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If you're unaware Eisenhower trained people for the invasion in Guatemala, well BEFORE Kennedy, you haven't done any reading on the subject. Here's a quick google grab, with far, far more to back it up: Vice President Richard Nixon was devoted to the idea of opposing Castro as early as April 1959, when Castro visited the U.S. as a guest of the American Society of Newspaper Editors. "If he's not a communist," said Nixon, "he certainly acts like one." On March 17 1960, President Eisenhower approved a CIA plan titled "A Program of Covert Action against the Castro Regime."
The plan included: 1) the creation of a responsible and unified Cuban opposition to the Castro regime located outside of Cuba, 2) the development of a means for mass communication to the Cuban people as part of a powerful propaganda offensive, 3) the creation and development of a covert intelligence and action organization within Cuba which would respond to the orders and directions of the exile opposition, and 4) the development of a paramilitary force outside of Cuba for future guerrilla action. These goals were to be achieved "in such a manner as to avoid the appearance of U.S. intervention."
In a meeting at the White House on January 3 1961, described by Richard Bissell, CIA Director of Plans, in his book Memoirs of a Cold Warrior: from Yalta to Bay of Pigs, Eisenhower "seemed to be eager to take forceful action against Castro, and breaking off diplomatic relations appeared to be his best card. He noted that he was prepared to 'move against Castro' before Kennedy's inauguration on the twentieth if a 'really good excuse' was provided by Castro. 'Failing that,' he said, 'perhaps we could think of manufacturing something that would be generally acceptable.' …This is but another example of his willingness to use covert action-specifically to fabricate events-to achieve his objectives in foreign policy."
By the time Kennedy took office in January 1961, he had already made serious commitments to the Cuban exiles, promising to oppose communism at every opportunity, and supporting the overthrow of Castro. During the campaign, Kennedy had repeatedly accused Eisenhower of not doing enough about Castro.
Eisenhower, Kennedy and other high ranking U.S. officials continually denied any plans to attack Cuba, but as early as October 31 1960, Cuban Foreign Minister Raúl Roa, in a session at the U.N. General Assembly, was able to provide details on the recruitment and training of the Cuban exiles, whom he referred to as mercenaries and counterrevolutionaries. (The CIA recruits were paid $400 a month to train, with an additional allotment of $175 for their wives and more for their children.) http://www.historyofcuba.com/history/baypigs/pigs3.htm~~~~~~~~~~On April 17, 1961, 1400 Cuban exiles launched what became a botched invasion at the Bay of Pigs on the south coast of Cuba.
During the period between the election and his inauguration, JFK was briefed on a CIA plan developed within the Eisenhower Administration to train Cuban exiles for an invasion of their homeland. The United States was distrustful of Fidel Castro, the leader of Cuba, and wary of his relationship with Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet premier. The plan anticipated that support from the Cuban people and perhaps even from elements of the Cuban military would lead to the overthrow of Castro and the establishment of a non-communist government friendly to the United States.
Invasion preparations had begun in March of 1960, when President Eisenhower approved a CIA plan to train Cuban exiles. Camps in Guatemala were established, and by November the operation had trained a small army in guerilla tactics and conventional assault landing procedures.
In Miami, Jose Miro Cardona, leader of the anti-Castro Cuban exiles in the United States, became head of the United Revolutionary Front, poised to take over the provisional presidency of Cuba upon the successful invasion. Despite efforts of the government to keep the invasion plans covert, it became common knowledge in Miami. The press reported widely on events as they unfolded, and Castro soon learned of the guerilla training camps in Guatemala. http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/JFK+in+History/JFK+and+the+Bay+of+Pigs.htm~~~~~~~~~~~~If you're referring to the fact Russia put missiles in Cuba to serve as a deterrent to future attacks from the U.S., there's a huge number of places you'll find confirmation for that FACT, not theory. Most people have known this from the first. ~snip~
The Cuban Missile Crisis was a confrontation between the United States, the Soviet Union, and Cuba during the Cold War. In Russia, it is termed the "Caribbean Crisis," (Russian: Карибский кризис, Karibskiy krizis) while in Cuba it is called the "October Crisis." The crisis ranks with the Berlin Blockade as one of the major confrontations of the Cold War, and is often regarded as the moment in which the Cold War came closest to a nuclear war.
