Overview
It was the early 1960s. The Cold War was at its peak. The threat of nuclear war hung over the world. Communist Cuba lurked a mere 90 miles off the coast of Florida, and President John F. Kennedy and his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, undertook a covert campaign to eliminate Fidel Castro and the communist threat. This book details the clandestine warfare that took place between Cuba and the United States-the spies and saboteurs, the guerrillas, the murder plots, and the kidnappings-and sheds new light on how, after the Bay of Pigs fiasco, the Kennedy brothers stepped up their covert, sometimes illegal efforts to oust Castro. Revealing new information based on first-hand interviews with participants from the FBI and CIA, historian William Breuer paints a fascinating picture of this highly charged period in our history.
Full Product Details
Author: William B. Breuer
Publisher: John Wiley and Sons Ltd
Imprint: John Wiley & Sons Inc
Dimensions:
Width: 16.50cm
, Height: 2.60cm
, Length: 24.20cm
Weight: 0.635kg
ISBN: 9780471184560
ISBN 10: 047118456
Pages: 278
Publication Date: 12 March 1998
Audience:
General/trade
,
College/higher education
,
General
,
Undergraduate
Replaced By: 9781620456897
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Out of Print
Availability: In Print
Limited stock is available. It will be ordered for you and shipped pending supplier's limited stock.
Reviews
From Library Journal Breuer (Unexplained Mysteries of World War II, LJ 6/15/97) is a military historian who specializes in books primarily on World War II. With this he has moved his investigations forward in time and geographically into what is foreign territory for him?and it shows. For the most part his newest book skims along the surface of what we already know about Castro and the Kennedy boys. Breuer's research base, for the most part, is thin, with only a smattering of archival sources, some interviews, and a bare minimum of secondary works acknowledged. The writing is choppy and uneven, brightened only now and then by moments of clarity. The best thing about this work is that it is short. For a more informative approach, readers should start with Aleksandr Fursenko and Timothy Naftali's One Hell of a Gamble : Khrushchev, Castro, and Kennedy, 1958-1964 (LJ 7/97), which is better researched and explores many of the same themes. For larger collections.?Edward Goedeken, Iowa State Univ. Lib., Ames<br> Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Kirkus Reviews A specialist in highlighting the drama in espionage and war, Breuer (Shadow Warriors, 1996, etc.) chronicles the escalating clash between President John F. Kennedy and Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro. Breuer's account takes a strong anti-Castro view on the disintegration of relations between the US and Cuba. Yet Breuer is far from pro-Kennedy, demonstrating the similarities between the two leaders, especially their heavy reliance on brothers of parallel temperamentthe humorless and ruthless Bobby Kennedy and Ral Castro. Before Castro had completed his first year in charge of Cuba, President Dwight Eisenhower had ordered the CIA to eliminate him and his revolutionary government. In the early days of his presidential campaign, Kennedy criticized Eisenhower's assessment of the Cuban regime. Only after Kennedy learned of secret plans to invade Cuba did he begin to criticize Castro publicly, due
A specialist in highlighting the drama in espionage and war, Breuer (Shadow Warriors, 1996, etc.) chronicles the escalating clash between President John F. Kennedy and Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro. Breuer's account takes a strong anti-Castro view on the disintegration of relations between the US and Cuba. Yet Breuer is far from pro-Kennedy, demonstrating the similarities between the two leaders, especially their heavy reliance on brothers of parallel temperament - the humorless and ruthless Bobby Kennedy and Ra l Castro. Before Castro had completed his first year in charge of Cuba, President Dwight Eisenhower had ordered the CIA to eliminate him and his revolutionary government. In the early days of his presidential campaign, Kennedy criticized Eisenhower's assessment of the Cuban regime. Only after Kennedy learned of secret plans to invade Cuba did he begin to criticize Castro publicly, due to fears that such a dramatic military move would give the incumbent Republican administration an advantage at the polls. Kennedy shrewdly beat Richard Nixon to the punch during a televised debate, calling for American support of Cuban freedom fighters, while Nixon was unable to speak on the issue for fear that he would reveal the Eisenhower administration's support of the planned invasion. Within weeks of taking office, Kennedy was deeply involved in planning the Bay of Pigs invasion. When it failed both of its objectives - to overthrow the Castro government and maintain the myth that the invasion was inspired, planned, and manned solely by Cuban political refugees - Castro became the number one target of the Fighting Irish duo in the White House. Tensions mounted and then exploded as the ultimate Cold War drama unfolded: the Cuban missile crisis. Relying on American sources, including government documents and interviews with former spooks, Breuer adds some interesting tidbits to this often rehashed period of the Cold War. (Kirkus Reviews)
Author Information
WILLIAM B. BREUER, one of today's most popular military historians, is the critically acclaimed author of twenty-six books, including Feuding Allies, Shadow Warriors: The Covert War in Korea, and Unexplained Mysteries of World War II (all published by Wiley). Ten of his books were main selections of the Military Book Club, including The Great Raid on Cabanatuan and MacArthur's Undercover War.
