The US military drafted plans to commit heinous acts against American citizens to justify war with Cuba in the 1960s, a declassified CIA document shows.
Code-named Operation Northwoods, this top-secret plot proposed killing innocent people and enacting terrorism on US cities in what are known as ‘false flag operations’, then blaming Cuba for these crimes to trick the public into supporting war efforts to oust communist Fidel Castro.
‘We could develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in other Florida cities and even in Washington,’ the document states, among dozens of other violent ideas of how to incite American hostility against the island nation.
US officials even proposed killing their own soldiers, writing: ‘We could blow up a US ship in Guantanamo Bay and blame Cuba,’ and, ‘casualty lists in US newspapers would cause a helpful wave of national indignation.’
Operation Northwoods was signed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) in 1962 but was rejected by then-President John F. Kennedy.
The document was originally made public on November 18, 1997 by the John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Review Board, a federal agency that oversaw the release of documents related to JFK’s assassination.
But the 12-page proposal has recently resurfaced on Reddit, where users of the social media platform compiled a list of the ‘craziest declassified CIA documents.’
Now, President Donald Trump has promised to release all classified documents related to JFK’s assassination, which could potentially lead to more shocking revelations about the US government’s activities during the 1960s.
Code named Operation Northwoods, this top-secret US military plot proposed killing innocent people and enacting terrorism on American cities, then blaming Cuba for these crimes
Due to extremely tense relations between Cuba and the US at the time JFK was shot in 1963, some within the intelligence community thought Castro’s regime might have been involved in the assassination.
But federal investigations ultimately concluded that there was no evidence linking Cuba to JFK’s death.
The Operation Northwoods proposal drafted as part of a larger document titled ‘Justification for US Military Intervention in Cuba.’
This top-secret collection of draft memorandum was written by the Department of Defense (DoD) and JCS and presented to then Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in 1962.
‘A series of well coordinated incidents will be planned to take place in and around Guantanamo to give genuine appearance of behind done by hostile Cuban forces,’ reads the document.
‘The following portions provide ‘incidents to establish a credible attack (not in chronological order).’
The plan included everything from starting rumors to ‘landing friendly Cubans in uniform to stage acts on military bases and blowing up ammunition inside facilities.
The list also featured a plant to ‘burn aircraft on air base’ and sink a ship near the harbor entrance of an unspecified base and then ‘conduct funerals for mock-victims.’
The goal of this plan was to trick the American public and the international community into supporting a war effort to oust Cuba’s then leader, communist Fidel Castro
Dwight D. Eisenhower’s administration developed a plan to overthrow Castro known as the Bay of Pigs Invasion, which was carried out in 1961 by Eisenhower’s successor, John F. Kennedy
‘[The] United States would respond by executing offensive operations to secure water and power supplies, destroying artillery and mortar emplacements which threaten the base,’ the document describes.
Public knowledge of Operation Northwoods did not come until a nearly-complete version of the document was published online in 2001.
Fidel Castro rose to power and became Prime Minister of Cuba in 1959 and turned the nation into the first communist state in the Western Hemisphere.
In the early days of his administration, he strengthened Cuban ties with the Soviet Union, establishing trade deals between their countries.
The Bay of Pigs invasion failed, and in 1962 the Cuban Missile Crisis began. A year later, then President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas
Simultaneously, Castro strained Cuban relations with the US by directly challenging capitalism and raising taxes on US imports.
At that time, the US was led by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, whose administration developed a plan to overthrow Castro.
This plan, known as the Bay of Pigs Invasion, was carried out in 1961 by Eisenhower’s successor, JFK.
He deployed a brigade of 1,400 CIA-sponsored Cuban exiles to overthrow Castro’s communist government, but the invasion failed.
In 1962, the Soviet Union began shipping ballistic missiles to Cuba in an effort to strengthen their ties and protect the island nation from the US. This became known as the Cuban Missile Crisis.
This strengthened the Kennedy administration’s resolve to overthrow the communist Cuban government.
The US went on to conduct covert operations against Cuba through Operation Mongoose, a secret CIA initiative to remove Castro from power.
The Operation Northwoods proposal was developed as part of this initiative.
This shocking document was kept secret for nearly 40 years until the JFK Assassination Records Review Board released it as part of 1,521 pages of formerly-classified military records covering 1962 to 1964.
