Fact check
Is it true: Operation Northwoods?
Yes — this is confirmed.
Confirmed by the primary document: the Joint Chiefs' memorandum of 13 March 1962, "Justification for US Military Intervention in Cuba," which comes from the Joint Staff's NORTHWOODS file released through the JFK Assassination Records Review Board in 1997 and was posted in full by the National Security Archive in 2001. The verdict covers the proposal only; the record shows a proposal, not an operation, and does not show that any later event was staged.
The claim
Proponents say that in March 1962 the Joint Chiefs of Staff, under Chairman Lyman Lemnitzer, formally proposed to Defense Secretary Robert McNamara a set of staged or manufactured incidents, some involving simulated or real casualties, to be blamed on Cuba as pretexts for a US invasion (the memorandum known as Operation Northwoods). The verdict covers that documented proposal only; it does not cover claims that any part of it was carried out, that Kennedy approved it, or that it proves later attacks were false flags.
Key evidence
Original Northwoods memo text
The released file records no staged incident
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