WEBVTT - Operation Northwoods: The False Flag Op That Never Was 0:00:01.440 --> 0:00:04.240 Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I 0:00:04.360 --> 0:00:13.080 Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, 0:00:13.119 --> 0:00:15.600 and there's Chuck, and there's Cherry, and it's the stuff 0:00:15.640 --> 0:00:23.480 you should know. Okay, deal with it. Yeah, up your nose, 0:00:24.920 --> 0:00:30.680 et cetera. Yeah. I just suddenly, you know how, I 0:00:30.720 --> 0:00:34.360 stopped saying that quote mid quote because I suddenly felt 0:00:34.400 --> 0:00:37.920 like an old dinosaur Chuck, and that probably nobody knew 0:00:37.960 --> 0:00:41.040 what I was talking about. And I'm tired of feeling old, Chuck. 0:00:41.720 --> 0:00:45.440 Are you feeling old? I feel young. I'm glad to 0:00:45.479 --> 0:00:50.080 answer your question. Yes. Okay, So hey, before we get started, Um, 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:52.040 this is gonna be a really good episode. Uh, and 0:00:52.080 --> 0:00:56.040 I want to enhance it by saying, I finally saw 0:00:56.080 --> 0:00:58.680 I got to see my niece's movie that I've been 0:00:58.680 --> 0:01:03.280 talking NonStop about. O Exit. It's amazing. It's such a 0:01:03.360 --> 0:01:07.440 great I would call it a popcorn thriller. Um. Like, 0:01:07.640 --> 0:01:09.440 you know, it's not like high art. It's not trying 0:01:09.440 --> 0:01:11.480 to be high art, but it's it's like really well 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:13.400 done in the script, doesn't have a bunch of like 0:01:13.760 --> 0:01:16.240 holes in it. Uh. It doesn't like they've trimmed off 0:01:16.280 --> 0:01:20.040 all the fat. It moves along really nicely. Um, and 0:01:20.080 --> 0:01:23.080 once it gets going, it keeps like getting going again 0:01:23.160 --> 0:01:27.039 and like these lurches forward and just it does it 0:01:27.080 --> 0:01:28.759 doesn't go off the rails. But it's just like, oh 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:30.960 my god, I can't believe this is going on right now. 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:34.760 And then to be able to see my niece Mila 0:01:35.400 --> 0:01:38.280 act as like the kid in this, to see her 0:01:38.319 --> 0:01:41.720 like do this stuff, it's just it's amazing Tod first 0:01:41.720 --> 0:01:44.399 of all, and I'm I'm like removing, I've done everything 0:01:44.400 --> 0:01:47.800 I can to remove any subjectivity as a proud uncle, 0:01:48.320 --> 0:01:50.960 and like actually watch her acting and like the performance 0:01:51.000 --> 0:01:54.240 she gets and it is great. It's amazing. She does 0:01:54.240 --> 0:01:56.440 an amazing job. She has to do a bunch of 0:01:56.480 --> 0:01:59.640 different stuff. She gets like tortured and harrass and beat 0:01:59.720 --> 0:02:04.080 up and everything. Um, it's actually really graphic movie in 0:02:04.120 --> 0:02:07.640 a lot of ways, but like delightfully if you ask me, Um, 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:09.480 and she did. She did a great job. And I 0:02:09.480 --> 0:02:11.480 thought the whole cast did a really good job too, 0:02:11.639 --> 0:02:15.799 including great It is good, including Havannah Rose Lou by 0:02:15.800 --> 0:02:18.840 the way, but yes it is. It is a great movie. 0:02:18.840 --> 0:02:22.959 And I recommend anybody who watches our movies to watch 0:02:23.000 --> 0:02:26.800 the movie and it's on It's on Hulu right now streaming. 0:02:26.800 --> 0:02:29.360 It's called No Exit Awesome. I can't wait to watch it. 0:02:29.400 --> 0:02:31.160 I've been traveling. I went on the road for a 0:02:31.200 --> 0:02:35.119 bit once again. See more Bonnie Prince Billy and Matt 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:38.880 Sweeney Superwolve shows. Matt Sweeney is that the girlfriend guy? 0:02:39.320 --> 0:02:42.079 What the guy who had that hit in the nineties 0:02:42.120 --> 0:02:47.640 called Girlfriend? No, he's local that was that was a 0:02:47.639 --> 0:02:50.679 great album. Um, I can't think of his name. No, 0:02:50.720 --> 0:02:53.600 Matt Sweeney is a genuine stuff you should know listener 0:02:54.200 --> 0:02:57.280 and super smart, awesome guy, and we're kind of pals now, 0:02:57.360 --> 0:02:59.079 so he's always kind enough to hang out and he 0:02:59.080 --> 0:03:01.720 always sends me really good ideas for the show. But 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:04.720 that's not my ninth Bonnie Prince Billy show in the 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:06.400 past like a year and a half. I'm going to 0:03:06.440 --> 0:03:09.160 where he goes. That's really cool. He didn't come to Atlanta, 0:03:09.240 --> 0:03:11.640 so I just I'm hitting the road and along with 0:03:12.120 --> 0:03:14.040 our good friend Joey c R. He came on this one. 0:03:14.600 --> 0:03:16.960 Oh yeah, that's right. I saw that post on Instagram. 0:03:17.000 --> 0:03:19.600 That's awesome to see Joey's looking good. Yeah, he he 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:22.360 says hello, and uh, if you want to see pictures 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:25.200 of this in my Travels and Travails. You can follow 0:03:25.240 --> 0:03:28.720 me to Chuck the Podcaster on Instagram. I'm sorry you 0:03:28.760 --> 0:03:32.440 had travails. Uh what I say travails? Did I not 0:03:32.440 --> 0:03:35.800 say travels? He said travels and travails? No, no travails, 0:03:35.880 --> 0:03:38.440 only good good It was only good times. I'm sure 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:40.600 I've told you before, but I always love rubbing it in. 0:03:40.680 --> 0:03:43.080 Did I ever tell you that I saw Bonnie Prince 0:03:43.120 --> 0:03:46.720 Billy doing karaoke at our friend Toby's wedding years back? 0:03:47.560 --> 0:03:49.000 I don't know that. You told me that do you 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:51.880 do a song? It was? It was some like sweet 0:03:51.880 --> 0:03:53.920 old country song he didn do wet with I think 0:03:53.960 --> 0:03:56.480 maybe his wife. Oh my god. I mean he's the best. 0:03:56.480 --> 0:03:58.800 He's my favorite vocalist. He's to me, the best singer 0:03:59.040 --> 0:04:02.200 that literally in music history. And a cool dude. I 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:04.200 can tell you because I've been in the same room 0:04:04.200 --> 0:04:07.400 with them plenty of times. Me too. I was four 0:04:07.400 --> 0:04:11.920 ft from him the other night. That's really cool. Anyway. 0:04:11.960 --> 0:04:14.480 Shout out to Sweeney, Shout out to no Exit. And 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:18.160 now let's talk about a time when the US government 0:04:18.600 --> 0:04:22.680 was not above uh planning false flag operations that were 0:04:22.720 --> 0:04:27.240 crazy and ludicrous and planning potentially to assassinate the leaders 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:31.560 of other countries hundreds of years ago. Oh actually no, 0:04:31.680 --> 0:04:34.960 this was way back in the nineteen sixties. Yeah, planning, 0:04:35.080 --> 0:04:39.040 that's the operative word here is planning doesn't mean that 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:42.640 like any false flag operation was ever carried out, at 0:04:42.680 --> 0:04:45.080 least by the United States government. There's been plenty of 0:04:45.120 --> 0:04:50.320 false flag operations carried out, most recently, um apparently by Russia, 0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:54.400 who was trying to accuse Ukraine of doing like sabotage 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:58.160 embombing across the border as a pretext for invasion. And 0:04:58.200 --> 0:05:00.960 that's generally the point of a false flag operation, which 0:05:01.120 --> 0:05:04.120 we should probably define it. But it's basically where you 0:05:04.200 --> 0:05:08.480 dress up as the um somebody from the country that 0:05:08.520 --> 0:05:12.560 you want to invade, have them or you assault your 0:05:12.560 --> 0:05:17.240 own like border crossing, your own military installation, your own railroad, 0:05:18.240 --> 0:05:21.160 and then you publicize to the world how that country 0:05:21.400 --> 0:05:23.640 attacked you, and now you're gonna have to go in 0:05:23.680 --> 0:05:26.440 and invade in in you know, for your own your 0:05:26.440 --> 0:05:28.720 own welfare and the welfare of your own country. That's 0:05:28.720 --> 0:05:31.800 a false flag operation, that's right. Staging any kind of 0:05:31.800 --> 0:05:35.440 a fake operation. Uh. The it originally came about the 0:05:35.600 --> 0:05:39.960 term false flag from pirates would fly a flag of 0:05:40.000 --> 0:05:43.720 a friendly country two lureships closer than they would attack them. 0:05:43.720 --> 0:05:46.239 But since then and Russia is big on it, they've 0:05:47.040 --> 0:05:49.400 I mean, Japan has done this, Germany has done this, 0:05:50.279 --> 0:05:53.480 but the Soviets and Russia, UH, like you said, they're 0:05:53.520 --> 0:05:57.279 they're still gangbusters for this kind of thing. Yes, I 0:05:57.320 --> 0:05:59.520 also think it's just a p s A. If you 0:05:59.560 --> 0:06:05.640 are really um feeling sympathetic or um, you know, absorbing 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:10.120 information that makes you see things through Putin's view, you're 0:06:10.200 --> 0:06:14.800 probably being manipulated online. Just why you may want to 0:06:15.080 --> 0:06:17.839 you may want to look a little deeper into that 0:06:17.880 --> 0:06:19.960 and pull your head out of that particular rabbit hole. 0:06:22.040 --> 0:06:25.000 All right, So let's go back in time, uh and 0:06:25.080 --> 0:06:30.159 talk about Operation north Woods. But to talk about Operation Northwoods, 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:33.280 we have to first talk about who did this one 0:06:33.320 --> 0:06:35.160 for us? By the way, who put this together? This 0:06:35.200 --> 0:06:40.120 was Olivia Joint Olivia Gershn, great work. We need to 0:06:40.120 --> 0:06:45.720 talk about Cuba and what the threat that that country 0:06:46.200 --> 0:06:48.920 started to pose or the seeming threat that country started 0:06:48.960 --> 0:06:53.400 to pose to the United States, UH, in the late 0:06:53.480 --> 0:06:57.560 nineteen fifties early nineteen sixties. Yeah, because Castro came to 0:06:57.560 --> 0:07:01.120 power ninety nine, and in doing so he became the 0:07:01.160 --> 0:07:04.440 first UM. He established the first communist regime in the 0:07:04.480 --> 0:07:08.280 Western hemisphere. Uh in America's backyard, as it would later 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:11.760 be put. And this is not settled well with the 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:15.040 Americans because at the time we were UM I guess 0:07:15.040 --> 0:07:20.440 our military, um brass, our intelligence community, basically everybody in 0:07:20.520 --> 0:07:26.520 charge with security for America. UM was of the of 0:07:26.600 --> 0:07:30.240 the of the ILK that like, we should be invading 0:07:30.320 --> 0:07:34.680 other countries that are communists and toppling those regimes and 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:38.640 fighting communism wherever it pops up. No, no countries too small, 0:07:38.840 --> 0:07:42.080 no countries too large. We need to invade them and 0:07:42.160 --> 0:07:46.720 fight them and remove those communists and and probably install 0:07:46.800 --> 0:07:50.000 like a democratic government from that point on, which is 0:07:50.080 --> 0:07:53.400 kind of ironic. By the way. That was Matthew Sweet, 0:07:54.640 --> 0:07:56.720 That's what I said. What did you say, Oh, Matt 0:07:56.720 --> 0:07:59.880 Matt Sweeney. Matt Sweeney. But it came to me when 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:02.840 was when you were talking about Cuba, Matthew Sweet, because 0:08:02.840 --> 0:08:05.720 it's a great record. Yeah, I can't remember the song 0:08:05.880 --> 0:08:07.760 how it goes, but I know it was a good song. 0:08:07.840 --> 0:08:09.240 I don't think I ever heard the record had a 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:13.760 cool video too. Yeah, while you sing it. Yeah, I 0:08:14.320 --> 0:08:18.960 love somebody, remember that. That's it. I think I need 0:08:19.160 --> 0:08:23.760 somebody to love Okay, and then the chorus is, uh, 0:08:23.920 --> 0:08:30.240 you need to get back in the Little Friend. Oh yeah, Yeah, 0:08:30.240 --> 0:08:31.880 it's a pretty good song. It's not as good as 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:36.760 I remember just by the Superwolf record, it's better. Um alright, 0:08:36.800 --> 0:08:39.240 so good set up on Cuba. Uh, if you want 0:08:39.280 --> 0:08:41.200 to go back, well, um, I don't even know how 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:42.360 much we need to go over it, but if you 0:08:42.360 --> 0:08:44.760 want to go back and listen to our I think 0:08:44.800 --> 0:08:49.000 pretty great episode from November called the Bay of Pigs disaster. 