long, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, and Death of a Generation...Dr. Mary's Monkey, a distant but intriguing fourth.
July 28, 2017
Being a child of the 60s, and alive albeit very young when JFK was assassinated, this book fascinates me as it goes into great detail about everything related to the assassination, what led to the decision to eliminate JFK and the military industrial complex in this country. This should be read by anyone who has doubts about the conspiracy theory. If you plan to read O'Reilly's current book, you might want to read this one as well. The author Col. L. Fletcher Prouty was portrayed by actor Donald Sutherland in the JFK movie. Prouty was in government at the time, right in the middle of it all. O'Reilly was not as he claims to interpret all the "facts."
September 16, 2011
This is the book that inspired Oliver Stone's Movie JFK. It is one of the more lucid "conspiracy theory" books, really keeing things sensible and not lapsing further and further from reality as you get into it. My only criticism was that it was somewhat repetitive at times...but it was still a solid bit of work
Frankly the facts put forth are quite scary and fully support the author's theory that JFK's assasination was a conspiracy by powers even higher than the office of the President of the USA...
It's a great read all in all.
Frankly the facts put forth are quite scary and fully support the author's theory that JFK's assasination was a conspiracy by powers even higher than the office of the President of the USA...
It's a great read all in all.
November 7, 2011
Interesting read from a man on "the inside". His Pentagon and black ops experience gives an unique perspective on the most controversial episode in 20th century America. He gives a good go at answering the question most people don't ask...WHY was JFK assassinated?
September 10, 2012
I found this book to be quite the eye-opener. Even if you don't buy into the conspiracy theory of JFK, the CIA activity in Vietnam and other hotspots around the globe will make you wonder.
March 23, 2016
Not as good as his The Secret Team, this is a rather scattershot summary of former Pentagon official Prouty's beliefs as regards black operations performed by some governmental agents and agencies.
January 19, 2018
Excellent background and full story of the Vietnam War influence that led to his assassination. After reading it becomes extremely clear why he had to go.
June 2, 2020
Col. L. Fletcher (“Fletch”) Prouty (1917-2001) believed that President John F. Kennedy had been murdered as the result of a conspiracy. His proximity to people in power at the time of the assassination gave his assertions a vague air of credibility: he was Chief of Special Operations (1962-63) in the Kennedy administration and answered directly to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. His perspective was, at least, unusual.
Maj. Gen. Edward G. Lansdale (1908-1987) dismissed Prouty as not merely a conspiracy theorist unworthy of serious attention, but also someone he barely remembered. This is hardly surprising: Prouty had picked out Lansdale (whom he knew well) in a photograph taken in front of the Texas School Book Depository in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, on the actual day of the assassination, 22 November 1963.
Lansdale was a senior CIA officer who favored greater US intervention in Vietnam (JFK wanted out) and directed CIA plots to assassinate Fidel Castro (JFK had refused to honor the CIA’s last-minute demand for full-scale US military intervention to overthrow the Castro regime during the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961). Prouty was clearly opposed to escalation in Vietnam and had no affection for CIA assassination operations. Little wonder Lansdale never gave any honor to Prouty’s theories.
Mainstream media and historiography successfully relegated Prouty to the ranks of the crackpots, and he lived out his life in relative obscurity (though not poverty) until Oliver Stone brought him into a brief spotlight ten years before his death. The character “Mr. X” in Stone’s movie, JFK (1991), is based on Prouty. In fact, Stone based the overarching narrative of the film on this book, most of which Prouty uses to examine motives for the assassination.
Prouty digresses heavily at times. It’s not that it isn’t worth reading; it’s just that it doesn’t all belong in the same book (he also repeats himself too often). Prouty refers to something called “The High Cabal,” a conspiratorial global elite that runs the world (another Prouty book, The Secret Team, also discusses this). If this sounds silly to many, they should know that Prouty is merely quoting Winston Churchill, a mainstream politician and historical hero to millions. It was Churchill who coined the phrase.
Prouty writes:
Prouty proceeds to recount how JFK pushed to draw down US forces in Vietnam, and how the CIA’s opposition to his efforts was simply too powerful to resist by the time he entered office. President Harry S. Truman had created the CIA in 1947 as an information-gathering organization, designed to collate and coordinate intelligence from all sources and provide reports to the President. But a month after JFK was murdered, Truman warned in an op-ed to the Washington Post that the agency had mushroomed into “an operational and at times a policy-making arm of the Government.” In other words, by December 1963, Truman viewed the CIA as a Pandora to be put back in its box.
But Truman was already just a cry in the wilderness by the time JFK was murdered. In his op-ed he publicly demonstrated his naivete by recommending that “the CIA be restored to its original assignment” (i.e. reformed). In fact, one of the men Truman cited in his op-ed as “of the highest character, patriotism and integrity” was Allen Dulles, CIA Director under Eisenhower and briefly under JFK. Dulles had actually tried to convince the ex-president not to publish and, after failing, to get him to publicly retract. All in all, not a pretty picture.
Truman’s op-ed nevertheless proved inconsequential to the CIA’s development. Eight years of Eisenhower complacency had already served as an opportunity for the CIA to expand its global operations exponentially. Vietnam became a major CIA staging ground, with tremendous prospects for what Eisenhower belatedly referred to as the “military-industrial complex.” Rather like Truman’s warning about the CIA, Eisenhower’s caution (in his outgoing speech as president) was too little, too late. From then on, the CIA would be effectively “in charge” of US foreign policy.
JFK, who in 1962 had brought the world closer than ever to the specter of annihilation, stared into the abyss of what evangelicals might call the “Apocalypse” unlike any president before or since. It no doubt had a serious impact on his thinking. He became an advocate of a “peace race,” and made a famous speech challenging the Soviet leadership to abandon military superiority in favor of cooperation. Arguably, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was an earlier version of Mikhail Gorbachev – a reformer wanting to consign Stalinism to the historical dustbin. But “what might have been” is, as always, moot. JFK was assassinated, Khrushchev was ousted, and the rest – as the saying goes – is history.
After JFK, the presidency quickly morphed into an exercise in the head of state “doing what he’s told” by the “Deep State.” Arguably, Donald Trump is the first president since JFK to “push back” against the Deep State. Not coincidentally, the Deep State seems to despise Trump as much as it did JFK.
Despite his military and intelligence credentials, Prouty “leans left”: much of JFK is devoted to demonstrating the superfluous, unnecessary nature of the Cold War. Correctly citing JFK’s policies and intentions, Prouty notes how the Cold War might have ended much sooner than it did. The massive arms race and today’s endless post-Cold War conflicts on behalf of the “military-industrial complex,” with myriad defense companies looking for another opportunity overseas, might never have been.
Prouty is at his strongest discussing the lack of security for the motorcade on 22 November 1963. He was expert in such matters, and he describes the shortcomings of the parade arrangements convincingly. All windows of all buildings along the motorcade route should have been sealed. Armed military personnel should have been stationed on top of every building, and on the ground along the motorcade route between the crowd and the presidential limousine. The Secret Service detail and motorcycle police should have been alongside Kennedy’s limo the entire length of the journey. Sewer covers should have been welded shut. The list goes on. Prouty does not discuss the implications of it all having taken place in Dallas, Texas, a state still largely the political satrapy of JFK’s vice president, Lyndon Johnson. Neither does he mention the fact that Kennedy might have dropped Johnson from the 1964 Democratic ticket. How difficult would it have been for LBJ to use his “good old boy” connections in Texas to make sure snipers had a clear shot at the President that sunny autumn day?
