“The ‘magic bullet’ theory and a coup d’etat in America” By Jerry Mazza

The ‘magic bullet’ theory and a coup d’etat in America
Jerry Mazza / 8 March 2010

Whether you know it or not, the “magic bullet” theory is the critical keystone of the US Government’s claim that a “lone gunman,” Lee Harvey Oswald, assassinated President John F. Kennedy. This theory has been conclusively proven false as of November, 2009, with the publication of Reasoning about Assassinations, by Dr. James Fetzer, based upon research by a team of experts.

Fetzer explains why the “magic bullet” theory, the foundation for THE WARREN REPORT (1964), THE HSCA FINAL REPORT (1979), and Gerald Posner’s CASE CLOSED (1993), is false

After all, it was the acceptance of this unbelievable theory that literally paved the way for a coup d’etat of America. That is, if you can assassinate a president in broad daylight in a major American city by deploying an elaborate set of lies and get away with it, what and who is left that is not within the province of US government intelligence agencies and cohorts to destroy?

In its wake, JFK’s assassination was the beginning of a new era of pessimism about the US government, including its Vietnam War, ongoing at that time, a war that JFK wished to withdraw from. Shortly after JFK’s death, his timetable for a complete withdrawal was reversed by Lyndon Johnson and all the stops for additional mass murders were removed.

It was the “magic bullet” theory that gave the Warren Commission and subsequently much of America “permission to believe” that Oswald could amazingly aim and fire three shots from his bolt-action, Italian Army rifle, within a mere six seconds and hit JFK in the back and then in the head. One of the shots missed the targets entirely, hitting a sidewalk and sending a piece of concrete into the face of a distant bystander, who received a small scar from it. This is a matter of record.

Destroying the Single Bullet Theory

That left only two shots, as it turns out, that had to have hit JFK twice. Even though the FBI and the Secret Service had concluded there were three shots and three hits—JFK in the back, Connally in the back, and JFK in the head—the miss that hit bystander James Tague dictated that they had to account for all those wounds based upon the only shot they had available—the one that hit JFK in the back. Where that shot actually hit is the lynchpin that refutes the “magic bullet” theory.

There are several side factors to consider as well. One is that the route of a presidential motorcade in any US city has to be completely scrutinized and made safe at some point before any visit. Open or blackened windows of buildings, open rooftops, any anomalies that provide opportunities for shooters need to be checked out and cleared for safety by local Army Intelligence working with local police departments well before the visit.

In Dallas, in relation to the Dallas motorcade on November 22, 1963, a presidential route that had been set in stone was changed three days in advance. The new route required the presidential motorcade to turn right off of Main Street onto Houston Street, travel north one block, then making a sharp left northwest onto Elm Street, which led downward into Dealey Plaza, the Plaza of the Condors.

Astonishingly enough, as events played out, some sixty eye-witnesses would report that the limousine either dramatically slowed or came to an actual halt after shots had been fired. It was only after the shooting that it sped away to Parkland Hospital.

The Magic Bullet

As Fetzer, in his explosive article, observes, “Everyone has heard of the ‘magic bullet’, which is the lynch-pin of the official account of the assassination of JFK presented by the Warren Commission. As Michael Baden, M.D., who chaired the medical panel for the House Select Committee on Assassinations when it reinvestigated the case in 1977-78 remarked on the 40th observance of his death, if the ‘magic bullet’ theory is false, then there had to have been at least six shots from at least three directions.”

The Great Zapruder Film Hoax: Photo analyst Jack White demonstrates that the famous 8mm film has been faked

This study, based on a presentation made at Cambridge and published by a peer-reviewed international journal, demonstrates that, not only is the “magic bullet” theory false, but, based upon research reported in his three books on the assassination, JFK had a wound to the throat and another to his back and two hits to his head” [which alone makes four shots, theoretically the end of the story].

