Look Folks, No Hands

To hear the Kennedy Administration tell it. it was all out of the goodness of the American citizens' heart. Except for the sentimental support of such as Jack and Bobby Kennedy, the U.S. Government was playing no part whatever in the deal to pay ransom to Cuba's Fidel Castro.

That, at least, was the claim--but the fact was much stranger than the fiction.

> Hour after hour and day after day last week, planeloads, truckloads and trainloads of goods poured into Florida for shipment to Cuba. The stuff--much of it handled by U.S. Air Force men called into stevedore service--consisted mostly of baby foods, drugs, hospital and medical equipment, ranging from Ex-Lax to tons of tranquilizer pills (1,288 Miltowns=1 lb.).

Agreement. All this was part of the $53 million tribute that the U.S. was prepared to turn over to Castro for the return of the 1,113 Cubans who were captured in April 1961 during the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion. Toward last week's end. New York Attorney James B. Donovan--who had been coordinating his negotiations for the prisoners' release with Bobby Kennedy--announced that he had finally gotten the unpredictable dictator at long last to sign an agreement. The terms: a freighter, carrying a cargo of drugs, would sail for Havana; the Bay of Pigs prisoners would be shuttled back aboard four jetliners to U.S. soil before Christmas. In Florida, where thousands of wives and children waited, smiles flickered on faces long drawn by dread.

In a humanitarian sense, the return of the prisoners could be only a cause for rejoicing. As for President Kennedy, he feels a moral obligation to the prisoners: he made the decision that sent them to the Bay of Pigs; he also denied them the air cover that might have given them a chance. But there remained even more basic problems of principle. Should the U.S. pay ransom to sustain Castro's Communist regime? And if so. should it be done with such look-folks-no-hands clan-destineness?

President Kennedy has publicly insisted that the U.S. Government was playing no official part in arranging for the ransom to Castro. "This," he said, "is being done by a private committee." What really happened was that representatives of the Justice Department all but ordered drug and chemical companies to kick in with "donations" of their products. Transport companies--railroads, truckers, airlines and shipping firms--were similarly told to "donate" their services. Naturally enough, all did.

Where Charity Begins. As against the implicit fear of Government reprisal for failure to cooperate, there was the implicit hope of tax goodies for going along.

Although the specific tax adjustments had not been worked out. it appeared that the drug, chemical and food companies who contributed to Castro would be able to write off $25 million (at retail, not wholesale, prices) of the $53 million ransom as "charitable" deductions. Charitable it certainly was--but of the sort that might becloud the brow of the ordinary U.S. taxpayer, worried as he is by Administration threats to make him show receipts for every dime he hands out for charity.

Drug company officials were understandably reluctant to let their names be used with comment about their coerced tribute to Castro. Said one, looking owlish when asked if Bobby Kennedy and the Justice Department had clobbered him into cooperation: "I do not care to comment." Said another: "You're bastards if you're in on the deal and you're bastards if you're not--so why not?"

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