Orlando Bosch Ávila

He is a Cuban exile, considered by some governments and organizations an old terrorist, and an agent who at one time was backed by the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States (CIA), who would become the head of the self-named Coordination of United Revolutionary Organizations (CORU), which would later be described by the FBI as "the umbrella of an anti-Castro terrorist organization".

Former U.S. Attorney General Dick Thornburgh would come to define Bosch as an "unrepentant terrorist"

He has been accused of having been part of Operation Condor (better known as Plan Condor, which coordinated the repressive activities of the right-wing military dictatorships of the Southern Cone during the 1970s, regarding Marxist armed insurgency or those suspected of having left-wing ideas. In addition to the terrorist attack against Cubana Flight 455 on October 6, 1976, which caused the death of 73 people on board, including the Cuban fencing team and five North Koreans. It has been alleged that the planning of this latter attack was carried out at a meeting held in Washington DC during that same year of 1976, which was attended by Bosch, Luis Posada Carriles, and a former U.S. agent of the Chilean DINA during the military regime of Augusto Pinochet, Michael Townley. Subsequently, it would be suggested that during that same meeting the planning of the murder (in the same U.S. capital) of Chilean exile Orlando Letelier, who had been minister during the mandate (1970-1973) of the overthrown and deceased Marxist president Salvador Allende Gossens, had been carried out.

Orlando Bosch made contact with the CIA in 1962 and in 1963, as that intelligence agency itself has historically recognized, and this is documented in the U.S. National Security Archive. At that time, Bosch was the general coordinator of the self-named Insurrectional Movement for Revolutionary Recovery (MIRR). He was a member of the anti-Castro group Operation 40.

For his part, Belgian researcher Marcel Dehaeseleer believes that Orlando Bosch is "the dark-skinned man" sitting next to the "umbrella man" in the famous filming carried out by Abraham Zapruder of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in the city of Dallas (state of Texas) on November 22, 1963. Bosch testified before the U.S. House Select Committee on Assassinations that he was at his home in Miami when the then U.S. president was assassinated.

Orlando Bosch entered Venezuela in mid-September 1976, under the protection of then president Carlos Andrés Pérez (also known by his initials CAP), according to the NSA. A CIA document described a fundraising collection of 1,000 dollars that had taken place in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas between September 22 and October 5, 1976, to help finance the (terrorist) activities of Orlando Bosch. The informant cited Bosch making an offer to some Venezuelan officials to forgo acts of violence in the United States, when CAP visited the United Nations building (located in New York) in November of that year, "in compensation for a substantial cash contribution to Bosch's organization".

Also, Bosch was heard stating: "Now that our organization has done well with the Letelier job, we are going to try to do something more". Several days later, it would be reported that "we are going to attack a Cuban plane" and that "Orlando has the details". (Both Bosch's and Posada's statements were cited in a report dated October 18, 1976 to then Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, deposited in the National Security Archive only on May 17, 2005).

Judicial officials in the Miami metropolitan area linked Bosch to some bombings, including an explosion at Mackey Airlines offices in 1977, after that airline announced plans to resume its flights to Cuba.

Attack on Cubana Flight 455
Main Article: Attack on Cubana Flight 455
On October 6, 1976, the Douglas DC-8 that was carrying Cubana Flight 455 was destroyed in a terrorist attack shortly after takeoff, through the explosion of a bomb that had been placed in the aircraft's bathroom. All 73 people on board, both passengers and crew, died in the attack. Among the former were the then young members of the Cuban national fencing team, as well as five North Korean individuals (four officials from Kim Il Sung's communist regime and a cameraman). The planning of that attack would have been attended by Luis Posada Carriles and American Michael Townley (who at that time was an agent of Pinochet's DINA, also involved in the fatal attack against former Chilean minister Orlando Letelier, which occurred in Washington DC in that same year). Bosch was imprisoned in Venezuela for a time, awaiting trial for the role he allegedly played in the terrorist attack, but would never ultimately be convicted on those charges.

Arrest and Subsequent Release
In 1968, Bosch was arrested in Florida for attacking a Polish cargo ship with a 57 mm recoilless rifle (At that time Poland was under a communist pro-Soviet regime, which Bosch believed contributed to sustaining the Cuban Castro regime that he so hated). Because of this incident he was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

In 1987, approximately a decade after the attack on Flight 455, Bosch was cleared of the charges that had been brought against him in Venezuela and was thus able to travel to the United States, assisted by the then U.S. ambassador to Venezuela, Otto Reich. There he was finally detained due to violation of the terms of his parole. Bosch was detained in the United States for six months until, once the charges against him had been dropped, he was able to live freely in that country. Several assume he was pardoned by former U.S. president George Bush.

Bosch was only released after some influential members of the right-wing Cuban-American community pressured the governor of the state of Florida, John Ellis "Jeb" Bush (brother of former U.S. president George W. Bush), to have his father intervene on Bosch's behalf. Although several countries have requested Bosch's extradition, he continues to live free in the United States.

