Timetable History of Cuba

January 1. Revolutionary forces take control of Havana. At about 2 a.m., Batista, his family, and closest associates, board a plane at Camp Columbia,and leave the island. Che Guevara and Camilo Cienfuegos lead the rebels into Havana.

January 1. In Santiago de Cuba, Oriente Province, Castro makes a victorious speech which includes the following: "This time the revolution will not be frustrated! This time, fortunately for Cuba, the revolution will achieve its true objective. It will not be like 1898, when the Americans came and made themselves masters of the country."

January 2. Manuel Urrutia is installed as President and Jose Mira Cardona as Prime Minister.

January 6. The first issue of Hoy appears.

January 7. Castro arrives in Havana. The U.S. government officially recognizes the new Cuban government.

January 10. Earl Smith, U.S. Ambassador to Cuba, resigns. He is replaced by Philip Bonsal.

January 11. Throughout the island, Batista's henchmen and former police are executed in firing squads after being prosecuted in military tribunals.

January 12. In Santiago de Cuba, 75 men are executed. The group allegedly represents former police guards known for cruelty and violence and members of former Senator Rolando Masferrer's private army.

January 13. Castro declares that the trials will go on "until all criminals of the Batista regime are tried."

January 23. At a public military tribunal held at the sports stadium in Havana, Major Jesus Sosa Blanco (of Batista's Army) is sentenced to death before an exited crowd of 18,000 spectators and 300 reporters. Serving as judges for the military tribunal are Dr. Humberto Sori Marin, Major Raul Chibas, and Major Universo Sanchez.
At night, a group of about 100 women dressed in black protest the executions of "counter-revolutionists."

January 31. Former Batista Army Captain Pedro Morejon is sentenced to death in Havana for "assassination, homicide, robbery, incendiarism and damage."

February 7. Cuba's Constitution of 1940 is reinstated (it was suspended by General Batista after his coup in 1952).

February 16. Fidel Castro, Commander of the Rebel Army, replaces Miró Cardonas as Prime Minister of the Revolutionary Government.

February 18. Major Jesus Sosa Blanco (of Batista's Army) is executed at the ancient moat of La Cabaña Fortress.

February 22. In Havana, 2 members of Rolando Masferrer's private army are captured after a shootout in which 2 policemen and a civilian are wounded.

February 28. Castro announces that general elections will be held in Cuba in 2 years. Quoted in the NY Times: "Elections could not be held now because they would not be fair. We have an overwhelming majority at present and it is in the interest of the nation that the political parties become fully developed and their programs defined before elections are held."

March 3. The Cuban government nationalizes the Cuban Telephone Compnay, an affiliate of ITT, and reduces telephone rates.

March 19. As of this day, 483 total "war criminals" have been executed by firing squads. An editorial in the front page of Revolution calls for an end to the executions.

March 24. Military trials and executions are suspended during Easter week.

March 26. Five men are arrested for a conspiracy to kill Premier Fidel Castro; Roberto Corral Miramon (Café owner), Roberto Lopez Paz (former Batista soldier), Roberto Perez Merens, Jose Sosa Mojena and Andres Arango Chacon. Allegedly the plot also involves pro-Batista exiles Rolando Masferrer and Ernesto de la Fe.

April 8. Heriberto Bertematy Rodriguez is sentenced to death for trafficking and selling marijuana.

April 11. Alan Robert Nye, a lieutenant in the U.S. Naval Reserve, goes on trial in Havana. He is accused of plotting to kill Fidel Castro. Prosecuting attorney Lieutenant José Antonio Suarez asserts that Nye received $100,000 from the ousted Batista regime. The trial takes place at the Cabana Fortress, across Havana Bay, in front of about 200 spectators that include army personnel as well as foreign and local reporters..

April 12. Alan Robert Nye is convicted of a plot to kill Premier Fidel Castro and sentenced to death. The sentence is suspended on the condition that Mr. Nye leave Cuba within forty-eight hours

April 13. In Havana, after a public trial that lasts 7 hours, Alan Robert Nye (a 31-year-old American from Chicago) is convicted in a plot to assassinate Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro. He is sentenced to death, but is allowed to leave the island as long as he never returns.

April 15-26. Castro visits the U.S. as a guest of the American Society of Newspaper Editors.

May 17. Castro signs Agrarian Reform Act, which expropriates over 1,000 acres of farmlands and forbids foreign land ownership.

June. In Cairo, Che Guevara makes the first official contact with the Soviet Union.

July 16. President Urrutia resigns, and Osvaldo Dorticós Torrado becomes Cuba's 19th president.

July 26. Castro returns to his post of Prime Minister.

July. American journalist Walter Lippmann writes:
"For the thing we should never do in dealing with revolutionary countries, in which the world abounds, is to push them behind an iron curtain raised by ourselves. On the contrary, even when they have been seduced and subverted and are drawn across the line, the right thing to do is to keep the way open for their return."

October 15. Raúl Castro becomes Defense Minister (the title is later changed to Minister of the Armed Forces).

October 19. Huber Matos, a leading figure in the revolutionary war, resigns his post as military commander of Camagüey province, along with 14 officers, because of the "rising influence of communism" in the revolution. He is arrested by Camilo Cienfuegos for treason.

October 25. Camilo Cienfuego's plane mysteriously disappears during a night flight.

December 15. Huber Matos is sentenced to 20 years in prison for conspiracy and treason.

December 17. The Army announces that death sentences will not be carried out during the Christmas season.

Terrence Canon on racism in Cuba

From: "Cuba, A Short History," Edited by Leslie Bethell. "Of the twenty-one ministers appointed in January 1959, twelve had resigned or had been ousted by the end of the year. Four more would go out in 1960 as the revolution moved toward a Marxist-Leninist political system."

Brief introduction to the 1960s | Carlos Franqui on new year's eve.

January 18. The CIA creates the Cuba Task Force, and Jacob D. Esterline begins a draft version of what becomes "A Plan of Covert Action Against Cuba."

February 6. Soviet Deputy Prime Minister Anastas Mikoyan arrives in Havana. The visit results in a trade agreement in which the Soviet Union will purchase 5 million tons of sugar over a five-year period. The Soviets will also supply Cuba with crude oil, petroleum products, wheat, iron, fertilizers and machinery. Included is $100 million in credit at 2.5 percent interest.

February 26. A U.S. Federal Court orders Rolando Masferrer Rojas to limit his movements to the New York area.

