C U B A A N D R E V O L U T I O N A R Y

L A T I N A M E R I C A

About the author

Dirk Kruijt is professor emeritus of development studies in the Faculty of Social Sciences, Utrecht University. A sociologist turned anthropologist, he has undertaken research on entrepreneurs and the labour

class, ethnicity and exclusion, and military dictatorship and guerrilla

movements, and has conducted fieldwork in many Latin American

and Caribbean countries. His previous oral history books are about the

Revolutionary Government of the Armed Forces of Velasco Alvarado

in Peru and the guerrilla movements in Central America.

CUBA AND

REVOLUTIONARY

LATIN AMERICA

AN ORAL HISTORY

DIRK KRUIJT

Zed Books

London

Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America: An Oral History was first published in 2017 by Zed Books Ltd, The Foundry, 17 Oval Way, London SE11 5RR, UK.

www.zedbooks.net

Copyright © Dirk Kruijt 2017

The right of Dirk Kruijt to be identified as the author of this work

has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs

and Patents Act, 1988.

Typeset in Sabon by Lumina Datamatics Ltd.

Index by John Barker

Cover design by Keith Dodd

Cover photo © Martin Roemers/Panos Pictures

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of

Zed Books Ltd.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978-1-78360-803-4 hb

ISBN 978-1-78360-802-7 pb

ISBN 978-1-78360-804-1 pdf

ISBN 978-1-78360-805-8 epub

ISBN 978-1-78360-806-5 mobi

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements vii

Select acronyms and abbreviations

x

1 Revolutionaries

1

2 Historical context

12

3 From insurgents to socialists

43

4 Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s)

79

5 The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s)

122

6 The years of soft power (1990s–present)

172

7 The legacy

200

Appendix: Biographical data of interviewees

215

Notes 220

Bibliography 254

Index 274

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The genesis of this book dates back to the mid-1980s. It was then that

I began to write about the leftist-nationalist Revolutionary Government

of the Armed Forces of General Velasco Alvarado, president of Peru

between 1968 and 1975. By interviewing nearly all of his military and

civilian advisers, I discovered that many of the progressive Velasquis-

tas had ties with Cuba; some of them showed me photos with Fidel

Castro or souvenirs they had received (in some cases Kalashnikovs).

During my second research project on revolutionary generations –

the Central American guerrilla leadership – I became aware of their

intense relationship with Cuba and the importance of the presence

and influence of the representatives of the Departamento América, a

Cuban institution whose history is the heart of this book. This time I

write about the Cuban revolutionary generation. Over decades they

decisively influenced nearly all guerrilla organizations and rebellious

movements in Latin America and the Caribbean (with the exceptions

of the macabre Shining Path movement in Peru and the Mexican guerrilla

movements).

I conducted many interviews in Cuba and afterwards in Colombia

and Central America. I owe a debt of gratitude to the roughly seventy

interviewees in Cuba. They enthusiastically participated in interview

sessions that always took several hours, sometimes several days or

more. They patiently amended, rewrote or corrected the written text

of various versions. I have the same feelings of appreciation with

respect to the twenty interviewees, former guerrilla representatives

viii | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

and peace negotiators, in Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala and

Nicaragua; sometimes they were reinterviewed after years but they

always found the time to reflect on their decisions in the past.

I also used existing interviews that were published in testimonial

publications in Cuba or all other countries where Cuba supported

insurgent movements. The fieldwork in Cuba was funded by a grant

from the Netherlands’ inter-university science foundation NOW.

Utrecht University sponsored my other field trips. In a more summary

version, the Cuban interviews were published as Bell Lara, Caram

León, Kruijt and López García (2013) and Suárez Salazar and Kruijt

(2015). The first series of interviews refer to the Cuban insurgency

generation; the second refers to the functionaries of the Departamento

América and other Cuban internationalists.

Delia López, Tania Caram and José Bell were excellent colleagues

who not only introduced me to the history and society of Cuba during

the 1950s and 1960s, but also provided me with insights into Cuba’s

history and the Cuban academic culture. With them I conducted inter-

views about Cuba’s insurgency veterans over the course of two years.

Tania Caram transcribed the taped interviews. With Luis Suárez and

Alberto Cabrera I interviewed Cuba’s internationalists, and Alberto’s

wife Martha Morales transcribed the taped versions. They became

friends and guides during the three years that we collaborated. I was

most hospitably received as a house guest by both Tony López and his

wife Joaquina Cruz; I learned much about the idiosyncrasies of life in

Cuba. Half of the interviews were conducted in the small apartment

above their house.

Kees Koonings (CEDLA Amsterdam and Utrecht University) read

the entire manuscript twice and I am very grateful for his comments

and suggestions. Eduardo Rey Tristan (Universidade de Santiago

de Compostela) also commented in detail on most of the chapters.

Sergio Acosta (Radio Nederland Worldwide), Eric Hendriks (Peking

University), Edelberto Torres-Rivas (FLACSO and UNDP Guatemala)

and the late Menno Vellinga (University of Florida at Gainesville and

Utrecht University) commented on previous versions of the chapters.

I am indebted to Alberto Martín (Instituto Mora Mexico City), Carlos

Figueroa (BUAP Mexico), Arturo Taracena (UNAM Mérida) and Mario

Vázquez (UNAM Mexico City) for their extensive comments on a

Acknowledgements | ix

proto-draft of Chapter 4, which I reviewed with them during a large discussion session at the Instituto Mora in Mexico. Luis Eduardo

Celis (Corporación Nuevo Arco Iris Bogotá) was the liaison with

nearly all persons interviewed in Colombia.

I had the good fortune of consulting the libraries of the Casa de las

Américas in Havana and the Widener Library of Harvard University.

I spent a couple of months researching at the magnificent library of

the Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut in Berlin.

With Edwin Koopmans (VPRO Public Radio and TV in the

Netherlands) I recorded a radio documentary about the members of

the Cuban guerrilla and urban insurgency between 1953 and 1959.

The Cuban ambassador to The Hague, Zelmys Maria Domínguez

Cortina, and the Netherlands’ ambassadors to Havana, Ronald

Muyzert and Norbert Braakhuis, were very helpful.

Jennie Levitt was so kind as to proofread the entire manuscript

meticulously; the quality of the manuscript improved enormously.

I also express my thanks to the staff of Zed Books, especially Kika

Sroka-Miller, the editor.

Havana and Utrecht, July 2016

SELECT ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS

AJR

Asociación de Jóvenes Rebeldes (Cuba)

ALBA

Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de

Nuestra América (Bolivarian Alliance

for the People of Our America)

ALN

Ação Libertadora Nacional (Action for

National Liberation) (Brazil)

BRAC

Buró para la Represión de las Actividades

Comunistas (Bureau of Repression of

Communist Activities) (Cuba)

CDR

Comités de Defensa de la Revolución

(Committees for the Defence of the

Revolution) (Cuba)

CEA

Centro de Estudios de América (Centre

of the Study of the Americas) (Cuba)

CELAM

Consejo Episcopal Latinoamericano

(Latin American Episcopal Council)

CIA

Central Intelligence Agency (United States)

COMECON

Council for Mutual Economic

Assistance (Socialist Bloc)

CPUSTAL

Congreso Permanente de Unidad

Sindical de los Trabajadores de América

Latina (Permanent Congress of Workers’

Labour Unity of Latin America)

Select acronyms and abbreviations | xi

CTC

Central de Trabajadores de Cuba

(Unitary Organization of Cuban

Workers)

CUC

Peso Cubano Convertible (Cuban

Convertible Peso)

DEA

Drug Enforcement Administration

(United States)

DEU

Directorio Estudiantil Universitario

(University Students’ Directorate)

(Cuba)

DGI

Dirección General de Inteligencia

(Directorate General of Intelligence)

(MININT)

DGLN

Dirección General de Liberación

Nacional (Directorate General of

National Liberation) (MININT)

DIER

Departamento de Investigaciones

del Ejército Rebelde (Department of

Investigation of the Rebel Army) (Cuba)

DOE

Dirección de Operaciones Especiales

(Direction of Special Forces/Special

Operations) (Cuba)

DR

Directorio Revolucionario Estudiantil, also

mentioned as Directorio Revolucionario

13 de Marzo ([Student] Revolutionary

Directorate of 13 March) (Cuba)

DSE

Departamento de Seguridad del Estado

(Department of State Security) (Cuba)

ECLAC

Economic Commission of Latin America

and the Caribbean

EGP

Ejército Guerrillero de los Pobres

(Guerrilla Army of the Poor) (Guatemala)

ELAM

Escuela Latinoamericana de Ciencias

Médicas (Medical School for Latin

American Students) (Cuba)

xii | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

ELN

Ejército de Liberación Nacional

(National Liberation Army) (Bolivia/

Colombia/Peru)

EPL

Ejército Popular de Liberación (Popular

Liberation Army) (Colombia)

ERP

Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo

(Revolutionary People’s Army)

(Argentina)

FAR

Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias

(Revolutionary Armed Forces)

(Argentina/Cuba)

FAR

Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes (Rebel

Armed Forces) (Guatemala)

FARC-EP or FARC

Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes de Colombia –

Ejército Popular (Rebel Armed Forces of

Colombia – People’s Army) (Colombia)

FBI

Federal Bureau of Investigation (United

States)

FEDIM

Federación Democrática Internacional

de Mujeres (International Democratic

Federation of Women)

FEU

Federación Estudiantil Universitaria

(University Students’ Federation) (Cuba)

FLACSO

Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias

Sociales (Latin American Faculty of

Social Sciences)

FMC

Federación de Mujeres Cubanas

(Federation of Cuban Women)

FMLN

Frente Farabundo Martí para la

Liberación Nacional (Farabundo Martí

Front for National Liberation) (El

Salvador)

FPL

Fuerzas Populares de Liberación

Nacional (People’s National Liberation

Forces) Farabundo Martí (El Salvador)

Select acronyms and abbreviations | xiii

FPMR

Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez

(Patriotic Front Manuel Rodríguez) (Chile)

FSLN

Frente Sandinista de Liberación

Nacional (Sandinista Front for National

Liberation) (Nicaragua)

FUMEC

Federación Universal de Estudiantes

Cristianos (Universal Federation of

Christian Students)

GDR

German Democratic Republic

ICAIC

Instituto Cubano del Arte y la Industria

Cinematográficos (Cuban Institute of

Art and Film Industry)

ICAP

Instituto Cubano de Amistad con los

Pueblos (Cuban Institute for Friendship

with the Peoples)

ICRT

Instituto Cubano de Radio y Televisión

(Cuban Institute of Radio and TV)

ISRI

Instituto Superior de Relaciones

Internacionales (Diplomatic Staff

School) (Cuba)

ITT

International Telephone and Telegraph

Company

JUCEPLAN

Junta Central de Planificación (National

Planning Board) (Cuba)

KGB

Committee for State Security of the USSR

Komsomol

Communist Youth of the USSR

M-14

Movimiento 14 de Mayo (Movement of

14 May) (Paraguay)

M-19

Movimiento 19 de Abril (Movement of

19 April) (Colombia)

M 26-7

Movimiento 26 de Julio (Movement of

26 July) (Cuba)

MEC

Movimiento Estudiantil Cristiano

(Christian Students’ Movement) (Cuba)

xiv | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

MINFAR

Ministerio de las Fuerzas Armadas

Revolucionarias (Ministry of Defence)

(Cuba)

MININT

Ministerio del Interior (Ministry of the

Interior) (Cuba)

MINREX

Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores

(Ministry of Foreign Affairs) (Cuba)

MINSAP

Ministerio de Salud Pública (Ministry of

Public Health) (Cuba)

MINTER

Ministerio del Interior (Nicaragua)

MIR

Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria

(Revolutionary Movement of the Left)

(Chile/Peru/Venezuela)

MLN–T

Movimiento de Liberación Nacional–

Tupamaros (National Liberation

Movement–Tupamaros) (Uruguay)

MNR

Movimiento Nacional Revolucionario

(National Revolutionary Movement)

(Cuba)

MNR

Movimento Nacionalista

Revolucionário (Nationalist

Revolutionary Movement) (Brazil)

MRO

Movimiento Revolucionario Oriental

(Revolutionary Movement of the East)

(Uruguay)

MRTA

Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac

Amaru (Revolutionary Movement

Tupac Amaru) (Peru)

NCO

non-commissioned officer

NO-AL

Movimiento de los Países No

Aliados (Movement of Non-Aligned

Countries)

OAS

Organization of American States

(Organización de Estados Americanos)

Select acronyms and abbreviations | xv

OLAS

Organización Latinoamericana de

Solidaridad (Latin American Solidarity

Organization)

ORI

Organizaciones Revolucionarias

Integradas (Integrated Revolutionary

Organizations) (Cuba)

ORPA

Organización del Pueblo en Armas

(People’s Armed Organization)

(Guatemala)

OSPAAAL

Organización de Solidaridad con los

Pueblos de Asia, África y América

Latina (Organization of Solidarity with

the Peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin

America)

PCC

Partido Comunista Colombiano

(Colombian Communist Party)

PCC

Partido Comunista de Cuba

(Communist Party of Cuba)

PCCh

Partido Comunista de Chile (Chilean

Communist Party)

PDVSA

Petroleros de Venezuela SA (Venezuela’s

state-owned oil company)

PGT

Partido Guatemalteco del Trabajo

(Guatemalan Workers’ [Communist] Party)

PRI

Partido Revolucionario Institucional

(Institutional Revolutionary Party)

(Mexico)

PRT

Partido Revolucionario de los

Trabajadores (Revolutionary Workers’

Party) (Colombia)

PRT-ERP

Partido Revolucionario de los

Trabajadores – Ejército Revolucionario

del Pueblo (Revolutionary Party of

the Workers – Revolutionary People’s

Army) (Argentina)

xvi | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

PSCh

Partido Socialista de Chile (Socialist

Party of Chile)

PSP

Partido Socialista Popular (Popular

Socialist Party) (Cuba)

SIM

Servicio de Inteligencia Militar (Military

Intelligence Service) (Cuba)

UJC

Unión de Jóvenes Comunistas (Union of

Young Communists) (Cuba)

UNAM

Universidad Nacional Autónoma

de México (National Autonomous

University of Mexico)

UNDP

United Nations Development Programme

UNESCO

United Nations Educational, Scientific

and Cultural Organization

URNG

Unión Revolucionaria Nacional

Guatemalteca (Guatemalan National

Revolutionary Unity)

USSR

Union of Socialist Soviet Republics

VMT

Vice-Ministerio Técnico (Technical

Vice-Ministry) (MININT)

CHAPTER 1

Revolutionaries

The Cuban revolutionary generation

I always I wanted to be a spy and a diplomat. Once, before the

Revolution, I had said that to my father but he told me I was

speaking rubbish. A poor, black boy born in Ciego de Ávila,

how could you become a diplomat? A spy? […] My paternal

grandfather had been executed by the Spanish colonial govern-

ment on allegations of conspiracy; my maternal grandparents

had participated in the War of Independence […] I joined the

Revolution through the student movement linked to the 26th

of July Movement [Movimiento 26 de Julio or M 26-7, led by

Fidel Castro]. Really, there was a good relationship among the

revolutionary organizations in the insurgency against the Batista

regime: demonstrations, events, declarations, distribution of

pamphlets. I was one of the organizers of the funeral of young

Ricky Pérez German, a member of the Rebel Army [Ejército

Rebelde, the guerrilla arm of M 26-7], who had fallen in com-

bat. He had been a student of the [local] Institute of Secondary

Education. I was also involved in the funeral of Raúl Cervantes,

whose cousins were my classmates and who was a member of

the Student Revolutionary Directorate [Directorio Revolucion-

ario Estudiantil, DR, another rebel movement that afterwards

merged with M 26-7] […].1

In a nutshell, this is the start of the career of a young revolutionary

student who participated in the insurgency campaign of Cuba’s rev-

olutionary movements – the M 26-7 and the DR – against dictator

Batista and who, afterwards, also took part in rebellions and leftist

movements across the Caribbean and Latin America. In the 1970s he

2 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

became a liaison officer with the Caribbean left and, in the 1980s,

the first Cuban ambassador to Surinam. There were hundreds, then

thousands, of rebels like him who would transform Cuba and influ-

ence the course of revolutions in Latin America and the Caribbean

island-states.

Two successive age cohorts, which constitute Cuba’s revolutionary

generation, have left their mark on Cuba. The first cohort participated

in the insurrection from 1953 through 1958 against the dictatorship

of General Batista. They operated with the support of the majority of

the Cuban population. After the victory in January 1959, this gener-

ation radicalized in a swift transition towards socialism, immediately

before the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1962. The succeeding age cohort is

that of the younger members of the two rebel organizations (M 26-7

and DR) and of the adolescent youth who was too young to partic-

ipate in the guerrilla campaigns or the urban resistance movements.

Afterwards, in the early 1960s, they joined the Cuban literacy and

public health campaigns. They also participated in the efforts to sup-

port and disseminate similar revolutions abroad: in Latin America,

the Caribbean, and central and southern Africa. If the first generation

cohort is that of the revolutionary combatants and their supporters,

the second is constituted of revolutionary internationalists and pas-

sionate fidelistas (named after their leader, Fidel Castro) who were in many ways inspired by the iconic figure of Che Guevara.

The two Cuban revolutionary generations had an enormous

influence on nearly all Latin American guerrilla leaders. The first gen-

eration served as a glorified example; as will be demonstrated in the

subsequent chapters, the second generation provided the revolution-

ary movements with liaison officers, advisers and caretakers.

The relevance of the study

This study is centred on Cuba, but it has an explicit comparative

perspective. Firstly, this is an analysis of the trajectory of the revolutionary generation that shaped the Cuban Revolution. I will describe

and illustrate the evolution of the Cuban Revolution through the

eyes and voices of its participants, from 1953 to the present. Secondly,

Cuba’s revolutionaries themselves are also an object of study. What

Revolutionaries | 3

happened to its members? What made them insurgents? What made

them socialists? What made them internationalists? Thirdly, the com-

parative element is highlighted in the central theme of this book:

Cuba’s internationalism in Latin America in the consecutive phases

of its relationship with the Caribbean and the Latin American region

as a whole.

This book traces the influence of Cuba’s revolutionary generation

in Latin America and the Caribbean from 1959 until the first decade

of the twenty-first century. It differs from other studies in the sense

that it is the first systematic analysis of the internationalization of the Cuban Revolution in Latin America and the Caribbean. As far as I

know, the following issues were never deeply examined: the organiza-

tion of this internationalizing process, the objectives and perspectives

of the leaders who formulated the strategy and tactics, the institu-

tional structures that implemented the policies, or the relationships of

Cuba with friendly or hostile governments and military dictatorships.

This study is a reconstruction of Cuba’s involvement with the region,

largely based on oral history, interviews with the (retired) members of

an elite organization that functioned as the ‘eyes and ears of Fidel’ –

the Departamento América – that implemented Cuba’s policy with

respect to the region, especially regarding the left and the armed left,

Latin America’s rebels, guerrilleros and revolutionaries. The analysis

is enriched with complementary interviews in Colombia and Central

America. It also draws on both testimonial publications and historical

narratives of most of the numerous revolutionary movements in the

region, particularly with respect to the experiences and consequences

of Cuba’s involvement.

This book is not a general history of the Cuban Revolution. I will,

of course, follow the evolution of Cuba’s economy, society and polit-

ical system. The majority of the chapters, however, are related to

Cuba’s support of Latin America’s revolutions and rebel movements.

During the Cold War, military dictatorships had replaced civilian

governments in many countries of the region. Counter-insurgency

was a favoured strategy of the ruling military administrations. Offi-

cial propaganda accused the emergence of any resistance movement,

rebellion, armed struggle – or even strike, protest march or mass

demonstration – of being the result of a sinister plot masterminded

4 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

by Cuban agents. In reality, Cuba supported most opposition move-

ments, moderate and insurrectional, against dictatorship and military

juntas. Cuba trained, advised, comforted and nurtured the numerous

rebellion movements that came to the island for support. In Latin

America and the Caribbean, political changes emerged across many

democratically elected centre-left and leftist governments in the 1990s

and 2000s. As I will emphasize in the final chapter of this text, this

transformation is at least in part a legacy of Cuba’s internationalism

and development assistance.

I will make frequent reference to roughly seventy interviews with

members of the revolutionary generation. Additionally, I make use

of about twenty interviews with former guerrilla representatives in

Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua. I also thoroughly

consulted published resources about nearly all guerrilla movements

that were supported by Cuba. With respect to Cuba itself, there is

an abundant number of biographical studies on Che Guevara. Fidel

Castro had the custom of letting himself be interviewed periodically

by biographers as well. There are also biographies of Raúl Castro and

Camilo Cienfuegos. Vilma Espín, Melba Hernández, Celia Sánchez

and Haydée Santamaría are the four women always mentioned as

outstanding participants in the insurgency.2 Nevertheless, it is clear that the revolutionary generation was much more extensive than the

famous few who lived in the limelight.

The Cuban Revolution was a source of inspiration for many other

revolutionary movements in Latin America and the Caribbean. The

second cohort – the Cuban internationalists – provided assistance in

many ways: as special envoys, confidential liaisons, trusted advisers,

diplomatic overseers, military instructors and medical specialists.

Between the 1960s and the 1990s, an elite group of high-level politi-

cal observers and counsellors worked as diplomats or as undercover

agents. They maintained direct relationships with Latin American

and Caribbean revolutionary movements. They also maintained

frequent contact with other political organizations, entrepreneurial

associations, labour unions, journalists and academic scholars. They

belonged to the Departamento América, an organization under the

charismatic leadership of Manuel Piñeiro – a close personal friend and

confidant of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, and one of Raúl Castro’s

Revolutionaries | 5

comandantes during the insurgency against Batista. The Departa-

mento América had several institutional predecessors, starting with

the Vice-Ministerio Técnico (VMT, Technical Vice-Ministry) of the

Ministerio del Interior (MININT, Ministry of the Interior). In 1971 the

VMT split into the Dirección General de Inteligencia (DGI, Directo-

rate General of Intelligence) and the Dirección General de Liberación

Nacional (DGLN, Directorate General of National Liberation), also

incorporated into the MININT.3 In 1975 the Departamento América, successor entity of the DGLN, was transferred to the Comité Central

of the Partido Comunista de Cuba (PCC, Communist Party of Cuba).

All these organizational structures were in fact the successive informal

elite departments that conducted Cuba’s secret foreign relations under

the direct supervision of, and access to, Fidel Castro. Official Cuban

sources have always been discreet about information regarding the

members and activities of the Departamento. Most of the chapters

of this book are dedicated to their close contacts with the armed left

and with progressive political parties and social movements in Latin

America and the Caribbean.

Methodology and data

For practical reasons I will follow the revolutionary generation until

the end of the first decade of this century, a period roughly coinciding

with the end of the administration of Fidel Castro and the matur-

ing of the Bolivarian Revolution of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela. In

order to portray the Cuban revolutionaries – the national combatants

and the internationalists – in a more coherent and realistic manner,

I will draw from two primary sources. A first round of thirty inter-

views was arranged with members of the national combatants, from

1953 to 1962. The interviews consisted of the life stories and testimo-

nies of men and women who fought as young people in the guerrilla

movement in the Sierra Madre and in the urban resistance groups.

They carried out tasks of dissemination of information, organized

public demonstrations against the Batista regime, prepared surprise

attacks and spectacular assaults (avoiding collateral civilian victims),

transported arms and money, and/or were affiliates and day-to-day

supporters of the guerrilla forces in the Sierra.4 These interviews were

6 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

conducted between March and October 2011.The respondents were

selected with the assistance of the Asociación de Combatientes de

la Revolución Cubana (Association of Combatants of the Cuban

Revolution). All interviews were taped and transcribed, then reor-

dered in a more chronological and thematic structure. All respondents

had the opportunity to review the text at least once to make alterations

and improvements.

Between October 2011 and March 2013, a second cycle of

interviews was organized among the members of the Departamento

América. All twenty-four interviewed members of the Departmento

(who were already retired at the time of the interview) were officers

at home and diplomats abroad during a considerable part of their

careers. In addition, fourteen interviews with other significant persons of the ‘extended institutional family’ of the Departmento were conducted,

covering the more ‘civilian component’ of Cuba’s internationalism and

development assistance.5 The interviewees also reviewed and corrected

their transcriptions.6 The Appendix provides the essential biographical and career data of the respondents directly quoted in this book.

I also draw from other interview sources: recent testimonial pub-

lications based on interviews with key figures of the armed left and

guerrilleros trained in Cuba. These include persons from Argentina,

Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela. I also

reviewed my own interviews with guerrilla leaders in Central America7

and made interview updates in Colombia, Central America and Mexico.

These new interviews in Colombia and Central America were conducted

between 2010 and 2015. Most interviews were taped and transcribed;

in cases where they were not, I took detailed notes while interviewing.

I explicitly compare and contrast the memories and experiences of

these former guerrilla members with those of the Cuban interviewees.

Structure of the book

Chapter 2 will establish the historical context of Cuba, the largest and most populated of the Caribbean island-states. Already charted

during Columbus’s first voyage to the Americas, it was also one of

the first territories to be colonized by Spain. However, it was the

last colony that sought independence – it remained under Spanish

Revolutionaries | 7

dominance until 1898, when it was occupied by the United States.

Cuba was formally declared independent in 1902; however, it was

only recently, after the Cuban Revolution, that the dependent dominion

status evaporated.

In this chapter I will also discuss the legacy of the colonial and twentieth-century economy and society up until the 1950s. I will

discuss the reverence for the heroes of the three unsuccessful inde-

pendence wars in the last decades of the nineteenth century, as well as

the inclination to rebellion in decades prior to the Cuban Revolution.

I will also examine the modernization of the country under American

control, the political culture that surfaced during the five decades of

the American protectorate, the significance of the student movements

of the twentieth century, and the extensive periods of dictatorship and

the periodic instances of upheaval in which the students were always

present. The last dictator was President-General Batista, against whom

various insurgent movements rebelled. I will briefly trace the ‘when’

and ‘why’ of the guerrilla movements in the Sierra Madre and how

the urban underground could finally triumph on 1 January 1959.

Chapter 3 provides a portrait of the revolutionary generation that participated in the insurrection between 1953 and 1959, the group

that constituted the Cuban Revolution. Here I will make significant

reference to the interviews with the combatants in the mountainous

eastern region (Sierra Madre) and the vital rebellions of the urban

underground in the flat regions of the country (Llano), where associ-

ated rebel groups operated. 8 I will review the history of the insurgency against Batista through the eyes of its very participants. The second

part of this chapter covers the principal events and episodes during

the three decisive years after January 1959. It was the phase of transi-

tion towards socialism and the implementation of the most important

revolutionary reforms. The analysis consists of the evolution of the

‘government of lawyers’ to a revolutionary government-cum-party

structure of (mainly) former guerrilla combatants as well as the

(uncomfortable) merger of the insurgent movements with the existing

Communist (Socialist) Party. The rapidly deteriorating relations with

the United States, the approach to the Soviet Union and the planning

(or non-planning) of Cuba’s economy as well as that of the restruc-

turing of its society – as seen through the eyes of the combatants – is

8 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

reserved for the end of the chapter. The failed American invasion at

the Bay of Pigs (Playa Girón) and the Missile Crisis were events that

consolidated Cuba’s trajectory towards socialism.

With the advantage of hindsight and the use of fresh, new, detailed

information in the interviews with Cuba’s internationalists, there is

an opportunity to nuance and balance the interpretation of Cuba’s

influence in the Latin American guerrilla movements. Chapters 4

through 6 are dedicated to the examination of Cuba’s official and unofficial foreign policy, especially with regard to the support of the

armed and non-armed left in the region. Following my own interests

and that of many of the interviewees, I cover in detail Cuba’s relations

with Mexico, Central America, Panama and the Andean countries

of Bolivia, Chile, Colombia and Peru. I also follow Cuba’s involve-

ment with the revolutionary governments in Granada, Guyana and

Jamaica, and the first government period of Colonel Bouterse in Suri-

nam. In lesser detail I analyse Cuba’s relations with Argentina, Brazil,

Ecuador, Paraguay and Uruguay. What were Cuba’s general and more

ad hoc, primary and secondary objectives? Who designed the over-

all strategy? How was the executing organization embedded? Here I

sketch a political portrait of Cuba’s spymaster, Manuel Piñeiro, and

the functioning of his elite organization, the Departamento América.

Chapter 4 is a study of Cuba’s involvement with nearly all insurgent movements in Latin America during the 1960s, through the Departamento América and its prior structures. Cuba became a leading

country within the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries (NO-AL,

Movimiento de los Países No Aliados). The island became a refuge

for persecuted intellectuals and politicians in the western hemisphere.

With the exception of Mexico, all Latin American countries rup-

tured diplomatic relations after the US embargo in 1962. Part of the

chapter is dedicated to the creation and operative style of the Depar-

tamento América and its leadership, along with the infiltration of

the oppositional Miami-based anti-Castro organizations and even of

the American security apparatus (and vice versa). It also describes

the good technical but politically strained relationship with its coun-

terpart organizations in the Soviet Union and the eastern European

socialist countries. In addition, it touches on the rivalry between the

Cubans and the Soviets about the control of and influence over Latin

Revolutionaries | 9

American communist parties, and specifically the guerrilla and resistant

underground movements during the first years of Latin America’s

dictatorships. The greater part of the chapter is dedicated to Cuba’s

support of the guerrilla movements of that period.

Chapter 5 covers the decades of the 1970s and 1980s: years of more pragmatic support, always emphasizing unity of action and organization

among the various, sometimes conflicting, guerrilla movements. At the

same time, contact with all non-armed resistance movements against mil-

itary dictatorship was maintained. This is also the period of Liberation

Theology, the Dependency Theory of the Social Sciences, the Allende gov-

ernment and the governments of progressive nationalist- leftist militaries in Peru (General Velasco Alvarado), Panama (General Torrijos Herrera) and

during a short period in Bolivia (Generals Alfredo Obando and Juan José

Torres) and Ecuador (General Rodriguez Lara). The Caribbean also saw

the emergence of progressive governments, such as that of Jamaica (Prime

Minister Manley), Grenada (Prime Minister Bishop) and Guyana. At the

same time, Cuba slowly but surely re-established diplomatic relations

with many Latin American and Caribbean countries. Cuba’s reputation

as a Third World leader increased hugely after its military involvement

in Angola. In the western hemisphere, Cuba’s support for revolutionary

movements continued.

In the case of countries suffering from repressive dictatorships, it

provided military training and advice, provision of medical services,

publication facilities, and rest and relaxation for the leadership and

the wounded or crippled guerrilla combatants. In the case of countries

where official diplomatic relations existed, support was restricted to

‘humanitarian support’, which was sometimes broadly interpreted.

Cuba supported neither the Mexican guerrilla movements of the

1960s and 1970s, nor the Zapatista Army for National Liberation

(Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional, EZLN) that formed in

1994. Mexico never had interrupted diplomatic relations with Cuba

and was its loyal supporter for decades. The Cubans detested the

actions of the Peruvian (officially Maoist) guerrilla of Shining Path, a

movement that was also never acknowledged by the Chinese govern-

ment. Central America became a region of Cuban attention. Special

mention is reserved for the support of Sandinista Nicaragua in the

1980s. Cuban aid also included (sometimes very substantial) support

10 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

in matters of defence and security as well as medical support and

assistance in literacy campaigns. This period ended with the implo-

sion of the Soviet Union and the disappearance of all communist

governments in eastern Europe.

Chapter 6 covers the decades of the 1990s and the 2000s. Cuba maintained its socialist character but without the economic support

of its former allies. Internally this meant the beginning of the ‘spe-

cial period’, which officially lasted only a couple of years but had

long-term consequences which persist to the present day. This period

entailed coping with an economy of enforced austerity. The relations

with the United States did not improve until December 2014, when

the re-establishment of diplomatic relations was announced after dec-

ades of negotiation. Cuba intensified relations with Venezuela after

the electoral victory of Hugo Chávez and the start of the so-called

Bolivarian Revolution. In 2004 Cuba and Venezuela signed the ALBA

covenant (Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América,

Bolivarian Alliance for the People of Our America), a formal agree-

ment that covered the exchange of medical and educational services

(Cuba) and petroleum (Venezuela). ALBA was subsequently joined by

Bolivia (2006), Nicaragua (2007), Ecuador (2009) and some smaller

Caribbean states – Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, St Vincent and

the Grenadines and St Lucia.

Where Cuba in previous decades had supported guerrilla warfare

and rebellion by the armed left, peace facilitation (Central Amer-

ica, Colombia) became the new hallmark of Cuba’s foreign policy

in the region. In the case of El Salvador, after two years of formal

negotiations, a peace agreement was reached between the national

government and the guerrilla movement FMLN (Frente Farabundo

Martí para la Liberación Nacional, or the Farabundo Martí Front for

National Liberation). Cuban leaders, especially Fidel Castro himself,

advised for years on how to begin to negotiate a political solution.

Even more clearly in the case of Guatemala, Cuba acted successfully

in offering its good offices. Formal peace negotiations between the

government and guerrilla umbrella URNG (Unidad Revolucionaria

Nacional Guatemalteca, Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unity)

had started in 1991. Parallel to the official negotiations, informal

dialogues had evolved between guerrilla leaders and representatives of

Revolutionaries | 11

the army. In March 1996 an army delegation of over twenty officers

and the entire guerrilla leadership departed for Cuba, where a cease-

fire and a personal reconciliation were reached. In December 1996

the formal peace agreements were signed. During the years of the

Guatemalan peace negotiations Cuba had established a rapport with

Norway, a country that had also offered its good offices. In the case

of Colombia, Cuban envoys had maintained good relations with

M-19 and the smaller guerrilla organizations that opted for peace

and disarmament in 1989. Simultaneously, it had sustained relations

with the ( guevarista) ELN and somewhat more distant relations with the FARC. In the period from 1998 until 2002, when the FARC was

based in the demilitarized zone of Caguán, Cuban emissaries partic-

ipated in preparations for formal peace negotiations. Between 2003

and 2007 the Colombian government and the ELN negotiated in

Havana. In 2010, again in tandem with Norway, Cuba facilitated the

first rounds of peace negotiations with the FARC. These negotiations

have persisted in Havana up to the present to the extent that several

partial agreements have been reached, even the crucial agreement on

ceasefire and disarmament, and a formal peace accord is expected

later in 2016.

CHAPTER 2

Historical context

Introduction

In 2011 I interviewed Antonio Llibre Artigas, who was seventy-nine

years old at the time. During the insurgency against dictator Batista

he had been Fidel Castro’s aide-de camp in the Sierra Maestra. After

1959 he had become a lawyer and political scientist. He also served as

a high-ranking diplomat in Algeria, a vital link between Cuba and the

African world. Afterwards he furthered his diplomatic career in several

European countries; he acted as one of the advisers to the head of the

delegation of COMECON (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance)

and negotiated the crucial membership of Cuba in 1972. After the

first interview he invited me to come back to his office two days later.

I asked him to describe the common traits of his colleagues, especially

the influences and inspirations characteristic of the revolutionary gen-

eration of the 1950s.1 He nodded his head, grabbed a bottle of rum,

served two small glasses and said: ‘That will take some time.’

To my surprise he did not begin with the rebellions and the

nineteenth-century wars of independence against Spain. Instead, he rat-

tled off a long and detailed series of quotations of successive American

presidents about how convenient it would be to dominate, annex or

incorporate Cuba. Effectively, Cuba’s history is not only closely related to the Caribbean and Latin America, but also intimately connected

to the historic and strategic interests of Spain and the United States.

In this chapter I will contextualize colonial and post-colonial Cuba.

I will pay special attention to the question of why Cuba did not follow the path to independence of so many other countries in Latin America:

by way of war. Most of this chapter is dedicated to the period from

circa 1860 to 1959, a century of civil strife and wars of independence.

Cuba’s complex relations with colonial and post-colonial Spain, the

Historical context | 13

American intervention in the Spanish-American War (1898–1902)

and Cuba’s formal independence under American supervision will be

analysed. The final two sections of this chapter will map out various

revolts, ending with the insurgency campaign of Fidel Castro. My aim

is to distil the historical ingredients of the collective conscience that moulded the revolutionary generation.

Colonial Cuba

Cuba had already been visited by Columbus during his first two

voyages in 1492 and 1494, but the first Spanish settlement was estab-

lished on the neighbouring island of La Española (or Hispaniola, the

present day two-state island of Haiti and the Dominican Republic). In

1510 an expedition was sent to (much larger) Cuba to conquer and

settle the island. The resistance of the indigenous peoples (Taínos,

Caribs) was quickly overcome; they disappeared in history. The

conquerors, however, did not find much gold; agriculture became

the main economic activity, exploiting the labour of imported black

slaves. Yet neither agriculture nor the farmers prospered. Zanetti

remarks that the exodus to Mexico, Florida and Central America

‘threatened to condemn the largest [colony] of the Antilles to the con-

dition of a “useless island” – an expression already used for some of

their smaller neighbours’.2 The tide turned in 1561 when the system of annual colonial fleets was established. Convoys had sailed from

Spain to the transfer ports of the viceroyalties of Peru and Mexico; the

return fleet was assembled in Havana.

Cuba became a paradise for European pirates. French, British and

Dutch buccaneers intercepted vessels and sometimes captured (most

of) the entire fleet. Smuggling, contraband and piracy were endemic

in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In several instances these

three countries assaulted Havana and occupied smaller or larger parts

of the island. As European maritime competitors of Spain, they tried

to establish empires in the Americas. The British and the French suc-

cessfully founded settlements in the northern landmass (present-day

Canada and the United States). Great Britain, France and the Netherlands

also competed in the West Indies (the Caribbean) and in South America.

The three Guianas changed hands among the British, the French and

14 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the Dutch. The French colonized the western part of La Española; in

1697 Spain officially ceded St-Domingue (Haiti). Remarkably, both

French St-Domingue and British Jamaica, and even the small Dutch

Antillean islands, developed sugar plantations that did substantially

better than the Spanish possessions in the Caribbean.3

Leather, tobacco and sugar became the major Cuban exports during

the first two centuries of colonialism. Tobacco became a monopoly of

the Spanish Crown. Since 1520, sugar cane was already being imported

from La Española. Cuba was not a densely populated country.4 In 1544, the island had a population smaller than 7,000; in 1607 there

were 20,000 inhabitants and in 1700 there were scarcely 50,000.

A significant portion was established in Havana.5 Common-law marriages with indigenous and black slave women were customary;

mestizo and mulato descendants formed a new population segment of

‘free mestizos’, ‘free mulatos’ and ‘free blacks’. Land tenure was an

important ingredient of colonial elite membership. Old families of the

traditional elite were inclined to form a select oligarchy, which per-

mitted marriages only with aristocratic Spanish administrators and

officers. White or ‘lightly coloured’ free professionals, military sub-

altern officers, teachers, doctors, lawyers and engineers constituted

a tiny middle class. Lower-middle-class citizens performed services

or worked as artisans or constructors; here all colour nuances could

be observed. Commercial agriculture, especially tobacco cultivation,

generated a class segment of small landholders and rural tenants.

Tempests of rebellion and independence swept over the Americas

in the second half of the eighteenth century. The first successful

rebellion was that of the thirteen American colonies, confeder-

ated into the United States of America. But after independence the

new state emerged as another imperial power in competition with

the older European colonial countries. Restlessly, the new coun-

try brought other territories under its domain by force, by buying

colonial possessions from France, Spain and Russia, or by conquest

from Mexico. 6 The emerging continental power was also attracted

to opportunities to conquer or annex territories in the Caribbean

and the Pacific which belonged to Spain. They also had their eyes

on land-ends that belonged to Colombia and formally independent

countries in Central America.

Historical context | 15

The independence of the former North American colonies also

reverberated in most Spanish colonies in the Americas. During the

Napoleonic Wars in Europe, Spain and Portugal were overrun by French

armies, and the weakness of the two Iberian powers evoked even more

sympathy for, and interest in, independence efforts. As a result, great

patriotic leaders of national independence emerged across Latin America:

Hidalgo in Mexico, De Miranda and Bolivar in Venezuela, Santander in

Colombia, O’Higgins in Chile, and De San Martin in Argentina.7 The

last two decisive battles against the Spanish armies in the Americas were fought in Peru, in 1821 and 1824. In 1823 the countries of the Central

American isthmus declared independence from Spain, then from Mexico.

The independence of Brazil was actually a matter of dynastic arrange-

ments, when the Portuguese Cortes forced the king – governing from

Brazil during the Napoleonic years – to return to Lisbon. His son Pedro

acclaimed himself Brazil’s first emperor in 1822.

The intriguing question remains why Cuba, which was the most

important Spanish colony in the Caribbean in the early nineteenth

century, did not declare independence but opted for the status quo.

Cuban historians mention the effects of the Haitian slave rebellion

and the killing of plantation holders in 1804, and the harsh and

repressive Spanish regime in Cuba during the decades of the Wars

of Independence. But even the Dominican Republic, which suffered

much more from the Haitian rebellion, gained independence in 1821.

André Gunder Frank coined the term Lumpenbourgeoisie to typify

the Latin American class of merchants, industrialists and plantation

holders as an elite that refused to perform its ‘historical mission’

to support national independence and implant national capitalism.

Instead they assumed the more comfortable position of intermediary

between foreign colonial powers, subordinated to their foreign mas-

ters. If that is indeed the case, then the Cuban elite were one of the

first examples of Lumpenbourgeoisie. There were tiny efforts to proclaim independence from Spain in 1811, 1812 and 1823. The most

important voice of independence and for abolition of slavery came

from the Cuban priest Félix Varela, during his exile in the United

States. Bolivar had ideas about an expedition to liberate Puerto Rico

and afterwards Cuba, but the dissolution of Gran Colombia in 1830

impeded further action.8

16 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

The Cuban colonial economy and society remained as stratified as

they were during the eighteenth century. A process of land and wealth

concentration took place in the mid-1880s.9 Slavery became even more important in that period. In the first decades of the nineteenth century, however, slave trade was forbidden, first by Britain and then by the

United States. An appalling fact is that, of the roughly 565,000 slaves

imported into Cuba from 1512 to 1865, about 425,000 (or 75 per

cent) were imported in the nineteenth century.10 Eventually, in 1886, a Spanish royal decree formally abolished slavery in Cuba. With only

free labour at hand, the Cuban sugar plantations were transformed

into enormous and fully mechanized centrales (capital-intensive sugar mills) in the 1880s and 1890s. What is remarkable is the fact that,

between 1878 and 1895, about 300,000 Spanish contract labourers

migrated to Cuba to join the workforce in the sugar industry; most

migrants remained and became permanent inhabitants of Cuba. 11 At

that point the sugar economy was already primarily dependent on its

exports to the United States, not to Spain.

The colonial ties with Spain were not appreciated by all members

of the Cuban elite. Both equal rights and incorporation as a Spanish

overseas province were denied; Cuba was a dependent colony with cer-

tain privileges reserved for the rich and the powerful. Frustrated by

the Spanish monarchy, elite segments initiated a discussion about alter-

natives: annexation or incorporation by the United States. American

presidents and politicians had expressed their interest in Cuba since

the early nineteenth century:12 President Jefferson considered annexation in 1809, and Madison contacted the wealthy Cuban plantation

owners for the same reason. Secretary of State John Quincy Adams

predicted that, over the course of time, Cuba would fall as ripe fruit

into American hands. After the American annexation of Texas in

1845, influential Cuban landowning families founded the ‘Club of

Havana’ in an effort to encourage the purchase of Cuba from Spain by

the United States. In vain, President Polk offered 100 million dollars

to the Spanish Crown. In 1854 President Pierce increased the offer to

130 million; it was also rejected.13 Cuban and American supporters of annexation organized, as in the case of Nicaragua, to ‘filibuster’

expeditions to Cuba that involved several hundred adventurers in the

1840s and 1850s.14 Their efforts failed. American abolitionists suspected

Historical context | 17

that a future annexation of Cuba would increase the number of slave

states. In the aftermath of the American Civil War, the annexation

debate lost impetus. However, when Cuban independence movements

acquired momentum again in the 1860s, American interests in Cuban

internal affairs increased as well.

Cuba’s wars of independence

In 1865, reform-minded Cuban and Puerto Rican envoys to Madrid

discussed the necessity of political, social and economic trans-

formations. They were specifically concerned with the countries’

relationships with Spain in terms of the abolition of slavery, labour

reforms and improvements of the terms of trade and taxation. 15

Several angry debates ensued, and the reform efforts failed. Both

colonies, Puerto Rico and Cuba, proclaimed independence in 1868.

The insurgency in Puerto Rico was rapidly repressed. The Cuban

revolt resulted in three successive insurrections: the Ten Years’ War

(1868–78), the Little War (or Guerra Chiquita, 1878–80) and the War

of 1895–98 (sometimes confusingly called the War for Independence,

which developed into the Spanish-American War of 1898). Formally,

Cuba’s independence was declared in 1902, not by Spain but by the

United States, whose armed forces intervened in the last months of the

third Cuban-Spanish War of Liberation. 16

In September 1868 an insurrection in Madrid resulted in the exile

of the Spanish queen Isabella. Revolution in the Spanish capital led

to rebellion in the country’s Caribbean colonies. In October 1868,

the local Cuban landowner Carlos Manuel de Céspedes freed his

slaves and declared both independence and the abolition of slavery.

The Cuban revolt, originally started in the east – the Oriente province –

spread promptly to other provinces. During this war and the

subsequent rebellion campaigns, many former slaves joined the revo-

lutionary movement as soldiers called ‘mambis’. 17 In 1874, however, the Spanish Republic was overthrown by a military government that

initiated a campaign of harsh repression in Spain and its colonies.

Eventually, the rebellion concluded in a pact, the so-called Pact of

Zanjón of 1878. During the Ten Years’ War Spain sent in roughly

210,000 soldiers, at least 50,000 of whom died. 18 During the first

18 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

War of Independence, Dominican-born general Máximo Gómez and

Cuban-born generals Maceo and Calixto García acquired fame.19

The Pact of Zanjón of 1878 transformed the latent anti-colonial and

ethnic conflict into another rebellion, the Guerra Chiquita of 1878,

1879 and 1880. In fact, this rebellion was initiated by General Maceo

and the thousands of soldiers under his command, who refused to rec-

ognize a peace agreement without independence and the abolition of

slavery. During the conflict there was a clash between (white) General

Calixto García and (black) General Maceo. Their dispute divided the

revolutionary soldiers, and the new Spanish captain-general Polovieja

suppressed the revolt in the Oriente. As a result, most revolutionary

leaders went into exile. 20

During the Guerra Chiquita a young national revolutionary hero,

José Martí, ascended to fame.21 Martí, born in 1853 to Spanish immigrants, had been exiled to Spain at the age of sixteen. A lawyer and

prolific journalist, he returned to Cuba in 1878 under the provisions

of the Pact of Zanjón. The following year he was deported to Spain

again and escaped to the United States, where he spent a considerable

part of his life. There, in exile, he founded the Partido Revolucion-

ario Cubano (PRC, Cuban Revolutionary Party), recruiting its first

members from the pool of Cuban exiles.22 Nuclei of rebellion rapidly formed in Cuba and the United States. As delegate of his party he

convinced General Máximo Gómez (and other revolutionary generals

like Maceo) to take up arms once again. By the end of 1894, three

ships with armed revolutionaries sailed from Florida to Cuba. At the

same time, another rebellion erupted in the Philippines, Spain’s last

Asian colony.

Santiago de Cuba once again became the principal stronghold of

the Cuban rebellion. Spain sent in an army of 200,000 enlisted men

and officers for ‘pacification’, which was in reality a bloody coun-

ter-insurgency campaign that employed the use of concentration

camps.23 The guerrilla forces were on the defensive, but the Spanish

counter-insurgency operations had only limited success. In early

1898, the Spanish government offered self-rule and amnesty to all

Cuban prisoners in Spanish jails. This reform programme had ended

the war in the Philippines, but the Cuban Liberation Army refused

to lay down arms.

Historical context | 19

At this point, the United States stepped in. A mysterious explosion

aboard the US battleship Maine in the harbour of Havana, resulting in the death of more than 250 American servicemen, was seen as a

casus belli. The United States declared war on Spain. Between May and August 1898, the US Navy destroyed the Spanish fleet and occupied Manila after its desertion by the majority of Philippine soldiers.

In August 1898, Puerto Rico was also occupied by an American inva-

sion force of 15,000 men.24 In Cuba the US Navy routed the Spanish fleet into the Bay of Santiago de Cuba and invaded the island with

a force of 15,000 soldiers.25 They defeated the Spanish army in a six-week campaign. The Americans prevented the Cuban Liberation

Army from formally taking over Santiago. At the signing of the Treaty

of Paris in December 1898, only the American and the Spanish gov-

ernment were represented. The Cuban rebel leadership was not even

invited, a fact that has always been remembered with bitterness. As a

result, Spain ceded its Caribbean and Pacific possessions (Cuba, the

Philippines and Puerto Rico) to the United States. 26

Cuba’s supervised independence

Between 1898 and 1902, Cuba was occupied by the American army.

The United States established ‘in effect, a military dictatorship. The

Spanish captain-general was replaced by an American general’. 27

More American soldiers were sent in to enforce the occupation. The

majority of the officials of the Spanish public sector were re-employed.

Americanized former Cuban exiles, white and wealthy, returned to

the island; American entrepreneurs and businessmen joined them.

They were followed by Protestant missionaries; churches and schools

were founded by Methodists, Baptists and especially Presbyterians. At

the same time, the Roman Catholic Church opted for reinforcing its

ties with Spain. 28

The US military governor also created a new security force, dis-

banding the Cuban rebel army of 33,000 soldiers and prohibiting

Martí’s Partido Revolucionario Cubano (PRC). A paramilitary

Guardia Rural was established, incorporating a number of former

rebel combatants. Unsurprisingly, the officer corps was white. A gov-

ernment cabinet was formed, and all ministerial appointments went

20 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

to Americanized white Cubans. The Department of Customs was run

by an American officer.29 The economy was in ruins; 100,000 ranches and smallholdings had been destroyed. Production of sugar diminished to 70 per cent of its original capacity; that of tobacco to 80 per

cent. 30 In addition, 42 per cent of the labour force was unemployed. 31

The American government and its representatives in Havana

had expected a legal annexation of Cuba. In order to achieve this,

legitimatization through elections was organized. The (municipal)

elections in 1900 were restricted to a selected electorate, representing

5 per cent of the population. To the surprise of the authorities, two

of the three participating political movements opted for independ-

ence after elections. Then a Convention was formed to draft a new

constitution, preparing Cuba to be a formally independent republic.

According to President McKinley, however, it would be connected to

the United States through ‘ties of singular intimacy’. 32 These ties were legalized (and afterwards enforced) by the so-called Platt Amendment

(Enmienda Platt).33 The conditions of this amendment – giving the

United States the right to intervene, to approve credit and loans for

third-party countries, and to provide four harbour enclaves inter alia –

created a de facto neocolonial status for the new republic, aggravated

by the territorial secession of Guantánamo as a US naval base. Even-

tually, the Convention approved an amendment that allowed only for

a choice of either ‘mortgaged independence’ or no independence at

all. 34 Like the exclusion of the Cuban rebel leadership at the peace negotiations in Paris, the imposition of the Platt Amendment created

bitter resentment that transmitted from generation to generation and

eventually exploded in 1933 and again in 1959.

After 1898, Puerto Rico and the Philippines were governed

directly by American administrators and English replaced Spanish

as the official language. The Philippines acquired semi-independ-

ence as a Commonwealth (associate state) in 1934, to be declared

an independent republic in 1946. In the case of Puerto Rico, also a

Commonwealth, the United States granted US citizenship to Puerto

Rican island residents. Cuba and Puerto Rico were not the only terri-

tories in the western hemisphere to become American protectorates.

US diplomacy and military also intervened in Panama, which was

created as an independent state when it conceded the Canal Zone

Historical context | 21

in 1904. The US military intervened in 1904, 1912, from 1918 to

1920, and again in 1925. During World War II the Canal Zone was

occupied; the most recent military invasion was in 1989. The United

States also occupied Nicaragua from 1912 to 1925, and intervened

again in the 1930s. Haiti was occupied between 1915 and 1934, and

the Dominican Republic from 1916 to 1930.

Against this background, one cannot be surprised that the United

States also intervened frequently in Cuba: between 1906 and 1909,

in 1912, and again between 1917 and 1923. The Platt Amendment

was formally revoked in 1934, but Cuba’s position as a US protector-

ate lasted until 1959. Cuban presidents asked for military assistance

when confronted with opposition by political movements, trade

unions or peasants’ associations. US envoys and ambassadors advised

on internal affairs and mediated in conflicts. Dictators and civilian

presidents became acquaintances to maintain respectful relations with

the American proconsul on the island. They asked for recommenda-

tions and assistance, and most importantly they complied with his

suggestions. Cuba’s economy adjusted even more to US interests. In

December 1898, President McKinley decreed the use of the dollar as

legal currency in Cuba. In 1914 Cuban president García Menocal

introduced the Cuban peso at a parity of 1:1.35 By 1920 American

products represented 72 per cent of all Cuban imports and 79 per cent

of the island’s exports were destined for the United States. 36

US investment in the Cuban sugar sector (representing 80 per cent

of Cuba’s export volume) rose from 23 per cent in 1903 to 53 per

cent in 1928. 37 As Gott38 commented: ‘Bankers and traders, mill and plantation owners, railroad operators and simple investors, all looked

to the [United] States to protect their interests. Cuba had become a

colony in all but name.’ In 1927 the ten most extensive and prosper-

ous sugar estates in Cuba, totalling 670,000 hectares, were the private

property of American businessmen.39 Between 1898 and 1930, several thousand US citizens immigrated to Cuba, accompanied by 200,000

Spanish and 150,000 Antillean labour migrants. 40

US influence had a more positive consequence as well. During the

1920s a modernization process took place in the form of cars, electric

light, urban railways, a national railway system, a national telephone

system, a national broadcasting system, baseball stadiums and movie

22 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

theatres. 41 Semi-urban and rural poverty was widespread, but in comparison with other Latin American countries Cuba could at least

boast a middle-class ambience for the well-to-do.

Important popular and student organizations emerged in the

1920s. In 1921 the Federación Obrera de La Habana (Havana Workers’

Federation) was established. In 1925, the Confederación Nacional Obrera

de Cuba (CNOC, National Workers’ Confederation of Cuba) was

formed under the leadership of anarchists. Several municipal and pro-

vincial committees founded the Partido Comunista de Cuba (PCC,

Communist Party of Cuba) in 1925. One of its founding members

was the student leader Julio Antonio Mella, who was also the founder

of the Federación de Estudiantes Universitarios (FEU, Federation of

University Students), created in 1922. 42 In 1923 the Confederación

de Estudiantes de Cuba (CEC, the Confederation of Cuban Students)

organized the secondary school students. Both student organizations,

inspired by Martí’s writings, closely cooperated in the decades that fol-

lowed. The old veterans of the liberation wars joined together to form

the Association of Veterans and Patriots (Asociación de Veteranos y

Patriotas, AVP), also in 1923. Originally an organization to further

the steady payment of military pensions, the association was generally

critical of the successive governments. Prior to the creation of these

organizations, the Movimiento de Independientes de Color – a social

movement of blacks and mulatos – tried to improve the marginalized

situation of these population segments. The government of the day

prohibited the creation of political parties based on ‘race and colour’.

When the movement rebelled in 1912, it was cruelly crushed as US

marines arrived to protect American properties.43

Between 1925 and 1933 Cuba was governed, at least formally, by

President Machado, a general turned businessman and a protégé of the

American ambassador. Establishing a de facto civilian–military dicta-

torship, he created a formidable opposition: the army (some officers

started an armed revolt that was crushed), the veterans, the students,

the labour unions and the political left. In 1927 a Directorio Estudiantil Universitario (DEU, University Students’ Directorate), a radical protest

organization against Machado, was created. Machado’s second term

coincided with the Great Depression. Economic conditions in Cuba

deteriorated when the United States was also affected by the crisis.

Historical context | 23

In a couple of months, 25 per cent of the entire Cuban labour force

was unemployed. A national strike paralysed the country in 1930.

Several clandestine organizations emerged; the Directorio Estudiantil

Universitario went underground. A more socialist-oriented wing split

off into the Ala Izquierda Estudiantil (Students’ Left Wing, AIE), pre-

paring for urban guerrilla activities. One of its leaders was Raúl Roa,

Cuba’s minister of foreign relations after 1959. Another member of

the Directorio Estudiantil was the revolutionary Antonio Guiteras; he

headed a guerrilla group in the Sierra Maestra and overtook the army

barracks of San Luis.44

The strike of 1930 was fiercely repressed, but the clandestine resist-

ance movements remained unbroken. Despite the presence of military

governors and an active political police, unions continued to organize

strikes. In July 1933, bus drivers organized a transportation strike that spread rapidly to other sectors. In August 1933, the army opted for

Machado’s resignation while the American ambassador procured a

transition government. Over the course of four months, a revolution-

ary fervour flooded the island. Protesters occupied sugar factories and

sometimes established local soviets. In September 1933, sergeants, cor-

porals and rank-and-file soldiers staged a coup, supported by the DEU

and some university professors. A key figure was sergeant-major Ful-

gencio Batista. In 1933/34, a revolutionary wind swept across Cuba. 45

A revolutionary presidency was formed by five members, the

so-called Pentarquía (Pentarchy), which only managed to govern for

less than a week. 46 Thereafter, at the request of the DEU, Grau San Martín was appointed president while Antonio Guiteras integrated

the cabinet as minister of government, war and navy. In fact, the army

was the stronghold for Batista, who forced most of the commissioned

officers to retire and replaced them with his allies – the sergeants and

corporals. As chief commander of the armed forces, he controlled the

Grau government. The government implemented a series of reforms:

the creation of the Ministry of Labour, a minimum wage, free union-

ization of the labour force, collective labour negotiations, a social

security system, several nationalizations, and the de facto abolishment

of the Platt Amendment. 47

The American ambassador refused to recognize the Grau govern-

ment. Batista had already clashed with Guiteras and saw a successor

24 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

for Grau in Colonel Mendieta, leader of the shrunken Liberal Party.

Grau went into exile in Mexico. In 1934, a new Reciprocity Treaty

was signed between Cuba and the United States; the US military base

at Guantánamo was maintained. In opposition, Guiteras founded

a clandestine movement, Jóven Cuba, and prepared for a national

strike in 1935. The new government – and Batista – imposed mar-

tial law and crushed the strike. When Guiteras prepared for exile by

initiating a guerrilla movement and returning to the island, he was

murdered. Consequently, Cuba came under military control. This

time, from 1934 to 1944, Batista – a sergeant-major turned general –

governed the country from the military Camp Columbia (in Spanish

the Ciudad Militar Columbia), the army’s headquarters in Havana.

Between 1934 and 1940, he first acted as military strongman and del-

egated government to seven puppet presidents of his choice. In 1940

he was finally elected president.

By fusing populism with authoritarian governance, Batista acquired

certain popularity, skilfully manoeuvring between reforms and con-

cessions to the right and left. He convened a Constituent Assembly

and produced the constitution of 1940. The new constitution was

progressive – at least for its time – with an eight-hour workday, a

forty-four-hour work week, a pension system, a progressive social

security system, freedom of association and universal suffrage. Public

education was free and mandatory, racial and sexual discrimination

were outlawed, and the death penalty was abolished. Grau’s political

followers opted for electoral opposition and Batista sought and found

political support from the Communist Party, legalized in 1939.48

The party was permitted to create a new union structure, the Con-

federación de Trabajadores de Cuba (CTC, Confederation of Cuban

Workers), a supporter and beneficiary of the Ministry of Labour.

Cuba, a staunch ally of the United States, had a flourishing economy

during World War II. In 1944, Batista lost the presidential elections

to Grau, who assumed Cuba’s presidency from 1944 to 1948. During

that period Cuba’s economy was in even better shape. The war period

benefited the island with favourable sugar export terms. Between

1940 and 1947, sugar export value jumped from 2.7 million to

54.2 million per ton; its overall export value ascended from 110 million

to 746 million dollars (pesos). 49 Hence, the new government had spending

Historical context | 25

power for public works and employment policies. The Cuban pub-

lic sector expanded enormously: from 60,000 positions in 1943 to

131,000 in 1949. 50 Along with prosperity, corruption also peaked.

Personal enrichment of the president (and his successors) and cabinet

members (and their successors) became notorious.51 Corruption, mis-management, ‘gangsterism’ ( gansterismo, a Cuban slang term), and

even control of student movements and trade unions, became ingre-

dients of everyday politics. To quote Henken:52 ‘Sadly, over the next eight years Grau, his party, and his successor, Carlos Prío Socarrás,

went on to violate nearly every principle of good government in a

fashion that would bring shame perhaps even to the utterly venal and

corrupt politicians of Cuba’s first republic.’ While Grau shifted to the

right during his presidency, Prío Socarrás – who, prior to his presi-

dency, was the minister of labour – was a right-wing hard-liner from

the outset. His fierce anti-communism was equally reflected in his

persecution of the labour movement and the CTC in particular.

