What follows isn't so much an examination of Operation Northwoods, but how it came to be so entwined with the Kennedy assassination, very often incorrectly, writes Seamus Coogan.

Jim Lesar, president of the Assassination Archives and Research Center in Washington, sent the following letter to Rep. Henry Waxman, who chairs the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. The Committee has oversight responsibilities for the JFK Records Act, but in ten years has held no hearings.

Former Assasssination Records Review Board staffer Douglas Horne put his career on the line with the ARRB by writing up the story of how two different brains, both of which were claimed to be Kennedy's, were examined, and how the evidence cannot be reconciled. This landmark memo, which has been summarized elsewhere, is presented here in its entirety.

While still backing the ARRB's mission, Jim DiEugenio criticizes some board members for publicly implying they have read all the declassified documents and that it doesn't matter, Oswald still did it – a judgment that does not fit the facts, or their own experience.

Marina Oswald Porter's letter to the Review Board was one of the most candid statements she has made in public.

The organizational hierarchy of the ARRB is discussed.

The first fight with ARRB over declassification of files: the FBI digs in its heels over 15 it deems "sensitive".

A report on the first set of declassified documents coming out of the Review Board.

The attempt in 1995, largely unsuccessful thanks to the lobbying efforts of COPA and others, is recorded here for posterity.

From the July-August, 1995 issue (Vol. 2 No. 5) of Probe

In the New York Times Magazine of August 6, 1995, author Gerald Posner was allowed to do what no other American can do at this moment: pass judgment on a 5 drawer file cabinet of materials from the late Jim Garrison's JFK assassination probe. DA Harry Connick has given Posner sole access to materials about which he said on local television last month: "Everything connected with that case [Shaw trial] should have been retained and preserved in some way." Later before the Assassination Record and Review Board hearing he stated that the files contained, ". . .things that would be of great interest to the American public and the world, as a matter of fact." In praise of the mission of the ARRB, namely to obtain and open up all records on the JFK murder, he said: "I compliment you for attempting to do what I think is a necessary undertaking"; and still later in his testimony, ". . .we think that what you are doing is important and we think that what we can hopefully add to what you're doing will clarify some of the clouded areas of the past and make sense out of what happened." At the time of his testimony-June 28th-Connick was arranging to ship these records to the National Archives so the American public could begin the "clarification of clouded areas" for itself.