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U.S. legislators frothed with frustration. Florida's Senator George Smathers led the chorus calling for U.S. military forces to march right into Havana and grab the Electra. And one Eastern Air Lines director exploded: "I'd bomb every damned airport Castro's got. This was stealing, kidnaping, mail robbery and felonious assault aboard a United States aircraft—and the sad part is that this country is doing nothing about it. What in hell's come over this country?"
At week's end, Fidel Castro was still cockily unconcerned. He passed the Electra's disposition to the United Nations, claiming that otherwise the U.S. would use the incident as a pretext for invasion. "But let them come if they want to," he said. "If our destiny is to be a bloody one, let them come."