What did Nixon mean by 'the Whole Bay of Pigs thing?'

President Nixon and CIA Director Richard Helms.

It is one of the enduring mysteries of the Watergate affair: Whatever did President Richard Nixon mean when he told aides on June 23, 1972 that the CIA had to shut down the Watergate investigation, lest it blow "the whole Bay of Pigs thing?"

The phrase, said White House chief of staff H.R. Haldeman, was Nixo…