WEBVTT - Strange Bedfellows 0:00:04.880 --> 0:00:07.880 It's the early nineteen sixties and we're in the hottest 0:00:07.880 --> 0:00:12.880 hotel in Miami. Beautiful people, beautiful cars. But tonight, in 0:00:12.920 --> 0:00:17.320 a private room, there will be a secret meeting involving 0:00:17.400 --> 0:00:22.759 some very strange bedfellows. First, there's a sharply dressed guy 0:00:22.880 --> 0:00:27.040 with slick back hair and sunglasses. His name is Johnny Rosselli. 0:00:27.880 --> 0:00:30.760 He's a mafia leader in Las Vegas and Los Angeles. 0:00:31.560 --> 0:00:34.760 Next to him is Sam g and Coanna, the notorious 0:00:34.800 --> 0:00:38.640 head of the Chicago Mafia. These mob guys are at 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:41.920 the height of their powers. The extent of their controlled 0:00:42.040 --> 0:00:44.560 over organized crime is historic. 0:00:45.840 --> 0:00:48.479 Just days before he was scheduled to testify to the 0:00:48.479 --> 0:00:52.200 House Select Committee on Assassinations, Johnny Rosselli who was found 0:00:52.320 --> 0:00:55.120 chopped up and stuffed into an oil drum off the 0:00:55.160 --> 0:00:58.920 coast of Miami. Of course, in the telling of this 0:00:59.040 --> 0:01:02.000 story's Bill in one piece and very much alive. 0:01:02.480 --> 0:01:07.160 Also there is Bill Harvey. Harvey runs the CIA's executive 0:01:07.280 --> 0:01:12.040 action program known as ZR Rifle. It's a secret program 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:17.000 designed to eliminate problematic world leaders. He's meeting with these 0:01:17.120 --> 0:01:21.679 legendary crime bosses with an official offer from the CIA. 0:01:22.400 --> 0:01:25.360 He wants to hire them to kill Fidel Castro. 0:01:26.440 --> 0:01:29.520 It was only revealed in two thousand and seven that Dulles, 0:01:29.800 --> 0:01:34.399 the godfather of the CIA, personally approved this arrangement. 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:38.080 When Rosselli and g and Conna were first approached, they 0:01:38.120 --> 0:01:41.240 were offered one hundred and fifty thousand dollars in cash 0:01:41.640 --> 0:01:45.759 to take out Castro, but the mobsters declined the money. 0:01:45.959 --> 0:01:47.400 They don't want the job. 0:01:47.920 --> 0:01:50.400 They wanted the job, but they said they'd do it 0:01:50.440 --> 0:01:53.680 for free. After all, they're patriots. 0:01:56.400 --> 0:02:00.760 This is who killed JFK. Sixty years later? What can 0:02:00.800 --> 0:02:05.040 we uncover about the greatest murder mystery in American history? 0:02:05.320 --> 0:02:08.480 And why does it still matter today? I'm your host, 0:02:08.639 --> 0:02:15.440 Solidad O'Brien. Okay, so where are we in the story? 0:02:15.840 --> 0:02:18.480 We've looked at the weeks leading up to Kennedy's arrival 0:02:18.520 --> 0:02:23.239 in Dallas, which included the CIA connected Ruth Paine helping 0:02:23.280 --> 0:02:26.760 Oswald get a job at the Texas school Book Depository, 0:02:26.840 --> 0:02:32.760 which overlooked Kennedy's motorcade route. We learned about Operation Northwoods, 0:02:32.880 --> 0:02:37.240 a CIA false flag plan designed to attack a prominent 0:02:37.280 --> 0:02:42.160 American target blame Castro to justify an invasion of Cuba. 0:02:43.040 --> 0:02:44.919 It's hard to believe all of that's real. 0:02:45.440 --> 0:02:48.639 But let's look at the motive. In solving any crime, 0:02:48.760 --> 0:02:52.000 you have to ask who had the most to gain. 0:02:52.320 --> 0:02:54.200 And who has the most to gain. 0:02:54.680 --> 0:02:58.280 Well, there are three groups. First, the Cuban exiles, whose 0:02:58.320 --> 0:03:01.440 country had been taken from them by Castro. They were 0:03:01.520 --> 0:03:04.760 determine to get it back. Second, the mob who suffered 0:03:04.800 --> 0:03:08.560 a huge financial loss with their hotels and casinos gone, 0:03:08.639 --> 0:03:13.040 and were furious at Kennedy's brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:16.920 for cracking down on organized crime. And third, the hardliners 0:03:16.960 --> 0:03:20.200 from the CIA in the military, who believed Kennedy had 0:03:20.200 --> 0:03:23.760 gone soft on communism and was selling the United States 0:03:23.760 --> 0:03:25.120 out to the Soviet Union. 