THE HEMISPHERE CUBA CAN'T ANYONE HERE PLAY THIS GAME?

Document Type: 
Collection: 
Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 
CIA-RDP75-00149R000600420003-0
Release Decision: 
RIPPUB
Original Classification: 
K
Document Page Count: 
1
Document Creation Date: 
November 11, 2016
Document Release Date: 
February 26, 1999
Sequence Number: 
3
Case Number: 
Publication Date: 
June 12, 1964
Content Type: 
NSPR
File: 
AttachmentSize
PDF icon CIA-RDP75-00149R000600420003-0.pdf131.29 KB
Body: 
C CPYRGHT CUBA Can't Anyone here Play This Game? Fidel Castro must -have laughed till he split his fatigues. Incredibly, disas- trously, Manolo Ray, the Cuban free- dom fighter who had promised to be operating inside Cuba by May 20, was exposed as a bungling amateur. Worse, Fidel did not have to lift a finger. The British, with an assist from the U.S. Coast Guard, put the damper on what was surely the most ludicrous act yet in the endless, tragicomic opera of anti- Castro moves. Five days before the May 20 dead- line, the exile leader had quit his job f plastic explosives were un oa e final check at the Anguilla Cays, here Ray planned to make a last radio ansmission. The good thing about the Anguilla ays is that they are only 40 miles off e Cuban coast. The bad thing is that verybody knows it. Castro watches hem; so do the British who own them, nd the U.S. sends over numerous re- onnaissance flights. So it was hardly urprising that Her Majesty's destroyer ecoy steamed up to look around. But t surprised Ray and his group. Franti- ally, they tried to hide their equipment. hen five of the party, including two reelance 'photographers, gunned away n the catamaran, hoping to decoy the Decoy away from the island while Ray tayed behind. A Green Lump. It didn't work. The quite-competent-thank-you British cap- lain saw the launch departing and sent landing party to see what it might be caving. "I found a shallow hole," re- ated Ray, "and I threw myself down n it and covered myself with a green loth. I crossed my arms and put my gad down and hoped they wouldn't nd me. They almost didn't." But on he second search of the island, one British sailor noticed the green-covered lump and hustled Ray to his feet. Meanwhile, back at the launch, the Cubans were holding their own against the pursuing destroyer. But it was all over when two U.S. planes showed up and began dropping messages, the thir RAY BOUND FOR TRIAL Hiding in a hole. in Puerto Rico and ? dropped out of sight. For two weeks, nothing was heard from him. Miami tingled with stories that Ray was in Cuba, carrying out a ,cleverly conceived plan to harass and eventually topple Castro. As it turned out last week, Ray did not start until May 24 and never set foot in Cuba. Everybody Knows. Following stand- ard procedure, Ray and his seven com- panions, including a woman radio operator, were launched from a ? CIA- sponsored "mother ship" that obligingly runs exiles to within striking distance of Cuba. As Ray and his men later told it to TIME Correspondent Ed Reingold, the weather was terrible the first few days, and Cuban patrol boats were everywhere. "Big, fast boats," recalled one of the infiltrators. "We saw ten in all." So the small band zoomed around tiny keys that lie between Florida and Cuba, testing their 24-ft. catamaran and tinkering with their boat's two 100-h.p. Volvo inboard-outboard en- gines. The Volvos were gobbling gas .and running hot at high speed. Never- and decidedly last of which ordere them to heave to or risk a barrage o 4.5-in. shells. And so Ray and his party were carte back to Nassau to stand trial for illega entry into the Bahamas. At first, whe police discovered Manolo's identity, th group tried to arrange for another Cu ban to take his place at the trial. Next a CIA type showed up, gave a differen name to each newsman present and pre pared to pay whatever fine was levie against the culprits, explaining that h was a "friend." At the trial, the Cuban were all so busy jostling around Ray t conceal him from photographers tha no one could have missed him, and on newsman happily snapped Ray frame under a protecting armpit. The terribl understanding Nassau judge meted o $14 fines to each of the eight, plus warning never to trespass again. Aside from the CIA's less-than-glor ous role, the depressing thing about th whole sorry business was that Manol Ray up to last week was considered small but genuine threat to Castro. former Castro ally, he had the bearde one so worried that Cuba went on full-scale military alert; scores of s - had come. The fliq r J ` ?(~ri~r~ with flash suppressors , i, 0 roun s - I F01Ab3b CPYRGHT ceedingly devious ploy, Ray's dunce cap for failure seemed all the bigger. "We have experience, and we are just as determined as we were," he said after the Nassau trial. "We think it will be easier next time. Fidel knows me, and he knows I'm coming." That may be &0044 '0 t98Vft&M bdel may not care. ammunition, and grenades and masses Unless the whole thing, was some. e - Sanitized - Approved WW se : CIA-RDP THE HEMIrYPHTERE