Brothers to the Rescue

Cuba is 90 miles (145 km) south of the US State of Florida.

Brothers to the Rescue (Spanish: Hermanos al Rescate) is a Miami-based activist nonprofit organization headed by José Basulto. Formed by Cuban exiles, the group is widely known for its opposition to the Cuban government and its former leader Fidel Castro. The group describes itself as a humanitarian organization aiming to assist and rescue raft refugees emigrating from Cuba and to "support the efforts of the Cuban people to free themselves from dictatorship through the use of active nonviolence". Brothers to the Rescue, Inc., was founded in May 1991 "after several pilots were touched by the death of" fifteen-year-old Gregorio Perez Ricardo, who "fleeing Castro's Cuba on a raft, perished of severe dehydration in the hands of U.S. Coast Guard officers who were attempting to save his life.".

The Cuban government accuses them of involvement in terrorist acts, and infiltrated the group (see Juan Pablo Roque and the Wasp Network).

In 1996 two Brothers to the Rescue planes were shot down by the Cuban Air Force, leading to international condemnation.

Rafting missions

Sample political leaflet dropped by Brothers to the Rescue on Cuba in 1996.

In its early years, the group actively rescued rafters from Cuba and claims to have saved thousands of Cubans who were emigrating from the country. Eventually, the group's focus shifted after changes in U.S. immigration policy meant that rafters would be sent back to Cuba. The group's founder has stated that after August 1995 it stopped seeing rafters in the water. Heavily dependent on funding for rafting activities, the group's funding rapidly dropped to $320,455 in 1995, down from $1.5 million the year before. As a result, the group focused more on civil disobedience against the Cuban government. At least once, the group's founder dropped leaflets on Cuba.

Juan Pablo Roque and the Wasp network

One of the group's pilots, Cuban Juan Pablo Roque, a former Major in the Cuban air force, unexpectedly left on February 23, 1996, the day before the two planes were shot down, and turned up in Havana where he condemned Brothers to the Rescue. Roque had left Cuba four years earlier and was shortly after recruited by Brothers to the Rescue where he flew several missions. Despite being dismissed as a Cuban agent by U.S. officials, Roque denied working for the Cuban government. He said he returned home because he had become disillusioned with the methods of the Brothers, including what he said were its plans to carry out attacks on military bases in Cuba and to disrupt its defense communications. Roque appeared on Cuban television on February 26, 1996, where he denounced Brothers to the Rescue as an illegal and anti-Cuban organization the fundamental purpose of which is to provoke incidents that aggravated relations between Cuba and United States. In an interview with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), he stated that the group had planned to introduce anti-personnel weapons into Cuba and blow up high tension pylons to interrupt the energy supply.

While in Miami, Roque had contacts with and was paid by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Roque's declarations brought questions about the role of agencies such as the FBI and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the activities of the exile community. However, White House spokesperson David Johnson said that "there does not exist, nor has there existed, any tie between the North American intelligence services and Hermanos al Rescate," adding that the organization is "not a front" for those services, nor is it financed by them.

José Basulto agrees with US officials that Roque was a Cuban spy who, along with the Wasp Network, infiltrated Brothers to the Rescue.

1996 shootdown incident

Main article: 1996 shootdown of Brothers to the Rescue planes

On February 24, 1996, two of the Brothers to the Rescue Cessna Skymasters involved in releasing leaflets which fell on Cuban territory were shot down by a Cuban Air Force MiG-29UB. Killed in the shootdowns were pilots Carlos Costa, Armando Alejandre, Jr., Mario de la Peña, and Pablo Morales.

See also

• Cuba-United States relations

External links

• Rosa M. Abella Collection, 1996-1997, an archival collection that contains clippings, other archival materials, and a bibliography, co-authored by Rosa M. Abella and Dolores Rovirosa, of sources that discuss the 1996 shootdown.
• Inter-American Commission on Human Rights report on killings of Armando Alejandre Jr. (45 years old), Carlos Alberto Costa (29), Mario Manuel de la Peña (24), Pablo Morales (29)
• Brothers to the Rescue Homepage
• Shoot Down, a 2006 film about the shootdown, co-produced by the niece of one of the four victims.
• KTOK Radio Interview on the Cuban Five and the shootdown of Brothers to the Rescue—aired on February 9 and 10, 2009, conducted by Radio Host, Reid Mullins.
• BETRAYAL: Clinton, Castro & the Cuban Five, a 2009 book that brings together 13 years of intensive research into the events of the shootdown, co-authored by Matt Lawrence and Thomas Van Hare.
• Carl Nagin, The New Yorker, January 26, 1998, Annals of Diplomacy - Backfire
• Seagull One: The Amazing True Story of Brothers to the Rescue. Prellezo, Lily, and Basulto, Jose. University Press of Florida (September 26, 2010)