The political pressure to grant Bosch a pardon began during a congressional campaign directed by Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, herself a Cuban-American, under the supervision of her then campaign manager Jeb Bush.

In the June 11, 2009 edition of the official newspaper of the Cuban regime, Granma, it expressed anger at the lack of new criminal charges against him, stating that "months after the change of administration in Washington [in reference to the assumption of President Barack Obama], nothing seems to have changed in the banana republic where the monstrous Orlando Bosch, the murderous pediatrician, sleeps peacefully in his bed".

Chronology of His Activities
Orlando Bosch Ávila, a Cuban-born pediatrician residing in Miami, has an extensive terrorist record.

His criminal activity began just a few months after the triumph of the Cuban Revolution, in January 1959.

Below is a chronology of the most outstanding and well-known actions of which he has been an organizer, author, or direct accomplice.

1960:
In mid-year his name appeared linked to counterrevolutionary bands in the Escambray, authors of dozens of crimes against the rural population.

According to his own unverified confessions, he participated as leader of one of them, which he abandoned to move to Miami.

Investigations carried out by the Permanent Commission of the Committee on Crimes of the U.S. House of Representatives in 1978 indicate that Bosch was recruited by the CIA from that very year. He was trained by it in techniques of assassination and sabotage and guerrilla warfare.

August 1960:
He was named representative of the organization Insurrectional Movement for Revolutionary Recovery (MIRR)

1961:
He organized several infiltration teams into Cuba in order to provide support to the bands operating in the Escambray Mountains, in the central region of the country, and who were authors of dozens of crimes against the rural population settled in those hills.

By orders of the CIA he established three training camps in Florida for these purposes.

1963:
He organized dozens of terrorist attacks from aircraft against Cuban economic installations with a toll of several dead and wounded and millions of pesos in material losses.

Bill Johnson, a former CIA pilot, declared he had flown with Bosch, under contract, in aerial raids against Cuban sugar mills.

January 17, 1965:
He dropped napalm and white phosphorus bombs on the Niágara sugar mill, Pinar del Río. He then declared to the Miami press: "If we had resources, Cuba would burn from one end to the other."

June 11, 1965:
He was arrested together with five of his men in Zellwood, Orlando, Tampa, when he was attempting to remove 18 aerial bombs from the country without authorization. He was also seized with an arsenal of heavy-caliber weapons. He was accused only of exporting war material despite it being proven that he was preparing to bomb the Havana refinery.

In the judicial proceedings it became known that the MIRR had also sabotaged the Cuban ship Aracelio Iglesias when it crossed the Panama Canal, causing 145 thousand dollars in damages.

September 30, 1965:
Aircraft in service of Bosch dropped explosives on Punta Pastelillo and Puerto Tarafa, Camagüey.

October 1965:
By orders of Orlando Bosch, in San Juan, Puerto Rico, a bomb was placed in the hull of the Spanish tourism ship "Satrústeguí", with 101 passengers and 109 crew members.

Bosch "officially" declared war on Spain and Great Britain for maintaining commercial relations with Cuba.

That same year he was arrested in Hartford, Connecticut, for extorting Cuban merchants who refused to pay contributions to finance terrorist activities.

November 15, 1966:
From an aircraft in service of Bosch, explosives were launched on an electrochemical plant "Cepero Bonilla", in the province of Matanzas.

1967:
Bosch transformed the MIRR into Poder Cubano (Cuban Power), a change that was due to the need to evade police controls.

1968:
In that year alone, the terrorist executed 82 diverse terrorist actions in the United States itself against Cuban, American, and third-country interests.

January 8, 1968:
Explosion of a bomb inside a mail bag at the warehouse of the Cuban Ministry of Communications. Three workers were wounded. Poder Cubano took credit for the act.

January 21, 1968:
Men from the organization Poder Cubano dynamited a B-25 model airplane at Miami International Airport that was carrying medicine to Cuba. Due to delays in departure, the C-4 charge exploded before takeoff and only affected one wing.

February 8 - April 22, 1968:
Poder Cubano takes credit for placing four bombs in New York, six in Los Angeles, two in Chicago, and at the residence of the Mexican consul in Miami, at a Spanish tourism agency, and at the businesses of several Cuban emigrants in the same city.

August 3, 1968:
This day he placed dynamite on the English merchant ship Caribbean Ventura. Before that, the residence of the British consul in Miami, Francis Pelly, was also the target of a bomb attack.

September 13, 1968:
Poder Cubano dynamited the Spanish merchant ship Coromoto in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

September 16, 1968:
The Polish merchant ship Polánica, anchored in the port of Dodge Island, USA, was hit by a 57-millimeter cannon projectile. Poder Cubano claimed credit for the action.

