[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
The Bay of Pigs disaster was a military
and diplomatic defeat for the new president.
[explosions booming]
After the failure of the Bay of Pigs episode,
Kennedy was really keen on getting rid of someone
who had so humiliated him.
The Kennedys were essentially out for revenge.
And so the CIA came up with a set of plans
called Operation Mongoose.
[speaking Spanish]
The mission was to get rid of Castro
one way or another.
Through sabotage, try to prompt
a popular uprising against him,
try to discredit him.
But up to this point,
Operation Mongoose was Mission Impossible.
♪ ♪
It didn't work.
♪ ♪
There is one good thing that happens
out of Operation Mongoose.
At the Opa-locka Airport in Florida,
the CIA is debriefing Cuban exiles,
and they hear rumors that the Soviet Union
is now putting missiles inside Cuba.
♪ ♪
When Johnny Roselli hears this,
he starts trying to find out from his sources,
both CIA assets in Cuba, but also from sources
that he had among the Cuban exile community,
was it true?
According to a CIA record of Roselli's actions
released in 2017, the mobster claimed he did,
"Through his Cuban contacts attempt
to verify the location of the Russian missiles in Cuba."
The human intelligence was discounted
until the U-2 planes actually took the pictures
in October of 1962.
If you go back and look at the newsreels,
you can see the circles out of Cuba
with how far the missiles could hit.
So there is a lot of fear
about what Castro is going to do.
[speaking Spanish]
This is JFK's worst nightmare.
He is facing the nuclear annihilation
of millions of people.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
Let me ask you one simple question.
Do you, Ambassador Zorin, deny that the USSR has placed
and is placing medium and intermediate range
missiles and sites in Cuba?
Yes or no.
[crowd clamoring]
[laughter]
I'm prepared to wait for my answer
until hell freezes over if that's your decision.
The United States had nuclear weapons in Turkey
right on the Soviet border.
And so the Soviets decided to try to even the balance
by putting their own nuclear weapons in Cuba.
Nikita Khrushchev said, "They have rockets in Turkey
"faced at the Soviet Union.
Why shouldn't we put rockets in Cuba?"
Why would Castro accept Russian missiles
being deployed on Cuban soil?
Because of an extraordinarily long history
of U.S. intervention in Cuba and the fact that
the presence of those missiles on Cuban soil
put Cuba at the center of the Cold War.
After the Bay of Pigs and Operation Mongoose
and all the assassination efforts, Castro thought that
all these operations aimed against him
would lead to something bigger--
an all out invasion by the United States.
So he thought that accepting these missiles
would help him defend himself and his own regime.
♪ ♪
[speaking Spanish]
On this field, you will see 22 crates
designed to transport the fuselages
of Soviet bombers.
These bombers are capable of carrying nuclear weapons.
There followed 13 days in October
where the fate of the world hung in the balance.
[soft music]
Lights had burned late in key Washington offices
as those most vitally involved in the nation's
defense and security made ready to deal with the crisis.
Over the many days of the crisis,
Kennedy listens to various different opinions.
There were a number of people in the military
who were itching for a fight with the Soviets.
John Kennedy did not want that.
But he didn't know how to do that without looking weak.
♪ ♪
He was very much caught between a State Department
that wanted to find a way for peace
and a military that wanted to go to war.
He really made a mistake with the Bay of Pigs.
Kennedy was made a fool of.
And he said, "I'll never let it happen again."
The American male fear of ridicule
runs throughout so much of our foreign policy.
♪ ♪
The takeaway for Kennedy was not to trust
everything that was told to him.
So when the Cuban Missile Crisis happens,
Kennedy is in a very different frame of mind
than during the Bay of Pigs.
He's gonna make his own judgments.
Kennedy decided that the United States
should create a naval blockade.
[dramatic music]
Within the past week, unmistakable evidence
has established the fact that a series
of offensive missile sites is now in preparation
on that imprisoned island.
To halt this offensive buildup,
a strict quarantine
on all offensive military equipment
under shipment to Cuba is being initiated.
Our resolution will call for the prompt dismantling
and withdrawal of all offensive weapons in Cuba
before the quarantine can be lifted.