February 29. U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles rejects an offer from Cuba to begin negotiations (because of Cuba's condition that the U.S. take no unilateral action that could damage the Cuban economy while the talks are in progress).

March 4. The French ship La Coubre explodes in Havana harbor, killing dozens of soldiers and workers. The ship carried a batch of Belgian small arms.

March 13. An article in the New York Times, "The Other Miami-City of Intrigue," lists 5 anti-Castro groups operating in Miami.

March 17. President Eisenhower approves a covert action plan against Cuba that includes the use of a "powerful propaganda campaign" designed to overthrow Castro. The plan includes:
a) the termination of sugar purchases
b) the end of oil deliveries
c) continuation of the arms embargo in effect since mid-1958
d) the organization of a paramilitary force of Cuban exiles to invade the island.

April 19. The first shipment of Soviet oil arrives in Havana.

May 8. Cuba and the Soviet Union establish diplomatic relations.

May 17. Radio Swan, an anti-Castro radio station created by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) goes on the air as part of the Eisenhower-approved plan for covert operations. By summer, several clandestine and CIA-funded stations in the U.S. join Radio Swan in broadcasting to Cuba.

June. In the U.S., the Frente Revlucionario Democrático (FRD) is formed by Cuban exiles to oppose the government of Fidel Castro. The FRD consolidates 5 existing anti-Castro groups: the Movimiento de Rescate Revolucinario, headed by Manuel Antonio Varona; Movimiento Democrático Cristiano, headed by Jóse Ignacio Rasco; Movimiento de Recuperación Revolucionario, lead by Manuel Artime; Associación Montecristi, of Justo Carillo; and the Frente Nacional Democrático (Tripel A), lead by Aureliano Sanchez Arango. Manuel Artime is put in charge of military activity and remains the main link to the CIA.

June 7. Shell, Esso, and Texaco, refuse to refine Soviet oil (it is now known that the U.S. government encouraged this). At the same time, U.S. companies, under pressure from the U.S. government, refuse to sell fuel to Cuba.

June 16. U.S. diplomats Edwin L. Sweet and Wiliam G. Friedman are arrested at a meeting of counterrevolutionary conspirators. They are charged with "encouraging terrorist acts, granting asylum, financing subversibe publications and smuggling weapons. They are immediately expelled from Cuba.

June 29. Cuba nationalizes the Texaco oil refinery.

July 1. Cuba nationalizes Esso and Shell oil refineries.

July 3. In response to these seisures, the U.S. congress passes the "Sugar Act," eliminating Cuba’s remaining sugar quota.

July 5. Cuba retaliates by nationalizing all U.S. businesses and commercial property.

July 6. President Eisenhower cancels the 700,000 tons of sugar remaining in Cuba’s quota for 1960.

July 8. The Soviet Union announces that it will purchase the 700,000 tons of sugar cut by the U.S.

July 23. China agrees to purchase 500,000 tons of sugar from Cuba each year for five years. This is the first commercial treaty between the two countries.

August. The Federation of Cuban Women (FMC) is founded. It is run by Raúl Castro's wife, Vilma Espín Guilloys.

September 15. Three Cuban airplanes are seized by the U.S. government in New York. The planes belong to a Cuban delegation visiting the United Nations that includes Premier Fidel Castro. (The planes are eventually released on September 28 on the grounds of diplomatic immunity.)

September 15. 16 cigar factories, 14 cigarette plants and 20 tobacco warehouses are seized and nationalized, including the H. Upmann factory (home of Montecristo), and Partagas.

September 17. Cuba nationalizes all U.S. banks, including First National City Bank of New York, First National Bank of Boston and Chase Manhattan Bank.

September 18. Fidel Castro goes to New York to address the United Nations General Assembly.

September 26. At the United Nations in New York, Fidel Castro speaks before the General Assembly. "Although it has been said of us that we speak at great length," he says to open his speech, "you may rest assured we shall endeavor to be brief." The speech lasts 4.5 hours.

September 26. Four boats set out from Miami to invade Cuba under the leadership of Rolando Masferrer Rojas. Only one of the boats reaches Cuba, and three Americans are eventually executed as a result: Allan D. Thompson, Anthony Zarba and Robert O. Fuller.

October 13. As Urban Reform Law No. 890 goes into effect, 382 locally owned firms, including sugar mills, banks and large industries, are nationalized.

October 19. U.S. imposes a partial economic embargo on Cuba that excludes food and medicine.

October 24. Cuba nationalizes additional properties owned by American interests in response to the economic embargo imposed by the U.S.

October 30. In Guatemala, the newspaper La Hora reports that preparation for an invasion of Cuba is "well under way."

December 6. In a cable from Havana to Washington, the U.S. embassy reports that "during the past three months the popular support of the Castro regime has dropped markedly. The government is determined to suppress the opposition at any cost. It has accumulated a substantial quantity of military hardware from the Soviet bloc and is making great efforts to train the military in their use… It is not likely that the Castro regime will fall without considerable bloodletting and destruction of property."

December 14. The United Nations adops Resolution 1514 (XV), which declares that "colonialism in all its forms and manifestations" must come "to a speedy and unconditional end."

December 26. A dozen Cuban children travel from Havana airport to the U.S., beginning Operation Pedro Pan.

In the first 2 years of the revolution, Cuba loses more than 50% of its doctors and teachers.

"By 1961, over 100,000 political émigrés had gathered in the United States. And this number was only a fraction of those who had tried to get out but could not." - Theodore Draper, Castro's Revolution: Myths and Realities.

January 1. The national literacy campaign begins in Cuba.

January 2. At the UN Security Council, Cuba charges that the U.S. is preparing an invasion.

January 2. In a speech, Castro demands that U.S. embassy staff be reduced to 11, the same number as Cuba's embassy in Washington. He referrs to the U.S. embassy as a "nest of spies."

January 2. Weapons from the Soviet bloc are displayed in a parade in Havana. Included are rocket launchers, truck-pulled field artillery, heavy tanks, anti-aircraft and anti-tank guns.

January 3. The U.S. breaks off official diplomatic relations with Cuba.

January 23. In U.S. News & World Report, Dr. Miró Cardona predicts a "general uprising" in Cuba. He says, "After the uprising, there will have to be a military decision on whether to help the people with a mass invasion or with a continuation of the infiltration by specially trained men. It is impossible at this point to decide whether a mass invasion will be necessary."

January 25. Eloy Gutierrez Menoyo and members of the Second Front of Escanbray during the revolution arrive in Key West, Florida, on a fleet of three fishing boats.

