The Bay of Pigs invasion of April 1961 started a few days before the bombing of Cuba on April fifteenth by what appeared to be defecting Cuban air force pilots. At 6 a.m. on that Saturday, B-26 bombers bombed three Cuban military bases. The airfields at Camp Libertad, San Antonio de Los Banos and Antonio Maceo airport at Santiago de Cuba were fired upon. Seven people were killed at Libertad and forty-seven people were killed at other sites on the island. Two of the B-26s left Cuba and flew to Miami, apparently to defect to the United States.

The Cuban Revolutionary Council, the government in exile, in New York City released a statement saying, “The bombings in Cuba were carried out by ‘Cubans inside Cuba’ who were ‘in contact with’ the top command of the Revolutionary Council.” The New York Times reporter covering the story alluded to something being wrong with the whole situation. He wondered how the council knew the pilots were coming if the pilots had only decided to leave Cuba on Thursday after a suspected betrayal by a fellow pilot had precipitated a plot to strike. Whatever the case, the planes came down in Miami later that morning. One landed at Key West Naval Air Station at 7:00 a.m. and the other at Miami International Airport at 8:20 a.m. Both planes were badly damaged and their fuel tanks were nearly empty. On the front page of The New York Times the next day, a picture of a B-26 was shown along with a picture of one of the pilots wearing a baseball hat and hiding behind dark sunglasses. His name was withheld. Even at this early stage, a sense of conspiracy had begun to unravel the events of that week. In the early hours of April seventeenth, the assault on the Bay of Pigs began in a cloak and dagger fashion. The assault began at 2 a.m. with a team of “frogmen” going ashore with orders to set up landing lights. Those lights indicated to the main assault force the precise location of their objectives, as well as to clear the area of anything that may impede the main landing teams when they arrived at 2:30 a.m. At 3:00 a.m., two battalions came ashore at Playa Gir¢n and one battalion at Playa Larga beaches. The troops at Playa Gir¢n had orders to move west, northwest, up the coast and meet with the troops at Playa Larga in the middle of the bay. A small group of men were then to be sent north to the town of Jaguey Grande to secure it as well. When looking at a modern map of Cuba it is obvious that troops would have problems in the area that was chosen for them to land. The area around the Bay of Pigs is a swampy marshland area, which would be hard on the troops. The Cuban forces were quick to react and Castro ordered his T-33 trainer jets, along with two Sea Furies, and two B-26s into the air to stop the invading forces. Off the coast were the command and control ship and another vessel carrying supplies for the invading forces. The Cuban air force made quick work of the supply ships, sinking the command vessel, Marsopa, and the supply ship, Houston, blasting them to pieces with five-inch rockets. Lost with the Houston was the fifth battalion as well as the supplies for the landing teams and eight other smaller vessels. With some of the invading forces’ ships destroyed, and no command and control ship, the logistics of the operation soon broke down as the other supply ships were kept at bay by Casto’s air force. As with many failed military adventures, one of the problems with this one was with supplying the troops. In the air, Castro had easily won superiority over the invading force. His fast moving T-33s, although unimpressive by today’s standards, made short work of the slow moving B-26s of the invading force. On Tuesday, two were shot out of the sky and by Wednesday, the invaders had lost 10 of their 12 aircraft. With air power firmly in control of Castro’s forces, the end was near for the invading army. During the seventy-two-hour invasion, the Cubans pounded the invading force of about 1500 men. The invaders’ weapons were no match for Castro’s 122mm Howitzers, 22mm cannons, and tank fire. By Wednesday the invaders were pushed back to their landing zone at Playa Gir¢n. Surrounded by Castro’s forces, some surrendered while others fled into the hills. One hundred fourteen men were killed in the slaughter while thirty-six died as prisoners in Cuban cells. Others were to live out twenty years or more in those cells for plotting to topple the government of Castro. The men of the invading force never had a chance for suc

Some topics in this essay:
Bay Pigs, President Kennedy, Soviet Union, York Times, Lost Houston, Americans Cuban, Cuba” Kennedy, Furies B-26s, Surrounded Castro’s, Operation Pluto, bay pigs, york times, soviet union, bay pigs invasion, pigs invasion, air force, president kennedy, operation pluto, castro’s forces, charge operation, central intelligence, bay pigs failure, cuban air force, height cold war, failure bay pigs,