The 1940s and 1950s were also decades that saw the penetration

of American organized crime in Cuba’s economy, society and political

structures. Smuggling and trafficking to the United States had also

been an important clandestine economic activity during the 1930s, the

World War II years and the early post-war years. Yet especially dur-

ing the government of Prío Socarrás, the gambling and prostitution

rackets – and the casinos associated with American mafia bosses –

flourished as never before. 53 Meyer Lansky was the unofficial mafia representative during the 1940s and early 1950s. He founded the

company Cuba Nacional in Havana (which later merged with the

National Cuba Hotel Corporation). The company had partial ownership

of Hotel Nacional and the Hilton Hotel chain. 54

By 1947 a former student leader, Eduardo Chibás – a talented radio

speaker and debater – broke with the ruling political party alli-

ances and organized a new party, the Partido del Pueblo (Ortodoxo)

(PCC–O, the (Orthodox) People’s Party). The new party adhered to

the ideals of the revolutionary 1930s – freedom, social justice and

labour reforms, property and agrarian reforms, educational reforms,

and honesty in public affairs. 55 He rapidly achieved enormous popularity, especially by means of his campaign against corruption. His

well-known statement (‘ verguënza contra dinero’, or shame against

26 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

money) remained in the collective memory of his and the subsequent

generation. All revolutionary veterans I interviewed remembered

Chibás for his honesty in public affairs and his anti-corruption cam-

paign. He would have been a serious presidential candidate in 1952. 56

But in 1951 he shot himself during his weekly radio transmission,

unable to present definitive proof against a minister he had accused

of misappropriation. His funeral caused a great popular demonstra-

tion, attended by hundreds of thousands of mourners. After his death,

Chibás became a man venerated with popular mystique.57

Dictatorship and rebellion

The 1952 elections were organized in an atmosphere of disillusion

caused by Chibás’ death, and by a discredited government. It was

assumed that the opposition would gain control; Batista had acquired

a meagre 14 per cent in the polls. He then staged a coup – early in

the morning of 10 March 1952, he and his followers arrived at Camp

Columbia and arrested all senior officers. President Prío sought refuge

in the Mexican embassy. It was a textbook coup; the plotters seized

all army posts and strategic positions. Communications and transport

were immediately controlled. The university was closed, union offices

occupied, the Communist Party banned. Constitutional guarantees

were suspended. The right to strike in labour disputes was revoked.

Batista promised new elections in 1954 and decreed a salary increase

for all military and police officers.58 He also dissolved the existing political parties and disbanded the Senate and the Chamber of

Representatives.

The United States was quick to recognize the new government;

Batista acted with energy and was, after all, an ally in the Cold War.

The number of American corporations proliferated and Cuba became

a major tourist destination. In adherence with the wishes of Meyer

Lansky, who had privately furnished huge cash provisions, Batista

opened Havana to large-scale gambling, hotel and casino investments,

and prostitution.59 He became very rich as a result. 60 Initially, Batista at least received the half-hearted support of important population

segments and institutions: the bankers, the sugar elite, rural land-

owners and even some labour leaders like that of the CTC, Eusebio

Historical context | 27

Mujal.61 The two significant political parties, the Partido Auténtico (the Authentic Party of Grau and Prío Socarrás) and the Partido

Ortodoxo (Chibás’ Orthodox Party), split up into factions. A small

minority joined the ranks of the Batista sympathizers and the majority

opted for a ‘non-insurrectional opposition’. 62 The Communist Party, the Partido Socialista Popular (PSP, Popular Socialist Party), took an

ambiguous position until 1958. Their leadership had never been in

tune with Guiteras’ resistance movement in the 1930s. Moreover, they

had – with instances of hiatus – collaborated with Batista for two dec-

ades. 63 Denouncing the coup as ‘pro-imperialist’, they abstained from

insurrectional activities, sailing their private course without much

affinity for other movements that opted for insurgency against Batista.

Resistance against the Batista regime grew rapidly, but the reasons

were political rather than economic. Cuba in the mid-1950s, though

affected by poverty and racism, was not a poor or underdeveloped

country by Latin American and Caribbean standards. As Pérez64

remarked, the frame of reference for Cuba’s middle classes was the

standard of living of the United States, not that of other countries in

Latin America and the Caribbean. In 1957, Cuba ranked second in

terms of per capita income after Venezuela; first in terms of telephones, newspapers and motor vehicles per thousand inhabitants; third –

after Brazil and Mexico – in terms of radios and TVs; and third – after

Argentina and Uruguay – in terms of daily food consumption. In

1958 Cuba had between thirty and forty radio stations and five TV

channels, one of which was in colour. Literacy was relatively high:

only 30 per cent of the national population was illiterate. 65

Moreover, in accordance with Cuba’s tradition of armed rebellion

and armed liberation movements, secret organizations with clear

insurrectional aims also emerged: the Asociación de Amigos de Aure-

liano, the Movimiento Nacional Revolucionario (MNR, National

Revolutionary Movement) and Acción Libertadora (AL, Action for

Liberation).66 Their leadership had participated in the rebellions against Machado in the 1930s. The Triple A, created by Prío Socarrás’ minister of education, Aureliano Sánchez Arango, and financed

by Cuban emigrants in the United States, conducted sabotage using

explosives and prepared plans for assaults on Batista. They were allied

with retired and active-duty military. The MNR, headed by university

28 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

professor (and former member of the DEU in the early 1930s) Rafael

García-Bárcena, organized a clandestine movement of students and

intellectuals. Their most militant members tried to overwhelm the mil-

itary Camp Columbia in April 1953; their insurrection failed.67 Acción Libertadora – headed by Justo Carrillo Hernández and consisting of

students, journalists, labour union leaders and organized workers –

launched an underground journal, prepared an attack against Batista,

and conducted actions of sabotage in Havana and Santiago de Cuba.

A new clandestine movement then changed the situation, putting

a definitive stamp on Cuba’s development. It was founded by Fidel

Castro, a young lawyer who as a student leader had been affiliated

with the left wing of Chibás’ Partido Ortodoxo. Castro proved to

be the charismatic leader of the revolutionary insurgency movement

that quickly triumphed over Batista’s dictatorship and acquired

a mass following. Between the second half of 1952 and the begin-

ning of 1953, the movement (initially called El Movimiento) began

in Havana and the surrounding provinces. It was a conglomerate

of secret, selective and compartmentalized cells of carefully selected

members. It was organized around a national directorate composed

of two committees, one military and another civilian. It included

1,500 members – students, workers and former disenchanted affili-

ates of the youth organizations of the traditional parties, along with

their trusted friends and family members. Castro was preparing for

an armed insurrection in the eastern region, based on its tradition

of armed rebellion and strong support for the liberation armies of

the nineteenth century. Of the 1,500 members, 165 were selected for

an assault (on 26 July 1953, subsequently to become, as 26-7, the

designation of the revolutionary movement) on the military barracks

of Moncada in Santiago de Cuba (the second-most important in the

country) and of Carlos Manuel de Céspedes in Bayamo. 68 Once the

barracks were overpowered, the large stock of weapons would be

distributed to the people.

The assault failed, however. The army captured and massacred fifty

attackers. Fidel and his brother Raúl escaped with a smaller group

of twenty-five to the Sierra Maestra, where they were subsequently

captured. 69 At his trial in September 1953, Castro defended himself by invoking José Martí. The written version of his defence, La Historia

Historical context | 29

Me Absolvará (History Will Absolve Me), in fact a political programme of nationalizations and land reform, circulated clandestinely afterwards

and impacted the radicalizing Cuban youth. All contemporaries I inter-

viewed in Cuba (see Chapter 1) said that they felt at the time that the (then relatively unknown) Fidel expressed the wishes of an entire

generation. Fidel and the other attackers were incarcerated. When

Batista tried to legitimize his regime with fraudulent elections in 1954 –

he ran unopposed and acquired 40 per cent of the electorate –‒ he proclaimed an amnesty policy that, after a public campaign, also

incorporated the Moncada assailants.

Probably by coincidence, on exactly the same day the Cuban Buró

para la Represión de las Actividades Comunistas (Bureau of Repres-

sion of Communist Activities, BRAC) – designed by CIA officers – was

created. In addition, a structure of somewhat rival repressive institutions –

the Servicio de Inteligencia Militar (SIM, Military Intelligence

Service) and the Servicio de Inteligencia Naval (SIN, Naval Intelli-

gence Service) in the cities; and the Servicio de Inteligencia Regimental (SIR, Regimental Intelligence Service) and the Guardia Rural (Rural

Guard) in the rural areas – was set up, each operating with a network

of snitches ( chivatos). 70 The climate of increasing repression resulted in Fidel and his closest comrades seeking refuge in Mexico to prepare

an armed insurrection, sensing that ‘all doors of the civic struggle

[had] closed’. Before departing for Mexico he appointed Frank País,

another charismatic leader of the first hour, as national chief of action

in Cuba.71 They would launch the guerrilla movement in the Oriente province, the most important region during the three wars of independence. País organized the first urban and regional networks of

‘action and sabotage’ of the public sector, along with the execution

of snitches throughout the country. He also set up committees of

funding, armament provision, medicine, transport and logistics. 72

The student movement fostered a second current of insurgency. The

Federación Estudiantil Universitaria (FEU) had periodically demon-

strated against Batista since March 1952. Most of the protest marches

were spontaneously organized; the police would intervene harshly,

using brutal violence against the demonstrating students.73 In early

1955 the president of the FEU at the time, José Antonio Echevar-

ría, launched a campaign of organized marches and publicity for

30 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

wounded students. Moreover, realizing that the FEU itself did not

have a structure of insurgency, he founded a Célula Central (central

cell) as the nucleus of the subsequent Directorio Revolucionario (DR):

Echeverria knew that the structure of the FEU was not suit-

able for the armed struggle […] the Directorio would be the

organisation of the revolutionary students […] In early 1955

he convened a meeting in a residence in Calle Lesquina a

Calle 27 No. 460 […] There we decided to change the name

to Directorio Revolucionario [instead of Estudiantil Universi-

tario. Present were José Antonio Echeverría, Faure Chomón,

Fructuoso Rodríguez, Jorge Ibarra, José Luis Varona and René

Anill.] Thereafter we organized nuclei throughout the country

and organised the clandestine structures. In September 1955 we

were invited, as the central cell, to another meeting with newly

recruited compañeros, and it was then that we established an

Ejecutivo Nacional […] In another meeting we chose 24 February

1956 as the official announcement […] That day José Echever-

ría, the organisation’s Secretary General, publicly presented the

DR as founded in the Magna Aula of the University of Havana,

and announced that it would be the armed branch of the FEU.74

By 30/31 August 1956 Echeverría and Fidel Castro had signed a

formal insurrectional alliance, the so-called ‘Carta de Mexico,

signed with the decision to die or to triumph’. 75 During these years

of insurgence (1956–58) they would support each other’s actions,

and after the triumph in 1959 the two organizations would merge.

In fact, part of their recruitment base overlapped and the members

of the two insurgent movements were like-minded. Their approach,

however, was different: the DR opted for spectacular urban guer-

rilla activities while the M 26-7 favoured a combination of rural

guerrilla and urban insurgency. Student units of the DR organized

protest marches, working from the idea of ‘armed manifestations’

in which armed commandos ‘incentivised the masses’. Their actions,

aiming to hit Batista’s top leadership, sometimes triggered escalating

violence. In 1956 they executed Colonel Blanco Rico, chief of the

Historical context | 31

SIM, while he attended a nightclub performance. In retaliation, hit

men of the intelligence community assaulted the Haitian embassy,

where nine student members had sought refuge. They were mur-

dered but during the fight the students killed Colonel Piedra, chief

of the feared Buró de Investigaciones de la Policía (Bureau of Police

Investigation).76

The Mujeres Martianas (short for the Frente Cívico de Mujeres

Martianas, or Civic Front of Martí Women) was created at the

University of Havana in 1953 on the occasion of Martí’s hundredth

birthday. It was a non-armed but influential national organization,

which was also a significant support for the armed insurgents. It

would quickly function as a civilian sustenance organization for both

the M 26-7 and the DR. When the first board members of the Mujeres

Martianas were arrested in January 1953, Fidel Castro was their law-

yer. In September 1955 Fidel invited them to affiliate with the M 26-7;

several of their national and provincial members joined the guerrilla

and the urban armed resistance groups as well.

Meanwhile, Fidel had assembled and trained an expeditionary group

of members in Mexico.77 There he and his brother had befriended Che Guevara, who would join the overcrowded Granma yacht as the

medical officer of the expedition. Once in Cuba Fidel appointed him

as first comandante of a guerrilla force, above even Raúl.78 According to plan, the expedition to the Oriente province would set sail on 30

November 1956. Frank País, already waiting with a support group

of locally trained volunteers, started a rebellion in Santiago de Cuba.

Young rebels, who were wearing the olive-green uniform and red-

black bracelets of the M 26-7 for the first time, occupied the city for

several hours.79 But the expedition did not go ashore ( Granma was two days late). When the insurgents’ ammunition was exhausted and

they had to look for safe houses in Santiago, the city’s population

spontaneously hid them – a standard practice during the insurgency

years of 1957 and 1958 (see Chapter 3). The alarmed Batista immediately sent military enforcements to the eastern region. The DR had

organized a protest march on 27 November 1956. It was the last one;

the march was bloody and repressed, and the government closed the

university shortly thereafter.

32 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Castro’s campaign

Owing to poor weather conditions, the disembarkation of the Granma

expedition was a failure. It was ‘more of a shipwreck than a landing’,

according to Che Guevara’s sardonic comment.80 Of the eighty-two

members of the crew, many were massacred by the army in the first

two weeks of December 1956. Some were imprisoned;81 others man-

aged to flee and later participated in activities in other provinces or

outside of Cuba. In any case, Fidel lost the better part of his General

Staff. Of the survivors, only twenty or so (initially twelve) reached

the Sierra Maestra, among them Fidel Castro, Raúl Castro, Che

Guevara, Camilo Cienfuegos, Faustino Pérez, Efigenio Amejeiras,

Juan Almeida, Ciro Redondo and others.82 The tiny guerrilla force turned to a Plan B and recruited their first guerrilla pelotons from

the poor rural population. For most of the first year of operation, the

force in the sierra depended on the llano ‘for everything from medi-

cine, weapons, ammunition, food, equipment, clothes and money to

domestic and international publicity’.83 In February and March 1957, Frank País sent reinforcements of about fifty young guerrilleros from Santiago de Cuba with arms and equipment.

Fidel then established the first formal guerrilla Column 1. País’

organizational brilliance also provided M 26-7 with the elementary

structure of an urban guerrilla: action and sabotage, civilian support,

propaganda, finances and liaisons with labour unions and students. 84

Frank País was assassinated on 30 July 1957 and buried as a guer-

rilla comandante in the M 26-7 uniform after a spontaneous general strike of five days, the largest popular demonstration in the history of

Santiago de Cuba. The leadership of M 26-7 was encouraged by the

enormous popularity of the rebels’ case. He was succeeded by René

Ramos Latour ( nom de guerre Daniel), who consolidated the organi-

zation of the movement’s cell structure. 85

The assassination of many of the Granma expeditionists, the ruthless persecution of the small guerrilla column in the Sierra Maestra –

and of the urban and provincial insurgents by the army, police and

intelligence institutions – generated a general climate of repression. 86

Paramilitary forces like the Tigres de Masferrer, a death squad of sev-

eral hundred members that operated in the Oriente province, further

Historical context | 33

reinforced tensions. 87 Initially only in the province of Oriente – and

then across the entire country from the second half of 1957 – civil

disobedience and support committees sprouted up under the supervi-

sion of the M 26-7. The founding members of these committees were

professionals: medical doctors, dentists, head teachers, businessmen,

and leaders of Baptist and Roman Catholic organizations. 88 The Communist Party still joined the protests, but expressed an adverse position vis-à-vis the M 26-7 and the guerrilla in the Sierra Maestra. In a statement published on 26 February 1957, the party leadership wrote:

In reality, there are only two oppositional factors that act with

intensity. One [is] the ‘26 July’ who does it in its own way,

with its anti-governmental foco [guerrilla centre] of the ‘Sierra Maestra’ and its erroneous ideas about political action. The

other one [is ours], our Partido Socialista Popular, labouring to

move the workers and the people based on the correct tactics of

union and mass struggle […]. 89

Based on the ideas of Frank País, Armando Hart formally organized the

committees into the Movimiento de Resistencia Cívica (MRC, Civic

Resistance Movement) as a non-partisan, non-violent movement of

clandestine cells. 90 The middle classes provided adequate support for the movement. Their members published national protest announce-ments (the editor of the journal Bohemia was one of its leaders), organized periodic ‘days of civic resistance’, requested intervention

by the Red Cross and the United Nations, urged the re-establishment

of constitutional rights, and advocated for political amnesty. Eventu-

ally, the National Confederation of University Alumni, the National

Medical College, the National Lawyers’ College, the Engineers’ Col-

lege, the national professional organizations of university professors,

secondary teachers, public and private elementary school teachers,

the Gran Loge of Free Masons, the Catholic (male and female) organ-

izations of Acción Católica, the Council of Evangelical Churches, and

even the Rotary and the Lions Clubs were represented. 91 Oltuski was the M 26-7 liaison with this movement, representing 300,000 Cuban

professionals.92 Sometimes the personal relations among the various organizations of protest and insurgency converged:

34 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

After entering the civic resistance movement I received [the

instruction] […] to guarantee the largest possible numerical

strength of the demonstrators in the streets of the city [Havana]

on any given day. We were authorized to mobilize not only the

women in the Resistance and other front organizations of the

M-26-7, but also the members of other organizations. These

included the Frente Cívico de Mujeres Martianas, the Federación

Democrática de Mujeres Cubanas, the women of the Directorio

Revolucionario, etcetera. As a parallel activity, the members of

the Movimiento de Resistencia Cívica who were in possession

of a car would block the streets to impede or postpone political

repression, giving time for the women to retreat and disappear. 93

Political hegemony within the opposition movements’ support was

contested. In November 1957, several political forces signed the

so-called Pact of Miami to establish a Junta de Liberación Cubana

(Cuban Liberation Junta). Co-signers were the Partido Ortodoxo, the

Partido Auténtico, the FEU, the DR and some union movements. Some

lower ranking M 26-7 members signed the declaration without hav-

ing consulted the movements’ leadership. Fidel publicly dissociated

himself from the declaration. After all, his movement took on most of

the fighting and the pact could potentially enable a post-Batista mil-

itary junta, with the silent agreement of the United States. To clarify

his position, he announced in December 1957 that the president of

the post-insurgency civilian government would be Judge Urrutia, who

had declared that the defendants of the imprisoned Granma survivors had acted legally.

Networks of exile organizations arose in the United States, Mexico,

Venezuela and other countries. Exiled Cubans formed ‘patriotic clubs’

and contributed with financial support. A vital exile and foreign

financial Comité del Exilio (Exile Committee) was headed by Mario

Llenera and afterwards by Luis Buch. 94 Internal financial support was also obtained by selling ‘ sellos’ (sympathy vouchers) in denomina-tions of 1 to 20 pesos. In early 1958 the monthly total in Havana

was between 15,000 and 20,000 pesos (dollars). 95 In February 1958 Radio Rebelde, a rebel radio station, started to transmit from

the Sierra Maestra under Che Guevara’s supervision. Although the

Historical context | 35

Batista government captured several clandestine radio transmitters,

Radio Rebelde continued to broadcast throughout the year of 1958.

After 1959, it became Cuba’s most important broadcasting station.

The rebel journal Aldabonazo also circulated secretly. Clandestine operations of the urban action and sabotage groups acquired national

fame: on 8 November 1957, one hundred bombs exploded simultane-

ously across the city of Havana. There were no victims, no wounded,

no deaths. From that point on it was impossible to deny the presence

and power of the M 26-7 in the national capital.96

In March 1957, a commando of the Directorio Revolucionario

attacked the Presidential Palace and the radio station Radio Reloj.

Both actions, which were nearly suicidal, failed. One of the many

student victims was José Antonio Echeverría. The weapons used in this

dramatic attack were, afterwards, transported to Frank País and then

to the Sierra Maestra by Manuel Piñeiro. 97 A month later four other DR leaders, one of them being Echeverrría’s successor Frutuoso Rodriguez, were assassinated by secret agents. The universities of Havana and

Oriente (Santiago de Cuba) were closed. Many students joined the

clandestine local insurgent organizations. Faure Chomón became the

new leader of the urban guerrilla of the DR and its incipient rural

guerrilla column in Escambray. In February 1958, the relatively

small DR guerrilla in Escambray, just north of the city of Trinidad,

organized three landings of combatants and equipment. Some of the

arms were used to reinforce their insurgents in Havana. The guerrilla

expanded slowly but it did fight. In August 1958, DR combatants

attacked the barracks of Güinía de Miranda. Two months later, they

occupied several villages in Las Villas and blockaded the Carretera

Central, Cuba’s national highway that stretches between Havana and

the central and eastern provinces. In October 1958, Faure Chomón

joined the guerrilla columns of Che Guevara and Camilo Cienfuegos. 98

After the triumph in January 1959, he was appointed Comandante de

la Revolución.99

In fact, with all these competitive revolutionary forces debilitated,

the M 26-7 remained the only strong armed resistance force cam-

paigning against Batista. Slowly but steadily their numbers increased.

On several occasions they attacked or counter-attacked Batista’s

troops. Although a numerically small force, they had survived all

36 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

attacks to their columns. Sometimes they even put Batista’s troops

on the defensive. The propaganda value of their fierce resistance was

enormous. Within the organizational structure of the entire M 26-7

movement, the Sierra became a kind of safe haven for those urban

militants who were ‘ quemados’ (identified as rebel) and persecuted.

On the other hand, the guerrilla forces in the Sierra constituted 300

combatants (until March/April 1958). The number of urban and rural

militia units in the llano was much larger: an estimated 300 in the

Pinar del Rio province, 3,000 in Havana, 150 each in Las Villas and

Camagüey, and 200 in Santiago de Cuba. 100

Batista’s armed forces became demoralized; factions within the

army and navy even rebelled. There were precedents – as early as

1956, Colonel Ramón Barquín had tried to overthrow Batista with

the most prominent members of the army, a group of 200 officers.

All conspirators were released from duty, while the principal leaders

ended up incarcerated. In September 1957, navy officers organized

another conspiracy across the island. When the marine base in Cien-

fuegos rebelled, the local population quickly sided with the mutiny.

Batista ordered an air attack and sent in the army’s special forces.

The invading soldiers wounded many of the conspirators and their

supporters, killing several and executing others. The members of the

Resistencia Cívica attended to the wounded and hid those who were

persecuted. Later that year conspiracies were discovered in the air

force, the medical corps and the police.101 The captured military rebels

and the clandestine members of the M 26-7, who were lucky enough

to be brought to court, were incarcerated in the Presidio Modelo at

Isla de Pinos (present-day Isla de la Juventud). There, Hart and other

arrested M 26-7 leaders organized a kind of revolutionary academy. 102

Meanwhile, the urban militia movements of M 26-7 achieved spec-

tacular success. In February 1958, the Grand Prix for Formula 1 was

organized in Havana. An urban commando accomplished the kid-

napping of world champion Juan Manuel Fangio, who (after he was

released) expressed sympathy for the cause of the rebels. 103 The kidnapping of Fangio was world news and the propaganda boost for

M 26-7 was enormous. 104 M 26-7 had already launched the daily news programme of Radio Rebelde; at least seven clandestine journals circulated regularly. Even Batista’s press chief Suárez Nuñez recognized

Historical context | 37

the superiority of M 26-7’s propaganda. 105 The M 26-7 also advanced in a more military sense. By March 1958, Fidel had split up his forces

to gain the initiative in the entire eastern region of Cuba. Raúl Castro’s second Frente ‘Frank País’, consisting of sixty-seven combatants

(although only fifty-three of them were equipped with rifles), estab-

lished a territorial base in the Sierra Cristal. With his third Frente,

Juan Almeida opened another base north of Santiago de Cuba; mean-

while, Fidel still commanded his remaining first Frente. The entire

rebel force then consisted of several hundred regular soldiers. 106

In the ‘Liberated Territory’ of Raul Castro’s second Frente (an

area of 15,000 km2), the rebels established an administrative appa-

ratus. They introduced a series of local reforms that afterwards,

between 1959 and 1961, were implemented on a national scale: a

land reform, a literacy campaign, construction of schools and hospi-

tals, and a public health system. In addition, a structure of policing

and justice was established. Micro-ministries of transport, logistics,

education and health managed twenty hospitals and fifty schools. In

the Sierra Maestra a similar reform system was established. It had its

own legislation and police force. Formal governance in the regions

that were controlled by the rebels illustrates that the insurgency was

successful. In the summer of 1958, this process would gain even more

momentum. After the failure of Batista’s offensive (see below), Cuba’s

larger sugar enterprises and industrial and commercial companies

began to pay ‘war taxes’ to the M 26-7. The amount of incoming

revenue surpassed the money collected little by little through bonos

(sympathy vouchers), which were sold to the civilian sympathizers. It

also trumped the contributions collected under the Cuban diaspora

abroad. 107

March and April 1958 were the turning point for the revolution.

First, the United States decided in March to withhold military sup-

port for Batista. That same month, Faustino Pérez – the leader of the

national urban resistance movement in Havana – came to Fidel’s camp

in the Sierra Maestra to discuss a national strike planned for April,

which would bring down Batista’s regime. Organizing a successful

general strike would, the Havana leadership thought, recalibrate the

balance between M 26-7’s urban resistance and rural guerrilla forces –

those of the llano and the sierra. Pérez insisted on a strike and was

38 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

convinced that Havana would be the key to Batista’s demise. Fidel

had misgivings. Weapons, mostly light arms, were scarce. Maybe

the militias in the llano were not prepared to resist the regime’s

armed forces. Maybe the coordination with other organizations that

opposed Batista, and especially the labour unions, was not completely

adequate. Maybe the strength of the forces of the llano had been over-

estimated in comparison with smaller, but better disciplined, guerrilla

forces in the sierra. In other words, would M 26-7 risk the fate of all

his forces in vain? 108

The outcome of the strike (9 April 1958) was indeed failure.

Militia members of the M 26-7 were quick to occupy radio sta-

tions in Havana and Santiago shortly thereafter. Other commandos

attacked an armoury and police stations, but most industrial and

transport workers in the capital managed to complete their work

shifts. Also, there were few worker strikes and the public transport

system kept running. In the following days, many militia members

were arrested, militia captains disappeared, and nearly all safe houses

were exposed. 109 In Santiago and the eastern region, workers did strike and both militia and guerrilla units attacked specific targets.

Yet on 10 April, it was clear that the failure was definite. The urban

underground had received a fatal setback.

In May 1958 the national M 26-7 leadership convened in the

Sierra Maestra (in a place called Alto de Monpié), where the internal

balance of the movement had significantly shifted in favour of the

sierra. 110 As a result, Fidel Castro was appointed secretary general and Comandante en Jefe (Chief Commander) of all M 26-7 forces.

The General Secretariat was transferred to the sierra. The guerrilla

forces in the sierra were renamed Ejército Rebelde (Rebel Army) and

the urban and rural militias were renamed ‘columns’. Membership

of all armed M 26-7 organizations was open to all who wanted to

join, regardless of their political origins. Radio Rebelde would be

the major propaganda tool and was transferred to the sierra. Judge

Urrutia was officially ratified as president of the Provisional Revolu-

tionary Government. M 26-7 would be the vanguard party in future

coordination with other opposition movements. Haydée Santamaría,

also the movement’s financial manager, was sent to Miami as fund-

raiser and representative of the Florida diaspora. Luis Busch went to

Historical context | 39

Caracas on a similar mission.111 Fidel had turned an external defeat

into an internal political victory. As Sweig rightly remarks: ‘Once

the vanguard, the urban underground had finally relegated to the

revolution’s rearguard.’112

After the failure of the April strike, Batista thought the time was

ripe to launch an overall offensive to dislodge and destroy the guerrilla forces. In his war memoirs, 113 Fidel mentions having been astonished about the careless preparation of Batista’s military campaign. General

Batista codenamed the military offensive ‘Plan FF’ (Fin de Fidel, End

of Fidel). He first deployed 7,000 and then 10,000 combat soldiers

along with air force squadrons and offshore naval units, all of whom

fought against an estimated total of three hundred-plus armed rebels.

The majority of the armed forces were assembled against the first

Frente of Fidel Castro: fourteen infantry battalions and seven inde-

pendent companies, mobilized against 220 guerrilla combatants with

rifles. 114 The rebels had anticipated the offensive and were prepared for a bitter defence, assembling an arsenal of shells, mines and makeshift

weapons along with stockpiles of food, water and medicine. Radio

Rebelde was transferred, intelligence networks were reinforced, and

hospitals and schools were camouflaged and prepared for wounded

combatants and prisoners. The rebels knew the terrain inside out.115

The campaign went on for seventy-four days of uninterrupted com-

bat and ended on 6 August 1958 with the retreat of Batista’s army. It

resulted in the loss of 1,000 combatants, 300 of which were fatalities.

Several military units were completely destroyed or disintegrated. The

Rebel Army took 443 prisoners (and sent them back home through

the Red Cross). The captured army officers were permitted to keep

their pistols; the wounded soldiers were attended to first. 116 The Rebel Army obtained 507 pieces of equipment, including two tanks, ten

mortars, several bazookas and twelve machine guns. 117 In some cases, captured officers and soldiers asked to be incorporated into the guerrilla columns.118 The demoralized armed forces licked their wounds, suffered desertions and began to disintegrate. Fidel’s star rose as his

military and political leadership were widely acknowledged. It had

immediate effects on all segments of the broad, and growing, oppo-

sition groups across the country and in exile. Now Castro could

negotiate and make agreements on his own terms

40 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

After the fall of Venezuelan dictator Pérez Jimenez in January 1958,

Caracas had become the focus for all Cuban opposition forces. Dur-

ing the first weeks of Batista’s military failure, in June 1958, Castro’s new standing was confirmed by the assisting leaders of all opposition groups, who recognized him as their senior (the so-called Pact

of Caracas). The Communist PSP did not sign the pact. However, in

the summer of 1958 the PSP established a formal alliance with the

M 26-7 and sent a prominent leader, Carlos Rafael Rodriguez, to the

Sierra Maestra. A few months before the final triumph on 1 January

1959, it granted them a comfortable position within the ranks of the

post-1959 revolutionaries. 119

The failure of Batista’s counter-insurgency campaign brought about

a change in the hitherto warm relations between the State Depart-

ment and the Batista regime. Now the idea of regime change and

a transition to a civilian or civil-military government was openly

discussed. The American ambassador tried – in vain – to establish

negotiations between Batista and representatives of civil society

and former politicians.120 Castro’s forces had taken up the initiative immediately after Batista’s military misfortune. His own forces

grew. In August, 1958 he added a fourth Frente to the three Frentes

operating in the eastern region. In September 1958, he created five

more Frentes to storm the llanos, although the operations did not

start until October.

Then, thirty-two columns and detachments (two from the DR and

one from the PSP) covered Camagüey, the northern zone of Las Villas

(Camilo Cienfuegos), the southern zone of Las Villas (Che Guevara),

or were on their way to Havana, Matanzas and Pinar del Río.121 This

time the rebels were better equipped, although the only ones with

arms were the veterans who served as the nucleus of the llano Frentes

(eighty men under the command of Cienfuegos and 140 combatants

under the command of Che Guevara). During their campaigns the

combatants swelled with new recruits, militia members of the urban

underground, and peasants and civilians who had secretly formed their

local resistance groups. Meanwhile, armed urban militia combatants

also carried out local attacks on Batista’s forces.122

In autumn, the fighting continued against new detachments of the

dispirited army of Batista. During their final campaigns, Che Guevara

Historical context | 41

and Cienfuegos distinguished themselves heroically and acquired

national fame. In November 1958 Fidel, Raúl and Almeida descended

from the mountains and advanced to Santiago de Cuba with their

veterans and new recruits. In early December 1958, Judge Urrutia and

Luis Busch flew from Caracas to the Liberated Territory with 7 tons

of weapons, a donation from Venezuela’s interim president, Admi-

ral Larrazábal.123 The rebel commanders had around three thousand combatants at that moment. Meanwhile, disillusioned army soldiers

laid down their arms or joined the rebel forces. Entire army units had

melted away. On 23 December 1958 the coup de grâce was provided

by Che Guevara, who derailed an armoured train with 400 soldiers

and an enormous amount of armament and equipment.

By December 1958, Batista’s army commander in Santiago de Cuba

was reporting that 90 per cent of the population supported the Rebel

Army. On 28 December, General Eulogio Cantillo (army Chief of

Operations) agreed with Fidel that the army would overthrow Batista

on 30 December and then surrender; Fidel postponed the takeover of

the garrison of Santiago de Cuba. 124 But General Cantillo, appointed by Batista as army General Commander a few hours before, allowed

the dictator to flee the country on New Year’s Eve. He flew to the

Dominican Republic, which was ruled by his friend, the dictator

Trujillo.125 Cantillo then tried to form a civil-military junta with help from the American embassy.126 Via radio, Fidel ordered a general national strike, which was a resounding success this time around. He

also sent an ultimatum to Colonel Rego Rubido, commander of

Santiago’s garrison. The officer accepted and joined the Rebel Army

with 5,000 soldiers. The peaceful transfer impeded a bloody battle

and completely frustrated the planned coup.

That day the revolutionary government under President Urrutia

was constituted in the provisional capital of Santiago, while Fidel

Castro was appointed General Commander of the Cuban Armed

Forces. In Havana, a euphoric popular mass swarmed the streets. The

M 26-7 militia and mixed DR and M 26-7 action groups took over

government buildings and police stations. Fidel had ordered Camilo

Cienfuegos and Che Guevara, the most charismatic comandantes of

the Rebel Army, to swiftly move to Havana and take over command

of the military Columbia barracks and the fort, La Cabaña.

42 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Fidel himself and the core of the Rebel Army embarked on a long

victory march, from Santiago to Havana. Their following expanded

by the day. The march was halted by speeches, salutations, meetings

with M 26-7 veterans and sympathizers, and other ceremonies. 127

By the time Fidel arrived in Havana, on 8 January 1959, the Rebel

Army had come to power across all of Cuba. The national hero was

welcomed by a jubilant crowd, while the new Revolutionary Govern-

ment – comprised of respected, pro-revolutionary citizens and some

M 26-7 members – took office. He spoke to an overjoyed audience

of sympathizers, emphasizing the need for revolutionary unity. As he

was finishing his speech, a white dove settled on his shoulder. 128

CHAPTER 3

From insurgents to socialists

The insurgents

Revolutions are achieved by generations engaged in collective action,

subject to collective suffering and motivated by collective sentiment.

Their views and thoughts are the legacy of the past and the dreams

of the future: shared frustration, mutual moral commitment and ide-

ological conviction. 1 Revolutionary generations also share an ethos of sacrifice and willpower. They will remember their collective history as a ‘calling’. There is a spirit of belonging, being chosen for the membership of a special community with new and superior moral-ity and new codes of conduct. They, and the selected members of

their age cohort, are destined to perform great things: rebellions and

revolts; profound transformations of the economy and of economic

rationality; transformations of society and the rebuilding of a new

and more decent class structure; transformations with deep political

reforms, creating new and more noble power elites, and new and

more dignified rules of control. As a new ideology dominates, new

cultural expressions and lifestyles emerge. Cultural role models will

be different. It will generate new family and gender relations. Some-

times even different moral and religious concerns and expressions

will surface.

A revolution also implies destruction: the radical restructuring of

the old economic, social and political order; resistance and migration

of the old elite and adherents to the former regime; and reorganiza-

tion of the key institutions of justice, order, security and defence. The old leadership disappears in favour of new governance. Economic

leaders with new urgencies replace the old guard. Representatives

of the new classes and new social strata establish the boundaries of

equality, inequality and opportunity in society. Maybe a dream of a

44 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

classless society will become reality. New political parties and social

movements replace the movements and institutions that support the

old regime. Career paths will be completely different.

The leaders and adherents of the Cuban Revolution had a common

mind-set: a fervent patriotism, strong anti-imperialist and anti-American feelings, pro-poor sympathies, and a conviction of urgency for social justice and social reform. They all venerated the revolutionary heroes of

the nineteenth century. Roots and triggers of the rebellions included

the following: being confronted with a coup by a detested dictator

supported by the United States; situations of direct persecution of

family members or fellow students; the visible presence of poverty

and social injustice; the shared disdain for a negligent economic elite;

national political and economic dependence on the United States; and

the sycophant behaviour of the ruling class with respect to represent-

atives from the ‘Colossus of the North’.

As already indicated in the previous chapter, the rebellion against

Batista was not a homogeneous movement. Fidel’s Movimiento 26 de

Julio (M 26-7) was not the only oppositional force, and even within

this movement there were dissenting opinions – at least until April

1958 – about the importance of urban insurrections vis-à-vis the rural

guerrilla, and in the llano (the flat regions of the island) versus the

sierra (the mountains in the Oriente, the Eastern Region). There were

other competing rebel groups that fought clandestinely in Havana

and other cities, or participated as urban and rural militias against the despised dictator Batista. Leaders of the traditional political parties

that were in place prior to Batista’s coup in 1952, now in exile, sup-

ported the insurgents with money and arms and made formal pacts

and agreements.

As early as 1955 an important resistance group headed by Frank

País – Acción Revolucionaria Oriental (afterwards renamed Acción

Revolucionaria Nacional) – merged with Fidel’s rebel movement.2

In August 1956, during his exile in Mexico, Fidel signed a pact of

coordination and support with José Antonio Echeverría, the leader

of the Directorio Revolucionario Estudiantil (DRE or DR, basically

a national students’ resistance movement). In practice there has

always been a considerable overlap of the student participants in

both groups.3

From insurgents to socialists | 45

While interviewing the revolutionary combatants in 2011 and

afterwards, I asked them about their social, religious and educational

backgrounds. I also asked about their intellectual mentors and role

models, and about the experiences that helped shape their moral and

ideological convictions. We talked about their ideological roots, the

influence of their teachers and icons, the evolution of their own vision

of society, and the path that had led each of them to embrace a life

of armed revolutionary struggle. Almost all interviewees were very

young – sometimes even teenagers – when they opted for a clandestine

existence. Nearly all veterans reckoned that their patriotic ideals were

transmitted by their parents, grandparents and great-grandparents,

and that their patriotism had been fostered by nationalistic teachers

during their primary or secondary education. Without exception, the

interviewed veterans explained that their radicalization in the period

of armed insurrection was also due to their confrontation with social

injustice in Cuban society.

Most combatants were influenced by the heroes of the nine-

teenth-century wars of independence: Martí, of course (Cuba’s pater

patriae), and the revolutionary generals and the rebellious soldiers, many of whom were former slaves ( mambis). Other heroes were the

patriotic leaders of the 1930s (Guiteras) and the 1950s (Chibás).

Nearly all insurgents had a religious upbringing: Roman Catholic,

Presbyterian, Episcopalian or Baptist. The Cuban Revolution was

not widely supported by the Roman Catholic hierarchy. There were

some revolutionary priests, but the majority of the bishops did not

sympathize with the revolutionaries or were explicitly opposed to

‘communism’. The more socially progressive Catholic priests remained

silent during the 1960s. 4 In the 1950s, most of the bishops were Spanish-born; as a result many of them had sympathies for the Spanish

Falange. 5 The majority of the Cuban revolutionaries had a religious

upbringing. Both Fidel and Raúl had attended a Jesuit college prior to

their university studies. Frank País, the important leader of the urban

underground, was the son of a Baptist pastor; he had provided Catho-

lic and Baptist chaplains to the guerrilla forces in the Sierra Madre.

One of them, Father Sardiñas, had been appointed comandante; he

baptised and performed marriage ceremonies. In January 1959, many

of the barbudos – the bearded guerrilleros – descended from the

46 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

mountains adorned with the rosary of the Virgen del Cobre, St Mary

and Cuba’s patroness. 6 Contrary to the subsequent official atheist preferences within the Cuban Communist Party, many Cubans –

also party members – believe in ‘God and the Virgin’, while simul-

taneously distancing themselves from the official church hierarchy.7

The members of the insurgent generation that made up the Cuban

Revolution were largely engaged in the urban underground until

1958. Students – from the university and from the institutes of sec-

ondary education and of arts and crafts – constituted the majority.

More men than women were incorporated. 8 Most members were young, aged fifteen to eighteen, when they decided to participate in

the resistance movements. The oldest combatants, and leaders, were

around thirty years old in the mid-1950s when they began to prepare

for the underground insurgency and guerrilla campaign.

The initial leadership of the urban resistance movement and the

guerrilla had a middle-class background. Fidel and Raúl Castro were

sons of an immigrant father from Spanish Galicia, who had become

a prosperous landowner. Che Guevara’s mother was a descendant of

the last Spanish viceroy of Peru, De La Serna. Manuel Piñeiro’s par-

ents were provincial upper middle class, sufficiently well-off to send

their radical son – identified as a rebel by local police – to Columbia

University in New York.

A smaller percentage of the urban insurgents joined the guerrilla

columns in the Sierra Maestra, where a larger number of the local

guerrillero recruits were peasants. Several of them acquired top

positions after the revolution. 9 Many ordinary members of the underground were also the sons and daughters of labour-class upbringing or

poor, though not destitute, families. They grew up in popular neigh-

bourhoods, both urban and rural. Here is the summary of the infant

and adolescent years of Ramiro Abreu, who later became Cuba’s liai-

son with the Central American revolutionaries and remained so for

more than thirty years:10

I was born in a distant peasant hamlet, very humble. Our house

was made of mud. My dad was a muleteer. He died after my

first school year, which was a disaster for a poor peasant family.

We had to move periodically, first to the village of Caibarién

From insurgents to socialists | 47

and then to Havana. We were always on the move. Once we

moved six times in a year. My primary and secondary education

was completely irregular. The result was that I was a functional

illiterate. Thanks to the revolution I could study.

After 1959 he studied sociology and diplomacy; he now holds a doctor-

ate in history. A similar case is that of Jorge Risquet, who was president of the Committee of International Relations of the Comité Central del

Partido Comunista de Cuba (the Central Committee of the Communist

Party of Cuba) until his retirement. Previously, he led a guerrilla sup-

port detachment in Congo-Brazzaville, played a crucial role in Cuba’s

intervention in Angola, and participated – as Cuba’s ambassador – in

the peace negotiations with South Africa. He remembers his infancy,

living with his parents in a ‘ solar’ – a one-room family unit with a multi-family bathroom, the habitual home of the urban poor in Central

Havana at that time. This is his description of his mother:11

Flora, my mom, was white, a granddaughter of Spaniards

migrants. That is why I have 5/8 Spanish, 2/8 Chinese and 1/8

African blood. Her parents were workers. She believed in God

and in spiritism. She hated the priests and had experienced what

extreme poverty and discrimination were like. She started work-

ing at 10–11 years of age, along with my grandmother, who was

also a tobacco worker in a workshop. She was so tiny, that when

the labour inspectors arrived, they put her in a barrel where the

tobacco leaves were stored and closed the lid. Mom couldn’t

write, but she could read. She learned to write during the literacy

campaign, in 1961, and sent a letter [of gratitude] to Fidel.

Luis Morejón, for many years the vice-director-general of the

Instituto Cubano de Amistad con los Pueblos (ICAP, Cuban Insti-

tute for Friendship with the Peoples), was a shoeshine boy who was

also working in a clandestine cell of the M 26-7. He even continued

polishing shoes during the first months of the revolution:12

I was born in a remote rural smallholding. My mother was of

peasant origin. My father sold furniture and household items.

48 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

When I was nine years old I started working as a shoeshine

boy in Villuendas Square. My mother worked as a maid for a

wealthy, devout Catholic; they got me a scholarship with the

Jesuits. There I studied until I was twelve years. I continued

cleaning shoes on Saturday and Sunday. In June 1956, I came to

Havana to clean shoes in the Venus Bar in El Vedado. [A doctor

helped me to get into the Instituto del Vedado.] The Institute

was rebellious. I was a classroom delegate. [I established ties

with] a cell of the 26 July Movement. I was a shoeshine boy,

cleaning cars, selling newspapers, selling tickets […]. Obviously,

the cell members knew me and they assigned me to the task of

watchman while they were meeting. And when someone suc-

ceeded in escaping police detention, my job was to watch them,

go out with them at night. At the time of the triumph of the

revolution I was thirteen years old. I was still cleaning shoes. But

when the first milicias were created, I joined them, following

Fidel’s call for artillery people. In 1960 I joined the first course

for anti-aircraft artillery.

During the insurgency against Batista, many urban rebels were per-

secuted by the police and the security apparatus – arrested, tortured

or condemned to long prison terms. Some of them even disappeared

after torture. In order to understand this generation, I present below

the exemplary careers of some members of the urban underground, of

the guerrilleros, and of the captured prisoners.

Insurgent women

The first rebel history is that of María Antonia Figueroa Araujo.

She is one of the oldest insurgent members of the movement whom I

interviewed, aged ninety-two at the time. She represents the numerous

female militants who joined the clandestine movement in the Eastern

Region. In her case she volunteered to support the attackers of the

Moncada, hiding the wounded and survivors in Santiago de Cuba. 13

I was born in 1918. I became a member of the female section of

the Orthodox Party. When the Moncada was attacked, I rescued

six compañeros. The attack was at 04.00. And at noon I get

From insurgents to socialists | 49

a call from a colleague. He says to me: ‘María Antonia, there

are six combatants in a friend’s house and we have to allocate

them.’ And they were rescued. All the families wanted a boy:

‘No, there are only six of them.’ We were very helpful, everyone

in Santiago de Cuba. It moved us, the carnage of that day. We

saw the trucks pass with corpses.

Fidel [was] imprisoned. I remember when his trial started,

at the hospital. We knew where he was going to be judged:

in the nurses’ room. And indeed, at exactly eight o’clock they

arrived: run, run, a military march! And when they brought him

in, handcuffed, I paced among the guards. I grabbed his hands

and said: ‘Everyone is with you.’ And he made [a gesture of]

gratitude […]. When he was released from jail [two years later],

he sent someone to look for me: ‘the compañera from Santiago

who rescued six lives’.

At that point, Fidel Castro and Melba Hernández had already

recruited the first members of the local cell structure in Santiago. Most participants were friends or friends of friends. The leader – Lester

Rodríguez, a Moncada assaulter – was a pupil of María Antonia’s

mother, a well-known activist and schoolteacher. Her maternal uncle

had been the godson of General Maceo, hero of the liberation wars.

More than thirty members of the Araujo family had been killed during

the rebellions of the nineteenth century. Fidel invited María Antonia

to join the M 26-7:14

And when I am talking to him he says: ‘I want you to be the

treasurer of the Movement in the east. Lester Rodríguez is a

friend of yours. He will be the coordinator. You have to form

a full committee, one for action and sabotage, another one for

financial matters, for propaganda, for coordination, for law-

yers’ assistance.’ And thus I was appointed treasurer. It was

1955 […]. I started with my family and my mom helped me a

lot. She wrote it all in a book as I told her: ‘X donated 20 pesos,

Y 30 pesos.’ In 1957 and 1958 we mostly collected money from

the poor. But at the end of the war, Fidel appointed Pastorita

Núñez [as treasurer]. So she went to collect at the sugar estates,

50 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

at the big companies, with a letter signed by Fidel. At that

time they already had territorial control. So I left the treasury

because, at the very moment that millions of pesos entered, I

could no longer manage these amounts.

Although she had a full-time job as head of a prestigious educational

institute, she went up to the sierra on the weekends:15

I went to the mountains, to fight in the third Frente with

Almeida. First I had to talk to each one of the peasants about the

reasons for our guerrilla. I assisted in that task. Then I mended

the wounded returning from battle, along with the doctors. But

mostly I talked a lot with the guajiros [the local peasantry], so that they joined the Rebel Army.

On 1 January 1959 she returned home as a captain of the Rebel Army,

a high-ranking officer of the third Frente headed by Juan Almeida

Bosque. In 1959 she became the Superintendent of Education in

Havana, until she retired.

Another female guerrilla member is Consuelo Elba Álvarez (Elba),

daughter of a maid, who was a young adolescent living in one of

Havana’s slums. She is one of the many young female adolescents

with vague sympathies for the left, who joined the urban under-

ground and afterwards ‘went to the mountains’. She compares daily

life in the urban underground to that of the guerrilla in the liberated

territories:16

I was born in 1942. I lived with my mother in a marginal

neighbourhood of Havana, in a ‘ solar’ – a one-room dwelling

with collective facilities. My mother was black and poor and

we frequently moved just because she was a maid. There was

a black, squint, ugly, old man: Roberto Azcuy. I’m beginning

to call him Dad, because it was him who reviewed my school

books when I went home … because my mother was never

home during the day. [Roberto] practically became my family.

And he and his friends were communists, members of the Par-

tido Socialista Popular. Of course, I didn’t know that. I believed

From insurgents to socialists | 51

in God, attended catechism meetings. For me, communists ate

children; that was what they told us. When I perceived that they

were communists, it was shocking news. But after a week I went

back, with a logical conclusion. They are practically my family;

if they are communists, they cannot be bad people.

In 1955, when I was thirteen years old, I joined the Socialist

Youth. I began to participate in everything, all tasks I was given.

In 1956, they arrested me for the first time [at a demonstration].

When the police arrived, everyone screamed: ‘Down with Batista!’

It was enormous and tremendous turmoil and confusion. Three

of us were arrested. They carried us to the First Police Office.

From there they moved us to the Buró de Investigaciones, and

afterwards to the VIVAC [detention centre] for women. At the

end of 1957 I was detained again. They took me to the Buró

Represivo de Actividades Comunistas [BRAC, the Repression

Bureau for Communist Activities]. That was definitely worse. I

was discharged because one of Batista’s spokesmen intervened. I

was fifteen years old. I was released, but I was super ‘ quemada’

[identified as a rebel]. It was then that I went to the guerrillas,

to the sierra.

After a period of clandestine work as a teenager, Elba was incorpo-

rated into the guerrilla, working in several areas of the sierra. She

remembers that the total number of (female) guerrilleras was around three hundred. There was even an all-female guerrilla peloton of

twelve combatants, Las Marianas, founded in September 1958 and

headed by Tita Guevara:17

In the sierra I was a member of Columna 1 ‘José Martí’ [Guer-

rilla Column 1], headed by Fidel. I was a courier and also a

teacher; the Rebel Army had a general policy about the literacy

of their members. Really, there were people who didn’t know

what Cuba was. Cuba was the small place where they lived and

nothing more. I was with the first Frente until the triumph of

the revolution.

Daily life in the sierra was complicated, especially for us, the

women. From the perspective of the [urban] underground, it

52 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

was glorious. But when I got there, the reality was different. To

take a bath, I had to go to a river where I could do laundry, leave

my clothes there, wait until they were dry and then put them

back on. Moreover, the troops are men. You are the one with

problems, like menstruation. Everyone noticed it, there was no

way around it.

Another terrible thing were the planes that bombed us. They

threw bombs at whatever movement they observed. I had a lit-

tle school; the children could have been injured or killed. The

daily meal was the worst. You had to eat anything you could

find.

Several former guerrilla members emphasize the strict codes with

respect to the local population. Llibre, aide-de camp to Fidel in the

Sierra Maestra, vividly remembers that Fidel, Che, Camilo and other

comandantes always insisted on reverence towards local peasantry:18

‘Take care. Always pay the price a peasant askes you, without discus-

sion.’ Fidel followed the rules set out by Céspedes and Martí during

the wars of liberation. The guerrilla was a people’s war that required

sensitive and tactful relations with the population that supported the

guerrilleros, especially in matters concerning women and girls, and land and animals. This was essential for maintaining the sympathy of

the local peasant population:19

The rules in the sierra were very strict; you couldn’t take any-

thing from the peasants. And that explains why the peasants

supported the Rebel Army so strongly. They won their sympa-

thy with their exemplary standing, with everything they were

doing. Far from violating a woman! On the contrary, the rules

were very clear. Not that there weren’t relations in the Cuban

guerrilla, but only if they were mutually consensual. And they

could marry. There was a priest, Sardiñas, who married a lot

of people in the guerrilla movement. I don’t remember any

pregnant woman within the guerrilla. Among the couriers, yes.

There were never relations of disrespect, because people were

severely punished if something like that happened. Many [local]

people joined or supported the Rebel Army.

From insurgents to socialists | 53

Asked about the similarities and differences between life in the under-

ground and that in the guerrilla, Elba considered the daily life in the

cities – especially Havana – more dangerous and difficult:20

In my opinion, the urban underground was more difficult than

the Rebel Army. The money, the resources, the support came

from the [local] base. I lived in both places. This [urban ambi-

ence] was more difficult, because in the city, including Havana,

there were many repressive organizations operating: SIM, the

BRAC, the people of the Buró de Investigaciones. They were tar-

geting the clandestine, the young guys. Being within the guerrilla

felt as if it were paradise. You had the enemy in front of you.

But acting there [in the city] was like staying in a mousetrap. In

Cuba [at that time], the mere fact of being young was enough

to be convicted. I think that being young was a sin at that time.

The repression was very harsh, very strong.

After 1959 she studied journalism and became one of Cuba’s eminent

radio and TV documentarists. She is still engaged in TV productions

and several of her documentaries, about female guerrilla combatants

in Cuba and elsewhere, have received honours and awards.

In one of the action and sabotage groups within the urban resist-

ance, a woman was part of the leadership. It was a group of five: three

young male and two young female students. They formed a collec-

tive leadership and called themselves the Pentarquía, in reference to

the civilian junta of 1933. Three members were killed; two survived

and became important figures in the government and public sector –

Gladys ( nom de guerre Marel) García-Pérez and Amador del Valle. 21

During the last months of 1958, Marel headed action and sabotage

groups in Havana and Matanzas. Eventually she had a diplomatic

career; she became a historian and a member of the Cuban Academy

of History. She wrote a seminal work (2005) about the urban under-

ground in Havana and Matanzas. One of her dearest memories is her

first meeting with Che Guevara and Fidel in early January 1959:22

Che and Fidel wanted to know me in person. Che was laughing

like crazy. He asked me what I wanted to do: ‘Do you know

54 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

what you want to do?’ I said: ‘Not exactly, I can only make and

detonate bombs.’ He laughed, because everyone he met asked

him for favours. ‘I don’t know anything like that.’ Then Che

says to me: ‘Look, now we want to organize the women, some

brigades of women in the Capitolio.’23 I said, ‘Ah, that’s perfect, organize the Brigadas Femininas Revolucionarias [Women’s

Revolutionary Brigades, BFR].’ And I organized them, with

more than three thousand members.

Insurgent men

I selected the experiences of two militants. The first one (Carlos Amat

Forés) was a young adult at the time of Batista’s coup in 1952. The

second one (José Antonio [Tony] López) was twelve years old when

Batista carried out his coup. Amat, eighty years old at the time

of the interview, was a university student who earned his family’s

income as an employee of the telephone company in Santiago de

Cuba, a subsidiary of the International Telephone and Telegraph

Company (ITT):24

I was born in a small town in the north-eastern Oriente prov-

ince. We were the poor part of my family. When I was thirteen

years old, my family moved to Santiago de Cuba. I stayed there

until the triumph of the revolution, when I went to Havana. My

father had embarked on a life in other places; he got lost and we

never heard anything else about him. That obliged me to find

a job to help my mother. I was seventeen years old. The ITT in

Santiago were accepting applications for a vacancy; I ranked

first and was admitted. Meanwhile, I continued studying and

graduated from high school.

Until 1947, the University of Havana was the only university in

Cuba. In that year, a second university – modelled after those in the

United States – was founded in Santiago de Cuba. Yet its faculty was

recruited from nationalist, progressive intellectuals and scientists.

Some new professors were refugees of the Spanish Civil War. The pro-

fessor of criminal law, for instance, was José Luis Gálvez – former

From insurgents to socialists | 55

Attorney General of the Spanish Republican government. Amat could

arrange a convenient timetable with his employer and his colleagues:

attend classes and seminars in the afternoon, and work during the

morning and night shifts and weekends:25

I’m talking about the year 1951. I worked at the department

of transmission, the long-distance radio communication with

Havana plants. And I enrolled in the Faculty of Law. I was

involved in the entire university life. Then Batista carried out a

coup in 1952; there was an enormous student protest. The Bati-

sta government embarked on a policy of repression. In Santiago

you could see murdered labour leaders, from the left, supposed

communists. They started to persecute them. They began to

torture people. Because of my employment at the telephone

company, I was able to eavesdrop on the long-distance calls;

no one could perceive that I was listening in. On the day of the

Moncada assault I overheard terrible things, like the order to

massacre all captured combatants.

That strongly influenced Amat’s political radicalization. When the

news of the killing orders leaked out, the population of Santiago de

Cuba – outraged – hid as many of the assaulters as they could. The

wounded were brought to trusted doctors. It was the beginning of the

clandestine circles of family members and friends, support groups for

the underground resistance in Santiago. Most rebels were young and

studied at the university or at the secondary educational institutes.

They were unified by Frank País, then a student leader. They printed

and distributed the clandestine copies of Fidel’s defence pamphlet,

La Historia Me Absolverá (History Will Absolve Me). When the first student members were captured, tortured and killed, spontaneous

strikes erupted. After Fidel’s release and the fusion of Frank’s and

Fidel’s rebel forces, cell structures emerged within the student and

labour movement.26

[…] people didn’t ask if you were a cell member. If they saw a

boy, because he had put a bomb in a street corner or when a

policeman was going to seize him, they opened the door and

56 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

hid him. And when the police came to look after him they said:

‘No, I saw him running away.’ And they hid him in a back room.

No one asked if you were a member of their cell, or if you were

distributing one of the illegal pamphlets that he then passed

from hand to hand. Because in each cell they gave it to their

neighbours, to friends whom they knew. The clandestine cell

movement really became very strong.

Amat’s job at the telephone company made him very valuable to the

resistance movement. Vilma Espín became a trusted contact, then

a friend. When the Granma expedition was organized, he also sent

messages to Frank País, Armando Hart and Haydée Santamaría.

Eavesdropping became dangerous. The army and the police posted

guards to supervise the incoming and outgoing communications with

other cities, and with Mexico:27

The operators had their ‘argot’ signs: ‘Take number one,’

they said, and I knew what to do. The National Directorate

[of the M 26-7], already founded in Santiago, got to know it.

We detected all [military] communication and notified them

about it, notwithstanding the presence of the guards. Nearly all

ITT operators in Santiago worked for the 26 July Movement.

I worked directly with Vilma. She was my immediate contact.

And later with Haydée, already clandestine – I also contacted

her. Frank was my chief. We worked out a code language. Like it

is at present, all telephone employees are long-distance friends,

with mutual trust.

That network was maintained during the insurgency years.

It was an enormous help because, for instance, you heard all

about military movements. They sent in I don’t know how many

thousands of soldiers from Havana for the [counter-insurgency]

campaign in the Sierra Maestra. We all noticed it, and we even

sent messengers to Fidel. At a certain moment my job became

indispensable. And that was one of the reasons that I didn’t

go to the sierra. [Meanwhile I had graduated as a lawyer.] I

defended the detained guys in the courtroom. I tried to conceal

From insurgents to socialists | 57

it, so that they didn’t discover that I worked at the telephone

company. But I also worked as a defence lawyer.

In January 1959, Carlos Amat was appointed vice-minister of

justice in Havana. But almost immediately afterwards, the mag-

istrates of the Supreme Court collectively resigned. They were

replaced by the ‘revolutionary lawyers’, former law students within

the underground movement or the Rebel Army. Amat’s minister

appointed him Deputy Attorney General at the Supreme Court.

When the Attorney General was relieved because of health prob-

lems, he became his successor. Several career changes followed.

When the dean of the Faculty of the Humanities of the University

of Havana died, he was asked to reorganize the faculty. Three years

later Fidel appointed him rector of the Universidad del Oriente, in

Santiago. He was then relocated to the Ministerio de Relaciones

Exteriores (MINREX, Ministry of Foreign Affairs). He served as

ambassador to Canada. Upon returning to Cuba, he was appointed

minister of justice for seven years. Again he was asked to repre-

sent Cuba, this time in Geneva. Subsequently he was in charge of

the General Directorate of Latin America of MINREX. After his

retirement he was appointed director of the Cuban Institute of the

United Nations, a position he still held when I interviewed him.

Tony López was born in an extended family with communist

sympathies: his grandfather, his father and his uncle had been Party

members from the 1930s onwards. His father was a tile maker, the

provincial leader of the tile workers’ union in Camagüey. He remem-

bers him travelling across the Sierra de Cubita, where the Party had

a strong peasant following. There he attended the secret meetings

where Soviet movies circulated. He remembers his father’s admi-

ration for Stalin, and Stalin’s bust at home, in a prominent place:

‘Stalin: military uniform! Proletarian face! Iron fist!’, according to his father. After 1956, when Khrushchev denounced Stalin’s Terror, his

father’s appreciation of the Soviet ruler diminished. Tony’s younger

uncles, leftists, became members of the Orthodox Party in the early

1950s. After Batista’s coup, soldiers and police officers routinely, and

unannounced, checked his home for illegal activities and visitors. Of

58 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

course, many visitors went and came secretly. No wonder that young

Tony, like many of his family members and friends, joined the local

insurgents. He became a member of M 26-7:28

In 1957 I became a member of the 26 July Movement, in their

action brigades. I was fifteen years old. My uncle was the chief

of the area where we lived. They were very active there. Later I

formed and even headed a small cell. I was appointed to do so

by my uncle, after his detention. My three uncles were arrested.

We did well, burned buses and threw Molotov cocktails. We

burned a police assault van. We disarmed an army corporal,

recovering weapons. We attacked a ‘ chivato’ [snitch]. We didn’t

kill him, but we threw a Molotov cocktail at his house, which

was made of wood. But we always avoided hurting civilians. It

was a code we respected. It was rather like armed propaganda.

And besides, Fidel was against kidnapping. Fidel always forbade

kidnapping someone.

In September 1958 I was warned that I was very ‘ quemado’

[identified as a rebel] and I asked to be transferred to the sierra.

I no longer lived at home; I had been brought to my aunt’s

house, then to another place. In November 1958 it was decided

that I could go to the mountains, to join the Rebel Army. I

came to the encampment of Comandante Víctor Mora, head

of Column 13. There were a few veterans, but also a group

of young people, untested recruits […]. There we experienced

the revolutionary triumph. Later we were sent to the city of

Camagüey. And on 12 January [1959] Fidel sent Column 13

of Víctor Mora to Havana. It was the first time in my life that

I boarded a plane; I was sixteen years old. I turned seventeen

here in Havana.

Tony tried, to no avail, to be incorporated into the early expeditions

to Nicaragua, to fight against dictator Somoza, or to join the guer-

rilla columns against dictator Trujillo in the Dominican Republic. He

found employment as aide-de-camp at the Ministry of Public Works.

