Film shows anti-Castro secret army in U.S.

Press, 11 June 1977, Page 7

Film shows anti-Castro secret army in U.S.

NZPA-Reuter New York; A secret army of Cuban; exiles, originally partly i trained by the United States; Centra] Intelligence Agency • and using United States soil ( as its base, is continuing! guerrilla operations against! Dr Fide) Castro’s Govern-i ment, according to a Colum-i bia Broadcasting Service! television documentary. The documentary says', that the army exists, even! though the United States is. moving towards improving; its relations with Communist( Cuba. Narrated by a C.B.S. cor-; respondent. Bill Moyers, a former press secretary for| Lyndon Johnson, the two-1 hour programme will be! shown today (New Zealand' time). It traces the devel-l opment of the secret army' since the Bay of Pigs invasion 16 years ago. At first the project had United States’ support, those! taking part being trained by

the C.I.A. Now it operates i on its own, based in,] ; Miami's Little Havana dis-( Strict, the documentary says, i; According to the docu- 1 mentary, called “The C.l.A.’Sjt i Secret Army,” President; I John Kennedy decided to i 'start an undeclared war on I Dr Castro involving thousands of Cuban exiles and tens of millions of dollars,, after the Bay of Pigs fiasco, i; The C.I.A. called the project “Operation Mongoose,”! ‘and among its purposes! were commando strikes on; 'targets within Cuba and acts' .(of sabotage designed to I J bring down the Cuban econ-1 jorny. J Some of the Cubans in-! evolved were personally re-; [icruited by President Ken-j .inedv’s brother. Robert, the! ■ report says. According to, J Moyers, his researches show, that “Operation Mongoose”; lihad between 600 and 700' .! C.I.A. officials working in, , Miami, and estimates of

Cubans involved have been! -put at 2000. For Dr Castro, briefly]’ interviewed by Moyers ini the programme, there was] .also the fear that United! ! States’ attempts to bring his I Government down would, lead to a direct invasion. i “This was behind the deci-1 sion to set the (Soviet) I istrategic missiles in Cuba,”! Ihe told Moyers. , But to end the Cuban mis-1 jsile crisis in 1962, President; (Kennedy had to agree not to! ! invade Cuba, even though the “secret war” continued, (Moyers says. I Moyers’s programme conj tains interviews with masked men and films of arms .depositories as well as a (listing of recent attacks on I Cuban officials abroad. Also ! included is the bombing of a ; Cuban plane earlier this (year, in which 73 persons were killed.