Justification For Killing (43 page)

On 15 April 1961, at about
0600 local Cuban time, eight Douglas B-26 bombers, flying in groups
of three, simultaneously attacked Cuban airfields near Havana,
including the International Airport. The B-26s had been procured,
prepared and piloted by the CIA on behalf of Cuban Exile Brigade
2506. They had been painted with the markings of the air force of
the Cuban government.

About an hour and a half
after the B-26s had taken off to attack Cuban fortifications,
another plane on a deception flight approached the shore of Cuba,
but at the last minute, changed course and headed north towards the
coast of Florida. Like the rest of the group of B-26s, it carried
false markings and the fuselage number 933. That same number was
painted on at least two of the other bombers to confuse the Cuban
pilots. Before the B-26 diversionary plane took off, the covering
of one of the aircraft's two engines was removed by CIA personnel,
shot full of bullet holes, then replaced on the airplane to appear
as though the aircraft had taken ground fire at some point during
its flight. Once the pilot got far enough from Cuba the pilot
radioed the Miami International airport, “Mayday!! Mayday!! Taking
small arms fire and being attacked by a T-33 fighter – request
immediate permission to land!!” After his fake Mayday broadcast the
pilot feathered the engine with the CIA supplied bullet holes in
the engine cowling. The pilot, formerly of the Cuban Air Force,
claimed three other colleagues had also defected. The next day he
was granted political asylum, but when night came, as prearranged,
he slipped out of the U.S. and returned to Cuba.

Later on in the evening of
April 16, the CIA, and the now numbered Brigade 2506 invasion fleet
come together at the code named 'Rendezvous Point Zulu', about
forty miles south of Cuba. Earlier the ships had sailed from
Nicaragua loaded with troops and other materiel, making only one
other stop at New Orleans to obtain more arms, ammunition and other
supplies. ‘Rough Road’ was the U.S. Navy’s operational code name.
The fleet, now named the 'Cuban Expeditionary Force' included six
2,600-ton freighter ships that had been procured and chartered by
the CIA from the Hernandez Line. After taking possession, the CIA
installed forty- millimeter anti-aircraft guns on their decks and
camouflaged them as large wooden crates.

During the night of the
16th and into the early morning of April 17th, a fake diversionary
landing was organized by the CIA near the Province of Pinar del
Rio.

At midnight on April 16,
1961, the two CIA ships the Badger and Willow J, each with a CIA
operations officer and five, what would now be called Navy Seals,
entered the Bay of Pigs on the southern coast of Cuba.

At 0100, the Badger, as
the battlefield command ship, directed the principal landing at the
Bay of Pigs, code-named Blue Beach, led by Underwater Demolition
Teams (frogmen/SEALs) in rubber boats followed by members of the
Cuban Expeditionary Force in small aluminum boats, followed by
bigger landing crafts. The Willow J, was landing troops at the same
time approximately thirty miles to the northwest at Playa Largo,
code-named Red Beach, using small fiberglass boats.

Settling into the
orange web seats of the C-130 the two sticks of sixty-four men of
the 101st Airborne were apprehensive. No, apprehensive wasn’t right
- some were just downright scared, and even more were terrified.
They had only been in the aircraft for a few minutes, but sweat was
beginning to form on their brows and run down their cheeks. Black,
leather, jump boots were tapping nervously against the steel floor.
They all had the same thought
- why are we
headed south?

A number of Army and Air
Force sergeants were at the doors. Sergeant Walker knew two had to
be the Jumpmaster and the Assistant Jumpmaster, a couple more were
safety guys and of course the C-130 loadmaster. The Jumpmaster
stood up - “Troopers,” he yelled above the roar of the four Allison
turboprop engines, “I know you have been wondering where we are
headed. Now I can tell you - we are going to Cuba!!”

The troopers could not
have been more shocked... each turned with a surprised,
unbelievable expression on their faces and glanced around the
compartment to see the same look on each man’s face.