Ultimately, the most convincing aspect of the conspiratorial account of the killing still concerns the number of shots fired, and hence the number of gunmen involved. Prouty rejects the conventional line that Lee Harvey Oswald could have been responsible for every shot fired at Kennedy, but he hastily accepts that the wound to Kennedy’s throat was an “exit wound.” Witnesses to the autopsy tell of a small hole in Kennedy’s throat, commensurate with the “entrance wound” of a non-explosive bullet, since an “exit wound” would have been bigger in diameter. These facts indicate that someone was firing at the President from the front. Witnesses to the limo’s arrival at Parkland Hospital told of a hole in the windshield, resembling a bullet hole, also indicating gunfire from the front. Too many questions remain unanswered about dents, holes and wounds to simply accept that Kennedy was hit only from behind, as Prouty glibly does.
Prouty does understand that the entire Warren Commission case against the “lone gunman,” Lee Harvey Oswald, rests on the ridiculous idea that only three shots were fired. Since the Warren Commission had to admit that one bullet missed altogether, it also had to conclude that one of the two bullets that hit Kennedy (the first) also hit Governor John Connally of Texas (also seriously injured by gunshot wounds). This became the “magic bullet,” since (1) its trajectory could not have been straight, (2) it supposedly caused serious injury to bone and flesh of two men, and (3) it supposedly emerged practically unscathed, to be found on Gov. Connally’s hospital gurney. If any other shots were fired during those seconds, there had to have been more than one shooter, thus destroying the Warren Report’s conclusion that Oswald acted alone. The Warren Commission could under no circumstances allow for the possibility of either more than one gunman or any gunman other than Lee Harvey Oswald. So it concocted a version of events that, with the passage of several decades, can be seen to be absurd. No reasonable person who has read the details surrounding the shooting could accept that the Warren Commission did any more than construct an elaborate cover-up.
As an example of buried inconsistencies, Prouty quotes a memorandum from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to LBJ on 29 November 1963:
As Prouty then notes:
Prouty doesn't appear to accept that Oswald could have hit the President from his alleged perch on the sixth floor of the Book Depository, which is encouraging (Oswald probably wasn’t even on that floor at the time and may not even have been in the building). He also correctly notes that, if it indeed came from the sixth floor of the Depository, the shot that sent a shard of concrete into James Tague’s face could not have been a “near-miss” (as the Warren Commission described it). It would in fact have been a very, very wide miss.
JFK is primarily a 101 course in why the Warren Commission (the most prominent and active member of which was none other than ex-CIA Director Allen Dulles) used the “magic bullet” theory to reconcile inconsistencies in eyewitness accounts of the shooting, and the “why” is important. If, however, you believe the assassination of JFK was not only the result of a conspiracy, but that multiple gunmen fired at Kennedy, and Oswald was only a patsy, then Prouty’s explanations seem timid and incomplete. Again, Prouty’s aim is not to suggest who was specifically culpable or explain precisely how the killing was done, and he makes no mention of the CIA’s links to the Mafia (crucial to understanding the assassination). He is concerned almost entirely with motives, and senior CIA figures - among countless others - had motive.
Some writers have important points to make and are relentless in their drive to make them. Some of these try to say too much in a single volume, and end up in serious need of a comprehensive editor. Fletcher Prouty is one such writer.
JFK is marred by a cluttered, ultimately plodding, style that sadly detracts from its key messages. It's a not-bad primer on the “High Cabal” (the photos in the paperback edition are very good), and Prouty's personal experiences around the time of the assassination are interesting. But there is so much more to tell of the facts surrounding the “public execution” of the 35th president, and even when making a few key points, he buries them strangely amid hundreds of pages of repetitive material about the sinister agendas of a hidden global elite.
In sum, there are much better written and more informative works out there on this subject. Some of these I have reviewed here on Goodreads. Check them out.
Maj. Gen. Edward G. Lansdale (1908-1987) dismissed Prouty as not merely a conspiracy theorist unworthy of serious attention, but also someone he barely remembered. This is hardly surprising: Prouty had picked out Lansdale (whom he knew well) in a photograph taken in front of the Texas School Book Depository in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, on the actual day of the assassination, 22 November 1963.
Lansdale was a senior CIA officer who favored greater US intervention in Vietnam (JFK wanted out) and directed CIA plots to assassinate Fidel Castro (JFK had refused to honor the CIA’s last-minute demand for full-scale US military intervention to overthrow the Castro regime during the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961). Prouty was clearly opposed to escalation in Vietnam and had no affection for CIA assassination operations. Little wonder Lansdale never gave any honor to Prouty’s theories.
Mainstream media and historiography successfully relegated Prouty to the ranks of the crackpots, and he lived out his life in relative obscurity (though not poverty) until Oliver Stone brought him into a brief spotlight ten years before his death. The character “Mr. X” in Stone’s movie, JFK (1991), is based on Prouty. In fact, Stone based the overarching narrative of the film on this book, most of which Prouty uses to examine motives for the assassination.
Prouty digresses heavily at times. It’s not that it isn’t worth reading; it’s just that it doesn’t all belong in the same book (he also repeats himself too often). Prouty refers to something called “The High Cabal,” a conspiratorial global elite that runs the world (another Prouty book, The Secret Team, also discusses this). If this sounds silly to many, they should know that Prouty is merely quoting Winston Churchill, a mainstream politician and historical hero to millions. It was Churchill who coined the phrase.
Prouty writes:
Winston Churchill, in conversation with intimate friends during World War II, made reference to a “High Cabal.” R. Buckminster Fuller wrote positively and powerfully of a super “power elite.” Dr. Joseph Needham, the great Chinese scholar at Cambridge University, writes of a Chinese belief in “the Gentry” as a similar “power elite.” This is a serious subject, and one that concerns us all. The “Why Vietnam?” question causes us later to ask, “Why John F. Kennedy?” We shall see why.
Prouty proceeds to recount how JFK pushed to draw down US forces in Vietnam, and how the CIA’s opposition to his efforts was simply too powerful to resist by the time he entered office. President Harry S. Truman had created the CIA in 1947 as an information-gathering organization, designed to collate and coordinate intelligence from all sources and provide reports to the President. But a month after JFK was murdered, Truman warned in an op-ed to the Washington Post that the agency had mushroomed into “an operational and at times a policy-making arm of the Government.” In other words, by December 1963, Truman viewed the CIA as a Pandora to be put back in its box.
But Truman was already just a cry in the wilderness by the time JFK was murdered. In his op-ed he publicly demonstrated his naivete by recommending that “the CIA be restored to its original assignment” (i.e. reformed). In fact, one of the men Truman cited in his op-ed as “of the highest character, patriotism and integrity” was Allen Dulles, CIA Director under Eisenhower and briefly under JFK. Dulles had actually tried to convince the ex-president not to publish and, after failing, to get him to publicly retract. All in all, not a pretty picture.
