ABSTRACT
Orlando Castro Hidalgo (no relation to Fidel) defected in 1969 from Cuba’s General Directorate of Intelligence (DGI), the country’s primary intelligence service. Castro Hidalgo and his wife were spirited out of Paris, where he was serving at the Cuban embassy, by the U.S. government. He took with him hundreds of embassy documents. The information that Castro Hidalgo provided the CIA was a mother lode of intelligence on the operations and personnel of DGI. For his safety Castro Hidalgo was maintained in concealment. Nevertheless, he had a series of meetings at a Washington, D.C. motel with Mallin. Mallin interviewed him and was also given copies of the embassy documents. He then ghost-wrote Spyfor Fidelm 1970, the first public revelation of the inner workings of the Cuban intelligence service. The following chapters are taken from the book.
