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BILL SIMPICH: My Summary of the Pepe Letters; DOUG CAMPBELL: Letters From Cuba (Nov. 2020)

11 March, 2025|Special to the AARC

My Summary of the Pepe Letters by Bill Simpich

 

Preface

Kudos to Paul Bleau for his fine work on the Pepe letters.  He is a good writer and tells a difficult story well.

I also want to give a shout-out to Doug Campbell, who also did a thoughtful presentation on the Pepe letters of 1962 and the Pedro Charles letters of 1963 several years ago.

Doug and I tried to put together a follow-up joint presentation on these subjects, but it is a complicated analysis and we put it on the shelf for another day.

Now that Paul has got the ball rolling, I would like to follow up with my thoughts on this fascinating story – I believe it links several different stories together.

Because it is complicated, I thought the best way to tell it would be in several segments.   It is still a work-in-progress.

It covers some provocative areas, and I don’t want to raise hopes too high, but I believe that Bill Harvey and his colleagues who worked on double-agent cases such as Richard Tansing may have been the original authors of the Pepe letters and even more troubling operations as well such as the stripping by CI/SIG of Oswald’s 201 file in the days before he was reported to have been seen in Mexico City.

Part 1: The linked 100-300 files, and how they were used to mislead the Mexico City station

It seems clear – by propinquity and other events – that there is a crucial tie between the 100-300-11 FPCC file (created around 1960, with files going back to 1958) and the 100-300-12 “Plots to Assassinate the President” file (created on March 4, 1963, with files going back to 1959).   Why did CI-SIG put these files next to one another?   The 11 file was created in around 1960, and the 12 file in early 1963?   There were no other “serious threats” in the interim?   (The Jim Garrison file of 1967 was numbered “17”, while a 1957 file affiliated with MLK was “23”)
Many of the late 1963 Oswald files have the 100-300-11 number right on them.
One of the index cards for Oswald (Lee Henry Oswald, Lee Harvey Oswald, and Lee H. Oswald) was kept inside the 100-300-011 file  (Note how each of these three cards had a slightly different identity for Oswald!  The Lee Henry Oswald description inaccurately questions whether Oswald is a US citizen; the Lee H. Oswald description inaccurately states he is still living in New Orleans as of 10/25/63; the Lee Harvey Oswald description inaccurately states that he is a Soviet citizen.)
Notice how someone changes the file number for Lee Harvey Oswald on this routing sheet originally opened on 9/10/63 – right before Mexico City – from 100-300-11 to his 201 number.  It happens again on this 9/24/63 file.  I believe this change occurred from September-1963, March 1964, and was uncovered after 37 files were discovered physically missing from Oswald’s 201 file during February 1964 – thus, the 201 file only had 5 files physically in it at the time of the assassination.  During March 1964, Oswald’s 201 (biographical) file was restored to the full complement of 42 files.   (The link reveals a 43rd file, created after 11/22)
In other words, it appears that Oswald’s 201 file “lied” to the Mexico City officials in September – it only had five files in it.  37 of the files appeared to be in the possession of CI/SIG and maybe other agencies.  Again, these files were not returned to Oswald’s 201 file until March 1964.
Part 2:  Investigations of Various Planners to Kill JFK, 1961-1963
CI-SIG had control of these 100-300 files.   File number 12 was created in March, four months after the Pepe files were created.   I believe the Pepe files were created by Bill Harvey, Richard Tansing, and company.  I do not believe they were created by Cuban intelligence.
There were various investigations of Cubans who allegedly were planning to kill JFK between 1961-1963.  The PEPE letters are part of these investigations, as are the ones involving Quintin Pino Machado and Antonio Rodriguez Jones, and the Pablo Charles letters mailed right after 11/22 that were supposedly directed to “Lee Harvey Oswald”, touting his shooting talents, and welcoming his imminent arrival in Cuba.
My opinion is that most of these suspects were “patsies”, cooked up by the Cuban double-agent crowd that people like Harvey, Tansing, and David Morales were familiar with.
Tomorrow, I will turn to the questions:
Who are the Secret Service sources on the Pepe letters, 3-11-14 and 3-11-48?   I believe they were Miami CIA chief Bill Finch (or an associate) and Ray Wannall, chief of FBI nationalities counterintelligence.
Who was Pepe?  A made-up character, not the alleged Jose Menendez, formerly of the Tampa FPCC and living in Havana when the Pepe letters were sent in late 1962.