“
The Hundred and First is
going to provide backup support to the Cuban Liberation Force. They
are going to overthrow the Castro government with our help. Our
mission is to parachute behind the beachhead and secure the area
for the Cuban exile fighters coming ashore, it is now 0445, we jump
at 0600. We’re going in at 650 feet, so no time for mistakes –
after the four count if main chute has not deployed initiate
reserve immediately – double-check your equipment – good luck to
you all... see you on the ground.”

For the next hour or so
the men sat on the C-130 staring at the man across from him
listening to the roar of the engines. They were packed in so close
their knees were actually touching each other. They were not
thinking ‘if that trooper will make it’, they were thinking ‘if
THEY would make it. ‘Would the ‘chute open? Would they do their
duty? Would they get killed?’ And they were thinking, ‘am I acting
afraid? I can’t let the others know I’m afraid.’ Some were not
thinking about the others at all – they were too busy saying silent
prayers, some had their Rosary beads in their hand, teeth clenched
staring across the way at the trooper facing him but not really
seeing him. The time was 0550, ten minutes to that dreaded place –
the drop zone. Six hundred short seconds were possibly separating
them from a life on this earth to an eternal one in the hereafter.
Were they nervous? No... they had passed the point of
nervousness... they were into a totally new state now. The
adrenaline had kicked in, and their training was beginning to take
over. They were the ‘best of the best’ – American paratroopers of
the 101st Airborne Division, and they knew it! But their hearts
were beating so hard some thought their chests were about to
explode. Breathing was rapid and shallow; the blood vessels in
their faces were tight and constricted, their jaws were clenched.
They were ready...

The Jumpmaster stood to
his feet and turned to the two sticks of paratroopers – giving the
commands and arm signals “GET READY”...; “OUTBOARD PERSONNEL
STANDUP”...; “INBOARD PERSONNEL STANDUP”...; “HOOK
UP”...

At this command,
each parachutist detached the static line snap hook from the top
carrying handle of the reserve parachute and hooked up to the
anchor line cable.
‘This is
it’
, thought Sergeant Walker.
‘We’re REALLY going to do this!!’

The Jumpmaster hollered
and gestured with his arms, “CHECK STATIC LINES”..., “CHECK
EQUIPMENT”... The paratroopers in the two sticks immediately
shouted back the Jumpmaster’s commands: CHECK STATIC LINES... CHECK
EQUIPMENT.

‘
Damn we can’t be more
than five minutes to the jump... We’re actually going to do this!!
Before the Jumpmaster had a chance to say ‘SOUND OFF FOR EQUIPMENT
CHECK’ and ‘STANDBY’ someone began the song:

“♪
Gory, gory what a hell
of a way to die,

With a rifle on his
back as he’s falling from the sky
♪
”

Half way through the
second refrain the paratroopers, all sixty four, had joined in
stomping their feet between each word.
‘Hell,’
thought the
Jumpmaster,
‘this singing and foot
stomping isn’t in the Army airborne manual,’
then he realized dying wasn’t in the manual either, and let
them continue.

Opening the doors on
both sides of the aircraft the roaring wind obliterated the sound
of the paratrooper’s song. The ‘red’ and ‘green’ lights on the
right bulkhead next to the exit door were still ‘red’. Sergeant
Walker knew once the ‘red’ turned to ‘green’ it was ‘all she
wrote’. The Jumpmaster would give the ‘GO’ signal and then they
would shuffle down the aisle, hand their static line to the safety
and step out the door into the nothingness of the cool Cuban
morning air
...‘Oh my God, this is
IT’,
Sergeant Walker thought as drops of
nervous sweat dripped from the end of his nose onto his reserve
‘chute on his chest.

Suddenly a slight
perceivable change could be heard in the roar of the
engines,
‘Darn!! Darn!! Darn!! That green
light is fixin’ to light up’,
thought
Sergeant Johnny Walker.
Breathe,
breathe
, he said to himself,
I’m holding my breath.
The ‘red’ light did not change; however, their course did.
The C-130 began a slow lumbering left turn eastward toward the
direction of the rising sun. The sun, which was just beginning to
emerge from the spot where the black and blue morning sky meets the
wide expanse of the green Atlanta Ocean, was beginning to lighten
the eastern sky. “East Smokes, we’re headed east,” the Staff
Sergeant said to his friend in front of him in the starboard stick.
From their eastward direction, the fleet of airplanes carrying the
one oh one Airborne Division continued to turn until they were
headed back in the direction of Ft. Bragg, North Carolina. Their
‘war’ was officially over.