February 1. In the Communist newspaper L'Unita (from Italy), Castro is asked by journalist Arminio Savioli about his opinion of Cuba's Communist Party. Castro replies: "It is the only Cuban party that has always cleary proclaimed the necsssity for radical change of structure, of social relationships. It is also true that at first the Communists distrusted me and us rebels. It was a justified distrust, an absolutely correct position, ideologically and politically. The Communists were right to be distrustful becaue we of the Sierra, leaders of the guerrillas, were still full of petty-bourgeois prejudices and defects, despite Marxist reading. The ideas were not clear to us,though we wanted with al or strength to destroy tyranny and privileges. Then we came together, we understood each other, and began to collaborate. The Communists have given much blood, much heroism, to the Cuban cause. Now we continue to work together. Loyally and fraternally."

February 16. Lino Fernandez and 500 of his men (who oppose the revolution) are captured and taken to jail in Santa Clara.

March 1. At least ten violations of Cuban airspace by hostile airplanes are reported.

March 9. President of Ecuador, Josh Maria Velasco Ibarra, announces U.S. demands that his country break off diplomatic relations with Cuba as a condition to the approval of various loans.

March 11. Major William A. Morgan (of Toledo, Ohio) and Major Jesus Carreras Zayas, both former military aides to Castro, are executed in Havana for treason.

March 18. A number of leaders opposing the revolution are arrested at a strategy meeting in Miramar, including Humberto Sori Marin, Manuel Puig, and Regelio Gonzalez Corso.

March 22. In New York, an agreement is reached between members of U.S.-based anti-Castro groups the Frente Revolucionario Democrático and the Movimiento Revolucionario del Pueblo. The agreement is signed by Antonio Varona, Manuel Ray and others.

March 29. Cuban soldiers arrest CIA agent Carlos Antonio Rodriquez Cabo, aka El Gallego. He is accused of various acts of terrorism.

April 8. Immigration and Naturalization agents in Miami arrest Rolando Masferrer Rojas. The arrest is requested by the U.S. State Department, which says that his presence in the U.S. (especially in Florida) is "prejudicial to the interests of the United States."

April 9. In Miami, Rolando Masferrer is indicted for an aborted invasion of Cuba (October 4, 1960). The alleged attack violates the Neutrality Act which forbids the launching of any military expedition from U.S. territory against a nation with which the U.S. is not at war. The Kennedy Administration opposes pro-Batista exiles while encouraging other anti-Castro groups.

April 9. In Havana, a terrorist bomb explodes in the store El Encanto. Another bomb explodes near the Pepsi Cola factory.

April 9. In exile, the newly formed Cuban Revolutionary Council, headed by Dr. José Miro Cardona, issues a statement that asserts, "We are not, nor could we be, counterrevolutionaries. We were revolutionists who fought against the previous regime, which had impoverished the whole country for the benefit of a minority lusting for gold and power. It is with the same convictions that we now oppose the present regime, which has betrayed our country and plunged it into chaos." The statement is published in the New York Times.

April 11. Rolando Masferrer Rojas is formally charged with violating U.S. Neutrality Laws in an attempt to overthrow Cuba's Fidel Castro. [Section 960 of Title 18 of the United States Code reads: "Whoever, within the United States, knowingly begins or sets on foot or provides or prepares a means for or furnishes the money for, or takes part in, any military or naval expedition or enterprise to be carried on from thence against the territory or dominion of any foreign prince or state, or of any colony, district, or people with who the United States is at peace, shall be fined not more than $3,000 or imprisoned not more than three years, or both."

April 13. Another explosion at the store El Encanto destroys the 7-story building.

April 15. Cuban airfields are bombed by "mystery planes" in order to destroy the Revolution’s air force. A total of 8 B-26 bombers attack airfields at Ciudad Libertad (in Havana), San Antonio de los Baños and Santiago de Cuba. The attacks wipe out 27 percent of Cuba's fighter planes.

April 17. Cuban exiles, trained, armed and funded by the CIA, invade Cuba at Bay of Pigs (known in Cuba as Playa Girón). After three days of fighting the invading force is defeated by the Cuban army.

April 19. Castro formally declares that the revolution is "socialist." In Havana, 10 counterrevolutionaries, including Humberto Sori Marin, Manuel Puig, and Regelio Gonzalez Corso are executed for treason.

April 20. Sorí Marin and Rogelio Gonzalez, CIA agents captured a few days before the Bay of Pigs invasion, are executed.

May. A record low rainfall creates one of the most severe droughts in the island's history.

May 1. In a speech, Castro refers to Cuba as a "socialist country."

May 5. At a meeting in the U.S. of the National Security Council, it is formally agreed that "U.S. policy toward Cuba should aim at the downfall of Castro."

May 8. In a major speech, Castro disassociates himself from prevailing "Communist ideas."

May 10. A resolution asking for an end to "the present drift towards American military intervention" in Cuba is published in the New York Times. The resolution is endorsed by 70 professors and writers (41 are members of the faculty at Harvard University). Among the signers are faculty members from Harvard, Boston University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Brandeis University: James Luther Adams, Lillian Hellman, David Owen, David Riesman, Noam Chomsky, Timothy Leary and others. The resolution also asks to "detach the Castro regime from the Communist bloc by working for a relaxation of diplomatic tensions and a resumption of trade relations," and that we concentrate "constructive efforts on eliminating in other parts of Latin America the social conditions on which totalitarian nationalism feeds."

August 22. Che Guevara and Dick Goodwin meet secretly in Montevideo, Uruguay. Goodwin goes on to write a memo to President Kennedy describing the content of their meeting on August 22. The memo remains classified until 1993, and can now be found at the National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 269: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB269/index.htm.

September 23. Five Cubans and one American are executed by firing squad for "counterrevolutionary activities" during the Bay of Pigs invasion.
[The unofficial count of executions by firing squad since January 1959 stands at 622.]

September 30. An article in the New York Times reports that the last of the casinos in Cuba have been officially closed.

November 3. At the White House, a program against the government of Fidel Castro is introduced by the name Operation Mongoose.

November 9. The U.S. Federal case against Rolando Masferrer Rojas is dismissed without explanation. He had been charged with violating U.S. neutrality laws by financing a 27-man invasion of Cuba.

November 16. President Kennedy, in a speech at the University of Washington; “We cannot as a free nation, compete with our adversaries in tactics of terror, assassination, false promises, counterfeit mobs and crises.”

