JFK’s handling of the Bay of Pigs invasion was a total failure, which is why I have to give it a F. The plan was an invasion, complete with air support, to drive Castro from power but stated that no U.S. military personnel could be part of the combat force. This was Kennedy’s first major failure, having the U.S military would have given the mission a far better possible success rate. Kennedy however wanted the invasion and the overthrow of Castro to appear to be the work entirely of the Cuban exile community, who were being trained by the CIA. He wanted to be able to deny that the U.S. government had had a hand in any of it. Kennedys other major mistake was cutting back the sixteen bombers that Richard Bissell, the CIA’s chief of operations suggested. The invasion eventually went with eight planes that attacked the three airfields of the Cuban air force knocking out some of the aircrafts, but not enough to do serious damage. The mission was a complete failure and made Kennedy look weak, inexperienced and indecisive which is why I gave him an F.
Kennedys handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis was far more successful than the Bay of Pigs incident. On October 15, 1962 U.S reconnaissance photographs revealed Soviet missiles under construction in Cuba. Kennedy’s first plan of action was to immediately organize the EX-COMM, a group of his twelve most important advisors to handle the crisis. After seven days of debate, a naval quarantine was put around Cuba. The U.S wished to