Truman’s op-ed nevertheless proved inconsequential to the CIA’s development. Eight years of Eisenhower complacency had already served as an opportunity for the CIA to expand its global operations exponentially. Vietnam became a major CIA staging ground, with tremendous prospects for what Eisenhower belatedly referred to as the “military-industrial complex.” Rather like Truman’s warning about the CIA, Eisenhower’s caution (in his outgoing speech as president) was too little, too late. From then on, the CIA would be effectively “in charge” of US foreign policy.
JFK, who in 1962 had brought the world closer than ever to the specter of annihilation, stared into the abyss of what evangelicals might call the “Apocalypse” unlike any president before or since. It no doubt had a serious impact on his thinking. He became an advocate of a “peace race,” and made a famous speech challenging the Soviet leadership to abandon military superiority in favor of cooperation. Arguably, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was an earlier version of Mikhail Gorbachev – a reformer wanting to consign Stalinism to the historical dustbin. But “what might have been” is, as always, moot. JFK was assassinated, Khrushchev was ousted, and the rest – as the saying goes – is history.
After JFK, the presidency quickly morphed into an exercise in the head of state “doing what he’s told” by the “Deep State.” Arguably, Donald Trump is the first president since JFK to “push back” against the Deep State. Not coincidentally, the Deep State seems to despise Trump as much as it did JFK.
Despite his military and intelligence credentials, Prouty “leans left”: much of JFK is devoted to demonstrating the superfluous, unnecessary nature of the Cold War. Correctly citing JFK’s policies and intentions, Prouty notes how the Cold War might have ended much sooner than it did. The massive arms race and today’s endless post-Cold War conflicts on behalf of the “military-industrial complex,” with myriad defense companies looking for another opportunity overseas, might never have been.
Prouty is at his strongest discussing the lack of security for the motorcade on 22 November 1963. He was expert in such matters, and he describes the shortcomings of the parade arrangements convincingly. All windows of all buildings along the motorcade route should have been sealed. Armed military personnel should have been stationed on top of every building, and on the ground along the motorcade route between the crowd and the presidential limousine. The Secret Service detail and motorcycle police should have been alongside Kennedy’s limo the entire length of the journey. Sewer covers should have been welded shut. The list goes on. Prouty does not discuss the implications of it all having taken place in Dallas, Texas, a state still largely the political satrapy of JFK’s vice president, Lyndon Johnson. Neither does he mention the fact that Kennedy might have dropped Johnson from the 1964 Democratic ticket. How difficult would it have been for LBJ to use his “good old boy” connections in Texas to make sure snipers had a clear shot at the President that sunny autumn day?
Ultimately, the most convincing aspect of the conspiratorial account of the killing still concerns the number of shots fired, and hence the number of gunmen involved. Prouty rejects the conventional line that Lee Harvey Oswald could have been responsible for every shot fired at Kennedy, but he hastily accepts that the wound to Kennedy’s throat was an “exit wound.” Witnesses to the autopsy tell of a small hole in Kennedy’s throat, commensurate with the “entrance wound” of a non-explosive bullet, since an “exit wound” would have been bigger in diameter. These facts indicate that someone was firing at the President from the front. Witnesses to the limo’s arrival at Parkland Hospital told of a hole in the windshield, resembling a bullet hole, also indicating gunfire from the front. Too many questions remain unanswered about dents, holes and wounds to simply accept that Kennedy was hit only from behind, as Prouty glibly does.
Prouty does understand that the entire Warren Commission case against the “lone gunman,” Lee Harvey Oswald, rests on the ridiculous idea that only three shots were fired. Since the Warren Commission had to admit that one bullet missed altogether, it also had to conclude that one of the two bullets that hit Kennedy (the first) also hit Governor John Connally of Texas (also seriously injured by gunshot wounds). This became the “magic bullet,” since (1) its trajectory could not have been straight, (2) it supposedly caused serious injury to bone and flesh of two men, and (3) it supposedly emerged practically unscathed, to be found on Gov. Connally’s hospital gurney. If any other shots were fired during those seconds, there had to have been more than one shooter, thus destroying the Warren Report’s conclusion that Oswald acted alone. The Warren Commission could under no circumstances allow for the possibility of either more than one gunman or any gunman other than Lee Harvey Oswald. So it concocted a version of events that, with the passage of several decades, can be seen to be absurd. No reasonable person who has read the details surrounding the shooting could accept that the Warren Commission did any more than construct an elaborate cover-up.
As an example of buried inconsistencies, Prouty quotes a memorandum from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to LBJ on 29 November 1963:
“I stated that our ballistics experts were able to prove the shots were fired by this gun; that the President was hit by the first and third bullets and the second hit the governor; that there were three shots…”
As Prouty then notes:
That simple statement, by itself, throws out the validity of the Warren Report. It does not account for the ���near-miss” bullet that hit the curb and injured a bystander named James Tague… That was an undeniable fourth shot.
Prouty doesn't appear to accept that Oswald could have hit the President from his alleged perch on the sixth floor of the Book Depository, which is encouraging (Oswald probably wasn’t even on that floor at the time and may not even have been in the building). He also correctly notes that, if it indeed came from the sixth floor of the Depository, the shot that sent a shard of concrete into James Tague’s face could not have been a “near-miss” (as the Warren Commission described it). It would in fact have been a very, very wide miss.
JFK is primarily a 101 course in why the Warren Commission (the most prominent and active member of which was none other than ex-CIA Director Allen Dulles) used the “magic bullet” theory to reconcile inconsistencies in eyewitness accounts of the shooting, and the “why” is important. If, however, you believe the assassination of JFK was not only the result of a conspiracy, but that multiple gunmen fired at Kennedy, and Oswald was only a patsy, then Prouty’s explanations seem timid and incomplete. Again, Prouty’s aim is not to suggest who was specifically culpable or explain precisely how the killing was done, and he makes no mention of the CIA’s links to the Mafia (crucial to understanding the assassination). He is concerned almost entirely with motives, and senior CIA figures - among countless others - had motive.
Some writers have important points to make and are relentless in their drive to make them. Some of these try to say too much in a single volume, and end up in serious need of a comprehensive editor. Fletcher Prouty is one such writer.
JFK is marred by a cluttered, ultimately plodding, style that sadly detracts from its key messages. It's a not-bad primer on the “High Cabal” (the photos in the paperback edition are very good), and Prouty's personal experiences around the time of the assassination are interesting. But there is so much more to tell of the facts surrounding the “public execution” of the 35th president, and even when making a few key points, he buries them strangely amid hundreds of pages of repetitive material about the sinister agendas of a hidden global elite.
In sum, there are much better written and more informative works out there on this subject. Some of these I have reviewed here on Goodreads. Check them out.
November 23, 2024
Detailing the Connection between JFK's Assassination and the Vietnam War
"JFK: The CIA, Vietnam and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy" by L. Fletcher Prouty is touted as one of the books that inspired and influenced Oliver Stone's movie "JFK" on the conspiracy to assassinate the president. This is only partially true, as the movie JFK is actually based on Jim Garrison's classic investigation of the JFK assassination, "On the Trail of the Assassins." But Prouty shows up in the movie as the mysterious Mr. X and his work sits alongside Garrison's as a classic of JFK conspiracy literature.
"JFK: The CIA, Vietnam and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy" is best described as a deep-dive look into the origins of the Vietnam War and the perceived need to eliminate JFK by those who had a vested interest in escalating that conflict in order to profit from it. It is also the sequel to Prouty's first book and magnum opus, "The Secret Team", about the modern history of the deep state and the conspiracy of the elites to employ intelligence agencies such as the CIA to make their agenda for absolute power come to pass.