In 1960, he was admitted to the first crash course on socialism and

revolution at the Primera Escuela de Instrucción Revolucionaria (First

From insurgents to socialists | 59

Revolutionary Instruction Course). After graduating, he entered the

Cuban security and intelligence system, organized a short time before

by Manuel Piñeiro. He served in the Departamento America (and the

earlier institutional structures) for the rest of his career: in East Berlin, Prague, Paris, Argentina and Central America. But his most memorable appointment was his liaison function with Colombia, generally

as an envoy or a diplomat, for eighteen years. His last posting was in

El Salvador and Nicaragua. He retired in 2010. 29

Imprisoned insurgents

Between 1952 and 1959, a substantial number of the rebels and mil-

itants were persecuted, interrogated, arrested, tortured and sent to

prison. I chose a woman and a man to illustrate the plight of those

in captivity. Ángela Elvira Díaz Vallina (Elvira), aged seventy-seven

at the time of the interview, was elected president of the Federación

de Estudiantes Universitarias (FEU) in 1957. She was arrested seven

times:30

I was the president of the FEU and they assigned me the task

of organizing the National Student Front [Frente Estudian-

til Nacional]. Ricardo Alarcón, who is now president of the

National Assembly, was my co-responsible. [I was arrested]

first when I was caught in a demonstration, which I myself had

organized, to support the landing of the Granma. [The last time

was when] the SIM captured me on Mother’s Day in 1958. They

arrested me, searched the house, picked up every paper item

they could find – even the bus and tram fare tickets. It was the

seventh time that they picked me up. And this time it was worse,

yes, really worse.

Finally, they took off my clothes, they were abusive […]

[The rector of the university intervened.] Then there arrived an

invitation for a student conference in Chile and the rector sent

it to me. He procured me a safe home at the residence of the

Colombian ambassador. The ambassador arranged the depar-

ture formalities. He said to me: ‘This is the largest file I have

seen, it is yours. You will stay not a minute more; I am putting

you on the first plane to Miami.’ Off I went to Miami.

60 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

The case of Manuel Graña Eiriz is representative of all underground

members captured by Batista’s political police and anti-communist

paramilitary bands (the Servicio de Inteligencia Militar in the cities

and the Servicio de Inteligencia Regimental in rural areas). His par-

ents had been members of the resistance movement against Machado

in the 1930s. He quickly joined the protesting student movement and

had already been detained twice by 1952. Both times, he was released

after one night in a police station. He then became a member and

successively the leader of a clandestine student network that even-

tually comprised seventy-four participants. When the M 26-7 was

founded, the entire network adhered to Fidel’s movement. Graña and

other compañeros participated in armed actions and even made con-

tact with some young, insurgent members of Batista’s armed forces.

In 1957, during one of the largest student demonstrations in Havana,

he was captured again. This time he was tortured:31

They hit me all the time, did me the ‘submarine’[submerged my

head under water] and broke my eardrums. Before that they

wielded a canvas bag full of sand, in the form of a sausage, and

began to beat me with it. That was the standard package for all

guys arrested: hit after hit, blow after blow, by six, seven people.

I guess that I spent months in pain, all over my body, my muscles

painfully contracted.

And I was scared. I was scared and the fear increased. To

be very clear: fear. It is like when someone corners a peaceful

animal somewhere. What I say is that there’s no such thing as

bravery or cowardice. From my point of view there is only fear.

Because [once in prison] I had the opportunity to talk with peo-

ple of the Moncada assault and the Granma expedition who

were imprisoned there. And they told me: ‘I was afraid at the

Moncada and I was afraid at the Granma.’ I talked to every

one because I remained traumatized by the fear that I had at

the time. Well, there is fear. And a medical compañero who was

in prison told me, if you have no fear then you had no value.

Because only the fools, who cannot realize what could happen

to them, have no fear.

From insurgents to socialists | 61

He was brought to court; the public prosecutor demanded six

months and the judges gave him two years, under pressure from the

police during the deliberations. Like many other members of the urban

underground, he was imprisoned in the Presidio Modelo at the Isla de

Pinos (present-day Isla de Juventud, or Youth Isle) where he was wel-

comed by previously arrested political prisoners: 426 members of the

M 26-7, 106 former officers of the rebellious armed forces, 14 former

police officers, and 32 members of other rebel organizations. 32 There he was in charge of the prison library, where the books and other

publications were stored. They were used at the two ‘prison acade-

mies’: one was the ‘department’ with courses in Spanish, French and

English, and the other one for ‘ideology and revolutionary textbooks’.

In January 1959, Graña was appointed Capitán de Milicias (Militia

Captain) of the M 26-7, given his past performance during the insur-

gency period. At the time of the interview he held a chair endowed by

the Asociación de Combatientes de la Revolución Cubana in Havana.

When the first revolutionary government was installed, several of the

hurriedly released prisoners acquired cabinet functions.

Socialists

The first revolutionary government was a ‘Government of Lawyers’. 33

Three key positions had been reserved for respected but relatively con-

servative individuals: Urrutia (judge, the president), Miró Cardona

(dean of the Havana Bar Association, the prime minister) and Agra-

monte (ambassador and university rector, minister of foreign affairs).

When in late December 1958 the comandantes of the Rebel Army

organized a meeting about the future of the government, Raúl Castro

did not speak. Finally, sitting on a stone with an M-2 rifle between

his legs, he commented: ‘Fidel, I won’t drop this iron; I am staying in

the second Frente, because with people like Urrutia and Agramonte,

I guess that we cannot advance along the lines that we should.’34 It

was a small incident at the time, but in 1959 and 1960 it would be

followed by several others in which Raúl Castro and Che Guevara

would express, in Buch’s presence, their distrust of the government. It

is also certain that Che Guevara wasn’t very impressed by the efforts

62 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

and activities of the urban clandestine and resistance movements in

the llano region. 35

On 3 January 1959, the new government was constituted at the

library of the University of Santiago de Cuba. Judge Urrutia commem-

orated José Martí and appointed Fidel Castro as Commander-in-Chief

of the Armed Forces, Comandante Gaspar Brooks as Navy Chief,

and Comandante Efijenio Ameijeiras as Chief of the Revolutionary

Police. The two security institutions, the armed forces and the police

were all controlled by the guerrilla comandantes. Faustino Pérez

was appointed minister of a new special trust fund and Luis Buch

minister of the presidency (a kind of chief of staff) and cabinet secre-

tary.36 The crucial cabinet positions of Government and Agriculture were reserved for the M 26-7. At Fidel’s request, Armando Hart was

appointed minister of education during the second session in Havana,

on 5 January 1959. Two other cabinet members with the rank of min-

ister were the M 26-7 members Enrique Oltuski and Julio Camacho;

they were the ‘civilian’ members of M 26-7. All other ministers and

cabinet members were political adversaries of Batista, but were not

directly associated with M 26-7 or with the DR.

When Fidel arrived in Havana he first acted like a people’s tribune,

giving speeches in Havana’s squares, in public buildings and at the uni-

versity. He had a room at the Hilton Hotel (currently the Havana Libre

Hotel). Very quickly, conflicts arose among the president, the min-

ister-president and the cabinet members. The four M 26-7 ministers

consulted Castro; Fidel remarked that the solution had to be structural.

On 13 February, the prime minister resigned. Fidel was appointed

after a change of the constitutional article 146, which assigned the

task of ‘leading the government’ to the prime minister. He inaugu-

rated his political position, remarking that this task was not his choice but it had been committed to him and that it meant ‘a profound con-

cept of the necessity to sacrifice yourself for your country’.37 Raúl

Castro was Fidel’s successor as Chief of the Armed Forces. Later in

1959 he would be appointed minister of defence, a post he held until

2006, when he succeeded his brother as president.

This was the beginning of a double process of political power

transition. 38 Gradually, between 1959 and 1961, more M 26-7

members became ministers or cabinet members. And within the M 26-7

From insurgents to socialists | 63

ministerial elite, the most prominent positions were delegated to the

guerrilla leadership: Fidel (minister president), Raúl (minister of defence) and Che (minister of industry and president of the Central Bank). On

17 July 1959, President Urrutia resigned. Osvaldo Dorticós – a highly

respected lawyer and dean of the national Bar Association before being

exiled by Batista, who was also a leading member of the civil resistance

movement – had supported the guerrilla with arms and supplies. A cab-

inet member without portfolio, in charge of the revolutionary reforms

laws, was his successor. After a constitutional reform in 1976, which

also made the president head of government, Fidel Castro became presi-

dent and Dorticós became the president of the Central Bank. In fact, after February 1959, Fidel was Cuba’s head of government. The perceived

urgency of the quick implementation of reforms, which in prototype

form had already been experimented with in the liberated zones in 1957

and 1958 – during the final months they had administered to thousands

of poor people – was one of the reasons to get a firm grip on the govern-

ment or, better yet, to be the executing government.

Immediately after January 1959, a kind of ‘moral revolutionary

aristocracy’ emerged among the combatants of the Rebel Army (and

the incorporated DR detachments). Many officers of the Rebel Army

(the comandantes, captains, first lieutenants and second lieutenants) would rise to positions of great responsibility, both in the armed forces and in the central and regional government and the public sector. But

their new responsibilities urgently required training and cadre forma-

tion, and that rendered the PSP, the old Communist Party, an effective

monopolist of knowledge and training. As Ángela Elvira Díaz Vallina

commented: ‘I became a revolutionary doing it, without being com-

munist, without being socialist, without such ideas, [only by] doing

so, making a revolution, to transform our society to make it better,

more just, more humane, more equal.’39 Many, if not the majority, of those who were interviewed for this book made similar statements.

The necessity of incorporating the cadres –‒ and the leadership ‒– of

the PSP became even more pressing when Cuba’s relations with the

United States quickly cooled off, then frosted, then became openly

adverse. At that point the Soviet Union became Cuba’s supporter

and supplier. 40 The PSP ‘never broke its allegiance to Moscow, and Moscow never backed Cuba’s support for revolutionary movements

64 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

abroad, regarding such efforts as adventurism’.41 And that gave rise to a third process: the rivalry between the new revolutionary cadres and the old communist guard, with its own ties with Moscow. It

eventually became a power struggle between ‘ fidelistas’ (M 26-7) and

‘ comunistas’ (PSP), finally resolved during the fusion process between the revolutionary parties and the PSP. It was officially ended by Fidel’s campaign ‘against sectarianism’. Cuba’s relationship with the Latin

American revolutions is the backbone of the remaining chapters of

this book. The rivalry between Cuba and the Soviet Union, specifi-

cally regarding the support to other revolutionary movements, will

become an issue in the next two chapters.

In high tempo, revolutionary laws and reforms were announced

and implemented: expropriations of foreign enterprises, an urban

rent reform and a pharmaceutical price reform. Then a far-reaching

Land Reform was promulgated. A proto-Ministry of Industry (still a

department) was formed. In fact, the newly created Instituto Nacional

de Reforma Agraria (INRA, National Institute of Agrarian Reform)

became the office of Fidel and Che Guevara, where a small team

prepared the design for further revolutionary reforms. A social secu-

rity system for all citizens was established, and a general educational

reform started. And all of that was in 1959. In 1960 an urban housing

reform, salary reforms, a reform of the banking system and many other

smaller transformations were implemented. In 1961, the government

launched a national literacy campaign, with a mass participation of

around 100,000 students. 42 Discrimination based on race and gender became liable to punishment. All these reforms and new social welfare policies contributed to a kind of collective euphoria. Birth rates

increased as a result.43

These were the years of the revolutionary honeymoon. Hundreds

of thousands, sometimes more than a million, people attended the

speeches of Fidel. Often these discourses galvanized the audience and

minutes-long applause extended over the duration – sometimes six or

seven hours – of these mass meetings.44 Pérez Jr comments:

Fidel became the object of popular importuning, both cause and

effect of a style of personalismo that fostered direct dialogue

between the leader and his followers. He listened to grievances,

From insurgents to socialists | 65

received petitions, considered complains. Fidel’s effectiveness

increased in direct proportion to rising confidence in it. As the

belief took hold that Fidel could provide redress, immediately

and easily, so too did his ability to do so […] Fidel was becom-

ing the government. More and more he responded directly to

popular calls for action. Fidel propounded the goals of the

revolution; the people demanded deeds of the revolution. This

interplay gathered and soon assumed a logic of its own. 45

In one of these plebiscitary speeches, before an audience of a million –

exactly one day before the Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961 – Fidel

asked whether the public agreed with the reforms. Of course there

was agreement. ‘And that is socialism,’ the prime minister declared;

thunderous applause followed.

In February 1961, Fidel invited the Spanish-Soviet professor Ana-

stasio Mansillo to lecture about Marx’s Capital at the Council of Ministers. According to Mansillo, Fidel and Che Guevara had been

his ‘most difficult students’.46 Soon thereafter, Che Guevara invited Mansillo to organize a more advanced seminar about Capital at the Ministry of Industry, to be attended by his vice-ministers and other

functionaries. They also studied econometry and mathematics. In this

same year (1961), the government structure was completely reformed:

new ministries were established and the public sector expanded.

A new National Planning Board (Junta Central de Planificación,

JUCEPLAN) was set up to catalyse and to control an economy based

on directive planning and state (or collective) property.47 In the years following, reforms of the property system transformed Cuba into a

country of collective or state-owned property, where even the smallest

micro-enterprises were collectivized: ‘bars, groceries, garages, small

stores, the shops of self-employed artisans and other independent

workers, from carpenters to masons to plumbers’.48

Already in early 1959, and in 1960 and 1961, Cuban adversaries

of the revolution had left the country, generally departing for Greater

Miami.49 The adversaries were the former supporters of Batista and their families, and the wealthy (upper-) middle-class segment of society that felt threatened by the nationalizations of American- and

Cuban-owned property. The Peter Pan operation (already mentioned

66 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

in note 5 of this chapter) contributed to another exodus of 14,000

children to ‘host families’ in the United States. By 1962, around

200,000 Cubans had left the country. After the Cuban Missile Crisis

in 1962 (see below) another wave of outmigrants departed on twice

daily ‘Freedom Flights’ between Havana and Miami. The programme

lasted until 1973 and peaked in 1968, when the last remaining small

businesses were nationalized. By then another 260,500 Cubans had

arrived in Florida.50

The United States and the Soviet Union

Here there needs to be a short reference to the interplay between

internal political processes in Cuba and the role of the two world

powers at the time. Although the Eisenhower administration had rec-

ognized the new government, the United States reacted to the Cuban

reform and radicalization process with growing unease, distress and

alarm. As early as February 1959, the US–Cuban relationship was

affected by the refusal of the American government to return US$424

million in bank reserves to Cuba. 51 The revolutionary war criminal tribunals during the insurgency period had caused indignation, which

was nurtured by the claims of thousands of victims in the Cuban

anti-Castro community in Miami.52 The early support for rebellious movements against dictatorships in the Dominican Republic (the

Trujillo regime), Haiti (the Duvalier regime), Nicaragua (the Somoza

regime) and Guatemala (the Ydígoras Fuentes regime) was also upset-

ting Washington. In December 1959 the Eisenhower administration

approved an action plan to overthrow Castro.

The overtures towards the Soviet Union were considered by the

US State Department to be a direct advance towards communism.

In February 1960 Soviet vice-premier Mikoyan visited Cuba and

negotiated a trade agreement on Cuban sugar, crude oil and com-

mercial loans. In May 1960 diplomatic relations with Moscow were

re- established. The Soviet Union also provided support to the Cuban

armed forces in the form of equipment – the higher military eche-

lons received advanced military training in Moscow and Leningrad. 53

Che Guevara visited China and secured another sugar trade and loan

agreement. In July 1960 the United States cut, then suspended, sugar

imports from Cuba; afterwards they were barred. The final nation-

From insurgents to socialists | 67

alizations of all US property (oil refineries, sugar estates, electric

and telephone companies) resulted in a trade embargo in October

1960. Prior to this, US agencies had embarked upon covert support

to counter-revolutionary movements in Cuba and even upon efforts

to assassinate Fidel Castro and his inner circle of revolutionary com-

panions. In 1960 and 1961 several serious assaults on Cuban civilian

targets took place: economic sabotage, bombings, assassination

attempts and even killings. In the course of this action, some covert

operators and CIA agents were arrested. 54

The change in Cuba’s relations with the United States and with the

Soviet Union can perhaps be illustrated with an event that occurred

after Fidel’s trip to the United Nations in September 1960. He deliv-

ered the longest speech ever made by a head of government (four and

a half hours), but shortly after his arrival in New York his plane was

seized by local authorities in compensation for the expropriation of

American property. Then Khrushchev lent him an Ilyushin to return

to Havana with the Cuban delegation.55 The already strained diplomatic relations of the United States with Cuba were suspended, and

then ruptured in early January 1961. At the insistence of Washington,

Cuba was expelled from the Organization of American States (OAS).

With the exception of two, all member states broke off diplomatic

relations with Cuba; only Canada and Mexico chose to maintain their

embassies in the country.

Of course, it had a lasting influence on assistance and support

from and, consequently, growing economic dependence on the Soviet

Union. It also implied the necessity of coming to terms with the PSP

and its seasoned leadership, who knew better than the Cuban revolu-

tionaries how to behave in Moscow and how to deal with the Soviet

inner circle. Former Soviet ambassador Pavlov, head of the Latin

American Directorate of the USSR Foreign Ministry from 1987 to

1990, remarks:

The Soviet leadership was also getting information and advice […]

by Blas Roca, Aníbal Escalante, and other leaders of the PSP,

who were regular visitors to Moscow. Having committed a gross

error in denigrating Castro’s armed struggle, Cuban communists

now faced the prospect of being left on the sidelines of his

68 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

revolution. They made themselves useful to Castro and gained

influence with the revolutionary regime by offering their services to

help obtain the Soviet Union’s economic support, which appeared

to be the most effective, simple solution to Cuba’s problem of

finding alternative markets and sources of supply.56

When Che Guevara headed the first significant Cuban mission to the

Soviet government and Communist Party, Aníbal Escalante (secretary

general of the PSP) briefed old Russian party comrades at the same

time that Che Guevara toasted with Khrushchev.57

The Eisenhower administration had prepared an invasion plan to

topple the Cuban government. The CIA already boasted a similar

experience in 1954, when it successfully removed the elected gov-

ernment of Colonel Arbenz in Guatemala, who had announced a

Land Reform and had recognized the small Partido Guatemalteco de

Trabajadores (PGT) – the local Communist Party. At that time they

had relied on a counter-revolutionary force of mercenaries headed

by a right-wing Guatemalan colonel, Castillo Armas. 58 The incoming Kennedy administration approved the plan but restricted the involvement of any US military and (especially) air force support. The plan

entailed the landing of paramilitary forces, recruited from anti-Castro

refugees in Florida and trained by the CIA in two encampments in

Guatemala and Nicaragua. Security measures were poor, and Cuban

intelligence already had a good idea of the number of mercenaries

involved as well as their leadership, equipment and fighting capacity

(see Chapter 4).

Washington had expected that the landing of the invasion force

would trigger a widespread revolt against the regime. The battle group

of 1,400 mercenaries, however, was met with fierce resistance when

it set foot on Cuban soil. Fidel had mobilized the army and the newly

created militias. He participated as a front-line commander at the

Bay of Pigs (Playa Girón), the theatre of the invasion.59 After two days of severe fighting the invaders suffered the loss of 114 dead and

1,200 captured. National pride was immense – the crowds cheered,

the nation was unified. The revolution was declared victorious – the

‘Colossus of the North’ had failed to oust their leaders. In May 1962

Khrushchev became Cuba’s self-appointed military protector by

From insurgents to socialists | 69

soliciting Fidel Castro’s permission to deploy nuclear missiles on the

island. He intended to kill two birds with one stone:60

[…] positioning nuclear weapons on the doorstep of the United

States with the noble justification of the ‘defence of Cuba against

possible American aggression’. An agreement was reached

about the deployment of intermediate and tactical nuclear mis-

siles and specialized Soviet forces, a total of 45,000 enlisted men

and officers with munitions and other supplies for thirty days

of combat, while ‘authorizing Field Commander Pliyev in Cuba

to exercise his own flexible response […] without asking for

Moscow’s permission’.

When the Kennedy administration was informed about the presence of

the Soviet missiles and their launching capacity, the president ordered

a naval blockade. With the world at the brink of a nuclear war, the

Soviets and the Americans cut a secret deal ‒– without consulting the

Cubans. Khrushchev agreed to remove the missiles under the condi-

tion that the United States would not attack Cuba. Simultaneously,

as part of the agreement, the Americans withdrew their missiles posi-

tioned in Turkey. The Cuban leadership got wind of the deal through

the radio. They were furious, realizing that they were too dependent

on the continuance of direct economic and military support from the

Soviet Union while feeling treated like a Soviet satellite of secondary

importance. In retrospect, Fidel Castro reflects:61

We learned of the Soviet proposal to withdraw the missiles from

public sources. And this wasn’t discussed with us at all! […]

Khrushchev should have told the Americans: ‘The Cubans

should take part in this discussion.’ At that moment, he failed

to show equanimity and determination. As a matter of princi-

ples, they should have consulted us. If that had been the case,

the terms of the agreement would have surely been better. The

Guantánamo Naval Base wouldn’t have remained in Cuba and

the high altitude surveillance flights would have been discontinued.

We were deeply offended; we protested.

70 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Khrushchev tried to soften the Cuban embitterment with multibillion-

dollar grants and abundant military assistance, and the continued pres-

ence of Soviet military on the island (a combat brigade of 2,800 men). 62

The relationship with the Soviet Union was maintained. In 1972 Cuba

became a full member of COMECON, hitherto limited to the Soviet

Union, Warsaw Pact members and Mongolia. The Missile Crisis

became a turning point in Soviet–Cuban relations: ‘Numerous mutual

proclamations of everlasting friendship and loyalty notwithstanding,

that mental block remained forever in Cuban leaders’ minds. ’63 The relations improved only during the Brezhnev years, during the 1970s

and most of the 1980s. 64

Becoming socialists

After January 1959, a significant number of combatants thought that

they had fulfilled their patriotic duty and went back home to resume

their daily lives. The sisters Laura and Carmen Fernández Rueda,

ninety-three and eighty-eight years old at the time of the interview,

had been couriers and had hidden leaders of the M 26-7 in their home

on several occasions. They also returned to their jobs after January

1959.65 Carmen, a schoolteacher, became a provincial inspector of

education in Pinar del Rio. She became a member of the Party in

1971. Laura, who had been a United Nations functionary, turned

down specific employment in the public sector, and even refused Party

membership:

In January 1971, they provided my sister Carmen with the Party

membership. But I never wanted to be a member of the Party.

For the revolution I would do anything, but I don’t like those

offices. I was, with all that I had, against Batista. The revolu-

tion was nice and worked well and there were many boys who

fought for it. But all that is over; now there are only memories.

Most insurgents were reunited with their families. Héctor Carmona

Heredia, a prisoner of Batista, was liberated and put on a plane to

Havana, where he met Camilo Cienfuegos.66 Camilo asked what his former rank had been within the M 26-7: ‘Captain of the militias,’,

he replied. ‘From now on you are Captain of the Rebel Army.’ Off

From insurgents to socialists | 71

he went to his family in Camagüey, where he was welcomed as a war

hero. He became Fidel’s helicopter pilot during the Bay of Pigs crisis,

flying the helicopter that Mikoyan had brought as a gift to Fidel.

Many of the interviewees mention the euphoric meetings and local

celebrations that characterized the first weeks of the revolution. After

the festivities in the first months, nearly all student participants of

the insurgency returned to the university and finished their studies in

special crash courses. In general, they combined study with postings

of responsibility within the public sector, army, police and militias.

When Cuba became a socialist country in 1961, there was an urgent

need for schooling. Then the Cuban leadership initiated a massive

training programme for the young revolutionary adherents and mili-

tia members.67 Most of the textbooks were of Soviet origin. Karol68

sketches the difficulties with which the Cuban leaders were confronted,

resuming a description of a discussion he had had with Che Guevara:

So far so good. But then I asked whether, given this rather

elementary plane of political education, it might not be dangerous

to throw into what C. Wright Mills had called this ‘ideolog-

ical vacuum’ a whole lot of Soviet literature of questionable

value. At this question, he became furious […]. I contented

myself with giving him my own views on the works of acad-

emicians Konstantinov, Mitin, and Lysenko, who had adorned

the shelves of the library […]. Che raised his arms up to heaven:

‘We want to turn our young people into socialists as quickly as

we possibly can, and that means consulting textbooks from the

Eastern Bloc. Have you got others you can recommend?’ […].

While he spoke, his look seemed to say: ‘Please, try to forget all

your preconceptions and put yourself in our shoes.’ He did not

attempt to defend the Marxism of Konstantinov and Mitin

any more than he approved of my opinion of them. He let it

be understood that he had never read these works and that

the political education of Cuba did not depend on the sort of

marginal aberration they might represent.

One of the students who followed the obligatory training in Marxism-

Leninism was young Fernando Martínez Heredia, who afterwards

72 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

became one of Cuba’s most influential philosophers (albeit not always

an orthodox one). He somewhat ruefully remarks on his first training

in dialectical materialism:

In the summer of 1962 I received military training in the Unidad

Militar 2254. [Suddenly I discovered that I was selected] for the

School of Marxist-Leninist Philosophy […]. I literally left my

FAL rifle to board at school with 104 students. My first session

there left me horrified, because the lecture was about dialectic

materialism. They spent the whole afternoon discussing whether

or not a shadow is an object, an absolutely sterile debate. I won-

dered: ‘This has to be a punishment. It cannot be that they sent

me to this crap.’ But I joined the school with the same extreme

dedication with which everybody then did everything. I spent

five months in that school. In the philosophy classes we studied

Materialism and Empirico-Criticism of Lenin, and the Anti-

Dühring of Engels as well as his Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy, and several monographs. But

our basic text was the Soviet manual, the Foundations of Marxist-

Leninist Philosophy of Konstantinov and others, published by

the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. It was an unbearable

book. I threw it away while reading Chapter 7 […]. At school I had a row in public […]. Everyone had to present a topic from

the manual in front of the entire school. I had to lecture about

the dictatorship of the proletariat. I presented a résumé of what

the book said, but then I concluded with the comment that

Stalin had ordered the murder of his compañeros in the USSR. 69

Socialism required a unification process and the fusion between the

two revolutionary movements (M 26-7 and the DR) – the combatants

with a revolutionary ethos, and the PSP with their good standing in

the Soviet-oriented party and their experienced cadres. On 26 July

1961, the three movements merged into one single unified structure,

the Organizaciones Revolucionarias Integradas (ORI, Integrated Rev-

olutionary Organizations), under the leadership of Aníbal Escalante.

In 1962 the ORI was restructured into the Partido Unido de la Rev-

olución Socialista de Cuba (PURSC, Unified Party of the Socialist

From insurgents to socialists | 73

Revolution of Cuba), with Fidel and Raúl as its First and Second

Secretaries. Here, the influence of the PSP was very strong: of the

twenty-five members in leadership positions, fourteen were M 26-7

members, one a member of the DR and ten of the PSP.70 In addition

to the party membership, the younger militants were admitted into

the Association of Young Rebels (Asociación de Jóvenes Rebeldes,

AJR), a creation of Che Guevara that merged in 1960 with the Juven-

tud Socialista of the PSP. In accordance with the unification of the

PURSC, the name was modified to the Unión de Jóvenes Comunistas

(UJC, Union of Young Communists).

The fusion process also brought misgivings. Enrique Oltuski, once

a former employee of Shell with an engineering degree from the Uni-

versity of Miami, was an acclaimed leader of the resistance movement

in the llano. Appointed minister of communications in January 1959,

he was asked to leave the cabinet in June 1960. He remembers:71

In my opinion, there were three main lines, with theirs nuances

and complexities, within the revolution. They were the Com-

munists [the PSP members] plus the compañeros of the 26 July

Movement who had positions and strategic purposes that coin-

cided with them, mainly Raúl and Che; other revolutionary

combatants with anti-communist ideology, who quickly moved

to openly counterrevolutionary positions […]; and we, the com-

batants of the 26 July Movements, with leftist ideas that were

not anti-communist but highly critical of the PSP, due to some

historical errors that weighted too heavily, especially their per-

sistent adverse attitude towards the armed struggle […]. When

I took charge of the Ministry of Communications, I brought in

some of my compañeros to occupy the highest positions […].

I knew them and I had confidence in them; they had fought with

me. That was completely normal in those early months. On the

other hand, the Communists began to establish themselves at the

Ministry of Communications. I knew them; some of them occu-

pied key positions […]. A fight quickly ensued, like in almost all

other Ministries, between the Communists and their following,

and some members of the 26 July Movement and others who

were not counterrevolutionary and also wanted to be part of

74 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the process. The Communists embarked upon accusing several

compañeros of being negative elements, even of being counter-

revolutionaries, and forced them out of the key positions that

they occupied.

President Dorticós and Prime Minister Fidel Castro discussed the issue

of the growing internal division within his ministry. Oltuski continues:72

Dorticós asked me to come over [to his office]. After explaining

some things, he said to me: ‘It has been decided to discharge you

because of the divisions in your Ministry. The situation is so

problematic that you’re not able to resolve it. We have to bring

a compañero who has no commitment to the parties involved.

That is the reason why you are to be replaced, and that is it.’

While President Dorticós was telling me that, I got angry. And

when he says to me: ‘Do you have any ideas where you want to

work? Do you need some support?’ I thought: ‘I’ll work with

the most radical guy there is, to make clear who I am.’ And I

said: ‘I’d like to work with Che.’ ‘Who?’ ‘Yes, with Che.’ The

President was pretty surprised. He only managed to tell me:

‘Okay, we’ll try doing that.’ Immediately afterwards Che called

me: ‘Damned, I’m really glad. Come over.’

And it worked well. Eventually Oltuski became Che’s very esteemed

vice-minister of technical development, then his vice-minister of

planning and finally, until his death in 2012, vice-minister of fish-

ing industries.73 Oltuski’s case was fought out at the highest levels.

Also notable was the case of one of Cuba’s leading historians, Ibarra

Cuesta, a former combatant as well:74

I have a dispute here with someone from the PSP, of Escalante.

Raúl [Castro] went to Santiago to see what a mess it was. There

was a discussion with him, and he asked me what I was doing.

And he said: ‘Come with me to the army, to the Political Direc-

torate, so that you can work with a few Spanish Republicans

who are writing the military history.’ Well, these Republican

Spaniards did not have a clue about Cuba’s history.

From insurgents to socialists | 75

Thus the chief of the Political Directorate said to me: ‘Hey,

look, why don’t you stay with the project and write the history of

Cuba?’ And I wrote the Historia de Cuba, a book for the mem-

bers of the Revolutionary Armed Forces that was later adopted

for university courses. And after the 1970s, our pro-Soviet

friends withdrew it.

The memories about the (uneasy) process of amalgamating the for-

mer insurgents and the old communists at all levels of government – in

the public sector, at the university, and in training centres – are still traceable more than fifty years later. In various interviews with diplomats, liaison officers with other Latin American guerrilla movements

and retired public officers, I could perceive the continuing irritation

and indignation. Several former insurgents mentioned having been a

victim of the Escalante period. In many of the interviews one could

feel the lingering grudge.

In Cuba, this episode is known as the period of ‘sectarianism’. In

fact, it was a power struggle between the old Moscow guard and the

fidelistas in the Party. Many of the fidelista victims, dismissed from office or sent away to stay at home, were reinstated in their old or

equivalent functions. Roberto Márquez, afterwards a diplomat, fin-

ished his career as Chief of the Special Forces at the Ministry of the

Interior (Ministerio del Interior, MININT). He was explicit about the

damage and the upset within the ranks of the revolutionary insurgents:

[In the public sector] there was an urgent need to fill up the

positions of trust, of importance, [with] people of absolute loy-

alty. And one began to place people of the PSP in those sorts

of functions. But that generated damages, due to the attitudes

of the Secretary of Organization of the ORI, which was Aníbal

Escalante, a leader of the PSP […]. That permitted him to

become a very powerful man, and he began to place his con-

fidants – people who responded to his [personal] interests – in

every state agency, wherever. And that happened in all structures

of the ORI, without participation of the masses. Therefore it

was called the period of ‘sectarianism’. And it caused the most

blatant stupidities. There were revolutionary compañeros who

76 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

were detained. Others went abroad, as a consequence of the

pressure of the sectarian period.75

Eventually, Fidel Castro intervened. Escalante was forced to step

down and accepted minor postings.76 In theory, after Escalante’s fall, unity was restored. ‘Escalante’ stood for many former PSP party

bureaucrats whose qualifications were indispensable for the national,

regional and local administrations. And Escalante’s demise did not

prevent the thousand and one small purges and insults of the ‘new

revolutionaries’. For a long period, bad feelings about the actions of

PSP members lingered just beneath the surface.

The formation of the unitary party was accompanied by a simul-

taneous process: the creation of the revolutionary mass movements.

It was a process organized and implemented from above. As in the

case of the economy, which was gradually brought under state con-

trol, civil society was reorganized in broad, sectoral organizations that

‘represented the masses’. In the context of the growing threat from

the United States and the emerging counter-revolutionary movements

(‘bandits’), aside from the armed forces, numerous militia members

were trained as a kind of auxiliary troops. They served as vigilance for

public buildings and as assistance to the regular armed forces in case of necessity. Sometimes very young adolescents were incorporated. On the

eve of the Bay of Pigs invasion, the government created a nationwide

system of locally based Comités de Defensa de la Revolución (CDR,

Committees for the Defence of the Revolution). They were considered to

be ‘the eyes and ears of the Revolution’, on the lookout for danger and

counter-revolutionary activities related to the state security services.

The CDR also organized neighbourhood vigilance and festivities. 77

Other mass organizations, unions and associations were also

created between 1960 and 1963.78 Probably the most encompassing of all was the Federación de Mujeres Cubanas (FMC, Federation of

Cuban Women) with more than four million members in 2015. 79

It was created in 1960; all other existing women’s organizations

were incorporated during the merging process. Until her death in

2007, Vilma Espín (Raúl Castro’s wife) was its president. Equally

important was the Central de Trabajadores de Cuba (CTC, the

Unitary Organization of Cuban Workers), formerly created as the

From insurgents to socialists | 77

Confederación de Trabajadores (Workers’ Confederation) in 1939

when the Communist Party was legalized. The CTC became a uni-

tary labour movement, in which all existing and competing labour

organizations were merged. In 2015 the CTC had around three

million members. 80 A new unitary movement for the agricultural smallholders’ association (ANAP, Asociación Nacional de Agricultores Pequeños) – in fact a federation of cooperatives – was formed

in 1961.81 The student federation FEU was resurrected.82 A unitary writers’ and artists’ association (UNEAC, Unión de Escritores y Artistas de Cuba, 1961) and a similar organization for journalists (UPEC,

Unión de Periodistas de Cuba, 1963) complemented the restructuring

process of mass organizations.83

Much later, in 1993, the combatants’ association (Asociación de

Combatientes de la Revolución Cubana, ACRC) was founded by

Raúl Castro ‘to unconditionally support the defense of the Revolution

and the conquests of socialism’. In 2015 it had 330,000 members:

former combatants of the Rebel Army, members of the insurgent

underground, members of the Bay of Pigs defence forces, members of

the campaigns against counter-revolutionaries, combatants in inter-

national missions, and members and retired officers of the Fuerzas

Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR, Revolutionary Armed Forces) and

the MININT with a minimum of ten years of service. 84

With the exception of one, the previously mentioned interviewees

in this chapter were members of the Party, the CDR and the ACRC.

Even in the case of one former member of the urban insurgency,

Ricardo Gómez Rodríguez – a member of the Havana insurgency who

had spent eight months in one of Batista’s prisons and went home

after 1959 – the Party discovered him after years. ‘I went to work in

Matanzas because I didn’t have any aspiration for anything else,’ he

remembers. 85 But afterwards he studied civil engineering. In 1968 he was invited by a friend to talk about his work in a youth encampment. He decided to speak about his time as an insurgent in Havana.

When it was discovered that he had been a revolutionary combatant,

two young female Party members advocated his Party membership.

But the municipal administration refused him as an aspirant member

because he had not been a member of the CDR. Furious, he told the

committee members:

78 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

When I was fifteen years old, I risked my life [for the revolu-

tion]. I sacrificed the life of my mother and father, the stability

of my family. I risked my life many times, spent eight months

in jail, and took part in a nine-day hunger strike when I was

fighting in Havana […] If that means less than paying 25 cents a

month and keeping guard on a street block with a wooden stick,

then I agree. 86

After an extraordinary meeting, the Party granted him his member-

ship under the condition of his incorporation into the CDR.

CHAPTER 4

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s)

Cuba’s impact in Latin America

The impact of the Cuban Revolution on the Latin American

armed left was immense. In nearly all Latin American countries

guerrilla movements emerged. With the sole exception of the Peru-

vian (officially Maoist) guerrilla of Shining Path in the 1980s and

1990s, all existing politico-military movements drew inspiration

from the Cuban insurgency against dictator Batista; they found

hope in the creation and consolidation of a stable socialist econ-

omy and society. In most cases that influence was indirect. But

Cuba also attempted to encourage and disseminate similar revo-

lutions abroad, in Latin America and the Caribbean as well as in

Africa. And that meant direct efforts, sometimes intromissions, by

sending Cuban military advisers and guerrilla detachments abroad.

In Africa (Angola, Ethiopia and several other countries) Cuba

deployed regular military units and participated directly in war

theatres. In Latin America, however, guerrilla support was nearly

always given under cover, and the number of Cuban combatants

who were directly involved never exceeded twenty per country.

The cases of direct involvement in Latin American and Caribbean

revolutions, and revolutionary movements by Cuban combatants,

occurred in the 1960s.

It was one of the most vehement periods in the Cold War, when

anti-communism dominated the discussions among members of the

Organization of American States (OAS). In many countries in the

region, military dictatorships had taken over civilian governments.

Counter-insurgency campaigns against communists, and supposed

communists, were accompanied by ‘civil action’.1 Every rebellion, every armed struggle, every resistance movement, every large strike,

80 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

every protest march and every mass demonstration was interpreted

as the result of a sinister plot masterminded by Cuban agents. In that

sense, the influence of the revolutionary island was overestimated.

Nevertheless, Cuba supported most opposition movements, moderate

and insurrectional, against dictatorships and military juntas in the

region.

The 1960s were also a decade of revolutionary fervour in Cuba.

This period of Cuban ‘revolutionary internationalism’ started a cou-

ple of months after January 1959. Cuba became a leading country

within the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries (NO-AL, Mov-

imiento de los Países No Aliados) and generously received persecuted

intellectuals and politicians, especially those from the Latin American

region. Many of the persecuted leaders became personal friends of

Fidel Castro and Che Guevara (until his departure to the Congo). The

influence of Cuba in the foundational period of almost all guerrilla

movements is demonstrable. Che Guevara acquired world fame as

a revolutionary theorist and for his ideas about rural guerrilla focal

points ( focos, or foquismo in Spanish). In fact it was his personal interpretation of the Cuban rebellion in the Sierra Maestra, putting

major emphasis on the guerrilla (and less on the enormous support

of the urban underground and the early sympathy of a significant

part of the population). His ideas were discussed and applied by

almost all rebellious Latin American movements. Fidel Castro’s war

memoirs2 were recently published at the end of the first decade of

the twenty-first century: they are the history of his campaigns in a

strictly military sense. Raúl Castro never published his extended war

records; he remained the brilliant organizer of Cuba’s regular armed

forces (the FAR, Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias). 3 In this book I barely mention the role of the Cuban FAR, originally a strong defensive apparatus that was also capable of launching effective offensive

expeditionary forces to Africa in the 1970s.4 I mention the FAR only when officers of the regular army were participating – as instructors

or combatants –‒ in the Latin American guerrilla movements of the 1960s. However, in most of these kinds of activities it was not the

FAR members who participated but rather special envoys or instruc-

tors of the special forces within the Ministerio del Interior (MININT,

Ministry of the Interior), under the leadership of Manuel Piñeiro.

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 81

During the 1960s, the foco approach, and in particular Che

Guevara’s ideas about revolutionary combat, were part of the sup-

port package to rural guerrilla warfare in the region, sometimes but

not always accompanied by Cuban mentors, instructors or partici-

pants. Cuba was diplomatically isolated by exclusion from the OAS

in January 1962, under pressure from the United States. All Latin

American countries ruptured their diplomatic relations with Cuba,

with the exception of Mexico.5 In the following pages I will typify the kind of Cuban involvement, maintaining a rough chronology. I reserve

for the last part of this chapter, however, Che Guevara’s plans for a

continental revolution that ended in 1967 with his death in Bolivia.

Proliferation of the revolution

In discourse and action, Fidel Castro and Che Guevara were the most

outspoken Cuban leaders in favour of the proliferation of the (ideas

of the) Cuban Revolution. Castro and especially Guevara were

convinced of the fact that the triumph in Havana could not be limited

to the continental borders of Latin America. While Latin America was

the Patria Grande (Greater Fatherland), Cuba focused on the entire Third World. Che Guevara translated these feelings and his own experiences as guerrilla leader into monographic publications.6 In short, a miniature version of Guevara’s foco thesis is that revolutions can successfully start with a rural guerrilla force that will unite peasants

against suppressive governments, military dictatorships and imperial-

ism. At that time, the initial guerrilla foco was a kind of starter motor that would ignite the real engine of the ‘popular masses’. In turn,

many Latin American guerrilla leaders, leaders of the armed left and

leaders of dissident factions of the hesitant communist parties found

their inspiration in the Cuban example and in the iconic figures of

Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. They were seduced by their revolu-

tionary mystique, read their books, became true believers of the foco

ideas, and went to Cuba for advice and training.7

Fidel and Che waxed lyrical about the revolutionary consequences

for the independent and other Antillean island-states of American,

British, Dutch and French statehood; for the ‘semi-independent’ Latin

American countries; and for the entire ‘colonized and underdeveloped’

82 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Third World. In reference to Latin America, the Cuban government

announced in the First Declaration of Havana (August 1960) that

it ‘energetically condemn[ed] the overt and criminal intervention

exerted by American imperialism for more than a century over all the

nations of Latin America, which have seen their lands invaded more

than once – Mexico, Nicaragua, Haiti, Santo Domingo and Cuba’.

The Second Declaration of Havana (February 1962) has a text with

the intonation of the Communist Manifesto. But it is a new manifest

for a sort of Fifth International with Cuba as the vanguard nation of

the Latin American Revolution:8

To the accusations that Cuba wants to export its revolution, we reply:

Revolutions are not exported, they are made by the people …

What Cuba can give to the people, and has already given, is

its example. And what does the Cuban Revolution teach? That

revolution is possible, that the people can make it, that in the

contemporary world there are no forces halting the liberation

movements of the people […]. There is a place for all progres-

sives, from the old militant Marxist to the sincere Catholic who

has nothing to do with the Yankee monopolists and the feudal

lords of the land […]. Anxious hands are stretched forth, ready

to die for what is theirs, to win those rights that were laughed at

by one and all for 500 years. Yes, now history will have to take

the poor of America into account, the exploited and spurned of

Latin America, who have decided to begin writing history for

themselves for all time. 9

In January 1966, Cuba was the organizer of the First Tricontinental

Conference, an international solidarity meeting of Asians, Africans

and Latin Americans, where delegates from eighty-two countries

(of which twenty-seven were Latin American) discussed the strate-

gies to combat ‘imperialism, colonialism, and neo-colonialism’. The

conference established the ‘inalienable right of the people [of Asia,

Africa and Latin America] to complete political independence and to

resort to all forms of struggle that may be necessary, including armed

struggle, to conquer this right’. 10 At that conference, the Third World Organization of Solidarity of the Peoples of Africa, Asia and Latin

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 83

America (Organización de Solidaridad de los Pueblos de Asia, África

y América Latina, OSPAAAL) was created. Here the famous mes-

sage of Che Guevara about the creation of ‘[…] two, three … many

Vietnams […]’ was read to the delegates. At the same conference, the

founding of another organization, the Organización Latinoamericana

de Solidaridad (OLAS, Latin American Solidarity Organization) was

announced.

In late 1964, all Latin American leaders of the (pro-Soviet) com-

munist parties met in Havana, officially to prepare for the OLAS

conference. The meeting was prepared by Piñeiro at the VMT and

presided over by Carlos Rafael Rodriguez, veteran old PSP leader who

had joined the M 26-7 in 1958 and was also held in high esteem by the

parties of the Moscow line.11 Some delegates openly complained about

Cuba’s preferences for radical splinters from the good old Party. 12 Fidel

addressed the delegations, analysing the ‘pre-revolutionary conditions’

and the need for ‘anti-imperialist and anti-oligarchic struggle’. He also maintained that the Soviet–China split was an ‘artificial division’. The

meeting ended in a firm promise to not openly discuss the China–

Soviet contradictions, to maintain a low profile and to concentrate on

the Latin American problems and the national realities. At the first

OLAS conference in Havana, in July/August 1967, the already exist-

ing divergence between the communist parties (with strong loyalty to

the Soviet Union) and the presence of the armed left in Latin America

(supported by Cuba) became concrete. The delegates sent a message

to Che Guevara: ‘The path of Viet Nam is our path, the continental

confrontation our task: the creation of the Second and the Third Viet

Nam in the world.’ Cuban–Soviet relations were cooling off and it took

several years for a new rapprochement to come about.

Algeria and Mexico were of crucial importance to Cuba. Algeria

was the pre-eminent country for diplomatic and other contacts with

liberation movements in Africa and Asia. In 1962, Piñeiro formed

a ‘working group’ for strategic cooperation. Cuba assisted with a

mission during the Algerian–Moroccan conflict in 1963. In 1965, an

agreement on intelligence cooperation was established between the

two countries. In 1965 a special unit was created within the Dirección

General de Inteligencia (DGI, Directorate General of Intelligence), to

accommodate relations with other African liberation movements.

84 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Che Guevara travelled to Africa for three months in 1964/65, estab-

lishing more direct contacts. Algeria was instrumental in establishing

these relations. 13 Cárdenas became the acting section head at the VMT; he had to attend to the exfiltrated Cuban combatants from

the Congo (see below). Ulises Estrada, Piñeiro’s experienced assistant,

was appointed unit head after his return from Prague, where he had

attended to Che Guevara. Estrada was made the director of the new

Africa and the Middle East directorate, with sections for East and

Southern Africa, West Africa and North Africa. 14

Mexico was the only Latin American country that had not ruptured

its diplomatic contacts with Cuba.15 This country (and by the late 1960s Panama under General Torrijos as well) was the bridgehead for

travel and contact with the clandestine movements in the region. In

Mexico City and Panama City, many revolutionary refugees found a

home, and institutional contacts had been established during the dec-

ades of military dictatorship. From the Cuban embassy in Mexico to

the legation in Panama, intensive contacts with the Central American

guerrilla were maintained. 16

The Departamento América and its predecessor

organizations

The most publicly acknowledged Cuban organization for relations

with other Latin American rebel movements was the Departamento

América. The Departamento América was formally created in 1975

but had operated under other names since early 1959. Its chief was

the charismatic Manuel Piñeiro Losada, a close personal friend and

confidant of Fidel and Che Guevara. Prior to 1959, he was the head

of the action group of M 26-7 in the city of Matanzas. Persecuted

by the local police, he went to the Sierra Maestra, where he finally

became a comandante in the second Frente of Raúl Castro. There he was in charge of intelligence, security and policing. In January 1959,

Piñeiro was assigned as Jefe de Plaza de Santiago de Cuba (Chief of

the First Military District, in the old Oriente Province) but he was

quickly transferred to national intelligence tasks. 17

Even during the insurgency period, the Ejército Rebelde had its

Departamento de Investigaciones (DIER, Department of Investigation

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 85

of the Rebel Army), the embryonic institution for all Cuba’s

intelligence services. In January 1959, DIER was incorporated

into general military intelligence. The transition was supervised by

Ramiro Valdés Menendez, one of the famous comandantes in the

Sierra Maestra. The international branch of the DIER, called ‘M’,

was headed by Piñeiro. ‘M’ had several sections, such as ‘M-A’,

‘M-B’. M-OE was reserved for ‘Special Operations’ (M – Oper-

aciones Especiales in Spanish), the paramilitary unit that trained

many future guerrilla members at Punto Cero.

Section M always operated completely autonomously because it

was created with the consent of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, who

wanted a swift and agile organization without bureaucracy. 18 When

in 1961 the MININT was created, Valdés became minister. Piñeiro,

as first vice-minister and head of the Vice-Ministerio Técnico (VMT,

Technical Vice-Ministry), built up the Cuban intelligence and security

apparatus. When the internal and external security functions were

separated, the VMT was split into the Departamento de Seguridad

del Estado (DSE, Department of State Security) and the DGI, again

headed by Piñeiro. Its function was to coordinate external intelli-

gence and counter-intelligence, and to support foreign revolutionary

movements.19 In 1971 DGI was divided into new directorates: DGI (intelligence and counter-intelligence) and Dirección General de Liberación Nacional (DGLN, Directorate General of National Liberation),

the last of which was controlled by Piñeiro.

All these organisms and consecutive directorate generals operated

within the jurisdiction of the MININT. 20 The functionaries of the DGI and the DGLN used pseudonyms and were engaged in covert operations or were working in Havana as analysts, country and

region overseers and section heads. They held military ranks. When

the Departamento América was officially created in 1975 under the

umbrella of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, the

officials used their real surnames, abandoned their pseudonyms and

operated as party representatives with diplomatic ranks and careers.

They even lost their military ranks; the institutional realignment also

implied losing their (better) salary as functionaries of the MININT

while becoming staff members of the Central Committee. 21 At that moment the department had around one hundred officers.22 Many of

86 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the higher-ranking officials eventually became formal diplomats. It

was no secret that the staff members of the Departamento América,

officially under the authority of the Central Committee, were ‘the

eyes and ears’ of Fidel Castro.

Here I present some representative career paths of the members of

the Departamento América: Giraldo Mazola, Fabio Escalante Font,

Alberto Cabrera and Ulises Estrada.23

Mazola was a member of a Havana action and sabotage group in

the M 26-7. In 1959 he was appointed as Secretary of International

Relations of the movement, and Fidel requested that he design the

ICAP in 1960. He was appointed president of that institution with

a ministerial rank. Afterwards he was designated vice-minister of

MINREX and then ambassador to Algeria, Nigeria and Chile.

Escalante Font, a member of an urban clandestine section of the

Socialist (Communist) Youth in Havana, became a member of the

advisory staff of Valdés in 1959. He was transferred to the DSE.

Afterwards he headed the section that monitored the CIA. He also

worked for Piñeiro to confirm the rumours about the secret CIA

training camps for the Bay of Pigs invasion. He moved through the

ranks and, during the Contras war in the 1980s in Nicaragua, he was

chief of counter-intelligence in Cuba at the same time that he was

chief adviser on counter-intelligence to Nicaragua’s Ministry of the

Interior (MINTER).

Alberto Cabrera, inducted at the age of twelve into a militia

battalion during the Bay of Pigs invasion, was selected for the first

course at the Intelligence School of the MININT. He entered the

DGLN to look after Colombia, and moved to the Departamento

América in 1975. He served as a diplomat at Cuba’s embassy in

Colombia, and later as minister councillor at the embassy in Pan-

ama. Arrested by the US army during the US invasion, he was

released by the local CIA chief. With his ambassador, Lázaro

Mora, he organized the defence of the embassy and the repatria-

tion of Cuban and Panamanian refugees (also General Noriega’s

family members) to Havana (see Chapter 6). 24 A diplomat in Ecuador, Venezuela and Uruguay, he ended his career as a functionary

of the ICAP, again looking after Venezuela.

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 87

Ulises Estrada, a distant relative of Antonio Maceo and member

of an M 26-7 action and sabotage group in Havana and Santiago de

Cuba, was appointed as a military intelligence officer in 1959.25 In the

early 1960s he participated as a combatant and intelligence officer in

the counter-insurgency operations in Escambray.26 He joined Piñeiro’s Vice-Ministry in 1961, as vice-chief of the section of Special Operations (M-OE). Stationed in Bolivia, he was involved in the preparations of

Che Guevara’s plans for a guerrilla in Argentina, Peru and Bolivia.

After participating as adviser to the Palestine National Liberation

Movement and in Amilcar Cabral’s guerrilla in Guinea-Bissau, he was

selected by Piñeiro to be on a special task force with Che Guevara.

He travelled to Africa for six months and accompanied Che Guevara

in his exfiltration from the Congo to Tanzania and from Dar es

Salaam to Prague. Upon his return to Havana he assisted Piñeiro, as

his number two, in the design of the DGLN and the Departamento

América. During the Allende government in Chile he was in charge

of the special forces within the Cuban embassy, and served as the

security liaison with the Chilean government. 27 He defended the

embassy against the Chilean army during Pinochet’s coup.28 He also assisted Amilcar Cabral’s Partido da Independência da Guiné y Cabo

Verde (PAIGCV). Upon his next return to Havana he was appointed

vice-chief of the Departamento América. Fidel Castro appointed him

ambassador to Jamaica during the government of Manley. His next

postings were those as ambassador to Yemen, Algeria and Maurita-

nia. At the MINREX, he was the chief of the Directorate of Africa

and the Middle East and the Directorate of the NO-AL Movement,

retiring as vice-minister. After his retirement he became the director of the Cuban journal Tricontinental.

Manuel Piñeiro headed the Departmento América (and the preced-

ing institutions) from 1959 to 1992.29 He was succeeded by one of his

vice-chiefs, José Antonio Arbesú Frage, who in turn retired in 2013.

Piñeiro was the brilliant Cuban intelligence chief.30 Audacious, sharp,

courteous, modest, soft-spoken and a great listener, he lived largely

in the shadows of power. As a member of the Central Committee, his

real influence in state affairs was based on his relationship of absolute confidence with Fidel; he was his fiercely loyal political operator.

88 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

According to several of his vice-chiefs at the department, he was one

of the very few who could say ‘no’ to the Commander-in-Chief. 31

Deeply respected by his officers, he was venerated by most department

members; for many he was a father figure:

All our missions were risky; we were always observed by the

American Special Services in the countries where we operated.

Piñeiro took care of our families, called [our wives at] home,

was interested in our problems and family affairs […] One of his

many virtues was that he was the only one who could reprove

or criticize his subordinates. He [always] defended his subordi-

nates and afterwards he checked the evidence. If necessary, he

and only he sanctioned […] Piñeiro taught us to detest dogma-

tism. He was anti-dogmatic, he wasn’t a sectarian. [He said:]

‘If we always and only talk to the left, we are wrong. We have

to talk with everyone. And remember that between black and

white, there are many nuances and many shades of grey.’ He

permitted us unlimited freedom on the job. But we all knew

where the limits were and what we could do or not do. Any one

of my colleagues could phone a minister or a leader and request

a meeting to address a specific topic. And we were attended

to immediately. They knew that the demand was on behalf of

Piñeiro. And that our missions were approved or even required

by the chief of the Cuban Revolution. And that our missions

could not be delegated [to others] […] As far as I know, we

never did anything that was not ordered, authorized and known

by Fidel Castro.32

Code of conduct

Those who were recruited by Piñeiro read a book by former Amer-

ican intelligence operator General Washington Platt (1957), who

considered intelligence-gathering to be a social science and insisted

on the fact that 90-plus per cent of the information would be told

voluntarily to a trained field officer. 33 The style of operation at the department was ‘convince, not command’. Another code of conduct

was strict neutrality in ideological disputes. In Argentina, Central

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 89

America, Colombia, Peru and Venezuela – where several larger guer-

rilla organizations operated at the same time and sometimes in the

same regions – the Cuban representatives were forbidden to use ter-

minology that could be explained as judgemental.34 Time and again, Fidel’s instructions were consistently repeated: ‘Programmatic and

operational unity of the revolutionary forces, whatever ideological

differences would arise between conflicting politico-military organ-

izations.’ Nearly all interviewed members of the Departamento

América reflected Fidel’s (and Piñeiro’s) instructions. The prescribed

ideological neutrality, however, did not mean that Cuba refrained

from influencing the Latin American guerrilla movements. Cuba’s

leadership had its own preferences and its own dislikes and it oper-

ated as an influential actor in the political left of the Third World.

It could also privilege some movements or be restrictive with respect

to others. In general, Cuba did not actively support the Trotskyist

or Maoist armed left in Latin America, but definitely wanted to be

informed about their intentions and activities.

There were many ideological disparities within every unified

movement of the armed left in Latin America. Splits, divergences and

breaches were the order of the day, as Gillespie and Sprenkels35 make

clear with respect to the Argentinian and Salvadorean guerrilla move-

ments. Eduardo Sancho, one of the five members of the Salvadoran

comandancia general of the Salvadorean Frente Farabundo Martí

para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN, the Farabundo Martí Front

for National Liberation), characterized the five guerrilla movements

under the umbrella of the FMLN as the ‘diaspora of the left […]. We

were transformed into sects, political sects. And it was worse, because

we were Marxists. So we were even more sectarian […]’.36

Also in the Colombian panorama of guerrilla movements, ideological

discussions about orthodoxy caused a rift among many compañeros.

Darío Villamizar, the historian of the Movimiento 19 de Abril (M-19,

Movement of 19 April), the most effervescent urban guerrilla move-

ment in the country in the 1970s and 1980s, sketches the context in

which the M-19 unexpectedly appeared: ‘At that time […] I was very

close to the communist Marxist-Leninist party, to the EPL. And we

were not only Marxist- Leninists, but Marxist-Leninist-Maoists. We

were quite sectarian. We were very young lads. ’37

90 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Fidel Castro remarks in retrospect:

I must say that we contributed a lot to the unity of those people

in Nicaragua, in El Salvador and in Guatemala. The Sandinistas

were divided; the Salvadorans were split up into no less than

five organisations; the Guatemalans were similarly divided. Our

mission was to unite them, and truly, we succeeded in unifying

them.38

‘Working together with Piñeiro’ did not always mean working within

the VMT, the DGI, the DGLN or the Departamento América. Piñeiro,

his vice-chiefs and section chiefs had their feelers in other Cuban

organizations and institutions: of course with the Ministerio de las

Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarios (MINFAR, Ministry of the Revo-

lutionary Armed Forces), with the other institutions coordinated by

the MININT, with the MINREX, and with the ICAP. Piñeiro always

had direct access to Fidel and that meant that he could make use of

any department and institution of the Party and the state. But the

network around the Piñeiro’s people was much larger: academic and

research institutions; the (international divisions) of Cuba’s youth

organizations; the federation of labour unions; the women’s federa-

tion; the journalists’ union; the writers’ union; Radio Habana Cuba;

Prensa Latina; the singer-songwriters of Cuba’s Nova Trova; individ-

ual TV documentary directors; the film institute (Instituto Cubano

del Arte e la Industria Cinematográficos, ICAIC); the medical mis-

sions, and the disaster and reconstruction missions; the literacy

missions; and other missions that went abroad and returned to Cuba.

By 1968, small ‘offices’ had been established in Havana by the

Brazilian Ação Popular (Action of the People, José Jarbas Cer-

queira) and the Movimento Nacionalista Revolucionario (MNR,

Nationalist Revolutionary Movement, Aloisio Palhano), the Guatema-

lan Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes (FAR, Rebel Armed Forces, Francisco

Marroquín), the Peruvian Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria

(MIR, Revolutionary Movement of the Left, Tania Álvarez) and the

Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN, National Liberation Army,

Jesús Maza), the Uruguayan Movimento Revolucionario Oriental

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 91

(MRO, Revolutionary Movement of the East, Eduardo Díaz), and

the Venezuelan Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR, Rev-

olutionary Movement of the Left, Carlos Palacios).39 In the 1970s, they were followed by offices of the Argentinian Montoneros and the

Colombian ELN. In fact, the offices were typically one or two rooms

in the accommodation allotted by the Cuban leadership. In the 1970s

and 1980s, Cuban representatives of the VMT, the DGLN and the

Departamento América also extended contact to the ‘periphery’ (dias-

pora) of Latin American refugees and politicians in exile who were

established in Chile, Mexico, Peru, Panama and Venezuela.40

Investment in respectful long-term and friendly relations and a

deep knowledge of the local political situation were the ground rules

of the Departamento América. To give some examples: Cervantes,

who also had experience in Portuguese-speaking Guinea-Bissau

and Angola, was the in-house expert for Brazil for more than thirty

years. After the re-establishment of diplomatic relations, he became

the political councillor at the Cuban embassy in Brasilia. Over dec-

ades he developed a personal friendship with labour leader, and later

president, Luiz Ignácio Lula da Silva (Lula). 41 Abreu, also a member of the Central Committee, was in charge of the relations with

Central America and the armed left in El Salvador, Guatemala and

Nicaragua for more than thirty years. 42 In 2012, after nearly forty

years, Otto Marrero Núñez retired as chief of the Caribbean Section

of the Department of International Relations (the successor institu-

tion of the Departamento América) of the Central Committee. He

had an encyclopedic knowledge of the who’s-who in the Caribbean

political landscape.

Then there were the numerous ‘ amigos de Cuba’ (friends of

Cuba): visitors, journalists, politicians and researchers interested in

the Cuban Revolution. Piñeiro, a workaholic with a ravenous appe-

tite for facts and details, always found time for an interview, a good

conversation or a dialogue among friends. Latell, 43 CIA officer at the Cuba desk in 1964 and the National Intelligence Officer for Latin

America in the 1990s, considered Cuban intelligence to be ‘one of

the five or six best such organisations in the world, and has been for

decades’.

92 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Early expeditions

In January 1959, on a visit to Venezuela, Castro called for rebellions

against the ‘old dictatorships’ of the Somoza dynasty in Nicaragua, the

Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic, and the apparently eter-

nal Stroessner dictatorship in Paraguay. 44 Exiled revolutionaries, their

family members or their sympathizers ‒– even informal delegations of exile and rebel movements in countries administered by military dictatorships –‒ were welcomed in Cuba. Former Guatemalan president Arbenz,

ousted by a CIA coup in 1954, stayed on the island. He was received by

Fidel and was interviewed by the young Guatemalan lieutenants who

had initiated their small guerrilla movements. Other political refugees

of that country would follow. A small Nicaraguan colony of exiles was

established in Havana as well. The founders of the Nicaraguan Sandin-

ista guerrillas – named after the rebellious General Sandino who, in the

1930s, had resisted an American marine invasion and had been mur-

dered on the orders of Somoza – came to Cuba and met Che Guevara.

