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Playa Giron: Bay of Pigs : Washington's First Military Defeat in the Americas

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This is a timely book published just before the 40th anniversary of the Bay of Pigs. It's a great way to learn about what really happened from the first-hand accounts of the Cuban revolutionaries who defeated the US-backed invasion. If you've never read a speech by Fidel Castro, there are a couple of very good ones in this book. You'll not only learn about what happened at the Bay of Pigs, but you'll also learn why the Cuban people smashed this invasion so swiftly and decisively. Another great part of the book is the testimony of Jose Ramon Fernandez who commanded troops in the thick of the fighting. There are maps, charts, all the details of the battle. But it's not a dry or boring account. He tells what happened from a very human and personal point of view, revealing his own mistakes and weaknesses, and recounting some humorous episodes as well. Finally, the foreword of the book tells a fascinating story of how a group of young people at Carleton College organized support for the Cuban revolution and against the US invasion and what they learned about politics. I think you'll be surprised as you read the book about how relevant this forty-year-old event is today.

This book is an eye-opening account of the defeat of the April, 1961 U.S. invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs. Jose Ramon Fernandez, the commander of the Cuban armed forces at Playa Giron, the scene of the invasion explains step by step how the recently formed militias of Cuban workers and peasants vanquished a 1500 strong mercenary force backed by the U.S. military. He reveals key decisions that were made by the Cuban central command, for example, the decision to send the small Cuban airforce to bomb the U.S. supply ships stranding and demoralizing the landing units. The book contains an inciteful speech by Fidel Castro which helps to explain how the U.S. government not only conceived and gave birth to the invasion but then denied paternity. As with other Pathfinder books, this one has deeply revealing photos, maps, illustrations, glossary and chronology. You'll have a hard time putting the book down.

Playa Giron/Bay Of Pigs: Washington's First Military Defeat In The Americas offers detailed and authoritative information on the historic and ill-fated invasion of Cuba by U.S.-backed forces popularly referred to as the Bay of Pigs. Included are three contemporary speeches by Fidel Castro informing and rallying the Cuban people and describing to the socialist character of the revolution. Jose Ramon Fernandez (today a vice president of Cuba) was at the time of the military incursion, the commander of the main column of Cuban forces which successfully repelled the CIA-organized and American supplied forces at Playa Giron. Highly recommended reading for students of Cuban and American international studies and history, the informative text is enhanced with more than two dozen maps and charts, dozens of photographs, a chronology of events, a glossary, and an index.

What makes this book so informative is it gives the Cuban perspective on the U.S.-backed Bay of Pigs invasion. It is also a great primer for understanding what the socialist revolution in Cuba is all about.

I first read this book the first day of beach season. Instead of spending time in the water, I just sat there and read this book until it was too dark to read. This account is an activist account of the fight from Cuban and US fighters who see and saw the US invasion and resistance in Cuba and the United States not as history to be deciphered but part of an ongoing struggle against imperialism, against war, and for the power of working people. I never stopped caring; I never stopped seeing what was hidden from me in 1961, I never stopped seeing lessons for the future. A good read.

After listening to the Canadian prime minister and company pontificating about why they couldn't invite Fidel Castro to the Quebec City summit this past April - only democracies allowed, you know - this book was SO refreshing. You just feel like you were there on the roads leading to the beaches, wrestling with the communications lines and determined to beat the invaders back. It's full of facts and really gives a picture of how it was the whole Cuban population that responded - especially those who lived in the swamps by the beach heads - they had gained roads and dignity and a better life from the first few years of the revolution. So of course they weren't going to welcome the US-backed forces! Sounds like democracy to me - do check it out. And, by the way, if you've seen the film "13 Days," it may shed a different light on Kevin Costner's version of history. At one point he says to his wife, "If the sun rises tomorrow, it's because of a few good men." This book gives an insight into a whole people who make sure that happens.

Any one who is interested in Cuba, or more specifically why and how the Cuban Revolution continues to survive, anyone interested in the future of humanity, or in the ideas ( unlike the myth )of Che Guevara -- you should start with this book.This book explains why the invasion of " Cuban exile" mercenaries at the Bay Of Pigs was not a "fiasco" : it was a military and political defeat of the Yankee Empire. This book shows vividly that the ordinary Cuban working men and women and farmers who fought and died at the Bay Of Pigs to defend their new-won independence did so for the sake of their own and their children's future : a Cuba free of Yankee domination and plundering for profits.The authors -- Fidel Castro and Che Guevara among them-- explain the ideas of the new socialist Cuba and the fight for new and better humans to change themselves that were the power behind the people behind the guns (and planes )that defeated the invaders at Playa Giro`n/ Bay Of Pigs. The ideas as a guide to action that have helped socialist Cuba survive it's toughest times in the 90s.And survive today as an example of what humans can do to begin to build a human society.

The book also describes how the activities against the invasion by a group of students at a small Midwestern college changed them forever--and convinced them to devote their lives to making a revolution like the Cubans made --here in the belly of the imperial beast.

If you are repelled by the barbaric effects of the "globalization" of the market system and its worship of the Almighty Dollar -- and you want to do something about making an end of it once and for all -- do yourself a favor and read this book.

Only those with a masochistic penchant for unadulterated, hyperbolic propaganda will enjoy reading this book. I bought the same hoping to gain a better appreciation of the military aspects of the Bay of Pigs invasion as viewed from the defender's side. However, I soon found myself mired in such tiresome, propagandistic rhetoric that I gave up the effort...

Castro et al. are to Cuban history what Comrade Stalin and company were to Russian history and Joseph Goebbels and friends were to German history. The title by itself is laughable. Who, except for Castro cultists, really thinks that the U.S. military could not have beaten Castro's forces if it had been given the go ahead to do so? As it was, the defeat of a force of less than 1500 Cuban exiles left stranded by the U.S. on Cuban soil is really a testament to President Kennedy's poor judgement rather than to Communist Cuba's military prowess. For a truly balanced, historical account of the Bay of Pigs affair, read Peter Wyden's "Bay of Pigs: The Untold Story." Then, for a study in propagandizing and myth-making, read this book.