9781422277164

BACKGROUND 1.: MISSION REPORT : I n 1959, the Soviet Union was knocking on America’s front door. Revo- lutionary leader Fidel Castro had come to power in Cuba, overthrow- ing the US-backed dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista. Two years later, Castro declared himself a Communist . The Soviets, more than eager to gain a foothold in the Western Hemisphere, immediately embraced Castro. The Soviet Union provided his regime with tanks, planes, military advisers, and economic help. The idea of a Soviet-backed Communist state 90 miles (145 km) from Florida was unacceptable to the United States. In April 1961, the CIA gath- ered a group of Cuban exiles and launched an ill-fated amphibious inva- sion of the island at the Bay of Pigs. The assault was a disaster as Castro’s forces slaughtered the invasion force. The situation increased already frayed tensions between the Americans, Soviets, and Cubans. A year later, President John F. Kennedy, reeling from the botched invasion, encouraged American war planners to “expand rapidly and sub- stantially, in cooperation with our allies, the orientation of existing forces for

Words To Understand Communist person who believes in a planned, state-run economy exiles those who have been forced to live away from their own country paramilitary modeled on the military but not necessarily belonging to it

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