Documents / FOIA release

Official History of the Bay of Pigs Operation- Volume 2- Part 1

Central Intelligence Agency · 179 pages · text from the file's own layer

This is Volume II, Part 1 of the CIA History Staff's Official History of the Bay of Pigs Operation, a Top Secret history dated October 1979 and approved for release in July 2011. It looks at how the Agency took part in shaping US foreign policy toward Guatemala and Nicaragua during the anti-Castro program. It covers dealings with President Ydigoras Fuentes and Roberto Alejos, training sites such as Retalhuleu, cover stories, and negotiations with the Somoza brothers for an air base and port. It contains no UFO material.

  • p. 16 …According to Esterline's report of the meeting "it was never said in so many words…
  • p. 31 …DPD planned to have the SALA representa- tive, who had never been cleared by the Agency…
  • p. 34 …The communications officer whom Alejos had declared to be "under arrest" was never technically arrested and…
  • p. 53 …We never were informed of KIA or wounded counts. We did hear that a couple of…
  • p. 55 …round Guatemala for years and we have never seen Guatemalan pilots fly or shoot with the…
  • p. 64 …emphatically * Delivery of the ~ight B-26's was never made to the Government of Guatemala.
  • p. 75 …Ydigoras said, "that piece of paper will never be exposed," and it hasn't to my…
  • p. 76 …young man I said, "Well, we're never going to get this thing going unless somebody…
  • p. 106 …Venezuela, have made many friendly noises but never once have made a firm offer of real…
  • p. 138 …the project "until Castro's defeat" was never officially made to either President Somoza or President…
  • p. 147 …they were on the ships they would never return to Nicaragua. With reference to the air…
  • p. 153 …68/* * The Agency's relations with Nicaragua also became \ somewhat strained because Miro Cardona was never…
TOP sj:RET
The President and the Foreign Minister
both indicated their desire that said
paper corne to the attention of Mr. Adolph
[sic] Berle, a man whose past career
they seemed to know very well. C/JMATE
assured them that this would be done. 79/
Available records do not indicate that the Agency was
further involved in the promotion of this particular
activity on the part of the GOG, however, it was quite.
clear that Ydigoras continued to be very sensitive
about Belize.
In March of 1961, one of the JMADD C-54's was
forced to land in Jamaica after an airdrop over Cuba
-- said aircraft having filed a flight plan out of
San Jose, Guatemala. Unfortunately, the GOG had not
given prior authorization for this flight plan. When
word from Jamaica apparently got out that the flight
originated at San Jose, Roberto Alejos was constrained
to make an immediate press release denying that the
aircraft had ever corne out of Guatemala, and he sug-
gested that the British were tyring to embarrass the
Guatemalan Government, in part, at least, so that
there would be no pressure for negotiations on the
Belize issue. In any event, Headquarters sent an OPIM
cable to Guatemala recommending that Alejos and Ydigoras
-83/
TOP ~RET

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About this file

FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 179 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.