Lone nut

"Lone nuts" feature repeatedly in official narratives of assassinations. The rapid placing of blame provides closure to what might otherwise result in inconvenient and potentially damaging investigation of deeper forces at work, while providing a chance to stir up strife by inciting factionalism. The 'nut' aspect means that a rational explanation is not required, while the 'lone' aspect conveniently explains the lack of any supporting documentary evidence.

"Lone nut"
Lee Harvey Oswald, the archetypal "lone nut". In fact, he was a patsy, framed for the JFK Assassination. He himself was murdered while in police custody by another "lone nut".
"Lone nuts" feature repeatedly in official narratives of assassinations. The rapid placing of blame provides closure to what might otherwise result in inconvenient and potentially damaging investigation of deeper forces at work, while providing a chance to stir up strife by inciting factionalism. The 'nut' aspect means that a rational explanation is not required, while the 'lone' aspect explains the lack of any supporting documentary evidence.

The "lone nut" is a familiar figure in official explanations of deep events, particularly assassinations. The meme is designed to avoid the need for explanations of why people did what they did, or the expectation of documents of other evidence to determine their guilt or innocence.

Official Narrative

Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby, Sirhan Sirhan, Mark David Chapman, Gavrilo Princip, Bruce Ivins... Official historical narratives are full of "lone nuts" who - whether afflicted by extreme greed, envy, desire for fame, pernicious ideology or mental illness - all decided to act independently of any organisation to carry out a murder of someone important in some deep political matter. A paper published in the Journal of Forensic Sciences (and distributed by the US Secret Service) found that around 2/3 of assassins had previously been arrested (not necessarily for related offenses), 44% had a history of serious depression, and that 39% had a history of substance abuse.

Problems

The "lone nut" claim might hold water if made very occasionally, and in in the absence of other complicating factors, but this does not appear to fit the observed facts. Not least because a plethora of killings seem to have been carried out by "lone nuts".

Secrecy

The insistence that authorities files on "lone nuts" remain secret naturally provokes suspicion. If the perpetrators were really acting alone, and just randomly picked their victims, one might expect little reason for the destruction or withholding of evidence by authorities. As of 2016, the US government has still not released all its documents regarding the JFK assassination - prompting one to wonder why not, if Oswald was indeed a "lone nut" already dead for over half a century. Audio and video recordings of Sirhan Sirhan's 2016 parole hearing were prohibited and only one reporter was allowed in the hearing to report on what happened. He condensed “more than three hours of intense testimony” into just 854 words.

It is not unusual that "lone nuts" never receive a normal legal process. In some cases this is because of their sudden death, whether before their accusation (Bruce Ivins) or soon after (Lee Harvey Oswald), in other cases legal methods prevent a trial (e.g. James Earl Ray). Where they do, they are sometimes quietly found not guilty (Christer Pettersson). Increasingly often, especially when Muslim, "lone nuts" are killed in the process of their attack, whether by their own hand or that of the authorities (e.g. Seifeddine Rezgui Yacoubi, Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, David Sonboly).

The Quest for Manchurian Candidates

Full article: MK-Ultra

An explicit aim of the CIA's MKULTRA 'mind control' programmes was to create Manchurian Candidates, i.e. programmed (i.e. involuntary) assassins. A number of intelligence agencies spent a large amount of effort was expended exploring a range of methods such as drugs, hypnosis, electroshock either alone or in combination, on both ordinary people (both witting and unwitting) and those specifically chosen (those of high suggestibility or low IQ) to render them more susceptible to such methods. The extent and results of this research remain matters of conjecture after CIA Director Richard Helms order the complete destruction of all documents about this work in 1973. Many supposed "lone nuts" have had either admitted or suspected links to MK-ULTRA or its derivative programmes, including Sirhan Sirhan and Theodore Kaczynski. Shane O'Sullivan reports that "The overwhelming opinion of the psychologists who have worked most closely with Sirhan over the years is that he was in a hypnotic state at the time of the shooting and that his amnesia for the shooting is genuine."

Busy Files

Often, authorities have existing files on those later disclosed as "Lone Nuts", and sometimes standard operating procedure is violated on the recommendation of higher ups, such as when Michael Springmann was orderedl to issue US visas to many of the suspected "terrorists" later alleged to be involved in 9/11. Another pattern noted by Peter Dale Scott is a sudden flurry of activity in these files just before the "Lone nuts" go on to commit actions of which, authorities later insist, they were unaware.

