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

lived one of the most eventful, intrigue-filled lives imaginable.” 626 Oswald created a
paper trail across the U.S. and Soviet governments – including the CIA, FBI, military
intelligence, and the State Department in the United States and the KGB and MVD in the
Soviet Union. Melanson rejected the notion that Oswald was a Soviet agent, pointing out
that the Red hunters in the U.S. government would have had to be completely
incompetent to let him slip through their fingers. As other authors noted, Oswald was not
prosecuted for defecting to the Soviet Union and he was not even seriously investigated
to uncover whether he divulged any secrets to the KGB.
From his time in the Marines to the end of his life, Oswald was entangled in
espionage matters. Melanson described the Atsugi air base in Japan, where Oswald was
stationed, as “one of the blackest [secret] bases anywhere in the world.” 627 The data on
the U-2 was “ultrasecret,” including how high it could fly, and Oswald would have heard
U-2 pilots request information for winds at an altitude of 90,000 feet – far higher than the
acknowledged altitude record at the time. 628 For Oswald to have served at such a base,
and then to pose as a left-wing extremist does not fit with the historical context of the
Cold War. Melanson pointed out “This behavior occurred in 1958, when the Cold War
tensions were high. The House Un-American Activities Committee was active;
blacklisting was declining but still in evidence. It had been only four years since Senator
Joseph McCarthy’s witchhunts.” 629 Melanson argued that it is much more plausible that
626 Melanson, xvi.
627 Melanson, 7.
628 Melanson, 8.
629 Melanson, 10.
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