TLR
You might mine this Joan Mellon article for valuable indications Oswald was debriefed
http://www.joanmellen.com/oswald.htmlHere is an excerpt
Further corroboration that the CIA Soviet Russia Division, Soviet Realities, SR6, in the person of Eleanor Reed, debriefed false defectors is contained in a document that I have just discovered that that CIA released “as sanitized” in 1998. The document resides in Robert Webster’s file, is dated 17 August 1962, and is telling for several reasons; the cases of Oswald and Webster are so similar that we can await, with reasonable expectation, that a parallel document of Oswald’s debriefing by Reed (with, perhaps, her frequent debriefing partner, Rudy (“Valentino”) Balaban, may well surface. This document demonstrates beyond doubt that Reed (“Anderson”) was an SR6 debriefer. I copy it here in full:
TO: Eleanor Reed
FROM: [03] IR/CR
SUBJECT: Appraisal of Interrogation
1. The eagerness of the subject to help and his repeated expressions of regret for having neglected opportunities for more detailed observations left me with mixed reactions. In my opinion this attitude detracted from his otherwise seemingly genuine manner and at least for me it “watered down” his attempt to generate a repentant impression.
2. The subject readily answered questions and was extremely friendly during both periods of interrogation. Plottings and data, however, by the subject on a blank town plan left him for homework later proved disoriented. [sic]. The subject discovered his error during our second meeting and volunteered corrections.
3. As far as substantive intelligence gained is concerned, the interrogation provided data on a plant previously described as possibly in the electronics business as a probable radar storage and repair area. A hitherto unknown naval installation was also identified and located in an area other than the one previously assumed.
4. It can be said that if the subject’s bona fides are definitely established, positive intelligence gathered from him is of real value.
[03]
GROUP 1
Excluded from automatic downgrading and declassification.
Sometimes Soviet Russia Counter Intelligence was called in at the briefings. So the mystery of Oswald in the Soviet Union unravels. The above trajectory offers further evidence that Oswald was a creature of the CIA, worked for the CIA, and, quite understandably, was debriefed by them upon his return.
Additional evidence that CIA debriefed Oswald after his return from the Soviet Union resides in the unredacted version CIA document 435-173A, dated 25 November 1963, by the same Thomas B. Casasin.
This document is familiar because we have long had a redacted version of Casasin’s 25 November 1963 memo to Walter P. Haltigan, whom Casasin subsequently revealed to be one “Jim Flint.” Flint was part of SR9, the operations part of the Soviet Division and was Casasin’s “normal contact” in Paris where Casasin arrived in September 1962.
In this memo, Casasin writes that “Oswald’s unusual behavior in the USSR” made him look “odd,” leading Casasin not to use him in operations in the REDWOOD target area. REDWOOD was an action indicator for the SE Division. (SED was a CIA geographic designator for the Soviet Union and the Soviet Bloc countries of Eastern Europe). It seems now a case of one hand not knowing what the other was doing, a not infrequent CIA situation.
In that unredacted version of Thomas B. Casasin’s memo to Walter P. Haltigan, Casasin writes: “as chief of the 6 Branch I had discussed – sometime in Summer 1960 (he later corrected that date to “1962”) with the then Chief and Deputy Chief of the 6 Research Section the laying on of interview(s) [with Oswald] through KUJUMP [the operations division] or other suitable channels.” KUJUMP had a contacts division for debriefing persons. KUJUMP was synonymous with 00 (Contacts Division).
Casasin closes his addendum to the memo with this line, indicating that was not aware of Angleton’s program: “It was partly out of curiosity to learn if Oswald’s wife would actually accompany him to our country, partly out of interest in Oswald’s own experiences in the USSR, that we showed operational intelligence interest in the Harvey story.” Casasin was looking for links between Soviet women marrying foreigners and the KGB. Casasin also refers in his 25 November 1963 memo to a program called AEOCEAN 3, then run out of SR10, and referring to Oswald in particular: this was the legal travelers program, i. e. the intelligence use of legal travelers to the Soviet Union. It seems apparent that Casasin, a pseudonym, was not in the loop, and is struggling to make sense of Oswald and his defection.
In his HSCA interview, while speculating, without any real evidence, that Oswald might have been a “lay-low Soviet operative,” Casasin fills in some gaps in our knowledge about what Oswald was doing in the Soviet Union. He reveals that “there were some type of special design plants in Minsk which were of interest to the CIA.” Casasin adds that CIA “had some type of encyclopedic information at the agency on the radio factory in Minsk where Oswald worked.” He is talking about a component of CIA called the “Industrial Registry.” Casasin was instructed by CIA not to reveal to HSCA information about a tourist guide he ran in the Soviet Union under a program called REDSKIN, and who, like Oswald, married a Soviet woman.