Basic logical errors

Elementary logical slips are often made which naturally arouse suspicion about the honesty of the investigations which blame one nuts. In the case of the JFK assassination, for example, a description was very quickly released which precisely matched the description of FBI's record on Oswald, but which was not a good match for the man himself. The Warren Commission made conclude the contradictory findings that (i) Oswald acted alone & (ii) that surveillance of communications needed to be stepped up.

Irrelevance

Sometimes there is evidence to suggest either that the actions of these so-called "lone nuts" were irrelevant or even non-existant. Many people^[Who?] have suggestedl that Lee Harvey Oswald, for example, did not fire a shot.

Patterns

The FBI claimed in 2009 that "We believe most domestic attacks are carried out by lone offenders to promote their own grievances and agendas."

It is more likely that the US law enforcement system has a standard cover-up modus operandi or MO for dealing with a suspect who is marginally attached to intelligence operations, covert operations, even controversial operations which are opposed by other elements of the US government. It is to tell the public (as they did earlier in the case of Oswald) that the suspect "acted alone."

Peter Dale Scott

Premature Death

These 'lone nuts' often suffer premature death in suspicious circumstances - sometimes soon after public identification, such as Lee Harvey Oswald, murdered while still in police custody - sometimes before they have even been identified as such, such as in the case of Bruce Ivins, a 'posthumous lone nut', whose machinations just happened to fit very neatly together with PNAC's ideas about a 'new pearl harbor'. Very commonly, standard operating procedure is violated and long established rules bent or broken in favour of a snap judgment of guilt.

Lost and Found ID

Full article: Lost and Found ID

Since they officially act alone, the question arises how the establishment can identify such "lone nuts". One method is the broader "Lost and Found ID" syndrome, whereby perpetrators (e.g. Lee Harvey Oswald or James Earl Ray) conveniently leave a trail of identity documents for investigators to pick up.

Real Lone Nuts

There may be some real 'lone nuts', with bona fide mental problems and no connections to deep politics. Statistically speaking, if they attacked people at random, on very rare occasions, their targets might be figures of deep political significance. The most suspicious indication of fake lone nuts is a known connection to deep state elements such as the intelligence services.

"Radicalisation"

Full article: “Radicalisation”

An official narrative is being crafted to suggest that exposure to "extremist" material can induce vulnerable people to become lone nuts, a process which is generally described in connection with Muslim men, but which is used an indirect justification for increasingly totalitarian laws such as arbitrary censorship and infringement of civil liberties. In 2016, Dean Haydon, head of Counter Terrorism Command of Scotland Yard remarked about Muhiddin Mire "And what we found following his arrest is, certainly from his mobile phone and other digital media, that he had downloaded a vast amount of extremist material which we think certainly inspired him to conduct an attack here."

"War on Terror"

Full article: “War on Terror”

The USA Patriot Act passed in 2001 contained special provisions for "lone wolf terrorists".

In 2006, without any announcement in the commercially-controlled media, the UK government set up "Fixated Threat Assessment Centre" which blurs the line between policing and medicalisation. Ostensibly to reduce risk to politicians, members of the British Royal Family, and other public figures, it was set up under the war on terror. It has been criticised as challenging free speech for effectively criminalising public criticism of the establishment. On 9 May 2014, UK Grenadier soldier Vivian Cunningham was committed to a mental hospital for asking questions about the status of Queen Elizabeth under Common Law court. In 2014, the BBC reported Scotland Yard commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe that 'there was "growing concern" about the possibility of a "lone wolf" attack on the streets of the UK'.

