Greg Burnham

Greg, I've always assumed that Rusk was in the chain of command to Bundy regarding this action, but I have no idea WHY Rusk did this. Can you elaborate? Tom Hi Tom, Yes, I can. And again, I must stress that I prefer not to speculate beyond that which is necessary. In this case some speculation seems in order. Here's what we know, which is not speculation: The best military minds who worked on this project insisted, unequivocally and without exception, that absolute dominance of the airspace over the BOP was paramount else the mission would fail. This was not up for question from the military's point of view, upon whom JFK relied to instruct his decision making. We must take this as a foundational parameter for the rules of engagement. IOW: If air dominance was deemed unachievable for whatever reasons, then the mission would not be successful and should therefore be abandoned. In order to insure air domination, it was therefore decided that Castro's air force needed to be completely eliminated--preferably while it was still on the ground. Why did it need to be taken out while on the ground? Because the anti-Castro Cubans did not possess jet fighters that could dog fight against Castro's T-33 jets. They only possessed the rather lumbering old B-26 bombers that we gave them. These aircraft could not win if Castro's planes were airborne. Their only hope was to take out his planes in a surprise attack before they could get off the ground. That was obviously the only logical option. How to accomplish it without revealing America's hand in it was the tricky part. We couldn't just send in the US Navy unprovoked to blow up Castro's airfields and planes without violating international law. So the modified B-26's would use their 50 caliber machine guns to take out the planes while on the ground during two separate raids. The first raid was scheduled to take place two days prior to D-day. Then the CIA came up with a lame brained plan. In order to incite the disaffection of Castro's military, particularly his pilots, the Agency decided to disguise the anti-Castro Cuban planes as Castro's own aircraft for that first air raid. After the raid was over the B-26's landed in Miami and the pilots claimed to have been defecting from Castro's air force, but decided to blow up as many of his planes as possible on their way out. The Agency figured that would hopefully inspire more defections (only real this time) from Castro's air force. The problem occurred when Castro displayed the differences in the markings on his own planes with those of the "fake" anti-Castro Cuban planes, including the opacity or lack thereof in their noses. Here's where it gets interesting and speaks directly to your question: Our ambassador to the UN, Adlai Stevenson, vehemently denied Castro's claims that the US was behind the attack. No one had "read in" Ambassador Stevenson into the operation so he didn't know. Perhaps it was decided that he was not in a "need-to-know" position. However, when Castro displayed proof that the planes used in the raid were NOT from his own air force, but rather were from the outside, Stevenson was humiliated. He appeared to either be lying or not considered relevant enough to be entrusted with the information about the true nature of the raids. So on the evening before D-Day, when he was "read in" to the plans for pre-dawn (pre-landing) air strikes, he was livid and adamantly opposed any air strikes because of what had just happened. He contacted his boss, Secretary of State Dean Rusk and raised hell about it until he basically got his way. Rusk in turn called Bundy, who called Cabell with the cancellation order. Now here's the speculation part: Did the CIA deliberately botch disguising the planes for the first raid so that Castro could easily humiliate Stevenson? If we give Rusk the benefit of the doubt, which I'm not certain he deserves...but for the sake of discussion, it would have allowed a Secretary of State who was inexperienced in military matters, to grossly under appreciate the devastating consequences of the stand down order.

He was giving some speech at a University in Puerto Rico. But I think you might be correct to a point. I think the prevailing perception would have been that if the US (especially CIA) was really behind an "overthrow Castro" plot, the DCI would most assuredly have been available and intimately involved in the operation rather than being out of touch and out of the country. Of course, this is just speculation, which I don't like to do.

Scott, I will not give up. I am not here to engage a petulant child. I am here to help interpret the events as they are revealed through the evidence. That you disagree with me is of no concern, but what is a concern is your refusal to remain civil about it. You do not adhere to any form of intellectual honesty as far as I can tell. When confronted you don't respond persuasively. Rather, you pout and attempt to close down the responses from your critics for whom you have not provided any real answers. The reason this is so important to me is because the last thing we need is yet another under-researched, poorly reasoned, book about the Bay of Pigs. We already have the CIA's ghost writers for that.

