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10 - PEOPLE/(N-S)/Guillermo Novo.md

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+---
+category: "Extremism & Violent Networks"
+tags:
+  - Person
+  - GuillermoNovo
+  - CubanNationalistMovement
+  - CubanExiles
+  - OrlandoLetelier
+  - DINA
+  - Terrorism
+alias:
+  - Guillermo Novo Sampol
+  - Bill Novo
+summary: "Head of the northern zone of the Cuban Nationalist Movement who fired a bazooka at the United Nations in 1964, visited Pinochet's Chile in 1974, and supplied Michael Townley with explosives for the Letelier bomb."
+location: "Union City, New Jersey"
+created: 2026-09-21
+updated: 2026-09-21
+---
+
+Guillermo Novo led the northern zone of the [[Cuban Nationalist Movement]] from [[Union City, New Jersey]]. He "was not a refugee from the Castro government, having left Cuba in 1952, seven years before Castro took power. Also, he had never worked for the CIA." Investigators met "a rather dapper man, given to three-piece pinstripe suits." An agent of the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation|FBI]]'s [[Newark, New Jersey|Newark]] office knew him as "an accomplished fund raiser and public speaker, a man of considerable philosophical knowledge, who would blow out a store window or dent the hull of a Russian ship, but who was not a killer."[^1]
+
+### The Bazooka
+
+In December 1964 Novo fired a bazooka at the [[United Nations]] building while [[Che Guevara]] was speaking inside. The shell "had been a semidud, aimed poorly, and had plopped harmlessly into the East River."[^1][^2]
+
+### Chile
+
+In December 1974 the movement's leader, [[Felipe Rivero]], sent Novo and [[Jose Dionisio Suarez]] to [[Chile]] "to pay homage to Pinochet." They entered the country with [[Orlando Bosch]]. When [[Michael Townley]] of [[DINA]] and his wife, [[Mariana Callejas]], first came to a Union City motel, Novo, Suarez, and Armando Santana "drew guns and ordered the couple to sit down," searched the luggage, and found an American passport in the name Kenneth Enyart and a Chilean identity card in the name Andres Wilson. "Finally, Novo put away his pistol and extended his hand to Townley." The movement lent Townley [[Virgilio Paz]] for a DINA mission to [[Mexico]] and Europe. A communique in the name of "Zero," a label used by Novo, his brother [[Ignacio Novo|Ignacio]], and Suarez, claimed the shooting of [[Bernardo Leighton]] in [[Rome]] in October 1975. The FBI credited it "because it provided details of the attack that only the assassins could know."[^2]
+
+### Letelier
+
+On September 10, 1976, at Union City, Townley "outlined my DINA mission to assassinate Letelier and requested the assistance of the Cuban Nationalist Movement." Novo demanded a full explanation and argued that "DINA should have killed Otero rather than turn him over to the FBI," a reference to the surrender of [[Rolando Otero]] to [[Robert Scherrer]]. After a meeting at the Chateau Renaissance Motel he sent formal word that the movement would help. He introduced Townley to [[Alvin Ross]], once a blackjack dealer at the [[Tropicana Club|Tropicana]] in [[Havana]]. On September 15 "Novo handed Townley a paper bag" holding detonating cord, C-4, and TNT. Paz and Suarez went with Townley to [[Washington, D.C.|Washington]], where [[Orlando Letelier]] and [[Ronni Moffitt]] were killed on September 21.[^2]
+
+Asked by the prosecutor [[Eugene Propper]] and the agent [[Carter Cornick]] where he had been the night before the bombing, Novo said: "That is my trump card. That is the ace up my sleeve." The informant [[Ricardo Morales Navarrete|Ricardo Morales]], then an officer of the Venezuelan [[DISIP]], had planted a story that Bosch was telling associates the "Novo brothers" had killed Letelier. "Bosch is a liar and a traitor to freedom," Novo said.[^1]
+
+### Footnotes
+
+[^1]: Branch, Taylor, and Eugene M. Propper. *Labyrinth*. Viking, 1982, pp. 101-108.
+[^2]: Dinges, John, and Saul Landau. *Assassination on Embassy Row*. McGraw-Hill, 1980, pp. 9-21, 147-152, 240.