Report of the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy

CHAPTER VII

This chapter, “CHAPTER VII,” examines the background and possible motives of Lee Harvey Oswald, whom the Commission identifies as the sole assassin of President Kennedy. The chapter opens by acknowledging that, although Oswald acted alone and was not part of any conspiracy, no single motive—such as Marxism, personal grievance, revolutionary aspiration, or desire for notoriety—fully explains his act when judged by ordinary standards. The Commission therefore analyzes Oswald’s character and state of mind through the events, relationships, and influences that shaped him, focusing on his profound alienation, isolation, frustration, grandiose self-image, and hostility toward his environment. The chapter then traces these formative influences through his early family life in Louisiana and Texas, his time in New York City during adolescence (including his psychiatric evaluation at Youth House), his Marine Corps experience, his turn toward Marxist doctrine, his 1959 defection to the Soviet Union, his return to the United States in 1962, his relationships and employment, his attempt on General Walker, his political activities, and his failed effort to reach Cuba in 1963, with possible motives treated within these contexts. CHAPTER VII examines Lee Oswald’s psychological and developmental history through assessments conducted in New York, his return to New Orleans, his exposure to radical ideas, his enlistment and service in the Marine Corps, disciplinary incidents in Japan, and the circumstances of his discharge after defecting to the Soviet Union. CHAPTER VII examines Lee Harvey Oswald’s grievances related to his military discharge, his adoption of Marxist ideology, motivations for defecting to the Soviet Union, and associated actions including a suicide attempt and renunciation of U.S. citizenship. This chapter chronicles Lee Harvey Oswald’s life and mindset across his residence in the Soviet Union, his return to the United States, and his early period living in Texas. It covers his preferential treatment by Soviet authorities, his growing disillusionment with Soviet society, the dramatic reversal of his earlier anti-American defection to return to the U.S., severe psychological turmoil following his return, his explicit rejection of both capitalism and communism, preparations for a hypothetical return press conference, continued engagement with the Soviet Union after his repatriation, and his strained personal relationships within the local Russian-speaking community in Texas. Chapter VII continues the chronological account of Lee Harvey Oswald’s life following his return from the Soviet Union, examining four interrelated aspects of his conduct in the United States: his strained marital and family relationships, his troubled employment history, his attack on Major General Edwin A. Walker, and his political activities on behalf of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee. The chapter draws on testimony from family members, friends, employers, and official records to portray a man whose defection, Marxist beliefs, and erratic personal behavior progressively isolated him from those around him while simultaneously feeding a self-image as a committed actor on the world stage. The Walker shooting episode and the Fair Play for Cuba activities are treated as particularly significant because they illuminate characteristics the Commission considers relevant to assessing Oswald’s possible motivation for the assassination of President Kennedy. CHAPTER VII examines Lee Harvey Oswald’s Fair Play for Cuba Committee (FPCC) activities in New Orleans during the summer of 1963, the collapse of those efforts, and his subsequent attempts to emigrate to Cuba or the Soviet Union. The chapter demonstrates that Oswald’s FPCC “organization” was essentially a solitary fabrication and traces the personal, professional, and ideological frustrations that culminated in his failed Mexico City visa applications in late September and early October 1963. Chapter VII of the Warren Commission Report examines Lee Harvey Oswald’s potential motives for assassinating President Kennedy. The chapter considers three main areas: the possibility that Oswald was motivated by sympathy for Fidel Castro’s Cuba and opposition to Kennedy’s policies toward the Castro regime; the alleged influence of Dallas’s rightwing anti-Kennedy atmosphere; and Oswald’s complicated, often troubled relationship with his wife Marina. The Commission ultimately found no credible evidence linking Oswald to rightwing groups in Dallas, while his relations with Marina were characterized as stormy and unstable, marked by mutual resentment, financial strain, and emotional friction in the weeks before the assassination. This chapter examines Lee Harvey Oswald’s motivations for the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, covering his use of aliases and related FBI concerns, marital conflict with his wife Marina, details of his November 21, 1963 visit to her home, unanswerable questions about his mindset in the days before the assassination, his behavior and arrest following the assassination, and the Commission’s final conclusions about his motives.