RELATED: Doug Campbell: Letters From Cuba – November, 2020

Bill Simpich (continues): In the first installment – Parts 1 and 2 above discussed how the 100-300-011 file was used to mislead the Mexico City station on Oswald’s identity, and how the 100-300-012 file was created in March 1963 to create a home for the Pepe files and related documents on “The Plot to Kill JFK” back in 1962.
Here is the next installment, Part 3.  It’s clear that American intelligence officers are the hidden identities of 3-11-14 (the interceptor of the Pepe letters) and 3-11-48 (who claimed Quintin Pino Machado killed JFK –  a claim made to the Warren Commission).   Who are these two American officers, and what is their objective?
Part 3: Sources and Targets
Who is the target Quintin Pino Machado – a claimed pro-Castro terrorist during the years 1961-1964?
Secret Service source 3-11-48 made the explosive claim on 11/27/63 that Cuban diplomat Quintin Pino Machado was engaged in terrorism in Washington DC all the way back to April 1961 – the months of the Bay of Pigs invasion – and might be involved in the killing of JFK as the “intellectual director” while working out of Mexico City?   This alleged tip about Pino as an “intellectual director” was the culmination of intelligence claims for years that Pino was a pro-Castro terrorist.
Pino was an aide to the Organization of American States (OAS) ambassador, Carlos Lechuga.  Lechuga, known to the CIA as AMLAW-3, had an affair with Cuban embassy secretary Silvia Duran, who met with Oswald in Mexico in 1963.  The CIA used the Lechuga-Duran affair by leaning on Lechuga’s wife in an effort to convince Lechuga and his family to defect.
Pino left the USA in June, 1961, and returned to Cuba.  But Pino remained in the cross-hairs of intelligence operatives.
Take a look at this 3/31/62 memo from JMWAVE chief Ted Shackley to Task Force W chief Bill Harvey.  This interview of Pino’s uncle – the brother of Pino’s mother Margot Machado, #3 in foreign relations department of Cuban government – provides background on the Pino Machado family. Pino’s uncle states that Pino was part of the 26 July movement, and spent 1957-58 behind bars, right before the Cuban Revolution.
Days after 3-11-48’s story about Pino as the “intellectual director” of JFK’s death, Miguel de Leon, a deputy to Manuel Artime who was running the AMWORLD program in the Caribbean, was spreading  a story about how “Quintin Pino had crossed into Texas from Mexico for the purpose of rescuing Oswald after the assassination, but that the plot failed because Oswald was not wearing clothing of the prearranged color, whereby he would be readily recognized by Pino, and also, since Oswald became involved in the shooting of Dallas Patrolman Tippit, Oswald failed to reach the rendezvous at the time Pino would pick him up.”
Was 3-11-48 credible to rely on Miguel de Leon?   I do not think that he is.  De Leon was a man of bad character and the stories about Pino as a terrorist were not reliable.

Another problem with source 3-11-48 goes back to a revelation five months earlier in June 1963:  The Mexico City station reported  that AMCRAB-1/Rolando Santana Reyes, a Uruguayan defector, said that Quintin Pino Machado was the “former leader 26 July organization, had differences (with) other leaders, was forced out of job “Casa Del 26″” and thus might be approachable for defection.”   So which is it – was Pino a Castro agent, or a double agent, or a triple agent?   Or is the story about Pino being a terrorist just made up?

