John F. Kennedy Gave the Order for the Bay of Pigs Invasion

The aftermaths of the CIA’s failed 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, an operation, set in motion by the previous Dwight Eisenhower Administration, were now laid down on Kennedy. The failed operation was a major backslide for the CIA. "The Bay of Pigs fiasco broke the dike," said one report at the time and now senior military leaders wanted to take matters in their own hands. President Kennedy’s administration was accused of being soft on Fidel Castro, a then-new communist leader, who took powers during the 1959 Cuban revolution. With the Cold War

The first operation, the Bay of Pigs, happened in 1961 in Cuba. The process of the operation was that the U.S.A had to send troops of Cuban exiled. With the support of the Central Intelligence Agency (C.I.A), the process of the operation was separate in three steps; they needed to invade Cuba, then ally with the existing guerrilla band and finally, take down the communist government and establish a provisional government. The last step was the accord of the president. Kennedy, hesitant about the plan, gave his agreement. Unfortunately, Cubans foiled Americans when they tried to invade the country and as a result, 114 men were killed, 1,179 were captured and Kennedy refused to rescue the hostages. The other fiasco was the Mongoose operation that took place in 1963. This operation was meant to assassinate Castro and destroy the Cuban economy. The actions to the plan include sabotage, psychological warfare and intelligence collection. All

After the Cuban election of 1947, Carlos Prio quickly became known as “the most polarized, corrupt, violent, and undemocratic” president in history (Sweig 5). His atrocities prompted General Batista to carry out a coup that would put him in power, backed by the States. The relationship between Batista, Cuba, and the U.S. was one of complete economic gain. Despite the violent uproar President Batista’s coup had sparked, America continued to back and use him to establish an economic stronghold in Cuba. However, Fidel Castro, a young lawyer slated to run for the presidency pre-Batista chose to mount a revolution against him, calling it M267. “As the M267’s military strength solidified beginning in the summer of 1985, it became possible for the movement to relate to the broad anti-Batista opposition from a position of political strength” (Sweig 10). By December 31, 1958, Batista was fleeing Cuba, which made way for Fidel Castro to become

There were over 1500 cubans used in the Bay of Pigs. The USA used the cubans as an invasion force. The Cubans failed and 200 were killed and 1197 were captured. On April 19 the Invasion force surrendered. USA denied their involvement but the evidence was substantial. The Bay of Pigs gave communism a victory. This event caused a ton of tension between the United States and Cuba. The United States resorted to other ways of getting rid of Castro like assassinations. The Kennedy administration attempted to kill him 42 times. (Kaufman 2) This caused Castro to seek out Russia's help. Russia saw this as an opportunity to advance their missiles closer to the United States and to show their power. Thus started the Cuban Missile Crisis.

The Bay of Pigs is an inlet of the Gulf of Cazones located approximately 97 miles southeast of Havana (Capital of Cuba). The Bay of Pigs Invasion is one of the United States biggest invasion fails in history. The invasion was meant to overthrow communist Cuba and bring Fidel Castro’s power to an end. This was obviously a fail, because as we now know, Fidel had been in power until 2008, and now his brother Raul Castro is the president. The blame for this fail is on the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and of course, the president of the time Pr. John F Kennedy. To realize what happened during the Bay of Pigs, we must first look why the invasion happened and then we must see why the plan did not work.

The Bay of Pigs is a battle between US trained Cuban exiles and Cuban militant forces. The Bay of Pigs was a battle in result of Fidel Castro’s rise to power in Cuba and establishing a communist government in the late 1950s. Castro, along with Che Guevarra launched a campaign that infringed civil liberties such as restricting media outlets from printing anything critical of the government. Along with media restrictions, unfair trials and executions were conducted against anyone who criticized the government. Cuba’s geographical location is a concern to US interest due its close proximity to US soil. The US’ fear of Cuba being a hub for the Soviet Union to insert communist agents and sympathizers triggered the planning phase to invade Cuba.

He began confiscating Cuban ground. Most of which belonged to North Americans. This required action from The United States. The Bay of Pigs Invasion was planned and authorized under the Eisenhower administration but before he could fallow through the invasion, Kennedy took over. Fidel Castro was born in Cuba on August 13, 1926.

The Bay of Pigs invasion was in 1961. It started on April 15th with the bombing of three Cuban military bases. The bombings were by supposed to be defecting Cuban military pilots. In actuality the bombings were by US planes designed to look like the Cuban B-26. 54 people were killed in the bombing and only a part of the Cuban air force was destroyed.1 The next day was scheduled to finish the job but for unknown

From July 16th 1994, after America tested the first nuclear bomb, the rest of the world knew that they were a powerful nation and a force to be reckoned with. Over the course of 5 days in April 1961, the USA sent a CIA trained squad of exiled Cubans to remove Fidel Castro. On the 15th of April, CIA trained squad of exiled Cubans sent bombers to destroy the air force of, leader, Fidel Castro. Many viewed this as Castro’s men revolting, but in reality it over 1000 expatriated Cubans. The Bay of Pigs was stormed on April 17th 1961,their supply ships are sunk by the remaining air force. The next day, the Americans find themselves under heavy fire from Castro, Kennedy is regretting this move. Cuba is successful and the defeat is labelled by an

