John Fitzgerald Kennedy was the 35th President of the United States. He was killed in Dallas, Texas, on 1963-11-22, ten days after issuing National Security Action Memorandum #271 (see Assassination of John F. Kennedy)1. In October 1962 he announced that the United States had discovered and photographed the installation of Soviet medium-range missiles in Cuba, precipitating the Cuban Missile Crisis2, and responded by sending US warships to the island3. By late 1963 his personal popularity had strengthened and his prospects for re-election in 1964 looked increasingly good4. He remained generally unpopular in the South but stood on firmer ground in Texas, owing partly to the influence of Lyndon B. Johnson, his confrontation with Nikita Khrushchev over Cuba, and the money the space programme brought to the state5.
On 1961-04-27, in his “The President and the Press” address to the American Newspaper Publishers Association at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York, delivered about two weeks after the Brookings Report was submitted to Congress6, Kennedy said that secrecy was repugnant in a free and open society and that Americans were inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, secret oaths and secret proceedings7. The speech also warned of the dangers of “excessive and unwarranted concealment” of matters he felt the public had a right to know8. Richard C. Hoagland has argued that the speech was a direct response to the Brookings Report’s recommendation that NASA consider suppressing any discovery of extraterrestrial artefacts9, and that Kennedy’s references to “secret societies” and “unwarranted concealment” pointed specifically at that recommendation10. Just under a month later, on 1961-05-25, Kennedy addressed a Joint Session of Congress and called for landing an American on the Moon before 197011, telling Congress the United States should commit to landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth before the decade was out12. He had taken office earlier that year determined to restructure NASA toward that goal13, and appointed James Webb as its Administrator on Johnson’s recommendation14.
Kennedy privately proposed merging the US and Soviet space programmes on more than one occasion. According to Sergei Khrushchev, less than ten days after his public call to reach the Moon, Kennedy secretly proposed the merger to Nikita Khrushchev at the Vienna summit15. Khrushchev turned the offer down, in part because he distrusted Kennedy after the Bay of Pigs Invasion16, and in part because he feared the US might learn Soviet technological secrets at a time when the USSR still led in heavy-lift launch vehicles17. In August 1963 Kennedy met Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin in the Oval Office and secretly renewed the offer18; Khrushchev considered it more seriously than before but again rejected it19. On 1963-09-18, Kennedy met with Webb20 and, according to NASA’s official history of the meeting, told him he was thinking of pursuing cooperation with the Soviets as part of a broader effort to bring the two countries closer together21. Webb had been unaware of the two earlier private offers to Khrushchev22. Kennedy asked him whether he was sufficiently in control to prevent Kennedy being undercut within NASA if he pursued it23; Webb later recalled that Kennedy told him he had already decided to pursue cooperation and wanted to do it, rather than asking Webb’s permission24, and Webb told him he could keep the matter under control within the agency25. Two days later, at the United Nations General Assembly on 1963-09-20, Kennedy publicly repeated the offer26, proposing a joint US-Soviet expedition to the Moon27. NASA insiders immediately voiced doubts that the technical problems of integrating the two countries’ programmes could be overcome28, Republican Senator Barry Goldwater objected29, and Democratic Congressman Albert Thomas of Texas, a political ally of Kennedy’s, made a strong protest30. Three days later Kennedy wrote to Thomas to reassure him that a separate American programme would continue regardless of the negotiations31, telling him the renewed cooperation was one more reason to move ahead with the American programme rather than an excuse to slacken32. Within a couple of weeks, lack of public support appeared to have scuttled the proposal, and Kennedy began publicly backing away from it33. He nonetheless issued National Security Action Memorandum #271, “Cooperation With the USSR on Outer Space Matters,” on 1963-11-1234. According to the “Classification Review of All UFO Intelligence Files Affecting National Security” memo, Kennedy had instructed Webb to begin the cooperative programme and wanted NASA fully briefed on the “unknowns” so that information could be shared with the Russians35. In a 1997 interview given after a NASA conference in Washington, DC marking the fortieth anniversary of Sputnik, Sergei Khrushchev said his father decided in early November 1963 to accept Kennedy’s offer, having initially ignored it36, reasoning that he might as well accept given the state of the two countries’ programmes37; Sergei Khrushchev recalled discussing the decision with his father about a week before Kennedy’s assassination38. A Mars-bound unmanned Soviet spacecraft, Cosmos 21, failed in low Earth orbit on 1963-11-11, one day before Kennedy’s directive to Webb39.
