The Communists Take Cuba (1959)

In 1934, Fulgencio Batista had overthrown the government of Cuba which hampered the social reform that had been begun by four separate Presidents. In 1952, he established a dictatorship.

Fidel Castro, who had become a Communist in 1947 during his second year in law school, led an unsuccessful revolt in 1953 in which he was captured and arrested, but later paroled. [Together with] Argentinian revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara, they rebuilt the guerrilla forces. With financial backing from Russia, Castro bribed many military leaders. He got a substantial amount of support from the intellectual and working class, who knew nothing of his Communist intentions.

In April, 1957, Herbert L. Matthews, a correspondent for the New York Times and a CFR member, interviewed Fidel Castro at his mountain retreat. For three successive front page articles, he compared Castro to Lincoln and presented him as a "peasant patriot", "a strong anti-communist", a "Robin Hood", and a "defender of the people". Earlier, in a February 25, 1957 article, Matthews reported: "There is no communism to speak of in Fidel Castro's movement."

On CBS-TV, Edward R. Murrow portrayed him as a national hero. President Kennedy in a speech compared him to South American patriot Simon Bolivar. Ed Sullivan interviewed Castro for a film clip which was seen by about 30 million people in which he said: "The people of the United States have great admiration for you and your men because you are in the real American spirit of George Washington." He retracted the statement 18 months later, but it was too late.

In 1958, in an interview with Jules DuBois, Castro said: "I have never been nor am I a Communist..." The American Ambassador to Cuba declared that Batista was no longer supported by the American government and that he should leave. Roy Rubottom, the Assistant Secretary for Latin American Affairs, said in December, 1958: "There was no evidence of any organized Communist elements within the Castro movement or that Senor Castro himself was under Communist influence." In April, 1959, Castro visited the U.S., and the State Department welcomed him as a "distinguished leader."

A member of the Intelligence section of the Cuban army hand-carried Castro's dossier to Washington in 1957, delivering it to Allen Dulles, head of the CIA, which revealed that Castro was a Communist. Dulles 'buried' the file. In July, 1959, Major Pedro Diaz Lanz of the Cuban Air Force toured the United States and revealed that he had first-hand knowledge that Castro was a Communist. This fact, for the most part, was kept out of the media. The truth of the matter was that the State Department was purposely covering up Castro's Communist connections, the fact that his supporters were trained by Russia, and that he was carrying out a Communist revolution.

Arthur Gardner, the American Ambassador to Cuba, referred to Castro as a communist terrorist and [so] he was replaced by Earl E.T. Smith, who, instead of being briefed by Gardner was briefed by Herbert Matthews. A Senate Committee investigation of William A. Wieland, who in 1957 became the State Department's Caribbean representative, said that he "regularly disregarded, sidetracked or denounced FBI, State Department and military intelligence sources which branded Castro as a Communist." Robert Hill, Ambassador to Mexico, said under oath in a Senate hearing: "Individuals in the State Department, and individuals in the New York Times, put Castro in power." These individuals included Robert McNamara, Theodore C. Sorenson, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., Roy Rubottom, McGeorge Bundy, J. William Fulbright, and Roger Hilsman.

After being asked to abdicate by Eisenhower, Batista left office on December 31, 1958 and Castro took control of the country in January, 1959. Later that year, he addressed a meeting of the CFR at their New York headquarters.

The Bay of Pigs Invasion (1961)

Soon, Castro revealed his alliance with Russia and nationalized all business and industry. On October 20, 1960 Kennedy said: "We must attempt to strengthen the non-Batista democratic anti-Castro forces in exile, and in Cuba itself who offer eventual hope of overthrowing Castro."

After the U.S. broke diplomatic ties with Cuba on January 3, 1961, an invasion force was organized, financed, and trained in Florida and Guatemala by the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency, who recruited from the thousands of Cubans who had fled to the U.S. to get away from Castro.

On April 17, 1961, an anti-Castro force of 1,400 landed at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba to begin the invasion. Within striking distance were two U.S. carriers, five World War II Liberty ships, and other support vessels whose decks were loaded with planes. About 500 miles away, a group of B-26's waited. Kennedy had promised air support, but it never came.

