apr OF.
s
g to counter Castro
Working the Cuban Beat
few of us who werehe birth of ihe Castro regime and who worked against it sporadically for three decades are still around as observers in its decliningave been particularly lucky in this regard. By far ihe most interesting and productive period of this era was at the Havana station from trie last year of tbc Batista regime8 to our break In tela-lions wjtfi Castro in1 J|
1 returnedropaganda
I
After theasiami for most ofnd the early
Miami tit handle Radio Americas.
operation against Cuba.
returned to Miami as case officer-directoruban intelligence service in exile known as theetiredas recalled to service as ancontractor to screen and interview arrivalsthe Mariel boatontinued to interview Cuban arrivals
rrived in Havanay main assign-men'J
were walk-ins in fairly large numbers. But almost all these people were revolutionary advocatesropaganda campaign against (he US Embassy innd CIA inThus. Castro was paintedemocratic reformer. Batista's "atrocities" were exaggerated and those ofh of July and the DR dismissed as acts of oveneal-ous underlings. Batista's fall was touted as inevitable, and the number of guerrillas fighting the regime inflated exponentially As ofur efforts had failed.
Castro was an attractive and popular figure, and the United States had no real alternative but to support him initially when he came to power. The CIA stationmany of whose casual contacts saw through the Castro democratic facade, were virtually unanimous in their opposition to Castro from the day he took power. The facade was convincing lo many, however, because the first revolutionary government was nude up of some people with ostensibly impeccable liberal credentials.
Castro did not take long before showing his true colon by reversing court decisions, ridding himself of hisprime minister and most of his democratically oriented entourage, and by placing "Che" Guevara, an Argentine physicianarxist, in charge of the
economy, as well as Ms brother. Raul, in charge of the Defense Ministry, and himself in dictatorial control of the nation. In the light of ihrae developments, the iniclligcrxe business picked up Walk-ias. defectors (IS members of the Supreme Court seeking visas ooe Saturdaynd coununevolutuMury gntps beganmultiply, and the intelligence droughteluge The ptobkm va* handling ihe mass of thetearing9tdifficult io evaluate the potentialariety of eountenevoltt-liooary group* and their usually extravagant claims. Some of the mote promising counterrevolutionaries became Lnownj
the Revolution
From the beginning, one principal aim of Castro and Guevara was to export the revolution Caribbeanof varied political stripes swarmed to Havana looking for help as soon as Castro took over, j
|Castro, In most cases, decided to use his
eopleToi the many "invasions" Jul be launched during my stay in Havana against Mexico, Haiti,and several other countries. Castro did not fail completely in his attempts to export his doctrine. He helped the Sandinistas in Nicaragua and numerous other rebel groups throughout Ihe Western Hemisphere and elsewhere, including those in Colombia. ElPeru, Uruguay, and the Dominican Republic Asome Castro-inspired desiabiliiation remained in some Latin American countries. This messianic facet of the Cuban Revolution may have been one of iu most destructive aspects. It was costly to several Latin Ameri-can countries and to the United States, which tried to conrain It.
ime things went smoothly, but the agent had three female neighbors who were apartment "males'* He had affairs with all three, and thisealad to find him another rent-freeound one. and once again banked on governmentin administering the whan reform law. We broke relations withew months later, and myof keeping himew safehouse disappeared when be departed.
Staybeh.ind Program
The station received no guidance from Headquarters ontaybchind operation, and we did noi have much time toechanism. There were manyand there were no replacements for departing officers. TDYers were often moreindranceelp We would have to reach some compromiseocal chain of command and independent
Cubar'
Funding wouldroblem bom for th; independents and for any net established. Al thisave scam recollection of which agent was which. While we were planning, each ageni wis handled by (he case officer who had either recruited him or to whom he had been assigned. As planning progressed, the operation's organization, if such It could be termed,hape of sorts.
required for ultimate recovery and use. Case officers transported ihe radios to different pans of the island; some were buried, some were slashed, and at least one was placedell wiih Ldhappy results.
Agents abounded because opposition lo ibe regime had become substantial, and some who would have been unwilling toear earlier now began to come around.
Another radio-stashing operation also returned ic haunt me. Oneolleague told me that he could stash two radios with contacts in Cienfuegos in south* central Cuba, and he suggestedccompany him. Wc were stopped en route by the Cuban police, who ignored our claim of diplomatic immunity and opened our car's trunk. Fortunately, the radios were inboxes which ihe police did not bother to open. In Cienfuegos my colleagueent to his contact's house, and my friend look him asidehalled with his son. Years later,as at MiamiAirport on my wayDY. the airline agent cursed meave him my ticket. The ticket agent was the son withad talked ia Ctenfuegos. My associate bad failed to tell his father what was being Mashed, and the father and son got rid of the radios when they discovered what they were.
Headquarters sentradiosavana for
caching or slashing around (he Island. By modemthese were dinosaurs. They came packedarge waterproof "coffin" which would have permitted cachingake or stream, as well as in the ground. All station officers were expected to help in placing the cumbersomeround cache was. inealnd precise details on the location were
ood deal of work had been done inour staybehrnd mechanism, much more was still needed when relations were broken After thewasave my servant some money, packed my scan! belongings,ubstantial amount of money from tbe station, phoned all principal agents and the chief radio operator, and met them all in my official vehicleew blocks from theurned over the funds to the agent Ithe most ' ' ave them
Canary Beat
law-minute instructions ami returned to the Embassy to await transport to the ship that would take us horn Havana to West Palm Bcacb.
I realizeiolated several security practices at the last meeting. Given the tone available,ecided to take tbe risk. The net survived for some time, and to my knowledge no one was arrestedesult of the emergency meeting. The principal agent witheft the funds survived, bul he ultimately had to brave the Florida Straitsaft.
The departure from the Embassy was an emotional experience, both for the Cubans and for US personnel. There were Cubans, still unwilling to believe that there would be no more visas, seeking our last-minute help in vain Cuba had been an interesting experience for most of us, and many could not help recalling Ihe contagious gaiety we had found upon our arrival and before Castro look over. That was gone now. In addition lo Ihe visa seekers, the Embassy parking lot was filled with angry Cubans, civilian and militia, who jeered at the "Yankee Imperialists."
A Denied Operation* Area
Tbe pursuit of operational leadsiring and generally unrewarding job because dry holes are the norm.even what at Am appears toome run turns out toane of time and money. One particular case sticks In my mind.
Vine operation worked for
a short time,as transferred elsewhere-eturned to Miami for anotherew years later and inquired about Iheearned that the agent had been jailed for ernbeulemew, that he had producedlittle before his arrest. I
During the Bay of Pigs invasion, Miami station wasupport mechanism for an operation run out of Washington. The Cuban *hadow government in exile was ia the area, but the officer dealing with thai group was not an officer permanently assigned to the station. BrigadUUss who participated in Ihe invasion were picked up in Miami. I-
also was the burgeoning intelligence service in exile that we were developing and which, at first, Ian administrative nuisance, in pan because there were so many other fishas wrong, and littleuspect at ihe time that oneould be case officer-director of this group. Ultimately, ii
If the optionilitary invasion had been selected during the missile crisis1 was one of fivewho would have been seel to the island toew station. All of us were military reserve officer*.
case officer, my visits lo the island were not frequent, but those of the station manager were, and he usually had to resolve personnel conflicts,
Jand logistic flaps.
A new chief of station.
Radio Americas
relumed to Miami and againovert action officer. My principal case was our major radiotargeted at Cuba, at that time called Radiobut originally known as Radio Swan, because the transmitter was located on Great Swan Island off tbe Honduran coast.
This operation, which had been in being from the early days of the Castro regime, was probably as effective as such an operation can be, especially considering thefunding itt hough it was supposed tolandestine operation, that is, privately sponsored, from the outset Castro was complaining about "acompany without ships" named the Gilbarltcr Steamship Company, the original notional company that was supposed to own the station. Along with the nsnsmluer, technicians and news readers wereoa Swan Island, which wasile or to long.ttle Swan it was the subjectow-key territorial dispute between the United States and(In recent years the United Stales has given up Its claim to the islands.)
Along with Radio Americas, the United Stateseaiher and FAA facility on Great Swan. The other occupants of the island were Caymanese who would come and go.as necessary for Radio Americas personnel who received logistic support and program tapes from south Florida by occasionallights and regular weekly flights by smaller aircraft- As
was noi entirety sattsnea with Knaie Amercas. even though the lettet response from both Cuba and Latin America was outstanding. He felt that some of the programs were too propagandis-tic and hard bitting My efforts to lone down theto the point of little more than straight news and muiie never quite satisfied him, and perhaps it wasfor me lhat ihe operation was canceled as my tor was about to end. The reasons for the cancellation are especially nebulous, consideringew months before termination we had been instructed tt> tease new quarters and buy the equipment to produce our ownin our own studio instead of farming them out.
While RFE and Radio Liberty may have been veryhelpful in hastening the crumbling of the Soviet Bloc, Radio Americas may haveeleterious effect, though one consonant with US polky. It may have slightly aggravated discontent on the island and thus contributed to the exodus of some of the verywho might have helped to overthrow Castro. If such is the case, it also contributed to the cosily immigration problems which have plagued Miami and other cities.