Kennedy’s fatal trip to Texas had been anticipated for months: Johnson had said the previous spring that Kennedy might visit Dallas that summer40. The November 1963 trip was centred on a testimonial dinner for Thomas, who held NASA’s purse strings in Congress and whom Kennedy admired41; Kennedy was relieved that Thomas had decided to seek re-election rather than leave his seat open42. On the evening of 1963-11-21 Kennedy was in a festive mood at the dinner, praising Thomas’s contribution to the space programme and calling him a good friend43. He joked about the “heaviest payroll” in reference to the imminent launch of the world’s biggest rocket booster44, said the launch would give the United States the lead in space and credited that leadership to Thomas45, and, quoting scripture on old men dreaming dreams and young men seeing visions, told the audience Thomas was old enough to dream and young enough to see visions46. Kennedy departed the dinner, and Thomas and Johnson accompanied him aboard Air Force One to Dallas the next morning47. After the shooting on 1963-11-22, Kennedy was rushed to Parkland Memorial Hospital, where doctors tried in vain to revive him48. According to the Houston Chronicle, Thomas waited outside the hospital’s emergency ward until word came that Kennedy was dead49. Johnson took the oath of office aboard Air Force One that evening, once Kennedy’s body was aboard50. In the following weeks, Johnson made a show of arguing to continue Kennedy’s plans for Soviet space cooperation51.
A number of researchers have connected Kennedy’s death to his space and secrecy-related initiatives, though these interpretations remain speculative. Hoagland has said Johnson had enormous political capital in the weeks after the assassination to continue any of Kennedy’s initiatives he chose to pursue52. According to Saint John Hunt’s account of his father’s deathbed confession tape, E. Howard Hunt said the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operatives who planned and carried out the plot to kill Kennedy, including Hunt himself, were all directed by one “top man”: Johnson53. Hoagland has speculated that if figures such as Johnson and Thomas were willing to orchestrate Kennedy’s murder to protect the space programme, they must have expected extraordinary discoveries over the course of its missions54; he has separately suggested that Kennedy’s proposal to merge the US and Soviet space programmes may have been the “last straw” that led to his killing55, and that the decision to propose sharing the lunar programme with the Soviets, negotiated with Khrushchev, may have led to his assassination56. Hoagland has also raised the question of whether Apollo was Kennedy’s own “deep black mission,” undertaken at the start of his administration, and whether his knowledge of it was the real reason for his death57, and has argued that the date of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, 1969-07-20, holds significance for the secret societies Kennedy had publicly criticised in his American Newspaper Publishers Association speech58. According to Dark Mission, Kennedy “was murdered immediately after his repeated offer to share the priceless Nazi heritage with the Russians was finally accepted”59. Ross Coulthart has described a document known as “Lancer” as an overt expression of intent by members of the alleged Majestic 12 (MJ-12) group to murder Kennedy60 - Lancer being the Secret Service code name for Kennedy61 - and states that the document describes Kennedy as making inquiries which could not be allowed, and suggests action “critical to the continuance of the group”62.
Other accounts link Kennedy to UFO secrecy specifically, and to material outside the assassination itself. According to Jonathan Caplan, Kennedy was concerned that, after the Bay of Pigs Invasion, a UFO might be mistaken by the Russians, or vice versa, for an incoming ballistic missile, and did not want that nuclear threat to exist63. Caplan says Kennedy wanted greater cooperation and disclosure between the United States and Russia on UAP64, and considers that this would not have been welcomed by the CIA, which he says had bent over backwards to denigrate the subject and keep it under wraps65. Kennedy was having an affair with Marilyn Monroe66. According to Caplan, Kennedy knew about, and had been told about, a crashed-craft matter on which Dorothy Kilgallen had been leaked information67, and allegedly told others about it, including Monroe68. Caplan has cited a leaked wiretap document in which Kilgallen and another individual discuss Monroe’s dissatisfaction with the Kennedys and her intention to leak secrets, including Kennedy’s secret visit to an Air Force base where, she said, great secrets were being held69. Caplan has said he is not asserting that Monroe or Kilgallen were murdered to protect Kennedy’s or the UFO secrets, but believes their deaths should have been more fully investigated at the time70. David Grusch, a former intelligence officer, has said that although the Kennedy assassination records were released to the public without explanation of what the material means, he has still not reached a conclusion about what happened to Kennedy or whether the CIA and organised crime killed him71. According to Michael Horn, the entity Asket gave contactee Billy Meier prophecies as early as 1953 that included Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas, Texas on a specified day72. Robert Monroe said that after an out-of-body experience on 1961-07-13, in which he realised Dwight D. Eisenhower was no longer President, he formed the deep conviction that Kennedy had a psychic bodyguard73; he said he then found a local newspaper reporting that Kennedy was arriving in Hyannis, Massachusetts that afternoon, although he had not seen a newspaper for the previous two days74. Luis Elizondo has said he believes Kennedy was among a number of US presidents briefed in some way on UAP75. According to European News, as reported in The Fatima Secret, Pope Paul VI permitted Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev to view portions of the Third Secret of Fatima76; the same source notes that Archbishop Tarcisio Bertone’s later research found no evidence of a Vatican leak, or support for the claim that the Third Secret had been shown to either man77.