ALLEGED CUBAN ARMS SHIPMENTS TO VENEZUELA VIA BRITISH GUIANA
Originator: CIA
From: WILLIAM A. TIDWELL
To: MR. CALIFANO
Document date: 02/00/1963
Document type: PAPER, TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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Identification Form

Agency Information

AGENCY: ARMY

RECORD NUMBER: 198-10007-10008

RECORD SERIES: CALIFANO PAPERS

AGENCY FILE NUMBER :

Document Information

ORIGINATOR: CIA

FROM: WILLIAM A. TIDWELL

TO : MR. CALIFANO

• TITLE: ALLEGED CUBAN ARMS SHIPMENTS TO VENEZUELA VIA BRITISH GUIANA

DATE: 02/00/1963

PAGES:

3

SUBJECTS :

BRITISH GUIANA

CUBAN ARMS SHIPMENTS

VENEZUELA

DOCUMENT TYPE: PAPER, TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

CLASSIFICATION: Secret

RESTRICTIONS: 1B; 4

' CURRENT STATUS: Redact

DATE OF LAST REVIEW :

02/10/1998

OPENING CRITERIA :

COMMENTS:

Califano Papers, Box 3, Folder 8. Transmittal of report from Tidwell to Califano re: Cuban arms

shipments into British Guiana.

Department of the Army EO 13526

* Declassify → Exclude E Exempt

Authority.

Review Date 1ZAUEIS BYLAMa4 Galla

NO STATE OBJECTION

SSIFICATIO

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OCI No. 0494/63

CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY

Office of Current Intelligence

16 February 1963

DDI- 491-63

72

CURRENT INTELLIGENCE MEMORANDUM

SUBJECT: Alleged Cuban Arms Shipments to Venezuela

via British Guiana

1. There is no confirmation of reported Cuban

arms shipments into British Guiana either for local

use or for Venezuelan revolutionaries.

However, Cu-

ban ships periodically call at British Guiana to pick

up rice and could offload weapons without detection

along the unguarded coast before reaching port.

Once

in Georgetown harbor, all Cuban vessels are searched

by Guianese under nominal British supervision. Re-

ports of these searches are made

available through

the British to US authorities; all such reports to

date have been negative although there are several

ways by which this inspection can be evaded.

2.: Two Cuban seamen who defected in Canada on

6 February have alleged that the Cuban merchant ship

BAHIA DE TANAMO has been smuggling Czech guns into

British Guiana destined ultimately for revolutionaries

in Venezuela.

The BAHIA DE TANAMO did visit George-

town on 6-7 January and the BAHIA DE NIPE--rumored to

be smuggling arms in 1962--was there on 15-22 Janu-

ary. Both of these ships--the only two Cuban vessels

to go to British Guiana in January--are engaged in a

regular trade between the two countries. Since 1961

British gulana has been selling rice to Cuba, and re-

cently added timber; Cuba sells cement to British

Guiana.

Travellers

have also used these ships occa

sionally to enter the colony from Cuba and the ships

have picked up students for Cuba and onward transit

to the Soviet bloc.

3.

These ships could have carried weapons when

they left Cuba and

it would be possible for them to

evade port inspection by first offloading any clandes-

tine arms into small boats somewhere along the

OSA 474Cuba

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unguarded Guianese coast. The area on both sides of

the Venezuela - British

Guiana border is almost un

populated and is cut by many small creeks. This

would appear to be the most likely of many possible

ways for Cuba to ship arms into Venezuela without de-

tection. One unconfirmed report of last November

mentioned

a discussion between Mikoyan and Castro

about an "economic treaty" between Cuba and British

Guiana that would provide for sending Cuban arms and

sabotage experts to Venezuela via British Guiana.

4. It is generally believed that Cuban policy

is to avoid the actual shipment of arms to subver-

sive groups abroad on the theory that such groups

Should Cuba feel the

Venezuelan situation ripe

should be self-sustaining for an overthrow of Betan-

court, however, an exception might be made. No arms

which can be traced back to Castro provenance have

been detected in Venezuela, however.

5. Neither the Venezuelans nor the British

patrol the coast. The British maintain no ships

in the area; the

Venezuelans have

suitable patrol

craft but not in adequate numbers.

As British Guiana

now has full internal self-government, inspections

in the Georgetown area are actually made by local per-

sonnel; the commissioner of police, however, is a

British national. Inspection in the countryside for

possible smuggled arms caches is not feasible because

both the local police and the 600 British troops in

the country are concentrated in the Georgetown area.

However, British security officials have been cooper-

ating closely with their US counterparts and state

they have no evidence in support of press allegations

that Cuban arms are being sent into British Guiana.

An untested source in a position to know.

stated that in November Jagan's party decided to ac-

quire arms--presumably from Cuba-and to start its

youth on a military training program. These plans,

as reported, involved military training in the party's

downtown headquarters. No such activity has yet been

noted, however.

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