November 30. U.S. President John F. Kennedy authorizes Operation Mongoose, which aims to eliminate Fidel Castro and the Cuban Revolution. President Kennedy creates an inter-agency team to plan actions against Cuba. The new Special Group Augmented includes new CIA director John McCone, national security adviser McGeorge Bundy, from the Dept. of State U. Alexis Johnson, from the Defense Department Roswell Gilpatric and from the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Lyman Lemnitzer. Also included were General Maxwell Taylor and Robert Kennedy, with Secretary of State Dean Rusk and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara as occasional participants. General Lansdale is named Chief of Operations.

December 2. Castro declares himself a "Marxist-Leninist."

Louis A. Pérez, Jr.,
from his book Cuba, between Reform and Revolution, 2nd Edition Pg. 343
"After 1961, one of the key elements of U.S. policy against Cuba was to isolate Cuba economically as a way to disrupt the Cuban economy, increase domestic distress, and encourage internal discontent-all designed to weaken the regime from within."

January 22. Under U.S. encouragement, the Organization of American States (OAS) suspends Cuban membership.

February 4. Castro responds to Cuba's suspension from the OAS with the Second Declaration of Havana, calling upon the people of Latin America to rise up against imperialism and declaring, "The duty of a revolutionary is to make the revolution."

February 7. President Kennedy broadens the partial trade restrictions imposed by Eisenhower to a ban on all trade with Cuba, except for non-subsidized sale of foods and medicines.

February 15. An assortment of U.S. naval vessels (including aircraft carriers) gather about the Cuban coastine.

March. Food rationing begins.

March 21. From a U.S. National Intelligence Estimate on Cuba:
1) Forces available to the regime to suppress insurrection or repel invasion have been and are being greatly improved, with substantial Bloc assistance through provision of material and instruction;
2) Castro and the Revolution retain the positive support of at least a quarter of the population;
3) There is active resistance in Cuba, but it is limited, uncoordinated, unsupported, and desperate. The regime, with all the power of repression at its disposal, has shown that it can contain the present level of resistance activity;
4) The regime's apparatus for surveillance and repression should be able to cope with any popular tendency toward active resistance. Any impulse toward widespread revolt is inhibited by the fear which the apparatus inspires, and also by the lack of dynamic leadership and of any expectation of liberation within the foreseeable future.

March 23. President Kennedy expands the Cuban embargo to include imports of all goods made from or containing Cuban materials, even if made in other countries.

May 7. In Washington, Sheffield Edwards and Lawrence Houston meet with Attorney General Robert Kennedy and "brief him all the way" on efforts against Castro involving the "criminal underworld." According to the Inspector General's Report on Plots to Assassinate Fidel Castro (released to the public on 6/23/1998) Kennedy responds: "I trust that if you ever try to do business with organized crime again-with gansters-you will let the Attorney General know before you do it."

May 29. A high-level Soviet delegation that includes Marshal S. S. Biryuzov, commander of the Strategic Rocket Forces, and a high-level delegation, arrives secretly in Havana to suggest the deployment of nuclear weapons in Cuba.

July 2. Raul Castro, Minister of the Armed Forces, arrives in Moscow.

July 26. In Washington, a memo from Bob Hurwitch, Deputy Director of the Office of Caribbean and Mexican Affairs, asserts that: "State believes it needs a virtual civil war situation in Cuba before intervention in Cuba with US military force might be considered politically feasible." [Doc. No. 361, page 885, Foreign Relations of the United States, Cuba, 1961-1963, Volume X.]

Between January and August, 5,780 counterrevolutionary actions are reportedly carried out in Cuba. 716 involve sabotage of important economic objectives.

August 26. The U.S. Coast Guard impounds two boats in Marathon, Florida, after members of the Florida-based "Student Revolutionary Directorate" used them to fire automatic weapons at Havana beachfront buildings the night before. The 23 members of the expedition are not arrested, and no charges are brought against them.

August 31. In Washington, a memo from General Lansdale (Chief of Operation Mongoose) outlines the objectives of Operation Mongoose, Phase II: a. Discredit and isolate the regime; b. Harass the economy; c. Intensify intelligence collection; d. plit regime leadership and relations with Bloc; e. Assist Cuban exile groups and Latin American governments to take actions; f. Be prepared to exploit a revolt. [Document number 399, page 974, Foreign Relations of the United States, Cuba, 1961-1963, Volume X.]

September 3. U.S. senators George Smathers, Strom Thurmond and Kenneth B. Keating propose direct aggression against Cuba. They suggest sponsoring a NATO-like military alliance that can deal with "the Cuban problem."

September 8. Soviet freighter Omsk arrives in Cuba with the first shipment of MRBMs.

September 15. Soviet freighter Poltava arrives in Cuba with the second shipment of MRBMs.

September 27. In Havana, five CIA agents are arrested and large quantities of weapons are confiscated.

October 2. U.S. government cables all Latin American governments and NATO countries new measures to tighten the economic embargo against Cuba.

October 4. In Washington, according to a memo from Director of Central Intelligence John McCone; "General Lansdale was instructed to give consideration to new and more dynamic approaches, the specific items of sabotage should be brought forward immediately and new ones conceived, that a plan mining harvors should be developed and presented, and the possibility of capturing Castro forces for interrogation should be studied." (Doc No. 8 - http://www.state.gov/www/about_state/history/frusXI/01_25.html)

October 12. In Washington, a memo from Edwin M. Martin (Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs) to U. Alexis Johnson (Deputy Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs) outlines a 2-track course of covert action against Cuba. "Track one would consist of a heightened effort to move along the present Mongoose lines. The minimum objective there would be harassment: the maximum objective would be the triggering of a situation where there might be conflict at the top of the Cuban regime leading, hopefully, to its change or overthrow by some group within Cuba commanding arms."
"Track two would consist of an effort to engage Cubans more deeply, both within Cuba and abroad, in efforts of their own liberation." (Doc No. 14 - http://www.state.gov/www/about_state/history/frusXI/01_25.html)

October 14. The Cuban Missile Crisis begins when U.S. reconnaissance aircraft photograph Soviet construction of intermediate-range missile sites in Cuba.
President Kennedy demands the withdrawal of Soviet missiles and imposes a naval blockade. Khrushchev agrees on condition that Cuba receives guarantee of non-aggression from the U.S. and Jupiter missiles aimed at the Soviet Union are removed from Turkey.

October 24. A naval quarantine of the island beings.

