Lee Harvey Oswald was the man who single-handedly thwarted the defenses of the most powerful nation on earth and killed its chief executive, President Kennedy. He caused a stand-down of the Secret Service as Kennedy's limousine passed through Dealey Plaza:
Oswald's ability to remotely issue psychic commands to Kennedy's security detail to stand down permitted him then to settle on his task at hand. He magically caused seven wounds in two persons, President Kennedy and Governor Connally, by firing three shots in six seconds. He used a bolt-action Carcano rifle. The term 'bolt action' means that the rifleman fires a shot then must reach up with his right hand and actuate the bolt, which removes the spent casing from the chamber and inserts a new round into the chamber. Here is a photo of the rifle:
One does not fire three shots in six seconds with a bolt-action rifle and hit anything, much less does one cause seven wounds in two people with those three shots. But let's pretend that one can. (It's America! Anything's possible!)
Here is the photo of Oswald which very plainly shows him holding this very rifle and also shows him holding some Communist newspaper or something. He had his commie wife take this picture so that everyone could see he had both the means and the motive:
See? What are you, stupid? He's completely down with militancy, as evidenced by the damning name of that communist tripe he's holding, called "The Militant." He's a man with a grudge against the President alright, and he's got the means to do something about it. Let's just save ourselves the trouble and convict him right now.
Now this is where the funny part comes in: That nettlesome movie, taken by some overachiever called Zapruder, throws a monkey wrench into the government's case because it plainly shows that all wounds were caused within a six-second window.
The two wounded men therefore must have sustained their seven wounds within this six-second timeframe. Zapruder screwed everything all up. If he hadn't taken that movie of his, the government could have claimed that Oswald had as much time as needed to fire even up to seven shots. So now the government is faced with the limiting factor of the cycling time of the Carcano rifle --that is, how many shots a professional sharpshooter could get off in the six seconds that is displayed by the evidence of the woundings in the Zapruder film.
The most shots a professional sharpshooter in the service of the Warren Commission could get off in six seconds was three. Therefore, the Warren Commission --which seemed oddly intent on not contemplating the existence of some partner in nefariousness of Oswald's, a partner who might have fired the missing four shots-- had to explain how three shots caused seven wounds in two men.
And thus we have the single bullet theory. It is Arlen Specter's brainchild.
What is the SBT? In a nutshell, the theory says that a bullet, known officially as CE 399, struck Kennedy in the back, transited his neck without leaving any metal fragments whatsoever, exited his neck, hit Governor John Connally near his right armpit, tore through his chest, smashing rib bone in the process, exited his chest, struck his right wrist and shattered a tough radius bone in the wrist, exited the wrist, and then stuck itself halfway into Connally's left thigh. Yet, amazingly, after supposedly doing all this damage, CE 399 emerged with its lands and grooves intact, with no damage whatsoever to its nose, and with no more than 3-4 grains lost from its substance. The only damage to the bullet is at its base, where there is deformation that is not even visible unless viewed from certain angles. It is no wonder critics have dubbed this bullet the "magic bullet."
http://www.kenrahn.com/JFK/issues_and_evidence/Single-Bullet_theory/Ten_reasons.html
The SBT is an absurd theory that was belatedly invented to avoid a conspiracy conclusion. Why was the theory conceived? Because the Warren Commission had two sets of non-fatal wounds to explain but only one shot with which to explain them because the Commission would not allow that more than three shots were fired. To put it another way, if the SBT is false, then there must have been more than one gunman. Or, if Kennedy and Connally's non-fatal wounds were not caused by the same bullet, then there was more than one shooter, and hence a conspiracy.
http://www.kenrahn.com/JFK/issues_and_evidence/Single-Bullet_theory/Shifting_sands.html
In short, due to the time constraints imposed by that vexing Zapruder film, there is a sequence of two wounds that must be reconciled with one of the three posited bullets. (Again, three bullets were posited because, obviously, Oswald acted alone, otherwise it's some kind of kookie conspiracy. And who wants that when it's so much better just to throw up your hands and put the whole thing down as an unfortunate chapter in American history. "Oh well, let's just move on."
So since we've already decided that Oswald acted alone, and since he could have gotten off only three shots in those six seconds as recorded in that bothersome Zapruder film, now we've got to figure out how that one bullet in question caused those two wounds. And that's where things turn magical.
That bullet takes on magical properties for two reasons: It has the ability to change trajectory in mid-air as it exits Kennedy and enters Connally. We know it changed trajectory in mid-air because we've already decided that Oswald acted alone. And since he acted alone, then that one bullet caused those two wounds. And since that one bullet caused those two wounds, but since the trajectory through Kennedy doesn't line up with the trajectory through Connally, that means that the bullet exited Kennedy along the path determined during his autopsy, then it decided to turn in mid-air and kind of go back the other way and go through Connally and break some bones in Connally's wrist. Here is an x-ray of Connally's wrist wounds:
This bullet broke a bone and left some fragments. These fragments were removed from Connally's wrist. Here is a photo of them:
This is the bullet in question. We're told that it was recovered from the stretcher on which Connally was transported to the hospital. It was just lyin' right on the stretcher. It wasn't even in him or anything. It was just lyin' there, waiting for someone to find it and say, "Wait a minute. Here's the bullet!"
Here's the bullet:
This is what the bullet looks like in its pre-fired state, when it is still mounted within the casing:
CE399 is the very bullet, Commission Exhibit 399, that caused two wounds in two different men, the bullet that broke a bone in Connally's wrist and left those bullet fragments.
The Carcano round is designed to wound, not to kill. It is designed not to fragment. It is conceivable that it could have passed through two men, and it is conceivable that it could have fragmented, but it is not conceivable that it could have left fragments in Connally's wrist and still retained its pre-fired shape and its weight within two grains. CE399's weight was determined to be within two grains of the standard pre-fired weight of 161 grains.
That bullet did not cause Connally's wrist wound. And therefore, more than three shots were fired in six seconds. And therefore, Oswald did not act alone. End of discussion.
We'll cover the photo of Oswald and his rifle later. I don't know if it's fake and it doesn't really matter. I've got bigger fish to fry right now anyway.