The invasion failed because [the decision was made] not to launch the attack at the alternate site which had an airfield nearby and was more suitable for the unloading of troops and supplies, [along with] nearby mountains to hide in. Besides the fact that the U.S. didn't provide the needed air support, it wasn't even a surprise attack because the New York Times carried an article on January 10, 1961 with this headline: "U.S. Helps Train Anti-Castro Force At Secret Guatemalan Air-Ground Base," thus, the complete communist domination of Cuba was insured.

The Cuban Missile Crisis (1962)

Russia, in May of 1962, realizing the potential of Cuba's location tried to build missile sites on the island, but the U.S., considering them to be a threat to our national security, threatened Russia with possible military action if they weren't removed. After a blockade was imposed, the missiles were removed; however, the Soviets were still able to bolster the Cuban military by providing advisors, troops, aircraft, submarines, and military bases.

There are some researchers who believe that there were never any missiles on the island. The objects identified as "missiles" in government photos were no larger than pencil dots and it was impossible to concretely label them as ballistic missiles. It is believed that the incident was created by the Russians and that empty crates were removed from Cuba in exchange for an agreement by the United States to remove missiles from Russia's borders and for a guarantee that the U.S. would not support an anti-Castro invasion.

According to The Nuclear Deception: Nikita Khrushchev and the Cuban Missile Crisis (Spook Books, 2002, an imprint of InteliBooks) by Servando Gonzalez who was a political officer in the Cuban Army at the time, the presence of missiles in Cuba was never proven. The CIA maintained that there were never nuclear warheads in Cuba and American planes flying over "missile sites" and Soviet ships had never detected any radiation.

In a 1996 article titled "Fidel Castro: Supermole" Gonzalez said that Cuba had turned into an economic embarrassment. He wrote:

"Cuba, which was intended to be a showcase of the Soviet model of development in America was in fact quickly turning into a showcase of Soviet inefficiency, mainly due to the Cuban leader's inability (and the) propagation of Fidel's 'heretical' ideas."

Because Castro was perceived as being "unpredictable, volatile, undisciplined," he was being blamed for the Soviet's failure in Cuba, and Khrushchev decided he had to cut his losses and withdraw from the country. However, leaving voluntarily would give the impression that they were admitting failure, so the scheme was hatched to get rid of Castro "as a result of American aggression."

Initially, an uprising was planned that would have unseated Castro and replaced him with Anibal Escalante, a trusted Party ally. However, Castro discovered the plan and neutralized it by expelling the ringleader, Soviet ambassador Mikhailovich Kudryavtsev. A frustrated Khrushchev then hit on the idea of provoking Kennedy to invade Cuba. The idea was that Castro would be overthrown, and when no missiles were found the American government would be embarrassed. According to Gonzalez, "Khrushchev's carefully conceived plans had not counted on the unexpected and apparently irrational behavior of President Kennedy." Gonzalez writes:

"...Finally, Soviet developments in Cuba were so blatant and political pressures in the U.S. so strong, that Kennedy was forced to act. But, when he announced the blockade of the island, he unexpectedly stated that the American actions were not directed against Cuba, but against the Soviet Union.

Kennedy's behavior was so surprising that Khrushchev was caught completely off balance and panicked before the possibility of a nuclear confrontation which he had not anticipated and for which he was not prepared... Fortunately for the world, Khrushchev was enough of a political realist to recognize when a gambit had been lost... Khrushchev never understood why Kennedy had acted in such an irrational and foolish way by not attacking Cuba and, thereby, allowing Castro to stay in power."

On December 2, 1961, Castro proclaimed: "I have been a Communist since my teens." On December 11, 1963, the New York Times printed one of President Kennedy's last interviews, in which he said: "I think we have spawned, constructed, entirely fabricated without knowing it, the Castro movement."

In 1979, the New York Times published a letter from the former U.S. Ambassador to Cuba, Earl E.T. Smith, in which he said:

"Castro could not have seized power in Cuba without the aid of the United States. American government agencies and the United States press played a major role in bringing Castro to power ... The State Department consistently intervened ... to bring about the downfall of Batiste, thereby making it possible for Fidel Castro to take over the government of Cuba."