This is great to debate and discuss because we will never know the truth. If it is as you say, the ones that could talk have long since been silenced and the others too culpable to talk or already dead.
I have always thought Johnson had a hand in it because of his relationship with the Joint Chiefs of Staff at that time and his investment and friendship with Bell Helicopter. The Vietnam War made the Bell's, close friends of the Johnson's, and the Johnson's fortunes because of the war and at that time the company and their stock was not doing well. The war not only reversed that but the business exploded.
But, I do not think that was the sole motivator, I believe it was a strong conviction, shared by the Joint Chiefs, that Kennedy was weak on Communism and a danger to the US with China and Russia strengthening, they were fearful of lost ground that might never be recovered and the Berlin Wall and USSR aggression was still fresh on their minds. The Bell side of it only helped it along.
I have never understood how anyone could accept there was one shooter with the evidence to the contrary with that rifle and the magic bullet. No sharpshooter could do what a mediocre marksman supposedly did with that rifle..
What I find interesting is when I have these debates with people who refuse to believe that, it is always based on America is above that. No way they pull a Julius Caesar on JFK. I just laugh and ask them with what they know now about what we send to D.C., do they not think it's possible that people like that existed and could have been thinking they were the patriots, they were saving America. Killing one to save many?
I think the biggest mistake JFK ever made was making his brother the AG. Bobby ruffled feathers in the old guard unlike anyone that had gone before him. It was never just about JFK, it was about "those damned Kennedy's". We will never know what would have happened with the worst thing to happen to this country in my lifetime if they hadn't assassinated him because I think he would have had to eventually get us into it. There were too many for him to fight and at that time this country was full of itself, undefeated unless you count Korea, and the hawk segment was growing as was the USSR's holdings and strength. If he'd stayed out of Vietnam, he never would have won the election in 64 anyway.
I was just a kid of 15 at that time but I can recall out and out hatred for Kennedy only matched by what I have seen for Obama and Trump. I heard people, adults that I knew, saying that was a good thing. It was a very confusing time for a teenager that could care less about politics or about who was President. My parents, lifelong Republicans, cried when the news came down and as they watched his funeral procession. They had never liked him and certainly hadn't voted for him but I was taken back as I watched them react to this.