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:51.840 This was sort of one of the first things that 0:08:51.960 --> 0:08:57.760 happened in the nineteen sixties when UH Eisenhower approved this 0:08:57.880 --> 0:09:01.440 boondoggle of an operation UH known as the Bay of 0:09:01.480 --> 0:09:04.440 Pigs Invasion that just went just about as wrong as 0:09:04.440 --> 0:09:07.520 it could go on every level. Yeah, and so like 0:09:07.880 --> 0:09:13.000 we were setting up fake invasions of Cuba supporting exiles 0:09:13.040 --> 0:09:18.000 invasions of Cuba. UM RFK and JFK were obsessed with 0:09:18.080 --> 0:09:21.559 Cuba and in particular removing Castro from power. Cuba was 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:24.400 a big deal for a number of reasons, we should say, 0:09:24.720 --> 0:09:27.120 and one of the leading reasons that Cuba was a 0:09:27.120 --> 0:09:29.840 problem for the United States is because they were worried 0:09:29.920 --> 0:09:33.520 Castro is going to serve as an inspiration for other 0:09:33.600 --> 0:09:38.800 countries in Latin America, especially the economically depressed ones um 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:42.240 where they're like, yeah, all this this capitalism running around 0:09:42.240 --> 0:09:47.040 where Americans own most of our national operations and exports 0:09:47.360 --> 0:09:50.800 and we're getting very little in return, Communism might seem 0:09:50.800 --> 0:09:53.920 pretty appealing to them, So Castro might serve as an inspiration. 0:09:54.280 --> 0:09:56.480 And if there's like that domino effect like they were 0:09:56.480 --> 0:09:59.880 worried about in Southeast Asia that happens in Latin America 0:10:00.000 --> 0:10:03.760 thanks to Cuba, all of a sudden, America's American businesses 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:06.440 are gonna be out a lot of money, Americans are 0:10:06.440 --> 0:10:08.320 gonna be out a lot of the bananas that they've 0:10:08.360 --> 0:10:11.960 come to love thanks to Edward Burney's and we would 0:10:12.000 --> 0:10:14.640 also lose access to things like the Panama Canal and 0:10:14.679 --> 0:10:17.440 other things we need. So it wasn't just like a 0:10:18.280 --> 0:10:22.679 like a ideological problem. It was a practical problem too. 0:10:22.760 --> 0:10:26.400 But the biggest problem, the biggest problem that a communist 0:10:26.480 --> 0:10:28.800 Cuba post to the United States is that it was 0:10:28.880 --> 0:10:33.160 now an ally with the USSR. America's swore an enemy. 0:10:33.520 --> 0:10:39.240 The other polar power of the Cold War would now 0:10:39.320 --> 0:10:42.480 had a country that would be willing to let them 0:10:42.480 --> 0:10:45.480 set up nuclear missile basis a hundred boles from Florida. 0:10:45.920 --> 0:10:49.080 That was truly the big problem with Cuba and Castro, 0:10:49.640 --> 0:10:53.240 That's right. And because of that kind of from the 0:10:53.360 --> 0:10:58.679 very beginning, the US very quietly started thinking about like, hey, 0:10:58.800 --> 0:11:02.839 should we assassinate this guy? Should we depose this guy? Um, 0:11:02.880 --> 0:11:05.400 And there were all kinds of crazy like poison cigars, 0:11:05.440 --> 0:11:08.240 like mafia hitman, that kind of stuff was being talked 0:11:08.240 --> 0:11:14.559 about behind closed doors, including um, Florida Senator George Smathers, 0:11:14.640 --> 0:11:18.959 great name, Uh, he proposed assassinating Castro, was a good 0:11:18.960 --> 0:11:22.040 buddy of Kennedy's and brought it up during the nine 0:11:22.640 --> 0:11:26.959 presidential campaign and include which included the plan included a 0:11:27.000 --> 0:11:31.160 false flag attack at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base. And he 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:35.320 claims that Kennedy basically was