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On the CIA. So intense and bitter was the feuding between the FBI and the CIA that some bureau officials even toyed with the theory that the CIA was responsible for Kennedy's murder. An FBI memorandum stated that the ammunition Oswald used was obtainable only from the U.S. Marine Corps and that perhaps the CIA had managed to get it to Oswald. Subsequent investigation disclosed that the ammunition was readily available from several U.S. mail order houses.
After CIA Director John McCone made a statement critical of the FBI, a top Hoover aide, DJ. Brennan Jr., wrote his superiors that McCone "has attacked the bureau in a vicious and underhanded manner characterized with sheer dishonesty." The memo added: "Over the years, we have had numerous conflicts with all CIA directors." In retaliation, Brennan continued, the FBI should inform McCone it knew he had dispensed false information to Congressman Ford—that Oswald had received $6,500 in Mexico to slay Kennedy—and that McCone had leaked the same story to Columnist Drew Pearson. The none-too-subtle bit of blackmail was intended to instill in McCone "a profound respect for our capabilities to be informed." The FBI brass endorsed the proposal enthusiastically: eight sets of initials, including Hoover's "H." festoon the Brennan memo.
On Kennedy. The files quote Kenneth O'Donnell, a top White House aide, as absolving the Secret Service of any responsibility. "The choice was security or politics, and we chose politics." said O'Donnell, meaning the presidential party decided to remove the bullet-proof bubble so the crowds could see Kennedy during the motorcade. The files also suggest Kennedy had a cavalier attitude to ward his own safety and was annoyed by Secret Service efforts to protect him. Agents recalled his habit of jumping behind the wheel of a car at Hyannis Port and zooming off; he was a poor driver and tended to ignore traffic signals. The report also notes that then Texas Governor John Connally, who was wounded by the bullet that killed Kennedy, had serious misgivings about whether Kennedy should come to Texas at all. He was concerned about right-wing hostility toward the President.
On Oswald. FBI agents had no doubt Oswald could have fired three accurate shots in five seconds, a point still disputed by some critics of the Warren Commission. The files include a Teletype message indicating that Oswald might well have been murdered even if there had been no Jack Ruby. William H. Darnall, a Huntington, W. Va., attorney, told agents he went to Dallas "to avenge the assassination of the President —and I would do it again." Oswald's Russian-born wife Marina once offered this apt assessment of her misfit husband—in her broken English: "Me like America. Lee no like Russia. Lee no like America. Lee like the moon."