JFK: The Lost Bullet (premieres Sunday 11/20 9 pm et/pt on the NGC)

Read the article and check out the photo gallery at the bottom of this next link:

http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/explorer/jfk-lost-bullet-facts/


Also, check out the video trailer (the restored home movies are very interesting):

http://video.nationalgeographic.com...hows/explorer-1/ngc-restored-jfk-footage.html

Journalist Max Holland rounds up a team that restores and investigates footage of the assassination of President Kennedy, claiming he has solved the riddle of the whereabouts of the missed shot and who was on the 6th floor.

Please reserve your comments until after the documentary has aired. Thank you.

Rockslinger said:

Oh no, now this JFK thread will compete with my Natalie Wood thread. Damn!

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I don't think JFK did Natalie Wood though. Beautiful woman in any event, and not a bad actress either.

This National Geographic channel doesn't seem to be available in Canada with Rogers.

However, in that video trailer link I provided above, it may viewed perhaps on National Geographic's website after it's aired on TV.

Aardvark154 said:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ogy-proves-Lee-Harvey-Oswald-acted-alone.html

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Thank you for this Aardvark154. I will comment on this article off the bat cuz I've studied this topic.

This Mail Online article claims that it's Oswald in the 6th floor window and that he's the lone assassin.

Max Holland believes it took 11 seconds, and that the Z film was overly relied upon.

Frankly, I will say now that Holland's claim may not jive with the WC finding that the majority of witnesses testified that two shots were spaced close together and, it goes against one SSA's testimony that he thought that two shots were right on top of each other. These observations don't support 3 shots in 11 seconds. Even Governor Connally believes that he wasn't hit with the same bullet that struck JFK and thought it maybe automatic weapons were used).

11 seconds isn't supported by the Zapruder film (the Z film was already digitally re-mastered years ago and sold publicly as "Images of an assassination", and is partially shown as a video link in this article).

In fact, the mini recap superimposed in this Mail Online article summarizes that the WC/Z film supports 3 shots betwen 5 to 8 seconds (actually, it's EITHER in about 5.6 seconds OR 8.3 seconds because the timing is contingent on when the 1st shot missed which they don't know for sure).


Note: Z - Zapruder, WC - Warren Commission, SSA - Secret Service Agent

Aardvark154 said:

However, several studies have shown that the bullet which struck Governor Connally was quite consistent with having passed through President Kennedy's body.

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Where do you get this info from? What studies? Consistent? Hardly! The bullet is virtually pristine after smashing several bones in Connally (it smashed several inches of rib too). It's also devoid of any biological matter. It's weight loss is also negligible.

Aardvark154 said:

Also Oswald qualified as a Sharpshooter in the U.S. Marine Corps, and the target picture he had from the Texas School Book Depository was just about "text book." As doubtless you know, there have been several reenactments with people with Oswald's skill level and they have been able to make the shots without difficulty.

In any event we will have to see what the program concludes.

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Oswald was downgraded to Marksman in another qualification and his buddies, particularly one named Nelson Delgado, joked about his shooting skills. In fact, Oswald received 'Maggies Drawers' on more than one occasion, which means a red flag that you've entirely missed the target.

Comparing Oswald's record in the Marines is silly if not ludicrous. They used a semi-automatic rifle (M1 Garand) on a flat mount at a stationary object.


Other Facts:


* There is no evidence that Oswald live-practiced with the Manlicher-Carcano rifle prior to the assassination.
* Marina said that Oswald admitted to taking a shot at General Walker, however, he MISSED. (See my reply about Marina to Rockslinger).
* There was a witness at a firing range who complained that someone named Oswald shot at his own target. Would a real sharpshooter or marksman do this?
* None of those re-enactments simulated the book depository setting with trees and a moving target (maybe the CBS one had moving targets but not trees).
* The WC used Master rifleman, the highest qualification. CBS used a hodge podge of expert shooters, including state troopers, sportsman store owner, etc. who were more experienced than Oswald.

Rockslinger said:

Oswald's widow said Lee didn't do it.

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She also said that she was under duress for fear of being deported back to the Soviet Union back then when she was questioned by the authorities including making statements she made that incriminated her husband.

Aardvark154 said:

To summarize Max Holland's thesis is that the "lost bullet" - so called because there were three shell casings on the floor by the window on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository and it is known that only two bullets struck JFK, was in fact a first shot that missed as the limousine passed directly in front of the Depository and that there was then a pause and that then the second and third shots were taken in relatively rapid order.

