These Fidel Castro assassination attempts are crazier than your Saturday morning cartoon plots
SUMMARY
Fidel Castro famously held onto power through 10 U.S. presidents — from 1959 to 2008 — as Cuba's ruler before finally calling it quits for health issues.
Related: The Cuban Missile Crisis: 13 days that almost ended the world
Surviving as a communist leader for half a century just 90 miles from the U.S. is a surprising achievement considering the estimated 638 CIA assassination attempts, according to Cuba's chief of counterintelligence Fabian Escalante in the video below.
Castro was on the naughty list from the very beginning for overthrowing President Fulgencio Batista and converting Cuba into the first socialist state under Communist Party rule in the Western Hemisphere. He stood for everything the U.S. was fighting during the Cold War, and his friendly relationship with the Soviet Union only made things worse — especially after allowing Moscow to place its nukes pointed at the U.S. there during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
It was a no-brainer; Castro had to go. And the U.S. attempted his removal by economic blockade, counter-revolution, and by assassination. This short animated History Channel video explores some of the most outlandish Fidel Castro assassination plots by the CIA.
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