Countdown to Dallas: The Incredible Coincidences, Routines, and Blind "Luck" that Brought John F. Kennedy and Lee Harvey Oswald Together on November 22, 1963

Written by Paul Brandus

Narrated by David Colacci

The so-called "crime of the century"-the assassination of President John F. Kennedy-was almost preordained to happen. Like all presidents from decades before him, JFK played it loose with security-open cars, Secret Service agents at a distance, and a desire to be seen. Yet conspiracy buffs are certain the security setup on November 22, 1963 was unusual and suspicious. It wasn't.

And what of Lee Harvey Oswald, the drifter, the vicious wife-beating, fame-seeking narcissist? Everything in his background-dating back to his violent, disturbing grade school years, including his stated desire to murder President Dwight Eisenhower-defines the real Lee Oswald. The Oswald that conspiracists rarely talk about-the Oswald who was perched in the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository as JFK drove by-was headed for this moment of infamy years before he pulled the trigger.

In Countdown to Dallas, author Paul Brandus tracks the backgrounds of both Kennedy and Oswald, the very different era in which they lived, and the incredible string of circumstances that brought them together for a few fateful moments in Dallas.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: Apr 11, 2023
• ISBN: 9798350816044

Reviews for Countdown to Dallas

[Richard Jordan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Very well done. Brandus's exploration of Oswald's wretched life - from the very beginning in 1939 - is excellent, but the part that truly makes this an exceptional book is his exploration of cognitive dissonance, how humans are wired to process information and its effect on the many conspiracies that Americans have always clung to. He also notes something that I didn't know: that the Texas School Book Depository had TWO locations in the Fall of 1963, and the fact that Oswald was assigned to the Dealey Plaza location was the proverbial toss of the coin by the company's superintendent, Roy Truly. Along with many other eye-opening things that conspiracists either overlook or choose to ignore because it is inconvenient to their chosen and flawed theories.