Convinced by the Communists? Some theorize Soviets or Castro inspired Oswald to kill JFK

By Elisha Fieldstadt, NBC News

AFP / Getty Images

In 1961, the U.S. attacked newly socialist Cuba in the unsuccessful Bay of Pigs Invasion.

In 1962, Soviet Union leader Nikita Khrushchev allied his country with Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro and constructed missiles on Cuban soil pointing at America — threatening to fire until the U.S. promised never to invade again.

In 1963, the president of the United States was assassinated.

Coincidence? 

“When Castro chose an alliance with the Soviet Union, it was more than our intelligence service could stand … it’s 90 miles off our shores,” said Bryan Ghent, an expert in the assassination of John F. Kennedy at Winthrop University.

So after JFK was shot, some couldn’t help but make a connection.

“Right wing activists very shortly after the assassination started blaming communism and Castro,” said John McAdams, the author of  “JFK Assassination Logic: How to Think about Claims of Conspiracy.”

Both Castro and Krushchev provide a path into what Ghent calls the “wonderful rabbit hole” of speculating and circular thinking around who killed Kennedy.

Keep reading on usnews >>