I was just there on sufferance, and I really couldn't show my hand politically, tell him anything I thought politically. He also didn't seem interested in a pointed political discussion about either society. He seemed to be able or willing to discuss in generalizations rather than in direct terms, a comparison of the two societies or anything like this. The point where I felt I could engage him was on economics, and here we did go in for some comparisons of the two societies. That was all. But politics we hardly discussed, except when he brought it up. And he didn't bring it up in terms of people at all.
(Short recess.)
Mr. Slawson. Miss Johnson, I wonder if you would search your memory with the help of your notes and make any comments you could on what contacts Lee Oswald had had with Soviet officials before you saw him, any remarks he made or things you could read between the lines, and so on.
Miss Johnson. I was looking for contact between him and the secret police, and I wanted to find out if there had been such contact, and if so, how much and was he aware of it. And I came away impressed only with the fact that he was secretive, and not at all certain what his contacts had been, but assuming that there had been some, whether or not he was aware of it.
He was very reticent as to who he had seen, what agencies they represented. I asked him whether he had told Intourist of his intention, and his answer, which is on the record somewhere, I asked him if they were encouraging him, and he said they treat it like a legal formality. They don't encourage and don't discourage you.
"They do of course warn you that it is not easy to be accepted as a citizen of the Soviet Union." They were investigating the possibility of his studying.
I assumed that the police had told him he wasn't to see any of us, and that they would tell him when he left the hotel at the end of the week not to tell any one before he left. I asked him if Intourist knew about his intentions and he refused to answer.
He said he had had an interview with an official of the Soviet Government a few days later. I assume that means after his arrival. But "official of the Soviet Government" meant nothing and I didn't know what agency that official represented.
Also I had the impression, in fact he said, he hoped that his experience as a radar operator would make him more desirable to them. That was the only thing that really showed any lack of integrity in a way about him, a negative thing. That is, he felt he had something he could give them, something that would hurt his country in a way, or could, and that was the one thing that was quite negative, that he was holding out some kind of bait. That also indicated his extreme naivete, because they have plenty of radar operators, and I doubted that anything in that realm would be of use to them, although perhaps he knew codes and things.
I didn't know anything about that.