Dwight D. Eisenhower

U.S. general and 34th President of the United States (d. 1969)

Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower resigned as Army chief of staff and was succeeded by Gen. Omar Bradley.

Dwight D. Eisenhower resigns as Supreme Allied Commander of NATO.

U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower refuses a clemency appeal for Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorizes the creation of the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower gives his "domino theory" speech during a news conference.

U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower announces to the nation that he is running for a second term.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs a bill into law allowing for Hawaiian statehood, which would become official on August 21.

U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the National Security Council directive on the anti-Cuban covert action program that will ultimately lead to the Bay of Pigs Invasion.

Nikita Khrushchev demands an apology from U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower for U-2 spy plane flights over the Soviet Union thus ending a Big Four summit in Paris.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivers a televised farewell address to the nation three days before leaving office, in which he warns against the accumulation of power by the "military-industrial complex".

The Bay of Pigs Invasion was a failed military invasion of Cuba undertaken by the CIA-sponsored paramilitary group Brigade 2506. A counter-revolutionary military, trained and funded by the United States government's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Brigade 2506 fronted the armed wing of the Democratic Revolutionary Front (DRF) and intended to overthrow the Communist government of Fidel Castro. Launched from Guatemala, the invading force was defeated within three days by the Cuban armed forces, under the direct command of Prime Minister of Cuba Fidel Castro. The Cuban Revolution of 1952 to 1959 had seen President Fulgencio Batista, an ally of the United States, forced out of the country into exile. He was replaced by the invading Communist movement led by Castro, which had seen the country's formerly strong links with the US severed after expropriating the assets of US corporations and developing links with the Soviet Union, with whom, at the time, the United States was engaged with in the Cold War. US President Dwight D. Eisenhower was concerned at the direction which Castro's government was taking, and in March 1960, Eisenhower allocated $13.1 million to the CIA in order to plan Castro's overthrowing. The CIA proceeded to organize the operation with the aid of various Cuban counter-revolutionary forces, training Brigade 2506 in Mexico. Following his election in 1960, President John F. Kennedy was informed of the invasion plan and gave his consent. Over 1,400 paramilitaries, divided into five infantry battalions and one paratrooper battalion, assembled in Guatemala before setting out for Cuba by boat on April 13. Two days later on April 15, eight CIA-supplied B-26 bombers attacked Cuban airfields and returned to the U.S. On the night of April 16, the main invasion landed at a beach named Playa Girón in the Bay of Pigs. It initially overwhelmed a local revolutionary militia. The Cuban Army's counter-offensive was led by José Ramón Fernández, before Castro decided to take personal control of the operation. On April 20, the invaders finally surrendered, with the majority of troops being publicly interrogated and put into Cuban prisons. The failed invasion strengthened the position of Castro's dictatorship and strengthened ties with the USSR. This led eventually to the events of the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. The invasion was a major embarrassment for US foreign policy. John Kennedy ordered a number of internal investigations across Latin America.