In 1962, the joint chiefs-of-staff approved Operation Northwoods, a covert plan to create support for a war in Cuba that would oust communist leader Fidel Castro.
Declassified government documents show considerations included: host funerals for "mock-victims," "start rumors (many)," and "blow up a U.S. ship in Guantanamo Bay and blame Cuba." They even suggested somehow pinning John Glenn's potential death, should his rocket explode, on communists in Cuba.
The advisors presented the plan to President Kennedy's Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, according to investigative journalist James Bamford's book, "Body of Secrets." We don't know whether McNamara immediately refused, but a few days later, Kennedy told Army Gen. Lyman L. Lemnitzer, the plan's poo-bah, that the U.S. would never use overt force to take Cuba.
A few months later, Lemnitzer lost his position.
"There really was a worry at the time about the military going off crazy and they did, but they never succeeded, but it wasn't for lack of trying," Bamford told ABC News.