The time was 05:55 a.m.
April 17, 1961.

A little past dawn
on the 17th at the very minute the 101st
was returning back to their home base 1,300 Cuban freedom
fighters trudged through the surf at the Bay of Pigs where they
were very quickly attacked and marooned on the beach by T-33 Cuban
fighter planes. The eight American B-26s provided less than an hour
of air cover for the Cuban freedom fighter on the beach then, on
orders from the White House, the B-26s pulled out. Backed up with
the sea at their rear there was no means of retreat, and no chance
of advancing into the jungles of Cuba, the brigade was in a dire
situation. Most of the one thousand CIA-trained and American armed
Cuban freedom fighters believed they were just the first assault of
Cuban exiles coming to wrestle their homeland, at the point of a
bayonet, from Castro. They had been told as they stormed the beach
they would be supported overhead by some of America’s finest
fighter pilots of the U.S. Air Force, and once on shore and
advancing into Cuba, the U.S. Marines would bring up the rear and
provide support. Sad to say, these men had been fed a lie. Most of
these freedom fighters would be killed, wounded or captured. Many
of the captured and wounded would be later executed by the Fidel
Castro regime.

In Washington the CIA and
the Kennedy administration had already come to the conclusion, the
invasion was doomed. A statement by President Kennedy had him
saying, "How could I have been so naive to trust the people
advising me?” Groups such as the CIA and the Joint Chiefs of Staff
were his chief advisors on the Bay of Pigs invasion. Even more
alarming to the CIA was a quote, believed reliable, and uttered by
President Kennedy stating he wanted to "splinter the CIA into a
thousand pieces and scatter it into the winds."

Aircrews killed in action
totaled ten Cuban exiles and four American airmen. The American
airmen shot down were Rayburn Thomas, Mark Holmes, Rian Almond and
Scott Willis. A count, only a guess, 114 Cuban exiles from Brigade
2506 were killed in action.

Only recently, has it been
learned the CIA transferred funds from the invasion budget to pay
the Mafiosos for an assassination plot against Castro. This was so
secret the chief of planning for the invasion, Colonel Terry
Martin, did not even know what the money was being used
for.

President Kennedy put a
bold spin on the Bay of Pig fiasco, and, as President, he would say
he alone was responsible. But when he was with brother Robert, he
struggled to make sense of the mess in Cuba, “How could you and I
have been so deceived and so gullible to let them proceed?” he
repeatedly asked. He was furious at the CIA for having misled him.
The President waited a few months then he forced CIA Director Allen
Spiegel to tender his resignation. Kennedy explained to the
Director, “Under a different system of government it is I who would
be leaving. But the system we are now under it is you who must
go.”

At the fifty-year reunion
of the Bay of Pigs survivors: “To find yourself on the beach of
your native land with the sea at your back and the enemy to your
front, and nowhere to hide and no air cover, I’ll never forget it,”
said Elcer de Pedaltia, 75. “I’ll never forget how we were betrayed
by Kennedy. But we got even.”

“
I also remember coming
ashore that day,” said Bay of Pigs veteran Francisco “Franco”
Hernando, 71, who cofounded and now heads the Florida-based Free
Cuba National Foundation, one of the most powerful Cuban exile
groups in Miami. “They are not good memories, but sad and bitter
ones. Many brave young men died needlessly because of the cowardice
of the Kennedys in Washington. All we needed to succeed was some
help from the Americans. We took a terrible toll, but them Kennedys
later got theirs too...”

Finishing the rehash of
the Bay of Pigs invasion the group around the table sat speechless.
“Well,” said the Captain, “See what I mean? The CIA is not as pure
as the wind driven snow. We know from Sam Lin and Si Lei the CIA
was totally involved with a black-ops program called MK-ULTRA. I
know, for a fact, the word MK-ULTRA was written on a napkin in Jack
Ruby’s place by one of the Cosa Nostra guys. How are the CIA and
the Mafia connected? That is what we need to find out.