Prouty's thesis is that the secret team (the government and industrial elites that run America and the world via the strong arm of the DOD and the secret hand of the CIA) stirred the pot in 1945 Vietnam by advising and arming the Hanoi independence leader, Ho Chi Minh on one hand while pledging to support French aspirations to regain control of their Indo-China colonies on the other. This "artificial war," moved along by other events created by the US and aided by the efforts of CIA operative and fixer, COL (Later MG) Edward Lansdale (who was also heavily involved in the Philippines in the 1950s), eventually took on a life of its own. The election of JFK, however, upset the timeline of planned events meant to escalate things. Prouty shows that JFK, far from trying to escalate the Vietnam War as many historians insist, had simply grown tired of CIA shenanigans over Cuba and was determined to prevent that from happening in Vietnam by bringing all the US troops home by December 1964. I had heard this theory before and always doubted it as a mere remnant of the Camelot mythology. But having read both Prouty books now (there is also a large amount of shorter Prouty material floating around the internet if you know where to look), done some independent research of my own, and having lived inside the government bubble for 40 years myself, I have come to the conclusion that the Prouty material is accurate. And damning to those who cling to the conventional story line created and promoted by the secret team.
"JFK: The CIA, Vietnam and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy" started out as a collection of articles published on the subject in Freedom Magazine. Thus, there is some repetitious material in the chapters that were once stand-alone pieces. This is a mild distraction and actually helpful to those who may be unfamiliar with the historical events covered in this book.
Prouty was a career Air Force officer who was active in the early history and development of DOD special operations and the CIA's sometimes conflicted relationship with the military. His testimony and first person perspective sets him apart from the crank conspiracy theorists and nut jobs he is often compared to. As a former intelligence officer myself, and one who was involved in the early days of Information Operations and the aggressive overseas engagement programs leading up to 9-11 and beyond, I can have a good ear for assessing Prouty's work.
And it is very good work indeed.
I absolutely and HIGHLY recommend this book to students of history (it helps if you have a good grasp of post-WWII/Cold War history) and conspiracy, those interested in the Vietnam War and/or JFK, and those who have read "The Secret Team" and want more of Prouty's investigative writing.
"JFK: The CIA, Vietnam and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy" by L. Fletcher Prouty is touted as one of the books that inspired and influenced Oliver Stone's movie "JFK" on the conspiracy to assassinate the president. This is only partially true, as the movie JFK is actually based on Jim Garrison's classic investigation of the JFK assassination, "On the Trail of the Assassins." But Prouty shows up in the movie as the mysterious Mr. X and his work sits alongside Garrison's as a classic of JFK conspiracy literature.
"JFK: The CIA, Vietnam and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy" is best described as a deep-dive look into the origins of the Vietnam War and the perceived need to eliminate JFK by those who had a vested interest in escalating that conflict in order to profit from it. It is also the sequel to Prouty's first book and magnum opus, "The Secret Team", about the modern history of the deep state and the conspiracy of the elites to employ intelligence agencies such as the CIA to make their agenda for absolute power come to pass.
Prouty's thesis is that the secret team (the government and industrial elites that run America and the world via the strong arm of the DOD and the secret hand of the CIA) stirred the pot in 1945 Vietnam by advising and arming the Hanoi independence leader, Ho Chi Minh on one hand while pledging to support French aspirations to regain control of their Indo-China colonies on the other. This "artificial war," moved along by other events created by the US and aided by the efforts of CIA operative and fixer, COL (Later MG) Edward Lansdale (who was also heavily involved in the Philippines in the 1950s), eventually took on a life of its own. The election of JFK, however, upset the timeline of planned events meant to escalate things. Prouty shows that JFK, far from trying to escalate the Vietnam War as many historians insist, had simply grown tired of CIA shenanigans over Cuba and was determined to prevent that from happening in Vietnam by bringing all the US troops home by December 1964. I had heard this theory before and always doubted it as a mere remnant of the Camelot mythology. But having read both Prouty books now (there is also a large amount of shorter Prouty material floating around the internet if you know where to look), done some independent research of my own, and having lived inside the government bubble for 40 years myself, I have come to the conclusion that the Prouty material is accurate. And damning to those who cling to the conventional story line created and promoted by the secret team.
"JFK: The CIA, Vietnam and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy" started out as a collection of articles published on the subject in Freedom Magazine. Thus, there is some repetitious material in the chapters that were once stand-alone pieces. This is a mild distraction and actually helpful to those who may be unfamiliar with the historical events covered in this book.
Prouty was a career Air Force officer who was active in the early history and development of DOD special operations and the CIA's sometimes conflicted relationship with the military. His testimony and first person perspective sets him apart from the crank conspiracy theorists and nut jobs he is often compared to. As a former intelligence officer myself, and one who was involved in the early days of Information Operations and the aggressive overseas engagement programs leading up to 9-11 and beyond, I can have a good ear for assessing Prouty's work.
And it is very good work indeed.
I absolutely and HIGHLY recommend this book to students of history (it helps if you have a good grasp of post-WWII/Cold War history) and conspiracy, those interested in the Vietnam War and/or JFK, and those who have read "The Secret Team" and want more of Prouty's investigative writing.
March 6, 2025
If you can’t believe someone like Colonel L. Fletcher Prouty with his distinguished service record and vast global military system experience, who can we believe? I always liked how he is portrayed as the mysterious “Man X” in Oliver Stone’s controversial film “JFK” because it ties the movie’s theory together in a cohesive point for the audience to ponder. “Man X” knew his stuff even if we as a nation are not fully prepared to accept it. Eisenhower warned us to be cognizant of the military-industrial complex. Too bad it took losing our young President on a balmy day in Texas before we began to comprehend it.
June 27, 2019
This is your classic conspiracy theory book. However, it has extra credibility because the author did work for the CIA and has certainly increased my knowledge of the events and history of the Vietnam War. There are a lot of strange co-incidences but not enough to really convince that there was a deep state plot to kill Kennedy in order to keep USA in Vietnam for commercial benefits.
What I did learn:
1) after the surrender of Japan the unused weapons and equipment were not shipped home but actually given to Vietnam and Korea.
2) In the case of Vietnam they were given to the communist leader who subsequently led the war against South Vietnam
3) After the French gave up Vietnam the country was divided in two with the southern part of Vietnam supposedly going to re-unite after a referendum. The southern part of vietnam having no infrastructure, and no ambition ever in the past to be an independent country.
4) A million Catholics were shipped by the US navy and airforce from North to South Vietnam. There was little infra-structure for these massive amount of refugees who settled primarily in the Mekong delta right in the South. It was the unrest and local battles between these new arrivals that caused the initial disturbances in south Vietnam. In other words little to do with the communists.
5) The US army was sent in with no specific objectives and ended up judging progress by the number of Vietnamese killed, whether or not they were actually communists.
6) The US army decision to use the helicopter ended up costing them a fortune in maintenance and support staff needed to keep these running.
7) The war could easily have been won if the US had bombed the N. Vietnam port of Hanoi to stop suppliers entering - but they were too afraid of Russian or Chinese reactions to ever do this.