In addition “Connally had an entry wound in his back, [a fifth shot?]. He had a broken rib, an exit wound in his chest [its result?], a wound to his right wrist [a sixth shot or still the same bullet changing trajectories?] and a bullet fragment embedded in his left thigh [from where? another shot?]. This is essential to understanding the outlandishness of its creator’s claims.

Since JFK had wounds from shots fired from in front and from behind, while John Connally had at least one hit from the side, and while another shot missed and injured James Tague, then there were at least six shots from at least three directions.

Thus, the magic bullet” theory is the weakest link in the entire chain of events in the assassination. Break that link and you break the government’s elaborate chain of events into pure fraud. It’s worth a closer look.

The creator of the “magic bullet” theory, Arlen Specter, a Republican Congressional Aide in 1963, is still around now as a senior Democratic Senator, celebrating a long, hearty if nefarious career. His theory posed that the single “magic bullet” “entered the base of the back of the President’s neck, transited his neck without hitting any bony structures, exited his throat right at the knot of his tie, then [and hold your breath for this] entered John Connelly’s back, shattering a rib, exiting from his chest, damaging his right wrist and then entered his left thigh, where the bullet was alleged to have performed all these feats and nevertheless [was] found in virtually pristine condition. The purported third shot that found its mark was said to have hit JFK’s head and killed him. Yet, we still have the nagging reality of the bystander who received a facial scar from the chip of concrete the slug of the first, missed shot kicked up.

JFK assassination: Secret Service Standdown

Read that paragraph again and try to process these forensic gymnastics and believe that the journey of Specter’s “magic bullet” could possibly be real. I say this because, as Fetzer reports, “When the official account…The Warren Report (1964), appeared, many readers were fascinated to discover that, no matter how implausible it might appear, the ‘magic bullet’ hypothesis was the core of the government’s case.”

Again, the cartoon-like journey of this zig- zagging “magic bullet” remained the keystone of the government case through repeated reinvestigations of the assassination by the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) during 1976-77, and even in more recent books, most notably Gerald Posner’s Case Closed, a bit of government wishful thinking. Although with the government, wishing can make things so.

The Warren Report (1964) published diagrams that JFK had purportedly sustained showed “a hit to the base of the back of the neck and a hit to the back of the head,” which Fetzer observes, allegedly killed him. He added, “The ‘magic bullet’ theory would be false if the bullet had not entered the base of the back of the President’s neck, if it had not transited his neck without hitting any bony structures, or if it had not exited from his neck at the level of the knot of his tie,” as the official tale is told. So they’re stuck with proving their own lies.

What’s not usually known by lay people is that Navy physicians who conducted the autopsy at Bethesda did not dissect the victim’s neck to find out whether the trajectory this bullet purportedly took was actually true. They arrived at it by “inference”. Why would you “infer” the path of a bullet that could be asserted through dissection? You do the surgery and say yes or no. We are talking about the life and death of a beloved United States President.

Because that work wasn’t done, we get this fuzzy language, that the “second wound presumably of entry [italics mine] is that described above in the upper posterior thorax…. The missile path through the fascia and musculature cannot be easily probed. [Why?] The wound presumably of exit was that described by Dr. Malcolm Perry in the low anterior cervical region. That sounds more like a lawyer’s language than a doctor’s.

So the entrance and exit locations are not facts but matters of “presumption”. Commander James Humes, US Navy Medical Corps, stood by and defended these presumptions on the basis of “inference.” And these inferences were drawn after JFK’s body “had been moved from the morgue for preparation for burial and the official state funeral.” Yet, based on conversations with doctors from Parkland Hospital (the original hospital Kennedy was taken to after being hit), Humes “belatedly realized that the wound to the back must have been the entry point for the wound to the throat as its point of exit!”

And notice too that the official description of ‘the upper right posterior thorax,’ which is the upper-right portion of the chest cavity, does not quite place the wound where it has to be if the ‘magic bullet’ hypothesis were true. Even Gerald Posner’s diagram from Case Closed—included in Fetzer’s article, does not accord with the official account. Just look for yourself!

