Cuban conspiracy, US planned to attack own countrymen

Source: AFP|Published: Wednesday May 2, 2:08 PM

http://www.theage.com.au/breaking/2001/05/02/FFX99DUY7MC.html

WASHINGTON - Top US generals planned a series of terrorist attacks inside the United States in 1962 to blame them on Cuba and swing US public opinion toward accepting a war against the communist-ruled island, a prominent US author said today.

"They actually had a plan," James Bamford, author of the newly published book Body of Secrets, told CNN.

"They said in the plan they would shoot people in the street, would sink boats with refugees from Cuba," he added.

Bamford said he had discovered the documents in the National Archives while working on the book, which examines the history of the US National Security Agency.

The NSA specialises in electronic intelligence collection.

One of the plans put together by the Joint Chiefs of Staff called for blaming Cuba if the Mercury 6 rocket carrying astronaut John Glenn into space in February 1962 blew up, according to Bamford.

"All of this was to have an excuse to invade Cuba," he said.

A CIA-backed invasion of Cuba by anti-Communist exiles failed in 1961, after the US military, following president John Kennedy's orders, declined to give support to the invasion force.

Bramford is also author of a 1982 book on the NSA - one of the first to ever look at the secret agency - titled The Puzzle Palace.