Comments on Michael Collins Piper’s book the Final Judgment

I just finished reading this (originally) 1994 book in a free e-version and thought of writing a few words. There is a link to the book in my post entitled JFK, LBJ, Lansky and Zionism.

It must be some fifteen years since I first time read a short exposition of Piper’s claim that the reason for JFK’s assassination was his opposition to Israel’s nuclear weapon program. I remember that the claim was supported by arguments that (Jewish) Jack Ruby was (Jewish) Meyer Lansky’s gangster and Permindex was a CIA and Mossad cover operation. Both claims were weak, but the core of this argument, that Israel’s nuclear weapon program was a possible motive for murdering a president, was not outlandish at all. At that time I paid no special attention to this theory – I was quite busy on my lectures, research and projects, and had no time nor interest to conspiracy theories. At that time I would not have read this 770 page book and probably thought that it too much focuses on Jews, like “everybody always blames Jews on everything”. I used to think that way, but as I got older and a lot wiser after studying all this stuff for over ten years, I rather do not think so any more.

Much later (around 2009) I looked at the video where WTC 7 building falls down straight through its steel frame as if there was no resistance, something that did not look correct. (I mean, I did not know of the third building.) Nor did the fall of the twin towers look correct: they were throwing stuff in the air like fountains. That should not happen in a gravitation fall. (Check gravitation fall of icebergs if you disagree.) After reading arguments for and against I am now quite convinced that all three buildings were brought down by explosives and that there were strong arguments pinpointing who did it. Three arguments are enough: 1) As the building fell by explosives, who had access to install the explosives? 2) Dancing Palestinians had come to video the attack before the planes hit and these Palestinians were Israelis with Mossad connections. 3) The buildings were rented and insured for a high value against a terrorist act by a person with high-level Israel connections. It comes as no surprise that no other argument was in contraction with the conclusion drawn from these three. This should be the case: if something is true, it usually can be demonstrated by a short chain of strong arguments and it will not be shown wrong by adding new arguments. It is not always the case, there are some mathematical theorems where the only known proof is very long, but almost always a reasonably short proof will finally be found.

This is my main argument against the method applied by Piper in the Final Judgment. He makes a long and messy argument for his claim. Many steps in the argument are weak, so the chain of arguments becomes all the time weaker and finally the conclusion has to be that the book does not prove its claim.

Piper’s main argument can be presented in a short way. I will first outline a way to do it and only afterwards go to arguments in the book. The starting points in the argument are quite good.

• John F. Kennedy was trying to stop Israel from developing a nuclear bomb, while Israel leaders saw nuclear weapons as critical for the existence of the new nation. Israel was behind two false flag attacks around the same time: USS Liberty in 1967 and the Lavon affair in 1954. These circumstances make it possible that the JFK assassination was an Israeli false flag operation.
• Anti-Castro Cubans and certain Mafia bosses are connected with the JFK assassination. Meyer Lansky was the leader of the organized crime syndicate after Lucky Luciano had been returned to Sicily after his failed effort to settle in Cuba. Lansky was also the head of Mafia operations in Cuba. The Mafia chiefs Carlos Marcello and Santo Trafficante, implied in the assassination, were Lansky’s subordinates or associates. This means that Meyer Lansky was connected with the assassination. As Lansky was a Zionist, this is an undisputable link to Israel.
• The JFK assassination was a conspiracy, not an act of a lone nut. This is clearly demonstrated by the Dictabelt and Zapruder film: there were minimum four shots (three can be heard in the recording, the last one is necessary in order to change the direction where Kennedy falls). As only three shots were fired with Oswald’s rifle, there had to be another shooter. Additional arguments, like the Umbrella man and the Dark Complexion man giving signals and possibly shooting an arrow, are not needed: they are not in contradiction with the conclusion that there was a conspiracy.
• There was a cover-up, which involved either police, FBI or CIA. This is shown by the Audiograph recording being tampered and an analysis of who could have had access to the recording. Additional arguments demonstrating a cover-up are ample, but they are not needed.
• There was a French Connection: a sniper connected with the French OAS (Organisation de l’Armée Secrète) was in Dealey Plaza in the day of the assassination. This piece of information has been well established. As the assassination was a conspiracy, we can accept the claim that Oswald as a patsy, as he himself claimed.
• Kennedy fired Allan Dulles from the post of the CIA director and appointed McCone, who was critical of Israel’s nuclear weapon program, implying that Dulles was pro-Israel. There were pro-Israel elements in the CIA including James Jesus Angleton, the CIA connection to Mossad. Lyndon B. Johnson was Christian Zionist and pro-Israel.