Contradicting Evidence

A different diagram of the Bethesda autopsy was made by FBI Agent James W. Silbert, who actually observed the autopsy. It is found in Noel Twyman’s Bloody Treason (1997), page 100, but Fetzer includes it, too. That clearly shows the difficulties that the “magic bullet” hypothesis presents, even in relation to its most basic assumptions, since the wound to the back is too low to be the entry point for a wound that exited the throat, if, as purported, the bullet was fired from above, that is from the sixth floor of the Texas Book Depository, as the official account asserts.

David W. Mantik, M.D., Ph. D., finally demonstrated that no bullet could have entered the President’s neck at the location alleged and exited at the location alleged without impacting cervical vertebrae. Astoundingly, “It doesn’t seem necessary to add that Malcolm Perry, M.D., who performed a tracheostomy in a vain attempt to save the President’s life, described the wound to the throat [and this is absolutely key] not as an exit wound, but as an entry wound, three times during a press conference at Parkland… a report widely broadcast over radio and television that day.”

Dr. David Mantik discusses forgery of the X-rays

Somehow, the Warren Commission never received a copy of that transcript, too difficult to locate, which in essence would clearly seal the fact that President Kennedy was hit from the front, the shot crashing through the center of the windshield into his throat. And this would by definition implicate other shooters facing the limousine from its front, positioned either in Dealey Plaza or around the Triple Underpass beyond.

Parenthetically, the Lincoln limousine with the windshield bullet hole and other evidence was quickly whisked away post assassination to Ford in Detroit where it was totally refurbished at taxpayer’s expense for $1,000,000, even though it was a “crime scene on wheels”. It is a striking image of the loss of openness in our society.

So then, where did that bullet that supposedly hit JFK in the back come from? If it wasn’t at the base of the back of the neck as the “magic bullet” stipulates, then The Warren Report (1993), The HSCA Report (1979), Case Closed (1993) and all other work that takes it for granted—as a presupposition—cannot possibly be true.

It was no less than Gerald Ford, gifted with the presidency years later when Nixon resigned, who, back in 1963 as a member of the Warren Commission, realized that the back wound would need to be “re-described” to make the “magic bullet” theory even remotely plausible. This fact was finally discovered by the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB).

The Zapruder Film: Truth or Deception

Dr. Mantik found a patient with similar neck and chest dimensions to JFK and, using a CAT scan, determined that no bullet could have taken such a trajectory. So the core of official account is not only false and provably false but is not even anatomically possible! So the wounds to JFK’s throat wound and the wounds to John Connally were not inflicted by a lone assassin firing from above and behind but have to have been caused by separate shots and separate shooters.

The truth would have been glaring if not for those in power suppressing evidence by not sending JFK’s blood-stained, bullet-holed shirt and jacket to Bethesda for the physicians to study; also, by not providing transcripts of the “Parkland Press Conference to the Warren Commission and using similar techniques of obfuscation. The process of selection and elimination—selecting evidence that supports a predetermined conclusion, eliminating the rest—is well-known to used-car salesmen, editorial writers and politicians, but especially to those who practice propaganda designed to mislead the public.

Fetzer and his research group have not only proved the falsity of the “magic bullet” theory but have exposed the fraud at the foundation of the government’s official account. Among their discoveries are the complementary deceptions that the autopsy X-rays have been fabricated (a) to conceal the massive blow-out to the back of the head that more than forty eyewitnesses reported and (b) to add a 6.5 mm metallic slice in an apparent effort to implicate an obscure World War II Italian Mannlicher-Carcano as the weapon used.

In fact, a world authority on the human brain, Robert B. Livingston, M.D., also concluded that the brain shown in diagrams and photographs held in the National Archives cannot possibly be the brain of JFK. These discoveries had already been made by 1993 (Fetzer 1998).

