CIA & JFK: Postscript: Toward October 2017
By Jefferson Morley
June 10, 2016
The following is the final chapter in the new ebook CIA & JFK: The Secret Assassination Files by former Washington Post reporter Jefferson Morley.
So, who killed President Kennedy?
The CIA’s last assassination-related files might help us answer that question. These files constitute a significant body of material — more than 1,100 files containing up to 50,000 pages of material. As we have seen, these are the files of senior is that this trove of long-secret intelligence files — if declassified in its entirety — will support the notion that the president was ambushed by enemies within his own government But that is only a hunch. New information might point us toward another conclusion. We have to see the documents to decide, and that won’t happen until October 2017.
The qualifier is important — if declassified in its entirety — because it raises a tougher question: Can online civil society force top CIA officials to make public information they obviously would prefer to keep a secret?
That is the fundamental question raised — but not answered — by this book. “Who killed JFK?” is a fascinating and significant question, but I have to admit it can sound like so much banter in a Baby Boomer bar room. The JFK story has no particular urgency in millennial America. I’m talking about a single homicide that happened before most of you were born. But the CIA’s last JFK files raise a contemporary political issue that couldn’t be more timely and relevant for the millennial generation: the role of extreme secrecy in a democratic society.
Extreme Secrecy
So, who killed President Kennedy?
The CIA’s last assassination-related files might help us answer that question. These files constitute a significant body of material — more than 1,100 files containing up to 50,000 pages of material. As we have seen, these are the files of senior is that this trove of long-secret intelligence files — if declassified in its entirety — will support the notion that the president was ambushed by enemies within his own government But that is only a hunch. New information might point us toward another conclusion. We have to see the documents to decide, and that won’t happen until October 2017.
The qualifier is important — if declassified in its entirety — because it raises a tougher question: Can online civil society force top CIA officials to make public information they obviously would prefer to keep a secret?
That is the fundamental question raised — but not answered — by this book. “Who killed JFK?” is a fascinating and significant question, but I have to admit it can sound like so much banter in a Baby Boomer bar room. The JFK story has no particular urgency in millennial America. I’m talking about a single homicide that happened before most of you were born. But the CIA’s last JFK files raise a contemporary political issue that couldn’t be more timely and relevant for the millennial generation: the role of extreme secrecy in a democratic society.
Extreme Secrecy