November 1968:
A U.S. jury declared Orlando Bosch Ávila guilty of terrorism against merchant ships, signing threatening communiqués to the press, and carrying out 40 other terrorist acts executed in Miami in that year. He was sentenced to 18 years in prison on five different counts. From prison he maintained his activity as a leader of Poder Cubano.

December 15, 1972:
He was placed on parole after having served only four years in prison.

January 1973:
To again evade police controls, Bosch dissolved Poder Cubano and created Acción Cubana, with the same terrorist aims.

In subsequent months he made an agreement with American authorities, committing to not carrying out terrorist acts in their territory and directing his activities against Cuban entities and personnel.

1974:
Bosch abandoned the United States to elude the FBI, which was searching for him as the suspected perpetrator of the murder of Cuban-born counterrevolutionary leader Elías de la Torriente.

June 1974:
He moved illegally to Chile to seek support from the fascist military Junta of Augusto Pinochet. He became involved in criminal actions of all kinds, including the murder of General Carlos Prats and his wife in Buenos Aires, 1974; the attack in Rome 1975 against Bernardo Leighton, vice president of the Chilean Christian Democratic Party in exile; and the murder in Washington, 1976, of former Chilean Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier and his collaborator Ron Moffitt; he also took part in 14 terrorist actions against Cuban diplomatic missions and personnel in different countries.

June 1976:
He founded in Bonao, Dominican Republic, the CORU (Coordination of United Revolutionary Organizations), made up of five counterrevolutionary organizations that would execute dozens of terrorist actions against Cuban entities and those of Central American and European countries in that and subsequent years.

July 10, 1976:
An explosive device exploded in the offices of the British West Indies airline, which represents the interests of Cubana de Aviación in Barbados. Author: CORU.

July 11, 1976:
Attack against Air Panamá in Colombia. Carried out by CORU members.

July 23, 1976:
Murder of Cuban Institute of Fisheries official in Mérida, Yucatán, Artagñan Díaz Díaz, when they were attempting to kidnap the Cuban consul. CORU took credit for the crime.

August 9, 1976:
Kidnapping and murder by CORU members of two Cuban officials accredited in Argentina. They made them disappear in the sea.

August 1976:
Orlando Bosch Ávila appeared at the head of death squads linked to Operation Condor to, as he said, form a "Solid, strong, vigorous and virile front for fighting communism on the continent."

September 1976:
Journalist Jay Mallín, from American weekly Time, defined the pediatrician in the following way: "Bosch's success has a very simple explanation, he is of the old Chicago gangster style, if you don't pay, he puts a bomb in your office, it's that simple...Bosch is an extortionist, not a patriot."

October 6, 1976:
This day saw the destruction in mid-flight over Barbados of a Cubana de Aviación aircraft, where 73 people on board perished, of which 57 were Cuban, 11 were Guyanese and five were Korean. Bosch was one of the organizers of the sabotage.

Shortly after the investigations began, Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles appeared as the principal intellectual authors of such a heinous crime. He was arrested by Venezuelan authorities and brought to trial.

As has been verified through recently declassified CIA and FBI documents, the American government knew the details of this criminal terrorist act and concealed information from Venezuelan courts.

October 24, 1976:
In reference to the Barbados attack, the newspaper The New York Times noted in an editorial that the chain of sabotages that occurred in 1974 in seven countries on the continent was related to groups trained by the CIA, and mentioned among their most noted authors Orlando Bosch.

1987:
After 11 years of legal delays over the Barbados attack, he was sentenced by a Venezuelan court.

Subsequently, he was deported to the United States, where after nine months of imprisonment he was released by order of President George Bush Sr., by virtue of efforts by the Cuban American National Foundation (FNCA).

This pardon was granted despite the fact that the acting Attorney General Joseph D. Whitley had denied him asylum "for being a dangerous terrorist and constituting a public threat." Previously, 31 countries had rejected the official request of the American government to harbor the terrorist.

In an editorial by the Times on the subject, it was stated that "he was released not by legal requirements but by visible political pressure, squandering American credibility in fighting terrorism."

1990:
In mid-July, an editorial in The New York Times recalled that among the most enthusiastic defenders of Bosch's release was the current governor of Florida, Jeb Bush.

After his release, Orlando Bosch continued his terrorist activities against Cuba in the group Protagonist Party of the People, without even being bothered by American authorities, despite the fact that he constantly makes public boasts in the press about his dedication to violence, which he confesses he has not renounced.

He lives with complete impunity in a comfortable residence in Miami, with the generous political and economic protection of the Cuban American National Foundation (FNCA)
"Sometimes he goes out on the street with the monitoring bracelet that the FBI installed for him, and other times he forgets," according to Colombian journalist Hernando Calvo Ospina in his article "The Bushes and Bosch Terrorism," who declared himself a witness to such "oversights."

He died in Miami at the age of 84 as a victim of a long and painful illness.