Red Flags Everywhere

In 1959 when Fidel Castro led a Cuban Revolution that brought about the overthrow of the Fulgencio Batista right-wing government it disrupted major business ties with the United States. Castro declared himself a Communist and developed links with the Soviet Union in the midst of the Cold War.

And thus began a series of secret plans by the Central Intelligence Agency to launch military strikes against Castro’s revolutionary forces and drive him out of power. The first unsuccessful attack was being planned while President Dwight D. Eisenhower was in the White House, and the attack, remembered as the Bay of Pigs invasion, was launched shortly after President John F. Kennedy took power in April, 1961. It was a failed mission that succeeded in strengthening Castro’s position as a political power in the Central American region.

The following year, the joint chiefs-of-staff under General Lyman L. Lemnitzer, approved a covert plan to generate public support for a military attack on Cuba, according to investigative journalist James Bamford in his book, Body of Secrets. The plan included mock reports of killings, false flag terrorist attacks in the U.S. and elsewhere, and blowing up a U. S. ship in Guantanamo Bay and pinning the blame on Cuba. (Remember the Maine.) As Astronaut John Glenn was preparing for his daring first manned rocket flight into space, another plan even suggested that if the flight failed and Glenn was killed, the disaster could be blamed on Cuban communists.

Kennedy, still smarting from the Bay of Pigs mess, rejected the plan that was code named Operation Northwoods. Lemnitzer lost his position a few months after this, Bamford said.

Kennedy’s presidency was plagued by the Cuban issue from the day he stepped into the White House. After calling off the chiefs-of-staff and the CIA from their complex plans to stage false flag attacks against the United States, Russian President Nikita Khrushchev and Castro were caught installing a battery of nuclear missiles in Cuba. This was in retaliation to our continued efforts to unseat Castro from power and the U.S. placement of missile launch sites in Europe. Thus Americans watched with fright during Kennedy’s 13-day confrontation with the Soviet Union in October, 1962.

Some say it was the closest the United States ever came to be engaged in an all-out nuclear conflict with another world power. Fortunately, Khrushchev backed off, a secret deal was reached and the crisis was diverted.

Kennedy was assassinated in November, 1963. His killing has been long debated among conspiracy buffs. Some believe it was directly related to Kennedy’s handling of the Cuban issues.

If the truth were known, the real culprits behind all of this trouble with Cuba may well have been the big oil companies and other corporations that lost their interests in Cuba after Castro took over.

Castro nationalized the oil refineries owned by Shell, Esso and Standard Oil and then processed crude oil shipped from the Soviet Union. He also nationalized most other U. S. owned assets including banks, sugar mills and took control of 383 private businesses including such firms as Coca-Cola and Sears Roebuck.

It might be interesting to note that many of the ideas proposed by American military personnel in Operation Northwoods were instituted during and after the 911 attacks.