On 24 February 1996 a

Cuban Air Force The Cuban Revolutionary Air and Air Defense Force () commonly abbreviated to DAAFAR in both Spanish and English, is the air force of Cuba. History Background The Cuban Army Air Force was the air force of Cuba that existed prior to 1959. The a ...

Mikoyan MiG-29UB shot down two unarmed

Cessna 337 Skymaster The Cessna Skymaster is an American twin-engine civil utility aircraft built in a push-pull configuration. Its engines are mounted in the nose and rear of its pod-style fuselage. Twin booms extend aft of the wings to the vertical stabilizers, ...

aircraft operated by

Brothers to the Rescue Brothers to the Rescue () is a Miami-based activist nonprofit organization headed by José Basulto, who claimed to be a CIA operative. Formed by Cuban exiles, the group is widely known for its opposition to the Cuban government and its former l ...

, an organization opposed to the Cuban government. The

Organisation of American States The Organization of American States (OAS or OEA; ; ; ) is an international organization founded on 30 April 1948 to promote cooperation among its member states within the Americas. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., United States, the OAS is ...

(OAS) reported that no warning was given; Cuban government sources said "These people knew what they were doing. They were warned", and that the aircraft had entered Cuban airspace. All the occupants of the aircraft were killed: Carlos Costa, Armando Alejandre, Jr., Mario de la Peña, and Pablo Morales. A third Cessna involved escaped. Previous similar flights had released propaganda leaflets over Cuba. BTTR southernmost positions

Radar data and screen prints were provided by a United States Customs Service Supervisory Detection Systems Specialist who recorded the entire incident as it happened using data from a U.S. surveillance radar balloon in the

Florida Keys The Florida Keys are a coral island, coral cay archipelago off the southern coast of Florida, forming the southernmost part of the continental United States. They begin at the southeastern coast of the Florida peninsula, about south of Miami a ...

Description

On 24 February 1996, two of the Brothers to the Rescue

s (twin-engine civilian light aircraft) were shot down by a

Mikoyan MiG-29UB, while a second jet fighter, a

MiG-23 The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-23 (; NATO reporting name: Flogger) is a variable-geometry fighter aircraft, designed by the Mikoyan-Gurevich design bureau in the Soviet Union. It is a third-generation jet fighter, alongside similar Soviet aircra ...

, orbited nearby. All the occupants of the aircraft were killed: Carlos Costa, Armando Alejandre, Jr., Mario de la Peña and Pablo Morales. A third aircraft, flown by

José Basulto José Jesús Basulto León (born August 8, 1940) is a former CIA-trained Cuban political dissident and the leader of the nonprofit Cuban exile organization Brothers to the Rescue. Career Since the Cuban Revolution, Basulto participated in vario ...

, escaped. The first aircraft was shot down outside Cuban territorial airspace, and the second was shot down outside. A military version of the Cessna 337, the

Cessna O-2 Skymaster The Cessna O-2 Skymaster (nicknamed "Oscar Deuce") is a military version of the Cessna 337 Super Skymaster, used for forward air control (FAC) and psychological operations (PSYOPS) by the US military between 1967 and 2010. Design and develop ...

, had been retired in the late 1980s from military service, although two examples were kept mainly in storage by the US Army at the Yuma Testing Ground until 2010. Cuba claimed that the group used "planes previously employed in the wars in Vietnam and El Salvador given to them by the

U.S. Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its origins to 1 ...

from which the "USAF" signs have not been completely erased."Section III, Paragraph 7 of the REPORT Nº 86/99, CASE 11.589, OEA/Ser.L/V/II.106 Doc. 3 rev. at 586 (1999) Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, issued September 29, 199

/ref> The incident was investigated by the

International Civil Aviation Organization The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO ) is a specialized agency of the United Nations that coordinates the principles and techniques of international air navigation, and fosters the planning and development of international sch ...

(ICAO). Their report concluded that the authorities in Cuba had notified the authorities in the United States of multiple violations of their airspace since May 1994."Report on the shooting down of two U.S.-registered private civil aircraft by Cuban military aircraft on 24 February 1996", C-WP/10441, June 20, 1996, United Nations Security Council document
S/1996/509
July 1, 1996. In at least one case (13 July 1995), the pilot had released leaflets over

Havana Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.FAA official about the possibility of being shot down, he replied, "You must understand I have a mission in life to perform", disregarding the potential danger involved.Court testimony from the Cuban spy trial, referred in ''The Miami Herald'' March 13, 2001 a
"Basulto testifies"

Latin American Studies Latin American studies (LAS) is an academic and research field associated with the study of Latin America. The interdisciplinary study is a subfield of area studies, and can be composed of numerous disciplines such as economics, sociology, histor ...

