The Bay of Pigs Invasion was an attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro’s communist Cuba in a three-day invasion of Cuba from April 17 to April 20, 1961. The invasion was fought by Cuban exiles that were influenced and were supposed to have the support of the United States military and Central Intelligence Agency, however, John F. Kennedy called the air support off just before the planes were scheduled to launch. Campbell Craig says in his book, America’s Cold War, that the reason the United States were so involved in pushing Castro out of Cuba is because Castro used the United States to gain his power, but once he gained it, he cut off trade with the United States and pursued connections with Moscow. This led to Kennedy giving the go ahead for 1,500 troops to land in Cuba planning on having United States air support behind them. Kennedy at the moment of launch canceled the air support, acting in order to keep the United States involvement hidden, leaving those attackers stranded and having no option but to surrender. After the failure in Cuba, Nikita Khrushchev saw this as weakness in the United States and decided to revive the Berlin ultimatum, taking complete control over Berlin. NATO and Kennedy responded by regaining control of West Berlin, and in August, German soldiers began controlling traffic in and out of the split territories, eventually leading to the construction of the Berlin Wall.
Looking at how the United States saw the Bay of Pigs invasion, a New York Times newspaper titled “The Cuban Invasion- White House Decision Cited in Study of Why Landing in April was a Failure” shows that this was used to promote fear of communism power throughout the United States. Hanson Baldwin’s first sentence reads, “The celebrations in Cuba last week deliberately emphasized the increasing strength of Premier Fidel Castro’s pro-Communist state.” This being the first thing the people in the United States read puts fear into their minds over communism when in reality, this attack failed because the United States pulled out before anything started. Baldwin continues to criticize the military strategy, saying that it was “stupid” to attack Castro with such a small force, saying that the United States should have known better. This newspaper is interesting because it places blame on Fidel Castro and his communist state being too powerful for such a small attack, almost promoting the thought of attacking Cuba again but with a bigger force and better strategy. This is done in attempt to place blame communism and Castro’s power rather than say the truth about Kennedy’s full plan and him withdrawing, manipulating the heads of the American reader into thinking worse of communism and being more afraid.
Campbell Craig and Fredrik Logevall, America’s Cold War: The Politics of Insecurity (Harvard University Press, 2020). 197, 199-200.
HANSON W. BALDWIN. 1961. “The Cuban Invasion — I: White House Decisions Cited in Study Of Why Landing in April Was a Failure.” New York Times (1923-Current file), Jul 31. http://newman.richmond.edu:2048/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/historical-newspapers/cuban-invasion-i/docview/115463259/se-2?accountid=14731.