Operation 40


 * For the faction, see Op 40.

Operation 40 is the first single player level in Call of Duty: Black Ops. This mission introduces the player to the story's main characters. The mission takes place in Santa Maria, Cuba on April 17th 1961, as the player, Woods, and Bowman attempt to assassinate the Prime Minister of Cuba: Fidel Castro. When you first complete the level, you gain the achievement/trophy Sacrifice.

Overview
A cutscene plays where an unknown interrogator is asking Mason questions. Mason is shocked multiple times, having failed to answer the questions. The mission starts with Woods, Mason and Bowman speaking to Carlos in a bar. Carlos provides them with intel to help them with their mission. Tropas soldiers enter the bar, while the Task Force remain calm. A Tropas soldier comes over and grabs Mason, and Woods grabs him and impales his hand to the counter with his knife, then smashing him in the head with a bottle. Mason then pulls out an ASP and eliminates the enemy soldiers. Carlos tosses him an M16 with ACOG and Grenade Launcher.

Mason and Woods then exit the bar and commence fighting through the streets. Carlos and Bowman remain in the bar, shooting through windows to provide covering fire. As they fight down the street, Carlos and Bowman join Woods and Mason as they take out police cars. The squad then comes to a large police roadblock, which forces them to take an alley to the left. Fortunately for them, there is a car with its door open ready at the end of the alley. Mason jumps in the driver's seat and is tasked with driving the squad through multiple barricades and to safety. After Mason drives through the barricades, he whites out and a cutscene plays where Mason, fading out of consciousness in the interrogation seat, is given an electric shock which forces him back into his flashback.

The mission resumes with the squad overlooking a building from the other side of a large gorge. When given a signal, then Mason, Bowman and Woods zipline over to the other side, where Mason and Bowman quickly and silently dispatch of enemy guards. On entering the building, Mason is tasked with taking a soldier using a telephone out silently. Mason garrotes the soldier with some cheese wire. The squad then exit the house and fight their way to another building. On entering this building, Mason and Woods are faced with heavy resistance.

After clearing out a room in slow motion, the squad come before the door leading to Fidel Castro's room. The squad stack up and Mason pulls out his ASP. They break open the door, and Castro defends himself using a gun and his mistress as a human shield. Mason shoots Castro, and after a short cinematic of the bullet being followed in its flight in slow motion (only occurs with a headshot), Castro's mistress picks up a gun and is gunned down as well, much to Woods' disgust.

The squad then fight their way out of the building, through the courtyard, and towards an airfield. The squad run down a cliff while secured with ropes and they make a break for a hangar where their plane is waiting. The squad enter the plane and Mason is tasked with protecting the plane from damage with an M60. Mason then jumps out of the plane, and stays behind in order to use an anti-aircraft gun to clear the runway.

Mason is then pulled off of the AA gun by Lev Kravchenko and is shoved to the ground. Mason awakes seeing Fidel Castro and Nikita Dragovich discussing what to do to Mason. It turns out that the squad merely had killed a double. Castro tells Dragovich to "Make sure he suffers". The mission ends with Mason in the interrogation chair exclaiming that Dragovich really did make sure he suffered.

Trivia

 * Operation 40 is the name of a real-life CIA-sponsored undercover operation in the Caribbean during the early 1960s.
 * Woods has a packet of cigarettes in the fold of his shirt sleeve.
 * The car has a 5-speed gearbox, something not seen on cars of that era.
 * The MiG-17F found in the hangar the player passes through has the markings of the Vietnam People's Air Force
 * In the beginning of the mission the song playing in the background is "Quimbara" by Celia Cruz, though it was from 1974.
 * The M16A1/M203 you acquire in the mission is fully-automatic.
 * The soda cans have Treyarch written on it.
 * For the ones that don't know Spanish here is the full dialog spoke by the Cuban and the woman "Saquen los papeles ahora! " (take out the papers now! ) (he means the passport or visa) "Sale de aqui puta capitalista" (Get out of here capitalist bitch) "No me toques hijo de puta" (Do not touch me son of a bitch) "Oye de donde tu eres!" (Where are you from!)
 * This mission has caused a large amount of controversy due to the fact that the player must assassinate a world leader, Fidel Castro. Cubadebate, a popular Cuban website, accused the US of trying to kill Castro virtually because they have failed to in the past 50 years. However, what the media failed to do again is research. Operation 40 failed to assassinate Castro in the video game as they did in real life. The character killed is a double and the real Fidel Castro appears later on to state its all a game.
 * According to Call of Duty: Black Ops (Nintendo DS), a character named Micheal Shaw was captured along with Mason in this level.
 * On the Wii, the ending of this level is in HD, like the ending to World at War'swas, the reason for this is unknown.''
 * If the player jumps to close to the plane's propellers, he/she will die and the screen will say "Watch your head".