I call upon Chairman Khrushchev
to halt and eliminate
this clandestine, reckless, and provocative
threat to world peace.
♪ ♪
[booming]
[line ringing]
You might think while the Cuban Missile Crisis
is going on that Harvey and Roselli would stop
the operation against Castro.
But instead, Harvey calls Johnny with orders
to keep going full speed ahead, unbeknownst to the Kennedys.
This is a huge problem.
At the same time
you're trying to bring peace to this crisis,
you have death squads coming into Cuba.
When Bobby Kennedy finds out, he's incredibly outraged.
♪ ♪
Harvey is called up to Washington.
And there, Harvey lets it be known
that he's still deploying these death squads in Cuba.
Bobby Kennedy thinks that Harvey is out of his mind.
RFK says, disgustedly,
"You're dealing with people's lives
in a half-assed operation."
But Harvey says, "Look, nobody ever told me
we should stop trying to kill Castro."
There's a big confrontation.
And finally, the simmering lid that Harvey has blows up.
"If you fuckers hadn't fucked up the Bay of Pigs,
we wouldn't be in this fucking mess!"
At this point, Harvey's days are numbered.
"Harvey has destroyed himself today," his boss says.
"His usefulness has ended."
♪ ♪
There had been negotiations going on for some time,
but they couldn't come up with an agreement.
A Latin American delegate told CBS News this evening,
"We are now in the most dangerous situation
since the end of World War II."
We are concerned that there might be shooting
among the ships at sea, the possibility
that invasion might have to be undertaken
to assure that those bases are eliminated.
Strategic air command immediately begins
dispersing its aircraft.
All elements go on advanced alert.
The military, they were ready to roll.
They had the planes on the runway.
They thought they were going to war.
♪ ♪
[speaking Spanish]
Good evening, everybody.
This is Douglas Edwards reporting.
Cuba reacted by ordering all its armed forces
on an immediate alert.
In Cuba itself, 100,000 men were put under
emergency orders as the Cuban regime waited
to see what their bosses in the Kremlin were to do.
[radio tuning]
Here centered the most critical threat of global war
since the surrender of Germany 17 years ago.
It was a very unsettling time.
The entire country was on edge.
And right in the middle of the crisis,
a movie called "The Manchurian Candidate"
starring Frank Sinatra
about the fears of Communist infiltration
hit the theaters.
What have they built you to do?
I don't think anybody really knows,
except Berezovo in Moscow.
"The Manchurian Candidate" really just extended
the general panic that Americans were feeling
about the expansion of communism and threat.
[screaming]
I mean, this was a terrifying moment
in American history.
Anyone who lived through this has memories
of the acute panic during those 13 days.
Community fallout shelter space
for more than 100 million people has been located.
Supplies for the first 46 million spaces
are already in production.
I remember the absolute fear,
the uneasiness of it all.
It was a frightening time to a 12-year-old
looking at the world going, oh, my God,
is there gonna be a tomorrow?
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
Meanwhile, JFK and Khrushchev
continue to negotiate.
And Castro feared that Cuba would be overrun
in an invasion by the United States.
So Castro writes a letter to Russia
saying that if Cuba is invaded,
that the Soviet Union should launch a military strike.
They would later call that the Armageddon letter.
♪ ♪
Castro had this crazy letter
in the middle of the Missile Crisis,
saying that he's willing to sacrifice Cuba
in a nuclear war.
He tells Khrushchev,
"Go ahead and do it."
Because there has to be one,
and if Cuba has to be the victims, that's OK.
Khrushchev gets this letter,
and he looks at it and says, "Are you crazy?"
The first one to go will be Cuba.
You'll be pounded into dust by the American nuclear missiles.
He's not going to provoke World War III.
That's not what Khrushchev wanted.
This was a Cold War chess game,
and he just wanted to move one more major part in place.
♪ ♪
In the end, Kennedy stood strong,
called Khrushchev's bluff, caused him to concede
and agree to withdraw Soviet missiles.
The Soviets backed down
in the face of U.S. determination,
dismantled their missiles, and shipped them home.
It was a retreat to Moscow.
It's one of the last chapters
in the offensive threat from Cuba
that led the United States
to throw a quarantine around that island
and force the Russians to dismantle
their medium range rocket installations.