Since there are too many issues for me to cover in one post, I will restrict my response to only a portion of what you wrote above. The US outfitted RETIRED aircraft -- 16 B-26 bombers -- GAVE THEM to the anti-Castro Cubans and offered training. These aircraft were no longer in the possession of the US military, they bore no American markings, and they were not piloted by American flyers. They were owned by the anti-Castro Cuban forces, stripped of American identifiers as they no longer belonged to us, and were flown by non-US military personnel. We also acted in an advisory capacity, as well. But that is a far cry from DIRECT US MILITARY INTERVENTION. It was completely legal and in keeping with JFK's "non-direct US intervention policy." -- Emphasis should be placed on the word DIRECT. The difference is HUGE. Direct US intervention means that we would "change the outcome" if it did not suit us by engaging Cuba with overwhelming US military force, including the use of active US equipment, aircraft and service personnel. That is a violation of international law. That is what Kennedy prohibited from start to finish. That Kennedy ordered the mission to be scrubbed if Castro's planes were not destroyed on the ground speaks to his grave concern for the success of the mission and the advice of the best military thinking at the time as to the absolute necessity to control the sky above the BOP. Our best military minds advised that if the Brigade's pre-dawn air attack failed to destroy Castro's planes on the ground, the landing party would have very little chance of success. JFK understood how crucial this phase of the operation was and he issued standing orders based upon it. As far as the number of planes shot down, I am aware of more than 16. However, Prouty can only speak to the 16 that he himself procured and outfitted to be gifted to the anti-Castro Cuban forces.

Dean Rusk. When Bundy spoke with Cabell he specifically told him that any further discussion of the matter (cancellation of the pre-dawn airstrikes) should be taken up with Secretary Rusk (Adlai Stevenson's direct boss).