These six arguments suggest the following scenario. In 1963 Kennedy had made several enemies: anti-Castro Cubans because of the Bay of Pigs; Mayer Lansky because of Kennedy brothers going against organized crime despite of Mafia help in the elections, because Kennedy did not return Havana to Lansky and because of Kennedy being an enemy of Israel; Israel’s Ben-Gurion because of opposing Israel’s nuclear bomb; friends of Israel in the CIA, because of disagreement in politics; Lyndon B. Johnson because Kennedy was turning too pro-Arabic. The idea of assassinating Kennedy came up. Maybe it was proposed by Lansky or by Israel, probably not by the CIA. Lansky set up to plot, but as killing a president requires more planning than Mafia’s typical assassinations, a sniper of OAS was contracted through the contacts of Corsican Mafia. There was Franco-Israel intelligence alliance and Algerian independence movement FLN (Front de la Liberation National) was against Israel and Zionism. As Israel was anti FLN, it was a natural ally to OAS, which had made several attempts on de Gaulle and knew something of assassinating presidents. Friends of Israel in the CIA agreed with the plan as they preferred Johnson’s political views to Kennedy’s. Jewish media was willing to cover Meyer Lansky and Israel involvement, as exposing it had spurred anti-Semitism and the goals of the operation were seen vital for Israel’s survival.

This, I think, is a reasonable argument (and not a single bit anti-Semitic), especially in the light of 9/11, but it is not a proof. The elements hostile to Kennedy were real, but having these enemies does not show that these enemies were behind the assassination. Before the assassination he had these enemies and was alive, so an argument that he had these enemies cannot prove that he was dead because of the same reason. What is missing is a chain of arguments showing that these enemies had a hand in the assassination. This chain can be demonstrated as far as to Mafia and anti-Castro Cubans because they can be linked to Oswald. CIA cover-up and media cover-up can be well argued. Connection to Meyer Lansky and to Israel can be only speculated in this case. It makes sense but is not proven.

And that is what Piper tried to change in his book, but in my opinion he did not succeed. He starts from the findings of New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison. When Oswald was arrested after JFK was shot someone named Clay Bertrand tried to get attorney Dean Andrews Jr. to represent Oswald. Clay Bertrand was proven to be Clay Shaw.  Shaw lead Garrison to Guy Banister and David Ferrie. Guy Banister was former FBI agent and a private detective involved in anti-Communist and anti-Castro activities. He had an office in the Newman Building, New Orleans. Oswald was dealing leaflets for the Fair Play for Cuba Committee, which also had an office in the Newman Building. It is a fairly good assumption that Oswald was working for Guy Bannister and was an infiltrator. David Ferrie was a pilot, anti-Castro activist, friend of Banister, knew Oswald and made a speech against Kennedy’s actions in the Bay of Pigs. Banister and David Ferrie had contacts to Mafia boss Carlos Marcello. Banister also had contacts to the French OAS. Thus, anti-Castro activists, Mafia and OAS can be connected to the assassination. Shaw, Banister and Ferrie may have been the people with whom Oswald actually worked with, meaning that he had turned anti-Communistic. Shaw tried to arrange a lawyer to Oswald before Ruby shot him, so probably this group did not frame Oswald as a patsy. If so, then he was most probably framed by Mafia. Killing a president must have been at least approved by Lansky and more likely ordered by Lansky. Banister’s connections to OAS may also originate from Mafia. This all may point to Lansky, a friend of Israel, but so far there is no connection to Mossad.

Piper uses the findings of Mark Lane to tie the CIA to the conspiracy. He uses the testimony by former CIA contract operative Marita Lorenz to tie Frank Sturgis, the CIA operative E. Howard Hunt, Cuban Novo brothers and Jack Ruby to the conspiracy. In this way Lane tied the institutional CIA to the assassination. Sturgis and Hunt were later two of the Watergate plumbers. Marita Lorenz, as a CIA operative, is not necessarily a reliable witness, but associating Hunt with anti-Castro efforts of Banister and Ferrie is quite natural: Hunt was engaged in the Bay of Pigs, worked with anti-Castro elements and criticized Kennedy’s actions in the Bay of Pigs invasion. At the time of the assassination Hunt manipulated US news, which also fits in considering the false lead of Oswald’s pro-Castro and pro-Soviet stance.

A CIA role in the assassination or at least its cover-up is very possible.