0:03:25.760 --> 0:03:29.440 Remember, after Castro took over in nineteen fifty nine, the 0:03:29.520 --> 0:03:33.000 CIA trained a group of Cuban exiles to execute a 0:03:33.040 --> 0:03:37.520 planned invasion to retake Cuba in nineteen sixty one. The 0:03:37.600 --> 0:03:42.600 attack was called the Bay of Pigs, and it failed miserably. Kennedy, 0:03:42.760 --> 0:03:46.440 not wanting American fingerprints on the mission, refused to send 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:51.520 the requested air support. The exiles were overwhelmed and slaughtered. 0:03:52.120 --> 0:03:54.800 So first, let's look at the Cuban exiles. 0:03:57.920 --> 0:04:00.240 He knows that followed the Bay of Pig's envision there 0:04:00.360 --> 0:04:03.360 developed a very hostile attitude and then the ex commute 0:04:03.400 --> 0:04:04.440 toward Kennedy. 0:04:04.160 --> 0:04:09.080 Of that's Fabian Escalante speaking through a translator. He was 0:04:09.120 --> 0:04:11.880 a leader in Castro's intelligence agency. 0:04:12.680 --> 0:04:15.560 They were convinced that he was responsible for the failure 0:04:15.560 --> 0:04:17.560 of the Bay Bigs invasion and even were saying he 0:04:17.600 --> 0:04:18.320 was a Communist. 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:21.760 My dad was a member of the Pigs invasion. 0:04:22.320 --> 0:04:25.920 That's the son of Ricardo Morales, Ricardo Morales Junior. 0:04:26.200 --> 0:04:30.560 My dad thought JFK screwed us at the Bay of Pigs, 0:04:30.760 --> 0:04:33.760 and then he screwed us after the Cuban missile crisis. 0:04:34.000 --> 0:04:38.360 Morales refers to the nineteen sixty two nuclear standoff against 0:04:38.360 --> 0:04:42.600 the Soviet Union where Kennedy, instead of using the crisis 0:04:42.680 --> 0:04:46.440 as justification to attack Cuba, made a deal with the 0:04:46.480 --> 0:04:50.239 Soviet Premier khrus Chef to avoid nuclear war. 0:04:50.480 --> 0:04:53.240 And so he was no longer loved or trusted by 0:04:53.520 --> 0:04:56.680 by that part of the community, especially my dad. He 0:04:56.800 --> 0:04:59.799 no longer cared for JFK as a as a leader 0:04:59.800 --> 0:05:02.240 that it helped the Cuban people. They had given up 0:05:02.240 --> 0:05:05.040 on Cuba, so he had given up on him. 0:05:05.080 --> 0:05:07.799 So Ricardo before the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban 0:05:07.839 --> 0:05:11.280 missile crisis. Your dad got involved to try to quote 0:05:11.480 --> 0:05:13.159 get Cuba back from Castro. 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:17.040 Yeah, my dad was a G two agent in Cuba, 0:05:17.080 --> 0:05:20.760 which is the intelligence branch of the government. Castro takes 0:05:20.760 --> 0:05:24.560 over and then it starts to evolve where Castro starts 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:28.359 going towards Communism, so he has to figure out a 0:05:28.360 --> 0:05:29.480 way to get out of the country. 0:05:29.560 --> 0:05:32.200 Morales comes to the United States. 0:05:31.920 --> 0:05:36.280 Then immediately he starts becoming involved in the bombings and 0:05:37.720 --> 0:05:41.520 killings of Cubans that are working for Castro. And then 0:05:41.880 --> 0:05:46.400 he he's never home at that point, he's out, you know, 0:05:46.920 --> 0:05:53.920 doing his thing, and he it's very emotional right now. Honestly, 0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:59.640 I don't know why. Oh yeah, so, but you know, 0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:03.840 he we we thought he was. What he was doing 0:06:04.000 --> 0:06:07.720 was trying to free Cuba. 0:06:08.000 --> 0:06:11.120 My mom was Cuban growing up. She talk about the 0:06:11.160 --> 0:06:14.680 Bay of Pigs and how disappointed she was in Kennedy. 