Conflict, Hope, and Progress
As the anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination passes, the woefully incomplete government release of assassination files years prior weighs against the heartening work by those who are searching the evidence. However, past differences and the current political climate at times has a tendency to bleed into the research community and if we gaze unflinchingly, we can observe related turmoil is rooted in tribalism. There are some serious identity issues cloaked behind worldviews and matters of historical importance and this causes some people to focus on politics or group identity to the detriment of their own arguments. It unfortunately can devolve into blindly serving ideology without concern to all the facts that might disagree and such an environment quickly can inspire people deep in their very being to eventually hate those who oppose them and seek out unnecessary conflict. The related tribe demands you suit up, join the fight, stand up for their “truth”, and remember anyone who disagrees is “wrong”.
However, there are many practical individuals who have poured over the files and work both alone and in groups together to move progress forward to offer the most verifiably correct history possible. These people appear to have realized that our arguments while sharpened on genuine productive debate can become dull and useless if wasted upon endless hyperbole. In the heat of rancorous fighting, it can often escape some that most of our debates can incite and fuel other even less reasonable conflicts that are often publicly observed. This often can turn away possible supporters because they witness the obvious consequences of becoming involved and while those who desire the case to be decided in the image of their beliefs shall likely never fully abate, the absolute truth is something no one can yet provide with certainty. We too face mythmakers and those who act in bad faith to see credible work marginalized and credible researchers attacked, but the tides have been turning as many prominent charlatans have come under greater legal and public scrutiny. Ignore the hype, demand the evidence.
Let us not overlook the long tradition of legal obstruction, public derision, and suppression that government actors have verifiably undertaken over decades to prevent the release of related legal files despite congressional assurances. Are the endless smears and personal attacks by even the very people charged with rendering a just decision to be forgotten? Unfortunately, we must contend with errors, myths, government intervention, and deeper internal conflicts within the research community as well. The human need for competition and status has often rendered even those whose view of case is quite alike to become enemies when minor details cause the actual disagreement. Guiding convictions and rational debate are being weighed down through senseless backbiting and the refusal of some to evolve with the proven evidence. It may be that some brief reflection upon the likelihood that it shall take most people from all sides of the case to solve it might be in order.
Perhaps the reliable examples of prior work being lost to endless acrimony should be considered and if that legacy will be damaged and buried under the conflicts that dominate some online spaces between those who support and contend the official narrative. Some might think on what their end game is beyond wasting time and preventing others from making progress and perhaps for some that might be the precise reason they act in such a manner. The facts support that no matter what someone genuinely believes about the case it does not make you a bad person, it might render some incorrect, but those with a genuine interest wish to see measurable progress. Most are decent people who desire historical accuracy on behalf of a President who was murdered under verifiably suspicious circumstances. As new evidence completes the historical puzzles that eluded us for so long, we can gaze upon new leads and facts that disrupt the myths and legends crafted to deceive researchers. All the prior credible work of both sides must not be set aside for pleasing but incorrect popular speculations because we share this case for better or worse.
There has been significant modern progress achieved in the release of millions of files despite legal obstruction that continues, admissions by several official of “benign” suppression, and subsequently exposed assassination plots targeting foreign leaders in the time preceding, during, and following President Kennedy’s death. Officials such as Director of Central Intelligence Allen Dulles and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover repeatedly lied to the public and even several other national officials to protect their own illegal programs. The decades have further revealed Lee Harvey Oswald to have been a constant source of attention for intelligence officials, despite past denials and concealment, and at least one American CIA official considered using him as a source of information. Huge portions of government and public legends were overturned by later evidence and the false reassurances of past leaders too has faded over time. While there is no definitive answer yet to be had by the public, the work of correcting official mistakes has taken some time and has progressed successfully in several instances with the evidence and hard work of those in the research community.
There are many living and gone who deserve thanks and present new evidence that challenges past assumptions, and while shoddy work falls to established facts, those seeking facts shall welcome evidentiary progress no matter what side it supports. From luminaries of research to people that are just recently diving into the files everyone that will help in a reasonable way toward progress must welcome new facts despite what they believe and those who cannot be reasonable enough to accept contending evidence should be corrected with because they seek attention and not progress. The humbling workload undertaken by many respectable people and groups is greater than any official effort concerning the same historical evidence and devoted volunteers offer days, months, and years of their life to benefit the pursuit of historical knowledge. Despite the acrimony in some corners and endless fights, most admirably spend significant time, resources, and endure public arguments or harassment to present facts without expecting compensation. It is this often-selfless work that defines much of what quietly transpires amid the constant spectacles of greater conflict.
A generous nature is one of many admirable features of the many in the research community which can shine beyond the fighting, because most are people who care when they discuss important historical truths and questions. The one unifying link between such opposing historical narratives has allowed a growing number of people from all sides of the political assassination community to work together despite the past disdain for undertaking joint projects. The research community with all its flaws still embodies the eternal quest for seeking greater evidence and establishing verifiable truth and we must ask hard questions, demand greater answers, and hold every related person historically responsible who substantial evidence implicates. Many collaborate on these complex historical matters because they know it is a subject of significant value to ourselves and those who shall take up the cause of historical inquiry after us. Within the current political culture, it matters more than ever that we press on and use cooperation not insults to achieve progress that can benefit all related people seeking to reveal more of the legal record and pursue historical facts.
Sincerely,
Larry Hancock, Jacob M. Carter, and C.A.A. Savastano
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