Letters to the Editor
droogoy
Published Letters: 589 Editor's Choice: 9
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Ballistics again
[Read the article: Chris Matthews gets it wrong -- again]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]About nineteen yrs. ago, I did an analysis of the dynamics of the head shot, using both the Nix and the Zapruder films, as well as annotated records of eye witnesses, including Jackie in her Warren Committee testimony- as well as the wound descriptions from the key Parkland surgeons (Carrico, Crenshaw, etc.)
The results clearly show that the key kill shot had to have come from the front, not the rear where Oswald was presumed to be. By virtue of the laws of conservation of linear momentum in physics a rear (e.g. occipital) bone CANNOT be dislodged or displaced by a rear shot! It can only occur via the forward momentum from a FRONTAL shot
. Hence, to blow out the occpital bone (which, incidentally, is also clearly seen flying over the limo boot in the Nix film) the shot must have come from the FRONT.
This was surely the kill shot, but Oswald was not alleged at any time to be in the front of the limo as it progressed down Elm St. toward the Triple Overpass. Hence, it follows that Oswald could not have fired the kill shot, even if he had been part of the plan.
The analysis is based on a simple torque model to disclose the physics. Namely the initial backward momentum imparted to the top half of the body, in the same direction that the head bone fragment hurtled over the trunk of the limo.
We use a torque or moment about the center of gravity, acting
perpendicular to moment arm as shown below:
H <------ bullet (e.g. from GK)-produces force F on H
!
!R
!
!
x CG
In the above, H denotes head, and CG is the center of gravity of the body (near point of contact with limo seat). R is the 'moment arm' (R = XO) and we assume a shot is placed at O and let R = 0.6m for ex.(The 'torso' can actually be modeled as a solid, uniform mass, cylinder 'block' centered at x and symmetrical about both sides of the axis XO. )
For a bullet of mass m= 0.01 kg, traveling at 545 m/s (see above) initially and decelerated to 445 m/s in 0.0004 s, we have a force of F = dp/dt = m(dv/dt) = 0.01 kg( 545 m/s - 445 m/s)/ 0.0004 s = 2500 N force exerted at O. (Note the bullet velocity is actually much higher, but one typical of a less sophisticated rifle is used to be deliberately conservative)
Assume the very reasonable estimate of 20 cm (about 8 inches) for the bullet path thru the head. At the velocities noted, this implies an average of 495 m/s for which the 'head transit' time is:
dt = 0.20 m/ 495 m/s = 0.0004 s
This would produce a torque (couple)T = F x R about 1500 N-m
at O. Thus a shot from the front (depicted) would produce a torque of 1500 N-m that would displace the head O toward H by some angular amount.
To find it we need the moment of inertia (I) of the 'torso' and from the cylindrical model we find: I = M/12[3r^2 + l^2] where M is the cylinder mass (say 50 kg), r is the cylinder radius (shoulder to center of torso dist. = 0.25 m), l =R,the cyl.length, say 0.6 m).
Now, the force of the bullet F impacting at moment arm distance R from CG exerts an external torque on the torso such that:
T = F x R = dL/dt = I(@)
where dL/dt is the rate of change of the angular momentum of the body, I is as defined above, and @ is the angular acceleration @ = dw/dt or rate of change of angular speed).
On substitution (say using the above reasonable values) we can solve for @:
@ = T/I = 1500 N-m/ (2.281 kg-m^2) = 657.6 rad/s^2
This is the angular acceleration under impulse. From this the angular velocity (arising in same time) can be obtained as:
and w = @t = 657.6 rad/s^2 (0.0004s) = 0.263 rad/s
Under conditions of uniform deceleration, we have:
@(u) = (w(f) - w(i))/ t
where t is the elapsed time over Z-frames 314-321, with a mean
film advance rate of 18 frames per second. (t = 0.44s). The
initial angular velocity is known from the impulse calculations
(0.263 rad/s) and the final angular velocity w(f) = 0.
@(u) = (0 - 0.263 rad/s)/ 0.44s = - 0.598 rad/s
Again, under conditions of uniform motion we have:
w^2 = w(i)^2 + 2@ (theta)
whence:
theta = [w^2 - w(i)^2]/ 2@
theta = [0 - 0.263^2]/ 2(-0.598 rad/s)
= 0.05783 rad
This must now be added to the angle made under impulse:
theta (total) = theta (impulse) + theta (uniform)
0.0001 rad + 0.05783 rad = 0.05793 rad
theta (deg) = 0.05793 rad (57.3 deg/rad) = 3.3 degrees
This is the total amount of angular motion backwards undergone by JFK's body with respect to a central axis, as a result of being struck by the frontal shot.