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:17.440 So I do understand when they say that for them 0:06:17.960 --> 0:06:20.320 this was the loss of their homeland, the loss of 0:06:20.320 --> 0:06:23.080 their family. But while there may have been a shared 0:06:23.240 --> 0:06:27.160 sentiment among many exiles who had to leave, not everyone 0:06:27.279 --> 0:06:30.640 acted in the same way. It's important to specify that 0:06:30.720 --> 0:06:34.800 we're talking about a very particular group of Cuban exiles 0:06:35.080 --> 0:06:37.440 who took really drastic measures. 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:41.200 These exiles, most of whom settled in Florida and New Orleans, 0:06:41.560 --> 0:06:44.160 were not going to just sit by idly and accept this. 0:06:44.760 --> 0:06:48.080 Their property was taken, relatives were killed in jail. They 0:06:48.120 --> 0:06:51.080 wanted their home back, so they started to organize. 0:06:51.720 --> 0:06:54.240 This is a huge turning point for the exiles. 0:06:54.640 --> 0:06:55.800 That's Dick Russell. 0:06:56.360 --> 0:06:59.960 Listen to what Castro's former head of intelligence, Fabian has 0:07:00.040 --> 0:07:01.159 Klante told me. 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:03.960 The official of the CIA and. 0:07:04.600 --> 0:07:08.000 An official of the CIA came to a Cuban safehouse. 0:07:08.440 --> 0:07:11.600 He seemed very bothered by this and said, you have 0:07:11.680 --> 0:07:14.559 to eliminate Kennedy, the pinko of the White House. 0:07:15.480 --> 0:07:18.240 The Cuban missile crisis made it even clearer to the 0:07:18.280 --> 0:07:21.120 exiles that Kennedy was not going to help them get 0:07:21.160 --> 0:07:24.000 Cuba back. He was looking to forge a path to 0:07:24.040 --> 0:07:27.520 peace with Cuba and the Soviet Union, and it was 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:30.240 made clear by his famous speech that he gave at 0:07:30.280 --> 0:07:34.520 American University. He took the position that was directly at 0:07:34.560 --> 0:07:38.280 odds with the exiles who wanted their island back. Kennedy 0:07:38.480 --> 0:07:39.600 was standing in their way. 0:07:40.240 --> 0:07:43.240 So that's the first group you've established the motive for 0:07:43.280 --> 0:07:44.360 the Cuban exiles. 0:07:44.840 --> 0:07:50.200 Next is La Coos Andostra the mafia. The mafia's goals 0:07:50.240 --> 0:07:54.440 were simple money and power, and in the nineteen sixties 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:58.760 they had both. This mob story starts in New Orleans 0:07:58.800 --> 0:08:01.640 with a burly mob boss named Carlos Marchello. 0:08:02.280 --> 0:08:05.600 The New Orleans Crime Commission reported that under Marcello, the 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:10.480 local mafia made over a billion dollars annually from gambling, prostitution, 0:08:10.680 --> 0:08:11.440 and burglaries. 0:08:12.360 --> 0:08:16.120 Attorney General Robert Kennedy was going after Marcello as part 0:08:16.120 --> 0:08:19.520 of his mission of cracking down on organized crime. In 0:08:19.600 --> 0:08:24.040 nineteen sixty one, Kennedy had Marcello deported. He had him 0:08:24.120 --> 0:08:28.600 flown out of the United States and unceremoniously dumped in 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:32.160 a jungle in Guatemala. Two months later, Marcello returned to 0:08:32.200 --> 0:08:35.320 New Orleans, and let's just say he wasn't in the 0:08:35.360 --> 0:08:36.280 best of moods. 0:08:36.760 --> 0:08:41.680 Marcello had a deep and abiding hatred of Robert Kennedy 0:08:41.720 --> 0:08:45.440 by that time, and that was shared by the other 0:08:45.840 --> 0:08:47.120 organized crime leaders. 0:08:47.840 --> 0:08:52.320 That's Jefferson Morley again, the creator of jfkfax dot Org. 0:08:53.080 --> 0:08:56.760 The mafia despised the Attorney General, who they felt was 0:08:56.760 --> 0:08:59.400 targeting them. But as we've come to know, when the 0:08:59.440 --> 0:09:03.960 mob makes it decision, it's not personal, it's strictly business, 0:09:04.600 --> 0:09:07.760 and they had a really good business reason to dislike 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:08.520 the Kennedys. 