Following an executive order from President Trump, the remaining files on John F. Kennedy’s assassination have been released by the US National Archives.
President Kennedy was killed by Lee Harvey Oswald, a former US marine who presented himself to the USSR around 1960 looking to defect there.
He married a Russian woman but eventually returned to the States and became a leftist agitator.
His assassination of Kennedy – and his own subsequent death two days after the event – has spawned a huge number of conspiracy theories in the years since.
In Ireland and the UK, there is a 30-year rule where, 30 years after an event, all Government papers are released by the Government.
Managing Editor at WSHU Public Radio Terry Sheridan told The Pat Kenny Show that the US has no such rule.
“We don’t have anything like that, it’s up to the Government, it’s up to the agencies about what they want to release and when they want to release,” he said.
“The Kennedy papers, these specific papers, were held back because of numerous reasons.
“One is the graphic nature of the murder of John F Kennedy, the wounds that he did sustain; the other is Oswald’s connections to Russia.”
Mugshots of Lee Harvey Oswald taken at the Dallas Police Department on November 23, 1963. Credit: Capital Pictures/Alamy Live NewsMr Sheridan said the CIA wanted to keep their methods and sources secure, while also protecting anybody that was still alive or could still be in danger.
However, he said there was very little new information revealed in these new papers, as President Trump previously released files in 2017 during his first term in office.
“We might see a few more names, we might see a few more methods and sources of the CIA,” he said.
“It’s also important to remember that there are still 2,500 documents that remain under court ordered seal and 2,100 documents that still have been redacted in some way, shape or form again under court order seal.
“So, they’re not expecting any – no pun intended – no smoking gun among this.”
According to Mr Sheridan, the vast majority of the papers declare that Oswald was the sole gunman who killed JFK, and that he acted alone.
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Main image: Moments before JFK's assassination. Image: LaPresse / Alamy. 22 November 1963