 

Examples

Page name	Accused of	Died	Cause of death	Description
Leon Czolgosz	William McKinley/Assassination	29 October 1901		Killed for the assassination of William McKinley
Germanwings Flight 9525				Air crash blamed on lone nut pilot. The investigation covered up several important aspects.
Roy Den Hollander		20 July 2020		A "crazed gunman" who reportedly shot at the son and husband of Esther Salas, killing the former.
Marinus van der Lubbe	Reichstag Fire	10 January 1934		Blamed for the Reichstag Fire
Ryan Routh	Trump/Assassination attempt in Florida
Giuseppe Zangara		20 March 1933

 

Related Document

Title	Type	Publication date	Author(s)	Description
Document:JFK and RFK: The Plots that Killed Them, The Patsies that Didn’t	article	13 June 2010	James Fetzer

 

Official examples

Name	Accused of	Died	Cause of death	Description
Anis Amri	2016 Berlin attack	23 December 2016	Gunshot	Supposed perpetrator of the 2016 Berlin attack, termed "Not independently notable" by Wikipedia.
Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel	Nice truck event	14 July 2016		The official perpetrator of the Nice truck event
Anders Breivik	2011 Norway attacks			Convicted of planting the bomb that killed 8 people in central Oslo, Norway, followed by the shooting to death of 66 teenagers on a nearby camping island on 22 July 2011
Martin Bryant	Port Arthur Massacre			The official "lone nut" perpetrator of the Port Arthur Massacre, with an IQ of just 66.
Mark David Chapman	John Lennon/Assassination			The convicted but probable controlled patsy killer of John Lennon.
Thomas Hamilton	Dunblane school massacre	13 March 1996		A "lone nut" who shot a class of primary children and their teacher before turning the gun on himself.
John Hinckley	Ronald Reagan/Assassination attempt			Would be assassin of Ronald Reagan, under institutional psychiatric care since the episode. Let loose in 2018.
Bruce Ivins	2001 Anthrax attacks	29 July 2008	Drug overdose	A biodefense researcher at Fort Detrick, Maryland who, the FBI concluded, sent anthrax letters with crude anti-Zionist messages to the US politicians who were holding up the rollback of civil liberties in the wake of 9/11. After an investigation costing around $100,000,000 Ivins was declared to be a "lone nut" responsible for the crime shortly after he was found dead.
Gundolf Köhler	Oktoberfest Bombing	26 September 1980	Oktoberfest Bombing	Supposed "lone nut" perpetrator of the 1980 Oktoberfest bombing
Andreas Lubitz	Germanwings Flight 9525	24 March 2015		27 year old pilot who was blamed for the crash of Germanwings Flight 9525
Thomas Mair	Jo Cox/Murder			Depicted by corporate media as a "lone nut" killer of Jo Cox in the run up to the UK's EU referendum.
Khalid Masood	2017 Westminster attack	22 March 2017		Named by UK police as the perpetrator of the 2017 Westminster attack
Omar Mateen	2016 Orlando nightclub shooting	12 June 2016
Muhaydin Mire	Leytonstone tube station attack			Convicted of attempted murder and admitted four counts of attempted wounding.
Lee Harvey Oswald	JFK/Assassination	24 November 1963		A patsy accused of the assassination of JFK and assassinated himself 2 days later by another "lone nut" gunman
Stephen Paddock		1 October 2017	Gunshot	A "lone nut" officially responsible for the 2017 Las Vegas shooting.
Christer Pettersson	Olof Palme/Assassination	29 September 2004		A "lone nut" who was imprisoned for the murder of Olof Palme, but released on appeal in light of the lack of evidence.
Gavrilo Princip		28 April 1918		The "lone nut" assassin who supposedly started the First World War
James Earl Ray	MLK/Assassination	23 April 1998		Charged by the US government for the killing of Martin Luther King. He died in jail having never had a trial.
Jack Ruby	Lee Harvey Oswald/Assassination	3 January 1967	Pulmonary embolism	A "lone nut" who killed another lone nut to try to hide the conspiracy which killed JFK. Both were actually assets controlled by the deep state groups who ran that coup.
Sirhan Sirhan	RFK/Assassination			A patsy who was very likely MK-ultra'ed to assassinate Robert Kennedy.
David Sonboly	2016 Munich shooting	22 July 2016	Gunshot	Official perpetrator of the 2016 Munich shooting
Seifeddine Rezgui Yacoubi	2015 Sousse attacks			The claimed perpetrator of the 2015 Sousse attacks.

Rating

1 July 2016 Robin  A good overview of this staple part of official narratives of deep events
This explains why the "lone nut" is such a convenient part of official narratives, and presents a good summary table of the "lone nuts" described on this site.

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