♪ ♪
From the Kremlin came a message
directly to President Kennedy.
I have today been informed by Chairman Khrushchev
that all of the IL-28 bombers now in Cuba
will be withdrawn in 30 days.
The Missile Crisis really was resolved
by Khrushchev and Kennedy, outside of Castro's aegis.
And he was very upset.
He only heard about Khrushchev's
decision to take the missiles out of Cuba on the radio.
The great secret was the Kennedy administration
said that it had compelled the Soviets
to unilaterally withdraw its nuclear weapons from Cuba.
But in fact, it had cut a deal,
whereby the Kennedy administration
would withdraw American nuclear weapons
from Turkey, which had been kept secret from the public
as a tradeoff or quid pro quo.
President and Bobby Kennedy felt that to reveal this
would be a suggestion of weakness.
And they wanted to portray an image of great strength.
So the removal of the missiles in Turkey
was kept secret for more than 25 years.
♪ ♪
The course of action that we finally adopted
was the right one.
Kennedy really rose to the occasion
in the Cuban Missile Crisis.
It was an emancipation from his father.
It was an emancipation from his brother.
It was an emancipation from all of these people around him
that were advising him.
He called the shots. He was right.
He handled it.
The Cuban situation itself was not resolved,
but an hour of great peril had passed
without nuclear holocaust.
♪ ♪
[jazzy music playing]
So after Harvey's blowup with Bobby Kennedy,
Harvey is told he's out of Florida,
and the CIA dispatches him to Rome.
♪ ♪
Before he leaves town, Harvey decides,
"I'm gonna go out for dinner with my good friend
Johnny Roselli."
[light music]
♪ ♪
Harvey wants to make sure that he's related to his friend
how much he admires him and that he really has
been convinced of Johnny's claims of patriotism.
If you want to talk about one relationship which rose
to a kind of mythological level in this story,
it would probably be the Johnny-Harvey relationship.
He really did have respect for Roselli.
At the dinner, Harvey gives Johnny what is called
a termination fee of $1,500.
It's not a lot of money.
In fact, Johnny spent a lot more money
out of his own pocket during this whole effort
to kill Castro.
But nevertheless, it's a token of thanks
for Johnny's patriotism.
[no audible dialogue]
♪ ♪
It's this symbol of respect that means a lot to Johnny.
♪ ♪
Johnny didn't fail at many things.
And as odd as this may sound, given his line of work,
he took pride in what he did.
So I think the end of this mission
would have been a hard thing for him to take,
because he would have felt like he had failed
and also would have felt as though he fell short,
being the patriotic American that
he always prided himself on being.
♪ ♪
[upbeat music]
♪ ♪
Shortly after the Cuban Missile Crisis,
President Kennedy plans to come out to Los Angeles.
♪ ♪
JFK was actually coming to Palm Springs
to talk with Dwight Eisenhower about presidential business.
And Sinatra is expecting that JFK is gonna stay
at his place in Palm Springs.
♪ ♪
Frank Sinatra, from the second he met
Jack Kennedy, he was in love.
Sinatra sees this young guy who is a war hero.
He's a Harvard graduate.
He's dazzled by JFK.
And what Kennedy saw in Sinatra was Hollywood.
This was a bromance.
At one of his guest houses, Sinatra has built
a heliport for the presidential helicopter
to come down in.
That's the way it works in the business world.
Power goes to power.
♪ ♪
Sinatra is all set for this wonderful visit
from his friend Jack,
and at the same time, Bobby is warned
about these mob connections of Sinatra.
Since Bobby Kennedy is going after the mob,
particularly Sam Giancana,
who was a good friend of Frank,
Bobby says, "You can't stay at Sinatra's house."
"The New York Times" quotes President Kennedy.
"You know, as much as I like Frank,
"I can't go there,
not while Bobby is handling this Giancana investigation."
So JFK, political animal,
understands the ramifications of this
and stays at Bing Crosby's house,
a rival singer who just happens to be a Republican,
and Frank really goes nuts.
[line ringing]
So he calls Bobby Kennedy.
Frank is heard saying, "What is this shit?"
Kennedy says, "Well, there's some security concerns."
And Sinatra realizes that
it's because of his friend Sam Giancana.