like a put something down 0:11:35.320 --> 0:11:39.800 on paper and I'll take a look. And um, so 0:11:39.920 --> 0:11:42.800 Kennedy wasn't you know, if you believe this, he wasn't 0:11:42.840 --> 0:11:47.920 initially adverse or averse excuse me, to the idea of 0:11:48.760 --> 0:11:52.160 taking care of the problem. If you know what I'm saying, Yeah, 0:11:52.240 --> 0:11:56.600 that's how obsessed he was with removing Castro. The problem 0:11:56.679 --> 0:11:59.640 was this after the Bay of Pigs. That was what 0:11:59.760 --> 0:12:06.120 nine teen sixty one, I believe, Yeah, it was April nine. Um. 0:12:06.600 --> 0:12:09.720 The one of the huge problems with aside from America 0:12:09.800 --> 0:12:11.960 having an enormous amount of a on its face for 0:12:12.679 --> 0:12:17.959 being outed for supporting a failed coup of Castro, Um, 0:12:18.240 --> 0:12:21.080 was that Kennedy had been led to believe by his 0:12:21.200 --> 0:12:24.720 military and intelligence advisors that there was going to be 0:12:24.800 --> 0:12:29.440 an uprising, that like these exiles showing up having maken 0:12:29.480 --> 0:12:32.600 a couple of wins against the Castro regime was going 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:35.680 to like awaken the Cuban people who would want to 0:12:35.720 --> 0:12:38.520 go back to, you know, the way things were before 0:12:38.600 --> 0:12:40.960 the Communists came along and took over the country, and 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:43.680 they're being uprising that top of Castro. That was the thing. 0:12:43.800 --> 0:12:45.960 They weren't necessarily trying to take over the country. They're 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:49.600 trying to incite a revolution, and that did not happen. 0:12:49.800 --> 0:12:52.520 Was supposed to work. Yeah, even though Kennedy had been 0:12:52.559 --> 0:12:54.840 told up and down by these advisors. He was a 0:12:54.840 --> 0:12:57.120 brand new president at the time, and he had been 0:12:57.160 --> 0:12:59.080 told up and down by these advisors that that was 0:12:59.120 --> 0:13:01.959 going to happen, and it didn't happen. It never materialized, 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:06.559 and so he lost full faith in any military or 0:13:06.600 --> 0:13:09.960 intelligence advisor around him at the time. From that point on, 0:13:10.240 --> 0:13:12.280 so he found he needed to surround himself with new 0:13:12.320 --> 0:13:15.600 people to take on this this Castro Cuba problem. And 0:13:15.640 --> 0:13:17.160 the point man he put on the whole thing, he 0:13:17.200 --> 0:13:20.199 basically said, I want you to to be in charge 0:13:20.200 --> 0:13:23.079 of getting rid of Castro, you know, figuring out how 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:27.720 to do it without sending in military people was his brother, Bobby. 0:13:27.880 --> 0:13:30.480 That's right. Uh, Like you said, Kennedy still had that 0:13:30.480 --> 0:13:34.640 new president smell, and Bobby still had that new attorney 0:13:34.640 --> 0:13:38.000 general smell. You were very very patient and waiting for 0:13:38.040 --> 0:13:40.120 your chance to use that, and I think it paid 0:13:40.120 --> 0:13:42.880 off in aces. Okay, good, I mean I try to 0:13:42.880 --> 0:13:46.679 get in there. But you know, uh so, Bobby, it 0:13:46.800 --> 0:13:49.120 was attorney general, like I said, And that isn't you know, 0:13:49.160 --> 0:13:53.640 attorney attorney general or attorneys general um or would it 0:13:53.679 --> 0:13:58.280 be attorneys generals? They usually don't get involved in stuff 0:13:58.280 --> 0:14:01.280 like this, but he was his his brother, and so 0:14:01.440 --> 0:14:04.120 he trusted him, and he ended up overseeing something called 0:14:04.360 --> 0:14:09.440 Operation Mongoose, which was kind of this crazy idea that 0:14:09.480 --> 0:14:14.400 they could disrupt life in Cuba such that, uh with 0:14:14.720 --> 0:14:19.680 you know, sabotage, with disorder, with espionage, um. And it 0:14:19.720 --> 0:14:22.800 would all be just in the name of stirring things 0:14:22.880 --> 0:14:25.880 up with the Cubans themselves again, not like putting in 0:14:25.960 --> 0:14:29.040 Americans dressed as Cubans and stuff like that. Uh. They 