The cubans

This explanation has been offered by columnist Jack Anderson, among others. It has two variants. The fashionable revisionist version tells us that Kennedy was killed by right-wing Cuban exiles in America who felt that the President had sold them out. Kennedy's refusal to allow U.S. forces to participate in the exile army's Bay of Pigs invasion, which was instigated and financed by the CIA, left the exiles easy meat for Castro's air force. Thousands of the emigres were killed or imprisoned by the Castro regime, and those escaping or left in America were quite upset. Also, in the aftermath of the Cuban missile crisis it was widely believed Kennedy guaranteed the Russians that Cuba would be left unmolested in return for a withdrawal of Soviet missiles from the island. Again, the Cuban exiles were not consulted.

Realistic Cuban exiles could see the writing on the wall in 1963 and may have wanted revenge. So these desperate men, no strangers to violence, had Kennedy assassinated, and left Oswald, who was somehow duped into following them, as the patsy. This is probably the weakest theory. While the exiles had the means and reason to kill Kennedy, and little to lose, it seems impossible that they could have escaped the police, covered up their role, and arranged for Ruby to silence Oswald. The Cuban exile community was so riddled with CIA infiltrators in the '60s that any plot would likely have been noticed by U.S. intelligence. The idea of Cuban exiles acting under CIA guidance is rather more interesting, but that's another story.

The more common theory is that Fidel Castro had Kennedy murdered in reprisal for numerous attempts on his own life by the Mafia and Cuban counterrevolutionaries, both of whom were acting at the behest of Kennedy's CIA The Bay of Pigs and Cuban missile crisis only strengthened Castro's belief that he was in a kill-or-be-killed situation.

THE K.G.B.

Also known as the Reader's Digest Theory, this theory is most favored by right-wing conspiracy theorists. Leon Oswald spent two years in Russia, married a K.G.B. colonel's niece, and came back to put an end to the President at a time when the cold war was at its most frigid. How could Soviet intelligence not have had a hand in the killing? Obviously Oswald was a K.G.B. fifth columnist, sent to do what he could for the cause, and when it became necessary for Kennedy to die, Oswald served his purpose.

The question mark for this theory is motive. Kennedy had embarrassed the Soviets in the big Cuban showdown the year before, but their geopolitical situation was, if anything, stronger in 1963 than in the previous year. Kennedy had removed missiles aimed at Russia from the Turkish border as a concession, and also had taken a hands-off posture toward Cuba. By all accounts Soviet premier Kruschev liked Kennedy and could expect no softer treatment from Johnson or possible Republican successors like Barry Goldwater.

This version of events offers the most interesting explanation for the Warren Commission coverup. Presumably President Johnson, on learning of Russian involvement, ordered the Commission not to overturn that stone. If it were learned that the K.G.B. controlled Oswald, the American public would demand war. The Democrats, afraid to appear soft on communism during an election year, would be forced to start World War III. A variation of the K.G.B. explanation was offered by Professor Revilo Oliver, whose account merited 123 pages of space in the Warren Report. Oliver explained that the international communist conspiracy killed Kennedy because he was not serving it as efficiently as he had promised. Kennedy was behind schedule in delivering America to communism and was eliminated when the conspiracy learned that he planned to "turn American". Oliver concluded by noting sorrowfully that while Kennedy, a communist tool, was the object of national grief, not a tear was shed in this country over the sad end of Adolf Hitler.