◆ SpookStack

With the destruction of FAR aircraft as the principal objective of air operations, the discussions through the late fall of 1960 and early winter of 1961 focused on the number of air strikes which would be permitted vs. the number which were necessary and the order of target priority. By the end of 1960, one of the problems appears to have been over management of Project JMATE. Air operations questions were being discussed in the Special Group and, in addition, Tracy Barnes, the A/DDP/A, was taking a more than active interest in air plans. In mid-December, a Barnes memorandum to Chief, WH/4 strongly recommended that a program of three days of fairly intensive air strikes, then under consideration, be dropped because it would be objected to by Livingston Merchant of the Department of State, among others. Merchant, according their capabilities once they were airborne." 119/ \ Chief, Project JMATE, Jake Esterlin~ also was extremely concerned about the possibilities of jet aircraft being employed against the Brigade's B-26's. In the case of Esterline, the fear was that MIG-IS's were going to be introduced into Cuba before the Brigade conducted its operation. It was known, for example, that Cuban pilots were training in MIG'S in Czechoslovakia. Al- though Esterline and some others have suggested that there actually were crated MIG's in Cuba at the time of the Bay of Pigs operation, the author has been unable to confirm this. 120/ - 90 -