◆ SpookStack

8. As the result of these messages, CIA Headquarters, apparently not aware of the critical importance of this resupply mission, called it off and the attempt to get ammunition to the beach ended. The Presid~nt was never asked permission to extend the air cover to protect the ammunition convoy. 9. These causes for the ammunition shortage rested in turn on others which lay deeper in the plans and organization of this operation and the attitude toward it on the part of Government officials. The effectiveness of the Castro air force over the beach resulted from a failure to destroy the airplanes on the ground before or concurrently with the landing. This failure was a consequence of the restraints put on the anti-Castro air force in planning and executing its strikes, primarily for the purpose of protecting the covert character of the operation. These restraints included: The requirement to use only the B-26 as a combat aircraft because it had been distributed widely to foreign countries; the limitation of pre-landing strikes to those which could be considered plausibly to come from Cuban air fields; the inability to use any non-Cuban base within short turn-around distance from the target area, (about nine hours were required to turn around a B-26 for a second mission over the target from Nicaragua); prohibition of use of American contract pilots for tactical air operations; restriction on munitions, notably napalm; and the cancellation of the strikes planned at dawn on D-Day. The last mentioned 264