"Mafia Spies"

That’s the teaser name of a new documentary streaming on Paramount Plus. The thugs in question are not actually spies. Maybe the name was chosen to increase interest or avoid a tiny degree of controversy (compared to “U.S. Government-Hired Murderers”). They are people our illustrious Federal government, via the CIA, hired to murder a foreign head of state — Fidel Castro.

I started watching since I’m in a television “show hole.” My usual crappy programs are on hiatus so I end up watching even worse crap. This documentary is actually a hoot. The interviews are interesting and substantive. I actually know a few of the interviewees. The funny part is the opening graphics and soundtrack for the entire production seems taken directly out of 1960s James Bond movies. Again, a pathetic effort to enhance popular interest.

The stories in basic outline are not new, though bolstered by newly declassified documents. The stupidity of the principals in the CIA in pursuing the ridiculous Bay of Pigs operation — Allen Dulles and Richard Bissell — is a little surprising. The ineptitude of the Mafia is not.

It is amusing to note that two of the Mafia principals in this affair met violent ends. Sam Giancana was shot to death in his own basement the day before he was scheduled to testify before Congress, while Johnny Roselli ended up in an oil drum floating off the coast of Florida. Santo Trafficante, by contrast, died in a hospital in 1987. Robert Maheu, a businessman used by the CIA as a go-between, lived to the age of 90.

In my old age, these documentaries are enjoyable because they light up memories. I could mention two others I liked, not terribly noteworthy, one on Yogi Berra and the other on Sonny Liston. The Yogi show turned up a new, favorite Yogi-ism I hadn’t heard before: “You’re not out of it until it gets mathematical.”