8) A lot of weird things happened around the time that Kennedy was shot. It should never have been possible for Kennedy to have been in such an exposed situation. Unfortunately still no answers as to whether this was planned or stupidity.
What I did learn:
1) after the surrender of Japan the unused weapons and equipment were not shipped home but actually given to Vietnam and Korea.
2) In the case of Vietnam they were given to the communist leader who subsequently led the war against South Vietnam
3) After the French gave up Vietnam the country was divided in two with the southern part of Vietnam supposedly going to re-unite after a referendum. The southern part of vietnam having no infrastructure, and no ambition ever in the past to be an independent country.
4) A million Catholics were shipped by the US navy and airforce from North to South Vietnam. There was little infra-structure for these massive amount of refugees who settled primarily in the Mekong delta right in the South. It was the unrest and local battles between these new arrivals that caused the initial disturbances in south Vietnam. In other words little to do with the communists.
5) The US army was sent in with no specific objectives and ended up judging progress by the number of Vietnamese killed, whether or not they were actually communists.
6) The US army decision to use the helicopter ended up costing them a fortune in maintenance and support staff needed to keep these running.
7) The war could easily have been won if the US had bombed the N. Vietnam port of Hanoi to stop suppliers entering - but they were too afraid of Russian or Chinese reactions to ever do this.
8) A lot of weird things happened around the time that Kennedy was shot. It should never have been possible for Kennedy to have been in such an exposed situation. Unfortunately still no answers as to whether this was planned or stupidity.
February 5, 2014
Although quite repetitive at times this book clearly demonstrates the reasoning behind why JFK was assassinated. This does not tread over the same ground about the actual event but for a few short passages but focuses more on the time leading up to the assassination and lays the ground work for the motive behind it more so than the perpetrators as that is an exhausted avenue ultimately leading to only speculation and wild goose chases. L. Fletcher Prouty is Man X in the movie JFK by Oliver Stone and his credentials in the pentagon and on the ground at the time of these event lend credence to his work. It is well worth the read not only for information on the assassination but also on the escalation of the conflict(s) in Indochina and how the CIA works.
March 20, 2014
What continues to astound me is that there are agencies, major media outlets and history books that insist that Lee Oswald was the lone gunman who assassinated JFK. While I have no access to the key evidence or documents around the event, Prouty's background makes him a credible witness. In addition, the information he unveils about Vietnam fills in pieces of a puzzle that have eluded me for forty years. Having served in the Army during the conflict, his explanation of events matches everything I witnessed or experienced during that time. If even half the allegations in this book are true, then we are governed by a very dark group of powerful people.
December 24, 2008
Great Book, one of the most informative political books I have ever read by a man with great credentials on the inside of the covert world.
September 16, 2009
At last the truth is out there, for those who search for it!
November 25, 2011
I read a book by this guy - perhaps this one - and he sounded fringe and unreliable to me - though I can't remember anything more about the book, to be honest
February 5, 2019
The short version first ...
I can still remember that November day, the 22nd, of 1963. It was a day that one can never forget once one has lived through it. It wasn't just that day alone, but the week or more of mourning afterwards. It was the only thing on television, black and white images though they were. It was the date of the assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy in our own State in Dallas, TX as his mortorcade moved through Dealy Plaza. There was no rhyme nor reason to this event, but it was a watershed moment in American history. In its aftermath over 58,000 of our American Armed Forces members would be sacrificed on those fields of fire in Southeast Asia. As L. Fletcher Prouty, Col. USAF, Ret. writes in JFK: The CIA, Vietnam, and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy, the event in Dealy Plaza changed the entire course or our involvement in Southeast Asia. Had President Kennedy lived, the immediate result would return of about 1000 soldiers in that field of conflict, by the start of 1963. By the end of 1965, all Americans would have returned home. Our losses in soldiers far less than the result in reality of 58,000+ by the end of 1975, and the heartbreak of those afflicted with so much trauma, PTSD, and exposure to carcinogenic agents would never have happened.
In his book, L. Fletcher Prouty describres in detail the events that lead up to that fateful November day. It appears that all of the impetus that drove our country and a generation of its best and brightest to the rice paddies, jungles, and fields of fire that is Southeast Asia. Countless persons who lived there were also affected negatively by the warfare and its brutality and violence. The American military personnel involved in the war were also egregiously affected by the type of weapons utilized, their concealed nature, their construction as booby traps, and their relentlessness were also factors that increased the body count on both sides. The indigenous population was also affected by these weapons of mass destruction which laid waste many areas where they were used indiscreminantly.
Col. Prouty, USAF provides in inside view of the workings in the Pentagon as well as Washington, DC, since he was assigned to work in the Pentagon during the last decade of his service to our country. His work involved duties in the Office of Special Operations in the Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon. As one might surmise, this sounds like Special Forces, and indeed, much of the decision making surrounding US Special Forces utilization and deployments were only a part of his area of responsibility.
JFK: The CIA, Vietnam, and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy looks at the beginnings of the war in Souheast Asia from its very beginning as an on-going conflict after World War II. Initially, it was a fairly low-key conflict involving only Special Forces, OSS, and eventually CIA operatives working to combat insugent skirmishes in Southeast Asia, particularly in Vietnam. France maintained colonial oversight of the Southeast Asia area, particularly in Vietnam. One of the way to provide help was determined to send several thousand people who lived in the northern part of the country to the souther part where they could help with needed projects to improve the lives of those eaking out a subsistence lifestyle in the river deltas of the south. While the people in the south knew well how to perform the back-braking activities associated with farming the lowland areas, they also had a wonderful process worked out where they grew rice and other foodstuffs which were purchased from peoples in other areas, particularly China who maintained a barter type relationship where they provided containers of water and necessities of life for the farmers while buying and trading for the farmers' crops, particularly rice and some root types of vegetables and other goods grown primarily in the delta lands of the southern reaches of Vietnam.
After World War II, things changed dramatically for the river delta farmers as their barter trade process in place for decades if not centuries were undermined by the newly installed country leadership in Saigon where decisions were made to end all of the barter trade with China as they were now run by Communist leadership under Mao Tse Tung. This cessation with the additional movement of a large enclave 9f Catholic followers in the northern part of the country were moved to the south. It was a two-fisted desttuction process that left the south's farmers with precious little water, no markets for their produce and harvests of rice. The result was thirst, starvation, and other maladies assosciated with poor medical treatment and lack of water sanitation or markets for their trade goods. The resulting unrest among the beleagured farmers and their families became intolerable to the new regime in power who knew nothing about what had gone on for centuries before in the river delta areas which they ruled without any regard for the centuries-long arrangements with people who now lived under a Communist regime in China. The new emingrees were unaccustomed to lowland, river-delta farming methods nor the centuries-old trade arrangements that others imposed upon the Vietnamese southern delta farming industry. The result was unrest, non-acceptance of the new ways of life, and a complete breakdown in the farmers' economic way of life. With the addition of a flood of nortbern farmers and others who knew nothing of the old ways of living in the deltas, a seething cauldron of unrest, violence, and breakdown of basics for daily living was the result. With no clear solution in the offing, nothing was done to exacerbate the situation, resulting in a constant boiling of tempers, lack of necessities of life, and a desire to get relief from any source available.