That's really what's going on here.
Sinatra is still loyal to Sam.
But he's upset that Jack Kennedy,
who he worked so hard for, he's going to betray him.
[smashing]
♪ ♪
Sinatra's assistant George Jacobs recalled,
"There was an endless silence.
"He stood there staring out at the desert,
as if someone had told him his folks had died."
Sinatra was a means to an end for the Kennedys.
Sinatra was useful, and then he wasn't useful anymore.
[soft music
Sinatra had been a big public face for Jack--
a lot of personal favors in Hollywood.
He got people to come through for Jack.
And he was totally humiliated.
He became a Republican then, I remember.
♪ ♪
[swing music]
♪ ♪
Soon after the Cuban Missile Crisis, back in Chicago,
Sam Giancana opens up the Villa Venice.
♪ ♪
Sam Giancana, out of the goodness of his soul,
out of the grandiosity of his spirit,
takes the hit off of Frank.
And the quid pro quo is that Frank has to get
his Rat Pack pals to come to Villa Venice
and do a big show for free.
The Villa Venice was like the Chicago version
of the Copacabana.
Owned by the wiseguys, same as the Copa.
[soft music]
There was an 800-seat auditorium,
and people would arrive
and then they'd get into gondolas,
and then they'd come into the auditorium.
My father, he ordered two gondolas from Italy
to ride on the river.
And you didn't have to pay for it, either.
It was the most romantic place you'd ever want to be.
[dramatic music]
And behind the Villa Venice were
all these Quonset huts where betting was taking place.
♪ ♪
Gambling was illegal in the state of Illinois.
Then everything is rigged.
It's a money mine for the mob.
[change rattling]
[swing music]
♪ ♪
Sinatra and his Rat Pack friends
appear under what can only be termed
a command performance, the FBI reports.
♪ ♪
So the room is packed.
Everybody is anticipating Sinatra,
Sammy Davis, and Dean Martin.
The Rat Pack.
Dressed up in a tuxedo,
Martin makes light of the tension.
"Hold the noise down," he instructs,
pointing to a penthouse apartment
overlooking the stage.
"There's a gangster sleeping up there."
[laughter]
"There's a gangster sleeping up there."
I mean, it was all very out in the open.
Also, there's Dean on stage singing
about how he didn't want to come there
because he's singing for free.
♪ I love Chicago ♪
♪ It's carefree and gay ♪
♪ I'd even work here ♪
♪ Without any pay ♪
[soft music]
[vocalizing]
♪ ♪
Well, they had a successful fire, as they say.
That's the old joke.
The guys walking on the street said,
"Jeez, I'm sorry to hear about the fire in the club."
"Shh, that's not till Thursday."
[laughter]
You know.
[light music]
♪ ♪
Right about the same time as Villa Venice,
there was a place called Cal-Neva on Lake Tahoe.
Cal-Neva was a hotel-casino
precisely on the California, Nevada state line.
And this was useful, because gambling was legal
in Nevada and not in California.
♪ ♪
There was actually a state line drawn
across the property, through the casino.
It was a gorgeous place.
There were all these chalets on the lake.
Crystal clear water, crystal clear air.
It was a paradise.
But also, it was a place
where Frank Sinatra used to like to go.
And he would entertain there from time to time.
And he very quickly became connected to Cal-Neva
through Giancana.
[dramatic music]
Cal-Neva was another cash register.
And Giancana wanted in.
[rattling]
But in 1960, the Nevada Gaming Commission
had started this thing called the Black Book.
♪ ♪
When your name was in this book,
that meant that you couldn't step into
any gambling facility in the state of Nevada.
You were barred.
Giancana was one of the gangsters
in the Black Book.
Sam Giancana, he became partners
with Frank Sinatra in the Cal-Neva.
Of course, you're not gonna see Sam Giancana's name
on any of the paperwork.
You know, a lot of these individuals,
they couldn't get a gaming license.
So they had their interests put in the names of others.
Frank Sinatra, he's a big draw in Las Vegas.
So having him affiliated with that
is gonna bring in guests and money to the casino.
[upbeat music]
♪ ♪
When the Cal-Neva came up for sale,
Sinatra did not have the money to purchase the Cal-Neva.
