The Great Game in Cuba

“Joan Mellen tells a brilliantly researched, meticulously supported, and compulsively readable tale that everyone concerned with how America operates should know.” —Samuel R. Delany, author of Dhalgren and Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders

This completely revised and newly updated edition of The Great Game in Cuba uses the backdrop of the Cuban Revolution to examine the CIA’s inner workings during the fifties and sixties. Detailing the agency’s lies and deceits, Mellen paints a vivid behind-the-scenes picture of the CIA in Cuba after the Castro revolution: what it wanted and the lengths it was willing to go to paralyze the opposition to Fidel Castro.

The game begins with Robert J. Kleberg, Jr., proprietor of the legendary King Ranch, one of the largest ranches in the world. Kleberg’s messianic ambitions bring him to Cuba, where he establishes a satellite ranch managed by his right-hand man, the James Bond–type character Michael J. P. Malone, who secretly reported to both the FBI and to at least five CIA handlers.

From there, the plot thickens as an array of Cubans share never-before-revealed information regarding the agency’s activities in Cuba and its attempts to unseat Castro and install a CIA-friendly figurehead in his place. The mysterious disappearance of Camilo Cienfuegos, a major figure in Castro’s government, is told here for the first time. The agency’s shady dealings with a major US publication are uncovered.

A testament to the sheer volume of previously classified and untold information, The Great Game in Cuba is a story the world needs to hear.

Joan Mellen is the bestselling author of twenty books, including A Farewell to Justice, her biographical study of Jim Garrison’s New Orleans investigation of the Kennedy assassination. She has written for a variety of publications, including the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, and Baltimore Sun. Mellen is a professor of English and creative writing at Temple University in Philadelphia.

“A ‘must read’ for the serious minded, who will find it both riveting and fascinating in yet another chapter of the untold history of the Cold War.”—Peter Janney, author of Mary’s Mosaic

“Until now, the role of Texas’ King Ranch in anti-Castro activities during the turbulent 1960s has remained largely unknown. Based on never-before-seen documents and interviews with key witnesses, Joan Mellen opens an important new window on the CIA's secret history.” —Dick Russell, author of On the Trail of the JFK Assassins

“Joan Mellen tells a brilliantly researched, meticulously supported, and compulsively readable tale that everyone concerned with how America operates should know.”—Samuel R. Delany, author of Dhalgren and Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders