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Grenada: Summing Up The Facts

By Bill Davis

After an all-night flight from a base in the States, U.S. Rangers hit the beach of a small tropical island most had never heard of. Backed by elements of all branches of the U.S. military and joined by a number of small and relatively powerless nations who gave local flavor and justification (of sorts) to the invasion, the Rangers went to work. In Washington, the Secretary of State told reporters that we could not allow another Iran hostage situation to develop. Three reasons given for the invasion: 1) to take power from an "unfriendly government"; 2) to station troops on the island until a government favorable to the U.S. was established; and 3) to facilitate the elections to set up such a government.

Grenada, 1983? Right? Wrong. Vieques, Puerto Rico, 1981. The operation, "Ocean Venture '81" described by the Grenadian government at the time as a dry run for the operation coded "Urgent Fury" that crashed ashore on Grenada on October 25, 1983. What is a real question is the justification used for the invasion was planned and practiced over two years earlier during "Ocean Venture I".

As evidence built that the "Ocean Venture 81" operation targeting Amber and the Amberdines, a thinly disguised version of Grenada and the Grenadines, was practice for the actual invasion, Prime Minister Maurice Bishop went public to the world with his evidence. Both privately and through the media the U.S. government made light of these accusations and pulled the plug on any further stories, with the exception of a continual barrage of crap from then-Secretary of State Alexander Haig comparing Cuba, Nicaragua and Grenada as "one in the same."

In October 1983, a lone driver burst through the so called security at the Marine compound in Beirut and killed 260 Marines as they slept. The nation was in shock. The U.S. needed a victory and needed one fast. Reagan & Co. went to the files. "Let's do Grenada—it should be easy enough and we already practiced it."

The invasion of Grenada was eased tremendously by the overthrow of the Bishop government and the killing of Maurice Bishop and as many as 150 of his supporters by the Hudson Austin Revolutionary Military Council on October 19th. Immediately, the huge Grenadian militia was disarmed. Many Grenadians say that had the Prime Minister been alive, they would have been willing to fight to defend the island, but that they would not lay down their lives for the Austin regime. The details surrounding the death of Bishop, and immensely popular man in Grenada, and the disarming of the population are at best murky, but the events were absolutely crucial to the success of the invasion. Given what is known of the plans for the invasion dating back to 1981, these are questions that will probably never be answered about the involvement of the U.S. in Bishop's death and other events leading to the invasion.

On the morning of October 25th, 7000 U.S. troops—Rangers, Airborne, Marines and other—stormed ashore to secure the island in what was to be a "two-or-three" day mop-up of Grenada. Seven hundred Cuban construction workers magically became several thousand Cuban troops, then became less troops, then became construction workers and prisoners of war. The puny Grenadian Army became formidable enemy troops, pinning down large U.S. units with sniper fire. The American forces contributed by shooting each other, calling artillery and airstrikes on themselves (and on Grenadian civilians). An entire U.S. Navy Seal team drowned when they were dropped too far out at sea. Many U.S. troops wandered lost due to pathetic intelligence and tourist maps provided to them. The "two or three" day mop-up stretched into weeks, then months, with U.S. military still occupying the island. Some highlights of the U.S. action there included the mutilation of corpses and mass graves for Grenadians and Cubans killed (recorded by NBC of first TV coverage of war). Explanations that surfaced were, "Well, the Iranians did that to U.S. bodies after the rescue attempt." Only the workings of some sick military mind could find the relationship in the statement. The British press, however, had not lost sight of Grenada: continual reports of prisoners held in boxes and small cages, continuing executions, and small outbreaks of fighting are still surfacing.

The major role in winning the American people went to the U.S. media; their criticism of the Pentagon censorship was held in principle only.

"Ocean Venture 81" was never mentioned by the main stream media; instead, they gave us new equipment pictures and faked U.S. footage of the invasion filmed on a nearby island unopposed with a faked soundtrack of gunfire, since cows don't shoot.

So-called secret documents showing an immediate Cuban takeover (which Reagan told the American people about) never materialized. The roller coaster figures of "the enemy numbers" were repeated by the media—again with no comment.

The actual history of the airport being built, the U.S., British, and Canadian contractors involved, its actual size in relation to other airports in the Caribbean never came to light. The "hostage" students at St. George Medical School, who were never in danger though held up as the key reason for U.S. troops to invade, were forgotten after a few tearful reunions.

Finally, the "huge" weapons stockpiles for the "Cuban soldiers"—what soldiers? The weapons turned out to be smaller stockpiles than reported, and when inspected by the media, turned out to be seriously outdated—some going back to the last century.

Tony Cavin, a reporter for Pacifica Radio News, stated "The press may argue it had no access, no choice; the fact of the matter is that the denial of access was accompanied by relatively uncritical repetition of claims of the world's most powerful government attempting to justify the unleashing of its military might against a tiny island in the face of world condemnation.

Cavin further stated, "U.S. officers involved made clear their distrust of the press. As they see it, it was the press that betrayed the military trust in Vietnam by sending home the version of the war that turned the American people against it." In war, truth is indeed, the first casualty.

Hailed as a great U.S. military victory, it is in truth the only "military victory" in over 2 decades. The importance is shown by the 8,500+ medals given out to the military which, at its height, only numbered 7000 troops in Grenada.

Currently, the government of Grenada is tightly controlled by the U.S. Fewer "democratic" institutions exist today than at any time in recent Grenadian history. Thousands upon thousands of dollars are being pumped into Grenada for "economic development." And the Grenadian people are as poor as ever. The airport, once described as a size which could only be used for Cuban military adventures, is nearing completion, larger than before to facilitate "economic development" (which is what the Bishop government had claimed in the first place). Happily re-installed are the well-off American students at the medical schools, they are rich enough to attend on in Grenada.

In the boiling caldron that is Central America there is one footnote of interest. Beginning in early may 1984 U.S. military, CIA, and Salvadoran and Honduran forces began "Ocean Venture 84" apparently aimed at Nicaragua.

Bill Davis
VVAW National Office