So my father, Sam Giancana, bankrolled him.
Frank tried to be in residence as much as he could.
It was a dream of his that he made a reality,
and it was a go-to place.
♪ ♪
[laughter]
One night in a chalet at Cal-Neva,
The McGuire Sisters are there.
Their road manager,
Victor LaCroix Collins, is there.
And Sam Giancana is there,
although he's not allowed,
because he's in the Black Book.
[jazzy music playing]
There's a tension
between Sam and their manager
because the McGuires are feeling
that Phyllis is ruining their act
by being involved with this gangster.
Phyllis is a tough broad, as they used to call them.
And she gets in a sort of frisky mood,
and every time she walks by where
her road manager is sitting,
she punches him on the shoulder.
And every time she walks by his chair
and gives him a punch on the shoulder,
the punch is a little harder.
[tense music]
♪ ♪
Finally, Collins throws her to the floor.
♪ ♪
And Sam Giancana runs over to her rescue.
♪ ♪
No! No, no!
Victor Collins picks Giancana up
and carries him outside,
at which point, Frank Sinatra shows up.
In his book, Roemer wrote, "When Victor made a move,
"Sinatra jumped on him and held him
"as tight as he could while Sam, the tough guy,
punched Victor's lights out."
[blows landing]
Sinatra tells Victor Collins,
"You're a dead man."
And Victor Collins tells Frank, "You know what?
"They better shoot me with a telescopic sight,
"because if that motherfucker comes anywhere near me,
I'm gonna kill him with my fists."
[siren chirps]
The cops come in, and it becomes a big fiasco
because Giancana's in the Black Book.
[siren wailing]
It turns out that they had been
watching Cal-Neva to prove that Sam has been there.
It becomes a big tabloid display
in "Life" magazine
and newspapers all around the country.
♪ ♪
And eventually, this relationship of Frank Sinatra
and Sam Giancana, which was secret to the public,
is now out in the open.
And the linkage of Sinatra with the mob
is now firmly affixed in the public's mind.
♪ ♪
Tony Accardo is looking at all this in the papers.
And Accardo is really upset about it,
because the limelight that Giancana's private life
is bringing is now affecting the business
of the mob in Chicago.
When you are in the mafia and you are told,
"We don't want any heat on us,"
and you're somebody that brings that kind of heat,
you're a goner.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
With the Castro government completely victorious
over the invading rebels, there is despair and confusion
among the relatives of the insurgents.
[sobbing]
[somber music]
After the Cuban Missile Crisis is resolved,
the more than 1,100 Cuban exiles from the Bay of Pigs
that are now being held by Castro
still remain the problem.
With Castro claiming the capture of invaders
and threatening them all with the firing squad.
It's been almost 18 months,
and this issue loomed over Kennedy's presidency.
♪ ♪
James Donovan, a New York lawyer,
had been tasked
to get the Bay of Pigs prisoners freed.
And he engaged in protracted negotiations
with Fidel Castro.
[engine roaring]
Donovan goes down to Cuba.
He's gonna bring presents as kind of tone setters
to finalize these negotiations.
[light music]
He gets Fidel Castro a brand-new Polaroid camera.
This is early '60s.
It's almost like magic for everybody.
And he acquires a scuba diving suit.
♪ ♪
Once the CIA gets wind
that he's gonna bring this wet suit down,
they basically go, "Well, jeez, here's our opportunity."
♪ ♪
Castro was a scuba diving enthusiast.
So the idea was we'd poison this wet suit.
[tense music]
We will switch out this wet suit.
We will put in the poison one
instead of the one that he bought.
The wet suit itself would have poison powder ingrained in it.
The snorkel would be contaminated
with a special bacteria fungus.
Donovan was not told of this.
I don't think he ever would have agreed to do this.
He had been hired to be a negotiator.
The people who were working directly with Donovan
protected him.
They found out that the CIA wanted
to replace the wet suit, and they secured
the scuba diving suit that Donovan had purchased
so that nobody could get to it.
It wasn't until later that the CIA finds out
that Donovan didn't use their poison wet suit
and that the wet suit that Castro is seen wearing
isn't gonna kill him.
