[Sample B: Approval/Signature Sheet] - George Mason University

when I saw him in Moscow.” 349 There is no record of Oswald being in Moscow while
Powers was there. In this way, DeLillo uses some of the conspiracy theories and his
freedom as a novelist to speculate about Oswald’s intelligence connections.
Back in the United States, Russian émigré George de Mohrenschildt is assigned to
debrief Oswald about his stay in the Soviet Union on behalf of the CIA. The CIA
arranges Oswald’s work at the photographic firm which DeLillo suggests handles photos
taken from U-2 reconnaissance flights, but he loses his job after he refuses to tell about
his encounters with the Soviet KGB. De Mohrenschildt later finds out that Oswald was
the man who attempted to kill the right-wing activist, General Walker, and unwittingly
tells a CIA agent involved in planning the Kennedy assassination. In this way, Oswald
becomes known to the plotters and is enmeshed in the conspiracy. DeLillo also diverges
from the Warren Commission in having Oswald attempt to kill Walker with the help of a
(fictional) former Marine buddy, an African-American man named Bobby Dupard upset
at the general’s segregationist views.
DeLillo describes a situation in which Oswald becomes involved in the plot to kill
Kennedy partly by the actions of the plotters, partly by the actions of Oswald, and partly
by pure coincidence. Some of these coincidences include Oswald walking into Guy
Bannister’s office to attempt to get a job as an agitator while the plotters are searching to
locate him and Oswald getting a job at the Texas School Book Depository shortly before
Kennedy is to ride through Dallas in an open motorcade. Oswald plays a double-game
throughout. He is a committed leftist who wants to work for the right-wing Bannister as
349 DeLillo, 210.
156