This is the pertinent text from a letter I received from Fletcher a very long time ago. ============================================================= Dear Greg, You ask about Col. Jack Hawkins. I certainly do remember him mostly from the Bay of Pigs days. I have looked in a 1963 Pentagon telephone book and find him listed for that year. He was the tactical man we got from the Marines to plan the landing of the Anti-Castro unit and train them. I knew that he was against the project, as many of us were for purely tactical reasons. These Cubans in the USA were not military trained and the restrictions placed upon the project were too severe. Actually Bissell's comment to Hawkins about "air support ready to strike, if needed" was accurate. We had provided the rebels with 16 B-26's that I had put through a transition project in Arizona. They had 8 -- 50 Cal. machine guns in each nose. (With this is mind,) Castro had only 10 capable combat aircraft [and] Kennedy ordered them all to be destroyed before the landing. On Sat., a.m., [April] 15th they were attacked and all of 7 were destroyed. We scoured Cuba with U-2 reconnaisance and found that three jets that Castro had left were all that he had; but these armed jets could easily shoot down the B-26's. Therefore Kennedy made it very clear on [April] 16th that the landing could not take place until the Rebel's B-26's had totally destroyed the last three Castro jets...ON THE GROUND. (If this had been done, as ordered by the President then the 16 bombers could have supported the invasion and the Cuban rebels would have had a more than even chance to beat Castro's ground troops and their equipment by bombardment). Bissell had not lied to JFK; but McGeorge Bundy called Gen. Cabell, then Deputy Director of the CIA, and told him that the bombing must not take place until the invaders had landed at the Bay of Pigs. It was about 3:30 am then and Cabell was having trouble locating Rusk to get his opinion. Of all things, Allen Dulles was out of the country. That is the basic mistake. I won't carry it further here. You have printed an interesting line: "there was a high motivation for the Agency to compromise JFK politically." The story is more than that. In late Dec. 1959, when Castro and his rebels were marching into Havana, a group of us in the Special Ops business were ordered into an office. There we were told that if Castro did take over Havana we were going to be ordered to a rebel force. Recall this was under Eisenhower and Nixon. Well no call came and after midnight when we had the office TV on and were watching the "New Years" celebrations we were told we could go home. Castro was the new ruler of Cuba. Later in the spring of 1960, Castro came to New York City to speak at the United Nations. Following that speech, he went to Washington and had a meeting with Nixon. After that meeting, Nixon commented with reporters saying, more or less, that if Castro was not a Communist he was close to it. That set the tone for the Eisenhower people to order the CIA to prepare to over-throw his Government. A little later a team from the CIA came to my office in the Pentagon (At that time I was the Special Operations Officer there for the Air Force). They asked me if we had an airfield that could be used for a base to train aircrews and to get aircraft for them for a Cuban anti-Castro rebel group. This started it all. During this period, the summer of 1960, we were coming up on a presidential election time and JFK was nominated by the Democrats. The Republicans were certain that they would win; so they began to put all the new, and huge appropriations into the next year for "President" Nixon; but in a surprise he was not elected and I never saw such emotional feelings as then. I was working in the office of the Secretary of Defense, in the Office of Special Operations. In the halls of the Pentagon you could hear the dislike of the new President; and the realization of the fact that JFK had inherited billions of dollars of procurement money for high cost items, such as the $6 or $7 billion dollar TFX aircraft buy. In one tactical move the Republicans changed the Anti-Castro plans from small over-the-beach and air drop tactics to a major invasion. In no time they had built up a 3,000 man force that had to be trained and equipped, and dumped it all in JFK's lap. They did not realize that JFK already knew the Anti-Castro leaders who had been guests of the Kennedy's at their big Florida resort home. One day I was sent to the Senate Office building to a certain room number to pick up four men and have them driven to the Pentagon and to the Secretary of Defense, Gates. The office turned out to be Senator Kennedy's office and the four men were the leaders of the Cuban Exile group: Artime, Varona, Mendonca and one more. Here it was only early summer of 1959, and JFK had yet be nominated for the Presidency by the Democrats, and he was entertaining them in his family's winter home in West Palm Beach and in his Senate office building. People did not know how well JFK knew them. The most influential debate he had before the election with Nixon was the third, when they debated the Cuban Problem. Kennedy just made Nixon look ridiculous; and that debate alone perhaps won for JFK his narrow managing in the election. Shortly after the election a team of top level CIA officials came to my office and requested that I get base facilities for at least 3,000 Cuban exiles, and enough aircraft for them. They built the Cuban force immediately by those numbers and then with Kennedy's inauguration they dumped it all in his lap. By April 1961 the invasion plan had been worked out under the leadership of Jack Hawkins. It was all predicated on the fact that the Invasion Force would destroy all of Castro's aircraft BEFORE the invasion took place. This was the plan that was briefed to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, approved by them and taken to Kennedy. Kennedy said little about it except on Sunday, April 16th he finally approved the invasion with the strict proviso that all of Castro's jets would be destroyed; or the invasion force would not be landed on the beach. We all understood that. For some reason, at 9:30PM McGeorge Bundy called Gen. Cabell, Deputy Director of the CIA and told him that the invasion was off until the men were on the beach. B-26 invasion planes that had been put on stand-by in Nicaragua were not to be released until dawn. This of course was against Kennedy's orders, because the three jets that Castro had could easily destroy them. Gen. Cabell left the office in an attempt to locate Sec. of State Rusk. He knew that order had to be changed. While he was doing that the hours passed, and I got a telephone call from the air commander in Nicaragua who was all upset. He knew if the B-26's were not there by dawn the jets would take off and down them. I could hear the B-26 engines running in the background. I made many calls around Washington to get help with this essential problem. As the clock kept running it became too late for the B-26's to arrive before dawn while the T-33 jets were on the ground. Meanwhile the troops were landing at the Bay of Pigs. The whole thing was a disaster...and it was not Kennedy's fault. The last order he had given that day was "The B-26's must destroy the jets before they take off or the invasion must be cancelled." This was the military approved plan and Kennedy's orders. You are correct about the Bay of Pigs landing disaster, except for the details that the Cuban rebels were equipped with armed B-26 's; and if used while Castro's jets were still on the ground on the morning of April 17th they would easily have been destroyed. Then the landing force would have had little or no real opposition and they would have defeated Castro. The JCS and Kennedy had both ordered that if the jets were not destroyed there would be no invasion. Kennedy had ordered that no "active duty USA aircraft would be used in that invasion". This was a firm order that we all understood. You are also correct that Kennedy's NSAM #263 would have had us out of Vietnam for sure. I was one of its writers. I know how determined he was, but that was Oct 11,1963. Kennedy was dead on Nov 22, 1963. We all can see the connection. L. Fletcher Prouty ============================ Note: We know today that Castro also had a Sea Fury in addition to the T-33 jets.