In Havana, there was fear of military intervention by the United States in Cuba.<1> In April 1961, the threat of invasion became real when a force of CIA-trained Cuban exiles opposed to Castro landed at the Bay of Pigs. The invasion was quickly terminated by Cuba's military forces given that promised American air support never arrived. President John F. Kennedy canceled air support as the invasion had already commenced. Castro was convinced the United States would invade Cuba.<2> Shortly after routing the Bay of Pigs Invasion, Castro felt more comfortable to finally declare Cuba a socialist republic and a Soviet Satellite state, and began to modernize Cuba's military with direct Soviet funding.
The United States feared the Soviet expansion of communism or socialism, but for a Latin American country to openly ally with the USSR was regarded as unacceptable, given the Russo-American enmity dating from the end of the Second World War in 1945. Such an involvement would also directly contradict the Monroe Doctrine that prevented European powers from getting involved in South American matters.
In late 1961, Kennedy engaged Operation Mongoose, a series of covert operations against Castro's government which were to prove unsuccessful.<3>. More overtly, in February 1962, the United States launched an economic embargo against Cuba.<4>
The United States also considered direct military attack. Air Force Gen. Curtis LeMay presented to Kennedy a pre-invasion bombing plan in September, while spy flights and minor military harassment from the United States Guantanamo Naval Base were the subject of continual Cuban diplomatic complaints to the U.S. government.
By September 1962, Cuban observers fearing an imminent invasion would have seen increasing signs of American preparations for a possible confrontation, including a joint Congressional resolution authorizing the use of military force in Cuba if American interests were threatened,<5> and the announcement of an American military exercise in the Caribbean planned for the following month (Operation Ortsac).
The climax period of the crisis began on October 8, 1962. Later on October 14th, United States reconnaissance photographs taken by an American U-2 spy plane revealed missile bases being built in Cuba. The crisis ended two weeks later on October 28, 1962, when President of the United States John F. Kennedy and United Nations Secretary-General U Thant reached an agreement with the Soviets to dismantle the missiles in Cuba in exchange for a no invasion agreement and a secret removal of the Jupiter and Thor missiles in Turkey. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Missile_Crisis~~~~~~~~~~snip~
The Cuban Missile Crisis was the closest the world ever came to nuclear war. The United States armed forces were at their highest state of readiness ever and Soviet field commanders in Cuba were prepared to use battlefield nuclear weapons to defend the island if it was invaded. Luckily, thanks to the bravery of two men, President John F. Kennedy and Premier Nikita Khrushchev, war was averted. In 1962, the Soviet Union was desperately behind the United States in the arms race. Soviet missiles were only powerful enough to be launched against Europe but U.S. missiles were capable of striking the entire Soviet Union.
According to Nikita Khrushchev's memoirs, in May 1962 he conceived the idea of placing intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Cuba as a means of countering an emerging lead of the United States in developing and deploying strategic missiles. He also presented the scheme as a means of protecting Cuba from another United States-sponsored invasion, such as the failed attempt at the Bay of Pigs in 1961.
Secretly build missile installations in Cuba were initiated after obtaining Fidel Castro's approval. Fidel Castro was looking for a way to defend his island nation from an attack by the U.S. Ever since the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, Castro felt a second attack was inevitable. Consequently, he approved of Khrushchev's plan to place missiles on the island. In the summer of 1962 the Soviet Union worked quickly and secretly to build its missile installations in Cuba. http://www.jfklancer.com/jfk1bop.html~~~~~~~~~~Gaps in the Cuban Missile Crisis Story
By PIERRE SALINGER; PIERRE SALINGER, FORMER PRESS SECRETARY TO JOHN F. KENNEDY, IS SENIOR EDITOR, EUROPE, FOR ABC NEWS.
Published: February 5, 1989
LEAD: During last week's round-table discussion among Russians, Cubans and Americans who, like me, had lived through the Cuban missile crisis, the hope of coming closer to the origins and facts of the event was substantially realized.
During last week's round-table discussion among Russians, Cubans and Americans who, like me, had lived through the Cuban missile crisis, the hope of coming closer to the origins and facts of the event was substantially realized.
To my disappointment, however, some of the participants seemed to judge the events of 1962 from the perspective of the cooled political climate of 1989 detente. It seems clear, for instance, that the Kennedy Administration, under heavy political pressures, was indeed planning to invade Cuba in the fall of 1962, and that the Kremlin sent the missiles to Cuba to forestall an attack. But Robert S. McNamara, who was John F. Kennedy's Defense Secretary, denied that Washington had any such plans. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE3DC103FF936A35751C0A96F948260 |
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