The 40th anniversary of the murder of four antiwar protesters at the hands of Ohio National Guardsmen at Kent State University is May 4, but the full truth of this abhorrent event still is not known.
The big question is whether the guardsmen, who fired 
67 rounds over a period of 13 seconds, were ordered to open fire on the more than 1,000 people, who were protesting the U.S. invasion of Cambodia for the third straight day, or whether they believed that they were being fired on by a sniper, the story promoted by Ohio Governor James Rhodes but never confirmed.
Rhodes had ordered the guardsmen to the campus after the university's ROTC building was set afire and rocks were thrown at police and firemen.
That question may now be answered because an audio recording of the moments before the guardsmen opened fire 
with their M1 rifles will be professionally analyzed to try to determine if an order to fire is audible.
The recording was made by a Kent State communications student who set the microphone of his reel-to-reel tape recorder on the windowsill of his dormitory room before he went outside to watch the protest.
The news comes on the eve of the meeting of the Kent State Truth Tribunal, which will begin four days of hearings today.
Hat tip to Will Bunch at Attytood
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