Spain

A rather odd plan for an invasion surfaced in January or February

1959, set off by Alberto Bayo – the venerated old lieutenant colonel

of the Spanish Republican Army, who had trained Fidel’s Granma

expedition force in Mexico – and Eloy Gutiérrez Menudo, a Cuban

comandante who afterwards changed sides. They prepared for an

expedition against the dictatorship of Franco in Spain. The plan was

quickly shelved.45

Dominican Republic

On 14 June 1959, Dominican and Cubans volunteers, combatants

of the Sierra Maestra and militants of the Movimiento de Liberación

Dominicana (MLD, Liberation Movement of the Dominican Repub-

lic) headed by (Dominican) Comandante Enrique Gutiérrez Moya,

sailed from Cuba’s Oriente province in an attempt to start an armed

rebellion against Trujillo; they were massacred. In Cuba, the expe-

dition force was trained by Comandante Delio Gómez Ochoa, but

the general supervision was in the hands of Camilo Cienfuegos. 46 I continue here with the Dominican case because it reveals a tragedy,

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 93

comparable with Guevara’s campaigns in the Congo and in Bolivia.

The Dominican reverse in 1959 brought about another rebellious

movement, the Movimiento Revolucionario 14 de Junio (1J4, Revo-

lutionary Movement 14 June), which launched a guerrilla campaign in

November 1963. In less than a month, the guerrilleros were decimated.

In 1965, after the US intervention in the Dominican Republic, 47 Colonel Francisco Caamaño – ex-member of the presidential triumvirate – was

sent as a military attaché to London. But he went in self-exile to Cuba.

Now, a refugee living as ‘Comandante Ramón’ and getting older, he

slowly but surely lost contact with his sympathizers at home and with

the senior Cuban leadership as well. He and his group were relegated

to Osvaldo Cárdenas, head of the Caribbean section at the time:

When I take care of Caamaño and his group, there are problems,

complaints, contradictions, misunderstandings. There are also

problems with the Dominican Republic because we have secret

connections with Caamaño […]. I got to know Caamaño at

Punto Cero, because there we had trained his people […].The

presence of Caamaño had lost interest for those at Liberación

Nacional. Caamaño had not seen Fidel for a long time. [But he]

was well aware that he was ageing. I think that the urgency to do

something in the short period of our lives has been a concern for

not only a few revolutionaries. This problem with age, I guess,

is what also happened with Che. You can’t wait to be sixty years

old to go to a guerrilla. We are talking about men who aspire

to transform the world, to have impact during their lifetimes. I

don’t think that any of them expected to have a long life. Maybe

if Che had more time after the Congo, things would have been

better organized. But he was pressed by the short time of his life.

And he had also left a letter of farewell that had already been

read to the Cuban people. He didn’t have much time.48

Caamaño had a hard-headed discussion with Piñeiro.49 Fidel called in Abrantes, his chief of personal security and the commander of

the special forces, as an intermediary. They tried to persuade him to

think it over. The conditions for a guerrilla campaign were not good,

they said. He could always stay in Cuba. But Caamaño had decided,

94 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

he wanted to go now. And then, in February 1973, Caamaño and

nine guerrilleros departed for the Caracoles Beach in the Dominican Republic to be captured alive, and then murdered the day after.

Panama and Haiti

Other small-scale operations by guerrilla units of exiled volunteers –

and sometimes a couple of Cuban participants – were organized

against Panama and Haiti.50 In April 1959 a Cuban-Panamanian crew disembarked in Panama to support an armed uprising. Very probably

it was a private initiative by former M 26-7 combatants. Their ship

came aground in the marshes and the crew surrendered after rescue.

In August 1959, a small group of Haitian exiles and some Cuban

volunteers came ashore in southern Haiti in an effort to overthrow

dictator Duvalier. They were captured or killed in action.

Paraguay

In December 1959, a heroic but nearly suicidal adventure started in

Paraguay. A group of exiles tried to overthrow dictator Stroessner.

They were inspired by the Cuban example but there is no evidence

of direct Cuban support. Two small guerrilla bands, the Movimiento

14 de Mayo (M-14, Movement of 14 May) and the Frente Unido de

Liberación Nacional (FULNA, United National Liberation Front,

associated with the Paraguayan Communist Party), crossed the Argen-

tine–Paraguayan frontier. The two movements operated separately.

The FULNA was a movement of national liberation (modelled after

the Cuban example) and the M-14 tried to provoke a spontaneous

mass insurgency. Both movements were easily overwhelmed by infan-

try battalions with assistance provided by the United States. Recently,

in 2004, some of the few survivors felt safe enough to testify. 51

Intelligence and counter-intelligence: the Soviet Union

and the United States

In the 1960s, Piñeiro was also in charge of Cuba’s external intelli-

gence. In that capacity, he and his colleagues were engaged in the

infiltration of the anti-Castro movements of the Cuban migration

colonies, concentrated in Florida and especially Miami. The first

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 95

recruits were asked whether they were willing to infiltrate the Miami

communities of counter-revolutionaries. Tony López, for instance,

then a young guerrilla veteran eighteen years old, remembers:

In October 1961, I was summoned to an interview with Piñeiro,

at 23.30 hours. Piñeiro invited me to be part of an undercover

team working in the United States, to discover activities against

Cuba. Recently, the CIA had established an office in Miami to

recruit counter-revolutionaries. Piñeiro began asking me if I was

ready to perform whatever mission to the benefit of the revo-

lution and to comply with whatever task the revolution would

request of me. He explained the what-to-do. I should go to the

United States, pretending to be a dissident, and ask for asylum

in an embassy. I asked him how I could travel and what were the

[financial] resources to go to the United States. He says: ‘What?

Aren’t you a revolutionary?’ I said: ‘Yes, Comandante, I’ll ask

asylum in an embassy. But, how am I going?’ And he replied:

‘After your request they have the responsibility to get you out of

the country. Go to the country that lets you stay there and then

to the United States.’ ‘We don’t have structure yet,’ he said to

me. ‘We still have to create it. You are [one of the] the pioneers.

Look, you joined the revolution, as young as you were. You

became a revolutionary and nobody paid you a cent for that.

You went on your own terms to the guerrilla. This is more or

less the same; you have to start from scratch.’52

That was the very beginning. Piñeiro and his companions learned

quickly to overcome their logistical and financial difficulties. The

Soviets and the Germans of the German Democratic Republic (GDR)

offered a helping hand. In the early 1960s, a Cuban mission was

established in Moscow. It served as a liaison between the KGB and

the VMT and to recruit young Latin American students to Patrick

Lumumba University.53 In 1961, nineteen members of the nascent Cuban intelligence community were sent to Moscow for training at

the Soviet Intelligence School. Escalante Font, then a rising star in

the Cuban intelligence organization, was one of them. 54 Previously, in September 1968, Piñeiro had requested that he go to Costa Rica.

96 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

A local police officer there had information about American base

camps in Central America, which were apparently preparing for assaults

in Cuba. The trip brought about essential and vital intelligence about

the invasion of the Bay of Pigs:

Manuel Mora [secretary general of the Communist Party in Costa

Rica] introduced me to a police officer. He revealed the infor-

mation about the encampments of the counter-revolutionaries in

Retalhuleu, Guatemala. And how they prepared the airport of

Puerto Cabeza, Nicaragua, for the air transport at the start of the

expedition against Cuba. He had several written reports, with

rather detailed information within them. I read them; I see the

convergence between what he told me and the text of the reports.

The camp in Retalhuleu was accessible to the public; many things

were known. What happened is that the report mentioned 6,000

to 10,000 persons, instead of the 1,500 that they were in reality.

All numbers were exaggerated. The report even mentioned the

date and points of departure, but not the real ones.55

The relations with the equivalent services of the countries of the

Warsaw Pact, especially the KGB and the Stasi, were collegial but

uneasy. The years 1966–70 constituted a period of relative frost. Sev-

eral of Piñeiro’s closest associates participated in missions to eastern

Europe. Morejón, who in 1967 was a cultural attaché at the Cuban

embassy in Moscow, remembers:

The ideological dispute was gigantic. The contradictions of our

line and that of the Soviets with respect to Latin America became

utterly clear […] the difference was about the guerrilla warfare

in Latin America. When the news came out that Che was [fight-

ing] in Bolivia, we organized a meeting in front of the embassy.

KGB officers blatantly transmitted in front of everyone, so that

everyone could see them. Olivares, the Cuban ambassador, said:

‘Well, I realize that representatives of the KGB are also here in

solidarity with us Cubans. I have not the slightest doubt that

they came here to show their solidarity with the struggle of Che

Guevara in Bolivia.’56

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 97

In 1970, Piñeiro headed a ten-person delegation to the Soviet Union

and the COMECON countries. Antelo, one of the mission members,

can still remember the atmosphere of tension.57 Ulises Estrada was the deputy delegation leader. The trip took three months; the mission

visited the entire socialist bloc with the exception of the GDR. Piñeiro

went to Berlin alone, and upon his return to Moscow he never briefed

his colleagues about what he had done or discussed. Here are Estrada’s

reminiscences:

It was the ‘delegation of the padlock of the chastity belt’.

Sexual relations were prohibited. We had to be careful

with drinks. The core of the trip was about political intel-

ligence. In every country they spoke about their structures

and objectives. But there was no mutual understanding

because there was no coincidence in positions. For example,

with respect to the United States, they had their apprecia-

tion and we had our opinion. When we were talking about

the fight against imperialism, they had one vision and we

had another one. In all countries there was some anti-

Soviet touch […]. In Hungary they took us to where the Soviet

tanks had killed I don’t know how many people, in 1956.

However, the social treatment was very good: great attention

and lots of food. Now, the political discussions were really

bad. My relations with the Soviets were always bad. When I

went to the Soviet Union, I always had disputes with my coun-

terparts. Because, firstly, I could not tell them what we were

doing. They knew something but we compartmentalized or

misinformed them. Che was more radical. Half in jest and half

seriously, he said that they all were penetrated by the CIA.58

The GDR was an enigma. Apparently, the relations between Manuel

Piñeiro and Markus Wolf, head of the Stasi, were pleasant enough at

a professional level. 59 But Walter Ulbricht, the leader of the Communist Party, had convictions about the etiquette and behaviour of the

petit bourgeois. He was not fond of the hugs and the loud voices of

his Latin American visitors, and was especially wary of barbudos. For him, Che Guevara was a messily dressed radical and an iconoclast.

98 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Under his successor, Erich Honecker whose daughter was married to

a Chilean, political relations with Cuba improved. 60

With respect to the United States, however, Cuban intelligence swiftly

created a network of infiltrators in the Miami community, even in the FBI and the CIA. 61 An example is the career of a double agent of Guatemalan descent, who retired as a colonel of the security forces: Percy Alvarado

(agent Fraile). Percy’s father and mother were also Cuban spies. In 1956, his father had befriended Che Guevara during his stay at the Argentinian

embassy in Guatemala, playing cards with his Argentine friend. All his

brothers and his sister were Cuban army officers; some of them joined the Guatemalan Ejército Guerrillero de los Pobres (EGP, Guerrilla Army of the Poor). He was recruited by Cuban State Security as a double agent:

In a small apartment on Avenida Salvador Allende, two com-

pañeros of the State Security swore me in, on the Cuban flag,

as a Cuban security agent. So I swore to serve Cuba uncondi-

tionally. I guessed that I was also serving Latin America and my

own Fatherland. Back on the street I felt euphoric.62

Percy Alvarado sought contact with the United States Interests Sec-

tion in Havana. The CIA sent him abroad. He was employed by the

CIA and he suggests that he also worked for the Israeli Mossad: ‘I was

helpful for my Palestinian friends. I worked for four enemy services

and they never knew of my ties with the Cuban service.’63 The KGB

offered him a position as a Soviet agent, and the Cubans told him to

feel free to do accept. But he refused the offer and decided to stay with his Cuban companions:

I was never trained by the Cubans. I mastered the spy techniques

in the service of the enemy. They helped me to develop a range

of professional skills that were very useful later on. Espionage

techniques are universal. Counter-intelligence techniques are uni-

versal. The techniques of communication using mailboxes are

universal. All intelligence services use [the same] skills.64

Alvarado was asked to infiltrate the Cuban Miami community. 65

Apparently, he was very successful; the anti-Castro Cubans paid him

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 99

huge cash amounts and he got a multiple entry visa for ten years. He

infiltrated the Cuban American National Foundation and was asked

to prepare assaults: to leave bombs in cinemas, assassinate employees,

release counterfeit money. All these plans failed but he worked unde-

tected for years. When, in 1998, it appeared to be convenient for the

Cuban authorities to reveal the infiltration of the Foundation, Cuba’s

State Security blew his cover. 66 Alvarado is not the only one who published information about the covert actions against Cuba. Escalante

Font, in charge of the DSE from 1976 onwards, mentions the fact that

Fidel Castro survived more than six hundred assassination attempts

between 1959 and 2006.67

The guerrilla in Guatemala

Che Guevara had friends within the emerging Guatemalan guer-

rilla movements. In 1954, while staying in Guatemala City, he had

been witness to the CIA coup against the elected president, Colonel

Arbenz. He then spent months at the Argentinian embassy, where

the most important Arbenzistas and the leaders of the left had been

offered exile. 68 The first leaders of the Guatemalan guerrilla move-

ment were disillusioned young officers who had participated in a

military coup against the dictatorship established after the demise of

Arbenz. Two of them, Lieutenants Yon Sosa and Turcios Lima – along

with a third one, César Montes – initiated guerrilla movements in the

eastern (Ladino, mestizo) region of Guatemala. Along with Colonel

Paz Tejada (a former minister of Arbenz), they led groups of former

soldiers, students and peasants.69

Cuba’s attention was immediately alerted and the VMT sought

contact with the Movimiento 13 de Noviembre (MR-13, Movement

of 13 November), comprised of young guerrilla comandantes. In

due time, radical members of the communist Partido Guatemalteco

de Trabajadores (PGT, the Guatemalan Workers’ Party) also merged

with this movement and formed the Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes (FAR,

Rebel Armed Forces). The VMT offered and provided support: clan-

destine transition routes for arms, even connected with ‘that vast

arms market in the United States’. In 1965 the VMT arranged for the

presence of Turcios Lima in Havana, to assist the First Tricontinental

100 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Conference in January 1966. He was praised as a hero and Norberto

Hernández, then the Cuban overseer of Central America, spent many

hours in discussions with him. 70

Nevertheless, the Guatemalan guerrilla of the 1960s was modest

in terms of military significance and results. The several small col-

umns did not coordinate and operated in Guatemala City (as urban

guerrilleros) and in a relatively restricted region: the south-eastern departments of Zacapa, Izabal and the Sierra de las Minas. The guerrilla attacks were mostly of local impact. The leaders were ex-military,

and their cadres were ex-students or even current students of the San

Carlos University. The comandantes could still be interviewed by the national press, sometimes in a local bar or restaurant. Yon Sosa and

Turcios Lima maintained contact with their former brothers-in-arms;

they met in movie theatres or drive-in restaurants in the capital. In

October 1966, when Turcios Lima died in a car accident, his coffin

was carried through Guatemala City; it was halted before the cadet

school, the Politécnica, to receive the last salutation from his fellow

officers. Yon Sosa was ambushed by the Mexican police while cross-

ing the Mexican–Guatemalan frontier, in 1970. Cesar Montes ( nom

de guerre of Julio Cesar Macías) was his successor.

In 1966 the Guatemalan army started a counter-insurgency offen-

sive with the support of American military advisers and paramilitary

militias recruited from the local population. General Balconi, then

a lieutenant but in 1996 the minister of national defence who nego-

tiated with the guerrilla leadership in secret – and whose memoirs I

co-authored71 – remembers how the paramilitary forces were formed: In 1966, there were about fifty full-time guerrilleros in the

Zacapa area […]. They had the support of the population:

for information, food and protection. [But] there were about

two hundred civilian patrol members. Their efforts were vol-

untary. During the day they worked, but at 6 p.m. they came

together and went on patrol. They spent the night in shifts, until

5 a.m. Local community leaders were at ease with the army

officers in the region. They came frequently to receive sugges-

tions, to comment on what they did and how they did it […].

They also collaborated with the army, providing information

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 101

or acting as guides for areas where it was suspected that there

were guerrilla groups. 72

With the participation of those patrols, the army acquired superiority.

The guerrilla was crushed in two years; the leadership was either

killed or managed to escape to Mexico or other countries. Younger

cadres went to Cuba for training, but the guerrilla forces as such

disintegrated. In the 1970s, however, a second generation of insur-

gent movements appeared in the indigenous territories of western

Guatemala, recruiting primarily from the Mayan population. The

insurgency and counter-insurgency operations continued into the mid-

1990s. The Cuban involvement will be discussed in the next chapter.

The guerrilla in Venezuela

Fidel Castro and Che Guevara had evident interest in the Venezuelan

guerrilla. As in the case of Guatemala, the first guerrilla leaders

became officers after a revolt. 73 In January 1958, after days of street

fighting in Caracas, dictator Pérez Jiménez left the country on a

flight to the Dominican Republic. A five-person civil-military junta,

headed by Rear Admiral Larrázabal, took over. Larrázabal resigned

in order to participate in presidential elections. President Betancourt,

an anti-communist, won the elections despite the fact that Larrázabal

had acquired a large majority in Caracas. Demonstrations in the capi-

tal were forbidden; peasants who occupied land were harassed by the

police. Betancourt ‘cleansed’ the armed forces but only just fulfilled

his presidential term without a coup or a revolt.

In 1960, the youth wing of his party, Acción Democrática, split off

to form the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR, Revolu-

tionary Movement of the Left), a guerrilla movement inspired by the

Cuban example. The president announced the persecution of ‘servile

followers of Moscow and Havana’ and disbanded the Communist

Party. In 1962, other small guerrilla movements were created, one

headed by former Communist Youth member Douglas Bravo and

others by ex-military officers and by Fabricio Ojeda, a key player in

the revolt against Pérez Jiménez. Luben Petkoff was another insur-

gent leader. At a certain moment, there were around twenty Frentes

102 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

operating in many Venezuelan departments, without an umbrella

organization or a unifying strategy. Most guerrilla units were over-

powered by the army. But in May 1962, a marine detachment rebelled;

in June, another naval base revolted. Young naval and army officers

joined the existing and newly formed clandestine movements. The

hitherto reluctant Communist Party formed guerrilla units as well.

In the early 1960s, Che Guevara suggested that Germán Lairet,

representative of the Partido Comunista de Venezuela (PCV, Commu-

nist Party of Venezuela), could unify a guerrilla group. Lairet ‘had to

consult the Politburo’ and the answer was negative. 74 Then these heterogeneous groups of military officers, communist cadres and radical

youth leaders formed an umbrella organization in Caracas in February

1963, the Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional (FALN, the Armed

Forces of National Liberation). But then divergences and break-ups

followed.75 In 1964, after presidential elections, the former MIR opted for a ‘peaceful struggle’, arguing that Venezuela was not ripe for guerrilla warfare. The Communist Party followed suit. In April 1965 the Party

officially opted for ‘legal opposition’. The government launched a series of successful counter-offensives. Ojeda was killed in action; by the end

of 1966, the only real guerrilla force left was that of Bravo and Petkoff.

There had been a long-term relationship between the Venezuelan

guerrilla movements and the VMT. In fact, Cuba had silently pro-

vided support with training and access to the island’s medical and

journalistic services. Now the guerrilla leaders asked for training and

military assistance on Venezuelan soil. By 1966 a small contingent

of the Cuban Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR), headed by

Arnoldo Ochoa, joined a guerrilla unit of the FALN under the com-

mand of Luben Petkoff. 76 Its other leader, Douglas Vega, was killed in action. In May 1967, another Cuban-Venezuelan team disembarked at Machurucuto beach. The Cuban participants were officers

of the FAR.77 Three MIR leaders, Moisés Moleiro ( nom de guerre El Ronco), Héctor Pérez Marcano, Eduardo Ortiz Bucaram, and a

peasant called Américo Silva, accompanied them. Immediately after

landing they found themselves confronted by units of the army and

the National Guard. After three months the group reached their guer-

rilla Frente, after zigzagging through difficult terrain, persecuted by

military units, and suffering from hunger and diseases. A couple of

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 103

days afterwards they were assaulted by the army’s special forces.

Several combatants were killed; Tomassevich, wounded, escaped and

was transferred to Cuba via Caracas, Rio and Paris.78 In his memoirs,

President Carlos Andrés Pérez mentions that consecutive presidents

had also created (and subsidized via the Ministry of the Interior) large

networks of snitches and police and army informants in peasant

grocery shops in the rural villages.79

In Cuba, a survivor reconstructed what happened. Military intel-

ligence discovered that the head of the Institute of Geodesy and

Cartography, who had provided maps of the area, had sold them out to

the CIA. ‘Of course, the captain was arrested, tried and shot.’80 In 1989, when Cuban–Venezuelan diplomatic relations were re-established,

Cuban and Venezuelan forensic anthropologists exhumed several of the

skeletons. There are indications that some of them were tortured. The

remains of Vega could never be identified. A special unit of the FAR

succeeded in exfiltrating fifteen Cuban combatants; Arnoldo Ochoa

was one of them.81 They returned to Cuba via Moscow.82

The guerrilla in Brazil

The military coup of March 1964, although prepared and negotiated

with the national entrepreneurial elite, surprised much of the left. 83 The Partido Comunista Brasileiro (PCB, the Communist Party of Brazil)

still defended the thesis of peaceful coexistence. 84 Just as in Guatemala and Venezuela before, the first Brazilian guerrilla leaders were

disillusioned army officers. In September 1963, even before the coup,

non-commissioned officers – sergeants of the navy in Rio de Janeiro –

had revolted. They had already sought refuge in Cuba, but the Cuban

leadership denied them guerrilla training because of extant diplomatic

relations.85 There is, however, information about the guerrilla training that Clodomir Morais, other members of the Ligas Camponesas (Peasant

Unions) and some members of the Partido Comunista Brasileiro had

received in Cuba, in July and August 1961.86

In 1964, after the coup, relations were ruptured. Leonel Brizola,

brother-in-law of the disposed president Goulart and himself a leader

of the Partido Trabalhista Brasileiro (PTB, the Brazilian Labour

Party), founded a resistance movement, Movimento Nacionalista

104 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Revolucionário (MNR, Nationalist Revolutionary Movement). He

sent some of his associates to Cuba and asked for them to be trained,

together with the Brazilian sergeants.87 He planned three parallel guerrilla focos: in the Serra de Caparaó of Minas Gerais, in Mato Grosso on the border with Bolivia, and in Goiás. The guerrilla movements were headed by the rebellious sergeants. 88 Capitani, one of the leaders, remembers the strict separation of technical issues from

political aspects in the training that they received in Cuba:

There is no training that makes you a [good] guerrilla soldier.

That depends on the political aspects. The local political con-

ditions have to be appropriate. That was one of the problems

of the foco. It provided you with technical knowledge, but it

neglected the fundamental, essential political options. Without

the political issue we turned into para-troopers. I felt like a para-

trooper dropped in the Serra de Caparaó. A strange element […].

We couldn’t recruit anyone in that region. 89

In October 1966, eleven guerrilleros settled in the hills of Caparaó.

They spent five months there; isolated and without interference from

enemy forces, they were hungry and depressed. The army mobilized a

force of 10,000 soldiers. Eventually, the guerrilleros were arrested by the military police of Minas Gerais.

After the First Conference of the Organización Latinoamericana

de Solidaridad (OLAS, Latin American Solidarity Organization) in

Havana (1967), new Brazilian politico-military movements emerged. 90

Carlos Marighella, already a veteran member of the Partido Comun-

ista Brasileiro, was visibly present at this meeting, pitted against the

orientations of the party leadership. He broke with his old comrades

and founded Ação Libertadora Nacional (ALN, Action for National

Liberation), a resistance movement against dictatorship. Praised by

Fidel as a great revolutionary, Marighella modified Guevara’s foco

thesis in the sense that he explicitly preferred urban focos in countries like Brazil. 91 The movement, with young students and other young militants as combatants, was reinforced by the incorporation of ex-army

captain Carlos Lamarca and his resistance movement Vanguarda

Armada Revolucionária (VAR, Armed Revolutionary Vanguard), in

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 105

1969.92 Between 1968 and 1971 four’ ‘ exércitos’ (‘armies’, in fact small units of twenty to twenty-five persons) were trained in Cuba. 93

One of the guerrilla novices remembers the pride they felt to be in the

vanguard of their generation:

He who went to Cuba thought he’d be back as guerrilla coman-

dante […]. There was an intense mythology about it, because

the Cubans encouraged the idea to the organisations of Latin

America that, when you went there, spent there a period, and

endured training, you would return half Che Guevara, half

comandante […].94

The majority of the combatants were members of the ALN and the

VAR, but other small movements sent their recruits to Cuba for

training as well. Marighella was killed in action in 1969; Lamarca in

September 1971. The high number of captured, tortured and killed

members of all revolutionary movements trained in Cuba not long

after their return to Brazil is the reason that historians (and the Cuban liaison officers as well) are of the opinion that these movements were

infiltrated by the Brazilian Serviço Nacional de Informações (SNI,

National Information Service).95

One of the consequences of the change in guerrilla tactics was the

creation of the Cuban Escuela de Lucha Urbana (the Cuban School of

Urban Warfare). After the formation of the DGLN in 1971, Piñeiro

appointed Cárdenas to ‘reorganize and modernize’ the school. The

Brazilian, Uruguayan and other Latin American experiences were

incorporated into the courses on intelligence, counter-intelligence,

urban warfare, communications, propaganda and counter-propaganda,

interrogation, camouflage, and infiltration. Until mid-1975, many

new recruits of the Uruguayan and Chilean clandestine movements

were trained at the centre. In 1975, however, the school was closed

after pressure from the Soviet Union. 96

The guerrilla in Uruguay

Uruguay, country of European immigrants, had a tradition of

democratic, bipartisan and welfare governance, where the parties of

106 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the left represented 10 per cent of the electorate. It was a configura-

tion of anarchist, socialist and communist backgrounds. In the 1960s,

an economic crisis profoundly affected the national economy and

society. Between 1962 and 1967, the annual inflation rate was 60 per

cent. 97 The government gradually became more authoritarian. Labour and other social conflicts erupted along with increasing repression, as

legalized by emergency decrees. In the context of a generally decreas-

ing standard of living, increasing labour conflicts and emerging new

social movements, a radicalization process affected the traditional

parties of the left.

As in other countries, the Uruguayan political left saw the Cuban

revolution as a watershed. The impact of Fidel, Che and the other

young Cuban revolutionary heroes resulted in splits within the com-

munist, socialist, anarchist and Catholic youth movements. It explains

the divergence among loyalties to reformist programmes and revolu-

tionary action. It also explains the divide between the security of the

Soviet ideology and that of the Second International on one hand, and

the galvanizing revolutionary ethos of the Cuban guerrilleros which implied secessions, factions and preferences for new and more militant movements on the other hand. 98 Ariel Collazo, who later became one of the leaders of the Movimiento Revolucionario Oriental (MRO,

Revolutionary Movement of the East), remembers:

The Cuban revolution meant a shock in the consciousness of

Latin Americans, above all for the university students. I was

elected Member of Parliament of the Lista 51 in 1959. At the

end of the year 1960 we – a group of MPs, union leaders and

journalists […] – were invited to travel to Cuba. In April 1961,

the Movimiento Revolucionario Oriental (MRO) […] is formed.

[With fractions that departed from the] Partido Colorado we

decided to create the Frente Izquierda de Liberación (FIDEL,

Leftist Liberation Front). In the election of November 1962,

FIDEL obtained 41,000 votes, the Communist Party 27,000 and

the Socialist Party [another] 27,000 […]. Then, after the elec-

tion, I had the idea of starting to explore the subject of urban

insurgency. And, in December 1962, I let it be known at the

Embassy of Cuba: ‘I am interested in learning a little bit more

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 107

about how to handle weapons and all that’ […]. They managed

to bring in a group of Uruguayans […]. The most important

for us were the modules on safety measures. Much more than

armaments training, this was something to learn starting from

scratch. 99

At the OLAS conference in Havana in 1967, the tensions between

the reformist left and the revolutionary left were probably most evi-

dent within the Uruguayan delegation. Arismendi – the leader of the

Partido Comunista Uruguayo (PCU, Uruguayan Communist Party), a

personal friend of Fidel Castro and one of the most loyal partners of

the Communist Party of the Soviet Union – was one of the vice-pres-

idents and co-author of the final declaration. It was obvious that he

had to meander during the debates and the write-up of the final text.

Ravelo had perceived his dilemma. Arismendi had a lot to lose; he

could not alienate the militants of the Communist Youth, nor could

he turn his back on his old comrades in Uruguay and the Soviet Union.

He opted for an ‘export move’:

The objective [of the OLAS] was to create the conditions to

support the international endeavour led by Che in Bolivia […] Aris-

mendi was never informed of the whereabouts of Che. But when

he learned from his own sources that he was in Bolivia, he sent

twenty-five militants of the PCU to Cuba for military training to let

them fight in that country.100

But that could not impede the emergence of movements of the armed

left in Uruguay. In 1962, several nascent politico-military groupings

established a kind of managing structure: the Coordinador. It was

the direct predecessor of Uruguay’s most prominent guerrilla move-

ment, the Movimiento de Liberación Nacional–Tupamaros (MLN–T,

National Liberation Movement–Tupamaros), which evolved in

1966.101 The name reflects the Cuban influence (Liberación Nacional) but also refers to Tupac Amaru II, the great Peruvian Quechua rebel

who fought against colonial rule and was a precursor to Latin America’s

independence movements. The MLN–T developed a clandestine cell

structure in Montevideo and in other parts of the country, and formed

108 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

an executive committee (whose members were Raúl Sendic, Tabaré

Rivero and Euleterio Fernández). Sendic went to Cuba for military

training; other MLN–T militants prepared for armed operations on

the island. The Cubans welcomed the principal leaders of the (com-

peting) Uruguayan MRO as well.102 In 1967, the MRO prepared a

small detachment to assist Che’s guerrilla movement in Bolivia; but

before they departed, Che Guevara was captured and killed.

The militants of the MLN–T were young: workers, but mostly

students, coming from labour unions, the Communist and Socialist

Youth, and some smaller leftist parties. 103 They operated mainly, but not exclusively, in the urban sphere. In their ideological expressions

and revolutionary activities (‘armed propaganda’), one can discern

the legacy of anarchism and socialism and a nostalgic evocation of

Che Guevara.

Eventually, the Tupamaros (MLN–T), the Federación Anar-

quista Uruguayana (FAU), the Movimiento Revolucionario Oriental

(MRO), the smaller Organización Popular Revolucionaria 33 Ori-

entales (OPR-33), the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias Orientales

(FARO), and the Frente Revolucionario de los Trabajadores (FRT)

were unsuccessful. Military intelligence captured or killed most com-

batants. Anti-communist death squads executed other militants. In

fact, before the coup in 1973, the guerrilla in Uruguay was already

largely eliminated. Those who survived were incarcerated in one of

the huge military prison camps.

The guerrilla in Colombia

Colombia was also a country with strong bipartisan tradition. Rural

violence erupted in 1946, after the forced presidential change of the

Conservative Party.104 Guerrilla bands and paramilitary units of the Conservative and Liberal Parties waged local wars. In 1948, after

the assassination of the Liberal presidential candidate Jorge Eliecer

Gaitán in Bogotá, rural and urban civil strife amalgamated in a bru-

tal confrontation that caused an estimated death toll of 100,000 or

even 200,000 in the period from 1946 to 1962.105 The most grue-

some period of mass murder (1948–53) was ended by a de facto

government under General Rosas Pinilla, who decreed an amnesty.

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 109

But the Communist Party (Partido Comunista Colombiano, PCC),

which had formed armed ‘ autodefensas de masas’ (mass self-defence organizations), refused to disarm their peasant movements. They had

already formed ‘independent peasant republics’ in various regions,

of which the republic of Marquetalia was to become the most well

known. The Colombian army, assisted by American support, started

a successful counter-insurgency campaign. In 1957, the Conservative

and the Liberal Parties reached an agreement to alternate the pres-

idency and to divide the official positions equally; but the peasant

guerrilla bands continued fighting. In 1959 the struggle was ended

with a ‘pacification campaign’ launched by the army.

As in the other countries I have analysed in this chapter, the Cuban

Revolution had an electrifying effect on political groupings of stu-

dents and intellectuals of the left. Small revolutionary movements,

like the Movimiento de Obreros, Estudiantes y Campesinos (MOEC,

Workers’, Students’ and Peasants’ Movement), the Frente Unido

de Acción Revolucionaria (FUAR, United Front of Revolutionary

Action), the left wing of the Liberal Party, and the Movimiento Rev-

olucionario Liberal (MRL, Revolutionary Liberal Movement) went to

the countryside and started independent guerrilla operations, attack-

ing remote army posts. In 1960 a CIA mission visited Colombia and

recommended counter-insurgency operations against threats of com-

munism. The following years saw the appearance of three guerrilla

movements, the ‘ guevarista’ Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN, National Liberation Army, 1962), the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – Ejército Popular (FARC-EP or FARC, Rebel

Armed Forces of Colombia – People’s Army, 1964) and the Ejército

Popular de Liberación (EPL, Popular Liberation Army, 1967).

Meanwhile, in 1961, the outlawed PCC organized a clandestine

congress that recommended ‘a combination of all forms of struggle’

and sent high-level cadres to the region: Luis Morantes, a member of

the Central Committee of the PCC ( nom de guerre Jacobo Arenas,

a reference to the ousted Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz) and

representatives of the Juventud Comunista (Communist Youth). Also

as a result of pressure from the United States, the army reinitiated

their ‘pacification campaigns’ in 1962 and 1963. In 1964 it initi-

ated ‘Operation Marquetalia’ with a force of 16,000 soldiers, which

110 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

constituted a third of the Colombian army at the time. But the peasant

guerrilla, headed by Pedro Antonio Marín ( nom de guerre Manuel

Marulanda Vélez or Tirofijo) broke the encirclement and officially

founded a political party with a military arm, the FARC-EP, in the

same year. Two years later it already had 300 combatants distributed

over six Frentes. 106 It also created distance from the PCC.

The ELN was inspired by the Cuban Revolution; its first mem-

bers were directly related to Cuba.107 A group of fourteen or fifteen persons received military training. One of them was Fabio Vásquez

Castaño, a lawyer and professor at the Universidad Nacional, who

was leader of the ELN until 1974.108 They made a plan to start a guerrilla foco. Back in Colombia they initiated a foco near Barranca-bermeja. Their political ideas were not strongly Marxist; they came

from the student movements, the labour unions and the peasant

movements. Several ELN members were priests, nuns, former sem-

inarists or radicalized Catholics. One of them was Father Camilo

Torres Restrepo, a radical theologian and sociologist and one of the

first Liberation Theologists. He broke with the Catholic Church

and joined the ELN as a guerrilla recruit, after a public message in

December 1965, only to die in combat. His death was lamented.

Like Che Guevara, through his death Camilo Torres became a sym-

bol of revolutionary martyrdom. In Bogotá, at the main plaza of the

Universidad Nacional, two large murals of Camilo Torres and Che

Guevara dominate the landscape.

In the early 1970s, Fabio Vásquez would instigate a reign of terror

within the ELN, with extreme violence, purges, torture and execu-

tions of ‘dissenters’ and ‘enemies’. The ELN entered into a state

of crisis. Military offensives gravely harmed the fighting capacity

of the then 200 combatants. Vásquez, seriously disturbed, went to

Cuba to be treated, decided to stay there, and directed the ELN

by radio-telephone. The crisis within the guerrilla movement

deepened; the active membership was reduced to thirty to forty per-

sons. 109 Only when a Spanish-Colombian priest, Manuel Pérez, and

the very young Nicolás Rodríguez Bautista ( nom de guerre Gabino), assumed the combined leadership of the guerrilla movement in the

second half of the 1970s did they succeed in salvaging and reviving

the ELN.

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 111

Guevara’s continental projects: Africa, Argentina,

Peru, Bolivia

Until his departure to the Congo, Che Guevara, even more than Fidel

Castro, had supervised the activities of the VMT of Manuel Piñeiro. In

many cases, he had even discussed details with Latin American politi-

cians and guerrilla leaders visiting or being trained in Cuba. From the

beginning of Che’s revolutionary career he had had dreams of a Latin

American revolution. When in power, these ideas were gradually incor-

porated into plans to launch a more coherent wave of revolution on a

continental scale. ‘Argentina, Peru, Bolivia … was part of his encompass-

ing project to bring forward his strategy of revolutionising the continent,’

says Manuel Piñeiro, who prepared all Che’s guerrilla missions.110

The African campaign

But Guevara’s first operation was in in the heart of Africa, the Congo.

In the first months of 1964 Che had tested the waters, discussing his

participation in the Congolese struggle with Nyerere (Tanzania), Ben

Bella (Algeria) and Nasser (Egypt). Apparently, Nasser had told him

that Che’s personal involvement leading a Cuban expedition force

would be a mistake. To go in like ‘Tarzan, a white man among blacks,

leading and protecting them’ could only end in disaster. 111 When he took the decision to leave for the Congo, he probably did it after an

arduous debate with Fidel and Raúl Castro about the merits of ‘Real

Socialism’ in the Soviet Union and the European socialist countries. 112

He had gradually expressed his critique about the authoritarianism

and dogmatism of the Soviet Union. He ultimately did so in public,

in Algiers, while Fidel and Raúl were negotiating with the Russians

about economic and military support and training programmes. 113

But Che Guevara was also their dear friend and one of Cuba’s iconic

comandantes. The Cuban leadership had sent 140 veteran combat-

ants with him to Africa, a much larger contingent than any other sent

to Latin America. 114 But eventually, his dream of a continental revolution against colonialism and imperialism ended in a misadventure and

the Cuban guerrilla force had to be exfiltrated.115

Afterwards, in his safe house in Prague, where he was accompanied

by his most trusted companions (Ulises Estrada and Juan Carretero of

112 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the VMT), he had prepared and reviewed his seven-volume collected

works on economy and society.116 But ultimately, he was a fighter rather than a writer. After the failed Congo campaign, he conceived

schemes for an even more grandiose Liberation Project, this time not

in the centre of Africa but in the heart of Latin America. According to

Piñeiro, he preferred to launch a

Revolutionary Struggle in another country of Latin America,

preferably Argentina. He was always on the alert about any

alternative that would represent a prospect for developing rev-

olutionary armed combat, be it in Nicaragua, Venezuela or

Colombia […]. His concept, rooted in the Cuban Liberation

War, was to found a mother column integrated by revolutionar-

ies of several Latin American countries. Once having passed the

first phase of survival, with experienced combatants and proven

cadres, in its [subsequent] phase of development and growth,

the conditions would be created to form other columns and thus

expand the fighting to other countries of the continent. 117

When still in power, he had overseen several interconnected expe-

ditions: one to Argentina (Operation Sombra) and several to Peru

(Operation Matraca). Operation Sombra was the priority. They were

launched from Bolivia, the most central and landlocked country of

Latin America with many indigenous ethnicities (Aymara, Quechua

and Guaraní being the most spoken languages). After independence,

Bolivia’s territory reduced to 50 per cent of its original surface area

as a result of frontier conflicts with all of its neighbours: Argentina,

Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Peru.

Operation Sombra118

Che Guevara and the Argentinian journalist Jorge Masetti had been

friends since Masetti’s trip to the Sierra Maestra in 1958. In March

1959 Che had asked him to found and manage Cuba’s official press

agency, Prensa Latina. He had also travelled, as Che’s emissary, to

Algeria. There he acquired ‘some kind of combat experience, and he

had also received military training in our country [Cuba]’.119 In 1962,

Guevara and Masetti initiated a plan to launch a guerrilla movement

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 113

in northern Argentina – Salta, the border region with Bolivia. Masetti

would be the comandante segundo (second-in-command) of the Ejér-

cito Guerrillero del Pueblo (Guerrilla Army of the People). Guevara

would be in charge of the guerrilla movement after the initial phase.

Manuel Piñeiro remembers:

[The initial phase is] the most risky one, of survival, when the

guerrilla basically depends on their own strength. Guevara had

wanted to lead the first column himself, but was persuaded by

Fidel to wait ‘until the advance party had created [more ade-

quate] conditions’. It is a principle that Fidel developed in the

Sierra Maestra […]. Fidel didn’t want someone of continental

prominence like Che to be at risk during the first phase of the

guerrilla struggle.120

Years later, Fidel Castro also commented in the same way:

When Che, in his impatience, wanted to go on his mission, I told

him: ‘Conditions aren’t ready yet.’ I didn’t want him to go to

Bolivia to organise a small group. I would have rather he waited

until the forces were well organised […]. I said: ‘Che is a strategic

leader, and he shouldn’t go to Bolivia until a sufficiently sound

and solid force is in place.’ He was impatient; but the minimum

necessary conditions weren’t ready yet. I had to convince him […].

He should not be exposed to risk at such an early stage. 121

Ulises Estrada, José Maria (Papi) Martínez Tamayo and Abelardo

(Furry) Colomé Ibarra (until 2015 the minister of MININT) were sent to

Bolivia and northern Argentina to prepare the logistics;122 the three had

also worked with Che Guevara in the Congo.123 In Argentina, Isabel Lar-

guía and John Cooke – both members of the revolutionary Peronism (see

Chapter 5) – were the liaisons.124 In Cuba, Alberto Castellanos – Che’s former bodyguard and loyal companion (he had been a member of Che’s

‘Suicide Peloton’) – was asked by Guevara to lead the expedition:

You will be in charge until I come over […]. I had been a first

lieutenant [in the Rebel Army]. And [Che] would also incorporate

114 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

captains and comandantes. I had never left Cuba. Ulises Estrada

prepared me for a week. I invented a legend for my family – secret

military training in the USSR – and told them that they couldn’t

write to me. I travelled to Prague and got another passport there

as Raúl Moises Dávila Sueyro, a student. From Prague to Rome,

then to Lisbon, Dakar, Rio de Janeiro, São Paolo. Overland to

Curumbá, at the Paraguayan frontier, then to Santa Cruz de la

Sierra, Cochabamba and La Paz. There I met Furry [Abelardo

Colomé] and Papi [José María Martínez Tamayo] […]. With

Furry and Papi we travelled to Cochabamba, then by jeep to

Tarija, at the Emborosú encampment […]. There I hugged

Masetti and Hermes [Peña, Castellanos’ friend and ‘colleague

bodyguard’ of Guevara]. 125

From September to December the group of nearly twenty-five

guerrilleros – Argentinians and a few Cubans – plodded through the jungle, set up camp and undertook reconnaissance missions. 126 Some-

times they suffered from hunger; it could happen that they were

without water for twenty-four hours. The region was thinly populated,

the inhabitants dirt poor. Armed propaganda did not attract followers.

Most of the Argentinian combatants were university students.

Masetti sent a public ‘Letter from the Rebels’ to the Argentinian

president-elect, announcing the liberation war. Although the immedi-

ate impact was not very strong, it alerted the Gendarmerie Nacional.

They moved troops into the region. The Gendarmerie assaulted their

camp at La Toma, arresting five combatants and seizing all weapons

and supplies. It turned out that some of the arrested were turncoats

and that police informers were among the newcomers. Masetti split

up the group: Castellanos had to train new volunteer guerrilleros

and Masetti advanced. Castellanos was wounded and captured in a

police ambush. Masetti’s group was trapped as well. Some men died

in combat (Hermes Peña, for instance); some were wounded and died

afterwards. The group split up again. Most of the combatants were

captured. Some died of hunger and were found later on. Masetti and

one of his men disappeared and were never seen again; the Gendar-

merie searched the entire region but returned empty handed. Eighteen

combatants were imprisoned; Castellanos was one of them.127 Che

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 115

Guevara, travelling in Europe when he heard of the debacle, was

deeply depressed.

The guerrilla was crushed. Castellanos remained silent in prison,

pretending he was a Peruvian, and endured three and a half years

in captivity. 128 Amnestied, he returned to Havana in 1968 and was received by Raúl Castro. He was reincorporated into the army, fought

in Angola in the 1970s and was a military adviser in Nicaragua in the

1980s. Recently, in the interview that Piñeiro granted to Luis Suárez,

his activities were declassified. 129

Masetti’s campaign was not the first one in Argentina and definitely

not the last of the guerrilla movements. There were several previous

rebellions and small armed clandestine groups: the early Peronist

resistance group of John Cooke in the 1950s, the Uturuncos move-

ments in 1959/60, and the Trotskyist Bengochea group of the early

1960s. After Che Guevara’s death in Bolivia, the (former communist)

Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (Revolutionary Armed Forces),

the (former socialist) Frente Argentino de Liberación (Argentinian

Liberation Front), the Fuerzas Armadas Peronistas (Peronist Armed

Forces) and the Trotskyist PRT-ERP (Partido Revolucionario de los

Trabajadores – Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo, Revolutionary

Party of the Workers – Revolutionary People’s Army) made their first

moves.130 However, in the decade of the 1960s their significance was rather local and the guerrilla efforts did not ‘really [get] off the ground, none of them attracting popular assistance even in the provinces […]

where they attempted to operate’.131 But in the 1970s, Argentina was the theatre of much more significant guerrilla movements, both of

Peronist and Trotskyist origin.

Operation Matraca

In 1962 Che Guevara was overseeing the VMT training for several

guerrilla campaigns in Peru; Ulises Estrada was directly in charge. One

of the guerrilla recruits was Che’s brother-in-law, Ricardo Gadea, the

brother of his Peruvian ex-wife Hilda. Fidel Castro visited the encamp-

ment, but Che Guevara ‘was their undisputed revolutionary mentor’,

as he would be for entire generations of Latin American guerrilleros

in the 1970s and 1980s, long after his death.132 The most important

guerrilla movements that received training were the Movimiento

116 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR, of Luis de la Puente Uceda and

Guillermo Lobatón) and the Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN,

of Héctor Béjar and Javier Heraud). The armed peasant movement in

La Convención (the Cuzco department), headed by Hugo Blanco, of

the Trotskyist Frente de Izquierda Revolucionaria (FIR, Revolution-

ary Front of the Left), was not considered a priority in Cuba. It is,

however, interesting to consider that the Peruvian military intelligence

officers and those in charge of the counter-insurgency operations (the

future team members of the Velasco ‘Revolutionary Government of

the Armed Forces’, 1968–75) considered Blanco’s rebel movement

to be the most important one. In 1961, a first group of nine ELN

members had travelled to Cuba; more arrived afterwards. In 1962,

seventy-two MIR members travelled to Cuba to receive training.133

Although the leadership of the MIR and the ELN had several

meetings in Cuba, ideological divergence and lack of personal trust

prevented coordination, notwithstanding all Cuban efforts. 134 Also evident is the lukewarm support from, and even distrust of, the leaders of the Partido Comunista Boliviano (Bolivian Communist Party)

and the Partido Comunista del Perú (Communist Party of Peru).

Initially the MIR, especially De la Puente, had opted for an urban

guerrilla, which was more appropriate for the country according to

the Peruvians themselves. However, the Cubans convinced them of

the convenience of rural guerrilla warfare.135

[De la Puente] was an expert on agrarian and peasant prob-

lems. He knew the situation very well and put Che Guevara

on the defensive when he explained the organic composition of

rural Perú to him. He told him that the peasants were organised

in unions. [That] there was thousands of peasant communities

with a tradition of internal discipline and struggle. He doubted

Che’s ‘pure foco’ because De la Puente told him: ‘There are con-

crete peasant organisations, and when we call for insurgency, we

have to work with what the peasants have built. Moreover, the

peasants will not leave their organisations because I am starting

a guerrilla. We have to work with these organisations.’136

The Cubans were very convincing, and the Peruvian guerrilla fight-

ers decided to follow their recommendations. When they crossed

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 117

the Bolivian–Peruvian border, the revolutionary poet and guerrillero

Javier Heraud was killed. De la Puente was killed; Béjar was captured. 137

For many of the initial combatants, it was an expedition destined

for failure and death.138 Even more tragic: the military in charge of the

counter-insurgency operations was notified by the indigenous population

and by infiltrated informants:

The guerrilla was short-lived; we had infiltrated them thoroughly.

Also, the three fronts operated without any coordination. One

of Hugo Blanco’s lieutenants worked for [Military] Intelligence.

We had people in De la Puente’s camp as well. Technically it was

not difficult to wipe out the guerrilla. They were idealists to the

point that they practically committed suicide. It was a bunch of

idealists who took to the Andes without knowing what the place

was like, without having worked there, remaining alien. They

came from Lima and wanted to be brethren to the peasants

without really knowing them. The guerrilla didn’t get results.139

Che Guevara’s Bolivian campaign

Asked how Che Guevara reacted when confronted with all these

setbacks, Piñeiro talked about Che’s growing impatience. Patience and

tact were not the most striking virtues that Che Guevara possessed;

he was uncompromising. His previous African mission had become a

failure. Meanwhile, in October 1965, when the Central Committee of

the Communist Party was created, Fidel Castro had to explain why

Che Guevara was not incorporated as a member. Rumours were cir-

culating that Che had been purged. It was the reason that his farewell

letter was read in public. Recovering in Dar es Salaam and in Prague,

Che Guevara maintained a correspondence with Fidel. Now he had

set his mind on Bolivia, in theory a promising theatre for a guer-

rilla war given that the country had a long history of revolution and

revolt.140 Piñeiro’s team had initiated the logistics for his new mission:

[In Prague,] in March 1966, it was a complicated situation [for

Che] for he was there undercover. Since he had already written

his farewell letter and he had a great sense of honour, it never

occurred to him to return to Cuba after having bid everyone

farewell. Meanwhile, the cadres for the Bolivian mission had

118 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

already been selected and were undergoing training. It is then that

I wrote him a letter, reasoning with him, appealing to his sense

of duty and his rationality […]. I persuaded him to return, I told

him that it was more convenient for what he wanted to do […].

I told him that it was his duty to return, to rise above any other

consideration, and to complete the preparations for the Bolivian

plan.141

He returned to Cuba in July 1966, preparing for his Bolivian trip. He

was anxious to depart. He was already thirty-nine years old, and he

felt ‘much urged by his increasing age. He knew better than anyone

how essential good physical conditions were for a comandante of a

guerrilla movement.’142 The fifteen members of his column were experienced veteran combatants, selected by Che and discussed with Fidel.

Some had fought in the Sierra Maestra; others had been with Che

in the Congo.143 Physically, militarily and psychologically, they were

fit.144 The team had already begun to learn Quechua. It was the first

Cuban operation in Latin America where the majority of the guerrilla

column was Cuban, not national. The movement was called the

Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN).

During unenthusiastic negotiations between Fidel Castro and Mario

Monje, secretary general of the Partido Comunista Boliviano, the lat-

ter had promised his support to the guerrilla expedition. In Cuba,

Monje had requested to be in charge of the expedition and Che had

refused; it resulted in a bitter dispute with Monje.145 Che, who had said goodbye to his family in disguise, was excited, even euphoric, at

the hour of his departure.146 They travelled by convoluted routes, via Prague and Montevideo. Strangely enough, the Cuban advance party

had selected a base encampment in Ñancahuazú, in a Guaraní- and

not a Quechua-speaking environment.

This expedition was another ill-fated foray. Once started, Che

and his Cuban group, reinforced with Bolivian and Peruvian cadres –

and at one point French philosopher Regis Debray and the German-

Argentinian Tania, and even prisoners – were operating alone. The

backing of the Partido Comunista Boliviano was half-hearted; support

from the local population was meagre at best. Quechua-speaking

Bolivian dictator Barrientos had made a pact with the indigenous

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 119

leadership.147 Communications with Cuba were disrupted, and those with La Paz disturbed. After some successful initial skirmishes, the

incipient guerrilla force was quickly spotted and substantial coun-

ter-insurgency operations started, with American logistical support.

The CIA was monitoring Che’s movements. The military acquired

detailed knowledge from a captured liaison officer, and later from

deserters. The guerrilla group was split in two parts that tried to find

one another. Sometimes the two guerrilla groups moved in circles.

Bolivian army units encircled the largest remaining guerrilla column.

Che was captured, then killed in La Higuera on 9 October 1967. His

hands were cut off for identification; the corpse was buried in a secret

location. 148

Some Cubans were able to escape and found refuge in Chile, where

by intervention of Senator (later President) Salvador Allende they

were able to return to Cuba. In an effort to revive the obliterated

Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN), some of the (Cuban) refugees

trained a new contingent of Bolivians and Chileans; of the Bolivians,

many were members of the Partido Comunista Boliviano. It is also

remarkable that of the sixty-seven combatants, thirteen had a leftist

Christian background. 149 The operations were ended in 1971. 150

The Cuban leadership was shocked by Che Guevara’s death, as was

an entire generation of revolutionaries. A million Cubans went to the

Plaza de la Revolución. An army battery fired twenty-one cannon

shots in honour of Che. The Mexican diplomat Iruegas remembers

the thunderous silence of the mourning Cubans, the farewell of a soli-

tary trumpet and the sad address by Fidel. 151 Che’s Bolivian diary was published in 1968 in Cuba with a first edition of 250,000 copies. 152

In retrospect, Che Guevara’s campaign and death in Bolivia had an

enormous impact. In a strictly military sense, the guerrilla opera-

tion was relatively insignificant. Richard Gott was absolutely right

when he concluded that ‘[…] had it not been for the presence of Che

Guevara and Regis Debray, the disastrous Bolivian foco of 1967,

which lasted less than a year, would have been ignored by the world’s

press in the same way that comparable abortive uprisings […] were

neglected’. 153

The political significance, however, was enormous. Instantly, Che

Guevara was transformed from a guerrilla hero into a revolutionary

120 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

martyr, and to a greater extent a kind of civil saint. Castañeda154 had

already pointed out the explosion in Che’s post-mortem popularity

during the European students’ revolts in 1968, and in the protest

movements against the Vietnam War in the United States at the same

time. His German biographer Lahrem explains the lasting fascina-

tion and the persisting allegory of Guevara as a secular saint through

the coincidence of several circumstances: the beautiful and roman-

tic Korda photo, printed on innumerable posters and T-shirts (and

Cuban souvenirs) over several decades, the analogy of the image of

the crucified Christ and Che on his deathbed, his ascetic radicalism

and the ‘purity of revolutionary violence’.155 I cannot recall a Latin American guerrilla movement (with the exception of the Maoist Shining Path movement in Peru) for which Guevara’s life and death were

not a source of inspiration.

Reflection

But his theory about guerrilla warfare, and especially in terms of the

revolutionary rural foco, did not withstand the proof of practice. 156 In all Latin American guerrilla wars between the 1960s and 1990s, it is

clear that guerrilleros did not achieve victory in rural environments; they could only hide and become ‘invisible’. But time and again, regular armies have defeated rural guerrilla movements, generally after

barbaric counter-insurgency campaigns.

With the wisdom of hindsight, it is easy to pinpoint the tepid

support of the (Soviet-oriented) communist parties in Latin America. In

most Latin American countries where guerrilla movements erupted, the

communist parties preferred a sort of political abstinence: in Bolivia, in Brazil, in Colombia, in Guatemala, in Peru, in Uruguay and in Venezuela.

Maybe there was an occasional early commitment but eventually the com-

munist parties remained on the margins. The Soviet Union, the country

of their old and trusted comrades, was never a fervent devotee of guer-

rilla movements in Latin America. The western hemisphere was the

home continent of the United States, the country with which the Soviet

leadership sought stability and a peaceful coexistence.

But there is more: Cuba did not have a significant indigenous

population. Even the poor peasants in Oriente spoke and understood

Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s) | 121

Spanish, at least in dialect. The guerrilla was not alien to the peasants and the peasants were not alien to the combatants. But in the 1960s,

the reality in other Latin American countries was different. In Cen-

tral America and in the Andean countries, huge contingents of

indigenous peoples, sometimes more than 50 per cent of the total

population, were monolingual in non-Spanish languages: they spoke

a Mayan language or Quechua dialects, Aymara or Guaraní, to list

only the dominant indigenous tongues. Their centuries-old segre-

gation, communal land tenure, ‘ usos y costumbres’ (traditions and conventions), poverty and backwardness all made it difficult to

facilitate contact with strangers who suddenly appeared, without

deep knowledge of the indigenous societies, aspirations and culture.

And if there was one institution whose members were more or less

familiar with the indigenous masses (from which they recruited their

soldiers), it is the army. In Latin America at that time, the army was

probably the only representative of the state with which indigenous

peoples were familiar. They knew the army officers, but also the

army doctors and nurses who cured the wounded and the sick, the

army engineers who traced and built the small roads, and the army

lawyers who explained and enforced the law. It was not uncommon

for former enlisted men, trained and literate after military service,

to become community leaders. The highly committed guerrilleros of that period, coming from the outside, were strangers operating in an

unknown environment.

In the early 1970s, another change took place in Latin America: the

rise of progressive military governments with nationalist-leftists pro-

grammes in Peru and Panama, and afterwards in Bolivia and Ecuador.

Allende’s ‘civilian transition to socialism’ appeared to become real-

ity. In the Caribbean, progressive governments emerged as well – in

Jamaica, Grenada and Guyana. The Cuban institutions of national

liberation and intelligence perceived a change in the political pano-

rama: progressive generals, progressive social movements, progressive

student movements and progressive religious movements. It was the

time of the proliferation of Liberation Theology in the churches and

of Dependency Theory at the universities. This is the context of the

next chapter, when Cuba’s leadership, sadder and wiser, reoriented

their support for the Latin American left.

CHAPTER 5

The mature years (early 1970s–late

1980s)

Realignment with the Soviet Union

The death of Che Guevara in Bolivia sent a traumatizing shock wave

through Cuba. It generated an internal discussion and a reassessment

of Cuba’s revolutionary politics. In the western hemisphere, Cuba was

politically isolated after its expulsion from the Organization of American States (OAS). Only Canada and Mexico maintained diplomatic relations.

While Guevara had promoted ‘one, two, three Vietnams’, the United States

had succeeded in preventing two or three other Cubas. The meagre sup-

port of the Bolivian Communist Party for Che’s campaign was evidence

of the divided loyalties of many Latin American communists: between

the good old (and generous) Soviet Party and the radical revolutionaries

in Havana. Cuba’s new approach was one of flexibility and pragmatism

with respect to the Latin American revolutions and the Soviet Union.

The forging of revolutions abroad required more than just ‘revolutionary

fervour’.

There was also a more domestic reason for a political recalibration.

By the late 1960s it had become clear that Cuba’s economy could

not be built on revolutionary spontaneity alone. Cuba’s economic

development stagnated and its growth depended more and more on

external supplies and subsidies, basically those delivered by the Soviet

Union and other member countries of the COMECON. Warmer rela-

tions and realignment with Moscow, accompanied by ideological

moderation, were thus unavoidable.

Two events, in 1968 and 1970, clearly illustrate this new realism.

In Europe, 1968 was a revolutionary year. Students in France and

Germany demonstrated under the Korda portrait of Che Guevara.

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 123

In Czechoslovakia, the Communist Party chose the path to reform.

But a Soviet army – reinforced by military detachments from Poland,

the GDR and Bulgaria – invaded the Czech lands and Slovakia.

After a brief period of silence, Fidel Castro appeared on national

TV to support the Soviet invasion and denounce the Czechoslova-

kian leaders as counter-revolutionaries. This was not the man who

was considered to be the Third World spokesman struggling against

injustice and dictatorship. It came as a shock to his sympathizers

in western Europe and Latin America and, very probably, also in

Cuba. Castro justified the invasion, referring to the Warsaw Pact as

a last resort of defence for the island in the event of an American

invasion.

The second moment was in 1970, when the Cuban leadership

publicly admitted the failure of overestimating the expected sugar

harvest of 10 million tons. Sugar was Cuba’s only real export com-

modity at the time. At that moment, capitalist and Soviet economists

were unanimous about the wisdom of continuing this mono-product

culture, despite all previous efforts of industrial diversification and

import substitution. The existing processing facilities were relatively

outdated and transport and harbour facilities were deficient in guar-

anteeing a regular supply of Cuban sugar to the Russian markets.

A national campaign on the ‘battle for sugar’ was announced and

virtually everyone within the Party, the public sector, the trade unions

and mass organizations – even schoolchildren and students – were

mobilized to reach the target. Experts who suggested that the plan

was overambitious were dismissed. The harvest of that year was the

best yet achieved: more than eight million tons. But the target was

not reached. Fidel took responsibility, acknowledging that building

socialism was difficult. The only remedy that the Cuban leadership

saw was to invite, on a massive scale, Soviet experts:1 for economic

planning, business management, engineering projects, infrastructural

design, military and technological advancement, and even higher edu-

cation. 2 In 1972 Cuba became a full member of the COMECON, an association for economic integration but not a military defence

alliance like the Warsaw Pact, of which Cuba never became a member.

Soviet investments and development assistance contributed to a

remarkable growth of new industrial plants and the reconstruction

124 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

of antiquated enterprises (including 156 sugar plants).3 The Soviet Union had practically become Cuba’s mono-supplier of oil, coal,

pig iron, cotton, timber, grain and flour (90–100 per cent) and its

principal provider of fertilizers, trucks, cars, and road-construction

equipment (70–90 per cent). Initially Cuba could cover these imports

by exporting sugar and nickel to the USSR at highly subsidized rates.

But it soon had to ask for more credits. The Soviet Union also paid

the running costs of transportation in both directions, dispatching

about three hundred cargo vessels on a permanent basis. On average,

100 ships were docked in Cuban ports. 4 In 1990 the deficit reached an estimated 24.6 billion dollars. Repayment was constantly postponed

and Cuba did not service the debt:

The vicious circle of increased Soviet aid only escalated Cuba’s

‘needs’ and became a permanent headache for the officials of the

Soviet State Planning Commission (GOSPLAN). Each year, Soviet

planners had to stretch their imaginations to find ways and means

of allocating additional funds and material resources to Cuba […].

The standard formulation of the [Politburo] was to ‘Find the

possibility to satisfy the request of the Cuban leadership’.5

Cuba became a mono-product agricultural exporter. 6 Under the first Agrarian Reform Law of 1959, all rural large and medium-sized

estates had been expropriated and brought under state control. In

1963, while the counter-revolutionary ‘bandits’ waged war in regions

with many smallholdings, the second and more radical Agrarian

Reform Law expropriated all rural private property. Cuba’s leader-

ship launched a policy of ‘urbanization of the countryside’, creating

rural communities with an ‘urban infrastructure’ of medical services,

schools, electricity and apartments. ‘Voluntary rural communities’

prepared for huge sugar harvests. After the failure of the projected

10 million ton harvest in 1970, the government created, alongside the

large state sector, a sector of agricultural production cooperatives in

around 10 per cent of the rural land in production. After an assess-

ment of the eastern European agricultural system, Cuba opted for the

model of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). After it became a

member of the COMECON, over-specialization in sugar affected its

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 125

overall agricultural structure. Most fruits, including malanga roots

(Cuban children’s basic food), disappeared; even cucumbers and

pickles were imported from Bulgaria.

