CUBA: One-Man Court

Fidel Castro fumed. A court of his own rebel judges had acquitted 19 pilots, ten gunners and 16 mechanics of Dictator Fulgencio Batista's air force on trial for "war crimes." Taking judgment into his own hands, he decided that the pilots were guilty as charged of "genocide, murder and homicide" in the bombing and strafing of villages during his war on Batista, ordered the verdict reversed. It was.

The essentials of the prosecution case were that Batista's bombers killed at least eight and injured 16 in 600 attacks. As evidence it submitted...

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