Bay of Pigs Invasion

The Bay of Pigs Invasion, known in Latin America as La Batalla de Girón, was an unsuccessful military invasion of Cuba undertaken by the paramilitary group Brigade 2506 in April 1961. A counter-revolutionary militia trained and funded by the United States government's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Brigade 2506 fronted the armed wing of the Democratic Revolutionary Front (DRF) and intended to overthrow the revolutionary leftist government of President Osvaldo Dorticós Torrado. Launched from Guatemala, the invading force were defeated by the Cuban armed forces, under the command of Prime Minister Fidel Castro, within three days.

The Cuban Revolution of 1952 to 1959 had seen President Fulgencio Batista, a right-wing ally of the U.S., ousted. He was replaced by a new leftist administration dominated by Castro, which had severed the country's formerly strong links with the U.S. by expropriating their economic assets and developing links with the Soviet Union, with whom the U.S. was then embroiled in the Cold War. The U.S. government of President Dwight D. Eisenhower was concerned at the direction which Castro's government were taking, and in March 1960, Eisenhower allocated $13 million to the CIA in order to plan Castro's overthrow. The CIA proceeded to organize the operation with the aid of the Mafia and various Cuban counter-revolutionary forces, training Brigade 2506 in Mexico. Following his victory in the 1960 United States presidential election, John F. Kennedy was informed of the invasion plan and gave his assent to it.

1,400 paramilitaries, divided into five infantry battalions and one paratrooper battalion, had assembled in Guatemala before setting out for Cuba by boat on April 13. On April 15, eight CIA-supplied B-26 bombers attacked Cuban air fields before returning to the U.S., and on the night of April 16, the main invasion landed at a beach named Playa Girón in the Bay of Pigs. Initially overwhelming a local revolutionary militia, the Cuban Army's counter-offensive was then led by Captain José Ramón Fernández, before Castro decided to take personal control of the operation. On April 20, the invaders finally surrendered, with the majority of troops being publicly interrogated and then sent back to the U.S.

The failed invasion strengthened the position of Castro's administration, who proceeded to openly proclaim their intention to adopt socialism and strengthen ties with the Soviet Union, leading to the events of the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. The invasion was a major embarrassment for U.S. foreign policy, with Kennedy ordering a number of internal investigations. Across much of Latin America, it was celebrated as evidence of the fallibility of U.S. imperialism.