By and large, the 1970s and the 1980s were years of relative prosper-

ity. Housing, medical provision, schools and universities, electricity,

domestic telephone provision, sports and cultural facilities, radio,

TV and even clothing were provided by the state. A professional

could earn 500 pesos per month; a secretary went home with 150

pesos. Prices were controlled. Transport was becoming a prob-

lem, but one could win a Lada car by merit. 7 Unemployment was

below 4 per cent. Cuba’s annual growth between 1975 and 1985

was more than 4 per cent, more favourable than that of the econo-

mies of the rest of Latin America and the Caribbean, with average

growth rates around 1 per cent.8

One of the institutions that strongly benefited from the Soviet

support was the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR).9 The Cuban military maintained warm relations with their Soviet counterparts;

commanding officers received training in Moscow or Leningrad. 10

The FAR were modernized along Soviet lines. In the early 1970s a

programme of re-equipment was launched with the most sophisti-

cated weaponry (MiG fighter-bombers, T-62 tanks and BM-21 missile

launchers) and military technology of the time.11 During the three dec-

ades of ‘fraternal cooperation’ between the Soviet Union and Cuba,

on an annual basis the FAR was provided with supplies, training

and equipment worth about one billion dollars. 12 By the late 1970s, the armed forces had expanded hugely. The Youth Labour Army, a

labour force under army command that was created in 1973, was

provisioning the entire FAR.13 At the peak of expansion, by the end of the 1970s and during its Africa campaigns, the FAR had between

470,000 and 510,000 members: ‘It was the largest military force in

Latin America and vastly bigger than those of countries Cuba’s size

anywhere in the world. Furthermore, man for man during the 1970s

and 1980s, it may have been the best and most experienced fighting

force of any small nation, with the single exception of Israel.’14

In the early 1970s, military officers also started to perform mana-

gerial functions beyond the soldierly realm. There had always been

cabinet ministers with a military rank; from that point on, a process

126 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

started in which eight to ten senior members of the FAR were in

charge of strategic ministerial portfolios.15

The influence of Soviet ideas on domestic ideology and culture and

even the Party structure was huge as well. While the Cuban economy

was reorganized and its military power was modernized and strength-

ened, another transformation took place behind the scenes. Soviet

economists restructured the JUCEPLAN. Soviet experts and old PSP

leaders advised on a new organizational structure: a three-layer system

of municipal, provincial and national Asambleas de Poder Popu-

lar (Popular Power Assemblies). The government was reconstituted

into a Council of Ministers and a State Council, and the Communist

Party was moulded after the Soviet model. Cultural expressions in

the broadest sense were more controlled. The first half-decade of the

1970s was the period of the ‘ quinquenio gris’ (the grey five years) of strict monitoring of political correctness and orthodoxy. 16

Cuba’s management of foreign relations

But whatever had been the Soviet influences and pressures on mat-

ters of foreign politics in Latin America, especially with respect to the political actors of the left, Fidel Castro was never a dogmatic sub-

scriber to Soviet politics.17 The Soviets assisted with credits lines, commercial activities, technical and military assistance and arms

delivery. The Cubans acted as political advisers, and provided mili-

tary training to national liberation movements in the region and in

Africa. In fact, over several decades Cuba was the ‘general hospital’

for many wounded or crippled revolutionaries and welcomed insur-

gents and political exiles to the island. The Soviet Union also greatly

benefited from Cuba’s reputation as a non-imperialist military and

medical service provider. Cuba – and not the Soviets – took the ini-

tiative in intervening with their regular military forces in Angola. This earned Cuba its immense reputation in the Third World and the NO-AL

movement. As Mesa-Lago rightly remarks:

[…] few would deny that [its foreign policy] has brought Cuba

from a small country with a virtually nonexistent role in interna-

tional affairs prior to the revolution to one which is a significant

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 127

actor in the world area today […] Cuba has become a model for,

or has significantly influenced, socialist revolutions or radical

social movements throughout Latin America and the Carib-

bean; and it had won two important wars in Africa defeating

movements/nations supported by the United States, the People’s

Republic of China, and South Africa. 18

Militarily, Cuba became engaged in the African wars. Politically, it

continued to support new politicians and actors of the left in Latin

America and the Caribbean; Fidel Castro personally monitored Cuba’s

foreign policy in detail. This perhaps illustrated an observation by

the minister of MINREX at the time, Carlos Rafael Rodríguez. In

1972, Arbesú – vice-chief of the Departamento América and Piñeiro’s

eventual successor – and section heads Ulises Estrada and Osvaldo

Cárdenas requested an interview about the Central Committee’s policy

with respect to the United States. Rodríguez told them bluntly:

Look, Arbesú. If Fidel instructs me that I explain to you Cuba’s

policy with respect to the United States, I think that I’m able to

do it. But don’t worry too much. Here, [even] the members of

the Politburo do not know what our policy is about. We’re going

to give you instructions and you follow what Fidel and I tell you

to do. Because here, [the two] who handle it, are Fidel and me. 19

But it was clear that Fidel provided the instructions and Piñeiro had

day-to-day access to Fidel. Instructions were given to specific persons

and sections on a need-to-know basis. As one of the vice-chiefs of

the Departamento, Norberto Hernández, remarks: ‘[…] I can’t speak

about all that because our highest chiefs, Fidel and Piñeiro, never told

one hand what they did with the other.’20

After 1975, when the Departamento América had been transferred

from the Ministerio del Interior (MININT, Ministry of the Interior) to

the Central Committee’s offices, and the department’s members were for-

mally incorporated into Cuba’s diplomatic apparatus in the region, they

still maintained direct communication with Piñeiro’s office in Havana.

In the 1970s, many of Cuba’s political alliances with leftist move-

ments and its leaders were based on personal friendships with Fidel.

128 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

As we will discover in this chapter, Fidel Castro developed a strong

affinity for Caribbean leaders Manley (Jamaica) and Bishop (Gre-

nada). He also became close with Chile’s president Allende, Panama’s

leader General Torrijos, the political team of Peruvian president Gen-

eral Velasco, and explicitly with Venezuelan president and former

lieutenant-colonel Hugo Chávez after 1994. Several times, he also

hand-picked Cuban diplomats who were likely to be appreciated by

these leaders and would become ‘friends of the president’, even before

the establishment of formal bilateral relations.

The 1970s and 1980s were the period of Dependency Theory in

universities and Liberation Theology in churches. The student gen-

erations and the faithful Catholics were not terribly interested in

membership of the communist parties. But they were influenced by

the anti-imperialist arguments of the dependency theorists and felt

a moral imperative to eradicate the structures of poverty and injus-

tice. Dependency Theory had already been developed in the 1950s

and 1960s in Santiago de Chile. At the regional UN office for social

and economic development in Latin America and the Caribbean

(ECLAC), economists like Raúl Prebisch had elaborated the thesis of

economic growth in centres and the periphery, whereby the periph-

ery (Latin America and the Caribbean) was seen as dependent on the

dynamics of the capitalist centres.21 In the late 1960s, they trained a new generation of economists and sociologists at the Escola Latina,

also established in Santiago. Poverty, exclusion, social conflict and

political violence were seen as the consequences of Latin America’s

dependent integration into the capitalist world system. Social and

economic scientists began to publish material about the roots of Latin

America’s underdevelopment, imperialism, the role of unsuccess-

ful national bourgeoisies, and the inevitability of reforms and even

revolutions.

Liberation Theology was probably even more influential in the

hearts and minds of considerable segments of the Latin American

population. In countries like Argentina, Brazil, Peru and Mexico – and

especially in Central America – theologists and priests emphasized a

new interpretation of the Bible. They established a moral relationship

between religious ethics and political activism for the benefit of the

poor, the exploited and the victims of persecution and injustice. In

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 129

many countries, Base Communities – small groups of twenty to thirty

persons who met regularly for Bible study and its relevance for the

solution of social and political problems – were formed. Priests and

laymen were engaged in organizing workers and peasants into unions

and associations that were forbidden or controlled by officials of the

military dictatorships. The influence of Liberation Theology on the

many emerging radicalizing groups of the Argentinian and Uruguayan

armed left (who published the journal Cristianismo y Revolución) and on the Colombian and Central American revolutionary movements is

undeniable. Also certain is its influence on the general public, com-

munity members and the student generations of the 1970s and 1980s.

Che Guevara and Camilo Torres were both revolutionary and moral

icons. Archbishop Romero was murdered in 1980 while celebrating

mass; he and the rector and priests of the Jesuit University who were

murdered afterwards in San Salvador were also incorporated into the

annals of revolutionary heroes and martyrs.

One can trace Camilo Torres’ influence in Cuba as well, not in the

Catholic hierarchy, which kept its distance from Liberation Theol-

ogy, but rather within the evangelical left on the island. Pastor Carlos

Piedra, for instance, founded the evangelical Movimiento Estudiantil

Cristiano (MEC) in Cuba:

In 1966, Camilo Torres, the priest, falls mortally wounded in

combat […]. [We] inaugurated the Camilo Torres Seminars

[Jornadas Camilo Torres] […]. We met and read the texts of

the Liberation Theologists in other parts of Latin America […].

We distributed them among the fourteen groups of the MEC as

discussion topics throughout the year […]. Since 2002, I have

been a member of the Communist Party of Cuba. I am the only

Protestant pastor in Cuba who is a member of the Communist

Party. 22

In this context of Dependency Theory and Liberation Theology, with

its empathy for Marxian sociology and philosophy, Cuba reoriented

its appreciation of new actors and organizations in Latin America.

The Instituto Cubano de Amistad con los Pueblos (Cuban Institute

for Friendship with the Peoples, ICAP) identified other actors and

130 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

movements beyond the traditional ‘revolutionaries’. It was time to pay

attention to the nationalist-leftists regimes and movements. René Rod-

riguez, the ICAP director at that time, was explicit in his pragmatism:

[René] opened our eyes. He told us not to neglect the nationalist

sectors in every country. They had to become allies of Cuba,

with greater or lesser affinity. And that caused contradictions

with the revolutionary movements in Latin America. I had to tell

them: ‘They are friends of Cuba, just like you’ […]. There were

friendship associations in Mexico, Uruguay. They flourished in

almost all countries of Latin America. And we discovered that,

like in Colombia, Mexico and Venezuela, there were leaders of

well-known parties that were more leftist than some leaders of

the communist parties. René insisted that we worked with them:

‘Don’t try to put in much ideology. Talk about Cuba’s necessities

and Cuba’s courage. Tone down your discourse’ […]. We real-

ized that by being more open-minded and using a more delicate

tone, we penetrated sectors to which we otherwise would never

have got access. That is what we called ‘popular diplomacy’,

going beyond the sectors we traditionally reached, the so-called

revolutionary sectors. Because many friends of the Cuban Rev-

olution are of middle-class background, are members of the

traditional political parties, or sometimes don’t have a political

affiliation.23

The ICAP also created ‘visiting brigades’: American visitors and stu-

dents came to the island with the Brigada Venceremos, and Europeans

with the Brigada Europa. Later, the Brigada Latinoamericana was

founded. After the ‘ quinquenio gris’ (the grey five years) in the 1970s, Cuba lost the interest of many influential intellectuals. The ICAP

considered its mission to be the recovery of solidarity among Latin

American and European intelligentsia. Philosopher Martínez Here-

dia remembers the invitations that were issued to influential religious

leaders and intellectuals:

I always [worked] in complete coordination with the Depart-

mento América […]. One of Piñeiro’s men at the United States

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 131

section sent me three books by a professor at Stanford, called

Herbert Marcuse. That was shortly before Marcuse became

famous. The books were The One-Dimensional Man, Soviet

Marxism, and Eros and Civilization. I notified Fidel, who immediately required that [Marcuse] be invited to Cuba. [But] it

seemed impossible to make such a sensitive trip at that time […].

For a long period we maintained good relations with many of

the progressive religious believers of the continent. A large

number came to Cuba and it facilitated the ideological and

political insight of Cubans into that ever so important issue. On

matters of religion many Latin Americans and some Europeans,

like François Houtart, assisted us. I conversed and dined twice

with Gustavo Gutiérrez, the founder of Liberation Theology,

and transmitted to him Fidel’s invitation to come to Cuba. But

he didn’t dare make that trip.24

But with other influential intellectuals and theologists, Cuba was more

fortunate. Famous Dominican Frei Betto (1985) came to Havana and

interviewed Fidel Castro about religion and revolution.25 In the early

1990s, the ICAP co-organized solidarity flights coming from Brazil,

with theologists Frei Betto and Leonardo Boff. They were accompa-

nied by entrepreneurs, politicians, students and movie and TV artists.

They celebrated mass where everyone collectively made a confession.

ICAP also assisted in masses celebrated by progressive priests with

solidarity groups from Argentina and Colombia. 26

At least three national labour union leaders were regular guests

and attended training courses and seminars in Cuba. Afterwards these

same leaders became presidents of their countries: Lula (Brazil), Morales (Bolivia) and Maduro (Venezuela). In 2011, 2012 and 2013, staying in

Bolivia and interviewing Bolivian cabinet members, I became aware

of the fact that several vice-ministers periodically visited Havana for

their MA or PhD studies.

New revolutionary friends

During the 1960s, the United States had intended to force Cuba into

diplomatic quarantine in the region. But in the early 1970s these

132 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

efforts began to dwindle. In some countries more progressive gov-

ernments took office. It coincided with Cuba’s turn towards a more

pragmatic diplomacy, creating alliances not only with the revolution-

ary armed left but also with other nationalist-reformist forces. Cuba’s

representatives abroad described themselves in the early 1970s no

longer as ‘revolutionaries of impulse’ but rather ‘revolutionaries of

the heart and thought’. 27 It served them well in a situation with

hitherto unexpected allies.

Peru

In October 1968 a military government, headed by the commander of

the armed forces, General Juan Velasco Alvarado, assumed political

power in Peru. The military nationalized the holdings of the Inter-

national Petroleum Company (IPC), a subsidiary of the Standard

Oil Company involved in a fraudulent contract, and announced a

radical agrarian reform and other progressive economic and social

reforms. Peru’s foreign policy also changed very quickly. The United

States reacted by threatening a boycott and the restriction of credit

and other assistance programmes. 28 But the Peruvian military did not

alter their nationalistic programme. The leading generals and colonels

had a vivid memory of what had happened to another leftist-reformist

army officer, Colonel Arbenz of Guatemala, who had given in and

was ousted by a CIA coup.

They became enthusiastic members of the NO-AL movement. Dip-

lomatic relations were also broadened to include the eastern European

countries, the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China. Peru

was extremely dependent on American armament and spare parts; in

the 1950s and 1960s it had been one of the Latin American countries

most favoured by US military assistance. From 1968 on, Peru diversified

its arms procurements, buying western European equipment. When the

Washington administration ceased delivery of weaponry, Peru turned to

the Soviet Union. Ambassador Pérez de Cuellar, Peru’s brilliant diplomat

and future secretary general of the United Nations, negotiated the deliv-

ery of state-of-the-art tanks, armoured vehicles and fighter-bombers with the Soviet Union and the other Warsaw Pact members. 29

A month after the Velasco coup and the nationalization of the IPC

holdings, the editor of the official Cuban newspaper Granma asked

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 133

Joa – then Piñeiro’s section chief for Bolivia and Peru – to write a

commentary on the Peruvian military. Granma published an article

depicting the new government as a ‘group of gorillas, trained by the

Yankees’. But the next day the paper perceived a call from Fidel with

the comment that Yankee puppets are not inclined to nationalize

strategic American assets. Piñeiro instructed his team to attentively

monitor the next steps of this sui generis government and to look

for an opportunity to approach the generals.30 The Departamento América rapidly identified Colonels Fernandez Maldonado, Enrique

Gallegos and Leonidas Rodríguez as core members of the revolu-

tionary conspirators; eventually they became influential cabinet

members.

In 1970 a severe earthquake affected the north-eastern indigenous

region, resulting in 70,000 victims. In Cuba 100,000 people (includ-

ing Fidel Castro) donated blood. Fidel immediately offered a medical

brigade and a reconstruction team. The Soviet Union sent their gigantic

rescue helicopters. Piñeiro created a logistical support team on the sec-

ond floor of the Hotel Nacional in Havana for Operación Ayacucho. 31

The team was headed by Fernando Ravelo and functioned for more

than a year. During the months of intense collaboration, the rela-

tions between Cuba and the radical colonels –‒ some of them recently

promoted to brigadiers – became warm and confidential:

The political leadership of the Cuban Revolution had become

aware of the fact that new actors were joining the revolution-

ary struggle in Latin America. That [they] were not guerrilla

movements but nationalist soldiers who already ruled in Peru,

Panama and later in Ecuador. That meant a change in the con-

cept of solidarity of the Cuban Revolution with Latin America.

In the case of Peru we launched an operation of solidarity with

a progressive sector of the armed forces that didn’t have to do

with the existing revolutionary organizations. 32

Piñeiro sent Angel Guerra, a trusted journalist and former chief of

the editorial team of Juventud Rebelde (Rebellious Youth, Cuba’s

second-largest newspaper) as a correspondent to Peru to become

familiar with the most radical generals, especially Fernandez Maldonado,

134 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

and the people around them – Marxists and Christians, adherents of

Liberation Theology:

We should also meet with progressive journalists and [leaders

of] social organizations, trade unions, students and grassroots

organizations. And [also] to debate with sectors of the left

that disapproved of the Peruvian process only because of the

fact that it was headed by the military. We should also explain

how counterproductive it would be for the left not to give active

support to the government of General Velasco Alvarado.33

The collaboration would go even further; Cuba supported, at the

request of the Peruvian army, intelligence operations against the

CIA and the Peruvian Marine Intelligence. It was a public secret that

the navy strongly opposed the more radical generals of the army. In

1974, General Morales Bermúdez – then prime minister and minister

of the army – went to Cuba to assist in military manoeuvres. Piñeiro

connected the Peruvian army leader with Escalante Font, a senior

member of the Cuban Department of State Security (DSE, Departa-

mento de Seguridad del Estado), who was in charge of the section

that monitored the CIA. Cuba already monitored CIA agents who

tried to infiltrate the Cuban embassy in Lima, via pillow talk from a

female CIA official who was in love with a Cuban undercover agent.

Escalante Font accompanied the Peruvian prime minister to Lima and

stayed there from November 1974 through February 1975. A network

of sixteen officials operated within and around the Cuban embassy.

They discovered eight or ten safe houses and the whereabouts of

many CIA agents in Peru. Cuban and Peruvian (Army) Intelligence

exchanged relevant information and the operation continued until

Peruvian Naval Intelligence discovered the presence of the Cubans.34

Panama

Also in October 1968, a crucial regime change took place in Panama.

Colonel (later General) Omar Torrijos Herrera, commander of the

National Guard, staged a coup with the support of the majority of

army officers. Like the Velasco government in Peru, the new Panamanian

leader announced a social reform programme for the benefit of the

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 135

poor. Unlike Velasco, Torrijos did not assume the title of president.

But until his death in 1981, his position as head of the Guard made

him the de facto chief of government, formalized in the new consti-

tution of 1972. 35 Velasco and Torrijos appreciated one another. Both were reformists without being Marxists, passionate nationalists with

sympathy for the underprivileged. Velasco never wanted to create a

political party and instead incorporated the slum dwellers, peasants

and members of the indigenous communities into a presidential min-

istry called SINAMOS (Sistema Nacional de Movilización Social,

National System of Social Mobilization). Torrijos founded a political

party, the Partido Revolucionario Democratico (PRD, Revolutionary

Democratic Party), that attracted the support of the urban poor, the

rural peasantry and the students’ movement. Both defined themselves

as military reformers with special missions to break the power of the

economic and political oligarchy, to restore national control over the

economy and to carry out social reforms, implemented by the armed

forces:

I am a soldier of Latin America who lives his daily life in the

barracks since I was seventeen years old. That gives me the

right, and knowledge, to treat a delicate, complex and sensitive

subject […]. Since 1959, the year in which, utterly remarkably in

our century, a guerrilla triumphs over a regular army in Cuba, at

the peak of the period of McCarthyism, military schools began

to analyse a problem that had not been recognised previously.

What had happened in Cuba? And why? […]: social terror,

terrorism, ‘exotic theories’. No, no, the real breeding ground

for these so-called exotic theories is [poverty and] misery. The

real cause is the lack of schools, the lack of provision of pota-

ble water, the lack of a national development programme […].

Many common soldiers, sergeants and lieutenants, men who

live in the same [circumstances of] misery in which ordinary

people live, realise quickly that their rifles should be targeted at

those who enslave […]. 36

Between 1968 and 1989, the year of the American invasion in Panama,

Cuba and the Panamanian generals Torrijos and Noriega (Torrijos’

136 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Chief of Intelligence and his successor as army leader) ‘provided

invaluable services to the Cuban Revolution’.37 Again, Fidel Castro personally intervened. He appointed Norberto Hernández, the VMT

section chief in charge of Central America at the time, as ‘friend of the president’, a kind of unofficial ambassador:

[Fidel] decided in 1969 that we should establish direct contacts

with General Omar Torrijos. I came to the country to live there

with my family. The position Omar Torrijos offered me was to

be ‘his friend’, as there were no diplomatic relations, embassies

or anything like that. In that condition I stayed in Panama until

the year 1974, when diplomatic relations between the two coun-

tries were renewed […]. The main objective for which I was sent

to Panama was not the re-establishment of diplomatic relations.

I went to Panama to support the Latin American revolutionary

movements. During my stay in Panama I firstly secured direct

contact with the Colombians. Thereafter, with all [movements]

that passed through there, be it Central Americans or South

Americans […] through Omar Torrijos and from Panama, I

established connections with representatives of the political

forces in Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Venezuela. I’m not

speaking about relations with the revolutionary movements –

we were already connected – but with the formal government

structures and key persons of the traditional parties in each of

those countries.38

Other progressive military

Military reformism was not restricted to Panama and Peru. Other

army chiefs followed suit and adopted similar, albeit more modest,

programmes: in 1971 in Bolivia (Generals Alfredo Obando in 1969/70

and Juan José Torres in 1970/71) and in Ecuador (General Guillermo

Rodríguez Lara in 1972). Rodríguez Lara announced an agrarian

reform; it was only partially implemented. But he also procured the

construction of highways, roads and electrification networks, and

created state enterprises in the petroleum and petrochemical sector.

Ecuador became a member of the Organization of the Petroleum

Exporting Countries (OPEC). Bolivian president Torres was less lucky;

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 137

he was quickly removed from power. Exiled in Argentina, he was

murdered in 1976. Peruvian president Velasco was ousted by a coup

in 1975 and was succeeded by a more conservative military team.

Rodríguez Lara shared the same fate and held power until 1976, when

conservative officers ended this reform period. In retirement, several

of the reformist military founded an NGO for progressive officers in

retirement, the Organización de Militares para la Democracia, la Inte-

gración de América Latina y el Caribe (ORMIDELAC, Organization

of Military Officers in favour of Democracy and Integration of Latin

America and the Caribbean). In the mid-1990s its president was the

Venezuelan Comandante (Lieutenant Colonel) Hugo Chávez. 39

Chile40

The most important political change in Latin America took place in

Chile. In September 1970 a candidate of the leftist coalition Unidad

Popular (UP, Popular Unity), Salvador Allende, won the presidential

elections. He re-established diplomatic relations with Cuba, severing

the political OAS cordon sanitaire. His electoral triumph also signi-

fied the potential for a peaceful and democratic transition to socialism, an astonishing event in the region. During many trips to the island,

Allende had cemented an enduring personal friendship with Fidel Cas-

tro. On one of these trips Allende’s daughter Beatriz had fallen in love

with Luis Fernandez Oña, one of Piñeiro’s officials at the Chile desk. 41

Beatriz was a member of the Chilean branch of Guevara’s Ejército de

Liberación Nacional (ELN, National Liberation Army) and Allende

had personally accompanied the three Cuban ELN survivors on their

way home. Immediately after Allende’s victory, Beatriz (now married

to Fernandez Oña) and Allende’s secretary and lover Miria Contreras

visited Havana; the two were Allende’s closest confidants. Suspicious

about the domestic capacity to guarantee Allende’s personal safety, they

asked for Cuban assistance to bolster the president’s security detail. Fidel and Piñeiro sent three Cuban specialists, one of them being Beatriz’s

husband.42 In Cuba, Piñeiro created a special task force of twenty-one

persons, headed by Ulises Estrada, to report to Fidel on a daily basis.43

In 1971, Fidel Castro made a long trip to Chile, Peru and Ecuador.

During his ‘technical stopover’ in Peru he was welcomed at the airport

by all Velasco’s army generals. The military were clearly impressed

138 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

and the members of Velasco’s inner circle began to visit Cuba.44 After Chile and Peru, Fidel made another stop in Ecuador, where he also

had dinner with the president and the military general staff. 45

But his principal objective had been Chile. He visibly supported

Allende’s position within the political alliance of the Unidad Popular,

made speeches across the country and explained that he had come to

‘learn about the Chilean process’. But in private he also expressed his

worries about the strength of the ‘counter-revolutionary forces’ and

had told Piñeiro to prepare for the worst. He also inspected the Cuban

embassy and was impressed by its defence infrastructure. He remained

afraid of a military coup against Allende, by the domestic right or

orchestrated by the CIA. By 1972 the situation had gradually wors-

ened and in 1973 rumours about a possible coup by the armed forces

circulated in Chile and abroad.46 In August 1973, Ulises Estrada was sent to Santiago as second-in-command within the Cuban embassy, in

charge of security and contingency plans for the defence of Allende:

Everything that we did in Chile happened with the agreement of

Allende. We were instructed by the Commander-in-Chief to be of

help in whatever way he would like or agree. You could not do

anything in Chile unbeknownst to Allende. We trained the social-

ists and the communists and we provided arms to both parties.

In Chile, Luis Corbalán and Carlos Altamirano, the senior lead-

ers of the PCCh and PSCh, respectively, didn’t believe in a coup

d’état. [But Allende did.] We prepared a plan for the defence of

the residence of Allende in Tomás Moro and in La Moneda [the

presidential palace]: shooting positions, weapons, et cetera.

On 11 September at ten o’clock in the morning [Beatriz]

Allende called. She told Luis Fernández Oña: her dad said that

we not could move out of the embassy […]. I called Samuel

Riquelme [PCCh]: a coup was ongoing. He said that it was

impossible. I also called Carlos Altamirano and told him the

same thing. He replied: ‘Ulysses, please, I am told that you are

sick. Take rest. In Chile there cannot be a coup.’ On the after-

noon of 11 September, the military called the embassy to tell

us that Allende was dead, that he had committed suicide. At

that time we had already informed Fidel [on a trip in Vietnam]

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 139

about the situation. His response was: ‘If they try to storm the

embassy, then shout “Fatherland or Death [ Patria o Muerte] and

fight to the death.” [The Chilean soldiers attacked us several

times. The second time] we received a hail of bullets from the

house across the street from the embassy. But immediately, from

the four walls of the embassy, we answered them in bursts with

tracer bullets. And the Chilean soldiers went running […]. 47

That same day, 11 September 1973, Pinochet’s government broke off

diplomatic relations with Cuba. Eventually, with the assistance of the

Swedish ambassador, Harald Edelstam (who also took charge of

safeguarding the stock of Cuban arms at the embassy), the Cubans

succeeded in evacuating the embassy personnel and the refugees.

Between 1973 and 1975, Estrada remained in charge of a task force

to support the Chilean resistance movement. In the 1980s, Cuba tried

to generate a united guerrilla movement, an umbrella organization of

the MIR and the Frente Patriótico (Patriotic Front) Manuel Rodríguez

(FPMR), then the armed branch of the Partido Comunista de Chile

(PCCh, Chilean Communist Party).48 The effort failed and many

guerrilleros died. The Departamento América put considerable effort into trying to forge a unitary political front against the government of

Pinochet. In 1986, the Christian Democrats, the Socialist Party and

the Communist Party formed an alliance, after discussions in Cuba.

The following year the FPMR and the PCCh ruptured. Cuba made

a judgement of Solomon: to deal with both the PC and the FPMR.

But the Departamento América told the guerrilleros of the FPMR

about Fidel Castro’s promise to the Christian Democrats that, after

Pinochet’s eventual demise, Cuba’s relationship with the Chilean left

would only be ‘humanitarian’. Indeed, the Departamento América

maintained good relations with the FPMR and the PC, but in 1990

it broke off all relations with the FPMR.49

Diplomatic relations and the left in Brazil, Argentina

and Venezuela

During the 1970s, Cuba managed to resume diplomatic relations

with various Latin American countries:50 Chile (November 1970),

140 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Peru (July 1972), Ecuador (August 1972), Panama (August 1974)

and Argentina (May 1973) after the return of Perón. Venezuela rein-

stated its embassy in Havana in December 1974 and Colombia in

March 1975. In 1977, Costa Rica resumed bilateral consular rela-

tions. Some countries suspended their bilateral relations temporarily:

Colombia (1981) and Costa Rica (1981). In the 1990s and 2000s, all

Latin American countries had established or renewed their diplomatic

relations.

Brazil

The formal relationship with Brazil remained suspended until June

1986, after the redemocratization of the country. But even in the

period of dictatorship, when General Geisel assumed the presi-

dency of Brazil (1974–79), relations improved. Cuba’s intervention

in Angola and southern Africa coincided with Brazil’s oil interests

in that region. 51 A silent rapprochement between the countries was the result. Sergio Cervantes, already operating under the wings of

Piñeiro in 1964 and as an artillery officer assisting the guerrilla in

Guinea-Bissau in 1973/74, was the liaison officer for Brazil at the

Departamento América from 1974 until his retirement in 2010.52 In

1976 he made his first trip to Brazil as a member of the International

Atomic Energy Agency. The Brazilian authorities knew about his sta-

tus as a functionary of the Departamento América; his permission to

stay in Brazil was perceived as a signal that the Brazilian government

was interested in an unofficial liaison with Cuba. Between 1976 and

1985 he made eight such trips. In 1985 he went to live there with his

family; in June 1986 diplomatic relations were restored.

He lived in São Paulo, warmly received by the Brazilian Jewish

community. From São Paulo he travelled across Brazil. He developed

a personal friendship with Lula, the labour leader at the time and

later president of the country; he even stayed at his home on a reg-

ular basis. The initial contact was made by another personal friend,

Dirceo, then a political exile in Cuba and later a key cabinet mem-

ber during Lula’s first presidential period. He also cemented relations

with the Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT, Workers’ Party) and all of

its leaders. Cervantes remained posted in Brazil for thirteen years and

was twice appointed Minister Councillor at the embassy. During the

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 141

first democratic government of President Sarney he befriended Marco

Maciel, minister of education and politician of the right. When Maciel

was appointed Ministro-Chefe do Gabinete Civil (prime minister), he

instigated the normalization of diplomatic relations. When Maciel became

the vice-president, as running mate of Fernando Henrique Cardoso

(1995–2002), Cervantes’ position was even more strategic. When Lula

was elected president in 2003, he was invited to the presidential palace as a close friend. His ambassador, uncomfortable with a deputy with easy

access to Brazil’s top politicians, asked Havana to have him retire. He

returned, despite Lula’s efforts to convince Fidel to let him stay.

Argentina53

With the emergence of Peronism as a political movement and party –

the Partido Justicialista – social reformism was an important ingre-

dient; it attracted both the labour unions and reform-minded youth

movements, the so-called Peronist left. During the two decades of

Perón’s exile after a military overthrow (1955–73), two segments

of what later became the Argentinian armed left arose.54 The first,

the Montoneros, was the heir of the Peronist left. Leading members

of the Montoneros were influenced by Liberation Theology and the

Cristianismo y Revolución journal.55 In 1970 the Montoneros launched themselves into the public eye with the execution of General Pedro

Eugenio Aramburú, the leader of the coup that had deposed Peróon

in 1955.56 In 1973 they merged with another small insurgent group, the FAR (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias, Revolutionary Armed

Forces), former members of the Communist Youth who had received

military training in Cuba. 57 The Montoneros had a knack for public relations. They organized rallies for the return of Perón; the participants jumped from 5,000 to 100,000 in the early 1970s.58 The second armed

insurgency was the Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo (Revolutionary

People’s Army, ERP), with many members of Trotskyist background

and some others inspired by Che Guevara.59 From the outset the ERP

launched actions that were targeted against foreign company managers

and government officials, especially military officers.

In 1973 Perón’s deputy, Héctor Cámpora, was elected president.

Soon thereafter he abdicated in favour of Perón; his (third) wife Isabel

became vice-president. The same day Argentina and Cuba resumed

142 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

diplomatic relations. Ravelo, representative of the Departamento

América, was the liaison with the ERP, the Partido Comunista de

Argentina (Argentinian Communist Party, PCA) and the Monton-

eros.60 Perón’s government was informed. The Montoneros reduced their attacks against the military; the ERP continued kidnapping

‘class enemies’ and assaulting military officers. Repeatedly, the

Cuban embassy members tried to convince the ERP leaders to

cease or at least reduce the number of assassinations of (former)

military officers, expressing their fear of a military takeover.

They also tried – in vain – to contribute to mutual cooperation

between the two guerrilla movements. But they were walking a

tightrope: ‘Despite the efforts we made, a dialogue and a unity

among the PRT-ERP and the Montoneros was impossible. Most of

the cadres of the ERP had a Trotskyist background. They were

irascibly anti-Peronists. The Montoneros ranged from those who

blindly believed in Perón to others who, despite being critical, were

supporters of Perón.’61

After Perón’s death, Isabel Perón assumed the presidency from July

1974 to 24 March 1976; she was ousted by a military coup. But

the Peronist left (and the ERP) was also persecuted from within the

presidential palace. Isabel’s trusted friend and secretary José López

Rega, who managed the cabinet, was also in charge of the feared

death squad Alianza Argentina Anti-Comunista (AAA, Argentinian

Anti-Communist Alliance). During Isabel’s government, Argentina

was the theatre of an ‘intra-Peronist civil war’. 62 The ERP and the Montoneros resumed their armed operation on a much larger scale.

Their support increased; by the end of 1974 the Montoneros had

10,000 sympathizers and had created ‘military networks’ across

the country. 63 A year later the ERP admitted to being 5,400 mem-

bers strong.64 Both organizations could spend money. The ERP

kidnapped selectively and once it requested (and got) a ransom of

12 million dollars. The Montoneros once received a ransom of

60 million dollars after kidnapping two entrepreneurs, the Bunge

brothers. At least once, at the request of the Montoneros, Cuban

agents transported a coffin with a million dollars in it to Paris. It is

probable that they deposited part of their revenues on the island. The

Montoneros launched three ‘tactical military offensives’ between

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 143

1974 and 1976. In one of these campaigns they occupied – momen-

tarily – Córdoba, Argentina’s second-largest city. 65

Then the military staged a coup in 1976; they intensified the

counter-insurgency campaign by means of a dirty war directed against

the armed left and all suspected sympathizers, using disappearances

and large-scale torture. In a series of brutal counter-insurgency oper-

ations they downsized the guerrilla considerably: not in open armed

confrontations, but by using torture centres, concentration camps,

abductions and murder. 66 In armed engagements, the military proved capable of disposing of better-prepared special forces, even fighting

against the heroically opposing guerrilla units. But the indiscriminate

kidnapping and the eventual ‘confessions’ and information gained

under torture stripped the Montoneros of their infrastructure, their

safe houses and their support bases. The ERP also lost many victims

during direct engagements. Amazingly, the military did not break off

its relations with Cuba.67

The two guerrillas slowly entered into decline. They relocated part

of their funds and weaponry to Havana. They appeared, sometimes

in uniform, in third-party countries and at international conferences.

In 1979, a Montonero paraded in battle dress alongside the victorious

Sandinista guerrilla in Managua. In 1980, a larger detachment under-

took a risky return to Argentina. Military intelligence had already

collected information about weapon depots and their locations. 68

They lay in wait for the incoming guerrilleros; it ended in disaster as the movement slowly faded away, as did the ERP. It did not disappear

completely; a veteran ERP commando killed Nicaragua’s dictator in

1980, then an exile in Stroessner’s Paraguay. Montoneros chief leader

Firmenich kept a low profile in Havana. 69 The Cuban embassy in Buenos Aires provided discreet assistance with his correspondence in

Argentina. In December 1983, the dictatorship ended and elected pres-

ident Alfonsín took office. Trying to return, Firmenich was arrested in

Brazil, extradited and sentenced to thirty years in prison. But under

President Menem he received an amnesty in 1996. 70

Tony López, representative of the Departamento América in Argen-

tina from 1987 to 1995, continued to liaise with the Communist Party,

the Montoneros, the ERP and the new movements of the left. From

Buenos Aires he monitored oppositional organizations and political

144 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

parties working against Chile’s President Pinochet and Paraguay’s

President Stroessner.71 He also maintained a good relationship with the chief of the Argentinian Servicio de Inteligencia del Estado (SIDE,

National Intelligence Service). The SIDE chief asked him once for

Cuba’s assistance: the Gendarmerie had arrested a Chilean MIR

leader while he was crossing the Chilean–Argentinian border. Presi-

dent Alfonsín did not want to extradite the captured guerrilla leader

to Pinochet’s Chile. Would Cuba receive the prisoner? Havana said

yes, saved a guerrilla leader and improved its relationship with the

Argentinian president.

Colombia

Diplomatic relations with Colombia had been resumed in March

1975 but were suspended in March 1981. This period coincided with

the last half of the presidency of López Michelsen and the first half

of that of Turbay. The improved relationship with López Michelsen

had been initiated by Norberto Hernández, stationed in Panama and

supported by General Torrijos.72 Ravelo, stationed in Buenos Aires, was appointed ambassador in Bogotá. One of his first delicate tasks

was to inform the Colombian president that Fabio Vásquez, leader of

the ELN, was living in Havana and was receiving medical treatment

there. Then he had to explain to the new Colombian ELN leadership,

which was slowly rebuilding the organization, that ‘Cuba, given the

new circumstances, could not continue supporting [them] like in the

previous years’.73 The Movimiento 19 de Abril (M-19, Movement of 19 April), a new guerrilla movement conducting spectacular urban

activities, had already been created but there were ‘neither contacts

nor arrangements’ with Cuba. 74

Of all guerrilla movements, M-19 attracted most of the public’s

sympathy. They were known for spectacular Robin Hood-like activi-

ties – assistance to the population of poor urban neighbourhoods – and

for raids on supermarkets and distributing food among the poor. 75

In February 1980, M-19 stormed the embassy of the Dominican

Republic during a reception, taking many diplomats – among them

the ambassador of the United States and other ambassadors – as hos-

tages. Cuban ambassador Ravelo negotiated among the Colombian

government, the guerrillas and the Latin American missions to reach

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 145

an agreement without further victims. Eventually, in April 1980, the

Colombian authorities granted permission to a Cuban plane that

transported the M-19 assault team, the Latin American diplomats

and the representatives of the guaranteeing third parties to Havana. 76

In Cuba, the M-19 team was free to move. They were joined by new

recruits, and forty to fifty M-19 members received military training

in Cuba. 77 But when a group of 150 M-19 guerrilleros disembarked in southern Colombia in early 1981, President Turbay suspended

Colombia’s relations with Cuba.

The suspension of formal relations facilitated more clandestine

Cuban contact with the Colombian guerrilla movements, and the

M-19 in particular.78 Other Colombian guerrilla movements, such as the Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN, National Liberation

Army), the Ejército Popular de Liberación (EPL, Popular Liberation

Army) and the Partido Revolucionario de los Trabajadores (PRT,

Revolutionary Workers’ Party), also visited Cuba.79 Contacts with the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) were initiated as well. Hernández, appointed vice-chief of the Departamento

América in 1980, and overseeing relations with Ecuador, Colombia

and Venezuela, points out:

In Colombia, we had plentiful relations with the M-19 […].

We initiated direct contact with the FARC [Fuerzas Armadas

Revolucionarias de Colombia]. We also had relations with the

Colombian Communist Party. Its general secretary, Gilberto

Viera, visited Cuba several times. But we also maintained very

good relations with López Michelsen […]. Despite the fact that

both belonged to the Liberal Party, López told us that it was a

great mistake to have [suspended relations] with Cuba. 80

In 1982, M-19 kidnapped family members of the leaders of emerg-

ing drug cartels. That instigated cartel leaders, rich landowners and

entrepreneurs to form the Muerte a Secuestradores (MAS, Death to

Kidnappers), paramilitary units to attack the guerrillas. It was the

forerunner to many regional counter-guerrilla forces of the right that

were unified into the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (AUC, United

Self-Defence Forces of Colombia) in 1997. 81

146 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

During the consecutive governments of Presidents Belisario Betan-

court (1982–86) and Virgilio Barco (1986–90), several efforts at

peace agreements with the guerrilla movements were conducted. In

1985, as a consequence of the negotiations with the FARC, a polit-

ical movement – the Unión Patriótica (UP, Patriotic Union) – was

created to facilitate the peaceful participation of the armed left in

the national political arena. The UP participated in elections and

gained national members of parliament. But the systematic assassi-

nation of UP members by paramilitary forces was so immense that

the CNMH report (2013: 28) labelled it the ‘genocide of the Unión

Patriótica’.82 The possibilities for peace were complicated even further by the M-19’s siege of the Palace of Justice in November 1985.

Army troops stormed the building and more than one hundred peo-

ple were killed, including twelve of the twenty-five Supreme Court

justices.

Still, the government and the various guerrilla movements resumed

peace dialogues. In May 1985, all movements – with the exception

of the FARC – had formed the Coordinadora Nacional Guerrillera

(CNG, National Guerrilla Coordination); in May 1987 the FARC

joined. In September 1987 a unifying Coordinadora Guerrillera

Simón Bolívar (CGSB) was created; it lasted for three years. Enrique

Flores, one of the delegates of the participating Partido Revolucionario

de los Trabajadores (PRT), remembers:

After the failure of the peace process [in 1985] a new reunifi-

cation follows. And this time, the M-19, FARC, [the ELN],

the EPL, the PRT and the Quintín Lame [an indigenous

movement] participated in the CGSB. The Comandancias

[commanding officers of each organization] discussed a uni-

fied strategy and a unitary strategic plan. Then [we] went

on an international tour and the Coordinating Committee

met in Cuba, supported by the Departamento América; they

had always encouraged us to create the Coordinadora. We all

went to Cuba where Barbarroja [Piñeiro] assisted in unifying

forces. They presented us with the Salvadorean example. We

came together to discuss the unification with the Salvadoreans,

with the FMLN. 83

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 147

Of all guerrilla forces, M-19 was most inclined to pursue the peace

negotiations. According to their Cuban liaison at the Departamento

América, another reason for the political solution to the armed

conflict was M-19’s deteriorating economic situation:

The M-19 never succeeded in self-financing. During those years,

the sources of foreign aid dried up and the acquisition of new

weapons and equipment was complicated for them. At that

moment, Comandante Carlos Pizarro came to Cuba to ask for

help. [But by the end of the 1980s,] Cuba’s austerity period, the

‘Período Especial’, had begun. Fidel told him that he should pur-

sue a negotiated political solution. In his view, at that moment

there were very few possibilities for a politico-military organi-

zation to come to power by means of weapons, as had [once]

happened in Cuba and Nicaragua.84

When the other guerrilla movements still doubted the wisdom of for-

mal peace agreements, the M-19 unilaterally announced that they

would sign the covenant; the smaller movements joined. In November

1989 they signed the Pacto Político por la Paz y la Democracia (Political Pact for Peace and Democracy). A direct consequence of the peace

agreement was the convocation of a Constituent Assembly in 1991,

which drafted a new, progressive constitution. In 1991, during the

presidency of César Gaviria, diplomatic relations with Cuba were

normalized.

Many of the demobilized guerrilla members were murdered; one

of them was Carlos Pizarro – the last M-19 comandante, presiden-

tial candidate of the Alianza Democrática, and forerunner to the

Colombian parliamentary left of the present. In that same year, 1990,

two other presidential candidates were murdered. During the final

negotiations, the ELN and the FARC had left the Coordinadora and

decided to continue fighting. The two oldest guerrilla movements, one

‘guevarist’ and the other communist, participated in peace negotia-

tions several times throughout the 1990s and 2000s. Not one of the

various and sometimes protracted efforts ended in a political solu-

tion. In the mid-2000s, the ELN was engaged in peace negotiations

with Colombian government representatives in Havana and in 2012

148 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the FARC started an uninterrupted series of negotiations with the

Colombian government. I will return to these negotiations in Chapter 6.

Venezuela

Diplomatic relations had been broken off in 1961 but had been

resumed in December 1974, during the first presidential period of

Carlos Andrés Pérez (1974–79). While visiting the Soviet Union, he

negotiated a covenant on the triangulation of oil delivery to Cuba with

Brezhnev (‘firm, solid, clear’) and Kosygin (‘brilliant, intelligent’):

The Soviets were grateful for my renewed diplomatic relations

with Cuba. They assured me that they wanted Cuba incorpo-

rated into the Latin American world. Alexei Kosygin told me

that Cuba cost them dearly. They didn’t have any interest in

deepening the gap between Cuba, the United States and Latin

America […]. They assured me that they wouldn’t allow the

expansion of Fidel Castro. They had settlements impeding

Castro from using Soviet weaponry without permission from

Moscow. I bluntly replied that Cubans didn’t sell them, but used

them in other countries. 85

Fidel appointed a veteran of the Departamento América, Norberto

Hernández, as ambassador. When he was instructed at MINREX,

they told him:

‘You are no longer a member of the Departamento América,

nor of the MININT. You are now an official of the MINREX.’

Therefore, I positioned at the embassy in Venezuela the col-

leagues who completely enjoyed my personal confidence.

Some of them came from the Dirección General de Liberación

Nacional or the Departamento América. Because in my heart I

felt the need to support the revolutionary movements, including

those in Venezuela, although at that moment they were passing

through a profound crisis.86

In fact, his core embassy team came from the MININT and the

Departamento América. Relations with the Venezuelan guerrilla

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 149

were virtually non-existent. After the disaster of Machurucuto and

the expedition and rescue of the Ochoa team (see Chapter 4), the armed left was in disarray. There were some smaller clandestine

organizations operating and the Cuban embassy maintained discreet

contact with them. Relations with the Communist Party were icy.

When embassy functionaries visited its secretary general, Jesus Farias,

he told them: ‘Unfortunately, I cannot do anything for you.’ Later,

relations improved. The Party was seriously debilitated: a new organ-

ization, Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS, Movement for Socialism),

had left the Party and ‘nearly all the revolutionary intelligentsia had

gone with them’. A second split produced Vanguardia Revolucionaria

(Revolutionary Vanguard), headed by Guillermo García, the former

military chief of the Communist Party. The embassy maintained fluid

relationships with both the MAS and Vanguardia, as well as with the

Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR) and the Movimiento

Electoral del Pueblo (MEP, Electoral Movement of the People), two

leftist movements that had left the youth wing of the social demo-

cratic government party Acción Democrática (Democratic Action).

The embassy also actively dealt with the Latin America evacuee

diaspora in Venezuela: refugees from Chile, Uruguay, Argentina and

Paraguay. 87

In general, Venezuelan relations with Cuba were decent, also with

respect to the war in Nicaragua. In the late 1970s, President Carlos

Andrés Pérez supported the Sandinista rebels with funds, albeit basically via the individual Eden Pastora, considered to be a social democrat.

He also offered air support to the Costa Rican president Carazo when

Nicaragua’s dictator Somoza threatened to attack his neighbour country.

Venezuela also transported arms via Panama. 88

In 1979, when Luis Herrera Campins became president, relations

with Cuba cooled off and the new government preferred friendly

relations with the United States. Ambassador Hernández received

instructions from Havana to ‘return for consultation’ and the diplo-

matic relations between the two countries were lowered to the level

of chargés d’affaires. In February 1989, at the very beginning of the

second presidential term of Carlos Andrés Pérez, the Venezuelan

president asked Fidel for Hernández’s return as ambassador.89 The Cuban embassy had developed cautious contacts with new emerging

150 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

leftist groups and they had perceived a growing discontent within the

military. In 1992 Lieutenant Colonel Hugo Chávez, leader of a group

of rebellious officers, staged a coup. But loyal army officers in Cara-

cas put the president in the boot of a car and brought him to a TV

station. From there he ordered a nationwide transmission by TV, won

over the military in Caracas and prevented other military units from

joining the rebels. Chávez was condemned to prison but was granted

amnesty in 1994. Cuban ambassador Hernández spoke with him for

only a few minutes during a farewell lunch a couple of days after

Chávez’s release. But other members of the Departamento América

developed a more confidential relationship with Chávez in the years

thereafter. The growing friendship between Hugo Chávez and Fidel

Castro is a theme in the next chapter (Chapter 6).

Revolutionary friends in the Caribbean

The ethnic and thus political configuration of many Caribbean states

is a legacy of slavery, its long period of abolition, and the immigration of contract labourers at the end of the nineteenth century. In 1804

the former French colony Saint-Dominique declared itself the inde-

pendent Republic of Haiti after defeating a French invasion army.

The British abolished slavery in 1833 in their colonies and the French

in 1848. 90 The Dutch abolished slavery in their East (Indonesia)

and West Indies (Surinam, the Dutch Antilles) colonies in 1863, the

same year that Abraham Lincoln declared all American slaves free.

Colonial Cuba (1886) and independent Brazil (1888) were the last

two territories in the western hemisphere where slavery was banned.

The abolition of slavery in the Greater Caribbean saw the arrival of

indentured labour from the British and Dutch East Indies. It created

a significant Indo-Caribbean labour force, especially in Guyana and

Trinidad and Tobago, and a Javanese- and Indo-Caribbean labour force

in Surinam that became numerically larger than the Afro-Caribbean

population segment.

In the second half of the twentieth century, Cuba’s foreign policy

in Latin America was based on its perceived revolutionary mission.

But it has a special affinity with the Caribbean island states. 91 There is certainly a kind of ‘Caribbeanism’ that makes personal relations easy,

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 151

despite linguistic differences.92 The English-speaking independent or recently independent states were sympathetic to Cuba: Barbados,

Guyana, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago took the collective deci-

sion to inaugurate diplomatic relations with the country in December

1972. The Bahamas followed in 1974, Grenada in April 1979,

(Dutch-speaking) Surinam in May 1979, and Santa Lucia in August

1979. In the 1990s, San Vicente and Nevis, Antigua and Barbuda,

San Cristobal and Nevis, and Dominica did the same. Relations with

the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), in which islands and ter-

ritories with American, English, French and Dutch statehood also

participate, were fluid. The two republics of the former Hispaniola,

both governed by dictators who had suspended (Haiti) or ruptured

(Dominican Republic) their diplomatic relations, normalized their

relations in 1966 (Haiti) and 1998 (Dominican Republic). 93

In the 1970s and 1980s, Cuba had a special relationship with

Guyana (Cheddi Jagan), Jamaica (Michael Manley), 94 Barbados (Maurice Bishop) and Surinam (Desi Bouterse). Three of these recently

independent states were former British colonies. The Dutch colonies

were granted autonomy and in 1954 Surinam and the six islands of

the Netherlands Antilles became ‘countries’ within the Kingdom of

the Netherlands. Surinam opted for independence in 1975 and the

Netherlands Antilles chose to preserve formal ties with the Dutch. 95

Guyana

Cuban relations with Guayana go back as early as the 1960s, when

the country was still a British colony. As was the case with its neigh-

bour, Surinam, ethnicity more than ideology played a dominant role

in colonial and post-colonial politics. The two main ethnic population

segments are the descendants of former Indo- (East Indian) Guya-

nese labour migrants and former Afro-Guyanese black slaves. In 1950

the British granted self-rule to the colony. In 1953, the multi-ethnic

People’s Progressive Party (PPP) – founded by Cheddi and Janet

Jagan and Forbes Burnham – formed the first self-rule government

with a radical reform plan. The British sent troops ‘to prevent a

Marxist revolution’. 96 The PPP was removed from office and a conservative ‘interim government’ of businessmen took over. The PPP

split in 1955: Cheddi and Janet Jagan, husband and wife, remained the

152 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

leaders of the (rural Indo-Guyanese) PPP and Burnham founded the

(urban Afro-Guyanese) People’s National Congress (PNC). A third,

middle-class-oriented party, United Forces (UF), regularly made a

coalition with the PNC. The PPP took a course to the political far left;

the PNC professed itself ‘moderate socialist’. In 1966 the country was

granted independence.

The Jagans never hid their sympathies for Cuba. In 1961 the PPP

won the elections; Cheddi Jagan became prime minister. He asked the

Cuban government to open a liaison office; Osvaldo Cárdenas was

appointed office chief. When Cárdenas departed, Che Guevara told him

that Cuba owed a debt to Guyana and especially to Cheddi Jagan. He

had been the only head of government in Latin America to offer assis-

tance during the Bay of Pigs crisis, even while Guyana was still a colony with self-rule. But quickly Jagan was confronted by a destabilization

campaign conducted by the PNC and UF, probably with American sup-

port. Riots, demonstrations and disturbances were the order of the day

in 1962 and 1963; organized strikes threatened to paralyse the country

by cutting electricity provision and impeding food deliveries. Now, in

despair, Jagan asked his friend Fidel Castro for a helping hand. Castro

sent two ships, one of them with fuel and the only tanker that Cuba had

at the time. The situation calmed down. After the elections of 1964 the

PNC and UF formed a majority coalition and Forbes Burnham became

PM; Cuba decided to close the office. 97

In 1972, Cárdenas, then chief of the Caribbean Section of the

Departamento América, visited Guyana again for a preparatory

conference for an NO-AL summit. Burnham received him as a good

friend. Cárdenas was instructed to make a démarche regarding the

possibility of formal relations. Burnham told him that, yes, that was

a good idea but that it would be more convenient to do it as a collec-

tive, as the Community of the Caribbean (Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica

and Trinidad and Tobago). He was as good as his word and the four

countries established relations with Cuba together.

In September 1973, Castro had a meeting with the four Caribbean

heads of government: Errol Barrow of Barbados, Forbes Burnham

of Guyana, Michael Manley of Jamaica and Eric Williams of Trinidad

and Tobago, in Port-of-Spain. In addition, he travelled together with

Burnham and Manley to the NO-AL summit in Algiers. When Burnham

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 153

returned to Guyana, Cuba sent an ambassador who became friends

with Burnham. Ulises Estrada, Piñeiro’s deputy at the Departamento

América, visited the country every two or three weeks, also in order

to facilitate relations between the Jagans and Burnham.98

Jamaica99

Norman Manley, founder of the social democratic People’s National

Party (PNP) and prime minister, guided his country towards inde-

pendence, but lost the elections just before Independence Day. In

1969, his son Michael Manley succeeded his father as leader of the

PNP and won the elections in 1972. He initiated a social reform pro-

gramme of minimum wages, union rights, literacy programmes and

an agrarian reform. Cuba cautiously sent emissaries.100 He met Fidel Castro in 1973 in Port-of-Spain. In September 1974 he made an unofficial trip to Cuba; the year after he officially visited the island. Fidel made the official return trip in 1977, where he was received by a

multitude of 100,000. 101 Cuba sent school construction and medical

brigades as well as fish and aviculture experts to Jamaica. With 900

Cuban civilians present, the country was the second-most privileged

country in terms of civilian internacionalistas after Angola at that

moment.102 Both the personal friendship between Castro and Manley and the Cuban–Jamaican collaboration intensified.

But an oppositional movement (headed by Edward Seaga) won

ground. In 1979, Castro sent trusted Ulises Estrada as ambassador

to Jamaica. When he arrived, the political opposition, assisted by

the CIA, started a smear campaign against him, the beginning of an

extremely violent crusade against Manley and his Cuban friends. 103

In 1980, when 800 Jamaicans were killed in acts of political violence,

Seaga won the national elections; immediately afterwards Estrada

was declared persona non grata. 104 After a period of resolved opposition, Manley became prime minister again in 1989. His second term

was relatively smooth and without armed opposition. He left office

owing to his fragile health and died in 1997.

Grenada

In the 1970s, Grenada was heavy-handedly governed by Sir Eric

Gairy, an authoritarian politician with a labour union background

154 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

who also employed paramilitary forces. His political opponent was

young lawyer Maurice Bishop, born to a migrant family in Aruba

(Netherlands Antilles). After studying in London where he was rad-

icalized, he returned to Grenada to become the co-founder of an

opposition movement, the New Jewel Movement (NJM). 105 In 1974, Grenada became independent. Via members of the Afro-Caribbean

Liberation Movement of Saint Vincent, Dominica and Antigua,

Cuban emissaries made contact. He asked Piñeiro for military train-

ing and weapons for his supporters, but was told that ‘after Angola

and Ethiopia, Cuba had to be cautious’. Piñeiro put him in contact

with Burnham, then president of Guyana, who provided his follow-

ers with equipment and training.106 In March 1979, Bishop and his

followers seized control of the island and proclaimed a revolutionary

government that initiated Cuban-like reforms, founded mass organ-

izations and established popular militias. His Cuban friends tried to

convince him to tone down his rhetoric and present his movement

as a social democratic instead of a Marxist-Leninist one. But Bishop

insisted and again asked Piñeiro for support. This time Cuba sent him

a ship with military equipment.107 Ulises Estrada remembers:

[…] at Punto Cero the special forces of the MININT began to

train twenty men. Given the delicacy of this mission, Comandante

Abelardo Colomé ‘Furry’ Ibarra [a four-star general and minis-

ter of the interior from 1989 to 2015] trained them personally.

The night before their departure we organized a farewell meet-

ing. We waited for Fidel and Piñeiro; only Fidel arrived. Fidel

told me that he wanted to talk in private. Bishop had sent him

a [confidential] message: don’t send [Ulises] or Osvaldo Cárde-

nas. When they had searched the archives of the Security Police,

they had found a lot of information about us. ‘Now Piñeiro is

looking for a compañero that fulfils the necessary conditions,

including his colour, to send him to Grenada [as ambassador].’

Fidel began to talk to [the members of the special forces] and I

remember that he said: ‘There will be an American invasion in

Grenada. I don’t know if it is now, next year or later, but there

will be an invasion by the marines. Grenada has a terrain that is

not very favourable for guerrilla fighting. [Your] mission number

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 155

one is to explore Grenada and seek a high enough elevation

to hold out there for ten days, to get time to mobilize interna-

tional agencies and public opinion. And then we bring in our

troops. There we will toy with the Americans if they get in.’ Soon

thereafter came Piñeiro with Julián Torres Rizo and Osvaldo

Cárdenas. Fidel knew him personally; he was mulatto and could

speak English very well. 108

The American ambassador strongly advised Bishop against Cuba’s

assistance but he answered that ‘We are not anybody’s backyard and

we are definitely not for sale’.109 Bishop established diplomatic relations with Cuba and the Soviet Union. The first Cuban diplomats and

advisers were followed by doctors, teachers, nurses, engineers and

construction workers. With Cuban assistance a large international

airport was built. Bishop visited Cuba several times and developed

a warm friendship with Fidel. He even considered a summit of rev-

olutionary Caribbean leaders.110 However, within the revolutionary government a more pro-Cuba (Bishop) and a more pro-Soviet line (led

by Bernard Coard, his second-in-command) emerged, accompanied

by a bitter rivalry between the two leaders over power and pres-

tige. In October 1983, Bishop was arrested; his supporters released

him and marched to the military headquarters, where the politi-

cal hardliners were housed. The military killed Bishop and several

other leaders; it culminated in severe riots. An American detach-

ment invaded Grenada ‘to restore order and democracy’. 111 Of the Cuban soldiers (‘armed construction workers’), twenty-five were

killed and more than six hundred captured. Colonel Torteló, the

highest- ranking Cuban officer, sought refuge in the Soviet embassy.

The captured officers were demoted. Torteló was degraded and he

and the other ‘officers who had behaved cowardly’ were sent to

Angola as common soldiers.

Surinam112

Neither the Dutch nor the Creole (black and mulatto) population

segment of Surinam was pleased with the colonial status of the coun-

try. The Creole political parties opted for independence. The Dutch,

concerned about the West Indian migrants and the heavy subsidies

156 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

to ‘the West’, wished to decolonize as rapidly as possible. In 1972,

a Dutch Social Democratic member of parliament publicly declared

that ‘[…] if they don’t declare themselves independent, we send them

their Act of Independence by certified mail’. In 1973, a Creole minor-

ity government took office in Surinam and they and the Dutch hastily

began to negotiate.113 The independence was sweetened by a generous

development programme of 1.6 billion euros. After independence, the

Surinamese minority government was no longer popular.

In the Dutch army, officers and NCOs are unionized. When the

(returned) Surinamese NCOs – some of them leftists and the majority

nationalists – negotiated with the government about labour condi-

tions, the union leadership was arrested. Then their comrades, headed

by Sergeant Major Desi Bouterse, staged a coup. They formed suc-

cessive civil governments while Bouterse, now colonel and army

commander, controlled both the army and the government. Osvaldo

Cárdenas had contacted them two weeks after the coup via Guyana;

he was surprised at the high standard of living at the time of inde-

pendence: ‘[…] the secondary schools look like five-star hotels in

Cuba’.114 The Surinamese army leaders were inclined towards the left, proclaimed a revolution and sought ties with Cuba and the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. Bouterse quickly befriended Maurice

Bishop and secretly visited Cuba. There he asked for support, espe-

cially on security matters. The head of his security detail and some

others were trained in Cuba. 115

The turn to the left and the preference for Caribbean revolutionar-

ies alienated him from important population segments. In 1982, when

Bishop visited Surinam, the labour unions announced a general strike

and organized a massive counter-demonstration. Meanwhile, after a

new visit to Cuba by Bouterse, Castro appointed Osvaldo Cárdenas

as ambassador at his request. In spite of the language barrier, Cárdenas

was rapidly at home with the several political splinter parties on

the political left (there was even a small Albania-oriented one).116 In

December of that year, on a night of booze and drugs, the military

set oppositional radio stations and editorial buildings on fire and

arrested fifteen leaders of the oppositional Association for Democ-

racy. They were summarily executed after torture. It was a social

and political watershed. The traditional parties were now operating

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 157

underground and refused to negotiate with Bouterse. The Dutch sus-

pended financial development while at the same time the global price

of bauxite, Surinam’s most important export product, plummeted. It

is even possible that the Dutch, urged by the United States, prepared

for a military intervention.