I invite vidor, the next time he posts or comments, to refute this analysis, as opposed to spouting more lone nut effluent.
Those days done.
The lone nut "hypothesis" with its absurd assault on truth, basic physics and common sense ("single bullet theory") must now be interred with other assorted dreck. It is, indeed, no more credible than buying into human virgin birth- or Immanuel Velikovsky's "Colligin worlds"
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Cold War hawk, my ass
[Read the article: Chris Matthews gets it wrong -- again]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]David Talbot wrote:
" JFK was a Cold War hawk, he insisted, so Brothers must be wrong to suggest that Kennedy was the victim of a conspiracy that came out of hard-line national security circles."
Those flat worms (from Africa) must have really infested Chris' brain. Either that or his "Tweety" persona is now dominating. (Well, it has since Donahue was terminated on MSNBC in 2002)If JFK was a "cold war hawk" then I am the freaking pope. A reminder for Chris and those other media bore-ons he featured:
1) In 1962, JFK launched the Peace Corps (which Matthews himself served in, as I did), still thriving today in more than 60 nations.
2) Perhaps the one move that may have signed JFK's death warrant was when he attempted - via Executive Order 11,110 issued on June 4, 1963 - to challenge Fed control of the money supply. (Which under the Constitution authorizes only Congress to create paper money not a private entity) This EO authorized the creation of some $4.2 billion in U.S. Notes - to replace Federal Reserve Notes. These U.S. Notes were issued by Treasury Secretary Douglas Dillon, and bore his signature.
After the assassination nearly all the notes were recalled. I was fortunate in being able to obtain two from my brother who still had them- a $2 note with Jefferson on the front, and a $5 with Lincoln. Both display the serial numbers in red ink. Not green, like Fed notes.
The Federal Reserve, of course, is the pivot and epicenter of corporatism has also been well documented by James Livingstone (Origins of the Federal Reserve System - Money, Class and Corporate Capitalism 1890- 1913, Cornell University Press, 1986, p.233):
"the creation of the Federal Reserve is an episode in, or evidence for, the emergence of a modern ruling class."
JFK's U.S. note issuance was clearly an effort to break the Fed stranglehold, and especially its policy whereby new money is brokered into the M1 supply system via interest, passed on to lending, issuing banks.
3)Though JFK was reluctant for sure, since he could foresee the effects would lead to the now dominant GOP "southern strategy" - he nevertheless federalized the AL national guard in the fall of 1963, to protect black students trying to attend academic institutions.
4) In August, 1963 he outraged the extreme right fringe by signing the Nuclear test Ban Treaty with Krushchev. (They were particularly enraged at the ban on anti-missile systems)
5)Kennedy rebuffed the JCS and their demand for use of force that would have assured U.S. conquest of Cuba but led to a nuclear war.(cf. The Baltimore Sun, Oct. 26, 1996, 'Bomb Cuba! Le May Urged JFK', p. 2A). According to this article:
"Tapes of secretly recorded White House conversations released this week show that President John F. Kennedy's military advisers strongly pressured him to bomb and invade Cuba during the missile crisis 34 years ago this month.
Indeed, they forecast that war would occur whether he invaded Cuba or not."
"Blasting Kennedy's cautious approach, the Air Force Chief, Gen. Curtis LeMay, told the President at a White House meeting on Oct. 19, 1962, "This is almost as bad as the appeasement at Munich."
--snip--
Through those days Kennedy was fending off strong pressure for an attack on Cuba from congressional and military leaders such as LeMay, who told him, 'We don't have any choice but direct military action...I see no other solution...'"
Had JFK followed the JCS imperative, we wouldn't be having this debate right now.
6) JFK issued NSAM (National Security Action Memorandum) 263, which paved the way for withdrawal of all U.S. adovisors from VietNam and for turning the entire war over to the ARVN (South Vietnames) by 1965. Released FOIA documents confirmed this. (The Baltimore Sun, p. 3A, 'New Documents show JFK Planned Withdrawal', December 23, 1997).
JFK instructed Maxwell Taylor - the de facto author, to write the specific order in the memo. From that report (in The Sun):
"All planning will be directed towards preparing RVN (South Vietnamese) forces for the withdrawal of all U.S. special assistance units by the end of calendar year 1965."
All the above show that while JFK may have posed as a war hawk for (1960) election strategy (including hyping the "missile gap" which never really existed), he certainly wasn't a real one by late 1962. No real hawk would have signed the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty or refused to invade Cuba in the '62 missile crisis.
This merely confirms for me that ALL those media blowhards, including Fineman and Borger, and blow-dried morons.