Reasons For The Failure Of The Bay Of Pigs

The failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961 illustrates the mismanagement, lack of security, and over confidence of our president and CIA at the time. This failure caused tensions to rise between the two superpowers of the world, The Soviet Union and the United States. While the blame for this failure falls on the president and intelligence community, there are many lessons to be learned. I will first discuss the background leading up to the operation, the operation, then failures and lessons learned. Fulgencio Batista was the 9th and 12th president of Cuba. His last term as president stemmed from a military coup and was from 1952-1959. During this era, there was extreme paranoia of communism and its agenda to take over the world. While
Kennedy was read on to the operation and then fed a plethora of misleading information for the CIA to have continued support for the operation. One of the Kennedy’s primary concerns was to retain deniability of the operation. Due to this factor, parts of the operation were changed. First the landing site was changed. It moved from Trinidad to the Bay of Pigs, some 80 miles from the nearest friendly forces. This also made it impossible for the invading force to withdraw if anything were to happen. There was an impenetrable swamp between the landing site and friendly forces as well. The aircraft to be used for the bombing mission were outdated B-26 bombers; painted and looked to be acquired from the black market. The bombers completely missed their targets, allowing Castro’s air force to attack the forces on the
Some of the failures were from a military standpoint, while others were from the intelligence community. From this operation, as with any operation, there are lessons to be learned. In the planning phases of an operation, there needs to be clear lines of communication and chains of command established. This will help alleviate confusion and ensure intelligence is delivered timely and accurately. Field officers that are in charge, need to be just that, in charge. Having higher headquarters changing plans without informing officers in the field, can be detrimental to an operation. The CIA has a charter to carry out covert action when ordered by the president. This charter was not fulfilled when intelligence and photos of the operation were leaked before the operation even began. This failure helped solidify for the future, that covert action needs to be isolated from intelligence and analysis. I feel that one of the biggest lessons learned from the Bay of Pigs fiasco, is accurate reporting. The CIA should have promptly reported there was not enough local support for a rebellion. I believe this reporting alone would have staved off the impending failure of the operation. This would have saved lives and ultimately, embarrassment of the President of the United States and