0:14:29.080 --> 0:14:32.520 thought they could get this done. Um. The CIA was 0:14:32.560 --> 0:14:34.520 going to be involved, the State Department was going to 0:14:34.600 --> 0:14:37.320 be involved, UM, the Defense Department, what we had at 0:14:37.360 --> 0:14:41.120 the time, the US Information Agency, and basically they were 0:14:41.120 --> 0:14:42.960 going to get together and get this done. And it 0:14:43.000 --> 0:14:46.840 was going to be headed up by a general from 0:14:46.880 --> 0:14:50.080 the Air Force named Edward Landsdale, who was interestingly a 0:14:50.080 --> 0:14:54.600 former AD exec and a CIA operative, and he was 0:14:54.640 --> 0:14:56.920 sort of in charge along with Kennedy of getting this 0:14:57.040 --> 0:15:01.520 thing planned and this Operation Mongoose again. Yeah, So Operation 0:15:01.560 --> 0:15:04.480 Mongoose is that operation that like all the wacky stuff 0:15:04.640 --> 0:15:07.360 that you have ever heard about getting rid of Castro, 0:15:07.480 --> 0:15:10.640 like a poisoned skin suit for him to scuba dive in, 0:15:10.760 --> 0:15:14.640 or exploding cigars, all that is Operation Mongoose. And like 0:15:14.680 --> 0:15:17.040 you're saying, the point was two kills a poison cigar. 0:15:17.120 --> 0:15:19.560 I don't think it was an exploding cigar. That's like 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:22.560 a novelty, right, Well, that was the level they were at. 0:15:22.760 --> 0:15:25.640 Somebody brought up joy buzzer once, right, they were like, 0:15:26.280 --> 0:15:29.720 exploding cigar won't kill him, like yeah, but it'll humiliate him, right, 0:15:29.880 --> 0:15:33.000 and we'll finish him off with the joy buzz um. 0:15:33.080 --> 0:15:36.080 So that that's all of that fell under Operation Mongoose. 0:15:36.120 --> 0:15:37.920 And like you said, they were trying to basically make 0:15:38.520 --> 0:15:41.840 life for the average Cuban so weird and disjoined it 0:15:41.840 --> 0:15:45.400 and uncomfortable without anybody realizing the Americans were actually behind 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:49.760 all these seemingly unrelated things that they would just get 0:15:49.840 --> 0:15:54.000 rid of Castro themselves. And that was the reason why 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:56.000 they weren't just like, well, we can't just go in 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:59.680 and kill Castro is because again they were friends with 0:15:59.720 --> 0:16:04.920 the Ovit's, and there was a chance that um JFK believed, uh, 0:16:05.120 --> 0:16:08.080 if they did in Vague Cuba, they would set off 0:16:08.160 --> 0:16:11.040 World War three. Like that was a very real fear. 0:16:11.720 --> 0:16:14.800 On the other hand, there was also this ticking clock 0:16:15.280 --> 0:16:20.760 going at all moments and among some people, some advisors 0:16:20.800 --> 0:16:24.200 to the White House and security advisors, it was like 0:16:24.320 --> 0:16:27.480 deafening the sound of this clock ticking. That the longer 0:16:27.600 --> 0:16:30.520 we waited, the more chance there was going to be 0:16:30.800 --> 0:16:33.000 that the Cubans were going to say, hey, so if 0:16:33.000 --> 0:16:35.240 it's come, build a missile base here. They hadn't yet, 0:16:35.480 --> 0:16:37.800 but it was on the table and everybody knew it. 0:16:38.080 --> 0:16:41.920 So they Americans needed to do something about Castro and fast. 0:16:42.200 --> 0:16:45.040 So the idea that the Americans could come up with 0:16:45.080 --> 0:16:48.480 these plots to get the Cubans to overthrow Castro themselves. 0:16:48.560 --> 0:16:50.640 That takes a lot of time, it might not pay off. 0:16:50.960 --> 0:16:53.680 And then looming in the background, getting ever closer, are 0:16:53.680 --> 0:16:57.320 these Soviet missile bases arriving in Cuba any day? Now? 0:16:57.360 --> 0:17:00.800 They just knew it. All right, that's a great suspenseful 0:17:00.880 --> 0:17:03.640 lead up to our first break. We're gonna come back 0:17:03.640 --> 0:17:06.159 and find out what happened with Operation Mongoose right after this. 0:17:31.320 --> 0:17:33.359 All right, so you set the stage very well. My 0:17:33.440 --> 0:17:37.399 friend General Lansdale is running the show. It was