A Convenient Presence
Fidel Castro Ruz overthrew the corrupt dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in January 1959. He had served a long apprenticeship in revolutionary activity. Tthat included seeing the power of an irate people first hand. The assassination of Colomabian lawyer and Liberal Party Presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán Ayala on April 9th 1948 unleashed the power of the people as Gaitán's supporters reacted furiously.

The future Cuban leader was in downtown Bogotá at the time of the assassination and its aftermath, but that hardly proves him to be Gaitán's assassin and nor does the fact that Rafael del Pino met supposed assassin Juan Roa Sierra 90 minutes before the assassination. Castro was also present during Bogotazo – the violence  that followed the assassination – and therefore got a first hand view of what working people and peasants were capable of when aroused to anger.

It certainly may have influenced his beliefs and strategy for the future, but there is no credible evidence that Castro was involved in the assassination of Gaitán. The Cubans had nothing to gain from assassinating Gaitán before that meeting which might have resulted in them getting what they wanted from him and there is no evidence of a conspiracy to neutralise Gaitán to benefit the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), let alone one involving Castro.

A Retaliatory Conspiracy
The Colombian Communist Party was founded in 1930. Gaitán was a threat to it. His views were radical and he was the major rival for the affections of the masses – a struggle that he was winning. He had rejected violence as a means of overthrowing the Colombian state, favouring an elected left-wing government. Unlike the Communist Party, Gaitán had mass appeal in the constituency that they wanted support from. He had the hearts and soul of working people. He might just have been able to deliver what he argued for without a violent revolution led by the Communist Party.

A Gaitán Presidency would therefore almost certainly have been absolutely disastrous for the Communist Party and its allies too. It could have totally wiped out their appeal, so Gaitán's assassination clearly benefited the Communist Party whether it was involved or not. With Gaitán gone and in such circumstances, the Communist Party could not only fill the void left by his death, but exploit it too.

A Valuable Lesson Learned
Although he stood for non-violent struggle, the Communist Party saw that his supporters could not be controlled when their anger was stoked to burning point (Bogotazo proved that). The lesson was not lost on them and it shaped their policies and others who favoured violent resistance for decades to come. The reaction to Gaitán's assassination  had shown that the poor of Colombia would rise up violently if the right circumstances presented themselves. It could be exploited for political gain by others and was.

Nevertheless, there is no credible evidence linking the communists to the crime, but they too sought to blame others. Their targets were the conservative President Mariano Ospina Pérez and the CIA. Ospina certainly benefited from Gaitán's assassination. Ospina's main opponent had been silenced and he was very unpopular. A Gaitán Presidency looked likely to succeed him and undo his policies. Just as communists would benefit from his death and were threatened by him, so were the conservatives headed by Ospina and the liberal oligarchy too. Again there is no credible evidence proving that they were involved either, but the CIA is a different matter.

A Cuban documentary placed the blame firmly and squarely on the CIA and US government. John Mepples Espirito was a CIA agent captured in Cuba in the 1960s. He told his interrogators about Operation Pantomime – a US plan to assassinate Gaitán after attempts to bribe and blackmail him had failed. The aim of the assassination was to curb left-wing influence in Latin America. It is the most believable of the various conspiracy theories as the US was determined that Latin America would not be a base for communist activities.

The US Secretary of State, George Marshall, was in Bogotá for the Pan-American Conference to deliver that. While Gaitán opposed communists and their methods, he did not support a puppet organisation to defend US views either, which arguably the Organisation of American States (OAS) was doomed to become. Before The 9th Pan-American Conference created the OAS an eloquent opponent was silenced – one who might have influenced Colombia's foreign policy regarding that organisation.

The Pantomime Conspiracy
Both the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and the USA had resorted to assassination of opponents in foreign countries, but unlike many conspiracy theories there was some evidence to support CIA involvement in this one. Roa was said to have acted under the orders of CIA agents Mepples and Tomás Elliot. Mepples confirmed that he was part of a US government conspiracy against Gaitán.

After the US failed to bribe or blackmail Gaitán, Mepples travelled to the Colombia with other agents, where they recruited Roa to the conspiracy and had him assassinate Gaitán. It is hard to assess the credibility of this claim as Mepples was in Cuban custody at the time and had a strong motive to tell them what they wanted to hear, especially as other conspiracy theories blamed Castro himself.

The Operation Pantomime hypothesis also claims that the police were involved in ensuring that Roa was abandoned to the mob, but there was nothing they could do. There was no evidence that police participated in the violence against Roa – they simply failed to save him. With Gaitán and Roa dead, the conspiracy theories blossomed and far more worryingly the violence spiralled out of control and has plagued Colombian history ever since.