AMBUSH! – How the Secret Service set up JFK

In spite of Fetzer’s repeated efforts to bring these findings to the attention of the American people (through “ABC Nightly News” and “Nightline”) and of the Department of Justice, he had little success, which is perhaps the most important reason I’ve worked with Dr. Fetzer to retell this incredible story.

Where We Stand Today

On the basis of the Fetzer group’s extended research, they have established that JFK was hit at least four times: once in the throat from in front; once in the back from behind; and twice in the head. Connally was hit from one to three times, where at least three shots seem to have missed. A total of eight, nine, or ten shots thus appear to have been fired from six different locations (Fetzer 2000, 2003. For more, see his chapter, “Dealey Plaza Revisited”, which can be downloaded from http://www.und.edu/org/jfkconference/.)

As a striking example of how official inquiries by the government have suppressed, even overlooked important evidence, Thomas Evan Robinson, the mortician who prepared the body for burial after the Bethesda autopsy, told Joe West, a private investigator, that JFK had a large gaping hole in the back of his head, a smaller wound in the right temple (which was the entry wound for the blow-out to the back of the head), and a wound to the back about five to six inches below the shoulder and to the right of the back bone.

LBJ’s Mistress Blows Whistle On JFK Assassination

That is the location supported by the shirt and the jacket, the autopsy diagram and the FBI sketch, and even the death certification by the president’s personal physicians. He provided this information to West on 26 May 1992, but it obviously could have been available to the Warren Commission anytime it had wanted it. Clearly, that was not something they wanted to hear.

In collaboration with other experts, including John P. Costella, Ph.D., Fetzer, et al have also discovered that the home movie of the assassination, known as “the Zapruder film”, has been recreated using sophisticated techniques of optical printing and special effects. The most important reason for doing this was to remove the limo stop from the film, since it was such an obvious indication of Secret Service complicity. Because of “ghost images” that link successive frames, it was necessary to reshoot the film in order that the deception not be readily exposed (Fetzer 2003).

Australian physicist John Costella PhD speaks
about the fabrication of the famous Zapruder film.

Fetzer et al have also discovered more than fifteen indications of Secret Service complicity in setting JFK up for the hit, including failing to weld manhole covers, failure to cover open windows, allowing the crowd to spill over into the street, adopting an improper motorcade route, ordering the vehicles in the wrong sequence, keeping motorcycle patrolmen to the rear of the limousine, bringing the limousine to a halt after bullets began to be fired, washing blood and brains from the limousine at Parkland, taking the autopsy photographs down and completely rebuilt. The probability that these things could have happened “by chance” is, unsurprisingly, vanishingly small (Fetzer 2000, 2002a).

Does that remind you at all of sweeping the evidence away from Ground Zero 38 years later? Giuliani knew he had 30 months (two and a half years) to get the job done, yet he pushed the workers at the expense of their health and even their lives to accomplish the feat in eight months. Almost like rebuilding the limo three days after the assassination. The flavor of corruption is the same in each case.

The conclusions that can be drawn from the authentic JFK evidence are rather profound. The Mafia, which may have put up some of the shooters, could not have extended its reach into Bethesda Naval Hospital to alter X-rays under the control of U.S. Navy medical officers, agents of the Secret Service, or the President’s personal physician. Neither pro- nor anti-Castro Cubans could have substituted the brain of someone else for that of JFK during a supplemental autopsy.

Was his demeanor that of a killer? What did he say?
What about his expressions and body language?

Indeed, even if the KGB, like the CIA, had the ability to recreate a film, it could not have obtained a copy of the Zapruder film to alter it. None of these things have been done by Lee Harvey Oswald, who was in jail or already dead. Based upon the scientific principle known as “inference to the best explanation”, it leaves no reasonable doubt that setting up JFK for the hit and altering the evidence to conceal the true causes of his death must have involved elements at the highest levels of the U.S. government.

Jerry Mazza is a freelance writer, life-long resident of New York City. His book “State Of Shock – Poems from 9/11 on” is available at www.jerrymazza.com, Amazon.com and Barnesandnoble.com.