Havana, Cuba. – The triumph of the forces of the regime in the battle of Playa Girón or Bahía de Cochinos, which took place between April 17 and 19, 1961, Castro propaganda presents it as “the first great defeat of Yankee imperialism in Latin America.”
But the Castro forces did not face the US army in that battle, as it could be supposed to and militiamen).
The defeat of the Brigade 2506 In Girón, he was mainly due to the bad coordination of the invasion by the CIA and the hesitations of President John F. Kennedy, which, overwhelmed by the American involvement in Vietnam and the conflict with the Soviets around Berlin, executed with reluct Castro.
The plan, which Kennedy always considered that he had remote chances of success, was that the invaders conquered a beach head where to install a provisional government that requested a military intervention in Cuba of the Organization of American States (OAS) and the United States.
The chosen site, a point in the Costa Coast of the Bay of Cochinos, to the south of Cuba, became a trap for the expeditionaries, deprived of air support that the Americans had promised.
Castro’s aviation, which had not been so damaged by the air blows of April 15 against the airports of Ciudad Libertad, San Antonio de los Baños and Santiago de Cuba, as the invasion planners assumed, could dominate the sky and machine -to -machine to Mansalva to the expeditionaries, practically abandoned to their fate and those who could not resist and do more than what they did during the 65 hours battle.
When deciding not to involve US military forces in an intervention to overthrow Fidel Castro, Kennedy probably took into account that due to the great support with which the regime still had among the population, it would have had to face a strong resistance and cause a blood bath to crush it, which would have won the United States the repulse of many in Latin America and other parts of the world where Castro Revolution.
There were 176 dead on the government side. Of the expeditionaries, 111 died and 1,189 were made prisoners in Girón.
Except those accused of committing war crimes during the Batista regime, they were shot, in 1962, after negotiations, the regime would exchange the prisoners for food and medicine.
Kennedy undervalued the danger of the communist regime established in Cuba, which a year later would facilitate the Soviets to install nuclear missiles pointed against the United States. With his laziness and hesitation, he served, in a silver tray, a victory, more than all propaganda, Fidel Castro to continue consolidating his communist dictatorship.
