Everyone knows the name Fidel Castro, the revolutionary of Cuba. At the University of Havana in 1945 is where Fidel Castro began his long and treacherous journey as a radical nationalist. (Fidel: The Untold Story). He fought the infamous Flugencio Batista in the name of social justice until victory was won. He claimed to have fought for a democratic Cuba and a restoration of constitutional government and Cuban sovereignty, but he also stood for socialism and communist ideals. As Tim Padgett from Times Magazine on page 42 stated “Fidel imported old-world Marxism and its perverse notion that social justice is best delivered via the injustice of autocracy.” He supported everything the US and pro-democracy states despised and stood as a revolutionary …show more content…
In 1952, Flugencio Batista, then president of Cuba, conducted yet another falsified election in his favor. Resulting in a shutdown of all political parties, constitutional rights and even the closure of the University where Castro attended. By July 26, 1953 Fidel Castro and his brother Raúl, standing for social justice, began assembling, “111 insurgents... and headed an armed assault on the Moncada army barracks in Santiago de Cuba,” (Padgett 43). Raúl and Fidel were caught and set to trial, beginning the Revolution of Cuba. It was at this trial where Fidel Castro stood before the judges announcing his lack of fear for prison stating confidently, “History will absolve me” (Fidel Castro). This is where his support came from, he was seen by his followers as the symbol of avengers who stood up the greater evil. Through gore and long ensued battles his victory came in January of 1959, Fidel Castro was the new leader of Cuba (Fidel: The Untold Story). Those who were pro Batista fled to Miami and other far away locations as soon as possible. While those who stayed, predominately the working class, stayed and celebrated in the streets because justice had been served and the dictator had been overthrown by the Valiant …show more content…
While on the contrary, during Castro’s USA tour Eisenhower refused a visit with him calling his ideals communist and unjust. Nixon, following Eisenhower’s judgment, claimed that Castro “is either incredibly naïve about communism or under communist discipline-my guess is the former” (Depalma 19). This sentiment spread to the American citizens rapidly creating a huge divide among Cubans and Cuban Americans. One of the first and most controversial reforms done by Castro was the Agrarian Reform which sought to break up all the landholdings by foreigners, including the US, from the Batista rule and redistribute it to those who worked for it, also known as the working-class citizens. The US grew animosity as some of these land holdings were owned by the USA, stripping them of some of their economic property. In addition, cases of denied human rights were reported. In September of 2000, there was a committee on foreign relations held by the chairman Jesse Helms where two Cuban doctors were interviewed about their medical expedition in Zimbabwe. When Leonel Cordova and Noris Pena were kidnapped by Zimbabwean police and Cuban diplomats by the orders of Castro himself. In this testimony, they clearly describe the conditions they faced after they made a declaration against the Cuban Government regarding their mission and the Castro regime in general. After being kidnapped Castro officials tried to
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was born on August 13, 1926, near Birάn in Cuba’s Eastern Oriente Province to a wealthy sugar plantation owner and a mother who was a domestic servant to his father’s first wife (Source A). Castro was the third of six children and was raised in prominently wealthy circumstances that allowed him to attend well known and well revered schools like Belen Jesuit Prep. (Source A). He was a man that could not be just labeled solely by one phrase or one convenient definition, he was loved by supporters of communist rule and he was also a face feared by many Cubans. He held multitudes of titles to countless different people, ranging from honorable military leader to a protruding symbol of the communist revolution in Latin America that was feared by the Cuban people and Americans alike.
The Cuban Revolution began at a time when Cubans could no longer tolerate the American capitalist influence in Cuba. Cubans blamed the United States for their destitutions and for the ruthlessness of American politically supported dictator Fulgencio Batista. Bastia’s administration was inhumane. Of the countless things he did, he annulled the 1940 Constitution that he helped to instate, widened the gap between wealth and poverty and turned United States supplied guns and ammunition on his own people. Fidel Castro and the 26th of July Movement extended hope and freedom to the oppressed people of Cuba. Castro earned the support of the public during his most famous
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was born on the 13th of August, 1926, the third of six children, and the son of a wealthy sugar plantation owner. After Castro graduated from El Colegio de Belen in 1945, he entered law school at the University of Havana. It was during this period that Castro began to become involved politics, taking an interest in the political climate of Cuban nationalism, anti-imperialism, socialism, and social justice (http://www.biography.com/articles/fidel-castro-9241487, 2009). Castro immediately became involved with student protests, whose student groups were known to be violent and often armed, which can be attributed to the fact that there had been a government crackdown on these protesters, with students sometimes being killed or terrorized (The Real Fidel Castro, p16-17, 2003). Brutality was already present in the political system, perhaps a sign that brutality would be needed to change it.