Good article, Jim, except for a very important detail. The armed Marines were not a contingency plan to be used in case the invasion failed. They were a part of the MAIN plan if the Brigade was able to successfully declare themselves a government in exile. Or perhaps a better term would be an interim government. To do that plausibly they needed to control a minimum amount of real estate (beachhead and airstrip), hopefully enlist the help of the disgruntled masses (who actually did not exist), and overcome any resistance from Castro. However, once their sovereignty could be marginally recognized, JFK needed the Marines ready to go. In that event, they may have needed direct US support but only after we quickly recognized them in the UN. Remember the birth of Israel? We were the first to recognize them as a sovereign state immediately upon their proclamation. If memory serves, it was at midnight. So the "sending in the Marines" plan is true. But it was NOT a contingency to rescue a failing mission. It was to be a support of the newly recognized government following a successful mission. Such a scenario is the only legal way he could have directly aided the anti-Castro Cubans with US military support.

It doesn't get any clearer than this. The President unequivocally stated, and those in charge of the operation understood, and the Brigade members themselves agreed: NO US INTERVENTION UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES.

Oh pleeeeze! Scott, I have read everything that has been declassified on the subject. You don't seem to be familiar with the Cuban Study Group's report or the Inspector General, Lyman Kirkpatrick's report, either. There are dozens of oral histories by eyewitnesses to the event. As for living witnesses, Hemming has been dead for nearly a decade. As for those eyewitnesses that I have interviewed and /or knew very well, the list is rather long, but include, Colonel L Fletcher Prouty USAF (Chief of Special Operations Office of the JCS) who was responsible for obtaining and outfitting all of the Brigade's modified B-26 bombers, among other things. HIs office was literally two doors down the hall from the office used by the Cuban Study Group investigation. Many of the witnesses stopped by to chat with him about it both before and after they gave their testimony. I also spoke extensively to my own father, who was a Special Aid to Eisenhower. It took me decades to confirm what he and Prouty reported because the documents were classified top secret or higher for so long. Upon release, the documents bore out what these witnesses reported quite well. Your witnesses are telling you what they believe to be true from their perspective. But, they were not on the inside of the US military intelligence apparatus like Colonel Prouty and my father were.

Whatever you do don't consider any additional evidence, no matter how relevant, to the contrary.

