The Cover-Up: How Was Movement from Phase I to Phase II Justified?

[Charles Drago]

How do we know that an invasion of Cuba was not actually a real aim of the conspirators rather than a way to maneuver the cover up?

I'm certain that the invasion of Cuba WAS a real aim of some of the conspirators operating at the Facilitator and Mechanic levels.

But I submit that at the Sponsor level there could be found perception of long-term value in the maintenance of a communist "threat" just 90 miles away. Castro was more valuable alive than dead. For wasn't the whole point of Cold War dramaturgy -- on both sides of the Iron Curtain -- to maximize power and profit by maintaining and controlling hostilities?

Substitute Al Qaeda and, for more than a decade, OBL for communist Cuba and Fidel, and you see that the Cold War template is alive and well.

How were the get-Castro hotheads controlled post-assassination when their shared dream fizzled? I suspect that some were bought off, some were scared off, and some were marked forever absent.

To put it another way: If the Sponsors wanted Castro gone, he would have shuffled off this mortal coil a long time ago.

One more comment on your question above: We reduce the JFK "conspirators" to a monolithic entity at the risk of fatally weakening our understanding of why JFK died.