It is their opinion after looking at home films by not just A. Zapruder but also several other people as well, and also interviewing several witnesses that the first shot likely hit a traffic light in front of the Depository as Oswald tracked the moving limousine.

They also recreated how Oswald would needed to have moved as he would have taken those shots and showed that the pattern of the ejected shell casings on the floor corresponded with the pattern in photographs taken of Oswald's shell casings on the floor of the Texas School Book Depository.

They do make a decent case for their theory and seemingly have photographic evidence which supports it.

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Here is a techinical report of that show which I couldn't see. http://www.washingtondecoded.com:80/site/2011/11/the-.html

I've been to Dealey Plaza and even have pics of the manhole cover with that concrete skirt surrounding it (It had a mark that pointed to the Dal Tex bldg but that mark may not be a bullet strike, but that's another story).

They couldn't examine the last 5 feet of a signal mast and therefore can't say whether a bullet hit it. Frankly, after spending all this money on that show and scissor lifts, I can't see why they couldn't.

Also, the fuzzy image at the 6th floor has someone wearing light clothes. Oswald wore a brown-orange shirt.

Therefore, their theory is inconclusive. Did they examine the other windows in which people say they also saw someone?

Aardvark154 said:

Because although the pole and support arm for the traffic signal is the same one that was there at the time of the assassination, the traffic signal itself has been replaced several times since then. However, they did show photographs which seemingly show a bullet hole in the bottom of the traffic signal (near the red light itself) a week or so after the assassination. Now the report contains information which casts doubt on this statement which was not discussed during the program. Also not discussed was that the composition of the steel of the pole and support arm is such that only slight depression was seen from glancing shots even at point blank range.

However, as the report states:

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It's a shame that they couldn't examine the mast, however, the report just doesn't cast doubt that the hole in the traffic signal component they see in a FBI training video, they exlude the possibility:

After hanging the exemplar light and viewing it from roughly the same perspective as the USSS training film, the view through the drilled “bullet” hole showed that the intervening base lip, that was presumed to form a deflection surface, obscures the view (figure 18, right). The viewing also revealed that a gap opening exists in the corner between the right and bottom back plates and produces a visible unobstructed hole in the same location as the “possible bullet hole” that was observed in the USSS training film (figure 16). Consequently, the hole was eliminated as a possible bullet hole.

basketcase said:

I believe this is the one where they even used a ballistic human surrogate and got almost identical results for the 'magic bullet'.

http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-8673666872571189886

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To the uninitiated, Beyond The Magic Bullet appears like they replicated it (and the Single-Bullet Theory or SBT), but note the following discrepancies:

a) They show you in captured high-speed film that the bullet exiting the JFK gelatin block yawed, but JFK's neck wound was a neat, round hole (also thought as an entrance wound). How could that be if the bullet is 'sideways' leaving the JFK gelatin block? They should also show you the exit wound in the Kennedy surrogate torso but don't (only very briefly).

b) The pinewood test showing an undamaged bullet is irrelevant. When fired thru a large pig bone embedded in gelatin, it is very deformed.

c) The bullet is more deformed after exiting both surrogate torsos, but it struck two ribs, not just one. However, the CAT scan showed that it cut thru two ribs almost perpendicularly. However, Connally's wound in his chest was the pulverization (or removal) of 4 inches of rib (laterally), not just a cross-sectional slice.

d) They don't show you enough of the forearm damage to the Connally surrogate. The actual injury was that his radius bone of his wrist (not a forearm bone) was smashed.

e) The exit wound from the JFK surrogate is a long wound, unlike the neat, round hole in JFK's. Big difference because it probably means that Connally was hit with a different bullet.

f) Their bullet doesn't lodge into Connally's thigh. They explained it travelled to slow which is possible if the bullet that exited the JFK surrogate yawed too much by passing thru too much simulated sinew or cartilidge, but why don't they show us the x-ray of the JFK surrogate neck?

g) The deputy medical examiner that did an autopsy on the surrogate info concluded two separate bullets, EVEN though the exit wound in the JFK surrogate was a keyhole (similar to the entrance wound in the Connally surrogate).

h) The damage caused by the real Magic Bullet is arguably more, yet it is more pristine than this bullet.