0:09:08.760 --> 0:09:13.160 In nineteen fifty nine, Castro took power and through organized 0:09:13.200 --> 0:09:14.160 crime out of Havana. 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:18.880 Marcello and his partner Santo Traficanti ran Cuba. They called 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:22.360 it the Las Vegas of the Caribbean. When Castro took over, 0:09:22.559 --> 0:09:29.240 they lost everything. Cuba was truly a second Vegas to them. Casinos, drugs, women. 0:09:29.520 --> 0:09:33.000 It's impossible to place a number behind these profits, but 0:09:33.080 --> 0:09:37.640 the business was huge, massive revenue streams, and growth potential 0:09:37.920 --> 0:09:40.960 was off the charts. Then Castro cuts them off. He 0:09:41.040 --> 0:09:44.280 shuts down their boomy casino and drug business. So now 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:47.040 their goal is get rid of Castro. So you have 0:09:47.200 --> 0:09:52.439 the classic definition of strange bedfellows, the mafia and the CIA. 0:09:52.840 --> 0:09:55.520 The relationship between the CIA and the American mafia had 0:09:55.559 --> 0:09:59.800 begun in World War Two when the US invaded it 0:10:00.520 --> 0:10:03.920 through the South, and they didn't want any problem with 0:10:04.200 --> 0:10:07.640 the organized crime syndicates. That really controlled that part of Italy, 0:10:08.200 --> 0:10:10.720 and so they made an agreement with the mafia that 0:10:10.760 --> 0:10:13.400 they could continue to run their casinos. The US occupation 0:10:13.480 --> 0:10:18.000 wouldn't bother them, and in return, these crime syndicates would 0:10:18.000 --> 0:10:19.439 assist the US occupation. 0:10:19.880 --> 0:10:23.680 And guess who came up with that idea The poet 0:10:23.760 --> 0:10:27.880 spy James Jesus Angleton. He was stationed in Italy at 0:10:27.920 --> 0:10:31.000 the time, and under his guidance the relationship between the 0:10:31.040 --> 0:10:34.920 CIA and the mafia began. Angleton relied on his contacts 0:10:34.920 --> 0:10:37.439 with organized crime throughout the nineteen fifties. 0:10:37.920 --> 0:10:41.040 So the CIA and the mafia have this history of 0:10:41.120 --> 0:10:43.800 working together, and in this moment, which is the early 0:10:43.880 --> 0:10:47.800 nineteen sixties, their motives are aligned against Castro. 0:10:48.360 --> 0:10:51.320 The hardliners in the CIA and the military felt that 0:10:51.400 --> 0:10:54.840 Kennedy was betraying the country. He had gone soft on 0:10:54.920 --> 0:10:57.719 communism and in order to stop it spread, you get 0:10:57.800 --> 0:11:01.360 rid of anything or anyone that stand And there was 0:11:01.400 --> 0:11:05.160 also an additional motive for Allan Dulles, the godfather of 0:11:05.200 --> 0:11:07.320 the CIA. 0:11:07.400 --> 0:11:11.120 I believe that President Kennedy had alienated much of the 0:11:11.400 --> 0:11:14.760 US establishment by the time he was killed in Dallas. 0:11:15.120 --> 0:11:18.840 That's David Talbot again. Author of the book on Alan Dulles, 0:11:19.160 --> 0:11:20.559 The Devil's Chessboard. 0:11:20.760 --> 0:11:24.280 I think he alienated not only much of his own government, 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:29.800 but the national security establishment and the military industrial complex 0:11:30.000 --> 0:11:33.319 that was making so much money, frankly off the state 0:11:33.360 --> 0:11:36.600 of permanent war. He and his brother who came from 0:11:36.600 --> 0:11:39.920 Wall Street, a very powerful law firm on Wall Street, 0:11:40.240 --> 0:11:45.640 the Rockefeller brothers, the oil industry, the weapons manufacturers, these 0:11:45.640 --> 0:11:49.120 were all their clients. And they had had it with 0:11:49.200 --> 0:11:51.600 President Kennedy and his efforts at peace. 