Bay of Pigs to Habana - Saturday

Bay of Pigs to Habana - Saturday
The trip back to Havana was somewhat complex. Es complicado. We took a southern route across the island looking at mountains to our right, and beaches to our left. The history I am recounting is paraphrasing our guide. These were the mountains Fidel had started in, but were subsequently occupied by those who were dissatisfied. Why the dissatisfaction? With the original overthrow of Batista, an ostensibly democratic government was established. Fidel was not officially part of the government, but obviously a power player. He arranged the ouster of the Prime Minister, and he became PM. He meets with VP Nixon to talk, and Nixon becomes convinced he is a communist and a puppet of the Soviets. He was neither, at <that> time. He promised Nixon there would be no nationalization of industry, especially American interests. He began to talk of "obeying the will of the people". He then used this ploy to oust the president for not "obeying the will of the people". He became Premier, and seized private assets, promising elections would occur when the Cuban people were fed and employed. Not exactly democracy. He began to accumulate arms and train people in military maneuvers. One of the ships carrying arms from Bulgaria exploded in Havana harbor. An accident? CIA? Fidel makes a speech to rally the people using the phrase "Fatherland, or Death!" Patria o Muerte! It's still on all the walls here. Fidel buys oil from Russia, but the US refineries refuse to process it. President Eisenhower cancels all sugar sales from Cuba, and Fidel seizes US property. Ike begins to make plans for an invasion. They begin to train exiles, form a government in exile, and make contacts with counter revolutionaries. JFK becomes president, and inherits this mess. A full embargo goes into effect.
Our military wants to do an all out invasion, but JFK wants something more low profile with no US fingerprints on the operation. The first landing site picked near the mountains with the counter revolutionaries seemed too much like Omaha Beach, so the site was moved to the Bay of Pigs, 50 miles to the west. Cuban reconnaissance people said there was too much coral in those waters, but US experts thought the images just showed seaweed. The bay led into a large swampy area with only 2 roads out. Fidel had spies in the the mountains so he knew the landing place.
So when the 1900 exiles tried to land, many boats grounded on the coral. Those that made it through were greeted with machine guns and lights in their eyes. It was over in 3 days, and they only got 4 km inland, and never met up with the counter revolutionaries in the mountains, miles away.
Afterwards, Cuba turned more to Russia for arms and socialism. As the missles and anti-aircraft weapons accumulated, Fidel was touring a facility. Allegedly, when a Russian colonel boasted "we could shoot down a US spy plane with the push of a button", and Fidel asked "which one?" and proceeded to push it, knocking a U2 out of the sky. Krushchev realized Fidel was a loose canon. When Fidel pleaded for Russia to invade the US, as part of the missle crisis, Krushchev and Kennedy negotiated together and never informed Fidel of the plans. Krushchev got JFK to take missles out of Turkey in exchange for taking the missles out of Cuba.
All this was in the lead up to the museum at the Bay of Pigs celebrating "Our Victory". Actually, the museum was very blasé and just showed photos of those who died, and a few canons, machine guns and a few tanks. The beach itself is now a resort, and looks like a beach.
Nice lunch overlooking the Bay.
We had a Nature talk after lunch about conservation. There is a Nature park of 150 square miles with hundred of bird and animal species. We learned the difference between a American and Cuban crocodile.
On the way back we stopped at Earnest Hemingway's house. Hemingway came to Cuba in 1928, and fell in love with the island. He bought a house with money from "For Whom the Bell Tolls". There is some controversy as to whether the house was a "gift to the state" or whether it was expropriated by Fidel. The house is preserved just as it was when he died. Hemingway used to weigh himself daily, and mark it on the wall. The notations are still visible on the bathroom wall above the scale. His liquor bottles are still there. I have some affinity with Hemingway, as we share a birthday.
We are now back in Havana at the Parque Central, with "dinner on our own". We are going to the old city to a little paladar (a privately run restaurant).



Stephen J. Rockower, MD
President, MedChi 2016-2017
The Maryland State Medical Society

Sent from my iPad