Castro was a suspect in JFK assassination

According to the book, The Johnson White House Tapes, 1963-1964, by historian Michael R. Beschloss, Johnson also told the late Sen. Richard Russell in 1964 that he did not believe the conclusion of the Warren Commission, of which Russell was a member, that Kennedy was killed by a lone gunman.

“I’m just worn out, fighting over that damned report,” Russell is quoted as saying on one tape. “Well, I don’t believe it.” “I don’t either,” Johnson said.

Newsweek magazine, in its edition on newsstands today, carries excerpts of the book, which details conversations from the secret tape recordings Johnson kept running during his stay in the White House.

The book, published by Simon and Schuster, is to appear in US bookstores this week.

In another conversation with former Senate Majority leader Mike Mansfield Johnson suggested he might use the FBI to investigate Republican contributions to get back at them for probing his family finances.

The tapes reveal that Johnson had strong reservations about involvement in Vietnam. “I stayed awake last night thinking of this thing,” he tells his National Security adviser McGeorge Bundy in May 1964.

“It looks to me like we’re getting into another Korea. … I don’t think we can fight them 16,000 kms away from home. … I don’t think it’s worth fighting for. … It’s just the biggest damned mess that I ever saw.”

Politics, the tapes reveal, was part of the decision to bomb North Vietnam in August 1964, following a second incident in the Gulf of Tolkin which later was shown never to have happened.

After the first incident, Johnson called Defence Secretary Robert McNamara to instruct him to gather together people from the Senate and House armed services committees.

“I want to leave an impression on background … That we’re gonna be firm as hell,” the president said.