Even Jake Esterline disagrees with this assessment and he wasn't particularly fond of JFK. Read his oral history of the event here. In that oral interview, among other things, he tells CIA Historian, Jack B. Pfeiffer, the following regarding the Bay of Pigs: “I am one of those who feel it is very wrong to pick too much on Jack Kennedy because it was Nixon who, if we had kicked off as we had hoped for, between November and January of 60-61, it might not have worked, but it would not have been a major disaster.” — Jake Esterline ​Remember that Nixon was in charge of this operation from the start. It was supposed to have taken place long before April of 1961. However, JFK embarrassed Nixon in the debate by having accused Eisenhower of "inaction" against Castro. Today we know that the action that was being planned--Trinidad and others--were so top secret that Nixon could not respond. Once the election was lost Nixon sought revenge against Kennedy and, apparently, in an act of pure spite, postponed action against Castro until after Ike left office. But, during the lame duck period, he ordered the CIA to build the operation up from about a 350 man affair to a more than 3,000 man amphibious assault invasion force! That had never been Ike's plan. But it was Nixon's revenge. The CIA convinced Kennedy that the (Nixon) plan was actually Ike's plan, which it was not. Who was JFK to question the amphibious assault plan of the former president who had been a 4 Star Army General and the Supreme Commander during the largest successful amphibious assault in the history of the world at Normandy? Well, he was the new president and so he did question it. The Agency lied. The rest is distorted history.

Now you're just making this up or you have failed to do your homework. Scott, the PROOF in documentation exists as it is now public record and declassified. You have the ability to correctly report the matter if you just do the work instead of stubbornly clinging to your ill conceived conclusions. Have you even read the Taylor Report from the Cuban Study Group? It is spelled out in detail there. To wit: McGeorge Bundy, by tendering his own resignation letter shortly thereafter, admitted to JFK that he had failed to serve him (best interests) during the Bay of Pigs! I have a copy of that resignation letter. JFK did not accept the resignation probably because he was already getting rid of so many in his National Security apparatus: Cabell, Bissell and Dulles. If he had allowed Bundy to go, too, he would have appeared to have chosen his national security advisors very poorly.

No Scott that is easily proved incorrect. Adlai Stevenson implored his own boss, Dean Rusk, to cancel the airstrikes as he (Stevenson) had already been embarrassed at the UN over the airstrikes that had been shown to originate from the US a couple of days prior to D-Day. If you are getting "very detailed" about all of this as you say, please provide the documents to support your claims as I have done on my website and in my presentations.

With only one or two relatively minor clarifications, I concur, Jim. You said: "1.) The D Day air strikes were not part of the plan, they were only a contingency..." To which airstrikes are you referring? The pre-dawn airstrikes were not a mere contingency, as they were central to the plan and, according to the Taylor Report, their having been delayed was the "proximate cause of the failure." That they were cancelled is public record. Who canceled them is generally not public knowledge, but by now it should be as it is documented well. Unbeknownst to JFK, McGeorge Bundy made the call to General Cabell on orders from Dean Rusk who had ostensibly deferred to Adlai Stevenson's objections. I wrote about this extensively in an article simply titled: Fiasco The "other" D-Day airstrikes that are regularly conflated with the pre-dawn airstrikes, were not canceled by Kennedy because they were never ordered by him in the first place! Indeed, he specifically excluded any and all direct US intervention (in an emergency cable from J.C. King to Colonel Jack Hawkins in Nicaragua less than one week prior to D-Day) as they were outside the Rules of Engagement under the circumstances. The ONLY scenario legally allowing JFK to order direct US intervention would have necessarily hinged on the successful establishment of a new "Cuban Government in Exile." This would have been realized only if Brigade 2506 could have secured a beachhead and airstrip, at the very least, before declaring themselves as the new Government. But this never happened because of the cancelation, by McGeorge Bundy, of the pre-dawn airstrikes, which allowed Castro's remaining air force to become airborne, shoot down the Brigade's B-26's when they finally did arrive (too late), sink the Brigade's supply vessels, and pin the Brigade down. Under those circumstances, any direct intervention by the US would have been a violation of international law. So Kennedy did not cancel any promised airstrikes. However, JFK did refuse to launch direct US intervention the next morning, as it was already too late for the anti-Castro Cubans to declare a government in exile status.

