Mr. Jenner. I see. And you learned about it through what source?
Mr. Thornley. The Stars and Stripes, the military newspaper in the Far East. It was on page 3, I believe, a little article about Lee Harvey Oswald having appeared in the American Embassy in Moscow, having plopped down his passport and requested Soviet citizenship. My first reaction was, "Good Lord, what is going on here?" And afterward, I, of course—it began to occur to me, his interest in communism, and I started kicking myself, thinking, well, you know, just for so misjudging a person. I just——
Mr. Jenner. Misjudging? What respect, please?
Mr. Thornley. As far as his sincerity went. I did not ever think he was so interested in communism to go to all the trouble to go to the Soviet Union and certainly to jeopardize his citizenship, and so forth. This was a great surprise to me. And right away I began to try to figure out the mechanism of his thinking.
Mr. Jenner. I see. Keep going and tell me what your rationalization and thinking was at that time.
Mr. Thornley. And what caused him to do this. This gets us back to the emotional instability and why did it occur. I do believe, to begin with, Oswald, how long ago he had acquired the idea I don't know, but I think in his mind it was almost a certainty that the world would end up under a totalitarian government or under totalitarian governments.
I think he accepted Orwell's premise in this that their was no fighting it. That sooner or later you were going to have to love Big Brother and I think this was the central, I think this was the central thing that disturbed him and caused many of his other reactions.
I think he wanted to be on the winning side for one thing, and, therefore, the great interest in communism. I think he wanted—I think he felt he was under a totalitarian system while in the Marine Corps, and, therefore, the extreme reactions when someone would call him a Communist. I think he had a persecution complex, and I think he strove to maintain it. I could not go so far as to say why. Perhaps it was necessary to his self-esteem in some way. This was and is the general conclusion I now have as to his general motivations, his overall motivations, insofar as he has tended to be emotionally unstable.
Mr. Jenner. Do you think he was emotionally unstable?
Mr. Thornley. I think so.