October 25. Soviet officials agree to remove the nuclear missiles from Cuba.

October 30. The Special Group (Augmented) orders General Lansdale to "cease all sabotage and paramilitary operations during the coming negotiations with Cuba." This is the official end of Operation Mongoose.

November 12. At a meeting in Washington, Desmond FitzGerald (CIA Director of Plans) points out that the CIA has three kinds of agent activities in Cuba: "1. Singleton, 2. Collection nets, and 3. Agents involved in "black net" operations. "While there is encouraging improvement in the geographical spread of these agents, there is still, understandably, a fairly heavy concentration of agents in the Havana area." (Doc No. 376 - http://www.state.gov/www/about_state/history/frusXI/376_390.html)

November 20. The naval quarantine that surrounded Cuba since October 24 is lifted. At a press conference, President Kennedy states that as long as Cuba commits no aggressive acts against any nation in the western hemisphere, it was never the intention of the United States to invade Cuba.

December 24. The U.S. exchanges $53 million of medicines and baby food for 1,113 exiles captured in the "Bay of Pigs" invasion. A few prisioners remain until 1986.

December 29. In Miami, President Kennedy meets with survivors of the 2506 Brigade in a ceremony televised from the Orange Bowl. Pepe San Roman gives JFK the brigade's flag to hold for safekeeping, and Kennedy says "I can assure you that this flag will be returned to the brigade in a free Havana." The book American Spy by E. Howard Hunt, reveals that the "flag was a replica," and that the the presentation almost didn't take place because of the animosity by brigade members against JFK.

January 25. New York attorney James Donovan meets with Fidel Castro to negotiate the release of 22 Americans imprisoned in Cuba.

February 8. The Kennedy administration prohibits travel to Cuba and makes financial and commercial transactions with Cuba illegal for U.S. citizens.

March 4. James Donovan (who negotiated the release of Bay of Pigs prisoners) conducts secret talks with Fidel Castro on behalf of the Kennedy administration. The memo remains classified until 1997, and can now be found at the National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 269: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB269/index.htm.

March 13. At the University of Havana, 3 men are discoveed by security police preparing to shoot Prime Minister Fidel Castro with a sniper's rifle.

March 18. Members of Alpha 66 attack a Soviet vessel anchored in Cuban waters. 12 Soviet soldiers are wounded.

March 19. In Washington, members of Alpha 66 hold a press conference to take credit for yesterday's attack on the Soviet ship Lvov. Alpha 66 leader Veciana says their purpose is "to wage psychological warfare against the government of Premier Fidel Castro and the Soviet troops supporting him."

March 26. Cuban exiles attack a Soviet ship (the Baku) docked in Cuban waters at Caibarien. A journalist from Life Magazine, Andrew St. George, is along for the ride.

March 30. In Washington, the State and Justice Departments jointly announce they will take "every step necessary" to ensure that exile violence against Cuba does not emerge from "U.S. territory."

April 3. In a meeting at the White House that includes Cyrus Vance, Richard Helms, McGeorge Bundy and additional staff from the State Department and the CIA, President Kennedy objects to exile groups holding press conferences after illegal aggressions against Cuba.

April 11. At a Cuba Coordinating Committee meeting in Washington, Desmond FitzGerald (Chief, Task Force W) presents three sabotage targets for the months of April and May: a railway bridge, a petroleum storage facility and a molasses storage vessel. It is concluded that "this will meet the President's desire for some noise level and for some action in the immediate future."

April 22. Liza Howard of ABC News conducts a 5-hour interview with Fidel Castro. She later reports to the CIA that "Castro is seeking rapprochement with the U.S." She adds that in her opinion Che Guevara, Raul Castro and Vilma Espin are opposed to any idea of rapprochement.

April 27. Castro begins a 5-week visit to the Soviet Union.

May 28. In a memo from Gordon Chase (National Security Council) to McGeorge Bundy (Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs) regarding "Cuban Exiles" in the Miami area, the following organizations are identified:
"Left. The Second National Front of Escambray, Alpha-66, the Anti-Communist Liberation Front, and elements of the People's Revolutionary Movement and the 30th of November Movement have reached a working agreement. Although the working agreement is essentially action-oriented, the member organizations tend to the view that the original revolution promised by Castro should be reclaimed and redirected. The adherence of Manuel Ray's Revolutionary Junta (JURE) would increase the influence of this grouping, which probably has the most potential appeal to Castro's opponents within Cuba, but which is an object of concern to more conservative exiles.
"Center. Revolutionary Unity (UR), Revolutionary Recuperation Movement (MRP), Christian Democratic Movement (MDC), Revolutionary Student Directorate (DRE), and other less well-organized center groups, have held aloof from attempts at unity.
"Right. The Alliance for Cuban Liberty (ALC), and the Association for Economic Recovery of Cuba (AREC) have had difficulty attracting adherents. They principally look to the return of their lost property, rather than action and politics. Recent discussions by these groups with U.S. nationals promising large-scale financial support appear to have had no results."
Further down the document states that "So far the efforts toward unity have been tentative and competitive. Political divisions, both ideological and personal, are deep and there appears to be little disposition or ability to effect a real accommodation of views. The groups on the left distrust those on the right and vice versa; the center groups are wary of both. Any formula for unity would have to be so diluted as to be almost meaningless. Moreover, the ability of a united exile organization to reflect, to any meaningful degree, the attitudes and aspirations of those within Cuba would be minimal." (Doc. No. 345, http://www.state.gov/www/about_state/history/frusXI/326_350.html)

June 19. President Kennedy approves a CIA program titled: "Proposed Covert Policy and Integrated Program of Action toward Cuba," presented to the Standing Group on June 8. The plan renews support for exile attacks on selected Cuban targets which include transportation facilities, power plants, fuel production and storage operations.

July 9. All Cuban-owned assets in the United States are frozen.

September 7. In a 3-hour interview with Associated Press reporter Daniel Harker, Castro indicates that he's aware of CIA plots to kill him, and adds that U.S. leaders also "may not be safe."

October. In Prologue to the Cuban Revolution, Robin Blackburn writes: "The Cuban Revolution is now widely recognized as an event of world-hsitorical importance. For the first time there has been a socialist revolution in the Americas… The universal significance of the Cuban Revolution makes it one of the decisive phenomena of our time."

November 14. Four Cubans are executed in Havana's Cabaña Fortress. Argimiro Fonseca Fernández, Wilfredo Alfonso Ibáñez, Israel Rodríguez Lima and Erasmo Machín Garia had been charged with infiltrating Cuba to find "spots along the island's beaches where arms could be landed."

