The Invasion of Cuba: Never the Intention of JFK Hit Sponsors

[Paul Rigby]

Very good summary. To put a little flesh on the bone, as some or other actress once remarked to a man of the cloth, I hasten to add the following, as more or less first posted on the Education Forum, but minus the footnotes.

Cuban Smoke

Out of the mouths of babes and elderly Tory imperialists...

Here's MI6 stalwart - and veteran CIA apologist - Julian Amery spilling the beans in the House of Commons in February 1976 on that now-forgotten Agency leg-up for Fidel. Note the anguished disbelief of the Labour MP Martin Flannery, for whom a childish Manicheanism had long since supplanted the study of history:

http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commo...05P0-00566

Mr. Amery (Conservative: Brighton, Pavilion):

I have often criticised the CIA. I criticised the help which it gave to Nasser and to Fidel Castro in his early days.

Mr. Martin Flannery (Labour: Sheffield, Hillsbrough):

The right hon. Gentleman must be joking.

Mr. Amery:

I am not joking. The CIA gave real support to Castro in the early days. I have also criticised the part that it played, no doubt inadvertently, in the recent coup in Cyprus. But, whatever mistake our friends and allies may sometimes make, we must not forget that we owe the CIA an enormous debt. Anyone who has worked in a defence or foreign affairs department in Government will know how much we owe to the CIA for our existing security. The CIA has been the principal eye of NATO and it has often stopped situations from developing which could have been much to our detriment, and on occasions it has even succeeded in reversing them.

I greatly regret that our American friends should now indulge in this orgy of masochism over the CIA. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Harlow should be taking the pleasure of a voyeur while it all goes on.