Wings of Denial

The Alabama Air National Guard’s Covert Role at the Bay of Pigs

Don Dodd author Warren Trest author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:University of Georgia Press

Published:1st Mar '01

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Wings of Denial cover

After nearly four decades of government denial, the deeds of four Alabama Air National Guardsmen who died at the Bay of Pigs in 1961 have been made public and their names memorialized at the CIA’s Wall of Honor in Langley, Virginia. Their stories can now be told. The four guardsmen who died flew with a group of Alabama volunteers to secret CIA bases in Guatemala and Nicaragua to train Cuban exiles to fly B-26 bombers in support of the invasion forces. When the small group of exhausted pilots could no longer sustain the air battle, seven Alabama Guardsmen flew with them into combat on the final day of the invasion in a futile attempt to stave off defeat at the embattled beachhead. The body of one of these men, Thomas W. “Pete” Ray, remained in Cuba until 1978 where it was frozen as a war trophy and as evidence of U.S. complicity in the failed 1961 invasion.

A superb account of one of the darkest tragedies of the Cold War era. Describes in chilling detail the bloody impact of JFK’s personal intervention.


A well-deserved and heartfelt testimony to the patriotism and bravery of the Alabama Air National Guardsmen who paid the ultimate price for their country.


A well-written and informative account of the covert role played by Alabama Air National Guardsmen—employed by the CIA as civilian contract personnel—in the abortive Bay of Pigs invasion. It sheds new light on the Air Guard's hard-to-document involvement in the murky world of clandestine operations.

ISBN: 9781588380210

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: unknown

160 pages