0:11:51.880 --> 0:11:54.760 What exactly does that mean? They had had it with him. 0:11:55.120 --> 0:11:58.080 They said this was putting the country at risk. They 0:11:58.120 --> 0:12:01.520 thought that President Kenny was a week president, that he 0:12:01.600 --> 0:12:04.080 was a Week leader, that he was an peaser, and 0:12:04.120 --> 0:12:08.080 he had to be removed from office. 0:12:09.520 --> 0:12:12.560 In October of nineteen sixty three, just weeks prior to 0:12:12.559 --> 0:12:16.559 the assassination, JFK signaled that he was going to start 0:12:16.600 --> 0:12:20.680 a withdrawal from Vietnam. He put it in writing in 0:12:20.760 --> 0:12:24.440 National Security Memo two sixty three, which he sent to 0:12:24.480 --> 0:12:27.760 a Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. 0:12:28.040 --> 0:12:32.120 National Security Memo two sixty three stated that the president 0:12:32.200 --> 0:12:36.240 would withdraw a thousand military personnel from South Vietnam by 0:12:36.240 --> 0:12:37.760 the end of nineteen sixty three. 0:12:38.080 --> 0:12:41.400 The memo says, quote, A major part of the US 0:12:41.480 --> 0:12:44.920 military task can be completed by the end of nineteen 0:12:45.040 --> 0:12:45.720 sixty five. 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:49.280 Right he was telling everyone that this wasn't our war. 0:12:49.640 --> 0:12:52.520 McNamara had gone on the record stating that if JFK 0:12:52.679 --> 0:12:55.720 had lived, he would have withdrawn the US from Vietnam 0:12:55.920 --> 0:12:56.760 after the election. 0:12:58.080 --> 0:13:01.760 Just think how history could have changed. Memo two sixty 0:13:01.840 --> 0:13:04.959 three had actually ever gone into effect. 0:13:05.160 --> 0:13:07.720 And it was the beginning, in my opinion, to the 0:13:07.800 --> 0:13:11.600 divide that we have today. When Blenda Johnson became president, 0:13:12.000 --> 0:13:15.240 he rescinded Kennedy's memo and he issued a new one 0:13:15.840 --> 0:13:18.560 in which he called for an immediate halt to the 0:13:18.600 --> 0:13:22.720 withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. Johnson signed the memo on 0:13:22.800 --> 0:13:28.440 November twenty sixth, nineteen sixty three, one day after President 0:13:28.520 --> 0:13:29.439 Kennedy's funeral. 0:13:34.040 --> 0:13:38.040 Rob has established his belief that the mafia, the Cuban exiles, 0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:41.840 and the hardliners in the CIA and military all had 0:13:42.000 --> 0:13:43.880 motive to kill President Kennedy. 0:13:44.120 --> 0:13:48.600 Their motives were different, but they were completely aligned. They 0:13:48.760 --> 0:13:52.720 just needed someone to put it all together, someone who 0:13:52.800 --> 0:13:55.400 had the means to pull something like this off. 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:58.640 So the popular theory is that the CIA had the 0:13:58.760 --> 0:14:00.840 means to make it happen. 0:14:00.400 --> 0:14:04.360 But not in any what you would think official capacity. Remember, 0:14:04.400 --> 0:14:08.200 this is all about plausible deniability. To do something this 0:14:08.360 --> 0:14:13.000 world changing, the assassination of an American president, it would 0:14:13.000 --> 0:14:14.800 have to be done in a way that couldn't be 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:18.280 traced back. A team would have to be assembled on 0:14:18.320 --> 0:14:21.880 a need to know basis. Certainly people like Alan Dulles, 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:25.080 James Angleton, and Bill Harvey would know how to pull 0:14:25.120 --> 0:14:25.640 this off. 0:14:27.000 --> 0:14:29.800 Harvey, you might recall, was the man Dullest placed in 0:14:29.920 --> 0:14:34.920 charge of ZR Rifle, the CIA's executive action program. In 0:14:34.960 --> 0:14:40.239 his reporting, Jefferson Morley describes Harvey as quote an assassination specialist. 0:14:40.880 --> 0:14:44.840 For most of that time, Harvey was a raging alcoholic. 0:14:45.120 --> 0:14:49.200 He was a bitter critic of President Kennedy and his brother. 