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Those unbelieving words, that ecstasy born of anguish, expressed the explosive emotion of the moment. But after the homecoming there remained some hard facts to be faced. What would the men of Brigade 2506 do next? Most were determined to continue their fight against Castro. Vowed Manuel Artime, one of the leaders of the Bay of Pigs invasion: "Our plan is to return to Cuba. We will come back—when or where I cannot say —but we will return."
Submerge Those Differences. To this spirit, President Kennedy lent great support on two occasions. First, he received Artime and other officers in Palm Beach.
Then, two days later, he flew to Miami's Orange Bowl to review Brigade 2506 and receive its flag—which had been hidden by one of the men during months of imprisonment and smuggled out of Cuba.
"I can assure you that this flag will be returned to this brigade in a free Havana," said the President in strident, emphatic tones. "The strongest wish of the people of this country, as well as the people of this hemisphere, is that Cuba shall one day be free again, and when it is, this brigade will deserve to march at the head of the free column."
Kennedy urged the Cubans to "submerge those differences which now may disturb you, to the united end that Cuba is free," and commended to them the advice of Jose Marti, the hero of Cuban independence, who in 1895 urged his fellow exiles to display "not the useless clamor of fear's vengeance but the honest weariness of an oppressed people."
But it was Kennedy's presence rather than his words that made the impact on a screaming crowd of nearly 40,000. As the President walked slowly through the lines of troops, chatting with many of the men, one ex-prisoner broke from the ranks to lock him in a mighty abrazo.
The President's heady words were relayed to the crowd through an interpreter. But such was not the case when Jackie. dressed in a pink sheath, stepped to the microphones. In excellent Spanish and a firm and confident voice, she praised the Cubans and said: "I feel proud that my son has known the officers. It is my wish and my hope that some day he may be a man at least half as brave as the members of Brigade 2506."
Women in the audience wept.
Starting Again. Official U.S. policy toward Cuba apparently is still as the President enunciated it in September: "We shall neither initiate nor permit aggression in this hemisphere.'' Without strong U.S. support, the Cubans could hardly hope to return to their homeland for a long while. But even if the men. as one immigration official said, would have to "start all over again like any other exiles." they were at least starting a long way from the dungeons of Castro's Cuba. And that was certainly something to be thankful for.