Shadow Warrior: The CIA Hero of a Hundred Unknown Battles

by Felix I. Rodriguez

Book Overview

This is the story of Felix Rodriguez, one of the CIA's most extraordinary agents. A member of the anti-Castro movement from the age of 17, Cuban Felix Rodriguez was infiltrated into Cuba six weeks before the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, and was one of only 15 of the original group of 35 infiltrators who escaped after the invasion failed. In 1967, as CIA advisor to the Bolivian Army, he helped to capture Che Guevara and was the last person to interrogate...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0671667211
• ISBN13: 9780671667214
• Release Date: January 1989
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 283 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.

Customer Reviews

The definition of a freedom fighter

Maybe it's because I'm close to the subject but I enjoyed every single line writing in this book. This book tells the story of a person that had an early understanding of the damage that communist governments could inflict on the freedoms and human rights of individuals. Felix's fight against communism went from being inserted inside Cuba helping to support and created armed resistance, to training and advising locals in Latin America to fight Castro communist trained and sponsored guerrillas that have brought so much pain and death into Latin America. He also fought in the jungles of Vietnam and had an essential role in the tracking down and capturing Ernesto Guevara in the Bolivian jungles. Che seems to be a hero by many that have been only touched by Fidel's Castro propaganda machine, but for people like me that were born and lived under Castro regime, we have a first hand knowledge of how Che agreed and supported the repressive steps taking by Castro against the Cuban people to increase his grip on power. Felix Rodriguez fit, in my opinion, to the definition of a hero. This is a book that anyone interested in cover operations should read, but particularly Cubans that have lived under Castro regime and want to know the side of their history that is impossible to find under the Castro's regime's Cuba's history books.

Excellent personal history of fight for freedom over 40 yrs

This is an exciting and detailed look autobiography of Cuban exile, Felix Rodriguez, who became famous during the Iran/Contra hearings. He details and justifies his life long fight against Communism. He comes off as fair and not always kind to some of the others in the Iran/Contra intrigue. The only problem I had with this book was a minor one. There is some repetition and many names and their respective aliases are over-repeated. If you want to understand the cuban exile (not pro-Batista) perspective on Communism, this is the book. This book also takes us to VietNam, briefly to Lebanon, and throughout Central America.

He REALLY hated Castro

Rodriguez reminds us that being anti-Castro does not make him pro-Batista. He's pro-Cuba.The son of a well-to-do doctor who escaped to Miami, Felix has spent his entire life fighting against Castro and his communists. One of the last men to see Che Guevara alive, he said he greatly regretted the man's execution and protested against it. He even relays the ironic anecdote of how a physician (Che) wound up as economics minister for Castro, and their brief but informative discussion on why the Communist rebellions in Africa failed.He also has no love for the CIA, detailing the number of times in the Americas and South East Asia that the Agency screwed up his missions from bureaucracy or sheer stupidity, and the pathetic budget they were allowed to use. He considered them to be useful idiots in his own crusade.Idealistic to a fault (Several faults) and yet quite shrewd, it was Rodriguez who warned LTC Oliver North that the arms coming in were being grossly overcharged for and that someone was pocketing the money. That he was ignored by North and others shows again the frustrating universe he had to operate in. And yet he persisted.The writing drags a little here and there--this was one of Weisman's first projects, I believe. But it's not bad overall and there's plenty of content. A great counterview to the numerous bios of Che and others, and a rare examination of the very underplayed US response. The CIA didn't smash the Communist Revolution. The Revolution failed due to it's own (greater) incompetence and dishonesty. A comparison of the players on each side makes that obvious, and Felix was one of those players.A fine addition to my library.

Fantastic book of a true hero

This is a fantastic book first of all. It tells the story of Felix Rodriguez who despite being Cuban born fought for this country's ideals and in fact became an American citizen. I won't go into the whole book, I'll leave that to anyone who reads it, although it is a great book, and you will see that Rodriguez does not deserve the things that he has been unjustly accredited with. A must read for those interested in CIA or Special Ops hiistory!

A Cuban-American tale of the struggle for liberty.

Felix Rodriguez, a Cuban-born CIA Agent better known to many by his nom de guerre, Max Gomez, relates how the brutality and oppression of Castro's communist regime led his family to emigrate to the US and him to become one of the youngest participants in the Bay of Pigs landing. After successfully evading capture, he made his way back to the US where he became a US Army Officer and later a CIA Agent. In Bolivia, he trained the forces which captured Che Guevarra. As one of his last acts before the Bolivians executed him, Che gave his wristwatch to Rodriguez who wore it constantly thereafter. Despite their adherance to different systems, each recognized the other as a fellow warrior. He also writes of his years in Vietnam where he worked with William Buckley, the Agent who was later taken hostage in Lebanon and ultimately tortured to death. Finally, he relates his involvement in extending US support to Nicaraguan freedom fighters seeking to liberate their own country from the secret police and political prisons which proliferated under the Sandinista government. The book is very inspirational and should, if they would read it, open the eyes of those who live in a fool's paradise regarding the fate which awaits them should America ever lose its strength and resolve. It is also a tribute to the contribution, to that strength and resolve, made by those Cubans who came to our country and proved to be better Americans than many who were born here. Felix Rodriguez is an American hero, and this is his story. Read it.