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compelled readjustments of cargoes on the Houston and other vessels. It was the shift from Trinidad to Zapata that led to the mad scramble at the last minute to acquire the aluminum small boats to off-load the troops at the Playa Larga site at the north end of the Bahia de Cochinos. ,~ No ~erious questions were raised by the committee concerning the performance of the Brigade despite the sharp differences immediately apparent between the 24 April 1961 memorandum that Col. Hawkins presented to the committee at its third meeting and his 13 April 1961 cable from Nicaragua extolling the virtues of both the Brigade's infantry and its Air Force. The committee apparently took for granted the comments made at its first meeting concerning the heroic fight waged by the invaders, despite the fact that well before completing their work they learned that the bulk of the Brigade had been taken prisoner and that fewer than a hundred men had been killed. 8. The failure of the USN'S CAP to meet the Brigade's B-26s for the one hour of protection on 19 April 1961 was never challenged. How the B-26s could overfly the Essex one hour early without being detected was ignored, even though the USN'S most senior officer, Admiral Burke, was a committee member, The destruction of the operational records of the . Essex which probably could have clarified the situation regard- ing the missed CAP strongly suggests that senior naval officers were interested in protecting their careers and/or the reputation of the USN than in admitting to error. This episode would not have changed the outcome at the Bay of Pigs, but it might have pe.rmitted the orderly withdrawal of some of the Brigade. from the beach.. Moreover, no question was raised as to why, at this stage of the operation, President Kennedy limited the air support by the USN to one hour. In addition to its failure to focus on any of the above issues, the committee deserved sharp criticism for failing to provide a verbatim transcript of its meetings. The loss of information from this decision is clearly evident in the comparison between the verbatim record and the "official" record of the first rneeting--the only session for which there is known to be a verbatim transcript. In this same category was the committee.'s failure to insure that the record of all meetings with witnesses clearly identified questioners, 241