Mr. Donovan. He must have had secret clearance to work in the radar center, because that was a minimum requirement for all of us.
Mr. Ely. Was the spot at which he worked such that in order to gain admittance one would have to show some sort of credentials?
Mr. Donovan. Yes; they checked your card data. Within the center, which is called a counter-air operations center, he rotated through all positions of an enlisted man. At times, as I told you, he served as plotter, sometimes surveillance, sometimes even as crew chief.
Mr. Ely. Were you the one who picked the crew chief?
Mr. Donovan. I was in a rather favorable position, since I was the training officer and assistant operations officer, that I had first choice of crew chiefs. I always picked one of two men—either Sgt. Cornelius Brown or Sgt. Eugene Holmburg. I have already told you where Sergeant Brown is.
Sergeant Holmburg is now a commissioned warrant officer and still on active duty in the Marine Corps.
Mr. Ely. Did you ever pick Oswald to act as crew chief?
Mr. Donovan. There was occasion when Oswald acted as crew chief. If one of these sergeants had another duty somewhere else, and Oswald was senior man present, he was crew chief. And I had no complaint about his work.
Mr. Ely. Did he show any special ability in this direction?
Mr. Donovan. Yes; I think he was competent, very competent. And I think he did his job well. I don't recall anything coming up that he could not handle.