Eventually, the French decided that they had little or no control of their Southeast Asia colony, so they turned over all rights that they had as colonial governors to the country itself. A disasterous loss of French forces at the battle of Dien Bien Phu resulted in the French mission to Southeast Asia making a hasty retreat and removal from Southeast Asia thus completing the die being cast to form the nation of Vietnam. Eventually it was clear that the 17th parallel would be the official demarcation point for the border between what would become two Vietnams, a Communist North, and a Democratic (loosely) South. The United States after the death of President Kennedy would align itself as the benefactor to South Vietnam; and, in so doing the war in Vietnam was set into motion with the resulting loss of 58,000+ American lives, hundreds of billions of dollars in equipment and arms, and a nation divided into factions some of which may still be in place.
In the final analysis of the work being reviewed, only those events up to the assassination of President Kennedy are discussed with any degree of rigor as the author's time in service with the Air Force ended shortly thereafter. There are those who postulate and contemplate about what would have happened had President Kennedy not died in November of 1963. That, dear reader, is the subject of other, fictional work (such as, specifically 11/22/63 by Stephen King).
I can still remember that November day, the 22nd, of 1963. It was a day that one can never forget once one has lived through it. It wasn't just that day alone, but the week or more of mourning afterwards. It was the only thing on television, black and white images though they were. It was the date of the assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy in our own State in Dallas, TX as his mortorcade moved through Dealy Plaza. There was no rhyme nor reason to this event, but it was a watershed moment in American history. In its aftermath over 58,000 of our American Armed Forces members would be sacrificed on those fields of fire in Southeast Asia. As L. Fletcher Prouty, Col. USAF, Ret. writes in JFK: The CIA, Vietnam, and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy, the event in Dealy Plaza changed the entire course or our involvement in Southeast Asia. Had President Kennedy lived, the immediate result would return of about 1000 soldiers in that field of conflict, by the start of 1963. By the end of 1965, all Americans would have returned home. Our losses in soldiers far less than the result in reality of 58,000+ by the end of 1975, and the heartbreak of those afflicted with so much trauma, PTSD, and exposure to carcinogenic agents would never have happened.
In his book, L. Fletcher Prouty describres in detail the events that lead up to that fateful November day. It appears that all of the impetus that drove our country and a generation of its best and brightest to the rice paddies, jungles, and fields of fire that is Southeast Asia. Countless persons who lived there were also affected negatively by the warfare and its brutality and violence. The American military personnel involved in the war were also egregiously affected by the type of weapons utilized, their concealed nature, their construction as booby traps, and their relentlessness were also factors that increased the body count on both sides. The indigenous population was also affected by these weapons of mass destruction which laid waste many areas where they were used indiscreminantly.
Col. Prouty, USAF provides in inside view of the workings in the Pentagon as well as Washington, DC, since he was assigned to work in the Pentagon during the last decade of his service to our country. His work involved duties in the Office of Special Operations in the Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon. As one might surmise, this sounds like Special Forces, and indeed, much of the decision making surrounding US Special Forces utilization and deployments were only a part of his area of responsibility.
JFK: The CIA, Vietnam, and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy looks at the beginnings of the war in Souheast Asia from its very beginning as an on-going conflict after World War II. Initially, it was a fairly low-key conflict involving only Special Forces, OSS, and eventually CIA operatives working to combat insugent skirmishes in Southeast Asia, particularly in Vietnam. France maintained colonial oversight of the Southeast Asia area, particularly in Vietnam. One of the way to provide help was determined to send several thousand people who lived in the northern part of the country to the souther part where they could help with needed projects to improve the lives of those eaking out a subsistence lifestyle in the river deltas of the south. While the people in the south knew well how to perform the back-braking activities associated with farming the lowland areas, they also had a wonderful process worked out where they grew rice and other foodstuffs which were purchased from peoples in other areas, particularly China who maintained a barter type relationship where they provided containers of water and necessities of life for the farmers while buying and trading for the farmers' crops, particularly rice and some root types of vegetables and other goods grown primarily in the delta lands of the southern reaches of Vietnam.
After World War II, things changed dramatically for the river delta farmers as their barter trade process in place for decades if not centuries were undermined by the newly installed country leadership in Saigon where decisions were made to end all of the barter trade with China as they were now run by Communist leadership under Mao Tse Tung. This cessation with the additional movement of a large enclave 9f Catholic followers in the northern part of the country were moved to the south. It was a two-fisted desttuction process that left the south's farmers with precious little water, no markets for their produce and harvests of rice. The result was thirst, starvation, and other maladies assosciated with poor medical treatment and lack of water sanitation or markets for their trade goods. The resulting unrest among the beleagured farmers and their families became intolerable to the new regime in power who knew nothing about what had gone on for centuries before in the river delta areas which they ruled without any regard for the centuries-long arrangements with people who now lived under a Communist regime in China. The new emingrees were unaccustomed to lowland, river-delta farming methods nor the centuries-old trade arrangements that others imposed upon the Vietnamese southern delta farming industry. The result was unrest, non-acceptance of the new ways of life, and a complete breakdown in the farmers' economic way of life. With the addition of a flood of nortbern farmers and others who knew nothing of the old ways of living in the deltas, a seething cauldron of unrest, violence, and breakdown of basics for daily living was the result. With no clear solution in the offing, nothing was done to exacerbate the situation, resulting in a constant boiling of tempers, lack of necessities of life, and a desire to get relief from any source available.
Eventually, the French decided that they had little or no control of their Southeast Asia colony, so they turned over all rights that they had as colonial governors to the country itself. A disasterous loss of French forces at the battle of Dien Bien Phu resulted in the French mission to Southeast Asia making a hasty retreat and removal from Southeast Asia thus completing the die being cast to form the nation of Vietnam. Eventually it was clear that the 17th parallel would be the official demarcation point for the border between what would become two Vietnams, a Communist North, and a Democratic (loosely) South. The United States after the death of President Kennedy would align itself as the benefactor to South Vietnam; and, in so doing the war in Vietnam was set into motion with the resulting loss of 58,000+ American lives, hundreds of billions of dollars in equipment and arms, and a nation divided into factions some of which may still be in place.
In the final analysis of the work being reviewed, only those events up to the assassination of President Kennedy are discussed with any degree of rigor as the author's time in service with the Air Force ended shortly thereafter. There are those who postulate and contemplate about what would have happened had President Kennedy not died in November of 1963. That, dear reader, is the subject of other, fictional work (such as, specifically 11/22/63 by Stephen King).
June 11, 2017
This is a dark and sobering book about the nature of the world we live in. The author quotes from his first-hand experience in many of these events, and uses many official documents and public domain sources to clarify and back up his ideas. In brief, this narrative advances the following ideas:
1. The discovery of the fact that the world is spherical (and therefore finite) led to the "inventorying" of the Earth by the European powers, chief among them the British Empire through their East India Company.
2. Part of this process involved the deliberate creation of propaganda schemes (Malthus & Darwin) that fostered a mindset that would justify genocide, slavery and economic exploitation. Malthus' idea was that the uncontrolled growth of population was detrimental to human survival and that known farming methods would not be able to match the demand of food required by the world population. Darwin's idea was that only the fittest survive, which is perfectly in accordance with natural law (i.e. therefore it becomes rational to exploit and annihilate the less civilized colonial masses).