November 17. President Kennedy asks French journalist Jean Daniel to tell Castro that he is now ready to negotiate normal relations and drop the embargo. According to former Press Secretary Pierre Salinger, "If Kennedy had lived I am confident that he would have negotiated that agreement and dropped the embargo because he was upset with the way the Soviet Union was playing a strong role in Cuba and Latin America…"

November 22. U.S. President John F. Kennedy is assassinated.

November 29. Composer Ernesto Lecuona dies in Santa Cruz de Nenerife, Spain.

December 2. Cuba announces the formation of the United Party of Socialist Revolution, which unites representatives from various groups, including the Popular Socialist Party (the former communist party).

Using Soviet-supplied equipment, Cuba becomes the first nation in the Western Hemisphere to jam radio broadcasts. The first apparent target being the anti-Castro stations in the U.S.

January 7. Castro tells American journalist Herbert L. Matthews that Cubans had put forward the idea of Soviet missiles on the island.

February 12. Castro sends a verbal message to President Lyndon B. Johnson through Lisa Howard of ABC News.

June. Castro's sister, Juanita Castro, defects, and becomes a prominent radio commentator in Miami. (In 2001 she is appointed director of Radio-TV Martí by President G.W. Bush.)

June 16. Look magazine runs a prelude to the book The Invisible Government by David Wise and Thomas B. Ross, which reveals that Miami's Zenith Technical Enterprises, Inc., is a cover for a CIA operation. At the time, this was the largest CIA station in the world after Langley.

July 6. In a New York Times interview with reporter Richard Eder, Castro makes a peaceful offer to the US. that includes ending material aid to Latin American revolutionaries and the release of political prisoners in Cuba. The Department of State immediately issues a sharp rejection; Cuba must first end its dependency on the Soviets, and cease to support revolutionary groups in Latin America.

In The Closest of Enemies, author Wayne Smith writes,
"I was bothered by the hardness of our demands. How could Castro break ties with the Soviet Union before reaching an accommodation with us? How could he renounce Soviet military assistance when he still faced a hostile United States? How could he renounce Moscow's economic aid without being certain of finding another benefactor? Obviously, he couldn't. Clearly, we did not wish to talk to Castro. Our hard reply was simply a way of saying no without appearing to do so." Pg. 88.

July 26. The Organization of American States (OAS) adopts mandatory sanctions against Cuba, requiring all members to sever diplomatic and trade relations. Only Mexico refuses to comply.

July 26. In a speech given in Santiago de Cuba, Castro reiterates the peaceful overtures made to the US in the July 6 interview in the New York Times.

November 3. Roberto S. Sanchez Vilella is elected governor of Puerto Rico.

October 14. Khrushchev is ousted as First Secretary and Premier of the Soviet Union.

December 12. Cuban exiles fire a bazooka at UN headquarters in New York during a speech by Che Guevara to the General Assembly.

February 18. Cuba and the Soviet Union sign a 5-year agreement that reschedules payment of Cuban debt (about $500 million).

February 26. In Algiers, Che Guevara speaks about the mistakes of the revolution.

April 1. Che Guevara resigns his Cuban citizenship and leaves to wage armed struggle in Latin America.

May 1. Che writes a farewell letter to Fidel Castro.

October 3. The new Communsit Party of Cuba is inaugurated.

October 10. Hundreds of Cubans begin to leave the island from Camarioca (a small fishing port). The port is opened to foreign boats, and within two months about 7,500 refugees have arrived in the U.S.

December 1. The Cuban airlift begins. In its first year, the airlift brings more than 45,000 refugees – only about 5% require federal assistance, and only for a short time.

December. The United Nations General Assembly adopts a "Declaration of the Inadmissibility of Intervention in the Domestic Affairs of States and the Protection of their Independence and Sovereignty." It says that "no state shall organize, assist, foment, finance, incite or tolerate subversive, terrorist or armed activities directed toward the violent overthrow of another state, or interfere in civil strife in another state."

January 3-15. Cuba hosts the first Tricontinental Conference, from which are founded the Organization for Solidarity with the Peoples of Africa, Asia and Latin America (OSPAAL) and the Organization for Latin American Solidarity (LASO).

February 13. Cuba announces a new trade agreement with the Soviet Union that includes credits for $91 million.

November 2. U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs into law the Cuban Adjustment Act, which exempts Cuban immigrants from general U.S. migration laws. Any Cuban who has reached U.S. territory since January 1, 1959 is eligible for permanent residency after two years. 123,000 Cubans immediately apply for permanent status.

December 29. U.S. Air Force pilot Everett Jackson is shot down over Cuba and captured after dropping arms and equipment intended for counterrevolutionaries in Las Villas province.

January 2. Rolando Masferrer Rojas and 67 others are arrested in Marathon, Florida, for an alleged plot to invade Haiti and then Cuba. Among the weapons seized by U.S. federal agents are machine guns, handguns and knives.

January 2. In the article "Cuba: Eight Years of Revolution," Herbert Matthews writes in the New York Times:"There have been improvements in child care, public health, housing, roads and the typical leveling down of the whole social and economic structure that accompanies revolutionary "equality." This also means, however, that the poorest and most backward elements, especially in the rural areas, have been "leveled up." Cuban Negroes, for the first time, have equal status with whites, economically and socially."

August 1. The first meeting of the Latin American Solidarity Organization (LASO) opens in Havana.

October 9. Che Guevara is killed in Bolivia by U.S.-trained rangers in the village of Vallegrande.

On economic performance.

January 2. The Cuban government announces petroleum rationing due to a cutback in deliveries from the Soviet Union.

January 11. Two British journalists are arrested and then expelled after photographing military sites in Havana. They are identified as Peter Davis and Joy Searl.

January 13. Castro offers to trade 100 political prisoners for the remains of Che Guevara (currently in Bolivia).

January 18. In Havana, an American pilot is captured when his small plane is shot down after dropping a cargo of weapons for counterrevolutionaries. The pilot is identified as Everett Jackson, age 27.

January 21. A bomb explodes on a B-25 plane at Miami International Airport. The departure is delayed, as the explosion damages only a wing. The plane was to carry medicines to Cuba.

January 22. Dr. Eliodoro Martinez Jonco replaces Dr. José Ramon Machado Ventura as Cuba's Health Minister.

