Oswald in the doorway: the blog of the Oswald Innocence Campaign, by Ralph Cinque

One of the worst things to happen after the JFK assassination, other than the fact that more people were killed, is the fact that the Kennedy family did not take up the fight against Officialdom. And that, as you know, has continued to this day. They don't reject the official story. So, what is the explanation for it? Didn't they love Jack Kennedy?  

The explanation is simple: the Kennedy family took their cue from their leader, their patriarch, Robert Kennedy. If he had opposed the official story, they would have also. But, he didn't, so they didn't. It's as simple as that. 

So, the question becomes, why didn't Robert Kennedy stand up and fight it? 

First, note that RFK was a smart man, and he was well aware of the danger his brother faced. He warned him that he could be attacked by his enemies. But, JFK was cavalier about it. He was fatalistic. "If it's my time, it's my time." Recall his favorite poem: I Have A Rendezvous With Death. 

So, when RFK was informed by Hoover that his brother had been shot, his first thought must have been that his brother's enemies had done it. 

The story goes that it was unseasonably warm in Virginia like it was in Texas, and RFK was swimming in his outdoor pool. But, he was called to the phone, and Hoover told him that his brother had been shot. Nobody knows exactly what Hoover said to him, but I have a hunch that he told him that it looked to be the work of a lone nut, and that it was very important that he let law enforcement do its job. I wonder how it was decided that Hoover would make the call to RFK. 

And remember, they weren't friends. JFK was going to sack Hoover, and RFK was all for it. So, it would be foolish to think that RFK didn't think independently even after hearing from Hoover.

As I said, RFK wasn't stupid, and he had to suspect the national security establishment, the hard-core Cold War warriors who were incensed that he and his brother were trying to end the Cold War. And he may have have suspected Hoover's involvement. But, the first decision he made was to just along and not go rogue, for the time being, because he didn't have enough information to do that. He had no concrete information at all, and he knew that it would take time to get it. 

Even without having any concrete knowledge of what really happened, by the very swiftness at which they declared the case solved, which was the very day it happened, he had to have doubts. I suspect that he put off making a decision about what he was going to do. But every day that passed in which he didn't stand up and oppose what was being said made it increasingly harder for him to ever do it. And I doubt that he thought about that at the time. I suspect he thought that weeks or even months later he could go public with his opposition to the official story- if he was so inclined, not realizing that by then the official story would be so thoroughly entrenched- in every facet of government, in the media, in the corporate world and everywhere, that it would be too late. Sure, there were individuals who were fighting it and loudly, such as Mark Lane and Harold Weisberg, and Robert Kennedy knew both of them. And then there was Jim Garrison, whose efforts RFK followed closely by way of Mark Lane.  But still, numerically, these people amounted to nothing. The conspirators had succeeded at making acceptance of the official story of the JFK assassination a litmus test for patriotism and loyalty to the government and love of country. Then, he had political ambitions of his own, and it was just too late for him to even consider becoming one of "them". 

So, without ever planning it, and without deciding in advance, RFK settled into not fighting the official story. And that meant the Kennedys weren't going to fight it. But, there is more to say about this- tomorrow.