◆ SpookStack

After the seizure of the objectives we would enlist and arm civilians, we would use the hospital and other buildings for the force --we would coordinate with local civilian leaders and make contact with local guerrillas. We would use the local airport for resuPPlY-7 --but the airport could not take a B-26.g AS the questioning about the Trinidad plan continued, Hawkins subsequently volunteered the following: We thought of another plan for Trinidad involving landing troops who would go directly into the mountaitis--but there was no airfield. Finally, through photography, we found what we thought was a usable field--this was in the Zapata area--and this is what led us to this area. The plan was hastily put together. We got started about 15 March ....after the 11 March meeting. An error in photographic interpretation had occurred. We believed there were 4,500 usable feet of runway in northe.rn Zapata Ipresumably at Soplillar]. One pf the disadvantages was the 18 mile bay which meant we would have trouble getting people up there in daylight hours. We found a 4,100 foot field at Playa Giron. We would never have adopted the Zapata Plan if we had known that he [Castro] had coordinated forces that would close in and fight as the~ did. The j!jfield requirement was what led us ~nto Zapata. * Writer's emphasis. The Trinidad Plan was the one which the Agency had worked out and which had been approved by the DOD. It called for an air supported amphibious invasion of the Casilda- Trinidad area on the southern coast of Cuba in Las Villas Province. This was a populated area in which it was expected that the invaders would attract a reasonably high degree of anti-Castro support. The port facilities would require no across beach landing. Although it was planned to use the captured air strip for C-46s, there was no plan to use it for B-26 operations. In case the invaders found that they could not maintain the area, it was planned that they would head into the nearby Escambray area as an organized guerrilla force. Trindad lay approximately 180 miles southeast of Havana. The Zapata Plan called for an invasion in the area of the Bahia de Cochinos in Las Villas Province about 100 miles nearer Havana than Trinidad. This alternate plan was dictated by President Kennedy and Secretary Rusk's desire for a quieter, "less like World War 11" invasion. The Zapata area was sparsely settled and the plan called for night landings across three separate beaches with air support to be withheld until the air strip at ~laya Giron could be captured and two of the Brigade B-26s landed and then flown off the strip. All of this was intended to support the "pl ausible denial" of U.S. involvement in the operation. The area offered no viable guerrilla option in case the brigade faced defeat. The DOD supported, the Agency's contention that none of " the alternatives to the Trinidad ("T") plan were as good as Trinidad, II. '''''but agreed with the Agency that Zapata (liZ") was feasible.