Cuban Intelligence Service in Exile
nucleus of'e intelligence group be^an ti> laSc
shape.
both the suiiaa and (he Cuban inleiiiper.se group, by now known as (he AMOTS. had begun tourned over the operationoniract employeead handled In Havana, and he ran it for several years. This was the same manad left in Havana as chief of the staybehind mechanism. Heommendable job during his long tenure, and he was well rewarded by the Agency.
1 became responsible for the operation
IM, ihe
ilut because
AMOTS .sponsored infiltration missions had ceasedhad been cuthad ibe (ask of
cutting (his number in hilT immediatelyetired. During most of my tenure, however,rincipal source of intelligence for the Miami station and had assumed many of the Cuban exile interviewing functions of CIA's overt office in Miami.
extent on various subjects soarticularwould have at least some basic knowledge of ihe field on which the source had information.
The raw interview results wereMOTS headquarters by courier from tbe safehousc, where most of the in-depth interviews were conducted. These were then scanned and sent to one of the sections, usually positive Intelligence, to be put into report formalcollateral information was added from file research or from the knowledgeability of the personthe report. Copies would be sent to the filet and to the studies section, which from time to time was requested to prepare biographical, political, andstudies.
All taw reports were written in Spanish, and thoseto the station as disseminab'^ positiveor counterintelligence reports were translated by one expert translator aad by another whoood bit ofdited all the reports and cheeked them for correct translation, when necessary.
principal sources of information derived fromof new arrivals from Cuba and ihe impressive files thai the organization had developed- We had two screcoers at the airport who talked to adult arrivals lo see if they might have information to service our requirements. Bask personal data, including Miami addresses and telephone numbers, were taken down and ihe person was told that he or she would be contacted for quesiioning in depth. Because ihe screening was done under what appeared to be official auspices,were few, and the "go lo hell" attitude assumed by some Cubans in later years were rare.
Cuban Adjustment Aci6 was passed, and any Cuban who could make il to the United Slates legally could claim permanent residenceearay. The Cubans could come with an immigrant's visa, or, as was to happen so often later, on rafts and inner tubes.
The screening results were passed to the Chief of the interviews sectionrge safehoosc near the AMOTS headquarters. There wereozenusigncd to that unit; ihey specialiied io some
In the AMOTS headquarters.
^here was aol employees available fot immediate "
innrre
through AMOTS headquarters. Eachould meettation courier to pass on all of our processed materials and to receive any station requirements.contact with the station was frequent, but my visits to the station were rare.
i believe that this operation was the principal source of station intelligence during the operation
i ior sucrt in operation, it became my last and unpleasant task to reduce thebyercent. Mass terminations arc not easy, and no training course could satisfactorily address (heCommon senseouch of empathy, feigned or
tola me mitre atw naoersonnel who had served loyally forecade wereinancial separation package.
Mariel Boat Lift
riggeredun invasion of the Peruvian Embassy in Havana by Cuban freedom seekers, Castro again resorted to ihe escape valve to rid himself of the discontented by facilitating mass flight to the United States He invited Cubans already in the United States to come to the port of Mariel several miles w> the west of Havana by boat and pick up loved ones. Castro decided who would leave. He termed them all guano*nd, though most wanted lo leave to joinin the United States and live better. Castroto sendood measure of antisocial types, including seasoned criminals as well as residents of ihe Havana Mental Hospital.
ad beenontract with the Agencyefusedanted to teach, travel, and write.1 had taught for eight years and hadood deal of traveling. The urge to write, at that lime, wasad turned down other Agency work offers-]-
Thecontinued by boat, by raft, through the Mexican border, and by sponsorship of Cuban exiles in other countries by the Cuban-American NationalPanama, where Cubans obtained entry visas, was used by hundreds as ihe departure point for the trek to the Mexican border. This "underground railroad"ig disadvantage- Such arrivals were deemed illegal, so they could not avail themselves of the CubanAct6 which permits any Cuban arriving legally to legal residence after one year in the Uniled States.
An Assessment
Tr.i' story of my experiences isuggestion of CIA's extensive operational activity against the Cubanhe effort has had its successes and its failures, including the Bay of Pigs and the revelation by ain thehai most Cuban agents "recruited" in the previous decade or so were "dangles" who remained loyal lo Castro.
Nonetheless, policymakers have been kept informed of internal Cuban developments, and the Agency has kept Castro off balance by reporting on and frustrating hii
persistent efforts to export his revolution militarily and by subversion. The price has been phenomenal, and wc may have prolonged bis existence by encouraging and facilitating the mass exodus of those who might haveiable resistance movement. This, of course,olicy decision.
Original document.
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