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such as held by Colonel Hawkins, was strongly presented to the President"; and the Attorney General added, "People that actually have to carry the operation through don't have access to the 69/* President." - The eighth meeting of the Taylor Committee took place on 2 ~ay 1961, and among the witnesses called for this session were Grayston Lynch and William "Rip" Robertson. Mr. Lynch had pre- viously testified (at the 6th meeting of the Cuban Study Group) where he spelled out his role in marking the route for the landing craft coming in at Blue beach. He was called back as a witness at the e~ghth meeting in order to clarify some aspects of the chronology as given in his initial session, but according to the memorandum for the meeting "he did relatively little to clarify the chronology." Based on the records of the Taylor Committee, Mr. Lynch was probably the one who came closest to encouraging the Cubans in their belief that they would get direct us support during the course of the invasion. The comment on Mr. Lynch's .appearance was: * The comment made by the Attorney General probably was one of the few made by Mr. Kennedy with which Jake Esterline, the Chief of WH/4 (the anti-Castro project) agreed. In the course of an interview with this writer, Mr. Esterline was quite explicit about the failure, particularly of the Agency, to let either Hawkins or himself do the major share of the b~iefings to the most senior . audiences. As already noted with reference to the previous meetings of the Taylor Committee, Messrs. Dulles, Cabell, Bissell, and Barnes were all guilty of sins of omission and commission that contributed significantly to confusing the picture of both the planning and operational stages of the Agency's anti-Castro effort. 76 ; ~.. ., .1.1