JFK Files Reveal New Depths Of CIA Incompetence

Newly declassified documents related to John F. Kennedy’s assassination shed additional light on the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) surveillance of Lee Harvey Oswald, the accused assassin, in the weeks leading up to JFK’s death.

Documents reveal that the CIA tapped the phones at Cuban and Soviet diplomatic facilities in Mexico City, according to journalist Steven Portnoy. Oswald traveled there multiple times to meet with officials just weeks prior to the assassination. It was previously known that the CIA was aware of Oswald’s travels — a fact they withheld from the Warren Commission — but details about CIA wiretapping were classified until Tuesday.

“The docs dropped last night add more specifics about the CIA’s operations, namely in Mexico City, where Oswald met with Cuban and Soviet Officials in Sept. 1963,” he said. “These docs reveal how the CIA tapped phones of the Cuban and Soviet diplomatic facilities, information that had been classified until now.”

Kennedy was assassinated on Nov. 22, 1963.

Oswald lived in the USSR from October 1959 to June 1962. Soviet spies, however, did not want him in the country permanently, particularly after his suicide attempt, according to a previously released CIA document. His trips to the embassy in Mexico City were allegedly to try to obtain a visa to return to the USSR, documents show.

The newly-released documents also reveal how a JFK advisor issued a warning to Kennedy about the CIA’s influence over foreign policy. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., JFK’s nephew, previously discussed how his uncle was “at war” with his military and intelligence community over his desire to keep the U.S. out of regime-change wars.

Jefferson Morley, a JFK assassination expert, noted that one memo from Arthur Schlesinger Jr. told JFK that “CIA encroachment on the traditional functions of state” affected his ability to direct foreign policy without the CIA’s influence.

Schlesinger was a historian and served as Special Assistant to JFK from 1961 to 1963, according to his biography in Foreign Affairs.

Schlesinger warned JFK that “CIA encroachment on the traditional functions of State” undermined his abilit to conduct his own foreign policy independent of CIA.

See pp.4-5 for what the CIA didn’t want you to know.https://t.co/FDvXekWAAm

— Jefferson Morley (@jeffersonmorley) March 19, 2025

Schlesinger argued that the “CIA has, in effect, ‘made’ policy in many parts of the world.”

In another letter from Schlesinger, he called the agency a “state within a state.”

“The contemporary CIA possesses many of the characteristics of a state within a state,” he wrote.

Another previously redacted memo was released Tuesday without redactions. It demonstrated that a CIA source, Samuel Cummings, owned the International Armament Corp, and Intercarmo. Interarmco reportedly was a supplier for the sporting goods store at which Oswald allegedly purchased the firearm used to kill JFK.

Cummings was the largest private weapons dealer in the world, and he sold arms to Cuba’s Fidel Castro, among others, The Washington Post reported in 1981. A lawsuit by Armco Steel forced him to change Interarmco to Interarms, the outlet noted.

“These items were to remain the property of the CIA, and their cost was to be returned to the Agency after they were sold,” the CIA document revealed.

Worth noting: the Trump admin did release the memo today but without redactions. The redactions weren’t about JFK though – instead, the CIA admitted that they owned the arms dealer Interarmco, which sold weapons around the world and were the original exclusive agent for ArmaLite. https://t.co/ZLvxKQDcXt pic.twitter.com/ZwgWAkyVTx

— Damin Toell (@damintoell) March 19, 2025

Morley revealed that he reached out to the CIA regarding the popular “Who Killed JFK?” podcast the week prior to the March 18 document release. Morley said a spokesperson called him and spoke to him off the record on March 18 and then sent him a statement.

“The notion that CIA was involved in the death of John F. Kennedy is absolutely false,” the statement read.

President Trump is ushering in a new era of maximum transparency. Today, per his direction, previously redacted JFK Assassination Files are being released to the public with no redactions. Promises made, promises kept. https://t.co/UnG1vkgxjX pic.twitter.com/XBbkQfz4Bx

— DNI Tulsi Gabbard (@DNIGabbard) March 18, 2025

On Monday, President Trump said “80,000 pages” of documents would be released. Over 60,000 pages and more than 2,000 files were published Tuesday night.

Trump signed an executive order in January mandating the declassification of the assassination files of JFK, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.

AUTHOR

Eireann Van Natta

Intellegence state reporter.

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