a 0:17:37.400 --> 0:17:41.560 pretty impossible situation to try and do this with the 0:17:41.640 --> 0:17:46.560 Cuban people without any real power, basically like he didn't 0:17:46.560 --> 0:17:50.040 have any real teeth in this. He was overseeing a 0:17:50.040 --> 0:17:54.240 bunch of different agencies. Uh And in February of sixty two, 0:17:54.400 --> 0:17:58.000 he basically put forward a plan that was supposed to 0:17:58.040 --> 0:18:01.280 get Castro out of office by October or even though 0:18:01.280 --> 0:18:03.840 he said that was pretty optimistic. And some of these 0:18:03.840 --> 0:18:07.199 ideas were pretty crazy. Um. One of them was that 0:18:07.240 --> 0:18:10.199 there's these things called star shells, which is kind of 0:18:10.200 --> 0:18:12.960 how you how you light up the night sky during wartime. 0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:16.480 I think, yeah, it's like you shoot it for as 0:18:16.760 --> 0:18:19.840 it were mortar around, but it's not mort around. It 0:18:19.920 --> 0:18:22.879 just lights things up for the night vision goggles or 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:24.280 back then. I guess, well, I don't know if they 0:18:24.280 --> 0:18:26.240 had them back then, but it's like that one scene 0:18:26.280 --> 0:18:31.400 at night, that battle, that night battle in Apocalypse Now, Yeah, exactly. 0:18:31.520 --> 0:18:34.520 So one of the ideas was for a submarine, the 0:18:34.640 --> 0:18:37.720 US submarine to fire these star shells off the coast 0:18:37.840 --> 0:18:41.400 and convinced the Cubans that the Second Coming of Jesus 0:18:41.480 --> 0:18:45.920 was was happening and that Jesus was against Castro. Yeah, 0:18:45.960 --> 0:18:48.320 they were going to shoot it off on All Saints Day, 0:18:48.480 --> 0:18:51.360 and that was based on the premise that the Cubans 0:18:51.359 --> 0:18:54.600 were deeply, deeply Catholic and that they would see this 0:18:54.640 --> 0:18:57.120 as a sign. And these are just ideas. Again, they 0:18:57.160 --> 0:19:00.720 never did this. All of these are just ideas, but 0:19:00.840 --> 0:19:03.520 they were ideas that were literally put forth in writing 0:19:03.960 --> 0:19:06.920 by the US government to the President. So it's okay, 0:19:06.960 --> 0:19:09.080 So the clock is ticking on Lansdale, and I read 0:19:09.119 --> 0:19:12.080 that basically every week he would go to the Oval 0:19:12.119 --> 0:19:15.840 Office and asked to be taken off of this assignment. Yeah, 0:19:15.880 --> 0:19:18.000 he was apparently a golden child. Like you said, he 0:19:18.040 --> 0:19:22.000 was an ad executive CIA operative. He basically shaped the 0:19:22.040 --> 0:19:26.760 geopolitical map of Southeast Asia by himself in the fifties. Um, 0:19:27.000 --> 0:19:30.120 and they, the Kennedy's, were like, hey, you seem pretty 0:19:30.160 --> 0:19:31.760 great at this. Let's see what you can do at Cuba. 0:19:31.800 --> 0:19:33.679 And he just ran into a brick wall in Cuba, 0:19:34.000 --> 0:19:35.960 in no small part because, like you were saying, the 0:19:36.040 --> 0:19:39.080 Kennedy's didn't give him any teeth, any authority. So he 0:19:39.119 --> 0:19:42.360 had to beg for everything from everybody from this this 0:19:42.800 --> 0:19:46.159 multi agency task force that he was in charge of. 0:19:46.200 --> 0:19:49.080 It was a terrible, terrible thing. And then again that 0:19:49.080 --> 0:19:52.320 clock is ticking. So in addition to coming up with 0:19:52.359 --> 0:19:56.000 ways to get the Cubans to topple Castro, Lansdale also 0:19:56.320 --> 0:20:00.919 was trying to figure out how to justify over action 0:20:00.960 --> 0:20:05.680 and actual military invasion. And so he asked the Joint Chiefs, 0:20:05.960 --> 0:20:07.879 who were one of the agencies that were part of 0:20:07.880 --> 0:20:12.200 the task force. He oversaw for some some info on that, 0:20:12.760 --> 0:20:15.719 like what would it take do you think for the 0:20:15.800 --> 0:20:19.960 United States to be able to justifiably invade Cuba and 0:20:20.080 --> 0:20:23.480 remove Castro as its leader? Problem solved? And again like, 0:20:23.520 --> 0:20:27.280 how can I scare the president bad enough? Kind of yeah, 0:20:27.560 --> 0:20:32.040 right exactly, so they they