Piper is very sure that the CIA involvement in the conspiracy was run by James Jesus Angleton, the head of counterespionage. Angleton certainly was a friend of Israel and co-operated with Mossad, which is natural considering his job. The task of counterespionage is to capture foreign spies and in those years it meant Communistic spies. Angleton needed a spy network in the Soviet Union for this task and Mossad had such a network through Soviet Jews. It also made sense for Angleton to co-operate with gangsters, as the USA Navy had done during the Second World War. Gangsters were strong anti-Communists and had criminal networks, which could deliver information and services to the CIA. It was not the CIA’s job to inform police or the FBI of what the gangsters were doing. The CIA could tolerate drug trade and even participate in it at times, like during the Iran-Contra scandal, where Israel played a major role. Exposing these connections, as in Piper’s book, presents the CIA as a criminal organization, which I think is an exaggeration, though working with organized crime tends to corrupt any organization regardless of what were the original goals. Does this background imply that Angleton should be the main CIA conspirator in the JFK assassination? It does make it very likely: counterespionage had the task of monitoring CIA agents for finding double agents, so it was a threat to any conspiracy inside the CIA targeting the president, unless counterespionage was in the conspiracy.  Another friend of Israel is rather convincingly connected to the conspiracy.

So far we have made it up to friends of Israel, but Piper wants to implicate Mossad and the state of Israel. He states that Fred Sturgis had Mossad connections, but these claims seem weak to me. I am no better convinced of his two other arguments: Permindex as a Mossad cover and the French Connection as the Mossad Connection.

Piper makes much of the Permindex connection of Clay Shaw. He mentions that Louis Mortimer Bloomfield, connected with Permindex, was Jewish and he finds Jewish bankers with connections to Permindex. There are so many Jewish bankers that this discovery does not show much. Permindex may have been a cover operation for something, such as anti-Communist activities. According to the CIA, it was not a CIA cover, but the agency is not known for telling everything precisely correctly. Piper’s claim that it was a Mossad cover is only an unproved suggestion. Whatever Permindex was, from unsuccessful business initiative to tax avoidance to money laundry to support of anti-Communistic activities, will probably never be known. Piper’s claims of a Mossad figure, banker Tibor Rosenbaum, having had a role in Permindex is based on LaRouche Executive Intelligence Review, not necessarily a reliable source.  

Piper’s own finding in the book connecting the assassination to Mossad is based on a French intelligence source. I quote page 445 in the Postscript: “While posted in Vancouver, Ledun committed a grievous—albeit honest— mistake that may have sealed his own fate. His unwitting action proved the high-level French intelligence status of the source, quoted in Final Judgment. The source—Pierre Neuville—asserted (based on his own inside knowledge) that Israel’s secret service, the Mossad, utilized connections in French intelligence, in arranging the hiring of an assassin or assassins who were involved in the execution of President Kennedy.” Ledun is the French diplomat Bernard Ledun, who died in Paris on February 1, 1994. Ledun got the information from a former French intelligence operative Pierre Neuville, who is explained to have exposed Israel’s scheme to assassinate Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser. A document is reprinted in Pipers book showing that Neuville was convicted to 20 years of forced labor by the French government on the charge of subversive activities against the state. That might imply that Neuville worked for OAS, but it does not mean that his story of Mossad being involved in the JFK assassination is true. Indeed, intelligence agents are seldom reliable witnesses and other motivations must always be suspected. Piper understands it: the book does not assure that the source is reliable and emphasis that the case for Mossad involvement is strong without this piece of information.

Piper also mentions that Colonel Georges deLannurien of the French secret service SDECE was with Angleton at CIA headquarters at Langley the day of the assassination, purportedly suggesting that these two were plotting the assassination together, but I cannot connect it since the French sniper in the Dealey Plaza (be it Lucien Sarti or Michel Mertz/Jean Souetre) is told to have been from OAS, not from SDECE. There was a French Connection, this much is accepted, but Piper’s claim, that the French Connection was the Mossad Connection, is not proven in my opinion. The fact that Israel voted in the UN against the independence of Algeria (according to Piper, I did not manage to check) does lend support to Piper’s statement that Israel supported OAS and opposed Charles de Gaulle.

Concerning the cover-up of the assassination conspiracy Piper does a bit better job. He draws attention that many assistant and staff members of the Warren Commission were Jewish (I count 9 out of 26, Piper says 9 out of 22, both are too high percentages) and that Gerard Ford’s main financial supporter was Jewish. This is typical to the USA and in itself does not need to mean anything, but it is interesting that the single bullet theory was co-authored by a young Jewish lawyer Arlon Specter. The single-bullet theory is false and I consider it a deliberate cover-up.

