Also, Castro blamed the USA for the island's poverty and sought aid from the USSR. In the past the USA had always bought Cuba's sugar, so when America refused to buy their sugar, the USSR agreed to buy it in return for oil and machinery. All this caught the USA off guard because the USA always saw Castro as non-threatening. A4 states that in America, Castro was virtually unknown and that "American ignorance to the changes he had in mind was one of the reasons for the friction, which later developed between Cuba and America leading to the Bay of Pigs invasion". .
When Kennedy took over as American president in 1961, he became the youngest ever president. He was told of a CIA plan to invade Cuba and overthrow Castro, which he allowed to go ahead but the result was a disaster, and became known as the Bay of Pigs. On April 17th, about 1500 of Castro's opponents landed at Cochinos Bay (Bay of Pigs) on the southern coasts of Cuba. They were equipped with arms provided by the USA. These rebels had told the CIA that the Cubans would join them and overthrow Castro, unfortunately they did not. The group was poorly trained and badly equipped; even their maps were out of date. They were outnumbered by almost 300 to 1 and within three days the invaders were either dead or in prison. The results of the Bay of Pigs were the opposite of what the CIA had intended. Firstly, Castro became more popular because of how easily the Cuban army had defeated the invaders. Source C1 is a primary source because it is a speech made by Fidel Castro at the funerals of the Cubans killed in the Bay of Pigs. What he is saying is that what the Americans can't stand is that the Cubans have made a revolution right under the American's noses, and they didn't even realise. It is obviously a biased source because it is from Castro, the Cuban president. C2 is a poster issued by the Cuban government with the phrase "The defence of our country is everybody's duty".