well, no, Also, like I 0:20:32.080 --> 0:20:34.400 think he was also trying to figure out what we 0:20:34.440 --> 0:20:36.760 could do to make that happen, you know what I'm saying, 0:20:37.080 --> 0:20:40.080 Like could we also like push Cuba into a corner 0:20:40.080 --> 0:20:41.639 and make them do something and be like, oh, well, 0:20:41.680 --> 0:20:44.520 we have our hands are tied. We have to invade um. 0:20:44.560 --> 0:20:47.919 But the reason that it would scare Kennedy too is 0:20:48.400 --> 0:20:50.960 like he was against military action. You just got to 0:20:51.040 --> 0:20:52.919 keep that in mind. After the Bay of Pigs he said, no, 0:20:53.000 --> 0:20:56.080 We're not invading Cuba. So now Landsdills trying to figure 0:20:56.080 --> 0:20:59.480 out basically how to how to change the President's mind. 0:20:59.720 --> 0:21:01.480 And I guess, yeah, like you were saying, if it 0:21:01.560 --> 0:21:04.960 meant through scaring him, whatever it took, he just wanted 0:21:05.000 --> 0:21:07.040 out of this stupid assignment where he's trying to figure 0:21:07.080 --> 0:21:10.080 out how to trick the Cubans into overthrowing Castro. Right. 0:21:10.160 --> 0:21:12.200 So this this is what this briefing was all about 0:21:12.240 --> 0:21:15.240 in February of nineteen sixty two from the Joint Chiefs 0:21:15.240 --> 0:21:19.840 of Staff to basically put put it forth that this 0:21:19.960 --> 0:21:23.359 cannot be ignored. The quote was, the communist regime in 0:21:23.359 --> 0:21:27.119 Cuba is incompatible with the minimum security requirements of the 0:21:27.119 --> 0:21:31.000 Western hemisphere. Um. I mean that's like that sentence kind 0:21:31.000 --> 0:21:35.040 of kind of says it all like where where he 0:21:35.400 --> 0:21:38.640 it is incompatible having him in power with the safety 0:21:38.760 --> 0:21:43.040 of the Western hemisphere, So we gotta get rid of him. Um. 0:21:43.080 --> 0:21:46.280 They said that that, uh, we can't count on like 0:21:46.320 --> 0:21:48.960 you see what happened with the Bay of Pigs. There 0:21:49.119 --> 0:21:52.440 is no insurgents happening in Cuba that we can count 0:21:52.440 --> 0:21:56.080 on basically at this point, and we need to intervene directly. 0:21:56.800 --> 0:22:01.480 And I don't think Russia will even like be supermad 0:22:01.520 --> 0:22:04.360 at this point yet. Yeah. Yet, that was the thing 0:22:04.440 --> 0:22:07.040 because they said that Cuba is not part of the 0:22:07.040 --> 0:22:09.919 Warsaw Packed, which is kind of like the Soviet Union's 0:22:10.040 --> 0:22:13.560 version of NATO UM. And since they weren't a member 0:22:13.560 --> 0:22:17.120 of that, the Soviet Union had no obligations to back 0:22:17.200 --> 0:22:20.040 them up if they were invaded in them by America, 0:22:20.320 --> 0:22:22.719 and the fact that they didn't have any military bases 0:22:22.720 --> 0:22:25.080 there and they also didn't have any reason to back 0:22:25.160 --> 0:22:27.840 up Cuba. So it was possible that if they invaded 0:22:27.920 --> 0:22:32.160 Cuba to capital to top le Castro, they the Soviets 0:22:32.160 --> 0:22:34.520 would not be drawn into it. Maybe JFK was wrong 0:22:34.560 --> 0:22:36.879 about it sparking World War three. They didn't know that 0:22:36.920 --> 0:22:40.320 for a fact, but that was their assessment of it, right, Yeah. 0:22:40.480 --> 0:22:44.119 So uh. On February second, Brigadier General William H. Craig, 0:22:44.600 --> 0:22:47.640 he was the Joint Chief of staffs rep for Operation Mongoose, 0:22:48.119 --> 0:22:51.560 He submitted this memo to Landsdale that said it was 0:22:51.560 --> 0:22:55.800 called possible actions to provoke, harass, and disrupt Cuba. And 0:22:55.840 --> 0:22:58.359 this is where some of these, uh, really kind of 0:22:58.359 --> 0:23:03.000 wacky ideas start coming forth. Um, some not quite so acky, 0:23:03.080 --> 0:23:05.920 like the Mercury mission was about to happen with John 0:23:05.960 --> 0:23:08.320 Glenn later that month, and they were like, Hey, if 0:23:08.359 --> 0:23:11.840 anything goes wrong with this thing, we could basically manufacture 0:23:11.880 --> 0:23:14.200 proof that Cuba was behind it and that would give 0:23:14.240 --> 0:23:16.639 us a reason. Yeah, that was one of the more 0:23:16.680 --> 0:23:20.679