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

enmeshed in intelligence matters, but Scott did not focus on Oswald’s connections to the
U-2 plane and his defection to the Soviet Union. Scott was much more concerned with
the political power structure in the United States and the interface between organized
crime and the government. Scott merely noted that Oswald’s “apparent defection to the
Soviet Union in 1959…has been frequently interpreted as part of a program by U.S.
intelligence…to penetrate the Soviet Union with false defectors.” 646
Back in Dallas and New Orleans, Oswald continued to live in “a milieu with
intelligence overtones” but Scott did not accept the notion that Oswald was a CIA
agent. 647 Instead, Scott believed Secret Agent Oswald was a private contractor. Oswald
must have worked for private detective Guy Bannister in his shenanigans involving the
Fair Play for Cuba Committee and other leftist groups. The most likely possibility,
according to Scott, was that “Oswald and Bannister were working for…an intelligence-
mafia gray alliance, rooted in the deep political economy of New Orleans.” 648 Scott
expressed doubt Oswald was on the FBI payroll but suggested he worked for a private
security agency that reported to the FBI. Scott also advanced the theory that as a private
contractor, Oswald was informing on illegal gun trafficking by ordering weapons through
the mail in 1963. At the time, a Senate panel was investigating such transactions.
Scott concluded that Oswald and Ruby were players in the deep political system,
and this system is to blame for the Kennedy assassination, later scandals such as
Watergate and Contragate, and it would seem any nefarious activity ever alleged against
646 Scott, 78.
647 Scott, 78.
648 Scott, 87.
280