January 23. Raul Castro (Minister of the Armed Forces and Second Secretary to the Cuban Communist Party, convenes a meeting of the party's Central Committee to hold a trial of 37 members (including Anibal Escalante) for "microfactionalist activities" which include "encouraging the Soviet Union to apply economic sanctions against Cuba." The charges amount to treason. It is asseted that had the microfaction succeeded, "it would have subordinated Cuban sovereignty" to the Soviets.

January 25. In Miami, 2 businesses who regularly ship packages to Cuba are bombed before dawn. The anti-Castro group "El Poder Cubano" (Cuban Power), takes credit for the bombings, and claims that "Servicios Especializados" and "All Cargo Transport, Inc." were "doing business with Cuba."

January 28. Anibal Escalante and eight others are expelled from the Communsit Party as a result of their "microfactionalist activities."

February 3. Eastern Airlines Flight 7 from Newark to Miami (with 193 passengers) is hijacked to Havana. The plane carries 193 passengers, and marks the 5th hijacking for Eastern Airlines this year.

March 13. Castro launches the "revolutionary offensive" which nationalizes 55,000 small businesses and leads to state control of nearly all trades and services.

March 23. A new economic agreement with the Soviet Union reveals a 13% decrease from the previous year.

June 5. U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy is shot in Los Angeles, California. He dies the next day.

August 23. Castro endorses the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia (on August 20).

September 16. Orlando Bosch and others fire a bazooka at a Polish freighter docked in the port of Miami. Bosch is sentenced to ten years, but is paroled in 1972.

Women comprise 15.6% of the Cuban work force.

January 2. The Cuban government announces sugar rationing.

February 16. Eastern Airlines Flight 1 from Newark to Miami is hijacked to Cuba. The plane lands in Havana.

July 26. Castro announces the start of a campaign to produce ten million tons of sugar in the next harvest.

August 8. According to a survey in Granma, Cuba's official newspaper, more than 75% of Cuban women have chosen not to enter the workforce.

August 25. TWA Flight 134 from Las Vegas to Philadelphia is hijacked to Cuba. The Boeing 727, with 80 passengers and a 6-person crew, lands in Havana's José Martí Airport at 10:21 p.m.

December. The first contingent of the Venceremos Brigade, a group of voluteer workers from the U.S., arrives in Cuba to work on the sugar harvest.

Women comprise 17.7% of the Cuban work force.

A report of the Cuban Academy of Sciences asserts that the Cuban family is in a state of crisis.

May 19. Castro announces that Cuba missed it's goal to produce 10 million tons of sugar by 15% (managing 8.5 million tons, the largest harvest in Cuban history).

August. The "Brigades of Militant Mothers for Education" is founded. It's goal is, in part, to encourage women to enter the labor force.

September 25. The U.S. warns the Soviet Union to discontinue construction of a nuclear submarine base in Cienfuegos.

By this time, more than 85 percent of Cuban trade is with the USSR or Eastern Block countries.

March 20. Poet Herberto Padilla is arrested and detained for 39 days.

April 17. In Miami, a few hundred Cuban exiles gather to dedicate a monument to the 10-year anniversary of the Bay of Pigs invasion.

September 12. In Puerto Rico, on the 80th anniversary of Albizu Campos' birth, 80,000 people march through San Juan demanding independence. This is the largest demonstration in the island's history.

November 10. Castro arrives in Chile for a three-week visit, his first to a Latin American country since 1959.

November 18. In a question and answer period with students at the University of Concepción, Chile, Castro tells how he became a communist.

November 28. In Chile, Castro talks about Che Guevara.

October 2. Bola de Nieve dies in Mexico.

The Center for Cuban Studies is established in New York to promote cultural and academic exchange.

May 3. Castro begins a 63-day tour of Africa, Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union.

July 11. Cuba joins the Council of Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA), an economic organization of the Soviet Union, East European socialist countries, and Mongolia.

August 28. At the United Nations, Cuba requests that in light of adopted resolution 1541 (12/14/60) that the UN declare that Puerto Rico has a right to self-determination.

November 19. Cuba accepts a U.S. proposal to begin formal negotiations over the problem of airline hijackings.

February 15. Cuba and the U.S. sign an antihijacking agreement.

April 6. Eastern Airlines flight 8894 lands at Miami International Airport at 11:55 A.M. with the last 84 passengers of the Cuban airlift. Since 1965, 3,049 flights had brought 260,561 Cubans to the U.S., making this the largest airborne refugee operation in American history.

November 15. The 13th Congress of the Cuban Labor Confederation ties wages to productivity in an effort to improve efficiency.

The Committees for the defense of the Revolution (CDR) celebrates its 13th year. According to Cuba's official newspaper Granma, the total membership is now about 4,750,000.

January 28. Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev arrives in Cuba for a week-long visit.

September 11. OMEGA 7, an anti-Castro paramilitary group is founded in the U.S. by Eduardo Arocena. Most of their “operations” are based in New York, New Jersey and Miami, and involve bombings, shootings and assassinations. Their most visible “operation” takes place on September 21, 1976, with the car-bomb assassination of Chilean Ambassador Orlando Letelier.

September 28. U.S. Senators Claiborne Pell (D-Rhode Island) and Jacob Javits (R-New York) visit Cuba. They are the first U.S. elected officials to visit the island since the break of diplomatic relations.

November. Assistant Secretary of State William Rogers and Assistant to the Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger conduct secret normalization talks with Cuban officials in Washington and New York. The talks end over Cuban involvement in Angola.

December. In a speech, Castro admits that "after more than 15 years of Revolution,women's rights rights are an area in which we are still politically and culturally behind."

Women comprise 12.7% of membership in the Communist Party.

February 9. In a TV interview from Mexico City, U.S. Senator Edward M. Kennedy urges the U.S. government to lift the embargo and normalize relations with Cuba. "I believe the idea of isolating Cuba was a mistake," says Kennedy. "It has been ineffective. Whatever the reasons and justifications may have been at the time, now they are invalid."

February 21. Cuban exile leader Luciano Nieves is assassinated after coming out in support for dialogue with Cuba.

March 1. Maurice A. Ferré, Mayor of Miami, asks Attorney General Edward H. Levi for federal help to combat "violence in the Cuban exile community that the police regard as politically motivated. Mayor Ferré sites the assassination of Luciano Nieves, and the bombings of TV station WKID in Dania, among other incidents. Mayor Ferré estimates that the actual terrorists number less than 2-dozen.

April. A government survey seeks to discover why so few women ran in the 1974 People's Power elections and why so few were elected.