0:14:49.880 --> 0:14:52.960 Bill Harvey was, in the words of his colleagues, a 0:14:53.120 --> 0:14:54.520 very dangerous man. 0:14:54.840 --> 0:14:57.680 Here's General Lansdale, who was in the Air Force and 0:14:57.720 --> 0:15:02.120 then the CIA. He was a pioneer in covert operations 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:05.640 and psychological warfare. Dick interviewed him decades ago. 0:15:06.120 --> 0:15:09.080 Harvey thought of himself as James Bond. 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:11.400 He was convinced. 0:15:11.480 --> 0:15:14.000 I think that the anime was after him, so he 0:15:14.080 --> 0:15:15.160 always went armed. 0:15:15.440 --> 0:15:19.640 William Harvey, my dad called him a psycho, a drunk psycho, 0:15:19.800 --> 0:15:21.640 but he was a dangerous man. 0:15:22.120 --> 0:15:25.240 That's Saint John Hunt, son of E. Howard Hunt, the 0:15:25.360 --> 0:15:30.000 legendary CIA operative who became notorious for his role in Watergate. 0:15:30.320 --> 0:15:34.120 We'll talk more about E. Howard Hunt later, because you 0:15:34.200 --> 0:15:36.160 guessed it. He's part of this too. 0:15:36.760 --> 0:15:41.080 During the Cuban Missile Crisis, Harvey was so insubordinate to 0:15:41.240 --> 0:15:45.480 RFK that he was taken off Cuban policy and banished 0:15:45.520 --> 0:15:49.760 to Rome. The humiliation only added to Harvey's hatred for 0:15:49.840 --> 0:15:50.840 the Kennedys. 0:15:51.480 --> 0:15:54.800 Harvey became very good friends with Johnny Rosselli, who was 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:56.920 the crime boss of Las Vegas. 0:15:56.640 --> 0:15:57.280 At that time. 0:15:57.480 --> 0:15:58.480 That's Morley again. 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:01.320 Johnny was also a known KI or. The FBI suspected 0:16:01.400 --> 0:16:04.280 him in about twelve murders. So if you wanted to 0:16:04.360 --> 0:16:07.360 kill somebody, Johnny Rosselli was the right person to go to. 0:16:08.160 --> 0:16:09.200 I loved Roselli. 0:16:09.760 --> 0:16:12.400 My husband always said, if I had to write shotgun 0:16:12.400 --> 0:16:13.520 and that's a guy I'd. 0:16:13.320 --> 0:16:13.880 Take with me. 0:16:14.280 --> 0:16:19.119 That's CG. Harvey. Bill Harvey's wife, cig was an agent herself. 0:16:19.640 --> 0:16:23.160 And here she is talking about her husband's close relationship 0:16:23.200 --> 0:16:24.120 with Johnny Rosselli. 0:16:24.760 --> 0:16:30.280 He definitely was mafia and he definitely was a crook, 0:16:31.240 --> 0:16:33.800 but he was a patriot. 0:16:35.080 --> 0:16:38.600 Well that's weird calling a mob boss a patriot, right. 0:16:38.520 --> 0:16:41.320 But it shows the connection that he had with her husband, 0:16:41.760 --> 0:16:44.200 which extended to their feelings about RFK. 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:50.480 Bobby Kennedy and my husband were absolutely enemies, I mean 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:52.240 just pure enemies. 0:16:52.560 --> 0:16:54.920 And then she goes back to talking about Rosselli. 0:16:55.160 --> 0:16:58.800 He knew that my husband was a patriot and that's 0:16:58.840 --> 0:16:59.800 what drew him to be. 0:17:00.920 --> 0:17:03.200 Now, pay attention to what comes next. 0:17:03.440 --> 0:17:09.119 And he had been recruited by another guy from the 0:17:09.240 --> 0:17:15.399 FBI for assassination purposes on. 0:17:16.960 --> 0:17:24.639 Kennedy or on cashtill on Kennedy. That's a big slip. 0:17:24.840 --> 0:17:28.919 Yes, she said that Johnny Roselli was recruited by someone 0:17:28.920 --> 0:17:32.480 at the FBI for assassination purposes on Kennedy. Then she 0:17:32.960 --> 0:17:35.680 quickly realized what she had said and she corrected herself. 0:17:35.720 --> 0:17:39.080 Freudian slip, but a big one. The CIA withheld a 0:17:39.160 --> 0:17:43.600 significant amount of material on Bill Harvey's secret operations from 0:17:43.600 --> 0:17:47.280 the House Select Committee on Assassinations when they investigated in 0:17:47.280 --> 0:17:48.600 the mid nineteen seventies. 