Yahoo news REALLY glossed over that embarrassing event. It's very interesting that this event is dealt with so lightly and protective of the asshole we had as President at the time and permitted Castro to export thousands of Cuba's criminals, insane, spies and adversaries....to hit the welfare roles and prisons of America.
It was call the Mariel Boat lift - and it was negotiated and implemented during ---- you guessed it, President Jimmuh Carter's rape of the Republic.
Castro KNEW a dumb ass sucker when he met one, and he took little Jimmuh to the cleaners....
Oh, and it wasn't 10's of thousands -- it was approx. 125,000 who got in before the outrage against the Carter foolishness brought it to an end.
Most of those who escaped became valued citizens -- but the mismanagement characteristic of the Carter administration allowed entry to thousands of low life bastards who created havoc on our streets, holding centers and prisons...
Semper Fi
Appreciated.
You're right about the nature of the folks. Most of those we picked up were voting for freedom with their feet. It was a very tiring but fulfilling operation. We carried boxes of fruit, Spanish Bibles and candy (we bought the candy). It was amazing how many (older people in particular) cried over the Bibles, how many kissed us and blessed us.
Then we would come up on one of the boats loaded down with people released from prison specifically by Castro to take part in the boat lift. These folks were the criminals, not the political prisoners. We would frisk them as we brought them on board and would net an amazing pile of weapons in no time. We kept a close and well armed eye on those groups.
Then there were the times we came upon survivors in the water from where an overloaded boat had capsized; floating in with the dead. One time we came on a boat that had had a fire. Three of them died before we made it back to port; we did what we could for them.
I don't know if I would want to do it again, but I wouldn't have missed it the first time for anything. We all had the chance to rotate out after thirty days; our crew refused to quit until it was over.