That was also the perception of the Brazilian military government.

In 1983, Brazilian security chief General Venturini landed after an

unannounced flight.117 After a veiled warning about the possibility of ‘unpleasant steps’ on the part of the Brazilian military, Venturini

offered a military and financial alliance with Brazil – instant credits to alleviate Surinam’s economic crisis.118 Bouterse agreed, a decision he justified by remarking that ‘We military march left, right, left, right.’

The Brazilians came in and Cárdenas was declared persona non grata; the embassy was closed. 119

In 1992, when Bouterse had lost his military command and thus his

political influence, Cuba and Surinam renewed their diplomatic rela-

tions. 120 But Bouterse returned to the political arena in the mid-1990s.

He founded a political party with an explicitly multi-ethnic charac-

ter. Skilfully reconciled with former adversaries, his party became

the largest in 2010. He was elected president, and in 2015 he was

re-elected. Present-day Surinam (2016) is an observer at the sessions

of the group of ALBA countries, headed by Cuba and Venezuela. 121

The Central American revolutions

In the 1970s and 1980s, Central America was the theatre of compli-

cated civil wars; the involvement of the United States, the Soviet Union

and Cuba made them sometimes appear as proxy wars.122 Cuba was intensely committed to the wars and the peace process. Between the

early 1960s and the mid-1990s, nearly all Central American guerrilla

leaders visited Cuba: as exiles and for military training, for political

consultations, for medical treatment, and for relaxation. Young guer-

rilla leaders and recruits were trained in Cuba. The Departamento

América had a prominent role. 123 In the case of Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala it decisively contributed to the unification of

the national umbrella organizations of the various politico-military

organizations.124

158 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

In Central America, Liberation Theology was of enormous influ-

ence. Half of the circa forty Nicaraguan comandantes were recruited by radicalized priests. Thousands of Comunidades Eclesiales de Base

(Church Base Communities) supported the guerrilla organizations. In

Guatemala the direct influence of Liberation Theology was maybe

less predominant, although Jesuit and Maryknoll priests were organ-

izing Mayan communities. 125 Several Guatemalan guerrilleros of the 1970s and 1980s also had religious backgrounds, especially the young

intellectuals of the Maryknoll discussion groups.126 Radical priests

participated in the small guerrilla movements in Honduras as well. 127

Many young military and civilian leaders were previously engaged in

the Central American student movement.128

Nicaragua

Three young leftist insurgents founded a rebel movement in1961; it

was named after General Sandino, who had waged a guerrilla war

against invading American marines and the Somoza dictatorship in the

1930s. Its first members were mostly young Catholic students. Many

Sandinistas were trained in Cuba or found a safe haven there in exile.

Until the mid-1970s the Sandinistas sustained a Che Guevara-style

rural foquismo strategy. Then the movement – Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional (FSLN, National Sandinista Liberation Front) –

began to split into three branches; the fragmentation had both

personal and ideological roots.

Fidel and Piñeiro, worried about the fragmentation, were essential

to the unification of the three branches. 129 Ulises Estrada was sent to

Panama and Costa Rica to convince the Central American commu-

nist parties to assist the Sandinistas in their countries.130 A team from

the Departamento América travelled on and off for six months. Joa,

at the Mexican embassy, was sent to Costa Rica for an operation to

clandestinely bring Humberto Ortega (Daniel’s brother) to Panama,

and to assist in the negotiations between the three Sandinista factions:

It was hard to manage the existing sensitivities between the

leaders of [the three branches]. It created difficulties for our

country to deliver the aid that the Venezuelans sent through our

channels. Piñeiro instructed me to travel to Panama, to assist

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 159

Ulises Estrada in an effort to unify the FSLN: one [group] led

by Tomas Borge, the one headed by the brothers Daniel and

Humberto Ortega and that of Jaime Wheelock […] On the other

hand, Cuba’s coordination with the Central American revolu-

tionary organizations and the Mexican political authorities was

such that President José López Portillo was willing to provide

an operational base on Mexico’s territory […] they had an air-

port in Chiapas that they did not use. It could be leased to the

FSLN. With the exception of weapons and explosives, supplies,

backpacks and food could be handed over to the Sandinistas. 131

In February 1979, the formal unification was celebrated in Havana in

a meeting between Fidel and Piñeiro, and the Sandinista leadership:

Between 1976 and 1979 the Departamento América was very

important for the Sandinista movement. Fidel had a keen eye for

the possibilities of a victory. [He] was enormously important.

Without a doubt, he brought order in the final phase. He knew

everything. He was involved in all things that mattered […]. He

spoke and we asked for his advice. We stayed at his office for

hours, many hours and days after the triumph. He was decisive

in the unification of the FSLN, ‘he, Piñeiro and Abreu’. 132

One of the most successful political initiatives was organizing the

active support of civilian sympathizers in exile: the so-called Group

of Twelve, a kind of cabinet-in-waiting. Castro had built a coali-

tion of Costa Rican, Cuban, Panamanian and Venezuelan heads of

government, providing arms to the Southern Front in Nicaragua

with roughly one thousand Sandinista guerrilleros, headed by Hum-

berto Ortega. 133 It was reinforced by Argentinian, Cuban-Chilean, Salvadorean, Guatemalan, Uruguayan and other Latin American

insurgents: the ‘International Brigade’, headed by a Cuban whose

nom de guerre was Alejandro. 134 At the same time, urban insurgency groups launched attacks against the National Guard in Managua and

other cities.135 Two female comandantes, Dora María Telles and Mónica Baltodano, liberated the former capital cities of León

and Granada. On 19 July 1979 Somoza gave up. The Sandinista

160 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

guerrilla columns, accompanied by the Group of Twelve, entered the

jubilant capital city of Managua.

Cuba immediately sent a prominent medical brigade by plane:

surgery professors, hospital directors, anaesthetists, gynaecologists,

neonatologists, nurses, technicians and paramedical personnel. 136

Many Nicaraguan doctors had disappeared and Managua, bom-

barded by Somoza’s air force, was a city in ruins. The arriving Cuban

staff had to clean abandoned hospitals and attended to injured guerrilleros and even wounded members of the National Guard who were

left to their own devices. When the Sandinista government launched

a literacy campaign, 2,000 Cuban teachers arrived to join the tens of

thousands of Nicaraguan urban youth volunteers. In the first months,

Cuban airplanes maintained a kind of airlift. During the Contra war

(1983–89) Cuba sent six flights per day with equipment and arms. 137

Even up to the end of the 1980s, Cuban pilots flew the military and

civilian airplanes to distant regional centres. Army matters were

negotiated with Humberto Ortega (minister of defence) and police,

intelligence and security affairs with Tomás Borge (minister of the

interior).138 While Cuba supported many essential government institutions, Castro had explicitly forbidden involvement in Sandinista party

affairs. 139

High-ranking Cuban generals were sent in to transform the coman-

dantes and other officers of the guerrilla columns into military

commanders and strategists. Cubans trained the General Staff and

regional commanders, acted as advisers at the military schools, and

accompanied the Nicaraguan brigades.140 Officers were also trained in Cuba by the hundreds when the Contra war began and the counter-revolutionary fighters, trained and equipped in Honduras – first

by the Argentinians and then by the CIA – acquired superiority.141 The Sandinista People’s Army (Ejército Popular Sandinista, EPS) eventually won the war, but at the cost of economic and military attrition

and electoral defeat in 1990.

The Nicaraguan Ministry of the Interior (MINTER) was, in a cer-

tain sense, ‘adopted’ by the Cuban MININT. At MINTER, Cuba’s

Director General of State Security, Fabian Escalante Font, became

Borge’s general adviser. Intelligence and counter-intelligence were to a

certain degree handled by the Cubans. Nicaraguan comandante Lenin

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 161

Cerna, Daniel Ortega’s cellmate during his prison years under the

Somoza regime, was Borge’s vice-minister in charge of security.142 But Escalante was a recognized expert, on and off in Havana and in Managua; his deputy, General Ramiro Mayans, stayed in Managua while

Escalante personally advised the brigade commanders of the Sand-

inista Army and the Special Troops of the MINTER. Furthermore,

Ramón Montero, a Cuban officer made a Nicaraguan comandante,

headed the foreign intelligence and the counter-intelligence office in

Managua, operating directly under Lenin Cerna.143 Cuban support to MINTER was sustained during the entire period of the Sandinista

government (1979–90).

El Salvador

For many decades military dictators persecuted ‘communists’: leaders

of the trade union and peasant organizations, journalists, intellectu-

als and even priests. The Partido Comunista de El Salvador (PCES,

Communist Party of El Salvador) was a clandestine, albeit beaten

organization. In 1970, Salvador Cayetano Carpio (Comandante

Marcial), secretary general of the PCES, decided to leave the party

with members of the Communist Youth and young students with a

Catholic upbringing.144 His rebel movement, the Fuerzas Populares de

Liberación Nacional (People’s National Liberation Forces) Farabundo

Martí (FPL), was named after a communist leader who had headed

a peasant insurgency in the 1930s. The FPL students brought him

into contact with their Liberation Theology tutors and the student

organizations at the university.

The FPL was organized into a military and a civilian wing (labour

unions and peasant organizations). In the years to come three other

organizations with a comparable structure were formed, initially tiny

politico-military organizations but with growing memberships. The

FPL was largest with roughly 80 per cent of the membership of all

insurgent organizations. The second one in importance and member-

ship was the militaristic Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo (People’s

Revolutionary Army) of Joaquín Villalobos. Dogmatism and personal

antagonism produced a continuous atomization of the Salvadorean

insurgent movements during the entire decade of the 1970s. Marcial’s

orthodoxy about the ‘prolonged popular struggle’, in discussions with

162 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

an irritated Fidel Castro, revealed the latter’s view that: ‘If we in the Sierra Maestra would have dedicated ten per cent of what you are dis-

cussing about, we would still be sitting high in the mountains.’145

His orthodoxy led him to paranoia. In 1983 his second-in-command

Ana Maria ( nom de guerre of Mélida Araya Montes) was murdered

in Managua, after a dispute with Marcial about the necessity of polit-

ical negotiations (an option favoured by Ana Maria). Nicaraguan

intelligence arrested the attackers and they confessed to having acted

at Marcial’s instigation. The Nicaraguans left it to the FMLN lead-

ership to resolve the situation. Confronted with the evidence by his

comrades, Marcial committed suicide.146 His successor was Salvador Sánchez Cerén, present-day (2016) president of El Salvador.

As in Nicaragua, Fidel and Piñeiro strongly insisted on the neces-

sity of a Salvadorean umbrella organization. In early 1980, at the

outbreak of the civil war, four politico-military organizations reached

an ‘epidermic unity’, to use the euphemistic terminology of one of

the principal Cuban negotiators.147 The incorporation of the fifth and smallest group – the guerrilla of the Communist Party, headed by

Schafik Handal – kept the Cuban negotiators busy for the rest of that

year. Until the end of the war in 1992, Schafik Handal handled the

day-to-day affairs at the FMLN office in Managua. Handal had many

good friends in Cuba. Tomás Borge at the Nicaraguan MINTER also

befriended Handal, whereas the Nicaraguan military preferred Villa-

lobos. The Departamento América had a guiding principle to treat the

five Salvadorean insurgent organizations as equals; but ‘[…] we took

into consideration the capacity of every one […]. We had magnificent

relations with Schafik Handal, but we always comprehended that the

FPL had a stronger military strength, so they received more assistance.

It also helped that they operated in zones closer to Nicaragua.’148

During the war years, the FMLN and Cuba maintained warm rela-

tions. The FMLN did not depend only on Cuba’s assistance. It raised

war taxes and it could rely on gifts from the western European, Cana-

dian, American and Mexican solidarity committees, and of course

on the sustained support of the Sandinista government during the

entire decade of the 1980s. From Managua, the Cuban-Nicaraguan

comandante Ramón Montero arranged the logistics of transport and

weapon delivery. But the relationship with Cuba was special owing

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 163

to its unrestricted medical support for the wounded and crippled.

Cuba trained new recruits and provided military training to guerrilla

officers (especially in the field of artillery) when the guerrilla units in the mid-1980s reached the strength of military battalions. The Salvadorean leadership had a kind of father–son relationship with Fidel

Castro, whose advice was sought on decisive matters. The respect for

Fidel was such that in 1988 and 1989, during the preparations for

the final offensive on San Salvador, the five members of the FMLN

leadership presented their war plans to Castro and discussed them. 149

Cuba’s involvement in the war can be illustrated by the experiences

of two guerrilla officers, one a (female) Cuban-Chilean army lieuten-

ant and the other a (male) Salvadorean artillery officer, afterwards the

FPL representative on the island. Fedora Lagos, a member of the Chil-

ean Communist Youth, was exiled with her parents and brother after

Pinochet’s coup in 1973 – first to Romania and later to Cuba. Her

brother died while participating in the Nicaraguan guerrilla. She also

opted for a military career and graduated as an army lieutenant and

radio-communications engineer. In 1986, she taught communications

to the Sandinista officers in Nicaragua. But at the request of Schafik

Handal she was transferred to El Salvador, where the FMLN urgently

needed a communications specialist at Radio Farabundo Martí.

There she was known as the ‘Cuban lieutenant’. At the same time, she

attended a guerrilla school for children and orphans – future guerrilla

members. Her most dramatic memory of the war was the death of

some of these children:

The Salvadorean army had offered sweets and coffee to chil-

dren who visited relatives in neighbouring villages in exchange

for information about the guerrilla encampment. [The army

at the time had assaulted and killed many guerrilleros.] There

were children who had to be interrogated and sanctioned. That

means killing a child of twelve, thirteen years. It was an abso-

lute disaster. Some of them were children of my school. I had

to speak with them. I said that they were children but they told

me: ‘No, they aren’t children any more, they are combatants.’

With a lump in my throat I couldn’t speak, [the children] spoke

to me. They said to me: ‘We know that they are going to kill

164 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

us, but please tell them that we will never do it again. We don’t

want to die.’ Then my favourite girl, fourteen years old, gave me

a kiss on my forehead and said: ‘The only thing they gave us was

a sugar bag and three coffee packages. And therefore I have to

die.’ How can you kill children of eleven, twelve, thirteen and

fourteen years who sold themselves for coffee and sugar because

they were hungry? There were months that we didn’t have any-

thing to eat; we ate roots, lizards, snakes, iguanas […]. ‘I am not

bad,’ she told me. For sure, they weren’t bad, but through their

fault an entire squad was killed. That is the war. [Question:]

‘Were they shot?’ [Answer, in tears:] No, they couldn’t waste

bullets.150

In 1979, Jorge Juárez joined the FPL at the age of seventeen. He

participated in the first offensive in 1981 in Santa Ana. In 1984, he

was sent to Cuba for artillery training with the special forces of

the MININT. Upon his return he joined a mortar and machine-gun

unit of a FPL battalion, as military instructor. As with all other FMLN

trainees, his life history and motivation were recorded on video by

the Cubans: ‘In Cuba all things are registered and guarded.’ After

the restructuring within the FPL, from large battalion-size units to

smaller units, he became chief of a peloton. Wounded in a mine-

field, he was sent to Cuba for convalescence. There he was appointed

co-administrator of an encampment of wounded FMLN members:

It is surprising, but nobody wrote a study about the enormous

efforts of the Cubans to attend to the many injured of the wars

in Central America. Nearly all patients received literacy courses,

primary or secondary education as well; the blind were trained

in Braille. It was probably the most important contribution of

Cuba to the combatants of Central America.151

He returned to El Salvador to participate in the second offensive, in

1989. As chief of a peloton of young, inexperienced recruits (fourteen,

fifteen to twenty years old), he was severely wounded, and was left

for dead. He was saved by a retreating unit commanded by a friend.

Sent to Cuba, to the same encampment that he had recently left, it

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 165

took him three years to convalesce. He attended university courses

and graduated in history in Cuba, serving as the FPL representative in

Havana. After the peace agreements in 1992, the FMLN reduced its

infrastructure in Cuba. He maintained contact with the Departamento

América. But after the war, they seemed somewhat uncomfortable

with his presence; his former counterparts always pretended to have

another appointment. When Sánchez Cerén visited Cuba, he also

became aware that within the FMLN things had changed, that there

was an ongoing power struggle. He gradually began to maintain some

distance and upon his return to El Salvador he decided to move into

academia instead of being immersed in politics. 152

Three of the five ‘historical leaders’ silently left the FMLN when

it was reorganized as a political party. Eventually, the cadres of the

Communist Party acquired the upper hand within the new party

structures. The party lost three successive presidential elections, but

its electoral attraction gradually increased. Schafik Handal became

the undisputed party leader and, with him, orthodoxy became the

dominant ideological line. After his death in 2006, a museum and a

memorial monument were built.153 The memorial is a pantheon to three revolutionary heroes: Handal (above), Farabundo Martí and

Archbishop Romero (below). His successor, Sánchez Cerén, served as

vice-president in 2009 and won the presidential elections in 2014. 154

Guatemala

After the fiasco of the guerrilla in the 1960s, the Guatemalan army

had discovered reports of the guerrilla leaders that admitted their fail-

ure. Guatemala was declared insurgency-free. Colonel Arana, chief

of the counter-insurgency operations, was promoted to general and

sent as ambassador to the Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua. With

his support he participated in the elections of 1970 and became pres-

ident. With only one exception, from 1954 to 1985, all presidents,

elected or fraudulent were generals, and all political parties sought a

general as their presidential candidate.

The guerrilla had disappeared but had not disbanded. In exile in

Mexico and Cuba, the Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes (FAR, Rebel Armed

Forces) split into three movements: the EGP (Ejército Guerrillero de

los Pobres, Guerrilla Army of the Poor), headed by Che Guevara’s old

166 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

friend Ricardo Ramírez de León ( nom de guerre Rolando Morán); the ORPA (Organización del Pueblo en Armas, People’s Armed Organization) under the command of Rodrigo Asturias ( nom de guerre

Gaspar Ilóm); and the remaining FAR, directed by Pablo Monsanto

( nom de guerre of Jorge Soto). They were joined by a small detachment of the PGT (Partido Guatemalteco de Trabajadores, Guatemalan

Workers’ Party, the Communist Party) under Ricardo Rosales ( nom de

guerre Carlos González). In the 1970s, these four organizations operated independently. The leaders of the EGP, the FAR and the ORPA

had an antagonistic relationship; Rolando Morán was in a certain sense

the accepted primus inter pares. Rosales was in fact the odd man out, commanding an insignificant number of combatants.

It was perceived that the Cuban leadership had a preference for the

EGP. The first sixteen combatants were trained in Cuba and many

recruits also received their military instruction there. The EGP was

the largest insurgent movement; it had firm roots in the indigenous

region, western Guatemala. They were supported by the Comité

de Unidad Campesina (Peasants’ Unity Committee), a mass organ-

ization of rural workers and landless indigenous peasants that was

capable of organizing tens of thousands in protest marches. The EGP

created a system of Fuerzas Irregulares Locales (FIL, Local Irregular

Forces) to support the guerrilla. But it had no means to equip and

train the supporting Maya population in the FIL. In the late 1970s

and early 1980s, when the army command organized brutal coun-

ter-insurgency campaigns, the guerrilla left the peasants defenceless.

Furthermore, the army established a system of ‘self-defence patrols’

(Patrullas de Autodefensa Civil, PACs) wherein 1.2 million indige-

nous men were incorporated, of an estimated national population of

9 million persons:

The military, often by assault during holidays, forced young

indigenous men into compulsory military service, only Mayas […].

Second, there was the system of Patrullas de Autodefensa Civil,

created as a strategic response to counter the guerrilla’s civilian

patrols [the FIL]. The army was fighting an unconventional war

but with a training in conventional warfare. And they began

to mirror what they were doing […]. Giving them arms was

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 167

the idea of General Benedicto Lucas García [brother of the

general-president, Romeo Lucas García], who had been in

France and had absorbed the design of how to gain the sympathy

of the indigenous population. And the first patrol commanders

were the comisionados militares, the ex-conscripts, former petty

officers and sergeants […] That is how they acted under [successive

general-presidents until 1985].155

From the early 1980s onwards, the guerrilla retired to remote rural

zones. In 1982, advised by the Cubans, the four organizations finally

agreed to form an umbrella structure – the Unidad Revolucionaria

Nacional Guatemalteca (URNG, Guatemalan Revolutionary National

Unity). Ironically, the leadership had moved to faraway Mexico City,

directing a guerrilla war at a distance of 660 miles. Recently, in 1986,

priority issues like logistics were unified. In retrospect, the Cubans are critical with respect to the Guatemalan guerrila. Always respectful,

they were sometimes in despair about the internal antagonisms, the

ideological splits (in fact disguised personal feuds), the lack of coordination and the loss of popular support. Joa, situated in Mexico City,

remembers that:

The EGP had many contradictions with the people of ORPA.

We told the leaders of both organizations that we could help

them establish contacts with the Mexican government, pro-

vided that they gave the impression that they were coordinating

and organizing a unitary revolutionary front. I made a similar

comment to the secretary general of the PGT when he came to

Mexico. They were the last to join the URNG. 156

Ravelo, vice-chief of the Departamento América at the time and in

charge of Mexico and Central America, is even more outspoken:

Although we never said it directly, our criterion was that the

URNG should have created strong guerrilla columns, capa-

ble of protecting a territory and its citizens. But they chose to

create small guerrilla groups all over the country, to give the

impression that they controlled the country. But that wasn’t the

168 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

case. And when the army advanced, it bulldozed all opponents

and killed all peasants. In my opinion, the URNG leadership

[…] had very narrow criteria and applied the wrong tactics.

That is the reason that the enemy killed so many indigenous

people. The guerrilla forces didn’t know how to defend them. 157

The peace negotiations lasted nearly ten years. After the counter-

insurgency campaigns, the guerrilla was in fact defeated. In 1982 Rios

Montt offered peace negotiations and amnesty through intermediar-

ies. 158 But the URNG never reacted. Later, after the inauguration of the first civilian government of President Cerezo in 1986, the guerrilla decided to test the waters. Official negotiations started in 1991

and lasted until December 1996. During the negotiation process, the

United Nations established a Human Rights Commission that con-

tributed through its good offices.159 Cuba had a crucial role in the peace and reconciliation process. That will be examined in the next

chapter.

Honduras160

The guerrilla in Honduras was smaller and of lesser significance. In the

mid-1960s, members of the Partido Comunista de Honduras (PCH,

Communist Party of Honduras) formed a local guerrilla movement, but

they were easy prey for the army. During the 1970s, consecutive mili-

tary governments were more reformist; during López Arellano’s second

government term (1972–75), even a prudent land reform was initiated.

In the 1970s, Honduras bought Cuban sugar and the Departamento

América maintained relations with the Honduran government and the

PCH. In the early 1980s, another army commander and provisional

head of state, Policarpio Paz García (1980–82), had intensified rela-

tions with Cuba, was treated in a Cuban hospital and was awarded a

golden medal by FidelCastro. 161

Meanwhile, the nascent Salvadorean guerrilla movement Partido

Revolucionario de los Trabajadores Centroamericanos (PRTC, Revo-

lutionary Party of the Central American Workers) had already formed

a Honduran wing of circa ninety insurgents. From excisions of the

PCH, new insurgent movements had emerged: the Fuerzas Populares

de Liberación (People’s Revolutionary Forces) Lorenzo Zelaya and

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 169

the Movimiento Popular de Liberación (People’s Liberation Move-

ment) Cinchoneros. There was a lukewarm effort to unify all armed

movements in a Directorio Nacional Unificado (Unified National

Directorate), but the army crushed most of the combatants in 1983

and 1984. Some of the survivors succeeded in assaulting and killing

former army chief Gustavo Álvarez Martinez.162 Castañeda, Cuba’s liaison from 1982 through 1990, does not ‘remember that we worked

[actively] here on a unifying process […] The Directorate wasn’t

strong. And all [movements] were somewhat sectarian.’163

After the wars

The insurgency in Nicaragua ended in the victory of the first Sandinista

government (1979–90). It was confronted with a second civil war (the

Contra war) that ended in a pyrrhic victory and produced an electoral

defeat in 1990. The new government of Violeta de Chamorro ruptured

diplomatic relations with Cuba. The Cubans maintained relations

with Daniel Ortega, notwithstanding all rifts and schisms within the

party. Formal relations were re-established when Ortega initiated his

second presidential period (2007–present). Nicaragua immediately

joined the group of ALBA countries, originally a Cuban–Venezuelan

alliance. The war in El Salvador ended in a military stalemate. After

the peace in 1992, the FMLN was transformed into a political party

that won the presidential elections twice after 2009. The Guatemalan

war of thirty-six years ended in de facto defeat of the URNG. After

the peace in 1996 the URNG, converted into a political party, gradu-

ally lost significance and voters. The political situation in Honduras

remained unaltered, until the late 2000s. Then a progressive president –

Manuel Zelaya, radicalized – announced social reforms and prepared

to join the ALBA countries group; he was ousted by a military coup in

2009. That was probably the reason why the Salvadorean FMLN, elec-

torally victorious in the same year, did not opt for ALBA membership.

Its relations with Cuba continue to be warm (2016).

Reflection

When assessing the entire period of the early 1970s to the late 1980s,

one has to take into consideration that Cuba’s military role was

170 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

mainly focused on Africa. In fact, most FAR officers were involved in

the wars in southern Africa and operated also in the Horn of Africa.

In Latin America, Cuba continued to play a role in revolutionary

politics – less assertive perhaps, but always significant. Economically,

the country was sustained by generous support from the Soviet Union

and the other COMECON countries. Cuba significantly depended on

subsidies and credits and on substantial military equipment provided

by the socialist bloc. But Cuba preserved its relative independence

with respect to its standing and acting in Latin America and the

Caribbean: by training, advising, facilitating and using the island’s

infrastructure and resources for anti-dictatorship coalitions, insurgent

movements and guerrilla rebels. In one case, that of Nicaragua, it led

to a triumph in 1979. The Cuban leadership succeeded in overcoming

the political isolation of the 1960s and rebuilt diplomatic relations

with most countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. Its status

as a leading Third World country was established in the 1960s and

reconfirmed during the 1970s and 1980s.

Cuba continued to support guerrilla anti-dictatorial coalitions and

insurgent movements when it perceived it to be convenient. There is,

however, a difference from the years of revolutionary fervour in the

1960s. In the 1970s and 1980s, the Cuban leadership operated more

pragmatically and explicitly emphasized the necessity of revolutionary

unity. Previously, the Vice-Ministerio Técnico – the institutional pre-

decessor of the Departamento América in the 1960s – had trained all

varieties of insurgents in a country of guerrilla warfare and with a preference for rural foquismo. Now the impetus for political pacts within the armed left, and the achievement of national umbrella organizations

within each country, predominated. One can perceive the continuous

efforts to shape unitary politico-military organizations in the case

of Argentina, Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua. A

considerable part of the activities of the Departamento América was

dedicated to this objective. All section heads and Piñeiro’s vice-chiefs, who are quoted in this book, remember the incessant instructions by

Piñeiro and by Castro to be respectful but not to forget to contribute

to the indispensable unifications of all revolutionary actors.

A second differentiating factor from the 1960s is the extension of

Cuba’s medical services to all revolutionary combatants of the region

The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s) | 171

and the growing importance of the medical brigades, sent to friendly

countries or to countries affected by natural disasters. It is without a

doubt the most laudable, selfless and generous contribution of Cuba

to all insurgent movements, highly regarded by all who received

medical treatment and could convalesce on the island. It is a scarcely

documented endeavour, but it has probably improved the quality of

life of thousands of former combatants. In interviews, it sometimes

sounded as if revolutionaries and guerrilla combatants were enti-

tled to receive medical treatment on the island. And in reality they

practically were. Furthermore, Cuba sometimes extended its medical

services to its enemies. In the period immediately after the Sandinista

victory in Nicaragua, in 1979, the first Cuban medical team attended

to wounded Sandinista rebels and suffering members of the National

Guard, left for dead by their own brothers-in-arms. 164 In 1992, when the dying ex-major D’Aubuisson – founder of the Salvadorean

ARENA165 party, leader of its death squads, and a visceral antagonist of the left and of Cuba’s support for the guerrilla – was denied

proper medical attention in the United States. Abreu (chief of the

Central American section at the Departamento América) offered him

hospitalization in Cuba. 166

By the end of the 1980s, worldwide East–West relations were

changed dramatically by the implosion of the Soviet Union and the

dissolution of COMECON, Cuba’s economic buttress structure. It

meant dramatic alterations in terms of the national standard of living,

military position, reliance on its defence capabilities and possibilities of external intervention. These changes and the effects on Cuba’s relations with the Latin American and Caribbean left are the subject of

the next chapter.

CHAPTER 6

The years of soft power (1990s–present)

The end of the Cold War

The year 1989 saw a cascade of political earthquakes in eastern

Europe. In February 1989 the Soviet army, humiliated, retreated from

Afghanistan. In March this was followed by Yeltsin’s electoral vic-

tory in Moscow, the economic and political reforms in Hungary, and

the victory of the Solidarity Movement in Poland in June. In August

the de facto separation of the Baltic states succeeded. In September

and October there was a massive exodus of East German citizens; it

caused the ousting of party leader Honecker and soon afterwards the

implosion of the regime. The year ended with the fall of the Bulgarian

regime, the velvet revolution in Czechoslovakia, and the toppling of

Ceau‒escu in Romania. Two years later the Soviet Union disintegrated

into fifteen separate countries.1 Comparing the events in eastern

Europe and those in Cuba, one has to remember that the constitution

of the European socialist bloc was the result of Soviet military power’s

advance to Berlin in the last years of World War II, and the presence

of the Red Army and the KGB as political enforcers in the late 1940s

and 1950s. 2 Cuba became a socialist country after its victorious revolution against dictator Batista.

When the Cold War came to an end and the United States remained

the only military superpower, the consequences for Cuba were dis-

astrous. Soon after the revolution in 1959, the island had become

highly dependent on economic and military support from the Soviet

Union and eastern Europe. Economically, Cuba had been generously

supported by credits, soft loans and export subsidies. Its economic

structure had been transformed, making it a mono-exporter of sugar

and agricultural products to the COMECON countries. Although not

a member of the Warsaw Pact, its military standing had benefited

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 173

enormously from special training and favourable delivery of equip-

ment and spare parts, as if Cuba were a kind of overseas Warsaw Pact

member.

The downfall of the socialist bloc was not the only catastro-

phe that struck Cuba. The United States intensified their already

damaging embargo and showed their military muscle by invading

Cuba’s strategic partner, Panama (1989). In 1990 Cuba’s ally, the

Sandinista government in Nicaragua, lost the elections. This was

at least partly due to the devastating Contra war initiated by contra-

Sandinista forces who were equipped, trained and supported by

the CIA.

Panama and Nicaragua

Panama was one of Cuba’s economic and political lifelines; Nicaragua

was Cuba’s political hope and pride, the only country boasting a suc-

cessful revolution in Latin America after Cuba. In both cases, (the

threat of) military intervention played an important role. Since the

first years of Torrijos’ government, Panama had been a precious ally:

its strategic location and its leftist-reformist government had made

the country Cuba’s diplomatic focal point for its relationships with

Central American and southern neighbours Colombia and Venezuela.

Torrijos functioned as a mediator in several cases.3 Panama had also been a transport hub for Cuba’s assistance to the left in Latin America.

After Torrijos’ death in 1981, his former security and intelligence

chief, Noriega, succeeded him as head of government. As Torrijos’

security and intelligence chief, he had maintained friendly contacts

with various intelligence organizations, ranging from the CIA and the

DEA to Cuba’s DOE and the Departamento América, not neglecting

pleasant relations with Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North (involved

in the Iran-Contra scandal), ex-Major D’Aubuisson (controlling the

death squads in El Salvador) and General Álvarez Martínez (Honduras’

strongman who was allied with the CIA and the Argentinian junta).4

He performed and returned favours for American and Cuban organ-

izations. At the request of CIA chief Casey, in 1984 he asked Fidel

under what conditions Cuba would take back some of the ‘criminals

and social misfits’ among the refugees of the Mariel boatlift (see below

in this chapter). 5 He also maintained relations with private and maybe

174 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

illicit organizations in Panama’s neighbouring countries; according to

Cuban sources he had several million dollars stashed away. 6

I never heard exactly how exactly Cuba benefited from Noriega’s

contacts and the information he channelled to Cuba’s intelligence

officers. His accomplishments were at least such that, as in the case

of Allende’s Chile and later Chávez’s Venezuela, Cuba provided him

with strong advice on his personal security and the necessity to arm

popular militias:

Noriega told me: ‘Last night I had a meeting with X or Y, tell

that to Fidel.’ On numerous occasions there were things like

that, both in Panama and Cuba […]. He was very loyal to the

revolutionary movement […]. Noriega offered limitless sup-

port to Salvadoreans, Guatemalans, to the M-19 of Colombia,

the FARC of Colombia […]. We gave him full support. We

even advised him where to store the armament, which was

done in different places. We supported him because one per-

ceived what was to come, just like what happened in Chile, the

same thing. 7

But in December 1989 an American invasion force of more than

27,000 soldiers landed for a ‘surgical operation’ against a Panamanian

army of 3,500 combatants. The official death toll after the bombard-

ment of the El Chorillo neighbourhood, where Panama’s General Staff

was established, was around five hundred; the number was probably

much higher. Cuban diplomats who left the country two weeks after

the invasion observed that the Americans had hastily flattened the

bombed house blocks of the underprivileged neighbourhood dwellers

and transformed them into an esplanade of red earth. 8

At the Cuban embassy a defence plan had been prepared as in

the case of Chile in 1973. During the night of the bombardment,

embassy personnel had transported AK rifles, machine guns and

ten rocket-launchers from Noriega’s deserted house to the embassy.

Noriega’s family members as well as the families of the staff members,

and Cuban and other Panamanian refugees, had sought protection in

the Cuban embassy and the ambassador’s residence. They were sur-

rounded by American tanks and mortars. After a dialogue between

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 175

the American and the Cuban ambassador (the American ambassador

had understood that the embassy was armed with rocket-launchers),

the tanks were withdrawn and the Cubans were permitted to evacuate

all personnel, family members and refugees.9

Already in the mid-1980s, the Sandinista government in Nicaragua

had planned defence operations against an American invasion.

Already engaged in a war against the invading Contra troops, the

General Staff was split in two: one to lead the war against the Contras

and the other to rebuff a US-led invasion:

All efforts were aimed at carrying out a war of resistance. If

there was going to be an invasion, all notion of borders would

disappear. We also let them know this: if we go into Honduras,

we will join forces with the Salvadoran guerrillas […]. The idea

was to force the gringos to enter an ant colony so that they

wouldn’t be able to just come in, strike a single blow, and take

care of business in one week like they [later] did in Panama. The

idea was that this would be a long-term situation that would go

on indefinitely – a quagmire. They would not be doing battle

with regular forces, which are at a huge disadvantage, where the

other side would enjoy complete command of the air and seas.

They would instead be forced to proceed on foot, conquering

the territory one metre at a time. The price [that they would

pay] would be very high. 10

The invasion did not materialize; but the Contra war that contin-

ued slowly exhausted and eventually shattered the patience of the

Nicaraguan electorate in February 1990.

Consequences of the Soviet implosion in Cuba

The collapse of European communism hit Cuba very hard, although it

had not come as a total surprise. When Gorbachev initiated the pere-

stroika policy of economic and political reforms in the Soviet Union,

Fidel Castro was not a warm supporter. Sometimes Granma published a polite article about the new policy, but in Cuba a similar reform discussion remained absent. Castro launched a ‘rectification of errors’

campaign, more a programme of ideological purity and unity within

176 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the party than one of liberalization. 11 Cuban–Soviet relations were becoming tense. Castro must have had a premonition of what was

going to happen. At his 26 July Commemoration speech in Santiago

de Cuba, Fidel Castro declared:

Our revolution – nobody can deny it – has maintained its

tremendous ideological strength. Why here [in Cuba]? Because

here, if the imperialism attacks us, who will defend the island?

There will be nobody to come defend our island. We will defend

our island! [applause] It is not that there isn’t anyone who wants

to defend us, but there is nobody who can do it [from outside].

Because our Socialist Revolution is not a couple of kilometres

away from the Soviet Union, but 10,000 kilometres.12

In 1988 the Soviets had suspended delivery of heavy arms to the

Nicaraguan army. Without consulting Cuba, Gorbachev negotiated the

end of the Soviet involvement in the Central American wars with Amer-

ican president Reagan. Gorbachev’s visit to Cuba in 1989 was formally

affable. Nevertheless, although a new friendship treaty was signed,

it had become clear that the huge volumes of economic and military

assistance were a thing of the past. Gorbachev had clearly given notice

that the Soviet Union, owing to its huge economic problems, could no

longer support its substantial ‘fraternal economic and military com-

mitment’ to Cuba. 13 The COMECON was disbanded in June 1991.

In September Gorbachev announced the withdrawal of all remaining

troops from the island, without prior notice to his Cuban counterparts.

The changes in the Soviet Union and eastern Europe came as a

shock for many Cubans. Even functionaries at the Central Commit-

tee, with access to information from outside, had only vague ideas

about the dissimilarities and disparities within the socialist bloc until the very end. One of them comments:

I’ve always considered myself to be an informed person. I read

[Russian journals and] the international wires […] No one here

knew of the commotion of Yeltsin in Moscow, nor did they

know what was going on in the urban black markets. All that

surprised us. Here some informed people knew that Tito was

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 177

not well seen, that Ceausescu in Romania was quite divergent.

But Honecker, Yidkov, Kadár, Andropov, Chernenko were loved

and admired in Cuba. That we had learned from our press and

our Party. We never knew about these internal conflicts […].

For me, the Komsomol was perfect. When our representatives

returned, they wrote only about [wonderful] interventions […]. We

never knew that they were defunct, that Brezhnev could not even

manage [the situation]. That was unknown to our population. 14

When Gorbachev’s domestic power was restricted, the new Russian

rulers distanced themselves even further from Cuba. Nor did it help

that the members of the attempted coup against Gorbachev in 1991

had maintained strong ties with Cuba in the past.15 It should be noted that the Russians did not abruptly halt all provisions. But between

1989 and 1991 subsidies for imported sugar were cut and the price

of oil deliveriess was adjusted to current world prices. Even before

the final collapse of the Soviet Union, Cuba’s commercial ties with

the COMECON were maintained on a cash basis. The end of the

military and economic assistance had undeniably dramatic effects on

Cuba. Fidel Castro mentioned it clearly in the fourth congress of the

Communist Party that year. Pavlov, after living in the United States in

1991, comments:

[It] was like a funeral service for the deceased benefactor of a

household, with the bereaved heir lauding the virtues of the late

provider and explaining to the family members – loudly enough

for the neighbors to hear – what they had lost. His eulogy

stressed that now they were on their own and needed help, but

charity would be accepted only on the condition that he as the

heir would be allowed to practice, as before, the religion of the

deceased and to run family affairs in accordance with his own

interpretation of that religion. 16

Cuba’s military was also hit hard by the downfall of the socialist bloc. In December 1982, Soviet Party leader Andropov explicitly notified Raúl

Castro that the Soviet Union would not defend Cuba by sending troops. 17

Subsequently, the MINFAR had created a defensive tunnel structure

178 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

and a voluminous militia system with the ‘nationwide capabilities to

revert to guerrilla warfare in the event of major military hostilities’. 18

Economic and military support by the Soviets continued on a dimin-

ishing scale after 1985, but fell dramatically by the end of 1991, when

the Soviet Union morphed into Russia. 19 Delivery of new weapons and spare parts was very difficult, and the FAR’s only way to maintain operational conditions was cannibalizing older equipment. Fuel was another

crucial shortage. When a Guatemalan army delegation visited the island

in 1996, during the reconciliation sessions with the guerrilla, the pilots were shown MiGs but the engines were not started; that was permitted

only in emergency situations. 20 Training in Russia was cancelled; intelligence hardware was restricted. Military service was reduced from three

to two years. The FAR’s personnel was officially halved; the reductions

probably went further, to one third or less of its previous strength, while

the budget was cut in half.21 A similar process occurred within the mil-

itary structures of the Ministerio del Interior (MININT, Ministry of the

Interior) and the intelligence provisions. In 1994, the special forces of the MININT, inter alia the training specialists of the Latin American

guerrilla in former decades, were dissolved.22

But the fear of a possible American invasion remained; the FAR kept

training their reserves and created its own elite units that were later

redeployed across the island. 23 The budget cuts and the lack of new equipment, spare parts and fuel considerably diminished the fighting

capacity of the FAR and the troops of the MININT. But although the

offshore offensive capacity of the Cuban military had shrunk consid-

erably, its priorities for defence and deterrence were maintained.24 But in the mind of the senior officers, the FAR always had to be prepared

to withstand a smaller or large-scale invasion. One has to bear in

mind that the Cold War in Cuba did not end in 1989 but rather in

December 2014, when the United States and Cuba announced the

re-establishment of diplomatic relations.

The ‘Special Period’

Many observers – foes like the Miami-based anti-Castro commu-

nity, the American political leadership and also friends in the Latin

American labour union, the women’s confederations and the national

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 179

friendship associations – were surprised that Cuba survived its

disastrous last decade of the twentieth century. 25 By 1992, Cuba’s purchasing power abroad had dwindled and only 19 per cent of its trade

was with the former COMECON countries. From 1989 to 1993,

Russia’s trade with Cuba dropped by 93 per cent. Even worse: the

United States tightened its embargo after the Torricelli Bill of 1992. 26

Cuba was on its own again.

The Cuban government announced a ‘Special Period in Peace-

time’, to tighten the belt, to hold out and to work towards the future

while the standard of living shrank severely. 27 Cuba’s economy and society were transformed into a spartan system of extreme austerity

and ideological tightening. Food was incredibly scarce and produced

nutritional deficiencies. The desperate shortfall of fuel nearly caused

a standstill of the public transport system. In one sad sentence, Gott28

describes the effects of the crisis between 1989 and 1993: ‘Horse-

drawn carts and carriages replaced cars and lorries; half a million

bicycles circulated in the streets of Havana, courtesy of the Chinese;

300,000 oxen replaced 30,000 Soviet tractors.’ Fuel and food pro-

vision were an absolute priority. A Programa Alimentario Nacional

(National Alimentary Programme) was quickly implemented and

Party cadres were asked to dedicate a substantial part of their free

time to voluntary construction work of hospitals and other essential

public buildings.29

The government prevented hunger and starvation by distributing

packages of essential food and clothing. Foreign tourism and joint

venture investment were promoted and a dual currency system was

introduced: the dollar (and later its Cuban equivalent, the CUC)

and the Cuban peso with which salaries were paid (at a rate of

1 CUC = 24 pesos). Joint ventures in the profitable emerging tour-

ism sector attracted direct foreign investment from Canada, Spain

and other Latin American countries. 30 A bank reform was imple-

mented, a chain of exchange (CADECA, casas de cambio) offices

was opened and foreign banks (from Spain, Canada, France and the

Netherlands) were permitted to operate. Economic reforms decen-

tralized the management in agriculture, industry and tourism. 31 In the last years of the 1990s the first timid signs of recovery were

observable. 32

180 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

A system of registered self-employment ( cuentapropismo in Spanish) and micro-enterprises (especially in the restaurant sector) was intro-

duced.33 But alongside these officially tolerated non-socialist reforms an enormous informal economy erupted, via (officially forbidden)

second and third self-employment jobs in the service sector: street

sellers, taxi drivers and domestic personnel. Part of it extended to the

illegal sector of the economy, the so-called ‘parallel market’ of home-

made rum, stolen watches and cell phones, cloned DVDs and later

also USB sticks with TV soap operas, rock and Miami-Cuban music

and dance shows. A widespread black market and part-time pros-

titution (‘ jineterismo’ in Cuban argot) flourished within the urban ambience and the growing tourist sector as well. The visiting tourists

came from Canada, Germany, Spain and other western European and

Latin American countries; Americans came to Cuba via the Canadian

route.

The first source of foreign currency was nickel, which had replaced

sugar as the principal export commodity. Another, smaller but also

important, source of hard currency was the growing ‘medical tour-

ism’ of members of the Latin American middle classes who opted

for the services of the highly revered Cuban biomedical and pharma-

ceutical services sector. Tourism and the expanding diaspora to the

United States, Canada, Spain and other Latin American countries –

where many Cuban families had brothers, sisters, cousins, children

or in-laws – produced a stream of dollar remittances; it basically ben-

efited the urban population more than the rural one, and the white

population segment more than mulato and black Cubans.34

More so than during the period of relative welfare throughout the

Soviet decades, smaller and large-scale corruption flourished: some

CUCs for immigration or police officers, a small gift before an exam-

ination, another gift for enrolment at the university, a favour for a

copy of necessary documentation, et cetera.35 The fact that a large segment of the informal economy is officially forbidden, and thus not

registered, makes it difficult to make a serious estimation of the vol-

ume of and the financial streams within this sector. The twilight zones

within the economy and the payment of ‘incentives’ in dealings with

authorities and state functionaries have become standard practices in

the present day.

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 181

The sudden reduction in relative welfare and alarming levels of

impoverishment had another effect on post-Soviet Cuba: anguish,

general misery and public disturbances in the 1990s. Cuban diplo-

mats, returning to their families between two postings, were horrified

to see their relatives and neighbours walking on the street or forming

endless queues for bread or vegetables ‘like living skeletons’. Some

burst into tears and told their family and in-laws that they preferred

to share their ordeal and starve together. ‘Don’t do it,’ they answered,

‘we only survive receiving your packages and your remittances.’

A new barter economy emerged: cigarettes became a kind of currency.

Jorge Juárez, representative of the Salvadorean guerrilla movement

Fuerzas Populares de Liberación (FPL, People’s National Liberation

Forces) in the 1980s and the 1990s, clearly remembers the changes in

the first years of the Special Period:

I have to admit that, as a representative of the FPL, I always

had certain privileges. For example, I had a special card. You

could not buy in dollar supermarkets but I had access to super-

markets with special products. But I remember how hard that

was. Sometimes you couldn’t even find a glass of water. How-

ever, the Cubans had a good policy: milk and yogurt were free

for the children, a great measure to combat the undernutrition

in that period. And there were the food packages. Cigarettes

were almost hard currency. Soy meat was introduced, a thing

the Cubans saw as something sci-fi. Rum was rationed. Shoes,

clothes and sanitary napkins disappeared; they invented some-

thing with cotton rags. Those things don’t look important, but

have a tremendous impact on everyday life. In 1988, Cuba’s

transport system was very good, efficient; [then] the entire

system collapsed.

There was a severe brain drain: teachers emigrated. It affected

the entire educational system: PhDs, philosophers, scientists,

they all went to Miami. But also at the level of primary schools

you could see the consequences. And you could discern the dif-

ferences between the children: those who have and those who

don’t have much. Inequality spread. Crime increased. Prob-

lems with drugs began to arise, especially among children of

182 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the generals, the military, the sons and daughters of the better

situated. The media didn’t publish anything about it, but it is

certain that crime and robbery increased. And another thing:

suicides seriously increased. Nothing was made public but one

who had contacts with people working in psychiatric hospitals

knew about it. Prostitution expanded as well. Was it purely

prostitution or something else or something more? With the

arrival of the tourists and foreigners, jineterismo [part-time

prostitution] increased. And at all levels: university-educated

young women, for instance. In the building where I lived, sev-

eral girls had fluctuating sexual relations with foreigners. And

not only for getting a blouse, new pants or money. Also to be

able to escape from the island. I know many cases of girls who

travelled abroad [with their new fiancés].36

The economic problems triggered the bizarre but sad third exodus

wave, after those of the elite and middle classes in the 1960s and the

Mariel boatlift in the 1980s. This time, in the mid-1990s, people left

the Havana seafront in home-made rafts in order to reach Florida; the

rafters (‘ balseros’ in Spanish) were seen off by their depressed family members. It became a daily spectacle. In August 1994 an angry crowd

assembled on the front, clashed with the police and smashed the win-

dows of nearby offices and a hotel. Fidel Castro left his office and

hastened to the disturbance. He succeeded in calming the growing

mob; his personal intervention saved the situation. When he left he

was even cheered by the protesters. I was told about this occurrence

by MININT officers in 2013; they ruefully remarked that ‘now Fidel

would have encountered more resistance’. 37

It was around this time (1993) that the Asociación de Combat-

ientes de la Revolución Cubana (Association of Combatants of the

Cuban Revolution, ACRC) was established, organizing all insur-

gency, guerrilla and military veterans with experience in warfare and

all ‘civilian internationalists’ like the participants in the medical and literacy brigades – the backbone of the old cadres. 38 In general, the role of the military, and especially the FAR officers, was expanded; 39

they became managers in the plentiful state enterprises in the existing

sugar and mining sectors, or in the new joint ventures in the tourist

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 183

industry. In the early 1970s, the FAR had created a conscript task

force to provide its own food programme. 40 Now, during the hardest years of the crisis, the FAR also deployed its regular officers to administer the National Alimentary Programme. It also provided assistance

in medical campaigns and natural disasters.

New enterprises, such as Cubanacán (tourism and hotels), Habaneros

(tobacco) and ETESCA (telecoms, a joint venture with the Italians) were

created and staffed with general officers of the FAR. Raúl appointed

his most trusted companions, such as Julio Casas Regeiro (his first

vice-minister at the MINFAR), as manager of a new industrial and

entrepreneurial complex, GAESA (Grupo de Administración Empre-

sarial), and Luis Alberto Rodríguez (his brother-in-law) as manager of

the already existing UIM (Unión de Industrias Militares). 41

A silent but constant ‘Raúlization’ took place in the economic

and political higher echelons, a process that was reinforced after

2006 when Fidel ceded the reins of government to his brother. For-

mer Rebel Army comandantes and FAR generals had always been

appointed to the cabinet; now their numbers extended into the Coun-

cil of Ministers and the Council of State. Senior officers of the FAR

were appointed at ‘civilian’ ministries – as ministers, vice-ministers or leading functionaries. In 1989 the so-called Ochoa case caused a radical change in the management and staffing at the MININT. General

Arnoldo Ochoa (a Rebel Army veteran, adviser to and participant

in several guerrilla organizations in Africa and Latin America, and

a prominent military leader in the wars in Angola and Ethiopia) and

twelve other high-ranking military officials at the MINFAR and the

MININT – even the minister of the MININT, General José Abrantes –

were found guilty of large-scale smuggling and drug trafficking; some

were executed and others condemned to extensive prison terms. Fidel

and Raúl cleansed and reorganized both ministries and placed the

absolutely trusted four-star general Abelardo (Furry) Colomé Ibarra,

an old friend and former collaborator of Che Guevara, as minister of

the MININT.42 Key functionaries at the MINFAR were transferred to the MININT and, during the years of reduction of the FAR, many

officers were relocated to the MININT. 43

The political rearrangement in the early 1990s also had conse-

quences for the Departamento América. In 1992, Piñeiro resigned as

184 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

chief after more than thirty years of leading the department and its

institutional predecessors. He retained his membership at the Central

Committee of the PCC. His successor was Arbesú, his senior vice-chief.

Piñeiro was widely known as Cuba’s spymaster, explicitly identified

with nurturing revolutions abroad. However, during the crisis years

of the Special Period it was more convenient to appoint a less out-

spoken head of this sensitive task force. Within the Departamento

América business continued as usual. Arbesú remained in charge of

the department until his retirement in 2013 and the members of this

elite unit continued to represent the political leadership of country

and party with the same dedication. But after Piñeiro’s departure the

situation was not quite the same. Piñeiro was the unconditional Fidel

loyalist, a personal friend whose opinions were highly respected by

the Comandante-en-Jefe. Arbesú was the trusted senior party offi-

cial whose well-substantiated fact-finding was appreciated by Cuba’s

political leadership; but he was not Fidel Castro’s old friend and

adviser. Piñeiro, although formally in retirement, still continued to

play a role as Fidel’s personal operative in sensitive cases, especially

with respect to Venezuela. 44 The department remained the source of excellent political information about the left, the centre and the right

in the region. 45

The first two years of the Special Period, with its economic reforms

for survival, produced a ‘liberalization atmosphere’ in matters of

culture and new ideas. New journals appeared in Cuba; the most

important journal, Temas, was one of the fifteen magazines that

appeared or reappeared. 46 The political authorities were not completely clear about the exact course of Cuba’s economy and tolerated

a certain degree of non-orthodox discussion. Nevertheless, in the

early 1990s the Party banned the circulation of Russian and Chinese

ideological journals, preventing contagious ‘misinformation’ among

the members of the FAR.47 It was the beginning of a new wave of ideological purity that looked like a mild version of the ‘ período gris’

in the 1970s. 48

In the mid-1990s an institution closely related to the Departa-

mento América – the Centro de Estudios de las Américas (Centre of

the Study of the Americas, CEA), an academically respected research

institute in Cuba and abroad with a first-class staff and a prestigious

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 185

journal and book series – was closed after an ill-fated discussion with

the Buró Político. It is not improbable that the CEA’s comparative

studies about reforms in the Latin American and Caribbean region

(plus Cuba) were the cause of offence. The director and senior staff

members were dispatched to mid-level functions in the public sec-

tor or cultural institutions; others emigrated. In the aftermath of my

interviews I asked for more details and the general consensus is that

Raúl Castro had slammed on the brakes. 49

Cuba’s foreign policy: soft power, peace-building

and civilian missions50

Over the course of several decades, the American press and mass

media portrayed Cuba as the archetypical warmonger, whose secret

service was always on the alert to nurture subversive, terrorist and

guerrilla movements worldwide, and especially in Africa and Latin

America. Interestingly enough, the Departamento América began to

get involved with peace negotiations in the late 1980s and thereaf-

ter. In Chapter 5 I mentioned the explicit efforts of Fidel Castro and Piñeiro to convince the leaders of the M-19 and the other members

of the Colombian Coordinadora Guerrillera Simón Bolívar (CGSB)

to engage in a political rather than a military solution. Piñeiro even

organized meetings between the CGSB and the Salvadorean FMLN

in order to facilitate the initial steps in formal and informal peace

dialogues. Cuba continued to play a leading role in the peace process

in Colombia and in Guatemala.51 These two countries were the last in which guerrilla movements were still fighting in the last decade of the

twentieth century. 52

Guatemala53

In fact, after the brutal years of counter-insurgency (1978–83) under

the military governments of the general-presidents Lucas García

and Ríos Montt, the guerrilla lost the war. They had retired to the

remote indigenous regions, retaining some smaller urban pockets

in the western highlands and the northern jungle. The leadership of

the URNG lived in exile in Mexico City, from where the chief com-

manders directed the war by fax and telephone. After the return to

186 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

democracy, in 1986, the guerrilla sought contact with civilian pres-

ident Cereso. Informal conversations were initiated in Costa Rica

and Spain. Cereso formed a National Reconciliation Commission

(Comisión Nacional de Recolciliación, CNR), headed by the arch-

bishop. The CNR organized peace talks in Oslo in 1990. In 1991,

newly elected president Serrano coerced the recalcitrant old guard of

the military to participate in the peace sessions. They were succeeded

by more moderate colonels and generals who wanted to end the rav-

ages of the war. From 1991 to 1996, the peace negotiations were

presided over first by the archbishop and then by a special UN envoy.

But the real breakthrough came when two key negotiators, Rodrigo

Asturias (Comandante-en-Jefe of the ORPA, URNG) and General

Julio Balconi (appointed as minister of defence in 1996), reached an

agreement about informal consultation before and after the sessions

in order to avoid friction and confrontation at the peace table. During

these informal conversations they developed a relationship of mutual

trust and rapport. In early 1993 army delegates and the guerrilla lead-

ership convened in extra-official sessions, with the silent approval of

the civilian presidents. Norway and Cuba played favourable roles as

facilitators. In March 1996, Cuba’s good offices were employed to

organize a three-day session of reconciliation between the army and

the guerrilla.54 Both Fidel and Raúl were very accommodating and after the Havana session, the URNG announced a unilateral ceasefire while Balconi dissolved and disarmed the PACs (the paramilitary

patrols). The army staff and the second-in-commands of the guer-

rilla worked out a timetable of disarmament. Between March and

December 1996, when the final peace agreements were signed, the

army ceased to attack the guerrilla encampments and disarmed the

paramilitary forces. The peace negotiations were successfully ended

after the Havana session and Cuba’s relationship with Norway on

matters of peace in Latin America would continue throughout the

larger period of the Colombian peace talks in the 1990s and 2000s.

Colombia

After the peace process, which lasted from 1989 to 1991 – when

M-19 and other guerrilla groups signed a peace agreement and were

incorporated into Colombian society – Cuba continued to act as a

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 187

peace facilitator, at the request of both the Colombian government

and the guerrilla movements FARC-EP and ELN. During the next

two decades, the Departamento América and Fidel Castro dedicated

much time to the efforts of consecutive Colombian presidents and the

changing leadership of the FARC and the ELN to reach an agreement

or to establish periods of temporary ceasefire. Castro even allowed

publication of a book55 about the repeated requests for Cuba’s good offices, with excerpts from diplomatic reports, accounts by officers of

the Departamento América, and taped conversations between Castro

and guerrilla leaders in Havana and elsewhere.

In the early 1990s, the FARC negotiated with representatives of

President César Gaviria in Venezuela and Mexico without even reach-

ing the minimum terms for an agreement. In 1998 President Pastrana

offered the FARC a demilitarized zone in El Caguán in order to initiate

new peace consultations. Previously, he had requested the good offices

of Fidel Castro through a representative of the Departamento América.

When Marulanda (for decades the principal leader of the FARC) and

Pastrana solicited Castro’s intervention, he sent Arbesú and López on

a fact-finding mission to Bogotá and Caguán. On their return with

guerrilla leaders, they had a lengthy nocturnal conversation with Fidel:

At the airport, Fidel’s private secretary informed us that the

Comandante wanted to have a discussion with us after the

formal reception. From 11 p.m. until almost 6 a.m. the fol-

lowing morning, Arbesú, Ambassador Martinez Beaton and I

spoke with the Chief of the Revolution. We were subject to a

rigorous cross-examination. He emphasized the need to avoid

errors. He didn’t understand the situation of peace talks in a

demilitarized zone while the war went on outside of this zone.

He considered it a strategic mistake that would endanger the

dialogues. He disagreed with the kidnapping of civilians and

did not understand why war prisoners hadn’t been transferred

to the authorities. He thought that it was not positive to begin

a dialogue and at the same time cause difficulties that would

be used by the enemies of the peace. With great respect for

the Colombian combatants, he explained that during his cam-

paigns in the Sierra Maestra, the politico-military strategy of

188 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

the guerrillas was to not keep prisoners of war in their power

for many days. Prisoners, he said, must be given humane and

considerate treatment; the wounded must be attended well. You

had to explain to your captured enemies the reasons for which

you were fighting. Then you would achieve two fundamental

objectives: one, to eliminate impediments of free movement for

the guerrilla, conserving food and not employing fighters as

prisoners’ guards. And two, returning former prisoners would

comment on their good treatment, and would explain the ideas

of the guerrilla. That would contradict the negative campaigns

of the military chiefs, provoking doubts and maybe sympathy

for the cause of the guerrilla. Then he reflected on the hypoth-

esis of a military triumph: How to consolidate power? And he

asked: ‘Is there nationwide support? Is there a strong political

movement behind the military operations? Is there a successful

alliance with other political parties and movements? Is there an

ongoing dialogue with entrepreneurial sectors and the military?’

And he answered his own questions: ‘If you don’t have broad

popular support, a political alliance with other national pro-

gressive sectors and a certain international support, it will be

very difficult to form a sustainable government that can maintain

power.’56

In fact, in 2001 the FARC and the government exchanged prisoners –

359 soldiers and police officers for fourteen rebels. 57 But the peace negotiations stagnated. In 2002, President Pastrana suspended the

dialogues and the war continued. When Uribe won the presidential

elections that year, the war intensified and both the FARC and the

ELN lost territorial control and saw their number of combatants

reduced. Uribe initiated a programme of mass demobilization of the

paramilitary forces and established a legal opportunity for individ-

uals to leave the guerrilla on easy terms. In 2011, around 27,500

former combatants (of which 25 per cent were reported to be deserted

guerrilleros) were enlisted in a programme of social reintegration. 58

When in 2010 President Santos was inaugurated, the FARC requested

a new round of negotiations and the new president acceded. Through

the good offices of Norway and Cuba, bilateral negotiations started

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 189

in Havana in 2012. By the end of 2015, several partial agreements

had been reached. In June 2016 the FARC and the Colombian gov-

ernment signed the crucial agreement on ceasefire and disarmament,

the last step to a final peace agreement that is expected in the second

half of 2016.

The ELN had always been a smaller guerrilla force than the FARC.

In the 1990s, the ELN – more so than the FARC – was also severely

beaten by the counter-insurgency campaigns of the paramilitaries in

their areas of operation. During the presidencies of Samper (1994–98)

and Pastrana (1998–2002) the Colombian government had also initi-

ated a series of peace dialogues. They were supported by the Catholic

episcopate, a committee of facilitators from civil society, and delegates of the UN. In January 2002 delegations of the ELN, the Colombian

government and the committee of facilitators convened in Havana.

But in May of that year, President Pastrana unilaterally suspended

the dialogue. During the term of President Uribe, the Colombian gov-

ernment tried to come to an agreement with the ELN in Mexico. The

effort failed and the parties involved came to Havana to once again

appeal to Cuba’s good offices. Arbesú and López repeatedly trav-

elled between Cuba and Colombia.59 Between 2004 and 2006, four negotiation sessions were organized, without a clear result. In early

2007 a similar session was organized in Caracas; then the negotiators

returned to Havana for a fifth round of conversations. Raúl Castro

and Colombia’s famous novelist Gabriel García Márquez were pres-

ent to announce their support. The negotiations proceeded in 2007,

2008 and 2009.60 The final result was again a failure. During the

negotiating rounds with the FARC, between 2012 and 2016, informal

ELN envoys visited Havana to put out feelers.