0:17:49.080 --> 0:17:53.560 You'll remember former CIA agent George Joanniedes. He acted as 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:58.280 a goalkeeper for the CIA during that investigation. Robert Blakey 0:17:58.440 --> 0:17:59.800 still has his regrets. 0:18:00.280 --> 0:18:05.480 Instead of pulling around with people that joeannadies Davis, I 0:18:05.520 --> 0:18:07.880 should have been talking to Harvey. 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:12.119 In twenty sixteen, David Talbot filed a Freedom of Information 0:18:12.240 --> 0:18:15.720 Act request for these records on Harvey, among others. 0:18:16.240 --> 0:18:18.840 They refused to release them to me, they said for 0:18:18.960 --> 0:18:20.400 national security reasons. 0:18:21.040 --> 0:18:24.840 The following year he sued the US State Department. 0:18:24.840 --> 0:18:27.960 And here we are in twenty twenty three and those 0:18:28.000 --> 0:18:30.600 Harvey records have still not been released. 0:18:30.920 --> 0:18:34.639 The records that have been released reveal that even after 0:18:34.680 --> 0:18:38.760 the Kennedys banished Harvey to Rome, he continued contact with 0:18:38.920 --> 0:18:43.399 Dulles and Angleton. They also reveal that he worked with 0:18:43.440 --> 0:18:46.200 a man named David Attlee Phillips. 0:18:47.640 --> 0:18:49.720 What do we know about David Attlee Phillips. 0:18:50.040 --> 0:18:53.199 David Attlee Phillips was a trust fund kid from Texas. 0:18:53.520 --> 0:18:56.080 He inherited a lot of money after the war and 0:18:56.160 --> 0:19:00.239 moved to Chile and opened up a expat newspaper. It 0:19:00.320 --> 0:19:02.760 was there he came to the attention of a traveling 0:19:02.840 --> 0:19:08.200 CIA officer named Howard Hunt, the future Watergate burglar, who 0:19:08.240 --> 0:19:12.240 recruited him to join the agency, and what his specialty 0:19:12.520 --> 0:19:16.520 was was deception operations using the press and radio. 0:19:16.840 --> 0:19:20.560 He was like an Angleton Junior. After Castro took over 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:25.120 a Cuba, Phillips became a point person for anti Castro activities, 0:19:25.440 --> 0:19:28.440 specifically working with the Cuban exiles in Miami. 0:19:28.880 --> 0:19:31.200 There were a number of different groups that formed during 0:19:31.200 --> 0:19:33.720 this time, and they each had a different method of 0:19:33.760 --> 0:19:37.680 trying to remove Castro. Some were more diplomatic, while others 0:19:37.720 --> 0:19:43.040 were outright violent. Alpha sixty six in Operation forty were 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:44.560 two of the more violent groups. 0:19:45.400 --> 0:19:50.800 OP forty is a special team of operatas basically assassins. 0:19:51.400 --> 0:19:56.040 That's Ricardo Moreles Junior again his father, Ricardo Moreles Senior, 0:19:56.320 --> 0:19:57.680 fought in the Bay of Pigs. 0:19:58.640 --> 0:20:03.800 OP forty became more of a CIA run team that 0:20:03.960 --> 0:20:06.920 was ready to do whatever the CIA needed them to do. 0:20:07.200 --> 0:20:11.680 Alpha sixty six is just Cubans expats that are furious 0:20:11.720 --> 0:20:14.840 and want to blow things up. Alphai six wanted to 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:16.719 go back to Cuban just assassinate Castro. 0:20:17.440 --> 0:20:20.919 Alpha sixty six was led by a Cuban exile by 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:22.960 the name of Antonio Vessiana. 0:20:23.040 --> 0:20:26.720 Antonio Vessiana was smart and angry, and there was nothing 0:20:26.760 --> 0:20:28.560 he wouldn't do to get his country back. 0:20:29.080 --> 0:20:32.679 Antonia was a wealthy guy in Cuba. 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:34.359 That's David Talbot again. 