. He later said he considered the group's activities to be acts of

civil disobedience Civil disobedience is the active and professed refusal of a citizenship, citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders, or commands of a government (or any other authority). By some definitions, civil disobedience has to be nonviolent to be cal ...

against the regime, and a demonstration that such disobedience was possible. According to Cuban authorities, two light aircraft entered Cuban territorial airspace on 9 and 13 January 1996, and released leaflets which fell on Cuban territory. According to the pilot of one of the aircraft, half a million leaflets were released on 13 January; he also claims they were released outside the Cuban territorial limit and the wind carried them to Havana. This version of events was detailed by Juan Pablo Roque, the man who had returned to Cuba the day before the shootdown and who was later implicated as having helped organize the shootdown as a Cuban spy placed with the group. According to Roque, Basulto had dropped the leaflets from north of Havana, not the stated , from a high altitude on a day when the winds would carry them south toward Cuba. Specifically, in a Cuban television interview days after the shootdown took place, Roque, from within Cuba, stated, "I personally have violated air space, specifically the last was on 9 January 1996, where I got a call the day before to participate in a flight to Havana where thousands of leaflets were going to be released from a height of more than at a distance of less than from the coast." Following that incident, the ICAO report states, the Commander of the Anti-Aircraft Defence of the Air Force of Cuba was instructed to intercept any further flights and was authorized to shoot them down, whether or not they had entered Cuban airspace. On 24 February 1996, the group's aircraft flew another mission. While the Brothers to the Rescue aircraft were still north of the 24th parallel, the Cuban Air Force ordered the scrambling of two military aircraft, a MiG-29 and a MiG-23, operating under ground control. The pilots identified the target as a Cessna 337 and requested authorization from military control, who responded with "authorized to destroy." Two of the group's three aircraft flying that day were shot down. According to the OAS report, there was no warning of any kind issued to the planes, nor the opportunity given to land. With the shooting down of each aircraft, the Cuban pilots could be heard celebrating over the radio. Terms like "cojones" were repeatedly used by the Cuban fighter pilots. Their radio transmissions included statements such as "We blew his balls off!" In a reference to the Cuban pilot's understanding that the aircraft they were attacking were the same ones that had been repeatedly and continuously flying directly over the island of Cuba beside all the buildings and over the streets, they also transmitted the following, "He won't give us any more fucking trouble." Finally, the Cuban pilots also said, "The other one is destroyed; the other one is destroyed. Homeland or death (''patria o muerte''), you bastards! The other one is also down." Military control stated "Congratulations to the pair of you." Subsequently, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights issued a report that concluded, "The fact that weapons of war and combat-trained pilots were used against unarmed civilians shows not only how disproportionate the use of force was, but also the intent to end the lives of those individuals. It is claimed the extracts from the radio communications between the MiG-29 pilots and the military control tower indicate that they acted from a superior position and showed malice and scorn toward the human dignity of the victims." The third Brothers to the Rescue aircraft, with Basulto on board, was also identified for intercept and was to be shot down, but escaped. Testimony from a USAF Colonel Buchner expressed support for Cuba's claim that both Brothers' aircraft and a third flown by Basulto were only to off the Cuban coast. The statement by Buchner is directly contradictory to eyewitness testimony and verified radar data documentation provided by Department of the Treasury, Supervisory Detection Systems Specialist J. Houlihan during sworn testimony before an FAA Administrative Hearing in 1996, and the House of Representatives, Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, Committee on International Relations, Washington D.C. September 18, 1996. The ICAO report found that the aircraft shot down were both very near (and, in one case, directly above) a U.S fishing vessel named ''Tri-Liner'' which had a recorded position at the time of the incident outside Cuban territorial airspace.Sections 3.16 and 3.17 of the Resolution on the Cuban Government's Shootdown of Brothers to the Rescue Adopted by the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) at the Twentieth Meeting of its 148th Session on 27 June 199

/ref> Also nearby was the cruise ship ''Majesty of the Seas''. The ICAO report also states that means other than interception, such as radio communication, had been available to Cuba, but had not been utilized, and that this conflicts with the ICAO principle that interception of civil aircraft should be undertaken only as a last resort. It is also claimed the Cuban Air Force did not make any attempt to direct the aircraft beyond the boundaries of national airspace, guide them away from a prohibited, restricted or danger area or instruct them to effect a landing.

Reactions to the incident

International

Following the incident, the United Nations Security Council passed United Nations Security Council Resolution 1067, Security Council Resolution 1067 (1996), a U.S.-sponsored resolution condemning Cuba. Dissenting members believed that the resolution was singling out Cuba for condemnation, and instead should have issued a call which urged both states to refrain from shooting down civilian airplanes as well as to prevent the improper use of civil aviation.