3. The invention of atomic weapons (which can only act as deterrent and are otherwise capable of ending all life on Earth) led directly to a new style of warfare involving the controlled escalation of conflicts ("brinkmanship"). If there were to be another all-out war like the two world wars, it would annihilate all life on the planet. The next great war would be as violent and expensive as the two world wars, but it would be a "covert" war that would be carried out with "paramilitary" operations.
4. Communism was purely a state of mind that was more or less impressed upon the Western world because there needed to be an "enemy". The Soviet Union was secretly anointed as the "enemy" even before World War II ended and while they were still allied with the West.
5. Most of the American methods of conducting covert operations were derived, ironically enough, from the "enemy", namely the Communists' preferred modes of asymmetric/guerilla warfare and subversion. More specifically, they were greatly influenced by Mao's "Red Book".
6. Korea & Vietnam were carefully chosen as the battlegrounds of the Cold War, and preparations for this were underway as early as 1945.
7. The "Vietnam War" was a deliberate result of the CIA's "Fun & Games" (i.e. black ops). The situation was gradually and deliberately spun out of control to a point where full-scale military intervention became "necessary". The primary catalyst of the so-called war was the deliberate transmigration of a million refugees from the North to the South. This was by design, and was intended to foster hunger, starvation, violence & banditry. This situation was referred to as the "Vietnam War", and the refugees the "Vietcong".
8. The purpose behind creating this "war" was the sale of hardware materiel, weaponry & other military paraphernalia, all of which amounted an expenditure of 220 billion US dollars.
9. Along similar lines, the CIA had tried to create a war-like situation in Cuba. The failure of the "Cuban Brigade" in the Bay of Pigs program was not because "Kennedy refused to provide air cover". Rather, the Brigade would have succeeded had a certain vital air strike not been cancelled at the most critical moment. The purpose behind cancelling the air strike was to put the Brigade in jeopardy and throw pressure on Kennedy to order the military to take charge of what had thus far been a covert, CIA-controlled, non-military operation. This would have led to an open, all-out war between the US and Cuba. Kennedy did not yield to the CIA's pressure because he knew he would be violating international law as well as the NSC's own stated directive on covert operations. This led to the "failure" of the Bay of Pigs operation.
10. The Bay of Pigs operation brought JFK the awareness that "something very bad is going on within the CIA". He began to formulate policies that, if implemented after his re-election in 1964, would have put the CIA out of the covert operations business.
11. A large number of programs had been underway in the White House under the assumption that Nixon would be the next President after Eisenhower. After Kennedy won, both he and his brother and their White House cohorts made certain policy decisions that threatened the plans and intentions of many powerful people. One of these was the decision to award the TFX fighter contract to sub-contractors from counties that had not voted for him in 1960. This decision disqualified Boeing from this contract (Boeing was the preferred choice of the military chiefs) and was a huge shock for many. Another was Kennedy's calling off the moon race in favor of joint exploration with the Soviets.
12. There exists a fair amount of documents in the public domain, as well as circumstantial & anecdotal evidence to prove that Kennedy most certainly intended to pull all US troops out of Vietnam by 1965. Many so-called historians & journalists have tried to deny or negate this basic fact.
13. The exit of the US military from Vietnam would have soured the business plans of many people who stood to gain from the "war". Remember, the plans for Vietnam had been made since 1945. Plus, they could not abide the thought of a Kennedy "dynasty": John, Robert & Ted, three brothers, two terms each. The assassination of JFK was a deliberate military-style "black op" that was planned and managed by invisible powers from the very top, and whose lone-gunman "cover story" persists to this day. On November 22, 1963, the world planners took complete control of the US government.
14. The "Vietnam War" was escalated under Presidents Johnson & Nixon after the murder of JFK. This time, the CIA succeeded in doing what they had failed to do in Cuba: start subversion with small covert operations and gradually exacerbate it to a point where the military has to step in and explicitly take charge.
15. All these events serve to indicate that there exists an invisible power structure that plans these events beforehand and which has the power to execute those plans while remaining anonymous. Nothing occurs by chance on a global scale and there are no coincidences. There exists a highly secretive echelon of people with enormous powers and influence over world events. This "High Cabal" has existed secretly since the dawn of civilization and manipulates global events for its own profit. It does not recognize nations or ethnicity and it does not even comprise a single large business group. Rather, all the top businessmen, state heads, politicians and bureaucrats are controlled by this High Cabal which has even greater powers and yet manages to remain anonymous & invisible. Over the years, these same people have orchestrated the Arab oil embargo of 1973 and the "financial crisis" of the 1980s'. Even the fall of the Soviet Union in 1990 and the creation of the European Union is part of a long-range strategy.
Interesting ...
1. The discovery of the fact that the world is spherical (and therefore finite) led to the "inventorying" of the Earth by the European powers, chief among them the British Empire through their East India Company.
2. Part of this process involved the deliberate creation of propaganda schemes (Malthus & Darwin) that fostered a mindset that would justify genocide, slavery and economic exploitation. Malthus' idea was that the uncontrolled growth of population was detrimental to human survival and that known farming methods would not be able to match the demand of food required by the world population. Darwin's idea was that only the fittest survive, which is perfectly in accordance with natural law (i.e. therefore it becomes rational to exploit and annihilate the less civilized colonial masses).
3. The invention of atomic weapons (which can only act as deterrent and are otherwise capable of ending all life on Earth) led directly to a new style of warfare involving the controlled escalation of conflicts ("brinkmanship"). If there were to be another all-out war like the two world wars, it would annihilate all life on the planet. The next great war would be as violent and expensive as the two world wars, but it would be a "covert" war that would be carried out with "paramilitary" operations.
4. Communism was purely a state of mind that was more or less impressed upon the Western world because there needed to be an "enemy". The Soviet Union was secretly anointed as the "enemy" even before World War II ended and while they were still allied with the West.
5. Most of the American methods of conducting covert operations were derived, ironically enough, from the "enemy", namely the Communists' preferred modes of asymmetric/guerilla warfare and subversion. More specifically, they were greatly influenced by Mao's "Red Book".
6. Korea & Vietnam were carefully chosen as the battlegrounds of the Cold War, and preparations for this were underway as early as 1945.
7. The "Vietnam War" was a deliberate result of the CIA's "Fun & Games" (i.e. black ops). The situation was gradually and deliberately spun out of control to a point where full-scale military intervention became "necessary". The primary catalyst of the so-called war was the deliberate transmigration of a million refugees from the North to the South. This was by design, and was intended to foster hunger, starvation, violence & banditry. This situation was referred to as the "Vietnam War", and the refugees the "Vietcong".
8. The purpose behind creating this "war" was the sale of hardware materiel, weaponry & other military paraphernalia, all of which amounted an expenditure of 220 billion US dollars.
9. Along similar lines, the CIA had tried to create a war-like situation in Cuba. The failure of the "Cuban Brigade" in the Bay of Pigs program was not because "Kennedy refused to provide air cover". Rather, the Brigade would have succeeded had a certain vital air strike not been cancelled at the most critical moment. The purpose behind cancelling the air strike was to put the Brigade in jeopardy and throw pressure on Kennedy to order the military to take charge of what had thus far been a covert, CIA-controlled, non-military operation. This would have led to an open, all-out war between the US and Cuba. Kennedy did not yield to the CIA's pressure because he knew he would be violating international law as well as the NSC's own stated directive on covert operations. This led to the "failure" of the Bay of Pigs operation.