Who is source 3-11-48?   I believe it is FBI’s chief on Cuban intelligence, Ray Wannall. The handwritten marginalia on this document says “Wannall“, providing a big tip that this is the identity of 3-11-48.   Wannall and his agency is not mentioned anywhere else in this document.
Ray Wannall was the head of the Nationalities Intelligence Division at the FBI from 1958-1965, and his subordinate Lambert Anderson had been monitoring both Oswald and the FPCC for months before 11/22/63.  As an intelligence chief on Cuba, Wannall had access to CIA information on a regular basis.
Who is source 3-11-14?  I believe it is Miami CIA security chief Bill Finch.  The identity of 3-11-14 appears to be clear.  This source turned over a PEPE letter to the Secret Service on 12/8/62.  3-11-14 called Miami SS chief John Marshall on 12/7/62 and stated that “they intercepted it”; that “the original letter was being forwarded to the Chief’s office”; and that “they have run traces” on those involved with the receipt of the letter.  3-11-14 is clearly an officer with a US intelligence group.
The context of the Pepe letter makes it clear that his group is not the Secret Service.  The memo linked here makes it clear that it is not the INS.  The FBI described this source as a government agency doing security-type investigations. This doesn’t sound like a military agency.  The process of elimination would point to the CIA.
Bill Finch was a CIA chief in the Security Division in Miami who had earned the trust of SS agent Ernest Aragon – this link shows Aragon turn over the Pablo Charles letter over to Finch on 12/6/63.
The next day, 3-11-14 went so far as to spread another disinformation story about the Chinese Communists and Castro being responsible for the JFK assassination on 12/7/63, the same day that he called SS John Marshall and tipped him off about one of the Pepe letters.  An adjoining memo states that Ramon Cortes of Dallas was one of the intermediaries of the plot, which had been accidentally exposed by Raul Saavedra (related to Castro’s mistress Celia Sanchez).

The FBI wanted direct access to the source of this story – but a JMWAVE office made it clear:  “of course not possible.”   The FBI described tipster 3-11-14 as T-2 – and went on to say that T-2 was “another government agency that conducts security-type investigations.”

This same story about Cortes, Saavedra and Sanchez was cobbled together by Angleton’s aide Ray Rocca and provided to lead JFK investigator Jack Whitten the day after the assassination, in what I consider a naked attempt to derail the investigation.

In another whopper a year earlier, Finch told the FBI on 12/8/62 that he was “unable to state” if CIA had an operational interest in Radio Libertad, the address of one of the Pepe letters.  In an Aragon and Marshall memo, we see “3–11–14” stating “they do not know at the Miami level whether they are supporting Radio Libertad”.  It looks like this comparison unlocks one of the secrets of the JFK documents.  I believe that a CIA officer – and specifically Bill Finch – was Secret Service source 3–11–14.
Note that Bill Finch’s identity is also protected by the FBI – the Bureau used the term MM T-1 to describe “CIA, Miami Florida, through William G. Finch of the CIA” when analyzing the Pepe letters.
To keep this short, I will discuss next time how several CIA officers close to Bill Harvey were trained by the Secret Service in Miami in the summer of 1962 in how to protect JFK – and that Marshall’s colleague Ernest Aragon was part of this training.  during the era where Harvey’s Task Force W was working hard to overthrow the Cuban government that culminated in the Cuban missile crisis and Harvey’s removal from head of Task Force W.   (Take a look at this memo for an advance look.)
Bill Finch was stationed in Miami, a former head of the Miami field office, and inevitably worked with Task Force W in some way.  As late as the 70s, Finch had the power to declassify one of the “Pablo Charles” letters sent to Oswald from Cuba in November 1963 and enter it into the Oswald file.
Another colleague of Bill Finch goes back to 1955 or so, in the CIA’s Special Security Division.  A colleague of James McCord was William G. Finch, who I assume is the same “William G. Finch” who was analyzing the Pepe letters.   We have every reason to believe that McCord, a Texan, was using his communications prowess to spy on defectors in Europe as well as the FPCC in the South here at home.   Was McCord also spying on Oswald?  Or even the Secret Service?
Keep in mind that Secret Service Miami chief John Marshall stated to the HSCA that he feared the Secret Service was involved in killing JFK.    Secret Service officer Ernest Aragon stated that he had the same fear.
Next time:  How the training of Bill Harvey’s fellow officers may have led to the creation of the three Pepe letters of 1962 – and the Cuban reaction by executing two men in early November 1963 who had names mentioned in the Pepe letters.
The previous installment (Part 3) studied the American intelligence officers  3-11-14 (the interceptor of the Pepe letters) and 3-11-48 (who claimed Quintin Pino Machado was complicit in JFK’s death –  a claim made to the Warren Commission) and their hidden identities as CIA officer Bill Finch and FBI officer Ray Wannall.   
This installment (Part 4) will examine how the Secret Service trained several of Bill Harvey’s colleagues in their secrets, prior to the sending of the three Pepe letters of 1962 that threatened to kill JFK – and the Cuban reaction by executing two men with names mentioned in the letters.
Part 4:  The Secret Service-CIA training is followed by three Pepe Letters that bring together these two agencies 

