Operation Northwoods
On March 13th, 1962, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff carried a Top Secret memorandum into the Secretary of Defense's office proposing staged terrorist attacks on American soil to justify invading Cuba. Unlike the other episodes, here the conspiracy theory is the documented part — and the signed memo is in the National Archives.
SOURCES
The genuine documents shown or cited in this episode. (6 sources)
- The declassified Northwoods memo, JCS 1969/321 (March 13, 1962), hosted by the National Security Archive
- National Security Archive posting "Pentagon Proposed Pretexts for Cuba Invasion in 1962" (April 30, 2001)
- Brig. Gen. Lansdale's March 16, 1962 memo on his meeting with the President (National Security Archive)
- U.S. Navy photo of A-4D Skyhawks over USS Essex during the Bay of Pigs invasion, April 1961 (public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)
- Official U.S. Army portrait of General Lyman L. Lemnitzer (public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)
- National Archives at College Park, Maryland (NARA photo, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)
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