Piper also explains in many pages, too many in my opinion, how the main media has ignored his book. I quote only one review statement concerning the Final Judgement. On page 426 Piper laments that the Washington Jewish Week claimed that “Piper spends most of his 302 pages quoting out-of-context secondary sources, making unlikely tenuous connections, and asserting untruths over and over as if their repetition will magically impart validity.” Do I think this is a correct evaluation of the book? No, I think it is unfair. Piper does repeat his claims in many places in the book and many of these claims are not proved in my opinion, to given an example, that Fred Sturgis had Mossad connections. (Page 237 states that Sturgis was in Haganah, was he?) On Page 398 the book claims that Barry Seal was murdered by Mossad, while the culprit was Pablo Escobar’s cartel. The book does explain that it was the Columbian drug cartel in connection with CIA-Mossad-Crime plot (the Iran-Contra scandal), so for Piper there is no difference, but was Mossad directly involved?

Some connections made by Piper are indeed unlikely and tenuous, and the sources he uses tying the Permindex to Mossad, are unreliable (I would not say out-of-context secondary sources). So, seemingly I agree with much of what this reviewer says, but I would also add that the main claim in the book is reasonable and worth investigating.

I object to the way the book argues its claims. It is some kind of a combination of propaganda texts and stories told by investigative journalists. I count repetition to propaganda techniques. Repetition is not bad, it has a large role in education and you always should repeat the truths, but it works by making the listeners (or readers) familiar with the information so that they find it natural. As an example, repeating the Copenhagen interpretation of a famous quantum mechanics paradox the result is that students accept it as an explanation, while it does not explain it. Repeating untruths works almost as well as repeating truths, “repetition will magically impart validity”, but that is a technique of propaganda. A technique of investigative journalism I see in reporting whatever “tenuous connections”, such as that Clay Shaw was in a party given by Stern as if that would prove a meaningful friendship connection. The validity of Piper’s methods can be seen in his speculation who was the Deep Throat in Watergate (page 377). Piper’s methods lead him to the CIA and Angleton, while today it is believed that he was FBI’s Mark Felt. It is just that Piper’s method of investigation has too much speculation. He is bringing too many weak items to support some view, while an argument should be supported by few strong items.

But the book is not bad in everything. I checked several claims of the book and they were correct (that is, until I found claims that I could not verify and believe to be weak. I do not say they are necessarily incorrect, only I could not find a confirmation.) Some were quite interesting. These I did not check: On Page 326 it is said that about 50% of Dallas police were members of KKK or minutemen, but for every 25 KKK members there were 3 COINTELPRO infiltrators. This is in Appendix 9. “Knowing that—today—Israel is the probably the biggest supplier of arms to China,” interesting. Piper claims that Israel helped China to develop the atomic bomb. I will check it one day. Page 404 tells of “McCone’s frustration at the constant Israeli lying”, of the atomic bomb, of course.

On Page 361 it is told that the B-team concluded that the Soviet Union is running out of oil 1980 and will have to attack an oil country. Piper thinks the B-team was all wrong but actually Soviets were running out of oil around this time, they did not attack, the system crashed. It is a fascinating question what actually happened at that time. And my favorite is Piper’s story of a Jewish neo-Nazi Dan Burros on Page 317. I looked for him in the Internet, so how does this sound like, Burros committed a suicide by shooting at himself three times: “Burros allegedly killed himself at the home of Roy Frankhouser, a Pennsylvania KKK leader and himself a contract agent for the CIA. As Frankhouser noted, commenting on Burros’ death: Bad case of suicide. Three bullets. . . .”

Finally, who, according to Piper, killed John F. Kennedy? The Final Judgment ignores the issue but he e-version of the book is appended by the Default Judgment and there he suggests that Michael Mertz (Jean Souetre) could have been the shooter. He also implicates anti-Castro Cubans, possibly the Novo brothers, and says that there were many assassination teams and not all were used. But for Piper this question is of no importance.  For him the real question was to show that Israel was behind the assassination. He thought he showed it beyond doubt, but I do not think he did.

In the book Piper very much regrets that his book, an underground bestseller, has been ignored and most of those, who criticized the book, had not read it. I read it, found it interesting but was not any more convinced of this theory than I was in the beginning. It is a possible theory, but not proven. Unfortunately I cannot forward my comments to the author. Michael Collins Piper died in 2015 at the age of 54. I checked what Wikipedia had to say about him. I noticed that Wikipedia does not link to the free version of the Final Judgment, though it can be downloaded. Piper seems to be right in one thing: this book is banned. Should it be? Is it anti-Semitic? No, books should not be banned and it is not anti-Semitic. It rather depends on what you do if you are liked or not. Killing a president is not really the best way to make friends, but I am not implying anything, I only want you to study 9/11 and then make up your mind on other conspiracy theories, like the JFK case and the holocaust, that is, go the path I did. If you honestly do it, you come to the same truths as I did, since there is only one way things really happened.