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:37.119 He had been a banker, had been a member of 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:40.960 the middle class there and saw that thought that the 0:20:41.040 --> 0:20:43.920 castro was taking the country in the wrong direction, so 0:20:44.000 --> 0:20:46.679 he joined the exiles who fled. 0:20:47.160 --> 0:20:50.720 Once he was on us soil, Vessiana started making plans 0:20:50.760 --> 0:20:53.919 to take Cuba back. He had a plan, but what 0:20:54.040 --> 0:20:56.840 he didn't have was money. He had left everything he 0:20:56.960 --> 0:20:58.000 had back in Cuba. 0:20:58.320 --> 0:21:00.760 The money for these organization this just has to come 0:21:00.760 --> 0:21:01.520 from somewhere. 0:21:02.000 --> 0:21:03.800 That's Morellis Junior. Again. 0:21:04.200 --> 0:21:07.840 You have the materials that are required, the bombs, the 0:21:07.920 --> 0:21:10.800 explosives and all that also has to be procured. 0:21:11.359 --> 0:21:13.960 A lot of the support came from a CIA operative 0:21:14.040 --> 0:21:15.240 named Maurice Bishop. 0:21:16.160 --> 0:21:17.920 So who's Maurice Bishop. 0:21:18.160 --> 0:21:20.480 I know I'm throwing a lot of names at you, 0:21:20.520 --> 0:21:25.880 but stick with me here on Maurice Bishop. This is important. First, 0:21:26.560 --> 0:21:28.760 what you have to know is that there is no 0:21:28.960 --> 0:21:33.000 record of anyone at the CIA with that name. Did 0:21:33.000 --> 0:21:36.919 he even exist? And if he didn't, who was helping 0:21:36.960 --> 0:21:41.399 Alpha sixty six? In nineteen seventy six, during the House 0:21:41.400 --> 0:21:45.959 Committee investigation, we got the answer, and it was like 0:21:46.119 --> 0:21:59.080 something straight out of a movie. Stick with me here 0:21:59.160 --> 0:22:04.080 on Maurice Bishop. This is important. First, what you have 0:22:04.160 --> 0:22:07.480 to know is that there is no record of anyone 0:22:07.600 --> 0:22:12.119 at the CIA with that name. Did he even exist? 0:22:12.480 --> 0:22:15.920 And if he didn't, who was helping Alpha sixty six? 0:22:16.880 --> 0:22:21.199 In nineteen seventy six. During the House Committee investigation, we 0:22:21.280 --> 0:22:22.120 got the answer. 0:22:25.280 --> 0:22:30.040 The committee called Antonio Vesciana in for questioning. Vasciana mentioned 0:22:30.080 --> 0:22:33.760 that he had a handler with the last name of Bishop. Again, 0:22:33.960 --> 0:22:37.879 nobody recognized the name, so they asked Vasciana to describe 0:22:37.960 --> 0:22:41.080 what Bishop looked like. The sketch artist starts to draw 0:22:41.119 --> 0:22:45.320 a compositive Bishop based on descriptions from Vesciana and others 0:22:45.320 --> 0:22:46.480 who've described. 0:22:46.080 --> 0:22:49.960 Him, and then the sketch looked like someone familiar. 0:22:50.440 --> 0:22:54.080 When David Attlee Phillips was testifying to the committee, they 0:22:54.119 --> 0:22:57.639 showed him a copy of the sketch. He said, couldn't 0:22:57.640 --> 0:23:00.240 identify the person, but it looks like me. 0:23:00.720 --> 0:23:04.040 I want to unequivocally state that Maurice Bishop was David 0:23:04.080 --> 0:23:04.880 Attlee Phillips. 0:23:05.520 --> 0:23:10.359 The voice you just heard is Antonio Vessiana's son. He's 0:23:10.400 --> 0:23:14.000 reading a statement from his father revealing that David Attlee 0:23:14.040 --> 0:23:19.360 Phillips also used the name Maurice Bishop, the CIA's very 0:23:19.400 --> 0:23:22.879 own David Attlee Phillips, Angleton's disciple. 0:23:23.200 --> 0:23:26.760 David Attlee Phillips was given a chance to respond in 0:23:26.800 --> 0:23:30.000 his testimony to the houselet Committee on Assassinations, and he 0:23:30.160 --> 0:23:33.440 denied that he'd ever use the name Maurice Bishop. 0:23:33.760 --> 0:23:38.000 Well, he would have to. The implications would have been huge. 0:23:39.119 --> 0:23:42.960 In March of nineteen sixty three, Alpha sixty six, under 0:23:43.000 --> 0:23:46.760 the leadership of Antonio Vessiana, with the support and funding 0:23:47.200 --> 0:23:51.280 of the CIA, through David Attlee Phillips, sank a Russian 0:23:51.320 --> 0:23:52.560 ship doctor in Cuba. 0:23:53.119 --> 0:23:57.720 This is in nineteen sixty three, after the Cuban Missile crisis, 0:23:57.800 --> 0:24:01.600 in a moment where Kennedy had turned to peace. Did 0:24:01.680 --> 0:24:06.080