Lessons learned through history are the foundation for not repeating previous mistakes. The U.S. military and governments greatest success stems from their use of lessons learned and adapting to the various threats around the globe. The spread of communism following the end of World War II (WWII) and ensuing turmoil throughout Latin America, set the stage for mistakes and blunders that occurred during the late 1950s and 1960s. One key mistake is the ill-fated Bay of Pigs Invasion on 15 April 1961 and the second and third order effects that inevitably lead to the Cuban Missile Crisis a year later. The Bay of Pigs Operation placed Cuban Exiles known as the 2506 Brigade, backed and trained by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), against Cuban President Fidel Castro’s armed forces on the island nation of Cuba. The 2506 Brigade Cuban Exile Forces (CEF) conducted a night amphibious landing on the south side of the island in the Bay of Pigs area in an attempt to invoke a revolution intent on overthrowing Fidel Castro’s regime. However, after three days of fighting on established beachheads, the 2506 Brigade was defeated and the U.S. government humiliated. Historians contemplate the alternative outcome of the Bay of Pigs Operation and the eventual alliance formation between Cuba and the Soviet Union. Resulting in the Cuban Missile Crisis the following year and international tensions within Latin America into the present.

While relations with United States and Cuba were dwindling, Castro and Khrushchev, the Russian Leader at the time were growing a tighter bond. Many event’s occurred during Castro's leadership position including the Bay of Pigs Invasion. This was when the United States was trying to rise up and overthrow Castro. The CIAs made it seem like a great idea to Kennedy, president at the time, and it lead to Cuba losing many men, and also led to the Cuban Missile

In 1959 Fidel Castro made a revolt and overthrew the Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista. The U.S. didn’t trust this new dictator, and was wary of his relationship with Nikita Khrushchev, the leader of the Soviet Union. John F. Kennedy was briefed on a plan by the CIA. THe plan was to train Cuban exiles for an invasion on Cuba. The plan was to overthrow Fulgencio, and set p a non-communist government that was friendly with the United States. The United states sent 8 bomber planes to bomb Cuba airfields. The United states tried to trick Cuba by painting the planes to look like Cuban planes. THe bombing happened on April 15, 1961, and the bombers left from Nicaragua. The bombing had failed the bombs mostly missed their targets, and left Cuban airfields intact. Cuba did figure out it was the United States, so John F. Kennedy cancelled the second bombing. On April 17, 1961 the Cuban exile army, also known as the Brigade 2506, landed on the beaches along the Bay of Pigs. As soon as they step on the beach they came under heavy fire. Cuban planes bombed two of the escort ships, and destroyed half of the air support. The Brigade had to fight under bad weather and the lack ammunition. After 24 hours Castro ordered a heavy counter-attack of 20,000 soldiers, and the Cuban air force still control the skies. Some exiles escaped in sea, or killed, or rounded up and imprisoned. Almost 1,200 of the Brigade surrendered, and nearly 100

This is important because it shows the lengths the U.S. government would go to remove Castro from power. Eventually, diplomatic relations between Castro and the U.S. broke down, and with Castro’s influence, the U.S.’s and Latin America’s diplomatic relations broke down also. This was due to the fact that Castro’s influence on other South American countries was hurting America’s relationships with said countries, so the United States government felt that he had to go. To do this, the United States tried to hurt Cuba economically by putting a trade embargo on Cuba. This didn’t bring about the desired results, because the Soviet Union helped them out economically, increasing relations between the two. Due to the failure of the trade embargo Eisenhower’s administration planned the Bay of Pigs invasion, which was later carried out by Kennedy. This invasion involved training ex-Cubans militarily, and sending them back to Cuba to overthrow Castro with support of U.S. air support. Though the Soviets and Castro new of the invasion date, April 17th, 1961, President Kennedy continued with the invasion as planned. The invasion was an embarrassing failure, due to the fact that at the last moment, Kennedy decided against providing air support. Kennedy admitted to the American public that the U.S. government was behind the failed invasion, but instead of backlash from the public, Kennedy gained

On April 17th 1961 the US led a group of 1400 trained and armed Cuban exiles to the Bay of Pigs for what was planned to be a simple invasion. The emigres were to draw support from the island, and the CIA expected Fidel Castro and his “inefficient, unstable” government to collapse almost instantly. However, Fidel had learnt of the invasion at 3:15am that day, prepared the army and rounded up CIA agents and journalists. The Americans had miscalculated Castro’s popularity and the whole operation failed dramatically in just 2 days with more than 1100 taken prisoners. Fidel Castro’s government maintained its support of the people and now Kennedy believed that Khrushchev probably thought he was foolish and immature for approving such a disorganized

During the Cold War, the United States attempted to topple the regime of Cuba’s Fidel Castro through various means, including a botched invasion of the island using anti-Castro Cuban exiles, sabotage and assassination, and a restrictive embargo to undermine the Cuban economy. These actions should have ensured that a revival in US-Cuban relations could never again be possible. History, however, has overturned our expectations.