♪ ♪
[speaking Spanish]
[lively music]
♪ ♪
[people speaking Spanish]
♪ ♪
Donovan later told overconfident Americans,
"Castro is crazy like a fox.
"Whether certain elements want to accept it or not,
the island of Cuba belongs to Castro."
♪ ♪
[soft music]
On March 29th,
the prisoners were brought to trial in Havana
and fined, ranging from $25,000 to $50,000.
[cheers and applause]
James Donovan ended up basically agreeing
to pay a ransom of $53 million worth of food and medicine
for the release of over a thousand prisoners.
[speaking Spanish]
We've heard a lot of stories about Castro's prison.
How did they treat you there?
20 months were to pass,
months that alternated between hope and despair.
But on Sunday, December 23, just two days
before Christmas, the first group
of 107 prisoners landed at Homestead Air Force Base.
Ten trips in all were made, and 1,113 men
welcomed the new year on free soil.
[sobbing]
♪ ♪
When the prisoners are released,
the Kennedys decide to take this disaster
and turn it into their favor
by having a big celebration at the Orange Bowl.
[triumphant music]
♪ ♪
Johnny sees on television his friend Manuel Artime,
the leader of the Cuban exiles.
He's there right next to the president.
He's in uniform.
He's safe.
♪ ♪
The Bay of Pigs was not only bumbled.
It was also a bloodbath.
And so they took the Bay of Pigs
and turned it into something that was
a confirmation of American greatness,
a confirmation of American bravery.
It is a pageant of trying to turn a story around.
Ladies and gentlemen, Mrs. Kennedy
would like to say a word to you.
JFK brings his most potent publicity arm,
his wife, Jackie Kennedy.
She addresses the crowd.
[cheers and applause]
[speaking Spanish]
[cheers and applause]
I can assure you that this flag
will be returned to this brigade in a free Havana.
[cheers and applause]
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
[phone ringing]
Johnny Roselli is asleep in a hotel room in Las Vegas.
[tense music]
It's a friend of his,
and he says, "Turn on your radio."
♪ ♪
Three shots were fired at President Kennedy's
motorcade in Downtown Dallas.
President Kennedy has been seriously wounded.
Roselli's only comment,
"Those damn communists."
And just now, we've received reports here
that Governor Connally was shot in the upper left chest.
And the first unconfirmed reports say
the president was hit in the head.
[solemn music]
♪ ♪
Now from Washington, government sources say
that President Kennedy is dead of an assassin's bullet
in the 46th year of his life
and in the third year of his administration
as President of the United States.
This is a dark day in the history of America.
This man, I think, wanted to save America.
He is not dead.
His spirit lives.
We are sorry, deeply moved
over this incident here in America.
I'm sorry.
I was in school when it came over the loudspeaker.
It was like a hit to the solar plexus.
I couldn't believe it. That's all.
I just couldn't believe it.
We were all crying in my place, all crying.
I think the whole country felt the same way.
I can hardly express my emotion.
And I hope that the country will survive.
It was the first time I ever saw nuns crying.
Our parents picked us up from school.
You have little glimpses in your memory
at that age of what you recall.
But seeing adults cry was really something.
Frank was shooting a movie, "Robin and the 7 Hoods,"
when word came that JFK had been assassinated.
Frank didn't even stay in Los Angeles.
He went down to the desert
to mourn the loss of his friend.
♪ ♪
In the immediate aftermath of the assassination of JFK,
Bobby Kennedy in some ways was a shattered man.
He was said to have been terrified
after the assassination at the thought
that maybe he had caused it.
He first wondered whether or not the mafia
might be behind his brother's killing.
♪ ♪
For years, Bobby Kennedy went after the mafia.
He was zealous about it.
But once Jack is killed, Bobby is unmoored in many ways.
He stays as attorney general, but he's lost his fight.
Robert Morgenthau,
then U.S. Attorney in New York, says,
"Kennedy never mentioned organized crime to me again."
♪ ♪
Who do you think would do something like this?
I don't know.
I--I can't imagine in a way.
I can't imagine.
Only two months earlier, Castro complained
that the Kennedy administration
was trying to kill him,
and Castro said two people could play that game.
[speaking Spanish]
The Kennedy assassination fell victim
to conspiracy theories almost within hours
of the President of the United States being gunned down.
