There are many moments in the history of the United States when the government shamelessly overstepped its boundaries, trying to stick its nose where it didn’t belong, including back when the Cubans were led by Fidel Castro, so we’re going to take a look at 6 facts about Operation Northwoods conspiracy theory.
History hasn’t always been nice in the United States and this particular case is one of those times. Operation Northwoods, in case you didn’t know, is proof of just how dirty the country’s administrations are willing to play to get what they want.
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Back in 1962, when Fidel Castro came to power, Washington wasn’t really a big fan of the fact that a communist country was just a stone’s throw away from their borders. The Department of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff came with the “brilliant” idea to commit various acts of terrorism on US territory in order to blame it all on the Cubans and justify military action in the country, hoping to cause “regime change” — a US euphemism for overthrowing foreign governments. Considering just how things went, it’s no wonder that some people in the United States and all over the world have a hard time believing 9/11 wasn’t fabricated, at least in part, by the US government.
Thankfully, the plan never came to be since the Kennedy administration eventually rejected the idea. Even so, the intent was there and sometimes that’s worth quite a bit and leaves enough scars on society as a whole. The whole thing became official public knowledge when a series of documents were declassified.
There are plenty of conspiracy theories out there, including about this particular operation. If you want, you can also check out 6 Elvis Presley conspiracy theories. Unlike those, however, most of the theories regarding Operation Northwoods turned out to be true. This is why we’re going to take a look at 6 facts about Operation Northwoods conspiracy theory.
6. Fake attacks
The declassified documents indicate that the US was planning to fake various attacks by Cubans on American bases, such as the famous one on Guantanamo Bay. According to the files, they were even planning to land friendly Cuban immigrants in uniform to help stage an authentic-looking attack.
5. Torch Guantanamo
One of the plans involving these same friendly Cuban agents was to have them start riots near the base main gate and to even blow up ammunition inside the base, which would, in turn, start fires across the area. There was also the plan to burn an aircraft on base and make it look like it had been sabotaged. This would, of course, put Cuba in a really bad light and would lead to acceptance from the world’s powers that an intervention in the area was not only necessary but advisable.
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4. Plane hijacking
One of the “great” ideas they had was to fake some hijacking attempts against civilian airplanes. This would, of course, be blamed on the Cuban regime. They even thought about creating an incident that would convincingly demonstrate that a Cuban aircraft had attacked and shot down a civilian airliner traveling from the United States towards Jamaica, Guatemala, Panama or Venezuela. Since ethics weren’t exactly very high among those making up these plans, the victims were to be college students leaving on a holiday.
An aircraft was to be painted as the airliner, which would be loaded up with carefully selected passengers boarding under various aliases, to make it all look real.
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3. Unprovoked attack
Another ploy was to create an incident that would make it appear as if Cuban MIG planes destroyed a US Air Force aircraft over international waters without being provoked. The plan was to have F-101 aircraft fly near Cuba in defense exercises at steady intervals. Then the “incident” would take place without anyone actually getting hurt. The aircraft would land at a secure base and be stored and given a new tail number, making this one of 6 facts about Operation Northwoods Conspiracy Theory.
2. Sinking ships
The thinktank behind Operation Northwoods also planned to have a fake attack take place on the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base. They suggested sinking a ship near the harbor’s entrance, full of fake victims. In fact, they wanted to even conduct funerals for the mock victims, taking the charade to the next level. They even mention an incident such as “Remember the Maine” when the explosion and the sinking of the USS Maine led to the American-Spanish war.
1. Terror campaign
Although the idea of this terror campaign is not exactly well developed, we can only assume what they wanted to do. “We could develop a Communist Cuba terror campaign in the Miami area, in other Florida cities and even in Washington,” reads the declassified documents. In order to give some flesh to the idea, they went on to say that these could be blamed on the Cuban refugees seeking haven in the United States.
Then, it casually states that they could sink “a boatload of Cubans” trying to get to Florida — whether real or simulated seemed to have no sway with the authors. They go as far as saying that they could explode plastic bombs in various spots, arrest Cuban agents and falsify the documentation.
This is just one of the 6 facts about Operation Northwoods Conspiracy Theory.
