JFK Bay of Pigs invasion - HISTORY April 17, 1961
JFK waits for word on the Bay of Pigs invasion
President John F. Kennedy waits for word on the success of a covert plan to overthrow Cuba’s government on this day in 1961. Kennedy had authorized Operation Zapata, the attempt to overthrow Cuba’s communist leader, Fidel Castro, on April 15. The failed coup became what many have called the worst foreign-policy decision of Kennedy’s administration.
When Kennedy entered the White House in January 1961, he inherited from his predecessor, Dwight D. Eisenhower, an ongoing conflict with the leftist regime in Cuba. Aided by Soviet-bloc weaponry, Castro led a brutal clampdown on human rights and dissent after taking power in 1959. That same year, Eisenhower had implemented a trade embargo on Cuban goods and, in 1960, broke off diplomatic relations with the island nation. Before he left office, Eisenhower had approved, but did not launch, a covert plan devised by his vice president, Richard Nixon, and the CIA to overthrow Cuba’s leader, Fidel Castro. When Kennedy assumed the presidency, he retained Eisenhower’s CIA and military advisors who had helped plan the mission. At their urging, Kennedy made the final decision to send approximately 1,200 CIA-trained Cuban exiles to land at the bay on Cuba’s southern coast called Bahia de Cochinos (Bay of Pigs). The attempted coup failed miserably, largely due to faulty intelligence. Kennedy and the CIA leaders in charge of the mission (all inherited from Eisenhower) believed that Cuba’s people and its military would spontaneously rise up to help the exile army overthrow Castro, a grave miscalculation. Instead, Castro’s forces captured most of the exile army, executed some and held the rest prisoner until private American groups raised funds for their ransom.
The CIA and JFK’s administration blamed each other for the plan’s failure. The CIA cited JFK’s failure to order prolonged offensive air strikes again Castro.
May President Kennedy R.I.P.
WWG1WGA
I wonder what AOC will spew from her communist mouth today.