Secret Service agent Ernest Aragon – a confidant of Bobby Kennedy – trained several of Bill Harvey’s colleagues in the summer of 1962.   The subject of the training was internal Secret Service procedures.   See the summary below:Aragon said that he became aware of the deficiencies of the Secret Service in Presidential protection very early in his career. Because of his work on Cuban subjects in Miami he became friendly with some CIA operatives working out of the Miami Station.

He was reluctant to identify them but was persuaded to do so and told the writer that he dealt with Ted Shackley, Bill Finch and Mitch Lawrence. Finch was head of the Miami office and Lawrence succeeded him. Aragon discussed with Chief Rowley the need for more formal liaison with the CIA and as a result, was asked to come to Washington in 1962 to discuss it further. He hitched a ride to Washington from Palm Beach on Air Force One.

Aragon met with Richard Helms, Ghosn Zogby, Victor Wallen and Clark Simmons.

Helms was the head of the Deputy Director of Plans, who supervised CIA’s covert action wing.  He worked on the same executive level as Bill Harvey, and the two men frequently worked in tandem.

Zogby was head of Cuban Task Force (WH/4) in 1962.  His position was assumed by Bill Harvey in early 1962, who renamed the branch Task Force W (after his first name, William).

Wallen was C-TFW-CI before Swanson.  I believe Wallen’s pseudonym was Richard Tansing – who worked with Bill Harvey in the Pepe investigation.

Clark W. Simmons served as C/WH/4/CI (chief of Western Hemisphere counterintelligence, Cuba) in 1961, succeeding David Morales, who  he worked with closely.  He later became Chief, WH/SAS/IOS (investigations and operational support for the Cuban division SAS). Throughout the early 60s, Simmons was intimately familiar with the duties of the various AMOT teams in Miami, the anti-Castro Cubans that worked with the CIA and waited for the day where Castro was overthrown and they could insert themselves as the new intelligence unit for the Cuban government.  [ 33 ]    

Aragon said representatives of the FBI were also present at this meeting. He said that arrangements were made for the immediate coordination and dissemination of intelligence information relating to the protection of the President.