Cuba’s civilian internationalism

Cuba’s soft power diplomacy, which was evolving in the 1990s and

continued into the 2000s, also implied the deployment of civilian

missions. Cuba’s internationalism, which in previous decades had

been predominantly expressed by support for guerrilla movements

in Latin America and the Caribbean and large-scale military opera-

tions in Africa, had now turned into the provision of humanitarian

assistance in the form of medical and literacy teams.61 In fact, most

190 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

military missions in Africa had always been accompanied by medical

and literacy campaigns, but on a lesser scale. The most striking exam-

ple was the spontaneous after-war development assistance in Angola.

When the Cuban military contingents were due to return after their tour

of duty in Angola, the authorities asked Raúl Castro for urgent repara-

tion and reconstruction assistance. Many common soldiers and officers,

mechanics, drivers, engineers and paramedics took off their uniforms

and continued working for a couple of weeks or sometimes months as

civilian volunteers, applying their own professional experience.62

Cuba’s civilian development aid (‘internationalism’) is a consequent

effort, over five decades, to provide poor citizens in underdeveloped

or poor countries with assistance in which Cuba has leading exper-

tise: public health provision and literacy campaigns, post-disaster

reconstruction, and sport (training and facilities). According to the

statistics of the MINREX, between 1959 and 2001, around 156,000

Cuban civilians worked as ‘internationalists’ worldwide: 81,000 in

Africa, 47,000 in the Americas and 10,000 in the Middle East. In the

same period around 40,000 academic professionals, of whom 30,000

came from Africa, graduated in Cuba.63 Cuba assisted in the establishment of medical schools in Yemen (1976), Guyana (1984), Ethiopia

(1984), Guinea-Bissau (1986), Uganda (1988), Ghana (1991), Luanda

(1992), Gambia (2000), Equatorial Guinea (2000), Haiti (2001)

and Eritrea (2003).64 The first Cuban medical mission abroad was in Algeria (1963). Already by 1978, around 2,000 Cuban health

personnel worked abroad; in 1999 there were around 3,000. That

number then increased to 3,800 in 2001, 15,000 in 2003, 25,000 in

2005 and 30,000 in 2007.65 During the administration of Raúl Castro (2006–present) this number has grown and other medical initiatives

(medical schooling for foreigners, for example) has been continued

or expanded. It brought and brings Cuba an enormous amount of

prestige in the global South. 66

In October 1998, Fidel Castro launched the idea of a special medi-

cal school for Latin American students, the Escuela Latinoamericana

de Ciencias Médicas (ELAM); the new university opened its doors

in September 1999 with students from eighteen Latin American and

Caribbean countries. But in the mid-2000s it started to attract stu-

dents from other continents and, between 2010 and 2012, the annual

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 191

number of ELAM graduates was around three thousand. In 2012,

students from ninety-eight countries (with thirty-one mother tongues)

matriculated at the ELAM. The ELAM system and the study allow-

ances also expanded to other countries when, after the creation of

the ALBA alliance between Cuba and Venezuela (see below), Hugo

Chávez co-financed and co-developed the Cuban initiative. ELAM-

like medical schools were established in Bolivia, Nicaragua and

Venezuela and an undergraduate school was set up in Guyana and

Nicaragua.67 In addition to the medical-technical curriculum, the ELAM system emphasizes a professional medical ethos of dedication

to the poor and underprivileged. In January 2010, when Haiti was

hit by a severe earthquake, the ELAM staff emailed their worldwide

alumni; within seventy-two hours, around a thousand professionals

had agreed to join the Cuban medical brigades. 68

Medical brigades operated or still operate in many Latin American

and Caribbean countries, especially after natural disasters. 69 They continued to work even when, after a regime change, a new national

government was adverse to Cuba.70 In 2004, Cuba launched the programme Operación Milagro (Operation Miracle) to cure cataract and

other eye diseases, co-financed by Venezuela. It started in that country

and was extended to many other countries in Latin America and the

Caribbean, and also in Africa and Asia. According to official data

2,577,000 persons benefited from this Cuban-Venezuelan initiative

between 2004 and 2015.71

A second instrument of international assistance is that of literacy

campaigns. In Cuba, a massive literacy campaign was organized in

1960; in 1961 the island had been officially declared ‘free of illitaracy’.

Nearly one million Cubans had learned to read and write; according

to UNESCO, in 2015 Cuba was the only country in Latin America

and the Caribbean that succeeded in ‘100% education for all’. 72 On the basis of these experiences, Cuban teachers advised on, assisted

in and implemented literacy programmes in Angola and Nicaragua,

and in other assistance missions in Latin America, the Caribbean and

Africa. In 2000 the instrument was standardized in an audiovisual

programme called ‘ Yo, sí puedo’ (Yes, I can).73 In the early 2000s it was

widely implemented in Venezuela on a massive scale.74 Half a million unemployed students were incorporated into the programme as teachers

192 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

and around five hundred Cuban experts assisted in the specific design;

in 2006 the country was also declared ‘free of illitaracy’. In 2006,

within the context of Cuban and Venezuelan support to Bolivia, when

Evo Morales had initiated his first term as president, the programme

was adapted in this multinational and multilingual country. Of the

indigenous population, around forty thousand Quechua and Aymara

monolingual Bolivians benefited from the programme. Cuban and

Venezuelan teachers re-adapted the programme for a second cam-

paign during the period of assistance to Haiti in the aftermath of

the 2010 earthquake.75 Meanwhile, Cuba had implemented adapted versions of ‘Yes, I can’ in thirty countries. 76

Chávez and the ALBA

At the turn of the century, Cuba gained a formidable friend that

fortified both its economy and its internationalist aspirations. Even

before Hugo Chávez was elected president of Venezuela, he and Fidel

Castro had developed a personal and political friendship that had

matured into an enduring father–son relationship over the years.

This friendship has to be contextualized. In several interviews with

members of the Departamento América it was emphasized that Fidel

never overestimated the lasting influence of Cuba, an island in the

Caribbean with a population of ten or eleven million and a modest

economy. In his opinion, it was obvious that Cuba alone did not have

the clout to compete as a leading power with the larger economies in

Latin America. Fidel considered Cuba to be a revolutionary vanguard

nation pro tempore, always on the lookout for a substantially larger country that could take over the revolutionary baton. He had a

certain preference for Colombia or Venezuela.

At least once, Castro embarked on a serious effort to convince a

Venezuelan president to assume the leadership of the Latin American

left. In August 1988, Fidel sought an opportunity to speak in private

with Carlos Andrés Pérez, presidential candidate for a second term

at the time. After mutual consultations, on the occasion of the inau-

guration of the new president of Ecuador, Rodrigo Borja, Fidel and

Pérez met each other and Pérez invited Castro to his room. Present

were Carlos Andrés Pérez and his trusted intelligence chief, Orlando

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 193

García. Fidel was accompanied by General José Ramón Fernández,

then vice-president of the Council of State and the Council of Minis-

ters, and Carlos Antelo, minister councillor at the Cuban embassy in

Caracas. Antelo taped the session:

In the meeting with Carlos Andrés Pérez, Fidel tells him: ‘You’re

going to be the presidential candidate in Venezuela and you’ll

not only be president of Venezuela.’ Carlos Andrés Pérez

says: ‘But can I be president of Venezuela if I don’t have [the

vote of] the CEN [National Executive Committee of Acción

Democrática]?’ Then Fidel answers him: ‘You have two CEN

members in favour, that’s enough for you. You are going to be

the candidate, you will win and you will be the president.’ Even

at that time, Carlos Andrés Pérez was not yet a candidate, but

Fidel had all the information that we had sent to Cuba, and his

chances of [electoral] victory were already perceptible.

Fidel continued: ‘You’re the only one capable of leading us

all, all Latin American leaders, including me. Venezuela has the

morale, its historical tradition, its favourable economic situa-

tion, its enviable geographic position, to convene us. If you are

willing to do this, I will renounce socialism in Cuba. Even the

Miami people can return. If you will convoke the Latin American

unity, I am willing to do that. It is a single objective, all of us

confronting the Big One Here Above.’ He never mentioned the

United States, only ‘the Big One Here Above’.77

But Carlos Andrés Pérez gave only non-binding answers. After leav-

ing the room, Fidel was severely disappointed. He told Antelo: ‘I

fulfilled the historic mission.’ When Antelo returned to Caracas,

Piñeiro requested that he send him the tape and the complete tran-

scription. Piñeiro brought it to Fidel, who archived it as a historical

document.

The Cuban embassy staff had slowly developed a confidential rela-

tionship with the Venezuelan leftist military. The staff was aware of

the fact that many Venezuelan officers come from families in poor

neighbourhoods, and their nationalism is a mixture of patriotism and

vague ideas about the necessity of social reforms. Some mid-career

194 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

officers, members of a group called COMACATE (Comandantes,

Mayores, Capitanes y Tenientes; Lieutenant colonels, mayors, cap-

tains and lieutenants), were clearly conspiring against President Luis

Herrera. The instructions from Havana were: monitor the move-

ment without involvement. The contacts remained clandestine, but

its leader – Lieutenant Colonel William Izarra – visited Cuba. The

Cuban observers afterwards believed that Chávez – then a captain,

son of a shoemaker – was one of the COMACATE members. But

there were other, parallel military opposition groups in operation. 78

In 1992, Lieutenant Colonel Hugo Chávez, a lifelong devotee

of Simón Bolívar and an admirer of Latin America’s progres-

sive generals Velasco and Torrijos, staged a coup that failed. He

and his followers took control of several large cities but failed

to take Caracas. He went to prison. Until then, the functionar-

ies of the Cuban embassy did not know him personally. But from

that moment on, they were interested in him and contacted him

via mutual friends. When he was released from jail, he was twice

interviewed very discreetly, once by a Cuban diplomat and the sec-

ond time by the Cuban ambassador. Chávez, in disguise, visited

Antelo. He told his Cuban companion about a triple plan: the mil-

itary conspiracy that he never abandoned; 79 a new political party; and his candidacy in the presidential elections. While monitoring

Chávez’s public appearances, Antelo visited a rural village called La

Victoria. He stood as a bystander among the general public and

was impressed by the number of participants. But when he heard

the very religious Venezuelan villagers saying, ‘The Messiah has

come, I want to touch the Messiah,’ he was finally convinced that

the next Venezuelan president would be Hugo Chávez. 80

As a prisoner, he had already made it clear that he was interested

in visiting Cuba and meeting Fidel. Antelo reported that to Havana.

It was 1994, the year of the worst economic situation in Cuba dur-

ing the Special Period since the implosion of the Soviet Union. But

the Departamento América reacted very cautiously and let Chávez

know that ‘he had to wait for a more favourable conjuncture’.81 But

soon thereafter, Venezuelan president Caldera formally met with the

head of the Cuban American National Foundation, the most hated

Cuban exile organization in Havana with a record of attacks and

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 195

assaults. In that context, Fidel decided to invite Chávez to Havana,

in 1994. Antelo received a telephone call from Arbesú: ‘Your friend

has to come over.’ ‘And how do I do that?’ ‘Invent something.’ ‘And

who is inviting him?’ ‘I don’t know.’ It took some time to convince

Chávez to go to Cuba. Not sure of being received by Fidel, he seri-

ously doubted the wisdom of the trip. Antelo had told Chávez that he

was invited by Eusebio Leal, the Historian of Havana, to a conference

about Simón Bolívar. 82 Could he send a ticket? Arbesú answered that Cuba not even could buy him a matchbox. Chávez decided to buy the

ticket himself. 83

When Chávez landed, Fidel greeted him as if he were the head of

state. At that moment, Fidel changed the entire meeting agenda, let

him speak in the Aula Magna at the University of Havana, received

him in private and accompanied him on most of his visits in Cuba. 84

It was the beginning of a special bond: Fidel the wise old mentor,

Chávez his young revolutionary successor. Chávez, a ‘presidentiable’

candidate, would control the oil revenues of Venezuela in the 1990s

and 2000s, and had an enormous financial reservoir to spend on rev-

olutionary projects and provisions for the poor and underprivileged.

Antelo was absolutely sure of Fidel’s intention and ability to pres-

ent to Chávez the same project he had previously offered to Carlos

Andrés Pérez. 85 And maybe Pérez was also aware of it. In his memoirs he laments ‘the seduction of Chávez’: ‘As if by the magic of Latin

American politics, he has become the one and only real disciple of

Fidel Castro who sees him, thanks to the Venezuelan oil affluence,

as his successor, his continuator. He is the most educated disciple of

Fidel, no doubt about it.’86

In the 1970s Fidel had befriended progressive army leaders-

turned-presidents like Velasco and his team of military ministers in

Peru, and Torrijos and his trusted military advisers in Panama. It was

a friendship based not only on pragmatism and political convenience,

but also on shared values and interests as reform-minded soldiers.

Chávez, Torrijos and Velasco were thinking – in terms of the military

mystique – about the indivisible unity between people and the armed

forces. This unity was based on the forming of a nation, patriotism

and a ‘revolutionary calling’. Chávez, as a first-time president, empha-

sized the role of the military as vanguard of the revolutionary process

196 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

he was about to undertake. Torrijos and Velasco had expressed them-

selves in nearly the same way as Chávez:

We can say that it is like the formula of water: H O. If we

2

say that the people are the oxygen, the armed forces [are] the

hydrogen. Water doesn’t exist without hydrogen. Let’s see:

the first rebellion in 1992. Who took the initiative? The army! A

movement of the Bolivarian military youth. But later, the armed

forces as an institution came in: if it hadn’t been for the atti-

tude of the majority of the military, the process of ’98 would

have failed […]. Once the Government was installed, the army

engaged in an attitude of support.87

Fidel and many Cuban revolutionary compañeros in the insurgency

were also soldiers, who admired the characteristic soldiers’ virtues

and heroism. They had – according to various comments from func-

tionaries within the Departamento América – sometimes found it

easier to understand and engage with the progressive military than

with the civilian socialists and communists who supported Allende.

Raúl was the innate military organizer. There was no doubt that the

military mystique of the two Castro brothers had contributed to their

lifelong maxim of revolutionary unity and to the calling of the revo-

lutionary vanguard to lead the Cuban nation to its socialist destiny.

During the fifteen years of Chávez’s presidency (1999–2013),

his political trajectory and his legislation demonstrated a deepen-

ing radicalism. 88 His first years were periods of moderate centre-left

government, based on a coalition of centre and leftist parties and

movements. At the same time, he started an extended social welfare

programme and let the army build and repair roads and hospitals,

and distribute food. The new president visited regions and munici-

palities and decided on instant solutions to the dilemmas with which

he was confronted. Fidel visited him and Chávez showed him the

country; the Venezuelan president was driving and the Cuban one

was seated next to him. But Fidel also told him: ‘Chávez, you can-

not be the mayor of all of Venezuela’89 and convinced him of the

necessity for a political party and medium- and long-term social and

political programmes. Chávez organized a Constituent Assembly

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 197

and the new constitution of December 1999 considerably expanded

presidential prerogatives.

In 2001 he nationalized the country’s natural resources and brought

their exploitation under joint venture contracts with the state-owned

oil company, PDVSA. He survived a (failed) counter-coup in 2002 and

a (failed) general strike organized by heterogeneous alliances of oppos-

ing military and political leaders. Fidel provided him, as in the case of Allende in the early 1970s, with Cuban bodyguards. In later years the

Cuban and Venezuelan security and intelligence communities would

reach an agreement of mutual cooperation that inter alia permitted operations in one another’s territory.

Already in the late 1990s, on the occasion of a disastrous flood

in the coastal regions, 1,500 Cuban doctors had come to Venezuela’s

assistance; in 2003 there were more than 10,000 Cuban doctors and

paramedics working in Venezuela. 90 In 2000, Chávez and Castro cemented their relationship with a mutually beneficial agreement:

Cuban doctors, literacy trainers and educational experts went to

Venezuela and Cuba received a generous quantity of oil every day. In

the 2000s this would be expanded to 90,000 barrels per day at pref-

erential rates. The Cuban–Venezuelan covenants were periodically

extended. By 2005, Cuba had sent 30,000 doctors, dentists and par-

amedics; it promised to train 40,000 Venezuelan doctors and 5,000

medical specialists in Venezuela. In that year, by means of the Milagros

mission, 100,000 Venezuelans had already been treated in Cuba. 91 By

the late 2000s, around 40,000 Cuban teachers, literacy experts, uni-

versity professors, doctors, dentists, paramedical personnel and other

experts were employed in Venezuela. In 2013, the year of Chávez’s

death, that number increased to 50,000. During the Chávez admin-

istration and the first two years of that of his presidential successor,

Maduro, many of Venezuela’s domestic social programmes were

co-designed and staffed by Cuban civilian internationalists.

In 2004, with his continuously growing electoral successes and his

maturing position as Venezuela’s leader, Chávez – already six years

a reformist military president – began to expand his reach, empha-

sizing an anti-imperialist political path and launching his own brand

of ‘socialism of the twenty-first century’. He had become the charis-

matic leader of the Bolivarian Revolution of fundamental economic

198 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

and social changes. Always in close synchronization with Cuba, he

launched a large series of consecutive social and economic ‘missions’,

headed by trusted military and loyal civilians. It created a system of

presidential ministers and cabinet members who depended directly on

the president’s orders. This was not unlike the system of presidential

military ministers during the Velasco years in Peru. The missions were

accompanied by workers’ cooperatives, co-management initiatives,

government expropriations and worker occupations, land distri-

butions, and transfers of authority to community organizations. 92

Chávez eventually founded his own political party, the Partido Social-

ista Unido de Venezuela (PSUV, United Socialist Party of Venezuela).

In his early years as president, Chávez was strongly influenced by

the iconic and charismatic Fidel Castro. But from alumnus he had

in time graduated to partner. In 2004, Castro recognized this in his

welcome speech at the signing of the Cuban–Venezuelan agreement,

which would become known as the ALBA, the Alianza Bolivariana

para los Pueblos de Nuestra América (Bolivarian Alliance for the Peo-

ple of Our America). It is a special government alliance between Cuba

and Venezuela that would afterwards encompass various other like-

minded socialist and social-democratic governments in Latin America

and the Caribbean. Castro stated:

Hugo, you said ten years ago that you didn’t deserve the hon-

ours you were being given […]. You promised to come back one

day, with your hopes and dreams come true. You have returned

and you have returned a giant, now not only as the leader of

your people’s victorious revolutionary process but also as an

important international figure, loved, admired and respected by

many millions of people all over the world – and especially by

our people.93

Cuban and Venezuelan leaders even thought seriously about advanc-

ing into a kind of further political unification. Carlos Lage, secretary

of the Council of Ministers and vice-president of the Council of State

at the time, claimed in Venezuela in October 2005 that ‘there was

only one country with two presidents’.94 In October 2007, Chávez launched the idea of a Cuban–Venez/uelan confederation: ‘We should

The years of soft power (1990s–present) | 199

look beyond. In the near future we, Cuba and Venezuela, could

perfectly establish a confederation of republics: one confederation,

two republics in one, two countries in one.’95

But that was a bridge to nowhere. Venezuela and Cuba had

two decidedly different economies, a different political structure,

and Venezuela’s society – more than Cuba’s – was already strongly

polarized. Venezuela and Cuba opted for an extension of the ALBA

structure. After the creation of the ALBA, Chávez turned out to be its

financier. During the first years of its existence he received large-scale Cuban support for his social and economic missions. He also began

generously co-financing Cuba’s civilian internationalism abroad.

The ALBA began to incorporate other countries: Bolivia (2006),

Nicaragua (2007) and Ecuador (2009). 96 Cuba provided medical and literacy assistance and Venezuela delivered oil under concession-ary financial agreements for the discretionary use of the Bolivian,

Nicaraguan and Caribbean presidents of the member states.97 The

politics of subsidized oil delivery to friendly governments of poor

countries and cities came to be known as ‘Venezuela’s oil diplo-

macy’. 98 Fidel Castro and Hugo Chávez had like-minded political ideas about joint revolutionary projects in the region. Together they

initiated and built up the new integration movement with public

health and social improvement services that had a serious effect in

the region.

At the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century the Cuban

and Venezuelan leaderships could seriously consider socialist expan-

sion across the Caribbean, Central America and the entire South

American subcontinent.99 With the support of friendly governments in such important countries as Argentina (under the presidency of the

Kirchners, 2003–15) and Brazil (under the presidency of Lula, 2003–11)

it felt as if the social democratic and socialist left could determine the future of the entire region.

CHAPTER 7

The legacy

The Fidel–Raúl succession and the cautious reforms

Rumours about Fidel Castro’s health problems circulated over the

years. In 2004 it became public that his well-being was in decline.

After giving a TV speech before a large audience in Santa Clara, he

fell to the ground; he needed surgery and convalescence. On 26 July

2006 he barely escaped death from a severe intestinal haemorrhage.

The first surgical treatment was unsuccessful; after several emergency

operations his health was slowly restored. Meanwhile, he had tem-

porarily conceded all of his government and party positions to his

brother Raúl, who was already his deputy in most functions and was

officially designated as his successor in 1997. The only post he preserved was that of First Secretary of the Party.

Cuban TV showed a bedridden Fidel, visited by his brother and

his friend Hugo Chávez. Other Latin American friends paid a visit.

Fidel reappeared in public, albeit in a sort of semi-retirement. He

started an extensive series of ‘Reflections of Compañero Fidel’ in

Granma. In February 2008 the transfer of power was made official

by Raúl’s election as president in parliament. In 2011, Raúl also

became First Secretary and Fidel was henceforth referred to as the

‘Historical Leader of the Revolution’, rather than the ‘Comandante-

en-Jefe’. As Hoffmann justly remarked, 1 it was a change from charismatic to institutional leadership. Raúl Castro took command of

the Party and the government, explicitly announcing that he was

appointed ‘to maintain socialism’. But he also announced the need

for reforms and, referring to ‘the biological factor’, the need for a

generational shift.

At first, Raúl’s appointments seemed to indicate the contrary. He

promoted or brought back several of his old military comrades in key

The legacy | 201

positions within the Party and government. But in February 2013,

five years after his presidential election, he announced his future

retirement in 2018. As Deng Xiaping had done in China in the 1980s,

Raúl also instituted a maximum of two legislative terms of five years

each for all elected representatives and office holders, thus providing

for a political generation shift for the future. At the same time, he discharged – with full honours – some of his most trusted military friends

and civilian cadres, assigning them as advisers of the Central Com-

mittee of the Party and other key institutions. He designated Miguel

Díaz-Canel, then fifty-two years old – appointed minister of higher

education in 2009 and vice-president of the Council of Ministers in

2012 – as first vice-president of the Council of State as well. Most for-

eign observers consider this double appointment to be a pre-selection

for Raúl’s succession.

Raúl’s programme of ‘structural and conceptual reforms’ – announced

as an ‘updating of the model without abandoning socialism’ –

would be implemented ‘without alacrity but also without interruption’

(July 2007) and would result in ‘increasing inequality but in moderate

terms’.2 Some of these reforms were modernizations, related to the

following: private property titles; the possibility of selling real estate and vehicles; permission to buy or import mobile phones, smart-phones, DVDs, iPods, tablets and USB sticks; a legal increase of five

years in the pension age; the annulment of the prohibition on lodg-

ing in tourist hotels; permission to travel abroad for two years for

all citizens; the possibility of renting rooms or apartments to foreign

tourists; and the possibility of salary increases in the non-state sector.

Campaigns to tackle corruption were announced but their results were

not made public.

Some reforms are really structural, such as the possibility of

acquiring property in the agricultural sector, the possibility of con-

tracting salaried labour, and the possibility of creating small-scale

enterprises – especially in the restaurant, service and tourist sectors.

Other reforms were announced but, up to now (2016), have not yet

been implemented. In 2010, for instance, the government published

its decision to dismiss 1.3 million workers, around 20 per cent of

the national workforce. They would be relieved of their duties in the

state sector and would find self-employment ‘outside the government

202 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

sector’: in the informal economy. The government published a long

list of professions that would now be legal; it was in fact a legalization of the existing informal economy. The shock wave this announcement

produced prompted the government to postpone its implementation.

Another announced reform, the abolition of the dual currency system

and the possibility of a gradual devaluation of the CUC (a lifeline for

all Cuban households with family members abroad), was also met

with public concern; in 2016, the reform was still undergoing a

feasibility study.

The freedom to travel abroad resulted in a new, albeit silent,

migration wave between 2010 and 2015. Cubans who obtained a

passport were caught in a kind of Catch-22 situation: they could buy

an airline ticket and travel to another country, but one after another

the neighbouring countries in the region refused to provide in-flight

visas. The only country that accepted Cubans without a visa, Ecuador,

attracted so many visitors that it withdrew the possibility of temporary

residence. The outmigration during the last three years is estimated to

have encompassed 30,000 to 40,000 people per year.

In the first decade of the twenty-first century, Cuba’s economy

depended substantially on the generous Venezuelan oil deliveries and

the salary transfers of the Cuban medical and other experts resid-

ing in Venezuela. Most of these transfers were paid directly to the

Cuban state and helped the country import essential foodstuffs, med-

icine and industrial inputs.3 The economic asymmetry between Cuba and Venezuela (in 2012, the bilateral trade amounted to 21 per cent

of Cuba’s GDP and 4 per cent of Venezuela’s GDP) is balanced by

Cuba’s social and political support mechanisms: the doctors, para-

medics, teachers and other professionals who staff social missions –

the base of the Venezuelan government’s popularity. In addition,

Cuba provided and still provides (2016) high-level intelligence and

military advisers to the Venezuelan security services, who monitor

dissidence and conspiracies. Cuban military advisers support the

Presidential Guard. Intelligence and military advisers are deployed

directly in military units and serve at the Ministry of the Interior

and Justice, in military intelligence and for the Servicio Bolivariano

de Inteligencia Nacional (SBIN, National Bolivarian Intelligence

Service). In 2009 a formal Cuban military coordination group was

The legacy | 203

established. The Venezuelan armed forces altered their former US-inspired military doctrine and adapted the Cuban model of protracted warfare,

which foresees the incorporation of civilian militias in the event of an

(American) invasion.

The Cuban–Venezuelan partnership was initiated by and estab-

lished on the basis of a strong personal friendship between Presidents

Fidel Castro and Hugo Chávez. Chávez, who in October 2012 had

won the election for his third six-year presidential term, underwent

cancer surgery in Havana in December of that year. Maduro assumed

power as interim president and Chávez returned in March 2013 to

Venezuela to die in his country. The two friends, Fidel Castro and

Hugo Chávez, are now succeeded by Presidents Raúl Castro and

Nicolás Maduro. Initially it appeared that Raúl was holding back

in fully supporting the Bolivarian Revolution, but the new presiden-

tial duo quickly regained a political and personal friendship. Already

during Chávez’s last years in government and even more obviously

under Maduro’s administration, Venezuela was a house divided. Eco-

nomic malaise, galloping inflation, a sharp decrease in the world oil

price and growing opposition brought the Venezuelan economy to the

brink of a breakdown.

Under Raúl’s presidency, serious progress was made with regard

to the dialogue with the Catholic Church. A painful incident in 2010

triggered the beginning of an improving relationship between the gov-

ernment and the episcopate.4 The protest group Damas en Blanco (Women in White), spouses and female relatives of prisoners, used to

demonstrate every Sunday morning around the cathedral in Havana.

Counter-demonstrators intimidated the women and pursued the pro-

testers into the church. The hitherto very guarded episcopate thought

that ‘enough was enough’ and wrote a letter to Eusebio Leal Spengler, the Historian of Havana, also in charge of the restoration of the historical

centre of the capital and a close friend of Raúl, to request a high-level meeting. As a consequence, the Cuban president and Cardinal Jaime

Ortega y Alamino initiated a ‘dialogue on issues of mutual interest

between the Cuban state and the Catholic Church in Cuba’. After-

wards, the cardinal made several trips to Washington. This budding

relationship also permitted a much better understanding between

Cuba and the Vatican. In 2013, when the Argentinian cardinal

204 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Jorge Bergoglio – in whose ideas one can trace some affinity with

Liberation Theology – became Pope Francis, the Vatican functioned

as an intermediary between Cuba and the United States.5 It paved the way to restoring diplomatic ties and the normalization of relations

between the two countries.

Three revolutionary phases

Cuba’s relations with the rest of Latin America and the Caribbean,

especially with the left and the armed left, can be categorized into

three distinct phases: the years of revolutionary fervour (Chapter 4), the mature years of the 1970s and 1980s (Chapter 5), and the period of soft power from the 1990s to the present (Chapter 6). 6 For the

entire period, Cuba was the referential country for nearly all Latin

American revolutionary and post-revolutionary movements and insur-

gent generations. The island provided support to the Latin American

countries during the long decades of military dictatorship. It provided

shelter to the many persecuted and refugee exiles. It was always the

political and medical recovery house for thousands of wounded or

crippled guerrilla fighters and other political ‘undesirables’ in their

own countries. Cuba was always loyal to their political friends and to

those who took up weapons to struggle against colonialism and for

independence. Despite its relatively small population, Cuba’s military

participated in African liberation wars and its special forces trained

guerrilla and resistance movements in most of the Latin American and

Caribbean countries.

One special organization, the Departamento América (and its

institutional predecessors), was the vital link among all Latin American

and Caribbean revolutions and rebellions. For more than three decades

it was directed by Manuel Piñeiro, previously a guerrilla comandante

in Raúl Castro’s second Frente during the insurgency who became a

trusted friend of Fidel and Che Guevara. He turned the Departamento

into an elite force, functioning as the eyes and ears of Fidel Castro, the liaison with the armed left, and the monitoring instrument for Latin

American and Caribbean politics. The hand-picked members of this

elite group were political operators who circulated among three key

institutions: the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Ministerio de Relaciones

The legacy | 205

Externas, MINREX), the Ministry of the Interior (Ministerio del

Interior, MININT) and the Cuban Institute for Friendship with the

Peoples (Instituto Cubano de Amistad con los Pueblos, ICAP), a kind

of informal Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

In 1959, Che Guevara famously asserted that ‘Cuba does not

export revolutions, just ideas’. 7 One can, however, argue about the validity of this thesis. In the 1960s, Fidel Castro, Che Guevara and

Manuel Piñeiro were convinced of the possibility of replicating rev-

olutions by training and assisting guerrilla movements, starting from

rural guerrilla focal points ( foquismo tactics), being supported and protected by the peasant population, and creating national insurgency

movements. In fact, in many cases the rebel forces emerged as splinter

parties after secessions and split-offs – via schisms and ideological

disputes – with the existing communist parties. Cuba actively trained,

supported and sometimes even sent Cuban advisers to incipient guer-

rilla organizations in the region. Tragically, all these efforts failed. All guerrilla movements in the 1960s were overwhelmed by the police,

the army or both security forces together. Very few movements sur-

vived. At best, as in the case of Colombia and Guatemala, they had

to seek refuge in the underdeveloped rural areas, where they could

hide, or they had to go into exile in Cuba or Mexico. The dominant

Cuban ideas about guerrilla warfare in the 1960s did not withstand

the proof of practice. This was especially the case for the emphasis on

rural focos. 8 In the guerrilla wars of the 1960s, guerrilla movements were not victorious in rural environments; they could hide there and

become ‘invisible’. But time and again, regular armies defeated rural

insurgency movements, usually after barbaric counter-insurgency

campaigns. In their revolutionary praxis, many guerrilla leaders

underestimated the immense difficulties of incipient guerrilla move-

ments and, very probably, the supposed enthusiasm of the population

that was directly involved. After the Cuban Revolution, many South

American armies, such as the Bolivian, Brazilian, Colombian and

Peruvian armed forces, received advanced intelligence and counter-in-

surgency training through US military support programmes. They

were also capable of mobilizing large paramilitary auxiliary forces.

The theoretician of the foquismo approach, Che Guevara, was

murdered after being captured by the Bolivian military. With the

206 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

wisdom of hindsight, one can seriously doubt the good sense of the

‘export model’ of foreign – in this case, Cuban – guerrilleros to the Congo and to Bolivia. But no one can question Guevara’s courage

and heroism. As Ramiro Alarcón, number three in Cuba’s political

hierarchy until 2013, rightly commented: ‘I do not know how many

ministers or cabinet members voluntarily left their posts to “go to the

mountains”, to become guerrillero.’9 The Cuban OSPAAAL cultivates his political legacy. 10

In the 1970s and 1980s, Cuba’s military role was mainly focused on

Africa. When Cuba sent in revolutionary assistance, it was through

strong army detachments and thousands of civilian internationalists.

A new kind of leftist government emerged in Latin America and the

Caribbean: progressive, reform-minded military regimes and elected

governments of a socialist signature. A more moderate Cuba made

alliances with all new leftist authorities. In Latin America, Cuba

sought and found relationships with progressive reform-minded mil-

itary governments in Peru, Panama, Bolivia and Ecuador. It heavily

supported the elected socialist government of President Allende in

Chile. It sustained its support to rebellious movements and guerrilla

movements struggling against the many military dictatorships in the

region. It tried to unify the emerging rebel movements against the mil-

itary regimes. In the case of Chile, it also actively supported a civilian coalition against the Pinochet regime. Cuba’s support to the Central

American guerrilla was long-standing and significant. Training and

assistance were professionalized; the emphasis on forging organiza-

tional unity and on military operations grew. Many rebel leaders and

cadres were trained on the island. They all observed and studied the

course of the Cuban insurgency and the Cuban Revolution. Support

from the local population and especially from the student movements,

trade unions and peasant associations became a priority in discussions

with the visiting guerrilla leadership.

In the 1970s and 1980s, Cuba consistently tried to unify guerrilla

movements under umbrella organizations like the Coordinadora

Guerrillera Simón Bolívar (CGSB) in Colombia, the Frente Sandinista

de Liberación Nacional (FSLN) in Nicaragua, the Frente Farabundo

Martí para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN) in El Salvador and the

Unión Revolucionaria Nacional Guatemalteca (URNG) in Guatemala.

The legacy | 207

This marks a difference in comparison with the 1960s, when the

Cubans trained a number of small guerrilla organizations in the same

country, sometimes competing with one another. Even more than in

the 1960s, Cuba functioned as a kind of general medical recovery

centre for all injured guerrilleros or members of the Latin American and Caribbean left. In all cases, Cuba was very generous with medical

assistance. It was probably the most altruistic Cuban contribution to

the Latin American revolutionary generations.

After the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the dissolution

of the COMECON, many of Cuba’s military or related facilities

that supported the existing guerrilla movements were considerably

reduced. During the Special Period, Cuba survived at great social cost,

but it never ceased to provide medical assistance to the poor and dis-

advantaged. On the contrary, in this period Cuba expanded its soft

power by sending medical brigades to poor regions in Latin America, the

Caribbean and Africa. It also provided emergency assistance in the

case of natural disasters and its literacy experts and teaching person-

nel went on internationalist ‘civilian missions’. Direct support to the

guerrilla was replaced by networks of mutual support among friendly

governments. In terms of internationalism, civilian cooperation (i.e.

medical brigades, literacy teams) replaced former explicit support for

revolutionary organizations. Cuba found a strong ally in Chávez’s

Venezuela, whose government announced a far-reaching reform and

subsidy programme of ‘socialism of the twenty-first century’. Cuba

and Venezuela founded an international structure of friendly countries

with the same ideological preferences: the ALBA group of countries.

After 2000 the two leading countries cooperated in developing and

financing medical and literacy campaigns in many Latin American,

Caribbean and African countries.

At the turn of the century, the Departamento América was charged

with deepening relations with friendly and adverse governments,

maintaining contacts with social movements of all kinds, represent-

ing the Party, and assisting in peace negotiations. It was substantially

involved in the peace agreements in Guatemala and Colombia. As

in the previous two phases, its functionaries remained well informed

about the actions of domestic political actors. It also functioned as the PCC’s liaison with the ALBA countries and the leftist governments of

208 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Argentina, Brazil, El Salvador, Paraguay and Uruguay.11 In Ecuador it tried to convince the indigenous movements to support President

Correa. It did not succeed, although Cabrera – a highly appreciated

representative – was invited to be the padrino (most important guest and benefactor) of the yearly festivities of the Confederación Nacional

de Comunidades Indígenas Ecuatorianas (CONAIE, National Con-

federation of the Ecuadorean Indigenous Communities), an honour

envied by all national politicians. 12 It also helped that the presidents of Brazil (Lula, Dilma), Bolivia (Morales), El Salvador (Sánchez Cerén),

Nicaragua (Daniel Ortega) and Venezuela (Chávez, Maduro) had all

been involved in Cuban friendships over several decades.

What remains?

Comparing Cuba with countries in the region with a similar popula-

tion size, one can easily detect the enormous differences in terms of

political significance and status. Cuba has a population of 11 million

(2016). There are demographically comparable nations in the region.13

But Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua were

war-torn societies for most of the second half of the twentieth century

and still suffer from the consequences of those wars. Regime instabil-

ity was a characteristic of those countries for decades. The economy

of the Dominican Republic is that of a resort island, highly dependent

on American tourism and the American economy. Jamaica also is a

resort country, but it is as well a state widely known for its drugs and

extreme violence. Puerto Rico is an American dominion.

In comparison, Cuba is a country with high political significance

and a reputable history as a revolutionary and influential power-

house, and an indestructible reputation as development donor for

the poor and the underprivileged. In strictly geopolitical terms, it is a crucial country in the Greater Caribbean. With its strategic position

in the Gulf of Mexico, and its short distance from the United States

(Florida, 90 miles), Mexico (Yucatán, 120 miles), Haiti (50 miles) and

Jamaica (90 miles), it is without a doubt the most important country

in the Caribbean. 14 Furthermore, since January 1959 Cuba has been a country with a stable regime for nearly sixty years. It removed a dictator whose rule was strongly supported by the United States. It opted

The legacy | 209

for its own revolutionary trajectory and it defied all American efforts

to topple its government, to obliterate its economy and to invade the

island by force. In spite of efforts by the hegemonic United States,

Cuba encouraged and assisted emerging movements and governments

of the left in the western hemisphere.

Cuba supported guerrilla movements in nearly all countries of the

Latin American and Caribbean region and it assisted leftist move-

ments and governments wherever they were to be found. Initially,

the Cubans basically advised and trained small guerrilla movements,

many of them headed by urban intellectuals, student leaders or

ex-members of the existing communist parties, and in some countries

also ex-members of the armed forces. It took them time to understand

the idiosyncrasies of the indigenous population, its uses and customs,

its religious codes and languages. The Cubans were not the only ones

who had to learn to understand the complex social and moral fibre

of the descendants of the pre-Iberian peoples. Also, the first genera-

tion of guerrilla leaders who sought to emancipate and liberate the

poor and neglected had enormous difficulties in understanding and

liaising as equals with the non-Spanish-speaking ethnicities. And this

was one of the reasons why the military – always recruiting from the

indigenous population and at least used to respecting the traditional

indigenous order – relatively easily crushed the emerging guerrilla

movements in the Andean countries and in Central America during

the 1960s and part of the 1970s. It is also one of the reasons why the

Nicaraguan Revolution met armed resistance from the ‘indigenous

minorities’ on the Atlantic coast. In fact, in the early years of the

twenty-first century, when Bolivia’s president Evo Morales created

constitutional space for a multi-ethnic and multinational country, the

Latin American left took explicit interest in the ‘indigenous question’

as a national priority of the highest importance. With respect to the

Cuban international cooperation, it has to be mentioned that the

Cuban and afterwards Cuban-Venezuelan literacy programmes – ‘ Yo,

sí puedo’ – are the first in the world that were developed in the native languages of Latin America (Aymara, Quechua) and of Africa.

But having learned the lessons from failures and convinced of the

necessity of unity, the Departamento América explicitly and contin-

uously tried to forge unitary guerrilla organizations in Argentina,

210 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Colombia, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua. Only

in Mexico (where the Mexican government guaranteed unhindered

diplomatic and other facilities) and after the 1960s in Peru (the

Cubans detested the murderous Shining Path guerrilla that terrorized

the country in the 1980s and the early 1990s) did the Cubans abstain

from support for existing guerrilla movements.

Cuba acquired and maintained an enduring reputation as a revolu-

tionary stronghold in two continents: Africa and Latin America. For

decades it was one of the leading countries in the NO-AL movement,

a political partner equal in importance to India, China, Indonesia and

Egypt. It fought (and won) a proxy war in Angola, against armed

movements that were supported by the United States and China. In

Latin America and the Caribbean, no country remained unaffected

by Cuba’s aspirations. During the twenty-five-year period of military

dictatorships in the region, the island was the safe haven and shelter

for political exiles and refugees.

Economically, Cuba depended heavily on subsidies, donations and

financial and technical support from the USSR for three decades.

During these thirty years, Fidel Castro and his brother Raúl were

depicted as lackeys of the USSR. Nevertheless, Chapters 4, 5 and 6

demonstrate that Cuba always acted according to its own vision and

followed its own call of duty. And then there is the fact that the Cuban

leadership maintained its socialist trajectory more than twenty-five

years after the implosion of the Soviet Union. Cuba remained a social-

ist country with regional and international ambitions, this time not

through armed force but through soft power; it sent medical brigades,

paramedic personnel, teachers and literacy experts to countries in Latin

America and Africa. Even in strict technical terms, Cuba’s development

aid is non-political, efficient, directly targeted at poor people, and based on the country’s decades-long experience in organizing instant help.

Discussion

Very probably, the Cuban government is opting for a sustained model

of a one-party regime, maybe comparable with those of Vietnam or

China, while reforming the national economy. That means governing

through the PCC as the vanguard party preserving strong ties with

The legacy | 211

the armed forces and the public sector. It also means transforming

the vital and significant economic sectors in terms of infrastructure,

know-how, technology and management via joint ventures with for-

eign (European, American, Russian, Chinese and Latin American)

capital while gradually expanding micro, small and medium-sized

national private enterprises. At the same time Cuba’s explicit policy

is to maintain the benefits of the country’s socialist system: free and

accessible education and public health, elementary provisions for all

and public security ensuring a basically crime-free society, the four

basic differences that distinguish Cuba from all other Latin American

and Caribbean nations.

At the same time, at present (2016) Cuba faces a future with

conflicting perspectives. First, the necessary generational shift of the

Cuban leadership, due to the ageing generation of old revolutionaries.

The members of this generation are reaching the last phase of their

lives. Nearly all were born in the late 1920s, 1930s and 1940s. At

present they are elderly or very old. Fidel Castro, born on 13 August

1926, is ninety years old; his brother and successor (Raúl was born

on 3 June 1931) eighty-five. They belong to the oldest of their gener-

ation; the youngest are surpassing the ripe age of seventy. Nearly all

are retired, with the exception of a few elected office holders, cabi-

net members, ministers and vice-ministers. Fidel was, and still is, the

charismatic and legendary historical leader; most Cubans were born

while he was the Comandante-en-Jefe. Raúl is less charismatic but has

the same legitimate revolutionary birthright as his brother; a more

pragmatic person, he was also the brilliant organizer of the Cuban

armed forces. But in 2018, who will be invested with the revolution-

ary legacy? The younger guard of Party leaders and cabinet members,

as well as the chosen representatives in Party and parliament, appear

in public as capable administrators and cautious civil servants rather

than popular leaders who will galvanize the nation about the state of

the revolution.

Secondly, all this is happening at the time of a certain rapproche-

ment with the United States, after decades of open confrontation. Both

countries have maintained diplomatic relations since July 2015. But

there are two controversial issues that stand in the way of a further

entente: the revoking of the still-continuing embargo and the transfer

212 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

of Guantánamo. The situation is delicate because improved relations

with its mighty northern neighbour are a necessity for Cuba’s economy

and trade possibilities. Its economy is in transition, its standing in terms of solvency is improving and the uninterrupted and contininuous

stream of remittances from family members of the Cuban-American

diaspora is an essential source of family income in urban Cuba. How-

ever, it was the United States that during the Cold War and thereafter

explicitly tried to tear down reform-minded regimes. Sometimes it

reached a form of peaceful coexistence, as in the case of Velasco’s Peru

and Torrijos’ Panama in the 1960s. However, in the case of Guatemala

in the 1950s, the Dominican Republic in the 1960s (twice), Chile in

the 1970s, Grenada and Panama in the 1980s, it successfully assisted in

coups or organized invasions. In the case of Sandinista Nicaragua

in the 1980s it preferred covert operations damaging vital (harbour)

infrastructure and it trained and financed counter-insurgency groups

in Honduras, Costa Rica and on the Atlantic coast that resulted in a

bloody civil war, the Contra war. In the case of Cuba it tried to wreck

its economic development though covert actions and a trade embargo

that endures to the present. In the case of Venezuela it played an

ambiguous role in the coup against elected president Chávez. It also

implemented a series of sanctions against the Venezuelan oil conglom-

erate PDVSA. 15 There is a sound reason for continuing suspicion and

distrust of the most formidable military power in the world, which in

the last fifty years nearly always reacted with hostility to progressive

regimes in the western hemisphere.

Thirdly, the years 2015–16 did not favour Cuba and the countries

that maintained close relations with the Cuban Revolution. During

the last ten years, Cuba could count on the sympathy of the presidents

of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Peru

and Venezuela, and in general of heads of government and states in

the Caribbean. But in 2015, after elections in Argentina, a president

of the right came to power, as in Peru in July 2016. The presidents

of Bolivia and Ecuador will not opt for a new presidential term. And

in May 2016 Brazilian president Rousseff left the presidential palace

after an impeachment procedure; the new government follows a neo-

liberal route. Because of the economic difficulties in Venezuela, Cuba

has recently been confronted with a substantial reduction in the oil

The legacy | 213

deliveries from its most loyal partner country.16 It means, at least in the near future, tightening the belt in many Cuban households. That

is the short-time perspective.

The long-time assessment, however, is very different. But when all

is said and done, Cuba’s legacy to the region is extraordinary. Cuba

did and does matter, in the region and in the Third World. It the

twentieth century, it decisively influenced the national political arena

in many African, Latin American and Caribbean countries. During

the decades of the military dictatorship in the western hemishpere

it was a safe haven for refugees of the left, the centre and the right.

The restoration of elected governments in the entire region is, at least

partially, due to Cuba’s assistance and support for those who fought

against tyranny and dictatorship. In the twenty-first century, Cuba,

despite its economic difficulties, acted and acts as a generous inter-

national donor with medical and literacy missions, in which it has

enormous experience. It notably contributed to the peace processes

in Central America and Colombia, more than the United States. The

very presence of democratic centre-left and leftist governments in

Latin America is at least part of the heritage of the Cuban Revolution.

The Cubans kept the flame of resistance burning through decades of

dictatorial persecution and civil wars in the region. Most governments

in Latin America and the Caribbean cannot say the same.

APPENDIX: BIOGRAPHICAL DATA OF

INTERVIEWEES

Abreu, Ramiro. Born in 1942, sociologist, PhD in History, MINREX, combatant Bay of Pigs and Angola, Departamento América (section head Central America) for 35 years, member Central Committee PCC, interviews 23 March, 19 and 25

October 2011 and 22 February 2015.

Aguilar, Graciela. Born in 1936, M 26-7, functionary MINFAR and Ministry of Labour, interview 23 March 2011.

Alvarado, Percy. Born in 1949, Guatemalan-Cuban, political scientist, double agent DSE, retired as colonel MININT, interview 7 February 2012.

Álvarez, (Consuelo)Elba. Born in 1942, Socialist Youth and 1st Frente Rebel Army, director documentaries ICRT and ICAIC, interview 30 March 2011.

Amát, Carlos. Born in 1930, † 2014, M 26-7, attorney general, rector of the Universidad del Oriente, minister of justice, ambassador to Canada and Switzerland, DG Latin America MINREX, interview 25 May 2011.

Antelo, Carlos. Born in 1943, combatant ‘war against bandits’, Departamento América, diplomat with postings in Colombia, the United States and Venezuela, interviews 24 and 27 October 2011.

Aranguren Echeverría, Emilio. Born in 1950, studied for priesthood in Havana, in 1991 auxiliary bishop in Santa Clara, bishop of Cienfuegos in 1995, in 2005

bishop of Holguín, also in charge of the Human Rights Commission. Between 2007 and 2011 member of the presidency of the CELAM, interview 4 August

2010.

Arce, Reinerio. Born in 1951, sociologist and psychologist, professor University of Matanzas, secretary general MEC, member executive committee FUMEC,

president Consejo de Iglesias de Cuba and rector Presbyterian Seminary of Matanzas, interview 13 February 2012.

Balconi, Julio. Born in 1946, Guatemalan, general and peace negotiator (1991–96), minister of defence Guatemala (1996), interview 15 April 2010

(Guatemala City).

Bell Lara, José. Born in 1939, professor of development studies FLACSO, University of Havana, interview 23 September 2011.

Bernal, Joaquín. Born in 1940, labour union leader, Socialist Youth, leader CTC, labour movement training in Moscow, deputy member Central Com-

216 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

mittee, Secretary of International Relations CTC and coordinator CPUSTAL, interview 31 July 2012.

Buajasán, José. Born in 1937, M 26-7, DIER, DSE, retired as a colonel MININT, interview 31 March 2011.

Cabrera, Alberto. Born in 1949, militia member Bay of Pigs, DGLN, Departamento América with postings in Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Uruguay, Venezuela and ICAP, interview14 February 2012.

Carcaño, Dora. Born in 1935, Spanish-Cuban, Socialist Youth, women’s section, secretary general of FMC, head regional office FEDIM, member Central Committee PCC, interview 6 February 2012.

Cárdenas, Osvaldo. Born in 1943, M 26-7, sociologist, DIER, VMT, DGLN, Departamento América (section head Caribbean), ambassador to Surinam, lives in Jamaica, interview 18 January 2012 (Havana).

Carmona, Héctor. Born in 1935, M 26-7, Fidel Castro’s personal helicopter pilot, combatant Angola, retired as lieutenant colonel FAR, interview 6 October 2011.

Castañeda, Humberto. M 26-7, combatant 2nd Frente Rebel Army, political scientist, MINREX and posting in German Democratic Republic, VMT, DGLN,

Departamento América, postings in Barbados, Guyana, Honduras and Guatemala, interview 8 November 2012.

Castellanos, Alberto. Born in 1933, M 26-7, lieutenant Rebel Army, bodyguard Che Guevara, participant of guerrilla Massetti in Bolivia and Argentina, captured and amnestied in Argentina, MINFAR, adviser in Nicaragua, retired as colonel FAR, interview 27 February 2012.

Celis, Luis Eduardo. Colombian, former member ELN Colombia, deputy director Corporación Nuevo Arco Iris Bogotá, interviews 13, 14 and 15 December 2012

(Havana), and 19 February 2013 (Bogotá).

Cervantes Padilla, Sergio. Born 1937, FAR, adviser guerrilla Guinea-Bissau, combatant Angola, Departamento América (Brazilian section) and several long postings in Brazil over 34 years, interview 10 February 2012.

Cervantes Vásquez, Lourdes. Born in 1961. Graduated at the ISRI in 1984, afterwards a functionary of the OSPAAAL, from 2012 secretary general, interview 19

November 2012.

Collazo, Ariel. Born in 1929, Uruguayan, MP, leader MRO, guerrilla training in Cuba, interview 10 November 2011 (Montevideo).

Cuza, José Luis. Born in 1940, M 26-7 and captain of the Rebel Army, FAR, retired as rear admiral, interview 11 October 2011.

Del Valle, Amador. Born in 1935, M 26-7, combatant Angola, retired as vice-minister of transport, interview 7 October 2011.

Díaz Vallina, (Ángela) Elvira. Born in 1933, M 26-7 and president of FEU, Director General Public Health MINSAP, interview 4 March 2011.

Escalante, Fabio. Born in 1940, Socialist Youth, arrested and tortured during insurgency, DIER, director DSE, chief adviser MINTER (Nicaragua), director Political Directorate MININT, interview 21 December 2011.

Estrada Lescaille, Ulises [Dámaso Lescaille]. Born in 1934, † 2014. M 26-7, combatant Rebel Army, G-2, combatant ‘war against bandits’, VMT, assisted Palestine Liberation Front and guerrilla Guinea-Bissau, Guinea and Cape Verde, assisted Che Guevara in Africa and Bolivia, DGI, vice-chief Departamento América,

Appendix | 217

MINREX, ambassador to Yemen, Algeria, Jamaica, Mauritania, DG Africa and

Middle East and vice-minister MINREX, interviews 21 and 28 October 2011

Fernández Rueda, Carmen. Born in 1922, M 26-7, inspector education Pinar del Rio, PCC member, interview 4 April 2011 (sister of Laura Fernández Rueda).

Fernández Rueda, Laura. Born in 1918, M 26-7, UNO functionary, did not want to be a PCC member, interview 4 April 2011 (sister of Carmen Fernández Rueda).

Figueroa, Maria Antonia. Born in 1918, first treasurer M 26-7 in Oriente, super-intendent educational system Havana, interview 18 March 2011.

Flores, Enrique. Colombian, comandante PTR and peace negotiator 1989–90, interview 20 February 2013 (Bogotá).

García, Jorge. Colombian, member urban community command M-19, community consultant Bogotá, interview 13 February 2013 (Bogotá).

García-Perez, Gladys [Marel]. Born in 1937, co-leader of sabotage cell M 26-7, organizer female militia Havana, diplomat and historian, interviews 4 and 5

October 2011.

Gómez, Ricardo. Born in 1933, M 26-7, official ministry of education, PCC

member after many difficulties, interview 27 September 2011.

González, Maritza. Born in 1976, UJC, PCC, physician-histologist, professor and vice-rector ELAM, interview 9 November 2012.

Graña, Manuel. Born in 1937, DR and M 26-7, arrested and tortured during insurgency, captain of the Milicias, member of the Economic Commission of the Central Committee of the PPC, chair endowed by the Asociación de Combatientes in Havana, interviews 21 and 26 September 2011.

Guerra, Ángel. Born in 1937, M 26-7, member of the National Bureau UJC, director journal Juventud Rebelde, director journal Bohemia, interview 21 December 2011.

Hernández, Norberto. Born in 1940, M 26-7, VMT, ‘friend of the president’

Panama, vice-chief Departamento América, MINREX, ambassador to Nicaragua

and Venezuela (twice), retired as vice-minister of culture, interviews 19 and 25 October 2011.

Ibarra, Jorge. Born in 1931, DR, FAR, distinguished professor of history University of Havana, interview 7 March 2011.

Joa, Jorge Luis. Born in 1941, M 26-7, combatant 3th Frente Rebel Army, MINREX, VMT, DGI, DGLN, Departamento América (section head) and posting in

Mexico, interview 27 October 2011.

Juárez Ávila, Jorge. Salvadorean, combatant FPL, twice wounded and sent to Cuba for medical treatment and recovery, representative FLP in Cuba, professor of history at Universidad de El Salvador, interview 15 July 2015 (San Salvador).

Krämer, Raimund. Born in 1952, German, former functionary of the German Democratic Republic with postings in Nicaragua and Cuba, professor Uni-versität Potsdam, interview 12 April 2010 (Potsdam).

Labrada Rosabal, Javier. Born in 1968, PhD in education, professor University of Physical Culture and Sport ‘Manuel Fajardo’, organizer literacy programmes in Bolivia, Haiti and Venezuela, interview 8 November 2012.

Lagos, Fedora. Chilean-Cuban, military engineer and communications officer FAR, with FSLN and FMLN in 1980s, former member PCCh and member PCC, manager

telecom enterprises in Cuba and Venezuela, interview 7 February 2012.

Llibre, Antonio. Born in 1933, M 26-7 and captain of the Rebel Army, 1st Frente, and aide to Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, MINREX, minister councillor

218 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Algeria, ambassador several European countries and delegation member to the COMECON, interviews 6 and 10 March 2011.

López Campos, Julio. Born in 1946, Nicaraguan, chief of the Sandinista Department of International Relations during 1980s, interview 2 June 2011 (Managua).

López Rodriguez, José Antonio. Born in 1942, M 26-7 and combatant Rebel Army, sociologist, MININT, Departamento América, diplomat with postings in Argentina, Colombia, El Salvador, German Democratic Republic and Nicaragua, interviews 8 and 10 March, 18 October 2011 and 1 December 2012.

Márquez, Roberto Rafael. Born in 1940, M 26-7, retired as colonel MININT, interview 6 July 2011.

Martínez Heredia, Fernando. Born in 1939, M 26-7, PhD philosophy, director department of philosophy University of Havana, director journal Pensamiento Crítico, Departamento América with posting in Nicaragua, staff member CEA, director general ICIC, interview 2 March 2012.

Mazola, Giraldo. Born in 1937, FEU and M 26-7, head department foreign relations M 26-7, founding president ICAP, vice-minister MINREX, ambassador to Algeria, Chile and Nicaragua.

Mora, Lázaro. Born in 1938, DR, vice-president FEU, MINREX (director NO-AL, director international organizations, Director General Latin America and Caribbean), ambassador to Zaire (Congo), Nigeria and Panama, interviews 8, 9 and 10

February 2012.

Morejón, Luis. Born in 1943, M 26-7, MINREX with posting in Moscow, director Latin America and afterwards vice-president ICAP, manager tourism, interview 1

March 2012.

Moreno, José Luis. Born in 1950, † 2015, physician specializing in traumatol-ogy, member of the first medical brigade in July 1979 in Managua, interview 5

December 2011.

Muro, Yolandra. Born in 1976, physician, FEU, member of parliament, chief medical mission Guatemala during Hurricane Mitch, vice-rector ELAM, Director General Primary Healthcare MINSAP, interview 9 November 2012.

Pérez, Niurka. Professor of sociology University of Havana, agricultural specialist, interview 9 October 2011.

Piedra, Carlos. Born in 1937, Presbyterian pastor, secretary general MEC, member executive committee FUMEC, member PCC, interview 21 November 2012.

Plazas, Nelson. Colombian, leader EPL, senior member NGO Fundación Cultura Democrática (FCD), interview 11 February 2013 (Bogotá).

Ravelo, Fernando. Born in 1937, M 26-7 and captain 2nd Frente Rebel Army, vice-chief AJR, VMT, DGI, DGLN, vice-chief Departamento América, ambassador Nicaragua, vice-president Biblioteca Nacional, interview 17 October 2011.

Regalado, Roberto. Studied in Moscow, DGLN, MINREX with postings in United States and Nicaragua, professor western hemispheric studies University of Havana, editor Ocean Press, interview 24 October 2011.

Rojas, Luis. Born in 1952, Communist Youth Chile, Chilean-Cuban artillery officer FAR, Frente Sur Nicaragua and FSLN, co-founder and representative of FPMR in Cuba, lives in Chile, interview 20 January 2012 (Havana).

Rosada-Granados, Héctor. Guatemalan, sociologist and anthropologist, peace negotiator (1993–96), interview 14 April 2010 (Guatemala City).

Appendix | 219

Terry, Héctor José. Born in 1937, FEU and DR, retired as vice-minister of public healthcare MINSAP, interview 2 September 2011.

Vargas, Alejo. Colombian, comandante ELN, professor of political science and vice-dean Faculty of Law and Political Science, Universidad Nacional, adviser ELN negotiations in Cuba 2006–08, interview 15 December 2011 (Bogotá).

Vázquez, Mario. Salvadorean, combatant Resistencia Nacional (National Resistance), professor of history UMAM, interview 3 September 2015 (Mexico City).

Villaraga, Álvaro. Colombian, leader EPL, senior member NGO Fundación Cultura Democrática (FCD) and director Dirección de Acuerdos de la Verdad (DAV) del Centro de Memoria Histórica, interview 11 February 2013 (Bogotá).

Villamizar, Darío. Colombian, former member EPL and M-19, functionary UNDP, historian of the M-19, interview 21 February 2013 (Bogotá).

NOTES

Chapter 1: Revolutionaries

1 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (18 January 2012).

2 Melba Hernández and Haydée Santamaría participated in the assault on the Moncada barracks in 1953, the very beginning of the armed resistance of

the M 26-7 movement. Vilma Espín and Celia Sánchez participated in the

guerrilla activities in Sierra Maestra; Celia was a member of the general staff of the Ejército Rebelde (Rebel Army). Vilma Espín, once a graduate student at MIT and chief of the M 26-7 in the eastern region during the insurgency years, became president of the Federación de Mujeres Cubanas (FMC, Federation of Cuban Woman) in 1959. Celia Sánchez, the liaison between the Llano movement and the guerrilla forces in the sierra during the insurgency years, became the secretary of the Consejo de Ministros in 1961. Haydée Santamaría was the founding director of Casa de las Américas. Melba Hernández was the secretary general of OSPAAAL, the Organización de Solidaridad de los Pueblos de África, Asia y América Latina. Vilma had a close relationship with Raúl, Celia with Fidel, and Haydée with Armando Hart, Cuba’s minister of education

and afterwards of culture. Aleida March, Che Guevara’s widow, had been a

guerrilla member; she also published an autobiography (March 2011). Recent biographies of Vilma Espín and Haydée Santamaría were published in 2015

(Ferrer and Aguilar 2015 and Randall 2015).

3 Its successor organization is integrated into the International Relations Department (Departamento de Relaciones Internacionales) of the Central

Committee of the PCC.

4 A shorter version of these interviews is published in Bell Lara et al. (2015).

5 A shorter version of these interviews is published in Suárez Salazar and Kruijt (2015).

6 I anonymized one interviewee as ‘Diplomat A’. This taped interview was withdrawn after transcription and I can only use the information as background or as small quotes by an unrecognizable person.

7 Kruijt (2008).

8 See Hart (1997), Oltuski’s (2000, 2002) memoirs and especially Sweig’s (2002) brilliant analysis. These publications contribute to a reassessment of the importance of the Llano rebellion. Sweig’s analysis is the most detailed

Notes to Chapters 1 and 2 | 221

study hitherto; she analyses the insurgency period through the confidential correspondence between the key members of the political leadership of the M 26-7. Fidel Castro’s military memoirs (2010a, 2010b) were published after handing over the presidency to his brother Raúl. A recent biography of Raúl Castro has been published by Klepak (2012). The four biographies about Che Guevara that I found most useful are those of Anderson (1977), Castañeda

(1997), James (2001 [1969]) and Taibo II (2007). Gálvez (1979) wrote a biography of Camilo Cienfuegos; Del Valle Jiménez (2009) published his war diary on Cienfuegos’s campaign, which he wrote on commission from Camilo.

