Original subtitles

this was a struggle of Cuban Patriots

against a Cuban dictator on March 13

1962 The Joint Chiefs of Staff put this

document in front of the secretary of

defense for approval from the president

this is a memo prepared by the most

senior leaders in the U.S military some

of the most powerful men in the country

and they're asking for permission to

execute a plan a plan to lob mortar

shells into their own military bases

with some damage to installations and

then to make hijacking attempts against

civilian air and surface craft they're

proposing to blow up a U.S ship in the

U.S naval base Guantanamo Bay and even

to conduct a terror campaign on American

soil exploding a few plastic explosives

and carefully chosen spots

we're looking at a plan to blow things

up on American soil and then to blame it

all on Cuba Cuban people have not yet

[Music]

operation never happened but it almost

did and that gets to a big question why

would some of America's most powerful

leaders charged with safeguarding our

nation think that their Duty would

require them to lie to and terrorize the

American people

in other words why were they planning

operation northwards we did not the

first time the Communist tanks have

rolled over

again rain is not inexhaustible

before we dive into today's kind of

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sponsoring today's video Let's dive back

into operation Northwoods

[Music]

operation Northwoods was a response to a

problem the U.S government had they

called it the Cuba problem

Cuba became a problem for the CIA when

they watched this young activist with an

affinity for cigars lead a Communist

Revolution on the island throwing out

the American friendly dictator and

nationalizing all the valuable land and

industries that American businesses had

been getting rich off for decades this

was the Cold War and communism was now

90 miles away threatening to spread to

other countries in Latin America

countries that American businesses also

wanted to continue controlling and

exploiting and any day this new leader

could align with the Soviet Union giving

the US's biggest geopolitical rival a

military base within breathing distance

of Florida

so this was what the Joint Chiefs called

their Cuba problem

[Music]

us had a few solutions to their problem

first they put an embargo on Cuba

blocking all U.S exports to the country

except for food and Medicine second they

stopped buying Cuba's largest export

sugar this actually ended up backfiring

when the Soviet Union stepped in to buy

Cuban sugar kicking off an economic

alliance between these two communist

countries exactly what the U.S didn't

want and third the U.S started making

plans

[Music]

lots of plans plans to somehow get rid

of Castro to turn Cuba back into the

American Business friendly client State

through whatever means necessary in one

of the secret plans called operation

Zapata the CIA recruited 1500 Cuban

Exiles who fled to Miami during the

Cuban Revolution it was this little

cia-funded army called Brigade 2506 and

the goal was to have them invade Cuba

and remove Castro from power so the CIA

trains them at this camp in the

mountains of Guatemala where they had

just recently executed a coup and

installed a US friendly dictator and

right in the middle of the planning

stages of this operation JFK wins the

presidency

can do for you ask what you can do for

your country and he inherits this scheme

to invade Cuba using exiled Cubans the

CIA briefs him on it this plan to fix

the Cuba Problem by forcibly unseeding

Castro using Cuban Exiles and after some

debate JFK approves the plan

so on the 17th of April 1961 they

launched their Invasion Brigade 2506

landed on Playa giron with the plan to

invade the island and Spark a popular

revolution against Castro

leadership of Fidel Castro Landings were

affected by rebels at several but it was

a complete failure Castro had found out

about the invasion ahead of time a radio

station on the beach had spotted the

invading ships arriving and called for

help several of the invading ships sank

on the coral reef and the invading

forces were met with immediate

resistance from Cuban Armed Forces who

defeated them within three days most of

them were captured nine U.S servicemen

actually flew combat missions in support

of this Invasion four of which were shot

down and killed in the process something

the U.S government and the CIA would go

on to deny for almost 30 years but the

point is that this Invasion failed

miserably and JFK and his administration

were to blame

on traditional military needs on armies

prepared to cross borders on missiles

boys for flight

now it should be clear that this is no

longer enough JFK would later fire the

CIA director holding him responsible for

the disastrous Invasion plan that we

know as the Bay of Pigs but this didn't

change anything the US government was

still obsessed with removing Castro from

power they just needed a new plan so JFK

initiates his own plan called the Cuba

project AKA operation Mongoose over the

next year the CIA employs hundreds of

spies to collect Intelligence on Cuba

they send submarines on recon missions

to Cuban Waters they fund anti-castro

protest movements spreading propaganda

throughout the country they sabotaged

Cuban infrastructure to create chaos and

they make dozens more plans to

assassinate Castro directly including

preparing poisonous pills to be planted

in a beverage to be drunk by Castro they

even hired the American Mafia to deliver

the pills knowing that the mafia had

their casinos kicked out of Havana

During the Revolution and would want

revenge but none of this worked the

assassination attempts all fell apart

Fidel Castro still remained in power his

support wasn't wavering and the U.S

military was getting desperate they

needed to solve the Cuba problem before

the Soviets could get more involved on

the island so after all these botched

assassination attempts and failed

invasions The Joint Chiefs of Staff

concluded that the only way to get rid

of Castro was for the U.S military

itself to invade Cuba and take him out

but they knew that the U.S public would

not support an outright invasion they

needed to create a reason a

justification and this gets us back to

our document

the one that went to the Secretary of

Defense for the president's approval

this cover and deception plan to make

attacks on American targets fake attacks

that will be blamed on Cuba to raise

tensions between the U.S and Cuba to

justify an invasion a legitimate

provocation as the basis for a U.S

military intervention in Cuba

in other words a lie to the American

public in the International Community a

series of false Flags to get what they

wanted and all detailed in this

classified document that was only meant

for a few people with hopes that the

president would approve in the spring of

1962.

