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doubt concerning whether assassination was authorized by the Administrations. Even if the plots were not expressly authorized, it does not follow that the Agency personnel believed they were acting improperly.

1. The Command and Control System for Assassinations Was Such That the Plots Could Have Been Undertaken Without Express Authorization

As emphasized throughout this report, we are unable to draw firm conclusions concerning responsibility for the assassination plots. Even after our long investigation, it is unclear whether the conflicting and inconclusive state of the evidence is due to the system of plausible denial and its attendant doctrines, or whether there were in fact serious shortcomings in the system of authorization which made it possible for assassination efforts to have been undertaken by agencies of the United States Government without express authority from officials outside of those agencies.

Our preeminent finding is that assassination could have been undertaken by an agency of the United States Government without it having been uncontrovertibly clear that there was

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