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Journalism of Courage
President John F Kennedy was the subject of three separate death threats during his visit to Ireland in 1963, according to newly declassified police documents released on Friday.
The documents released by the Irish Justice Department said police received two anonymous telephoned warnings in the weeks before the arrival of the United States’ first Irish Catholic president. A third threat went to the newsroom of the Irish Independent newspaper.
Kennedy’s June 26-29 visit was completed without any trouble. He was greeted by adoring crowds in Dublin, Cork, Galway and his family homestead in County Wexford, in southeast Ireland.
He was assassinated in Dallas five months later.
One threat claimed a sniper would target Kennedy as his motorcade traveled from Dublin airport to the residence of the Irish president at the start of his visit.
The second warned of a bomb at Shannon Airport, in southwest Ireland, which would detonate as Air Force One was about to depart.
According to the documents, the third threat, phoned to the newspaper, indicated that Kennedy would be attacked at Dublin Airport, although the method was not specified in the call.
The documents detailed police security concerns — and also reflected officials’ desire to impress US visitors and onlookers in Britain, Ireland’s colonial master till 1922.
In a letter, Commissioner Daniel Costigan, the commander of Ireland’s national police force in 1963, described the Kennedy tour as “the most important visit to this country since the establishment of the state, with worldwide publicity. British journalists are likely to criticise any fault in arrangements.” He wrote that though unlikely, “we can’t overlook the possibility” of an assassination attempt.
Costigan said his officers would use binoculars to monitor rooftops along the route of the presidential motorcade. He added an unspecified number of policemen would be armed with handgun s, rifles and submachine guns — in a country with a largely unarmed police force — to engage any would-be sniper.
The documents indicated 6,404 police officers were on duty the night Kennedy arrived, and 2,690 lined his route from Dublin airport to the residence of Irish President Eamon de Valera.
–SHAWN POGATCHNIK