♪ ♪
A lot of conspiracy theories focused on the idea
that Cuban exiles working with the CIA
had assassinated John F. Kennedy
because they were angry that he had not
followed through with clear U.S. military support
during the Bay of Pigs.
One of the dominant conspiracy theories
around the Kennedy assassination
is that the mob killed Kennedy.
There's even a theory that Johnny Roselli
was one of the shooters.
Sam Giancana, you know, hated the Kennedys
for the way that they came after the mafia.
Santo Trafficante, Jr., is implicated
through his connections with a lot of figures.
Jack Ruby is a perfect example.
He visits Trafficante in prison in '59 in Havana.
And four years later, he's the patriotic American
who shoots and kills Lee Harvey Oswald.
Even if you don't believe any of the conspiracy theories,
that's a pretty interesting connection right there.
[dramatic music]
People want to say the mob orchestrated the whole thing.
These guys are not that kind of guy.
These guys are worried about the rackets they got going,
the deals they got going.
They're looking at that.
Among the most outrageous of those theories
was one that was generated by a prosecutor
in New Orleans named Jim Garrison.
The most recent, most spectacular development
in the Oswald case involves the CIA.
He started out by blaming what he called
a cabal of homosexuals for killing Kennedy
and then expanded this to include the CIA and the FBI.
We know how it was done.
We know the key individuals involved.
And we are in the process
of developing evidence now.
The Oliver Stone movie "JFK"
was about that particular conspiracy theory,
presenting it as if it was true.
So what really happened that day?
Let's just for a moment speculate, shall we?
The movie that Oliver Stone did
was based on what I and others thought
were some outlandish conspiracy theories.
[gunshot]
This is the key shot.
The president going back and to his left.
Totally inconsistent with the shot from the depository.
Everything about that movie was a bald lie.
One of the few things that Stone got right in that film
was the date on which Kennedy was killed.
It's hard to believe how much he got wrong.
But the American public who saw the movie
were kind of outraged.
The people who worked on the film were very savvy.
Oliver Stone, with this movie,
he wanted to get so much public attention
to the JFK assassination
that it put pressure on the government
to release, you know, thousands--
tens of thousands of pages on the JFK assassination
that they had been sitting on.
♪ ♪
But those five million pages of documents that were
released under the JFK Assassination Records Act,
not a single one suggested that anybody but Oswald
killed the President of the United States.
[ominous music]
Lee Harvey Oswald had this tortured childhood.
Oswald decides to join the Marines,
and it's an unmitigated disaster for him.
They think he's gay.
He's ostracized.
In the middle of the Cold War,
he defects to the Soviet Union,
where he expects to be greeted as a hero,
and the Russians say to him, "Get lost."
♪ ♪
So he decides how these guys in Russia,
they screwed up communism.
"I want to go back to the U.S."
Not because he loves it,
but as he says in his notes,
it's the lesser of two evils.
And Lee Oswald commits himself to the new revolution--
Castro and Cuba.
I think Oswald was infuriated by what he felt
was American mistreatment of Cuba.
The embargo.
The Bay of Pigs, all the raids.
And in his twisted mind, he had had enough
and had an opportunity.
And the rest is history.
As the casket is returned to the caisson,
Mrs. Kennedy begins the long hours of her public grief
with the courageous dignity that has marked
each moment of her ordeal.
Caroline and John seem
to mirror their mother's poise.
Mrs. Kennedy comes forward with Caroline
in a tableau that calls for no words.
Its poignancy calls only for tears.
The JFK assassination leads to a three-day period
of mourning, and it's a mortal wound
to the psyche of America.
[drums playing]
And one of the things that saved the country
and put the country back was the post mortem that happened
of that funeral and all of the details,
and the loving wife and the little boy saluting.
A gentle reminder from his mother.
And John-John celebrates his third birthday
with a soldier's farewell to his father.
The martyrdom of him, it ended up healing a nation.
Bearing the burden of their own sorrow,
a quarter of a million people brave near freezing weather
to pass by the dead president in tribute.
The old, the young, the aged, the children--
they became one in their grief,
in the spontaneous outpouring
that throws up an enduring memorial
to the American spirit.