July 28. The Organization of American States (OAS) votes to end political and economic sanctions against Cuba. This opens the way for each member nation to decide whether to have diplomatic and trade relations with Cuba, which many had already established.

August 21. The U.S. announces that it will allow foreign subsidiaries of U.S. companies to sell products in Cuba, and that it will no longer penalize other nations for trade with Cuba.

October 31. In Miami, Rolando Masferrer Rojas is killed by a bomb planted in his car.

November 5. At the request of the newly inaugurated Angolan government, Cuba sends a large contingent of troops to help the Angolans repel an invasion by South African forces launched on October 23.

November 20. The U.S. Senate Select Intelligence Committee releases its 347 page interim report on CIA assassination plots against foreign leaders. The report identifies over eight attempted plots to kill Castro between 1960 and 1965, as well as additional plans against other Cuban leaders.

December 14. An article runs in the New York Times titled "Sentiment Against Cubans Is Found Growing in Miami Over the Terrorism Linked to Anti-Castro Exiles." In the article, author George Volsky writes, "A strong and growing anti-Cuban sentiment has become evident here in recent weeks, principally a result of a wave of terrorism attributed by law enforcement agencies to anti-Castro exiles." The article adds that in the last 10 days 9 powerful bombs have exploded, and that 100 bombs have exploded in the past 18 months, but there have been no arrests.

December 17-22. The First Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba is held in Havana. It adopts party statues, a programmatic platform, and approves the draft of the constitution.

December 20. President Ford announces that Cuban involvement in Angola prevents the possibility of restoring full diplomatic relations in the near future.

Women comprise 25% of the Cuban work force.

Of the Communist Party's Central Committee's 100 members, 6 are women.

Cuba gets new constitution; becomes socialist state. Among the changes is the establishment of new administrative division of the island. Instead of the 6 provinces left over from Spanish rule (Pinar del Río, La Habana, Matanzas, Las Villas, Camagüey, Oriente) the island is divided into 14 provinces: Pinar del Rio, La Habana, City of La Habana, Matanzas, Cienfuegos, Villa Clara, Santi Spiritus, Ciego de Avila, Camagüey, Las Tunas, Granma, Holguín, Santiago de Cuba, and Guantánamo.

February 24. The Family Code is adopted. It seeks to preserve and strengthen families, promote social changes and increase the participation of women in Cuban society.

April 5. U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger states that there is no possibility of U.S. relations with Cuba while Cuba has troops in Africa.

September 21. In Washington, Chilean Ambassador Orlando Letelier and Ronnie Moffitt are murdered with a car bomb. The murders are later attributed to José Dionisio Suarez Esquivel, who is pardoned in 2001.

October 6. Cubana Air Flight 455 crashes after an explosion nine minutes out of Barbados, killing 73 people, most of them teenagers. Luis Posada Carrilles, an anti-Castro activist trained by the CIA, is charged with the bombing. In 1998, Carrilles admits to (and later denies) over a decade of anti-Castro terrorist activities funded by the Cuban-American National Foundation (CANF), a Miami-based non-profit organization and the most powerful lobby in Washington.

[This is the worst case of airline terrorism in the Americas until the al-Qaeda attack on 9/11/2001.]

October 15. At a mass funeral for the victims of the October 6 bombing, Castro blames the sabotage on the CIA.

October. Orlando Bosch is arrested in Venezuela in connection with the Cubana Air Flight 455 bombing that killed 73 people.

December 3. Fidel Castro is elected president of the State Council, which, under the new constitution, consolidates the previous positions of president and prime minister. The new president serves as head of state, head of government, and commander in chief of the Armed Forces.

600,000 women work outside the home. | Government operates 654 nurseries throughout the island serving about 48,000 families.

March 19. U.S. President Carter drops the ban on travel to Cuba and on U.S. citizens spending dollars in Cuba.

April 27. The U.S. and Cuba sign a maritime boundary and fishing rights accord.

May 25. The U.S. State Department warns that Cuba's recent deployment of military advisors in Ethiopia could "impede the improvement of U.S.-Cuban relations."

September. The U.S. and Cuba open interests sections in each other’s capitals.

November 5. Somalia expels all Soviet advisors and breaks diplomatic relations with Cuba, citing the presence of Cuban and Soviet advisors in Ethiopia.

Mid-December. Cuban combat troops begin to arrive in Ethiopia (eventually totaling nearly 20,000).

January. At the request of the Ethiopian government, thousands of Cuban troops, supported and led by Soviet, East German and Cuban officers, help repel a Somali invasion of Ethiopia.

February 27. U.S. Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance, states that he does not foresee the normalization of relations with Cuba due to the presence of Cuban troops in Africa.

July 31. Castro calls for the removal of U.S. military bases from Guantanamo Bay. Bombings of the Cuban United Nations Mission, the Cuban Interests Section, and the Soviet Mission by anti-Castro exile groups follow throughout the fall.

September 9. In New York, Cuban exiles bomb the Cuban Mission to the United Nations.

December. U.S. government announces that the full force of the law will be used against those responsible for the July terrorist actions. (As far as I'm aware, no serious inquiry or arrest takes place other than the standard investigation by local police.)

January 1. Cuban-Americans are permitted to visit their families in Cuba. More than 100,000 visit in the coming year.

April 4. In San Juan, Carlos Muñoz Varela is murdered by members of Command Zero, an offshoot of Omega 7. Varela managed the Viajes Varadero Travel Agency which organized trips to Cuba and supported the establishing of dialogue between the two governments.

June 19. In the U.S., Rep. Ted Weiss (D-NY) introduces unsuccessful legislation to end the U.S. trade blockade against Cuba and re-establish diplomatic relations.

July. Cuba develops close relations with the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. (Since 1977, Cuba supported the Sandanista insurgency against Anastasio Somoza's rule.)

September 3-9. At a meeting of the sixth sumit of the Nonaligned Movement in Havana, Castro is elected chair of the movement and serves until 1982.

November 1. A new penal code takes effect, replacing the criminal code passed in 1936.

November 6. The first contingent of volunteer Cuban teachers leave for Nicaragua.

November 25. In Union City, Eulalio José Negrin is murdered in front of his 12-year-old son by Omega 7 member Pedro Remon. Orlando Bosch later boasts (from a prison in Venezuela) of having ordered the murder. [Bosch was later pardoned by President Bush.]

In competitive sports, Cuban women comprise 17 percent of participants. | Women make up almost half of all university students and half of the medical students.