United States

In Miami, reaction from the exile community was swift.

Jorge Mas Canosa Jorge Lincoln Mas Canosa (21 September 1939 – 24 November 1997) was a Cuban-American businessman who founded the Cuban American National Foundation and MasTec, a publicly traded company. Regarded within the United States as a powerful lobbyist ...

, co-founder and leader of the

Cuban American National Foundation The Cuban American National Foundation is a foundation with the aim of assisting members of the Cuban community in Miami, Florida and opposing the current government in Cuba. Background and founding The Cuban National American Foundation was founde ...

, condemned the attack: "For two warplanes from the Castro government to shoot down two unarmed civilian aircraft with American flags on a humanitarian mission should be considered an act of war against the US". President Bill Clinton issued Proclamation 6867 on March 1, 1996, declaring a national emergency by reason of a disturbance or threatened disturbance of international relations. After the attack, the pilots responsible were the twin brothers, Teniente Coronel (LTC) Lorenzo Alberto Perez Perez and his "Guy in Back," Teniente Coronel (LTC) Francisco Perez Perez. Both were charged in the United States for their role in the attack.

Cuban response

Miguel Alfonso Martinez of the Cuban Foreign Ministry said that the two aircraft that were shot down were "not common civilian aircraft" as suggested by the US. "This is not the case of an innocent civilian airliner that, because of an instrument error, departs from an air corridor and gets into the airspace of another country". "These people knew what they were doing. They were warned. They wanted to take certain actions that were clearly intended to destabilize the Cuban government and the US authorities knew about their intentions"."U.S. TIGHTENS SANCTIONS AGAINST CUBA AFTER DOWNING OF TWO EXILE PLANES OFF CUBAN COAST". In NotiSur - Latin American Political Affairs ISSN 1060-4189, Volume 6, Number 9 March 1, 1996 Groups sympathetic to Cuba, while not approving the shootdown, noted "the policies of the United States government of indefensible hostility against the island of Cuba that sit at the heart of the matter", citing constant threats and a history of military and paramilitary attacks on Cuba from the US and paramilitary groups."The Cuban Downing of the Planes. The News We Haven't Been Hearing...." Article from

Cuba Solidarity Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

In popular culture

Film

* Documentary film ''

Shoot Down ''Shoot Down'' is a 2006 documentary regarding the events surrounding the Brothers to the Rescue organization and the eventual shootdown of two of its aircraft. Based on five reviews collected by Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an A ...

'', that illustrates the incident from the Brothers to the Rescue perspective, was released in 2006 and rereleased in an updated, edited version on January 25, 2008. It was directed by Cristina Khuly, niece of downed pilot Armando Alejandre, Jr.Shoot Down, a 2006 film about the shootdown, co-produced by the niece of one of the four victim

* '' Wasp Network (film), Wasp Network'', 2019. Starring

Penélope Cruz Penélope Cruz Sánchez (born 28 April 1974) is a Spanish actress. Prolific in Spanish and English-language films, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, BAFTA Award, a David di Donatello and three Goya Awards. Cru ...

Édgar Ramírez Édgar Filiberto Ramírez Arellano (, born 25 March 1977) is a Venezuelan actor. After studying communications at the Andrés Bello Catholic University, Ramírez worked in media and considered becoming a diplomat. When filmmaker Guillermo ...

Gael García Bernal Gael García Bernal (; born 30 November 1978) is a Mexican actor and filmmaker. He is known for his performances in the films ''Amores perros'' (2000), ''Y tu mamá también'' (2001), ''Bad Education (2004 film), Bad Education'' (2004), ''The Mot ...

, and

Wagner Moura Wagner Maniçoba de Moura (; born 27 June 1976) is a Brazilian actor, voice-actor and filmmaker. His accolades include the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor for his performance in ''The Secret Agent'' (2025), as well as a Golden Globe n ...

Literature

* Book: The Last Soldiers on the Cold War by

Fernando Morais Fernando Gomes de Morais (born July 22, 1946) is a Brazilian journalist, biographer, politician and writer. He wrote biographies and books on a series of Brazilian historical personalities and events, many of which were adapted into film. Life ...

, 2011. * Book: BETRAYAL: Cuba, Castro & The Cuban Five Thomas Van Hare and Matt Lawrence, 2010.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Brothers to the Rescue 1996 in international relations 1996 in military history 1996 in politics 20th-century aircraft shootdown incidents Aviation accidents and incidents in 1996 Combat incidents Diplomatic incidents Cuba–United States relations 1996 in Cuba Mass murder in 1996 February 1996 in North America