On September 28, 1965, six years after leading the Cuban Revolution and four years after the failed invasion of the Bay of Pigs backed by the United States, Fidel Castro announced that any Cuban who wished to leave the island was free to do. With Cuban forces no longer preventing civilians from leaving, a massive wave of emigration ensued, bringing hundreds of thousands of Cuban immigrants to Florida.
Poverty and political repression had sparked Castro’s revolution, but most remained the same under the new regime. As Castro raised his voice over his belief in socialism and his opposition to US imperialism, he faced dissent from political opponents in his country and hostility from the US political establishment. The year after the Bay of Pigs, the United States and the Soviet Union almost went to war over the latter’s placement of nuclear missiles on the island. Due to recent hostilities, many Americans have speculated that Castro was behind the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963, although no such evidence has ever emerged. Castro refused to allow the Cubans to leave for America, although a number of dissidents and supporters of the fallen Batista regime managed to escape.
With new anti-government protests and widespread poverty, due in large part to the US embargo on all trade with Cuba, Castro believed his company was near breaking point. He therefore announced on September 28 that those who wished to leave were free to do so. Immediately, several thousand refugees boarded boats at the port of Camiorca, leading to a haphazard pass that threatened to overwhelm the US Coast Guard and immigration authorities. As the continuation of these perilous crossings was in neither interest, the United States and Cuba engaged in surprisingly cooperative negotiations, culminating in the “Freedom Flights” airlift program. .
For the next eight years, ten flights a week left Cuba for Miami, and many Cubans waited years for their places on planes. About 300,000 people made the trip. This mass movement of people had several major effects on both countries. Castro managed to rid the island of many dissidents, although their departure was a propaganda victory for the Americans and may have led to a major “brain drain” in Cuba. It also dramatically changed Miami’s demographics – it was during this time that the city’s Little Havana neighborhood became a permanent enclave for Cuban culture, and as of the 2010 census, 34.4% of Miami residents were d Cuban origin.
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