David Sánchez Morales

For David Morales the New York remixer/DJ, see David Morales. For Dave Morales the on-air radio personality, see Dave Morales.

David Sánchez Morales (August 26, 1925 – May 8, 1978) was a Central Intelligence Agency operative who worked in Cuba and Chile.

Biographical highlights

Morales, of Cuban-Mexican descent, spent his early life in Phoenix, Arizona, and attended school at Arizona State College in Tempe (now Arizona State University) and the University of Southern California in Los Angeles before joining the Army in 1946. He served in the 82nd Airborne, and was recruited into US Army intelligence during that time.[1] Morales maintained an Army 'cover' even after joining the Central Intelligence Agency in 1951.

Shortly after joining the CIA, Morales became an operative for the CIA's Directorate for Plans. It is alleged that he was involved in Executive Action, a series of projects designed to kill foreign leaders deemed unfriendly to the United States. Morales reportedly was involved in Operation PBSuccess, the CIA covert operation that overthrew the democratically elected President of Guatemala, Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán.[2]

Through the 1960s and mid-1970s, Morales was involved at top levels in a variety of covert projects, including JMWAVE, the ZRRIFLE plot to assassinate Fidel Castro, the Bay of Pigs Invasion operation, the CIA's secret war in Laos,[2] the capture of Che Guevara, and the overthrow of Salvador Allende.[citation needed]

Allegations of involvement with the Kennedy assassinations

John F. Kennedy

Main article: John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories

After the death of E. Howard Hunt in 2007, John Hunt and David Hunt revealed that their father had recorded several claims about himself and others being involved in a conspiracy to assassinate John F. Kennedy.[3][4] In the April 5, 2007 issue of Rolling Stone, John Hunt detailed a number of individuals implicated by his father including Morales, as well as Lyndon B. Johnson, Cord Meyer, David Atlee Phillips, Frank Sturgis, William Harvey and an assassin he termed "French gunman grassy knoll" who some presume was Lucien Sarti.[4][5] (Lucien Sarti was in prison in France at the time of the assassination,[6] but Corsican hit man, Jean Souetre, who came to New York on Nov 19, 1963 and then left the country from Laredo, Texas on Dec 6[7] is thought more likely to be the “Sarte” or “Satre” mentioned in Hunt's son's book[8] as the Corsican assassin allegedly contracted for "the big event".[7])

The two sons alleged that their father cut the information from his memoirs, "American Spy: My Secret History in the CIA, Watergate and Beyond", to avoid possible perjury charges.[3] According to Hunt's widow and other children, the two sons took advantage of Hunt's loss of lucidity by coaching and exploiting him for financial gain.[3]

Morales' friend, Ruben Carbajal, claimed that in 1973 Morales opened up about his involvement with the Bay of Pigs Invasion operation, and stated that "Kennedy had been responsible for him having to watch all the men he recruited and trained get wiped out." Carbajal claimed that Morales said, "Well, we took care of that SOB, didn't we?"[9]

Morales is alleged to have once told friends, "I was in Dallas when we got the son of a bitch, and I was in Los Angeles when we got the little bastard".[10] presumably referring to the assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, and to the later assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy in Los Angeles, California, on June 5, 1968.[11] Morales is alleged to have expressed deep anger toward the Kennedys for what he saw as their betrayal during the Bay of Pigs Invasion.[12]

Robert F. Kennedy

Main article: Robert F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories

In November 2006, BBC Television's Newsnight aired a twelve-minute screening of Shane O'Sullivan's documentary RFK Must Die.[12][13] O'Sullivan stated that while researching a screenplay based on the Manchurian candidate theory for the assassination of Robert Kennedy, he "uncovered new video and photographic evidence suggesting that three senior CIA operatives were behind the killing".[12][13] He claimed that three men seen in video and photographs of the Ambassador Hotel immediately before and after the assassination were positively identified as CIA operatives Gordon Campbell, George Joannides, and Morales.[12][13] Several people who had known Morales, including family members, were adamant that he was not the man who O'Sullivan said was Morales.[13] After O'Sullivan published his book, assassination researchers Jefferson Morley and David Talbot also discovered that Campbell had died of a heart attack in 1962, six years prior to the assassination of Kennedy.[13] In response, O'Sullivan stated that the man on the video may have used Campbell's name as an alias.[13] He then took his identifications to the Los Angeles Police Department whose files showed the men he identified as Campbell and Joannides to be Michael Roman and Frank Owens, two Bulova sales managers attending the company's convention in the Ambassador.[13] O'Sullivan stood by his allegations stating that the Bulova watch company was a "well-known CIA cover".[13]

References

  1. ^ Fonzi, Gaeton. The Last Investigation, (New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1993), p. 382. ISBN 1-56025-052-6
  2. ^ a b Fonzi, Gaeton. The Last Investigation, (New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1993), p. 382-3. ISBN 1-56025-052-6
  3. ^ a b c Williams, Carol J. (March 20, 2007). "Watergate plotter may have a last tale". Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles. Retrieved December 30, 2012.
  4. ^ a b Hedegaard, Erik (April 5, 2007). "The Last Confessions of E. Howard Hunt". Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on June 18, 2008.
  5. ^ McAdams, John (2011). "Too Much Evidence of Conspiracy". JFK Assassination Logic: How to Think About Claims of Conspiracy. Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books. p. 189. ISBN 9781597974899. Retrieved December 30, 2012.
  6. ^ "Observer-Reporter - Google News Archive Search". news.google.com. Retrieved December 19, 2021.
  7. ^ a b Kroth, Jerome A (June 27, 2018). The Kennedy Assassination: what really happened: A deathbed confession, new discoveries, and Trump's 2017-18 document release implicates LBJ in the murder. Kindle. pp. 79–80, 90.
  8. ^ Hunt, Saint John (2008). Bond of Secrecy: My Life with CIA Spy and Watergate Conspirator E. Howard Hunt. Walterville, OR: Trine Day LLC.
  9. ^ Fonzi, Gaeton (1993). The Last Investigation. Thunder's Mouth Press. pp. 383–390.
  10. ^ "CIA role claim in Kennedy killing". BBC News. November 21, 2006.
  11. ^ Who Killed Bobby?: The Unsolved Murder of Robert F. Kennedy, O'Sullivan, Shane. (New York: Sterling Publishing, 2008) ISBN 1-4027-5444-2
  12. ^ a b c d O'Sullivan, Shane (November 20, 2006). "Did the CIA kill Bobby Kennedy?". The Guardian. Retrieved November 21, 2006.
  13. ^ a b c d e f g h Aaronovitch, David (2010). "Conclusion: Bedtime Story". Voodoo Histories: The Role of the Conspiracy Theory in Shaping Modern History. Riverhead Books. ISBN 9781101185216. Retrieved August 19, 2015.