Russia Still Has Troops In Cuba

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30043, 30 January 1963, Page 16

Russia Still Has Troops In Cuba

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter— Copyright) WASHINGTON, January 28. A “substantial” Soviet military force still remained in Cuba, the United States Secretary of State (Mr Dean Rusk) said last night.

However, the Soviet Union had given the United States some indication that its forces in Cuba, or at least a portion of them, would be removed “in due course,” Mr Rusk said during a television interview.

The Soviet Union still had four heavily-armed combat groups on the island as well as other military and technical personnel, ground-to-air missiles and other equipment, Mr Rusk said. He said the presence of Soviet troops in Cuba is “a matter of real concern. . . .

The United States does not look upon the military presence as a normal condition.

“It remains our policy . . . that the penetration of this hemisphere by a MarxistLeninist regime, backed from the outside, is unacceptable,” he said. Some of the Soviet forces had moved out of Cuba in recent weeks, he said. The next stage was to find ways and means of reducing further the continued Soviet pressure in the Carribbean. Mr Rusk said the United States did not believe that there were nuclear weapons in Cuba,” but of course this is a problem of proving the negative.” He disclosed that United States surveillance had shown that Russians had been flying MiG fighters in Cuba as well as training Cubans to fly them.

Cuba said yesterday .that it had smashed two American “spy networks” aimed at touching off internal revolts to protect a massive landing by counter-revolutionaries. At least 36 persons were arrested. They included two who allegedly planned to assassinate the Armed Forces Minister (Raul Castro) and four alleged “main links” with United States Central Intelfliigence Agency operatives in • Miami and on the United Sttaes naval base at Guantanamo Bay Bay. In Washington, a State Department spokesman said: “We’ve heard this type of charge before, but have no comment.” The C.I.A. also had no comment.

A large quantity of buried weapons and explosives had been seized, together with 36,000 Cuban pesos and some

Jebovah’s Witnesses’ prayer books, the Cuban communique said. The immediate objectives of the two espionage organisations were to “get all available information about military installations, troop movements, the arrival and departure of all ships, and the promotion of the activities of counter - revolutionary bands in the country,” the Cuban Government said. “The C.I.A. ordered the agents to spot farms where weapons could be airdropped and where small liaison planes could land with arms to produce several large uprisings simultaneously,” it said. This activity had been planned for February. “All these plans had one objective; to distract (Cuban) armed forces to protect a massive landing by counterrevolutionaries in the near future,” it said.