if the nations of this hemisphere

should fail to meet their commitments

against outside communist penetration

then I wanted clearly understood

that this government will not hesitate

in meeting its primary obligations

which are to the security of our nation

so let's see what this plan actually

says it starts with the U.S military

base at Guantanamo Bay where they would

start rumors using fake radio stations

and get american-friendly locals to

Stage fake attacks on the base starting

riots in the surrounding area another

proposed part of the plan was to blow up

a U.S ship and blame it on Cuba this was

specifically called out as a quote

remember the main incident referencing

the sinking of an American warship in

Cuba in the late 1800s that the U.S used

to justify intervening in Cuba back then

to fight the Spanish this is often

thought of as a planned sabotage to

justify the intervention and here was

the U.S military in the 60s at it again

the document predicts that the

newspapers would start reporting on the

casualties causing a helpful wave of

national indignation they also wanted to

create a fake terrorist campaign on

American soil in Miami or Washington

they wanted to sink boats of Cuban

refugees and Stage the shooting of ref

Refugee targets and even suggested

exploding a few plastic bombs in

American cities these weren't all going

to be pretend they even say in the

document that they would go to the

extent of wounding people and then

making fake arrests with prepared

documents so it could all be widely

publicized making Cuba look like an

irresponsible government worthy of

American intervention they thought

through having American Air Force pilots

fly over places like Nicaragua and drop

bombs on Cane fields to burn them down

using weapons from the Soviet Union but

for this to work they would have to be

flying Cuban military-style aircraft

they would need to ensure that their

planes were properly painted they would

also use these planes to harass American

civilian aircraft making it look like it

was the Cubans doing this they planned a

fake hijacking of commercial planes to

blame the Cuban government or to fake

shooting down a civilian airliner and if

that wasn't enough The Joint Chiefs

planned to create an incident which will

make it appear that communist Cuban Jets

have destroyed a U.S Air Force aircraft

while it was flying over international

waters in an unprovoked attack

operation Northwoods was a reckless plan

to lie and hurt people proposed by top

government leaders who were more and

more desperate to invade Cuba and they

wanted to move fast they say in just a

few months they needed to do this so

that this attack wouldn't involve the

Soviet Union who still hadn't

established any defense pact or military

bases in Cuba so what we're looking at

here is the increasing desperation of

the U.S military to achieve its goal to

solve the Cuba problem if JFK would just

approve this plan then the military

would get to work blowing things up

attacking their bases and terrorizing

the American people

but he rejected it operation Northwoods

never happened

JFK's rejection of this plan is one

reason that there was a rift between him

and the military with the military

wanting to take a hard line on Cuba and

JFK feeling the sting of the Bay of Pigs

invasion thinking that something like

this was too much of a risk a month

later another document came to him the

Joint Chiefs following up with another

memo saying that the only way to remove

the Communist Regime was military

intervention by the United States and

that Cuba was a vital base of operations

for Espionage sabotage and subversion

against other countries in the region

the fear was that communism would spread

across Latin America because of this and

time is running out

the rift between JFK and the military

continued during the Cuban Missile

Crisis when the Joint Chiefs hoped to

deploy nuclear missiles against the

Soviets and invade Cuba but JFK stood up

to the military once again and said no

JFK eventually went on to deny General

Leeman lemnitzer another term as

chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

likely because of his leading role in

planning operation Northwoods and

looking at this bizarre episode in

American history you might feel like

this is a moment where our system worked

military leaders tried to abuse their

power to launch an unprovoked and

illegal invasion of another country and

the president stopped them checks and

balances right but the reality is all

these men have the same goal

Castro out of power and Cuba under their

control again their disagreement was one

of just a few degrees the means not the

ends the reality is that the US was one

man just one person away from this

operation happening from a full-scale

Invasion if JFK had lost the presidency

to Nixon would operation Northwoods have

happened we can't say conclusively but

it certainly raises the probability but

what's more startling is that outside of

a few norms and some ideas about

government nothing fundamentally has

changed in our government the political

military machine still runs on the same

software it did in the 60s if the US

government felt like it and had a big

enough enemy a big enough threat to

American interests

it could happen again

the Iraqi regime

has plotted to develop anthrax

and nerve gas

and nuclear weapons for over a decade

States like these and their terrorist

allies constitute an axis of Evil arming

to threaten the Peace of the world