It should be noted that Ramparts editor Warren Hinckle wrote that RFK convened “a select committee the day after the assassination, which was to conduct a secret investigation of the Secret Service…the committee’s report excoriated the Secret Service for organizational and functional deficiencies…”  Allegedly, the report cleared the Secret Service of involvement in any plot.  Hinckle said that French intelligence relied on its internal copy of the RFK report in his communications with their offices – this document has been often discussed but to date it has not surfaced.
I think the Pepe letters – sent in the weeks after the Cuban missile crisis, when Bill Harvey was being forced to step down as Chief of Task Force W by the Kennedy brothers – were created by forces allied with CIA Miami agent Bill Finch or people close to him.  Jack Wallen (who I believe is Richard Tansing) and other CIA officers close to Bill Harvey had been trained in Secret Services procedures during the summer of 1962, which exposed Secret Service secrets to these men.
The first Pepe letter received by the Secret Service made an explicit threat to “kill President Kennedy”, addressed to “Bernardo Morales”, and was supposedly written by former Tampa FPCC member Jose Menendez, now living in Havana.   Bill Harvey and Richard Tansing (who I believe was Jack Wallen) led the investigation into this letter.
In the second Pepe letter received by the Secret Service, chauffeur Antonio Rodriguez Jones was sent a letter on 11/14/62,  However, his “sensitive” mail wound up in the Dead Letter Office because it was sent to the imaginary “Ashmead” Place in Washington DC.  “Hugh Ashmead” was one of Angleton’s pseudonyms.
This second Pepe letter had a negative reference regarding President Kennedy‘s alleged plans to invade Cuba, and the same handwriting as the 11/27/62 letter supposedly written by Tampa FPCC member Jose Menendez.
A third Pepe letter, dated 11/5/62, was intercepted and turned over to Guatemalan authorities – it was directed to “Carlos Meneses” of Guatemala City, signed “Pepe”, and called for “worldwide revolution.”
The Secret Service concluded that there was a “pattern” with these three letters.   All three of these letters were misaddressed and could not be delivered to the addressee.  “Every effort will be made to determine whether or not these letters were purposely misdirected to the hands of individuals known to be anti-Communist.  If such is true, the sender would know full well that the letters would be turned over to the hands of appropriate US government authorities for investigation.“
The Castro government seemingly reacts to the Pepe Letters by Executing Two Men with Names Mentioned in the Letters
Note that on 11/12/63, two men – Antonio Rodriguez and Jose Morales – were executed in Cuba by a firing squad accusing them of being CIA agents.  The CIA tells the SS that this case began with the Antonio Rodriguez (Ezcheabal) & Bernardo Morales case, then included Jose Menendez.  I believe that the Cubans got wind of the Pepe letter situation and executed the wrong men in a mash-up of the key names – maybe in an excess of caution, certainly fear.
Bill Harvey was a lead investigator with the CIA familiar with double agent activities – at Staff D, the Berlin Operating Base, Task Force W, and as Chief of Station, Rome.   He knew how to exploit the doubts of others.
Harvey’s colleagues got themselves in place to “train” inside the Secret Service in 1962.  I think the Secret Service was penetrated, and both Ernest Aragon and his Miami chief John Marshall came to the conclusion that JFK was killed by government officers.   Marshall testified to HSCA he feared the Secret Service was involved in killing JFK.     Did RFK or his people ever speak to Marshall after 11/22?  Or Aragon?
Next time:    After JFK is killed, the Pedro Charles letters start arriving – one of them is addressed to Lee Oswald and touts his shooting skills.  The investigation links this Oswald letter by specifically citing CI-SIG’s Pepe file 100-300-012.  Is it the same people that sent the Pepe letters?  And are the authors of these letters complicit in the killing of JFK?
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Bill Simpich: Civil Rights attorney, author of ground-breaking articles focusing on the hidden intricacies of the CIA, a leading and insightful analyst of the intelligence files associated with Lee Harvey Oswald’s enigmatic episode in Mexico City seven weeks prior to President Kennedy’s assassination. Bill’s eBook, State Secret, was published in 2013 and may be read in its entirety courtesy of Bill and the Mary Ferrell Foundation: State Secret: Wiretapping in Mexico City, Double Agents, and the Framing of Lee Oswald.
Doug Campbell is the creator of The DALLAS ACTION Podcast presented by Wall Street Window. He is an adroit host, commentator, lecturer and analyst of the JFK assassination.
Bill Simpich and Doug Campbell are popular contributors to the current and ongoing AARC Lecture Series.