Cuba’s victory over mercenary forces that were backed by the US on April 19th, 1961, not only constitutes imperialism’s first military defeat in Latin America but was also a political failure.

This act of state terrorism, named Operation Pluto, carried out by the Pentagon and CIA, and largest organized against the island and which was presented before the world by the John F. Kennedy administration as an “internal rebellion”.

On this occasion, as before and after, Washington offended and attempted to deceive the international community’s intelligence with a Hollywood style lie.    

The show began on the morning of April 15th.  B-26 aircrafts took off from Puerto Cabezas, Nicaragua to bombard several airports on the island with the objective of destroying the Cuban air force.

There were 9 aircrafts painted similar to the Cuban air force planes. Three were directed to Ciudad Libertad, a similar figure to the San Antonio de los Baños Air Base and two to the civilian airport in eastern Santiago de Cuba; they flew directly to Miami afterwards and participated in a press conference in that south Florida city.

The pilot of Cuban origin showed the fuselage that was allegedly shot at by the “Castro followers” and declared that he was a deserter of the Revolutionary Armed Forces – alongside others- had abandoned the country after dropping the bombs.

During an afternoon emergency session of the UN Security Council met, Cuban Foreign Minister Raul Roa denounced the air attacks as well as the story fabricated by the CIA.

Immediately the US ambassador offered the news reports whose headlines summarized the version revealed by Washington.

The US representative exhibited the photos of the pilot and aircraft which were taken by UPI with the objective of reinforcing the veracity of his declarations.

The following day, the leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, during the burial of the 7 victims of the air attacks the previous day, analyzed the news agency´s news reports that revealed the CIA version and summoned the US President to present before the UN the pilots that they said had defected the Cuban Armed Forces.  Kennedy´s response was silence.

This attack, responded by strong air fire by the young men of the Granma Base located in Ciudad Libertad was the advance of how the Cuban people were to repeal the aggression two days later.  This was the beginning of the story that ended on April 19th in Playa Larga and Playa Giron and the Cuban people´s victory at the Bay of Pigs. (By Ángel Rodríguez Álvarez / acn)