Russia hands over secret JFK assassination to US with map for 'Trump-Putin tunnel'

John F Kennedy | (Courtesy: Britannica)

Russia has shared secret Cold War-era file on former US President John F Kennedy’s assassination to the United States. The release comes as US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin continue talks aimed at ending the Ukraine war, with their meeting set to take place in Budapest within the next two weeks soon after their last meet in Anchorage, Alaska in August.

The 350-page Soviet-era document reportedly contains the Kremlin’s own findings on Kennedy’s assassination and includes one particularly startling feature: a map labelled the Kennedy-Khrushchev World Peace Bridge. The map shows a proposed transportation link across the Bering Sea between Alaska and Russia and carries a handwritten message: "Could and should be built between Alaska and Russia. At Once." Russian media outlet Sputnik has described the file as "the Kremlin's official findings on the JFK assassination."

Florida Representative Anna Paulina Luna, part of the US House Foreign Affairs Committee, first made the JFK assassination file public online. She wrote, "The following report (referring to) the JFK assassination was delivered to me by the Ambassador from Russia and is now made accessible to the American public at the link below." Luna added, "While experts are actively authenticating the legitimacy of these documents, at this time they are believed to be authentic."

The assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas on November 22, 1963, has sparked countless theories for over six decades. The official investigation by Warren Commission (1964) concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone, but alternative theories have accused the CIA, organized crime or mafia, and even factions inside the US government. Oswald, a former US Marine who briefly defected to the Soviet Union, was himself fatally shot before a public trial could take place.

Why is Moscow releasing this document now? Commentators believe the timing is not accidental. "Is this a propaganda play? Could be," warned Jefferson Morley, who is helping Republicans analyze the file. "Clearly, they [the Russians] see some advantage in putting this out there... We have to be really careful."

More intrigue was added when Kirill Dmitriev, investment envoy to Putin, posted an image of the document’s bridge map online. "With modern The Boring Company technology, this could become a Putin-Trump tunnel connecting Eurasia and the Americas for < $8 billion," Dmitriev wrote, referring to Elon Musk’s tunnel construction firm. He later added, "Elon Musk, imagine connecting the US and Russia. The Americas and Afro-Eurasia with the Putin-Trump Tunnel-a 70-mile link symbolising unity. Traditional costs are $65B+, but [Musk's] Boring Company's tech could reduce it to less than $8 billion. Let's build a future together!"

The concept of connecting Russia and the US through the Bering Strait has circulated for generations. In 2016, The Schiller Institute promoted the idea in a report titled Beijing to Seattle Through the Bering Strait. The think tank claimed, "The Bering Strait tunnel will be one of the greatest symbols of the coming end of British imperial geopolitical operations, when the United States joins Russia, China, and India for a new era of peace through development."

Internet commentator Mario Nawfal is among those connecting the old bridge proposal to current politics, asking, "Could a Cold War dream actually unite the two continents?", suggesting that the Peace Bridge was proposed by JFK himself. He also questioned Russia’s motives in releasing the file now: "Why is Putin giving US conservatives access to explosive Cold War-era secrets, at this moment?"

The US sought access to these KGB files in the 1990s but received only a summary during the Clinton administration. Gerald Posner, author of a well-known book on the JFK assassination, suggested that the sudden handover could be a distraction, as per New York Post. "In the '90s, the files had a price," he said. "I think that the Russians providing them is a distraction from what's going on in Ukraine."

Whether the contents of the JFK file reveal anything new about the assassination remains to be seen. However, the resurfacing of the Kennedy-Khrushchev Peace Bridge proposal -- now being rebranded as a possible Trump-Putin tunnel -- has already stirred geopolitical debate. As analysts study the classified Soviet report, many believe the idea of linking North America and Russia physically has the potential to unsettle global alliances and realign international cooperation in unforeseen ways.