♪ ♪
After Kennedy was assassinated,
if you had even the slightest connection to him,
you could imagine what you would feel in terms of,
could you be in danger?
I mean, literally, Johnson didn't know
if he was gonna be next.
Nobody knew anything.
And so if you were Roselli or Judy Campbell
in the days after that,
you could imagine how petrified they would be.
[tense music]
This is a young woman who's now trapped
in the middle of a situation
with very high-profile players.
♪ ♪
I think Johnny Roselli,
his heart just went out to her.
She had walked into a dangerous game,
and he understood that she was certainly an innocent.
But also, Johnny knew that if the FBI were to get to Judy
and her story got out,
she could expose her affair with the president.
Judy said, "They had me going from hotel to hotel
"so the FBI couldn't subpoena me.
I sensed I was in terrible danger."
You have the whole creation of the Camelot myth
with the loving wife.
♪ ♪
What she could have done in terms of undermining
all of that would almost have been a national
spiritual catastrophe.
Just imagine it.
♪ ♪
And Johnny was patriotic.
He would not be comfortable with the country
being destroyed in a spiritual sense.
♪ ♪
So there was every reason to want to keep her close,
keep her contained, and keep her quiet.
♪ ♪
Meanwhile, Johnny has his own problems with the feds.
They're building a case against him
based upon what they found out
about his illegal immigration status.
Sometimes he would use two S's in Roselli.
Other times, he would use one S.
The whole purpose is that
people who would try to follow him
really couldn't be sure
whether or not they had the right guy.
The feds had been after Roselli for years.
They learned of his secret
because one of his own betrayed him.
[dramatic music]
When Roselli started working out in LA,
he was doing all right for himself.
And he needs to send money to his family back in Boston.
His family is depending upon him.
And so he's very aware that he doesn't want to expose himself
with this alias that he has.
He wants to make sure that his real identity
as an illegal immigrant was never found,
because it was not uncommon for the government
to go after mobsters who had come here illegally
and have them deported.
♪ ♪
The authorities leaned on the INS and the taxman
in order to combat the syndicate and the mafia.
So he had this buffer between himself
and his family back in Boston.
Johnny would rely upon Salvatore Piscopo.
This is a man that he could entrust
with the biggest secret of his life.
[knocking]
Every year, Johnny would give a satchel full of money
to his mother in Boston.
[swing music playing]
♪ ♪
So that was the big fear in Johnny Roselli's life,
that this deep, dark secret of what his real name was
and what his real background was, if it was found out,
he would be shipped out of America.
♪ ♪
[dramatic music]
For years, he would send money to his mother.
But Piscopo got into trouble with the feds himself.
♪ ♪
The taxman had something against him.
He had to start divulging information.
And he didn't give up Johnny right away.
But at some point, he finally gave up.
You know, hey, this guy, he wasn't born in Chicago.
His real name is Filippo Sacco.
He's from Italy.
The feds could potentially deport him.
♪ ♪
May 5, 1966.
Johnny Roselli is walking down the street.
The feds roll up in a car,
and they do one of these, "Psst.
Hey, Johnny, you feel like being deported?"
[tense music]
♪ ♪
Johnny's gonna blow them off like he does most times.
♪ ♪
"See my attorney," Roselli growled,
without breaking stride.
The two men continue to follow him.
One of them said, "We know where you were born
and when you entered the United States."
The FBI agents called out...
Hey, Filippo Sacco!
♪ ♪
That's like a hammer hitting Roselli.
He knows they know.
♪ ♪
Roselli gave an unconvincing denial.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
After years of fakery and covering his tracks,
Roselli came face to face with who he really was.
Johnny's worst fears have come true.
♪ ♪
Johnny Roselli, this tough mobster,
had an inner fear of somebody discovering
that he isn't Johnny Roselli.
They're gonna do the same thing to him
they did to Lucky Luciano.
They're gonna do the same thing they did
with Carlos Marcello
when they kicked him out of the country,
the head of the New Orleans mob.
You could see this fear of not being a real American
and your very name being a fraud
being something that was devastating to him.
And in terms of him being
the U.S. government's mafia spy--
a disaster.
♪ ♪
[big band music]
♪ ♪