I believe Sirhan should be paroled because he is innocent of the crime. However, if you believe that the portion of your statement that I bolded above [where he was shot in the head by Sirhan] is true, why would you want him to be paroled? [edit] After posting this I realized that since Schrade is of the belief that he was himself shot in the head by Sirhan, which may well be true, then the disposition of Sirhan's guilt as viewed by Schrade is significant, IMO. That Sirhan does not remember shooting anyone at all--if we are to believe him--speaks to his innocence.

This post is Millicent Cranor's response to Pat Speer from above: Some people have stopped making excuses for Pat Speer. They used to say his "mistakes" are simply the result of incompetence. Now, after reading my short but revealing report, and especially after reading his evasive non-response to it -- they say they know better. For those forum members who are interested, here is a sample of Speer's cherry-picking of evidence. This one concerns part of his "proof" that the large wound in JFK's head did not include the back of the head, or the occipital region. He focused on the pathologists' descriptions of lacerations in the scalp. He said "none" were reported in the back of the head. Elsewhere he expressed it as "no large lacerations" were reported in the occipital region. (Pat Speer) This is supposed to prove the big hole did not include the back of the head? It might seem that way -- if you don't know what else the pathologists said. Omitted by Speer: The pathologists ALSO said there was NO SCALP AT ALL (or bone) in the large hole which included the BACK OF THE HEAD, specifically the occipital area. (See item #1 under "Missile Wounds" of the Autopsy Report, p.3) This is a significant part of the autopsy report. It completely neutralizes what Speer was trying to use as proof of his position -- and he doesn't even mention it in this discussion. See for yourself: You have to wonder: What else has Speer left out?

Thanks for the follow up, Doug. I don't know if there's any truth to his claim regarding RFK negotiating for two ships or not, but I never heard of it before. And, even if that was true, it certainly does not constitute RFK "planning the Bay of Pigs invasion" with United Fruit.

A pity. I wrote about his apparent decline a few years ago: Fetzer and Guilt by Association Sadly, it appears to have further accelerated.

I hope that the points that have been lost on you will become clearer in the subsequent installments. But I doubt it. As I said to Brian, I simply published an article that checked your facts. Mili is independent. Unlike some authors, she will give credit where and if credit is due. Irrespective of your criticism of the work by Mantik and/or Chesser, IMO, Mili's article stands on its own merit as an expose` intended to enlighten the reader so that they may draw their own conclusions.

The article is the first one on the main page. However, I also have now added a direct link here and edited it into the above post for your convenience. I am not "out to get" anyone. I simply published an article by someone who checked his facts.

I just published an article by my dear friend, Milicent Cranor, on my main website. As many of you know, Pat Speer has been critical of the work done by Dr's Mantik and Chesser. Please read this article and come to your own conclusions. ​PatSpeer.com: Fact Check

I suppose I'm number seven then. Still, Allen Dulles didn't give orders. He took them.

Even Hemming maintained that the reason the Watergate criminals were caught was because they were set up. According to him, the reason for their having been betrayed was to eventually implicate and take down Nixon.

Thanks Doug. This particular claim bears the stench of disinformation. To wit: It appears that it could be post mortem character assassination by connecting RFK to the ill-fated decision making process...when he, in fact, had "many other fish to fry" more in line with his expertise in the Justice Department at that point of the JFK Presidency.

Although I am aware of United Fruit's involvement with the BOP invasion, I question the claim made by McCann that they dealt directly (or otherwise for that matter) with then Attorney General, Robert Kennedy, in "planning the Bay of Pigs Invasion." Robert Kennedy was not among those who planned the BOP invasion. RFK was not tasked with CIA oversight until AFTER JFK forced Dulles to retire in the wake of the Report of the Cuban Study Group (The Taylor Report). Bobby was on that committee, which included, Allen Dulles, Admiral Arleigh Burke, and the recalled [Retired] General Maxwell Taylor. United Fruit Company was always connected at the hip to the CIA. To be clear, I repeat: Robert Kennedy was not involved in directly planning the Bay of Pigs invasion with United Fruit or anyone else.