A first review of the newly released files about the assassination of John F. Kennedy reveals no bombshells, presidential biographer Robert Dallek tells DW. He also explains why many Americans can't accept that fact
Image: Reuters/Walt Cisco/Dallas Morning News
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DW: What is your assessment so far, from looking through the files as much as you have been able to, are there any bombshells?
Robert Dallek: It's a massive amount of material and I have not seen an awful lot of it, although I have seen some of it, but I don't see any bombshells. I think what is there is a number of documents that were released before, but this time they are not redacted and I have not seen anything that was so dramatic.
Of course what this material will do, and even more to the point, what the material that's being held back is going to stimulate, [is] a renewal of conspiracy theories about Kennedy's assassination.
People in this country can't accept that someone as inconsequential as [Lee Harvey] Oswald killed someone as consequential as Kennedy. And also, I think, they want to believe that the world is not that random, that things don't happen so much by accident and that there has to be a larger design for a seminal event like Kennedy's killing. So I don't think it is going to change anything.
So you don't think that in these remaining files there will be any explosive information that could confirm any of the conspiracy theories that have been floated since Kennedy's assassination?
Robert Dallek is a professor emeritus of history at Boston UniversityImage: Geraldine Dallek
No, I think the files that are being held back will probably embarrass the FBI and the CIA with their missteps and their misunderstanding and maybe a failure to have kept closer track of Oswald, who after all had spent time in the Soviet Union and was very much on their minds. I think that's what the material held back will largely do. I can't imagine what grand design they could turn up and I don't think they will.
Could you briefly sum up the general accepted conclusion among historians about the Kennedy assassination?
Among professional historians, there is the conviction that the Warren Commission had it right and Lee Harvey Oswald was the only killer. In the larger public there is something like a majority that believes there is a conspiracy that is not fully revealed. The great Dutch historian Pieter Geyl said history is argument without end. And so I don't see any end to this dispute about how Kennedy was killed and 50 or a hundred years from now, I think, it will still be argued over.
What's your take on President Donald Trump's decision to not release the complete files after all, saying that he had no choice because of the pressure by government agencies. Doesn't this again fuel conspiracy theories?
It does indeed. The fact that they are holding back material fuels the notion that what's being hidden is the smoking gun about a conspiracy. I don't know what animates this president. He is terribly erratic and says he will do one thing and then he will do another. I just don't put any trust in anything he says because I think his credibility is minimal.
Robert Dallek is a presidential historian and professor emeritus of history at Boston University. His 2003 Kennedy biography "An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963" was a New York Times bestseller. His biography of Franklin D. Roosevelt "Franklin D. Roosevelt: A Political Life" will be published next month.
The interview was conducted by Michael Knigge.
The assassination of John F. Kennedy
On November 22, 1963, US President John F. Kennedy was assassinated: for the western world, his murder was a shot through the heart.
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A shot through the heart of the Western world
At 12:31 Dallas time, several gunshots hit the US president in the heart and in the head — in front of running cameras. His wife, Jackie Kennedy, was with him at the time, as was his host, the governor of Texas, John Connally, with his wife Nellie. Connally, too, was seriously wounded. It is still not known how many shots were fired or in what order they were fired.
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A day that changed history
It was a sunny Friday morning when the US president and the first lady arrived at the airport in Dallas. It was the second day of Kennedy's election trail in the conservative state of Texas. JFK himself suggested opening the top of the limousine for the motorcade through the city.
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The president is dead
An hour after his arrival, the 35th president of the United States was hit by gunshots on Dealey Plaza. When he arrived at the Parkland Memorial Hospital, his heart was still beating, but the bullet that had pierced his head made any attempt to save him impossible. Kennedy died at the age of 46.
Image: picture-alliance/Everett Collection
Return to Washington
When Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in as president on board Air Force One, Jackie Kennedy was right next to him. Kennedy's coffin was also on board at the time, since his body was returned to Washington for a post-mortem. Four days later, Johnson appointed a commission to examine the assassination. The results released by the Warren Commission have remained disputed, however.
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The suspect Lee Harvey Oswald
The shots fired at the president had apparently come from the sixth-floor window of the Texas School Book Depository. The gun belonged to Lee Harvey Oswald, who was originally arrested as a suspect in the murder of a policeman an hour and a half after the assassination. Only in the course of Oswald's interrogation did police begin suspecting him of JFK's murder as well. Oswald denied both murders.
Image: Reuters
Silenced forever
On November 24, a camera crew from a national TV station was filming Oswald's transfer to another prison when night club owner Jack Ruby appeared in front of the suspected assassin and took him down with a single gunshot. Millions of people witnessed the murder on screen. Oswald, too, was brought to the Parkland Memorial Hospital, where he then died.
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A shocked population
When the president was buried on November 25 at Arlington National Cemetery, millions of people lined the roads to accompany JFK on his final journey. The memorial service became an international media event.
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Final journey
After JFK's death, Jackie mourned her husband, while a nation mourned a politician who had inspired so many. After the memorial service in St. Matthew's Cathedral in Washington, Kennedy's two brothers and his veiled widow accompanied the president's coffin to his final resting place. Five years later, Robert Kennedy was also the victim of an assassination.
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He was a "Berliner"
Germany, too, was shaken by John F. Kennedy's death. Especially in West Berlin, JFK had become an idol after his legendary declaration of "Ich bin ein Berliner" during a speech in August 1963, in which he expressed his solidarity with the divided city. After JFK's death, thousands of people expressed their sorrow by writing in condolence books or by laying flowers or wreaths at the Berlin Wall.
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What if?
The peak of Cold War hostilities came during Kennedy's term as Democratic president from 1961-63. Those years witnessed the Berlin Wall, the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam war. A young, charismatic president, for many "Jack" — as JFK was often known — embodied a new age for the United States. His assassination was a terrible blow to US consciousness.
