◆ SpookStack

they supported Zapata as the best alternative plan, "apparently never reached the senior civilian officials." But here again the committee blatantly ignored the real issue in not faulting the single "senior civilian official"-- Secretary McNamara--who ignored, lost, or misplaced two critically important JCS papers. Nor did they criticize either the JCS for failing to follow through with the Secretary of Defense concerning the official DOD position re Trinidad and Zapata or senior CIA officials--particularly Allen Dulles--for not pursuing the matter of JCS support for Trinidad with Mr. McNamara or with President Kennedy. In short, the Taylor Committee failed to place blame where it really belonged--on a principal member of the President's cabinet. 8. One of the most positive conclusions recorded by the Taylor Committee stated: "Although the intelligence was not perfect, particularly as to the evaluation of the effectiveness of the T-33s, we do not feel that any failure of intelligence contributed significantly to the defeat." This conclusion poses serious semantic problems. It would have been impossible for intelligence to evaluate the "effectiveness" of the T-33s prior to the invasion. What could be evaluated was the "capability" of the T-33s. 217