From July 26, 1953 to January 1, 1959, Fidel Castro led an uprising against the incumbent Cuban president, Flugencio Batista. This insurrection, known as the Cuban Revolution, was successful in the overthrow of the Batista government and implemented a socialist state under Castro’s rule. By 1961, Fidel Castro became the undisputed leader of Cuba with strong popular and military support. Although Castro was the figurehead for revolution in Cuba, his brother Raúl and friend Ernesto “Che” Guevara were instrumental in helping the revolution to succeed. Guevara, an Argentine native, was passionate about guerrilla movements and social revolution.
Fidel Castro has most certainly been a controversial dictator during his reign in Cuba. His regime has made quite the infamous name for itself during the sixties. When news spread of his, for some, long anticipated death, some were riddled with joy and took to the streets with celebration. Others were solemn for the fall of an impactful leader. However, no one could deny that he left a legacy. Majority of what we hear about Fidel Castro in the United States is negative, seeing that Fidel ousted United States backed dictator Batista and positioned himself against the United States throughout much of his time in power. It shouldn’t be forgotten that Fidel has done pretty indefensible things while in charge but he also is not totally devoid of
Fidel Castro was a Cuban revolutionary who rejected the democracy. At that point, General Fulgencio Batista was leading the country using the democratic economic system. After an unsuccessful attempt of rising against the government, Fidel Castro was sentenced to 15 years in prison. He was released under an amnesty and fle...
Originally a dictator ran Cuba: President Fulgencio Batista, who was an ally to the United States. Cuba during this time enjoyed a healthy urban middle class, and its citizens enjoyed some degree of freedom without a police state. Many other countries seemed a lot more likely to revolt, because economically and developmentally, Cuba seemed stable. However, the United States’ role and control of Cuba’s economy started to take its toll on the “peasants”. In 1953, the United States owned many of the major entities, such as 50% of the railroad. Just as much development as there was in the urban areas there was a lack thereof in the rural areas. Not just economically, Cubans started to resent the image of Sin City that Americans gave the country. Cuba was a popular tourist spot where Americans came to behave badly. Castro’s success came from these opposite sides of distaste for the United States, the peasants economically and the middle class socially & nationally. Castro was not originally a socialist; he was a nationalist first. However when he attacks Moncada Barracks, he is arrested and exiled to Mexico City. During this time his failures are turned into “successes” through propaganda. Castro meets with Che Guevara in Mexico City and when he returns, he purges the military of 483 Batista loyalists and enacts land reforms and nationalizes US
Fidel Castro’s belief of a Cuba libre was not only his; many Cubans envisioned an independent Cuba, ‘A Cuba that could have been’. Plenty felt the urge to raise their voices and prove their discontent and patriotism to the world, but what could have been remained a silent whisper. Furthermore illiteracy and ignorance encircled a big chunk of society one which could not comprehend the causes and effects of such a term as ‘imperial’. In Thomas G. Patterson’s Contesting Castro: The United States and the Triumph of the Cuban Revolution, Nixon is quoted expressing that Castro is "either incredibly naive about communism or under communist discipline." (Paterson 257) His assumption was most probably correct "Pazzo recalled that Castro did not want to appear as one more Latin American leader ‘sold out’ to imperialism." (Paterson 257) Cuba’s history is revealed in numerous writings like Marifeli Perez-Stable’s The Cuban Revolution: Origins, Course and Legacy ,and other documents which will be used to support the idea that Cuba was not a victim of it’s own rebellion, but one of a ‘wrong leader’, if one might say, and a harsh and complicated past. In addition the United States’ imperialism caused that many succeed and even more undergo horrendous treatment, illiteracy and inadequate lifestyles for the US own benefit. This caused the Cuban revelation, so why still ask why.
Before the revolution Fidel Castro had studied law at the University of Havana. After realizing he was “politically illiterate” he joined a radical student group. He was then introduced to student protests, and violent culture within the university he attended. It was clear from the beginning he was anti-American. He was very passionate about anti-imperialism as well. He tried to become president of the Federation of University Students (FEU) but it was unsuccessful. He was also opposed to the corruption that was going on in the government at the time. In 1947 Castro joined the Socialist party of Cuban People, which was lead by Eduardo Chibas. Castro and Chibas had similar views about the corruption and the reforms that needed to take place. Soon after Chibas lost the election in 47, Castro received a death threat coming from gang leader trying to make him leave the university. Castro refused to give into this threat and started carrying around a gun with him. These steps that Fidel Castro took were in the direction of a rebellious Leader. That is exactly what he would become in year to come, his influence and the relationship with The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics would bring major change to Latin America.