10. The Bay of Pigs operation brought JFK the awareness that "something very bad is going on within the CIA". He began to formulate policies that, if implemented after his re-election in 1964, would have put the CIA out of the covert operations business.
11. A large number of programs had been underway in the White House under the assumption that Nixon would be the next President after Eisenhower. After Kennedy won, both he and his brother and their White House cohorts made certain policy decisions that threatened the plans and intentions of many powerful people. One of these was the decision to award the TFX fighter contract to sub-contractors from counties that had not voted for him in 1960. This decision disqualified Boeing from this contract (Boeing was the preferred choice of the military chiefs) and was a huge shock for many. Another was Kennedy's calling off the moon race in favor of joint exploration with the Soviets.
12. There exists a fair amount of documents in the public domain, as well as circumstantial & anecdotal evidence to prove that Kennedy most certainly intended to pull all US troops out of Vietnam by 1965. Many so-called historians & journalists have tried to deny or negate this basic fact.
13. The exit of the US military from Vietnam would have soured the business plans of many people who stood to gain from the "war". Remember, the plans for Vietnam had been made since 1945. Plus, they could not abide the thought of a Kennedy "dynasty": John, Robert & Ted, three brothers, two terms each. The assassination of JFK was a deliberate military-style "black op" that was planned and managed by invisible powers from the very top, and whose lone-gunman "cover story" persists to this day. On November 22, 1963, the world planners took complete control of the US government.
14. The "Vietnam War" was escalated under Presidents Johnson & Nixon after the murder of JFK. This time, the CIA succeeded in doing what they had failed to do in Cuba: start subversion with small covert operations and gradually exacerbate it to a point where the military has to step in and explicitly take charge.
15. All these events serve to indicate that there exists an invisible power structure that plans these events beforehand and which has the power to execute those plans while remaining anonymous. Nothing occurs by chance on a global scale and there are no coincidences. There exists a highly secretive echelon of people with enormous powers and influence over world events. This "High Cabal" has existed secretly since the dawn of civilization and manipulates global events for its own profit. It does not recognize nations or ethnicity and it does not even comprise a single large business group. Rather, all the top businessmen, state heads, politicians and bureaucrats are controlled by this High Cabal which has even greater powers and yet manages to remain anonymous & invisible. Over the years, these same people have orchestrated the Arab oil embargo of 1973 and the "financial crisis" of the 1980s'. Even the fall of the Soviet Union in 1990 and the creation of the European Union is part of a long-range strategy.
Interesting ...
December 12, 2023
This book is a hard read. Not because of the content or the topic... but because it's written badly. Some parts are like wading through a thesis written by someone who has swallowed a dictionary and wanted to give air to words that don't get out enough. Some parts are written by a drunk down the pub standing on his soapbox and going off on one. It's disjointed, rambling and way too repetitious. In every chapter... and I mean every chapter... the author goes back over the points from the chapter before.
If you manage to get through all that, you do find some interesting facts. The author does add little snippets here and there like sprinkles on a cake... only trust me - most of them have fallen off and got lost along the way.
The author makes more than a few assumptions in this book. Although he was at many of the important events he mentions... honestly, he sounds like Forest Gump... he wasn't privvy to conversations, planning, or logistics at many of them. Most of the time he was just flying a plane. A bystander. It's like he's taken 2+2 and come up with 5. To make it fit.
This book gives a lot of credit to the ability of so-called "elite" humans to plan for never-ending future wars... yet it hides one slight flaw in that thinking. It relies on full compliance from minions. Ground level, every day, humanity very rarely ever does the expected. Most of the time chaos reigns.
If you manage to get through all that, you do find some interesting facts. The author does add little snippets here and there like sprinkles on a cake... only trust me - most of them have fallen off and got lost along the way.
The author makes more than a few assumptions in this book. Although he was at many of the important events he mentions... honestly, he sounds like Forest Gump... he wasn't privvy to conversations, planning, or logistics at many of them. Most of the time he was just flying a plane. A bystander. It's like he's taken 2+2 and come up with 5. To make it fit.
This book gives a lot of credit to the ability of so-called "elite" humans to plan for never-ending future wars... yet it hides one slight flaw in that thinking. It relies on full compliance from minions. Ground level, every day, humanity very rarely ever does the expected. Most of the time chaos reigns.
July 15, 2025
Extremely informative, especially considering it's coming from a verifiable first-hand in most cases. Excruciatingly revelatory and paranoia-inspiring as well. Two issues for me. Given that this book provides a scathing report on the CIA, black ops, psy ops, red flag ops, among other things, it's baffling that Prouty wasn't disappeared and his book censored. Hmm. Also, the fact that this book is essentially a vehicle published by and for Scientology makes it a tad suspect, to say the least. My major question here addresses Prouty's reiteration about the philosophical underpinnings of the "elite": Malthus, Darwin, etc. It's a largely compelling explanation of belief structures to justify and fuel all the Fun and Games. But this is such a foundational speculation that it demands referencing with specific footnotes, and I don't find them. And, given our knowledge of Scientology's own spy ring that has infiltrated numerous government departments, including the CIA, and given Hubbard's personal quirky philosophies - totally opposed to the entire field of psychology, for example - you have to wonder if this is true. And if the shoe does fit, does it really fit all CIA agents? My thinking has always been that the "elite" justify everything from a perspective of basic greed - "king of the hill", i.e. I hate everyone who threatens my campaign of taking over the world. And field agents, were they actually inculcated with philosophy or just blind loyalists?
November 21, 2018
This incredible book details the real truth about how the CIA shepherded the U S into a destructive, incredibly expensive and very enriching (for military industrials) war. Un-elected and unaccountable to anyone, the CIA and its affiliated Deep State defied Eisenhower and murdered JFK to accomplish its stupid helicopter war in the jungles of Asia.
The description of how the CIA moved a million peasants from the north to the south of Vietnam is a story of an incredible achievement....but it was all to create a scenario for a war they wanted at all costs. Long settled and networked in the north, the relocated peasants were turned loose with no way to support themselves, except by turning into bandits to survive. And the CIA incredibly smart and deceitful perps and planners - by twisting a descriptive word slightly - turned the bandits into Viet Cong communists who were a threat to Western freedom.
But instead the book details how this mess in Vietnam, one of many created since then, shows how a faction within the U S are a threat to humanity.
After successfully engineering a $220 billion war, and trillions of wasteful misdirected spending since then, these whatever you want to call them live on today and are behind the massive effort to destroy Trump and the reform movement that swept him into power. The latest chapter is not in the book, but easily inferred.
The description of how the CIA moved a million peasants from the north to the south of Vietnam is a story of an incredible achievement....but it was all to create a scenario for a war they wanted at all costs. Long settled and networked in the north, the relocated peasants were turned loose with no way to support themselves, except by turning into bandits to survive. And the CIA incredibly smart and deceitful perps and planners - by twisting a descriptive word slightly - turned the bandits into Viet Cong communists who were a threat to Western freedom.
But instead the book details how this mess in Vietnam, one of many created since then, shows how a faction within the U S are a threat to humanity.
After successfully engineering a $220 billion war, and trillions of wasteful misdirected spending since then, these whatever you want to call them live on today and are behind the massive effort to destroy Trump and the reform movement that swept him into power. The latest chapter is not in the book, but easily inferred.
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