The Bay of Pigs

     On my second day in Cuba, I participated on a field program with my friend, Shari, to the Bay of Pigs. The Bay of Pigs invasion is a very important part of both American and Cuban histories. The invasion took place in April 1961. Three days before the invasion, American troops painted their planes the color of Cuban Air Force planes and bombed Cuban airfields. They did this to make the Cuban Air Force think that rebels were attacking them, because there was a rebel group during this time that did not agree with the Cuban Revolution. This killed many military men. At their funeral, Fidel Castro gave a declaration of the country being a Socialist country; this was a huge declaration to make.

     The American troops that would later invade at the Bay of Pigs were trained in Guatemala, and they launched from Nicaragua. They did this to make it look like Cubans did this, because Americans would come from the north, as opposed to from the south.  During the invasion, American troops came to the Bay of Pigs area, which is a mixture of ocean and swamp, in the hope to win beachhead and gain support from the local Cuban people; this was not achieved. The invasion lasted 66 hours. The Cuban forces stopped the American troops as soon as they could  because they anticipated if American troops were able to get beachhead, they would have bigger plans.