1962: Another Silly “Operation” of Uncle Sam After the Bay of Pigs Failed in April 1961

Air Force brigadier general Edward Lansdale was the “chief of operations” of “the Cuba Project” for Bobby Kennedy, the attorney general at the Justice Department, and the brother of President John F. Kennedy.

Lansdale came up with this idea to “eliminate” Fidel Castro:

A U.S. submarine was to surface off Havana in the middle of the night and fire star shells toward the shore. The shells would light up the nighttime sky. In the meantime, CIA agents would have spread the word that Fidel was the anti-Christ, and that the illumination was a harbinger of the Second Coming of Christ. Lansdale suggested that the operation be timed to coincide with All Soul's Day “to gain extra impact from Cuban superstitions.” CIA skeptics dubbed the scheme “Elimination by Illumination.”

Another pet Lansdale project was branding the Cuban resistance with the symbol “gusano libre.” But the public relations campaign was a flop. Imbued with pride and machismo, Cubans refused to identify with worms, free or not.

As told in: Page 12 of:

One Minute to Midnight : Kennedy, Khrushchev and Castro on the brink of nuclear war.  By Michael Dobbs, Alfred A. Knopf, Random House, New York, 2008

-----

JG: Don't spend any money on this book. (I only paid 49 cents for the book (remainder mark), and I want my money back! Try to get a free copy at a public library.

The author does not know the difference between the Sierra Madre (California) and the Sierra Maestra (Cuba).

Operation Mongoose was the official name given by Uncle Sam to the Cuba Project. Another huge waste of taxpayer's money. 

Below is one example of the “super-good” English grammar used by the author in the book. Poor Shakespeare, he must be turning in his grave.

“His brain seemed to worked faster than anyone else's.” [page 69]

Does the Alfred A. Knopf publishing house have a great need for a competent proof-reader?