Chuck Todd

At the United Nations, Adlai Stevenson II defends a story that he doesn't know is false.

I can't be too this because I am breaking a barrier.

When he learns the truth, he's humiliated, and he reportedly considered resigning.

And I think it's true of anybody that's broken a barrier.

I'm sure you don't want to be, you don't want to leave this place where nobody that looks like you doesn't have a shot again.

That's the cost of plausible deniability.

So now Kennedy has a choice.

Does he escalate or pull back?

Well, he cancels the second airstrike, and that's the moment the operation dies.

Now, the entire plan rested on one assumption, that the Cuban people were going to rise up.

They don't.

Because by then, many of the opponents had already fled.

The bombings ended up rallying support for Castro.

And Castro moved fast.

It's very positive in the- Well, when he was born, it was, his parents-

He arrested more than 100,000 suspected opponents.

Relationship was illegal in about half the states.

Dissidents, clergy, journalists, CIA networks.

He clamps down art.

The invasion doesn't just fail to spark an uprising, it does almost the opposite.