Bay of Pigs Invasion | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Part of the Cold War | |||||||
Map showing the location of the Bay of Pigs |
|||||||
|
|||||||
Belligerents | |||||||
Cuba |
United States Cuban DRF |
||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
José Ramón Fernández Juan Almeida Bosque Che Guevara Efigenio Ameijeiras |
Pepe San Román Erneido Oliva |
||||||
Units involved | |||||||
Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces |
Brigade 2506 CIA USAF |
||||||
Strength | |||||||
25,000 Cuban army 200,000 Cuban Militia 9,000 armed police |
1,500 ground forces 8 American B-26 bombers 5 supply ships |
||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
Cuban army: 176 killed 500+ wounded or 4,000 killed, wounded, missing 6 Cuban aircraft shot down |
Brigade 2506: 118 killed 360 wounded 1,202 captured 4 American B-26 bomber aircraft shot down 2 supply ships sunk |
||||||
|
The Bay of Pigs Invasion (Spanish: Invasión de Playa Girón or Invasión de Bahía de Cochinos or Batalla de Girón) was a failed military invasion of Cuba undertaken by the CIA-sponsored paramilitary group Brigade 2506 on 17 April 1961. A counter-revolutionary military (made up of Cuban exiles who traveled to the United States after Castro's takeover), trained and funded by the United States government's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Brigade 2506 fronted the armed wing of the Democratic Revolutionary Front (DRF) and intended to overthrow the increasingly communist government of Fidel Castro. Launched from Guatemala and Nicaragua, the invading force was defeated within three days by the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces, under the direct command of Prime Minister Fidel Castro.