The dictatorship of President Batista caught the attention of a young attorney named Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz, or better known as Fidel Castro. In protest against President Batista, Castro formed and led a small group called M-26-7. The name of this group symbolized when the group attacked the Moncada Barracks in Santiago de Cuba on July 26, 1953. This marked the beginning of the Cuban Revolution. The attack was unsuccessful and it left many of the attackers, including leader Fidel Castro, jailed while others fled the country and a few killed in the attack. After going to trial, on October 16, 1953, Castro was sentenced to 15 years in prison in the hospital wing of the Presidio Modelo while delivering his History Will Absolve Me speech. However, on May 15, 1955, Castro and the rest of the prisoners were released after President Batista believed that to be of no threat. Upon getting being released from prison, Castro’s main focus was to strengthen the M-26-7. Later that year, Fidel Castro and his brother Raúl Castro fled Cuba to avoid being arrested after the 1955 bombings. Fidel said that his reason for leaving was because all doors of peaceful struggle had closed on him.
The American government created their own enemy out of Fidel Castro, pushing Castro into a position where he had to fall back onto the Soviet Union’s help in order to escape from the overwhelming military capabilities of the U.S. Castro was a dictator and he did terrible atrocious things but no more than any other government, including the American government, but it cannot be denied that he did not make some very beneficial changes to many aspects of Cuban society which broadly include improved literacy rates amongst both children and adults, more accessibility to healthcare and housing. Though on the other side of that coin, Castro was infamous for his suppression of the Cuban people’s freedom of expression, where Castro made huge progress in the economic, social and cultural aspects of Cuban society he retrogressed in
Fidel’s earliest written propaganda were published inside of El Acusador (The Accuser.) El Acusador was an underground anti-Batista newspaper published by Castro’s group early on. It was in this newspaper that Castro would publish his first manifesto four months after Batista’s military coup. In his manifesto, Fidel outlined the goals, or “five revolutionary laws,” of the government he hoped to implement in Cuba. These “revolutionary laws” are: (1) To return power to the people and reinstate the 1940 constitution, (2) To expropriate land from large landowners and turn the land over to “smallholders,” (3) To instate rights for workers to share 30% of the profits of larger enterprises, (4) To instate rights for sugar workers to receive 55% of company profits, (5) To confiscate the wealth of those with “ill-gotten gains” and split the properties recovered between workers and institutions such as hospitals, asylums and orphanages. With the newspaper, Fidel hoped to clear up what changes he wanted to bring about and hoped to stir up support from the locals living in poverty. Fidel also used his many speeches as propaganda as well. One of his most famous speeches is his “History will absolve me” speech, given during his trial for the Moncada barracks attack. It was a four hour speech in which Fidel utilized his lawer experience to try and form a defense in
The Cuban Revolution, also partaken as the 26th of July Movement, was an armed rebellion against the Cuban President Fulgencio Batista led by Fidel Castro. Fidel Castro was very idiosyncratic towards politics and therefor joined law school at the University of Havana. In 1950, Fidel Castro graduated from law school and began practicing law. Embracing his strong interest in politics, Fidel Castro decided to become a candidate for a seat in Cuba’s House of Representatives during June 1952 elections. Before elections could be held, however, Fulgencio Batista successfully coup the previous Cuban government and cancelled the elections. Fulgencio Batista would jail his opponents and use terrorist methods to make himself and his associates a fortune. Fidel Castro, wanting to establish a communist gover...
Many nations were falling to Communism, especially, the nation of Cuba. Cuba was first ruled by a corrupt dictator, nevertheless in the 1950s, a rebel group was organized to overthrow the government. The leader of this rebel group was none other than Fidel Castro. “Fidel Castro was born into the farming life until he decided to go to law school. Once he graduated law school, his goal was to reach social justice and reform the government. By 1959, Fidel Castro led his rebel group to victory using guerrilla warfare to transform the country.” This transformation became known as the Cuban Revolution. To help with the transformation, Castro sought the support of the Soviet Union, which would lead to the new Communist Cuba. Castro nationalized
4. Fidel Castro put into place a series of agrarian and urban reform laws in the spring of 1959, at the beginning of Castro’s rule. The First Urban Reform Law states that there would be a 50% cut in rent, which was good for the peasants, but bad for the landowners (such as United States companies). The Agrarian Reform Law took land from people who had more than 1000 acres of land, and gave it to the poor. It was bad for landowners, especially foreign ones, because they lost land. In addition to that, the prices were controlled. The United States began to worry about these laws because they seemed communist in nature, and began placing economic sanctions on Cuba, pushing Cuba closer to the Soviet Union.