Chapter 2: Historical context

1 Interview with Antonio Llibre Artigas (11 and 15 March 2011).

2 Zanetti (2013: 40).

3 Gott (2004: 44).

4 Data quoted in Gott (2004: 20) for 1544, in Ibarra Cuesta (1985 [1967]: 45) for the period from 1608 to 1700.

5 Here I follow Zanetti (2013: 54–65).

6 Louisiana was bought from France in 1803 by President Jefferson for 15 million dollars. In 1810, West Florida was declared independent from Spain by President Madison. East Florida followed in 1819, under President Monroe. In

1842, under President Tyler, the United States and Great Britain came to an agreement about the border with Canada. Under President Polk, Texas was

annexed in 1845 and Oregon in 1846. After the Mexican-American War

(1846–48) Mexico ceded other territories; the USA paid 15 million dollars.

A new Mexican land strip, part of New Mexico and Arizona, was bought

from Mexico in 1853 for 10 million dollars under President Pierce. In 1867, the United States bought Alaska from Russia for 7.2 million dollars under President Johnson.

7 See Harvey (2002) for a comparative history of the Wars of Independence.

8 Guerra Vilaboy (2010: 223–62).

9 Around 1850, for instance, the family bloc Aldama–Alfonso–Madan controlled forty sugar plantations, was owner of 15,000 slaves and – additionally –

was proprietor of railways, warehouses and credit banks (Torres-Cuevas and Loyola Vega 2011: 165). This multi-family bloc was the backbone of the ‘Club of Havana’, which tried to push the United States to annex Cuba.

10 Henken (2008: 53).

11 Zanetti (2013: 174–5).

12 Torres-Cuevas and Loyola Vega (2011: 190–209); Zanetti (2013: 148–54).

13 Between 1850 and 1868 Spain sent several volunteer soldier battalions to Cuba in order to protect Cuba against annexation by the United States (Uralde Cancio 2009).

14 Gott (2004: 68–9).

15 Torres-Cuevas and Loyola Vega (2011: 216–20).

16 Here I follow Gott (2004), Girón Garote (2007), Thomas (1977), Torres-Cuevas and Loyola Vega (2011) and Zanetti (2012, 2013).

222 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

17 A term coined in Santo Domingo and afterwards used in Cuba to denominate the insurgents of the Liberation Army and again during Castro’s insurgency in the 1950s as a revolutionary badge of honour.

18 Moro Barreñada (2007: 52–3).

19 The American administrations during the Cuban war years – Presidents Johnson, Grant and Hayes – strongly opposed the Cuban rebellion and even

prevented the direct support of Cuban immigrants (Torres-Cuevas and Loyola Vega 2011: 257–9).

20 See Torres-Cuevas and Loyola Vega (2011: 324–34) for a more detailed analysis.

21 A recent short biography was published by Fernández and Fernández (2007). A more detailed one is that of López (2014). For more references

see the Centro de Estudios Martianos en Havana (www.ecured.cu/index.php/

Centro_de_Estudios_Martianos).

22 Juan Gualberto Gómez, the president of the Directorio Central de las Sociedades de Color – the association of mulatos and blacks (see below) – acted as his representative in Cuba (Zanetti 2013: 184).

23 Fernández Bastarreche (2007); López Díaz 2009: 120–21).

24 Cardona (2007: 66).

25 At the Museo Naval en Ferrol (Galicia, Spain), an entire room is dedicated to the battle of the Bay of Santiago de Cuba, where the Spanish fleet was destroyed.

26 The small remaining part of the Spanish overseas empire – the islands of the Marianas, the Carolinas and the Palaos – were sold to Germany at a price of 25 million pesos in June 1899 (Pérez Prendes Muños-Arraco 2007: 86; Jirón Miranda 2007: 376).

27 Gott (2004: 104).

28 In 1919, Cuba had 426 priests with Spanish nationality and 156 priests with a Cuban one (Zanetti 2013: 219). The influence of the Spanish episcopate, part of it with Falangist sympathies, remained strong until the late 1950s.

29 Gott (2004: 105–6).

30 Zanetti (2013: 195).

31 López Civeira et al. (2012: 3).

32 Zanetti (2013: 199).

33 US senator Platt was the president of the US Commission of Relations with Cuba.

34 Gott (2004: 110).

35 A dual system of pesos and dollars and the peg to the dollar was maintained until 1960, when the dollar was replaced by the Soviet rouble.

36 López Civeira et al. (2012: 44).

37 Pino Santos (1973: 31).

38 Gott (2004: 129).

39 Henken (2008: 78).

40 Venegas Delgado (2007).

41 López Civeira et al. (2012: 62ff.).

42 Mella was also the co-founder of the Universidad Popular José Martí, the Liga Antiimperialista, the Liga Anticlerical, and the Asociación de Nuevos Emigrados Revolucionarios Cubanos in 1928.

43 Castro Fernández (2008: 259ff.); Rodríguez (2010: 247ff.).

Notes to Chapter 2 | 223

44 Bell Lara et al. (2014: 21).

45 See Briones Montoto (2008) for a detailed analysis of the period.

46 Between 5 and 10 September 1933. Its members were Ramón Grau San Martín, Guillermo Portela, José Miguel Irizarri, Sergio Carbó and Porfirio Franca. The Pentarquía appointed Batista as army chief with the rank of colonel.

47 The revolutionary fervour of 1930 had consequences for Cuba’s involvement in the Spanish Civil War. While the Cuban episcopate and the haute bourgeoisie expressed their unquestionable sympathy for the Franco regime, Cuba’s progressive forces supported the republican cause. Young Cubans volunteered for the International Brigades: Pablo de la Torriente Brau, a Cuban war journalist and lieutenant and political commissar of one of the brigades, eventually died. After Franco’s victory, Cuba received many Spanish intellectuals and journalists who influenced the foundation of the Universidad del Oriente in 1947 (Fernández Muñiz 2009: 8–19). Other Spanish refugees, many of them

gallegos, were also welcomed in Cuba (Vidal Felipe 2009). After Mexico (464

volunteers) and Venezuela (149 volunteers), it was Cuba (136 volunteers) that sent the highest number of participants in the International Brigades of all Latin American countries to Spain (Baumann 1979: 54). Cuba also benefited from the Spanish exiles. Many intellectuals and high government officials were welcomed on the island. In Cuba, several Spanish-Cuban refugee organizations were established, such as the Formación de Ex-Combatientes Antifascistas en Cuba and the Institución Hispanocubano de Cuba (Cuadriello 2009: 62, 126).

See also Vidal Felipe (2009).

48 The Soviet Communist Party had tried, after Stalin’s policy change at the 7th Congress of the Third International 1935, to form alliances with other

progressive organizations. Grasping the possibility to be legalized in 1939, the party leadership changed its name to Partido Unión Revolucionaria

Comunista (PURC, Revolutionary Communist Union Party). In 1944, the

name was changed to Partido Socialista Popular (PSP, Popular Socialist

Party). Blas Roca was its secretary general from 1934 to 1962, when the

party merged with the two organizations that had triumphed in the Cuban

Revolution, into the (PURS, United Party of the Cuban Socialist Revolution).

See also Chapter 3.

49 By 1948 sugar represented 90 per cent of Cuba’s total export value.

50 Pérez (1993: 80).

51 Zanetti (2013: 240–41). Grau was accused of having misappropriated 74

million dollars and his outgoing minister of education was accused of having pocketed 20 million dollars (Pérez 1993: 80).

52 Henken (2008: 91).

53 Sáenz Rovner (2008: 75ff.).

54 English (2007: 40–41).

55 See López Civeira et al. (2012: 226 ff.).

56 In 1950 the Cuban journal Bohemia published the results of an early survey about preferences for the presidential elections foreseen in 1952. The two most important candidates, Chibás and Batista, obtained 35 per cent (Chibás) and 15 per cent (Batista) respectively (López Civeira et al. 2012: 241).

57 An annotated selection of his essays and articles was curated by Alavez Martín (2009).

224 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

58 Batista also agreed to extensive promotions within the army’s officer corps.

Before the coup, the Cuban armed forces contained a total of 480 officers. A month later there were 800. Fifteen months later the number rose to 1,300

officers (López Civeira et al. 2012: 264).

59 English, who wrote a salacious story about the Mob connections in Cuba, interviewed the then 75-year-old Comandante de la Revolución and General

William Gálvez Rodríguez in Havana in 2007. Gálvez, a combatant during

Fidel Castro’s anti-Batista insurgency in the Sierra Maestra and himself a proficient author (who also wrote about the mafia ties in Cuba, but mostly about the insurgency campaigns and the tactics of Camilo Cienfuegos and Che Guevara; see Gálvez 1979 and 1982), told him that, although the presence of the mafia was not a reason for the revolution, the casinos and the connections with the American gangsters symbolized corruption in the eyes of the rebels (English 2007: 20). Solomon (2011: 41) mentions that in the years before the Cuban Revolution, there were around two thousand brothels in Havana.

60 By 1958, Batista’s personal fortune was estimated to be 300 million dollars, mostly invested in Switzerland, Mexico, Florida and New York. He also had abundant ventures in Cuba, especially in land, media outlets and tourist

properties (Sáenz Rovner 2008: 114).

61 Zanetti (2013: 257–60).

62 Also an important organization of civil society, the Sociedad de Amigos de la República (SAR, the Society of Friends of the Republic), opposed the Batista dictatorship but opted for the strategy of dialogue and negotiations with the dictator. For details see Ibarra Guitart (2003).

63 Gott (2004: 158–9). Two PSP leaders, Juan Marinello and Carlos Rafael Rodríguez, had been Batista’s cabinet members in the 1940s.

64 Pérez (1993: 89).

65 Data mentioned by Sergio Guerra, head of the Department of History at the University of Havana, during a seminar at the Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, 24 April 2014.

66 López Civeira et al. (2012: 267–70).

67 Cuesta Braniella (1997: 36). García-Bárcena was incarcerated, then exiled.

In 1959 he was appointed Cuba’s ambassador to Brazil. Other participants

were Mario Llerena, Armando Hart, Faustino Pérez and Enrique Oltuski,

all of whom later became prominent members of Fidel Castro’s insurgency

movement.

68 The formal foundation of the Movimiento Revolucionario 26 de Julio (M 26-7) was on 12 June 1955. The first national leadership comprised Fidel Castro, Antonio López, José Suárez Blanco, Pedro Miret, Armando Hart, Faustino

Pérez, Haydée Santamaría, Melba Hernández, Pedro Celestino Aguilera

González and Luis Bonito Milián. Frank País would later join the leadership as well (Bell Lara et al. 2015: 27).

69 Fidel and Raúl had a third brother, Ramón, who was the oldest of the three.

Ramón also assumed tasks in the insurgency, but at a more modest level. There is a communiqué signed by Raúl Castro on 30 November 1958, in which

he confirms that ‘Compañero Ramón Castro Ruz is appointed Chief of Supply of the FAR [Fuerza Áerea Rebelde, or Rebel Air Force]’ of the Second Frente (see Espín Guillois et al. 2011: 208).

Notes to Chapter 2 | 225

70 Bell Lara (2007: 28).

71 Guerra Vilaboy and Maldonado Gallardo (2005: 53, 57).

72 Bell Lara (2007: 26).

73 A detailed study on the sympathies of the FEU members who overlapped between the M 26-7 and the DR is that of Nuiry (2002). See also Chapter 3.

74 Faure Chomón interviewed in Granma, 28 February 2011.

75 Cuesta Braniella (1997: 54).

76 Bell Lara (2007: 22).

77 The expeditionary forces had been trained by Alberto Bayo Giraud, a Spanish officer during the Spanish Civil War. Born in Cuba in 1892, he went to Spain at the age of six. He found exile in Mexico in 1939, and moved to Cuba in 1959. He lived and died there as a venerated general.

78 Ernesto (Che) Guevara, born in Argentina, had already travelled extensively across Latin America. During the Guatemalan Revolution of President and

Colonel Arbenz (1950–54) he had been a political tourist. After the CIA coup against Arbenz in 1954, he – together with many other Guatemalan leftists –

sought exile at the Argentine embassy in Guatemala City. After his release he went to Mexico, where he met Raúl Castro and other members of the

proto-expedition of the Granma. In Mexico he was detained and shared a prison cell with Fidel. Former Mexican president Lázaro Cárdenas intervened to release the Cuban prisoners.

79 Portuondo López (1986) published a detailed testimony about the rebellion of 30 November 1956.

80 Anderson (1977: 212).

81 In 1957 the captured participants of the Granma expedition and the rebellion in Santiago de Cuba were brought to court. The president of the court, Judge Manuel Urrutia, however – quoting Article 40 of the constitution – ruled that the defendants had been acting within the legal context of the constitution. In 1959, Urrutia became the first president of revolutionary Cuba (López Civeira et al. 2012: 336).

82 Almeida (1987a, 1987b, 1988), after Fidel and Raúl, was the third comandante to lead a Frente (battle group). He published three small autobiographical notes on his experience as a prisoner, in exile in Mexico, and as a participant in the Granma disembarkation.

83 Sweig (2002: 14).

84 Ibid.: 43–5, 49. Bell Lara (2007: 18–19) mentions the Frente Estudiantil Nacional (FEN) and the Frente Obrero Nacional (FOB), which were extended

by unifying the labour unions into a national Frente Obrero Nacional Unido (FONU) in 1958.

85 After he was incorporated as comandante of guerrilla Column 10 in April 1958, he died in combat during Batista’s counter-insurgency offensive in July 1958 (López Civeira et al. 2012: 333).

86 On 24 May 1957 another disembarkation of twenty-seven members of a separate guerrilla expedition, headed by the British-Cuban World War

II hero Juan Calixto Sánchez White, took place in the Bay of Cabonico.

Fifteen of their members, including Calixto Sánchez, were killed in combat; others were imprisoned and a few managed to escape (López Civeira et al.

2012: 330).

226 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

87 Sweig (2002: 26–7). Masferrer, once a member of the International Brigades during the Spanish Civil War, initially supported the students who protested against Batista but rapidly allied with the dictator. He formed a group of anti-Castro enforcers, heavily supported by Batista. After 1959 he escaped to Florida, where he also had mafia contacts.

88 Cuesta Braniella (1997: 75ff.). Frank País had already provided Catholic and Baptist chaplains to the early guerrilla forces in the Sierra Maestra.

89 Quoted in Cuesta Braniella (1997: 85–6). Eventually, in February 1958, the PSP permitted their members to join the guerrilla. One of the first to join the guerrilla was Jorge Risquet, a sympathizer of the armed resistance

against Batista who was elected as president of the Juventud Socialista

in Havana in 1956. He had lived in Guatemala in 1954, where he met

Che Guevara. In the Sierra Maestra he was incorporated into the Second

Frente, commanded by Raúl Castro, and was appointed to organize the

political education of the combatants (León Rojas 2006: 107 ff.). After

1959 he played an important role in Latin America but especially in Africa, as delegate in Congo-Brazzaville, ambassador in Angola, and later as peace negotiator on behalf of Cuba (see also Gleijeses 2002 and Risquet’s introduction in Gleijeses 2007: vii–lv).

90 See Cuesta Braniella (1997, 2010).

91 Cuesta Braniella (1997: 383–6).

92 Sweig (2002: 25–6, 51–2).

93 Elvira Díaz Vallina, prominent leader of the urban resistance movement M

26-7, quoted in Cuesta Braniella (1997: 155). She also confirmed this event in her interview (interview with [Ángela] Elvira Díaz Vallina, 3 March 2011).

94 Guerra Vilaboy and Maldonado Gallardo (2005: 53, 57).

95 Cuesta Braniella (1997: 199–200).

96 The operation was organized by Sergio González ( nom de guerre El Curita), chief of the action and sabotage team in Havana (Bell Lara et al. 2015: 33).

To read more about the Havana underground movement, see Rodríguez Asti-

azaraín (2009). Here I also draw from an interview with Ricardo Gómez

Rodríguez (21 September 2011), one of the participants in the urban underground in Havana who operated in the action and sabotage team of Sergio

González. Gómez Rodríguez (2011) wrote a detailed account of this period.

97 Castro Ruz (2010a: 11).

98 See www.ecured.cu/index.php/Faure_Chom%C3%B3n_Mediavilla, accessed 9 December 2014.

99 He had commanded his Destacamento DR 13 de Marzo and joined the Frente of Che Guevara. After 1959, he was Cuba’s first ambassador to the

Soviet Union, a very important post but also very far away from Havana, the political centre of the revolution.

100 Sweig (2002: 114–15).

101 Pérez Jr (1993: 86–7).

102 Hart Dávalos (1997); Graña Eiriz (2008).

103 However, in February 1958 the leaders of the urban Brigadas Juveniles and the action and sabotage teams in Havana – Gerardo Abreu ( nom de guerre Fontán), Sergio López ( nom de guerre El Curita) and Arístides Viera ( nom de guerre Mingolo) – were killed in action, a serious weakening of the urban

Notes to Chapter 2 | 227

organizations (Rodríguez Astiazaraín 2009: 108–14). See also Meneses

(1995) and Rodríguez Camps (2005) for more details.

104 Calvo González (2014: 260–65).

105 Ibid.: 171–212, 104–6).

106 Macaulay (1978: 289).

107 Bell Lara et al. (2015: 33–4).

108 Sweig (2002: 120ff.).

109 A testimonial booklet about the strike was published by Álvarez Estévez (1999).

110 Present were Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Faustino Pérez, René Ramos Latour, Vilma Espín, Celia Sánchez, Marcelo Fernandez, Nico Torres, Haydée

Santamaría, David Salvador, Luis Buch and Enzo Infante (Sweig 2002: 150).

111 Oltuski et al. (2007: 323–40).

112 Sweig (2002: 153). A similar conclusion was reached by Macaulay (1978: 292).

113 Castro Ruz (2010a: 14–15).

114 Ibid.: 16. At the moment of the Granma expedition (December 1956), the Cuban army had around 27,000 personnel, the navy 6,000, and the police

7,650. The army’s officers corps had 1 major general, 6 brigadiers, 17 colonels, 47 lieutenant colonels, 119 majors ( comandantes), 258 captains, 736

first lieutenants, 736 second lieutenants, and 379 sub-lieutenants (Uralde Cancio and Rosado Ciró 2006: 183, 193).

115 Fidel Castro devotes an entire chapter to the preparations of the defence (Castro Ruz 2010a: 17–48).

116 A fact that clearly contributed to the prestige of the Rebel Army. Allowing captured officers to keep their weapons was not a habit of Fidel alone; Raúl, Che Guevara and Camilo Torres also followed this practice (interview with Antonio Llibre Artigas, 11 and 15 March 2011). See also Fulgeiras (2009: 60).

117 Castro Ruz (2010a: 704–5).

118 In the second part of his war memoirs, Fidel Castro mentions a correspondence with a soldier of the Guardia Rural, who asked for his permission to join the rebels. He was authorized by the Comandante en Jefe to ‘go to the mountains’ (Castro Ruz 2010b: 123–6; ‘going to the mountains’ was Cuban

and afterwards Latin American slang for ‘joining the guerrilla’).

119 Notwithstanding the formal opposition of the PSP hierarchy, several young members of the Juventud Socialista, the youth branch of the PSP, joined the M 26-7 guerrillas and especially the second Frente of Raúl Castro. Among

them, Jorge Risquet, Antonio Pérez Herrero and peasant leader José (Pepe) Ramírez would fulfil important functions in the post-1959 period.

120 Ibarra Guitart (2000: 259ff.).

121 Castro Ruz (2010b: 79–86).

122 A fine and comprehensive study of the urban underground in Havana and Matanzas is García-Pérez (2005).

123 The last of six air transports; for details see Buch (1995: 168–78). See also García-Pérez (2005: 107–13).

124 Macaulay (1978: 291) estimated the total strength of the Rebel Army on 20

December 1958 to be 7,250 combatants.

125 Batista, in exile, wrote several apologetic memoirs such as Cuba Betrayed (1962) and The Growth and Decline of the Cuban Republic (1964), presenting himself as an abnegated soldier fighting against Nazism and communism

228 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

and a statesmen financing production and public housing (Batista 1964:

x, 144ff., 218ff.). His adherents, such as Riera Hernández (1966), wrote

hagiographic biographies.

126 For a detailed day-to-day account of the situation between 25 December 1958 and 8 January 1959, see Graña Eiriz (2008: 350–452).

127 Guerra Vilaboy and Maldonado Gallardo (2005: 78–88). The jubilant triumph caravan is described in Báez and De la Hoz (2009).

128 A nice PR ploy, which successfully mesmerized the public. In 1960, another white dove perched on Fidel’s shoulders when he spoke in public in Harlem.

Chapter 3: From insurgents to socialists

1 Here I rephrase ideas from Kruijt (2008, 2013).

2 Frank País had also rescued surviving members of Fidel Castro’s first assault on the military barracks of Moncada in Santiago of Cuba, in 1953, and of

Carlos Manuel de Céspedes in Bayamo.

3 A book with essays and documents about the student federation FEU (Federación Estudiantil Universitaria) was published by Nuiry (2002). Nuiry was the president of the FEU, a board member of the DR and the FEU’s representative to the guerrilla movement M 26-7. See also Chapter 2.

4 See Trujillo Lemes (2011: 154 ff.).

5 Interview with José Buajasán Marravi (31 March 2011). Buajasán, a Lebanese-Cuban and a pious Catholic during the insurgency period, retired as Colonel of State Security after a long career in counter-espionage. After the Bay of Pigs victory he was in charge of disbanding all counter-revolutionary organizations of the Roman Catholic episcopate that had supported the invasion:

‘There wasn’t anyone dead, anyone wounded, nobody hit, nobody tortured,

because it was an apparatus […] formed by revolutionary people.’ Buajasán also co-authored the Cuban report on Operation Peter Pan, the exodus of

around 14,000 young children to the United States under the guidance of

Catholic priests and church-related organizations, with the direct involvement of the CIA and the State Department (Torriera Crespo and Buajasán

Marrawi (2000). See also Eckstein (2009: 12).

6 See Ortiz (2012).

7 Ramiro Abreu, a member of the Comité Central who spent more than thirty years of his professional career as the Cuban overseer of the Central American guerrilla (in El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua), went to war – during the Bay of Pigs invasion – with a necklace around his neck with the medallion of the Virgen del Cobre, a gift of his mother (Abreu 2013: 91).

8 Bell Lara et al. (2012) published a series of interviews with women who participated in the first years of the urban underground.

9 The first peasant to be incorporated into the Rebel Army was Guillermo García Frías ( nom de guerre Niquero). By the end of the insurgency campaign he was a comandante and deputy chief of the third Frente. He was appointed one of the twenty-eight Comandantes de la Revolución and is decorated

as Hero of the Republic of Cuba. A member of the Comité Central of the

Communist Party, he was also the vice-president of the Council of Ministers

Notes to Chapters 2 and 3 | 229

and minister of transport. He published his memoirs (García Frías 2010).

Another peasant, Lorenzo Castro ( nom de guerre Pineo), joined the army as a simple soldier. By December 1958 he was a captain of the Rebel Army

and retired as a brigade general at the Ministry of the Interior; he also published his memoirs (Lorenzo Castro 2007). A third example is García Peláez (2010), born a Cuban to Galician immigrants, who returned to Spain with

his parents, worked in Asturias as a truck driver and then returned to Cuba.

He participated in the guerrilla as a captain in the sierra in 1959, appointed chief bodyguard of Fidel, and retired as division general. He also published his memoirs. Combatants of the DR, like Ramón Espinosa Martín (2009),

also ascended to the highest FAR echelons.

10 Interview with Ramiro Abreu (25 March 2011).

11 Quoted by León Rojas (2006: 25, 27–8), Risquet’s biographer.

12 Interview with Luis Morejón (1 March 2012).

13 Interview with María Antonia Figueroa Araujo (18 March 2011).

14 Ibid.

15 Ibid.

16 Interview with Consuelo Elba Álvarez (30 March 2011).

17 Ibid. Marel García (see below) trained the first contingent of female militias.

Pérez Caso (2011) describes the subsequent training of the militia women.

18 Interview with Antonio Llibre Artigas (11 and 15 March 2011).

19 Interview with Consuelo Elba Álvarez (30 March 2011).

20 Ibid.

21 After 1959, Amador del Valle Portilla was vice-minister of transport; he also fought in Angola (interview, 7 October 2011).

22 Interview with Gladys (Marel) García-Pérez (5 October 2011).

23 Cuba’s formal government building, a copy of Washington’s Capitol.

24 Interview with Carlos Amat Forés (25 May 2011).

25 Ibid.

26 Ibid.

27 Ibid.

28 Interview José Antonio (Tony) López Rodríguez (8 and 10 March 2011).

29 Interview with José Antonio (Tony) López Rodríguez (8 and 10 October 2011).

30 Interview with Ángela Elvira Díaz Vallina (30 March 2011).

31 Interview with Manuel Graña Eiriz (21 and 26 September 2011). Graña (2008) also wrote the seminal work on the combatants captured and imprisoned during the insurgency.

32 Graña (2008: 460, 471, 477).

33 Buch and Suárez (2009: 193).

34 Ibid.: 31.

35 Ibid.: 330 and Oltuski (2000: 1). See also the remarks of several leaders of the urban underground in Sweig (2002: Introduction).

36 Luis Buch, a friend of Guiteras and a respected member of the M 26-7, was the movement’s representative in the United States and Venezuela before

1959. He was also cabinet secretary until 1962. Afterwards he served as a magistrate of the Supreme Court. Buch and Suárez (2009) is an annotated

and edited compilation of two manuscripts that were intended to be parts of

230 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

his memoirs; Buch died in 2002. About the Cuban revolutionary evolution, see also Kapcia (2000, 2008, 2014).

37 Buch and Suárez (2009: 81).

38 There are other interpretations of this process. Martínez-Fernández (2014: 10, 56–61, 97–8, 219–20) sees this as the beginning of a master strategy of divide et impera (divide and conquer), as employed by Fidel throughout his entire career.

39 Interview with Ángela Elvira Díaz Vallina (30 March 2011).

40 That also resulted in changes to the cabinet composition: González Lage (2015: 40–43) analysed the changes between early 1959 and late 1960. In

January 1959, of the 19 cabinet positions, only 9 were occupied by members of the two revolutionary movements. By the end of 1959, eleven of the nineteen positions were occupied by members with direct access to Fidel and four others were ‘moderate’ M 26-7 members. The DR had one minister (of the

interior), while three people were ‘civilians’ (the ministers of trade, finance and economy). By the end of 1960, fourteen were ‘ fidelista’ members of the M 26-7 and two others were also M 26-7 members. In the meantime, the DR

maintained their ministerial post and only two ‘civilian’ ministers remained (the ministers of trade and economy).

41 Sweig (2012: 38–9).

42 Gott (2004: 189).

43 Interview with José Bell Lara (23 September 2011).

44 Interview with Héctor Terry (23 September 2011). Terry, who retired as a vice-minister of public health, was (in his younger years) one of the transcribers of Fidel’s public discourses.

45 Pérez Jr (2011: 242).

46 Borrego Díaz (2013a [1966]: 7).

47 Orlando Borrego Díaz, Che Guevara’s vice-minister of industry, describes the early years under Guevara: ‘The new administrators knew nothing. Once we

appointed a boy from the FAR [Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionaria] who was

younger than twenty years old. When we set up the Ministry of Industries, we already had hundreds of factories and things became unmanageable. We

worked from nine in the morning until three or four in the morning. I finished every night with the Comandante until he told me, on one of these sleepless nights: “Hey, we’re running low too often, let’s make a Pact. We’ll stay here until one o’clock in the morning”’ (interview in Página 12-El País (Argentina), 15 June 2003, www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/elpais/1-21445-2003-06-15.

html, accessed 10 July 2015); see also Mesa-Lago and Zephirin (1974).

Many voluntary foreign experts, such as visiting ECLAC economists, were

astonished by the chaotic atmosphere at JUCEPLAN. Dudley Seers, head of

a visiting team of British economists, typified it as ‘euphoric planning’. Even Zimbalist and Brundenius (1989), very friendly analysts, are critical about the long-term results of the Cuban planning system. In retrospect, even the Cuban economists on the planning board had their misgivings. Fabio Gobart Sunshine (son of one of the founders of the first Communist Party of Cuba in 1925) holds a PhD from Humboldt University, then in the German Democratic Republic. He commented that, during the formative years of the Cuban planning structures, when he and his team of econometrists delivered their first reports, the then minister of planning told him: ‘No, no, this is not what

Notes to Chapter 3 | 231

we want. We will do it Cuban style’ (discussion with Grobart at the University of Havana, 15 February 2015).

48 Llovío-Menéndez, quoted in Gott (2004: 236).

49 In three large migration waves, in 1965, 1980 and 1994. For a more general analysis of the Cuban migration and successive Cuban generations in the

United States, see Eckstein (2009). The 2000 census registered 1.24 million Cubans (853,000 Cuban-born) living in the United States. Of them, 67 per

cent lived in Florida and 52 per cent in Greater Miami (Martínez-Fernández 2014: 220). Other migration streams were to Mexico, Venezuela, Canada,

Ecuador, Panama, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic and Spain.

50 Sweig (2012: 47–8).

51 Solomon (2011: 210).

52 The revolutionary tribunals had been sanctioned by President Urrutia and were witnessed by American newsmen (Solomon 2011: 83).

53 In the late 1990s, nearly all Cuban generals had been trained in the Soviet Union; see the interviews with Cuba’s military in Báez (1996). By and large, they maintain good memories of their time in Leningrad or Moscow, and some of them even begin their memoirs with quotes from Lenin instead of Fidel or Raúl Castro.

54 About the escalation of violence I follow Bolender (2011), Hersch (1998: 185–221, 268–93), Livingstone (2009: 24–38), Martínez-Fernandez (2014:

53–6, 76–80), Solomon (2011) and the Cuban authors Alvarado Godoy

(2003, 2007, 2011), Arboleya Cervera (2009), Báez (2005) and Escalante

Font (2010). Fidel Castro’s reflections on the 1960–62 period are in Ramonet (2008: 271–326). For a more detailed overview of US–Cuban relations and the consequences of the embargo, see Bernell (2011), Dávalos Fernández (2012), Nieto (2003) and Spadoni (2010). See Dominguez (1979, 1993, 2006) and

Kapcia (2000, 2008, 2014) on Cuba’s internal development. Very fine and

detailed analyses of the intent to normalize US–Cuban relations are LeoGrande and Kornbluh (2014) and Ramírez Cañedo and Morales Domínguez (2014).

55 Reid-Henry (2009: 221).

56 Pavlov (1994: 5).

57 Reid-Henry (2009: 223).

58 For details, see Arévalo de León (2015), Gleijeses (1992), Hersch (1998), LeoGrande (1998), Sabino (2009) and Torres-Rivas (2011).

59 Officer (and later Rear Admiral) Cuza fought next to Fidel: ‘I am the only officer of the entire armed forces that can say that Fidel fought at his side. At the Bay of Pigs [Playa Girón] we fought together. And when my FAL [rifle]

projectiles were running out, I threw myself into the trench to recharge my weapon. And Fidel changed his position to protect me’ (interview with José Luis Cuza, 11 October 2011).

60 Pavlov (1994: 40–42).

61 Ramonet (2008: 312).

62 The combat brigade remained in Cuba until September 1991, a month after the attempted coup against Gorbachev.

63 Pavlov (1994: 55).

64 Bain (2007: 27ff.). See also Bain (2012), Duncan (1985), Frankel (2004), Latrèche (2011) and Pavlov (2012).

232 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

65 Interview with Carmen and Laura Fernández Rueda (4 April 2011).

66 Interview with Héctor Carmona Heredia (6 October 2011).

67 See Rueda Jomarrón (2009) about the role of the Cuban militias.

68 Karol (1971: 46–7).

69 Interview with Fernando Martínez Heredia (2 March 2012).

70 As of July 1961; see González Lage (2015: 43).

71 Enrique Oltuski interviewed by Buch, in Buch and Suárez (2009: 354–6).

72 Ibid.

73 As vice-minister of planning he was the chief of the Junta Central de Planificación (JUCEPLAN), the National Planning Institute.

74 Interview with Jorge Ibarra Cuesta (6 October 2011). Ibarra is the author of Cuba’s military history, which became the university textbook for student generations. He also wrote two influential studies about the turn of the nineteenth to the twentieth century (Ibarra Cuesta 1985 [1967], 1992, 1995, 2007).

75 Interview with Roberto Rafael Márquez Orozco (2 April 2011).

76 Years afterwards, Escalante tried again to influence Cuban–Soviet relations.

This time he was condemned to prison.

77 There are 122,000 CDR (2015) in Cuba with 8 million members; www.

ecured.cu/index.php/CDR, accessed 26 June 2015.

78 Bell Lara et al. (2008: 307–76).

79 www.ecured.cu/index.php/FMC, accessed 26 June 2015.

80 www.ecured.cu/index.php/CTC, accessed 26 June 2015.

81 With 330,000 members in 2015, according to www.ecured.cu/index.php/

ANAP, accessed 26 June 2015.

82 With 110,000 members in 2015, according to www.ecured.cu/index.php/FEU,

accessed 26 June 2015.

83 www.ecured.cu/index.php/UNEAC, and www.ecured.cu/index.php/UPEC, both accessed 26 June 2015.

84 www.ecured.cu/index.php/ACRC, accessed 26 April 2015.

85 Interview with Ricardo Gómez Rodríguez (27 September 2011).

86 Ibid.

Chapter 4: Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s)

1 See Barber and Ronning (1966) for one of the first explicit manuals for military and civilian counter-insurgency operations. For the evolution of civil-military action in the American and local counter-insurgency strategy in Latin America, see Weitz (1986).

2 Castro Ruz (2010a, 2010b).

3 For studies about the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR), see Klepak (2000, 2005, 2009, 2012, 2014) and Latell (2003).

4 According to Risquet Valdés (2007: xlvii) Cuba sent 380,000 soldiers to Angola and 70,000 additional civilian technicians and volunteers. The Cuban forces possessed 1,000 tanks, 600 armoured vehicles and 1,600 pieces of

artillery (Risquet Valdés 2008: 102). Based on data in Mesa-Lago and

Belkin (1982), Gleijeses (2002), George (2005), LeoGrande (1980) and my

own interviews, Cuba had a military presence in Algeria, Congo, Congo-

Brazzaville, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique, and sent

Notes to Chapters 3 and 4 | 233

civilian ‘ internacionalistas’ to at least ten African countries. The involvement in Angola and Eritrea was enormous. At a certain moment, Cuba could have

had 100,000 ingoing and outgoing military in Angola and 16,000 military in Ethiopia (George 2005: 133, 321). For another detailed study about Cuba’s involvement in Angola, see Carrasco (1997).

5 Canada never interrupted its diplomatic relations with Cuba. Bolivia, Chile and Uruguay broke their diplomatic relations in 1964 after strong admonition from the United States.

6 For a serious discussion about the content and influence of Guevara’s ideas in the 1960s, see Childs (1991). See Loveman and Davies (1997) for all of Guevara’s military writings.

7 See Gott (1971, 2004), Lamberg (1979), Pereyra (2011 [1994]), Pozzi and Pérez (2012) and Prieto (2007).

8 The Second Declaration of Havana was read by Fidel Castro while nearly two million Cubans attended his speech at the Plaza de la Revolución. After the First International (1864–76), the Second International (1889–present) was created by the social democratic parties. In 1919 Lenin founded the Third International, the Komintern (1919–43). Trotsky founded the Fourth International (1939–54).

9 I use the translation as presented at www.walterlippmann.com/fc-02-04-1962.

html (accessed 10 June 2015).

10 I use the text of the final declaration as presented at constitucionweb.blogspot.

com.es/2014/06/declaracion-continental-de-la-primera.html (accessed 10 June 2015).

11 Che Guevara was travelling in Africa and the Middle East.

12 Interview with Jorge Luis Joa (27 October 2011).

13 Several Cuban representatives, also sometimes Che Guevara, travelled with Algerian passports; see De la Rosa Valdés (2011: 135–8). This is confirmed by Osvaldo Cárdenas (interview 18 January 2012).

14 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (18 January 2012).

15 Many Latin American countries commissioned Mexico to represent their interests on the island (Toussaint 2013: 116).

16 Interviews with Ramiro Abreu (19 and 25 October 2011), Jorge Luis Joa (27

October 2011) and Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

17 Here I use biographical data from Suárez Salazar (1997, 1999), De la Rosa Valdés (2011), Martínez Heredia (2010: 138 ff.) and Timossi (2011), and

data from a lengthy interview with José Antonio López (1 December 2012),

especially about the personality of Piñeiro. I also use interviews with former vice-chiefs and section heads of the department for my sketch of the evolution of the organizations within the MININT, which eventually morphed into the Departamento América: Carlos Antelo (interview 24 and 27 October 2011),

Osvaldo Cárdenas (interview 18 January 2012), Norberto Hernández Curbelo

(19 and 25 October 2011), Ulises Estrada Lescaille (21 and 28 October 2011) and Fernando Ravelo Renedo (interview 17 October 2011), as well as Giraldo Mazola, president of the ICAP and vice-minister of MINREX (4 February

2012), and Luis Morejón, vice-president of the ICAP (1 March 2012).

18 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (18 January 2012).

19 Basically for movements in Latin America and the Caribbean. Until 1965

there was no formal office to attend to the African and Asian revolutionary

234 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

movements. Cuba supported the independence movement in Algeria. Upon

independence in 1962, Piñeiro and others formed a ‘working group’ for

strategic cooperation. Cuba also assisted with a mission during the Algerian–

Moroccan conflict in 1963. In 1965, an agreement on intelligence cooperation between the two countries was established (De la Rosa Valdés 2011: 135–8).

20 Hudson (1988) published a history of the Departamento América. His data are sometimes very detailed but are basically employed to demonstrate

‘Marxist-Leninist violence’.

21 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (18 January 2012).

22 Interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille (21 and 28 October 2011).

23 Interview with Giraldo Mazola (4 February 2012), Fabio Escalante Font (21

December 2011), Alberto Cabrera (14 February 2012) and Ulises Estrada

Lescaille (21 and 28 October 2011).

24 Interview with Lázaro Mora (8, 9 and 10 February 2012).

25 He was born as Dámaso José Lescaille Tabares, but he adopted his pseudonym as his name and first surname. Ulises Estrada Lescaille died in 2014. Mallin, who published a book on the ‘Communist Dictator’ – of which a large part

is dedicated to the Departamento América – incorrectly calls him Armando

Ulises Estrada Fernández (1994: 128).

26 This episode is beyond the scope of this book. However, it refers to a period of counter-revolutionary rebellions, mainly but not limited to the regions of Camagüey, Escambray, Holguín, Las Villas, Oriente and Pinar del Río,

between 1959 and 1965. As far as I know, the size and scope of the rebel-

lion of the ‘bandits’ and the counter-insurgency operations against them were never completely documented. Euphemistically, it was the ‘campaign against bandits’ (Lucha Contra Bandidos, LCB); it was probably a kind of mini civil war. Several thousands of the family members of the executed or imprisoned

‘bandits’ were transferred to Havana and afterwards distributed among special municipalities (interview with Graciela Aguilar Cardosa, 23 March 2011): Graciela was the special assistant to Celia Sánchez and was appointed Chief of Personnel at the Ministry of Defence in January 1959. For testimonial references, see, for instance, Borges et al. (2004), Etcheverry Vázquez and Gutiérrez Oceguerra (2008), Gárciga Blanco (2010, 2011), González de Cascorro (1975) and Herrera Medina (2006).

27 See also Harmer (2011).

28 In 2003 he wrote a detailed account of Cuba’s activities during the days of the Pinochet coup (Estrada Lescaille 2003); he provided me with a PDF copy. See also Suárez Salazar (2007) on Estrada’s involvement in the Bolivian expedition of Che Guevara and his love affair with Haydée Tamara Bunke Bíder (Tania

la Guerrillera), who joined Che Guevara’s guerrilla column in Bolivia and died during his campaign.

29 This sketch of Piñeiro’s career is based on an interview with José Antonio López (1 December 2012), a long-time member of the Departamento América

who retired in 2010.

30 He sported a Santa Claus-like long red beard and was hence nicknamed Barbarroja (Redbeard).

31 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011).

32 Interview with José Antonio López (1 December 2012).

Notes to Chapter 4 | 235

33 Interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (28 February 2012).

34 The Colombian FARC (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia –

Ejército Popular, or FARC-EP), for instance, was very susceptible to the neutrality of its Cuban liaisons. When they once perceived a possible preference for another guerrilla organization by one of their Cuban liaison officers, they sent a letter to the Central Committee in Havana. After the damage was done, they formally withdrew the letter a couple of days later.

35 Gillespie (1982); Sprenkels (2014).

36 Interview with Eduardo Sancho (23 August 2005), quoted in Kruijt (2008: 62).

37 Interview with Darío Villazimar (Bogotá), 21 February 2013.

38 Fidel Castro in Ramonet (2008: 332).

39 Mentioned in Lamberg (1979: 67). I corrected the name of the Peruvian ELN.

40 Joa and Diplomat A mention these tasks as part of their instructions (interview with Jorge Luis Joa, 27 October 2011, and with Diplomat A, 2011).

41 Interview with Sergio Cervantes Padilla (10 February 2012).

42 Interview with Ramiro Abreu (19 and 25 October 2011, 22 February 2015).

43 Latell (2007: 192).

44 Here I make use of the introductory texts of Gott (1971: 1–36), Lamberg (1979: 11–67), Mercier Vega (1969), Pereyra (2011 [1994]) and Cortina Orero (2014).

45 Interview with Diplomat A (2011).

46 Ibid.

47 Analysed by Gleijeses (1978) in detail.

48 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (12 January 2012).

49 According to Osvaldo Cárdenas (interview, 12 January 2012), who was present during that meeting, the atmosphere was very tense; they almost used their small arms.

50 Also against Guatemala and Nicaragua, but with the participation of very few persons.

51 I used the study of Nickson (2013) for this résumé.

52 Interview with José Antonio López (1 December 2012).

53 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011) and Luis Morejón (1 March 2012).

54 Interview with Fabian Escalante Font (21 December 2011).

55 Ibid.

56 Interview with Luis Morejón (1 March 2012).

57 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011).

58 Interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille (21 and 28 October 2011).

59 Wolf visited the island regularly and in his autobiography (Wolf 1997: 346) he comments that Cuban foreign intelligence quickly had become competent.

60 See Krämer (1998). I interviewed Raimund Krämer (12 April 2010, Potsdam), who had been a GDR mission member stationed in Nicaragua and Cuba until

1989.

61 Latell (2013) relates the situation from the American side.

62 Interview with Percy Alvarado Godoy (7 February 2012).

63 Ibid.

64 Ibid.

65 For a sketch of the Miami Cubans, see the contribution of Portes (2007).

236 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

66 He published several books about his intelligence career (Alvarado Godoy 2003, 2007, 2011). He also published a booklet of poetry (Alvarado

Godoy 2013).

67 See Escalante Font (2010).

68 For an account of the government and the downfall of Arbenz and the transformation of the Arbenzista army into a fierce anti-communist counter-insurgency institution, see Arévalo de León (2015). The best account of the democratic interlude of the consecutive presidents Arévalo and Arbenz (1944–54) is still Gleijeses (1992). However, the recent study by Arévalo de León (2015) gives a very detailed analysis of the relations and tensions between the revolutionary actors and the army factions.

69 Here I draw on the memoirs of Macías (1997), on Balconi’s memoirs (Balconi and Kruijt 2004), on Sabino (2009), on Figueroa Ibarra et al. (2013) and on Monsanto (2013). Recently, a fine memoir was published by one of the five participating women (Paíz Cárcamo and Vázquez Olivera 2015).

70 Interview with Norberto Hernández Curbelo (19 and 25 October 2011).

71 Balconi and Kruijt (2004).

72 Interview with General Julio Balconi (15 April 2010).

73 I use the detailed chronology of Gott (1971: 121–220), still one of the best accounts of the Venezuelan guerrilla, and the studies of Pereyra (2011: 110 ff.) and Pérez Marcano and Sánchez García (2007).

74 Línarez (2007: 18–19).

75 Héctor Pérez Marcano, co-founder of the Venezuelan MIR, comments about the changes in preferences. Piñeiro and his military adviser Arana initially had a strong preference for Lairet and Douglas Bravo (PCV). The MIR sent its leader, Américo Martín, to Havana and, after long discussions, Fidel reached a kind of Solomon’s Judgement: 60 per cent of the financial and military assistance for the PVC and 40 per cent for the MIR. Bravo left the PVC in 1966 and continued to be supported by Piñeiro (Pérez Marcano and Sánchez García 2007: 67–70).

76 Apparently, Luben Petkoff had come to Havana and asked Piñeiro to send 1,000 men. Fidel decided that the group would be comprised of fourteen persons:

‘They are the comandantes of [guerrilla] columns, of the pelotons, who will train guerrilleros whom you can command’ (Línarez 2007: 11–12).

77 Raúl Menéndez Tomassevich, Ulises Rosales del Toro, Silvio García Planas and Harley Borges, the last a doctor.

78 Menéndez Tomassevich in his memoirs (Garcíga Blanco 2009: 170–73).

Tomassevich, Division General, one of the chiefs of the military mission to Angola in the 1970s and 1980s, was decorated as Hero of the Republic of

Cuba in 2004.

79 Hernández and Giusti (2006: 152–3).

80 Interview with Diplomat A (2011).

81 In the 1970s, Arnoldo Ochoa was the Cuban commander in Angola and Ethiopia, and the principal Cuban military adviser in Nicaragua in the 1980s. A member of the Central Committee of the Party, he was anointed a Hero of the Republic of Cuba in 1984. In 1989 he was, with other high-ranking officers of the MINFAR and the MININT, arrested, tried and shot on counts of corruption and drug trafficking.

Of the transcripts from the trial, 200 pages are on behalf of the prosecution; those by the nine defence lawyers constitute only four (George 2005: 342).

Notes to Chapter 4 | 237

82 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 October 2011) and with Diplomat A (2011).

83 See Dreifuss (1981).

84 In Brazil, another Communist Party exists, the Partido Comunista do Brasil (PCdoB). It is a split-off from the PCB with a preference for the Chinese party line, opting in 1978 for the orthodox Albanian (Hoxhaist) ideology. The

PCdoB organized the guerrilla movement in Araguaia that ended in disaster; for a detailed analysis, see Nossa (2012). The PCdoB also criticized ‘Fidel Castro’s revisionism’ (ibid.: 127–9).

85 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

86 Clodomir Morais, quoted in Rollemberg (2001: 18–19). She had the opportunity to interview former combatants and used documents from military and political archives.

87 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

88 Rollemberg (2001: 23).

89 Avelino Capitani, quoted in Rollemberg (2001).

90 Here I follow Amorim da Angelo (2009), Gorender (1987) and Rodrigues Sales (2007).

91 A detailed biography of Marighella is Magalhães (2012).

92 Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff was a member of the VAR.

93 The total number of people trained between 1967 and 1970 was ninety-two (Rodrigues Sales 2007: 68).

94 Segundo Domingos Fernandes, a member of the ALN and a trainee of the IV

Exército, quoted in Rollemberg (2001: 38).

95 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

96 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (18 January 2012).

97 Aldrighi (2001: 15–18). In 1973, the year of the start of the Uruguayan dictatorship, the inflation rate was even higher, 70 per cent.

98 Here I follow Rey Tristán (2005, 2006: 63 ff.), who presents a panoramic account of the entire Uruguayan armed left. Another good source on the

MLN–T is the comparative study of Torres (2012) about the Uruguayan

Tupamaros and the Chilean MIR.

99 Interview with Ariel Collazo (Montevideo, 10 November 2011) by Eduardo Rey Tristán.

100 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

101 See medios.presidencia.gub.uy/jm_portal/2011/noticias/NO_B889/tomo1/1-sec1- cronologia-hechos-represivos/5_movimiento_tupamaro.pdf

(accessed

11 June 2015) for a day-to-day chronology. For a detailed analysis of the evolution of the MLN–T, see Rey Tristán (2006: 96 ff.).

102 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

103 See Rey Tristán (2006: 129–30).

104 Here I follow the Final Report of the Centro Nacional de la Memoria Histórica (CNMH 2013: 110 ff.).

105 Numbers quoted in Gott (1971: 224).

106 See CNMH (2013: 123).

107 Here I follow Luis Eduardo Celis Méndez (interview, 13, 14 and 15 December 2011, Havana).

108 His second-in-command was Víctor Medina Morón, a dissident member of the Communist Party.

238 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

109 Interview with Luis Eduardo Celis Méndez (13, 14 and 15 December 2011, Havana).

110 Manuel Piñeiro in an interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (1999: 29).

111 Anderson (1977: 623).

112 There is a controversy among Che’s biographers about Che’s relation with Fidel and Raúl when he departed on his campaign in the Congo. Castañeda

(1997) implies a rupture of their friendship and Anderson (1977) and

Reid-Henry (2009) let their friendship prevail. I follow Anderson’s and

Reid-Henry’s interpretation.

113 From Prague, he had predicted to his trusted vice-minister of industry, Orlando Borrego, the eventual implosion of the Soviet Union as an economic and political system (interview in Página 12-El País (Argentina), 15

June 2003, www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/elpais/1-21445-2003-06-15.html,

accessed 10 July 2015).

114 Manuel Piñeiro in an interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (1999: 35).

115 After the catastrophic intervention in the Congo, Osvaldo Cárdenas was asked to keep the original version of Che’s Congo diary. He still reflects on the fact that most of the Cuban combatants who accompanied Guevara,

particularly comandante Víctor Drecke and José María (Papi) Martínez Tamayo, knew that the Congo mission would end badly and could never be

successful. They had accompanied Che Guevara out of personal loyalty. But when Guevara told them that they were free to leave but that he would stay, they preferred unanimously to continue fighting: ‘with the courage’, says Cárdenas, ‘that reminds me of the battle of Thermopylae’. Piñeiro told him to take care and safeguard the original. In September 1982, when Cárdenas was appointed ambassador to Surinam, he asked Piñeiro what to do with the diary. ‘Give it to me,’ he told him. Piñeiro passed the original copy to Fidel (interview with Osvaldo Cardenas, 18 January 2012).

116 Orlando Borrego, Che Guevara’s vice-minister for industry, interview in Página 12-El País (Argentina), 15 June 2003, www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/

elpais/1-21445-2003-06-15.html, accessed 10 July 2015.

117 Manuel Piñeiro in an interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (1999: 26–7). Also confirmed by Fidel Castro (Ramonet 2008: 333): ‘Che [was] fully supported by us, according to promises made.’

118 In this section I make use of the works by Anderson (1977), Castañeda (1997), James (2001 [1969]) – a hostile but interesting one, because he had abundant access to relevant CIA sources at that time – Lahrem (2005, 2010) and Reid-Henry (2009). I also consulted the elaborate analysis of Rot (2010), also a biography of Masetti.

119 Manuel Piñeiro in an interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (1999: 26).

120 Ibid.: 27.

121 Fidel Castro in Ramonet (2008: 333–4).

122 The operation was so secretive that nobody at the Cuban embassy in La Paz was informed about the campaign (interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille, 21 October 2011).

123 Ulises, a ladies’ man, was declared persona non grata in Bolivia after a love affair with the wife of a high functionary, in February 1962. Upon his return to Cuba, Piñeiro sidelined him for a couple of months, but on his first day

Notes to Chapter 4 | 239

in the office he told him: ‘So, you bedded her. Well, that is what we Cubans do,’ and put him in charge of the training of the first Peruvian combatants of Operation Matraca (interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille, 21 October 2011).

124 In an interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (1999: 28), Manuel Piñeiro also mentions Cooke’s wife Alicia Eguren, a friend of Che Guevara. In Bolivia, the brothers Peredo and Rodolfo Saldaña assisted the Cuban emissaries and the first members of Masetti’s group.

125 Interview with Alberto Castellanos (27 February 2012).

126 The number is mentioned by Fidel Castro (Ramonet 2008: 333). Castellanos was instructed to wait for Che Guevara, but when one of Masetti’s men was sick, he asked that he be incorporated into the expedition. He wrote a letter to Che and sent it back with Martínez Tamayo (Anderson 1977: 575).

127 Castellanos considers Masetti to have been murdered by the police; he had 30,000 dollars with him and two Rolexes (interview with Alberto Castellanos, 27 February 2012).

128 Castellanos learned about Peru from a copy of the Reader’s Digest, given to him in jail. But his accent is clearly Cuban. I lived for a number of years in Peru; I believe I can distinguish between the Andean melody and the Cuban staccato. Apparently the Argentinian police and prison guards couldn’t.

129 He told his family about his adventures in the late 1970s, when his son asked him to translate a text from Spanish into Russian and he couldn’t do it (interview with Alberto Castellanos, 27 February 2012).

130 Pereyra (2011 [1994]: 110–20).

131 Gillespie (1982: 76).

132 Ricardo Gadea, quoted in Anderson (1977: 535).

133 Lust (2013: 137, 277). Lust’s fine book is by far the most detailed analysis of the Peruvian guerrilla movements in the 1960s. See also his more recent article (Lust 2016) on the significance of the Peruvian guerrilla in Che Guevara’s continental project. This vision is confirmed by Angel Guerra (interview, 21

December 2011), who interviewed General Enrique Gallegos – one of the

authors of Velasco’s government Plan INCA, and afterwards the leading manager of the land reform and minister of agriculture in Velasco’s cabinet.

134 Lust (2013: 176). On the Bolivian and Peruvian communist parties, see Lust (2013: 177 ff.). See also the testimony of Ricardo Gadea in Lust (2013: 276).

135 Interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille (21 and 28 October 2011).

136 MIR combatant Ricardo César Napurí Schapiro, quoted in Lust (2013: 246).

137 Piñeiro, the highly intelligent Cuban overseer of Latin America’s armed left, may have had second thoughts about the campaigns. After being notified

about De la Puente’s death, he asked Martínez Heredia (2010: 139–40), the editor of Pensamiento Crítico at the time: ‘You who are so intelligent, can you explain to me how it could happen that De la Puente, a Marxist-Leninist, went to the Sierra and was killed right away, and that prior to that Hugo Blanco, a Trotskyist, was hidden and provided for by the peasants?’

138 Ricardo Letts (pseudonym Américo Pumaruna), another leftist Peruvian who headed Vanguardia Revolucionaria (Revolutionary Vanguard), a movement whose members would create the parliamentary left in the 1980s), also stayed in Cuba. Eventually Béjar’s memoirs (Béjar 1969) received the Premio de la Casa de las Américas in Cuba and Letts’ harsh analysis of the situation

240 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

(Letts 1967) was published in Pensamiento Propio, the leading Cuban journal about movements of the left under the editorship of Martínez Heredia.

It was followed by several pages of critique by the editor. Blanco (1972) also wrote his memoirs.

139 General Jorge Fernandez Maldonado, then prime minister and one of the authors of Velasco’s Plan INCA and between 1968 and 1976 minister of

energy and mining, quoted in Kruijt (1994: 55; I retranslated the last sentence from its original Spanish).

140 See Webber (2011) for a detailed historical account.

141 Fidel Castro quoted in Ramonet (2008: 336–7).

142 Manuel Piñeiro in an interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (1999: 32).

143 In a footnote clarifying the interviews of Fidel Castro with Ramonet (2008: 733), all fifteen men and their noms de guerre are mentioned; four of them were comandantes and three were captains of the Ejército Rebelde.

144 Manuel Piñeiro in an interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (1999: 32).

145 Fidel Castro says, in retrospect: ‘I think that Che should have made a greater effort in the interest of unity; that’s my opinion. His personality led him to be very frank […]. Monje was ambitious and his aspirations were rather ridiculous; he wasn’t prepared to lead a guerrilla’ (Ramonet 2008: 339).

146 Manuel Piñeiro in an interview with Luis Suárez Salazar (1999: 35) and Fidel Castro, quoted in Ramonet (2008: 337–8). The two versions vary slightly in details.

147 Dunkerley explains part of Guevara’s failure as the result of the support of the Bolivian indigenous peoples for the president. His Quechua adherence

brought him his ‘regionalist backing and something of an indigenous iden-

tity’, and also his ‘significant popularity’ (Dunkerley 1992: 2, 4).

148 In June 1997 a Cuban forensic team, headed by Professor Jorge González and assisted by Argentinian forensic anthropologists, exhumed the remains of Che Guevara. His hands were hidden in a closet in Bolivia for years and then transported to Moscow by representatives of the Partido Comunista

Boliviano. A KGB general tipped off his Cuban counterpart, Carlos Antelo, who all but assaulted the head of the Bolivian delegation, pistol in hand: ‘I pushed open the door of his room, my Makarov pistol in hand, and told him:

“I’m here for the hands. Give them to me or I’ll give you a shot in the head right now”. He told me they were in the closet. I opened the cupboard and they were actually there: Che’s hands, with the death mask and a match box with two bullets, I suppose the bullets that killed him’ (interview with Carlos Antelo, 24 and 27 October 2011).

149 Rodríguez Ostria (2009: 552). Rodríguez Ostria is the historian of the second Bolivian ELN.

150 In the late 1980s, a new guerrilla movement with indigenous and Marxist tendencies emerged, the Ejército Guerrillero Tupac Katari (EGTK), named

after the rebellious indigenous leader of the eighteenth century. The prevalent indigenous part was headed by Felipe Quispe Huanca and the Marxist

minority segment by Álvaro García Linera, who later became Bolivia’s vice-president in 2006. In October 1988 they visited the Cuban embassy,

offering US$30,000 to buy Cuban weapons. The political councilor, Santi-

ago Salas, was astonished: ‘Ever since the death of Che Guevara, we have

Notes to Chapters 4 and 5 | 241

never been offered money. All Bolivian parties of the Left did ask Cuba for money to initiate an armed struggle.’ He consulted Havana and the answer

was negative. But he provided a contact with the Peruvian Movimiento

Revolucionario Tupac Amaru (MRTA) (Quispe 2009: 39–40).

151 Ambassador Iruegas in Toussaint (2013: 128).

152 His writings on economy and society were less appreciated. In 1996, Guevara’s collected works on the economy, El Che en la Revolución Cubana, published in seven volumes of 650 pages each and edited by his vice-minister, Orlando Borrego, were published with a limited edition of only 320 copies (interview with Fernando Martínez Heredia, 2 March 2012). Only in the mid-1980s

did Carlos Tablada revive Che’s writings and the volumes he then published were acclaimed and translated into many languages. Finally, the Cuban editorial house José Martí republished Borrego’s original 1966 edition between 2013 and 2015. The final two volumes were launched on 9 October 2015

at the Instituto de Investigación Cultural ‘Juan Marinello’ (ICIC), whose director general is Martínez Heredia.

153 Gott (1971: 9). He had already written the same statement, in Spanish, in 1968 (Gott 1968: 558).

154 Castañeda (1997: 391ff.).

155 Lahrem (2005: 131–9).

156 The Latin American discussion continues to the present. For efforts at revalorization, see Lora (2011) and Vásquez Viaña (2012).

Chapter 5: The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s)

1 Duncan (1985: 87 ff.). The contingent of Soviet specialists increased from 1,000 in the early 1960s to 6,000 by 1975; of them, 50 per cent were military specialists (ibid.: 101).

2 Until the late 1980s, every faculty of the University of Havana had a Russian adviser and the PhD candidates travelled to Moscow to write and defend

their doctoral dissertations (interview with Enrique López Oliva, former

professor at the University of Havana, 3 November 2013).

3 The statistics are from Pavlov (1994: 76).

4 Ibid.: 83.

5 Ibid.: 77.

6 Here I follow Pérez Rojas, one of Cuba’s foremost agricultural experts (interview with Niurka Pérez Rojas, 9 October 2011). See also Deere et al. (1998) and Jiménez Güethon (2009). The Agrarian Reform process is analysed in Valdés (2003).

7 Data mentioned by Sergio Guerra Vilaboy, head of the Department of History at the University of Havana, during a seminar at the Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, 24 April 2014.

8

Data from Guerra Vilaboy and Maldonado Gallardo (2005: 129) and

Domínguez Guadarrama (2013: 136–8).

9 For the first generation of FAR officers, see Vellinga (1976).

10 See, for instance, Báez (1996).

11 Duncan (1985: 101).

12 Latell (2003: 10).

242 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

13 Interview with Niurka Pérez Rojas (9 October 2011).

14 Latell (2003: 11).

15 Duncan (1985: 108–9).

16 See Fornet (2007).

17 Pavlov (1994: 97 ff.).

18 Mesa-Lago (1982: 3).

19 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (18 January 2012). At that moment, Cárdenas was head of the Caribbean section.

20 Interview with Norberto Hernández (19 and 25 October 2011).

21 For the evolution of the ECLAC ideas in Dependency Theory, see Guzmán (1976).

22 Interview with Carlos Piedra (21 November 2012). His successor as secretary-general of the MEC, Reinerio Arce, was also strongly influenced by Camilo Torres and Liberation Theology (interview with Reinerio Arce, 13

February 2012).

23 Interview with Luis Morejón (1 March 2012).

24 Interview with Fernando Martínez Heredia (2 March 2012).

25 In October 2015 Frei Betto was one of the keynote speakers at the international symposium about the Cuban Revolution, organized by the Instituto de Historia de Cuba (an institute established by the Central Committee). The day before his discourse, he received a doctorate honoris causa from the University of Havana. His laudation was given by Fernando Martínez Heredia.

26 Interview with Luis Morejón (1 March 2012).

27 Harmer (2011: 27).

28 See Walter (2010) for a detailed analysis of the diplomatic relations between Peru and the United States.

29 Kruijt (1994: 105).

30 Interview with Jorge Luis Joa (27 October 2011).

31 Ayacucho was the city where the last battle in Latin America took place, between victorious Marshal Sucre and the last Spanish army under Viceroy De la Serna.

32 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

33 Interview with Angel Guerra (21 December 2011).

34 Interview with Fabian Escalante Font (21 December 2011).

35 Here I use the publications of Ford González (2009), Martínez (1982), Rodríguez V. (2008) and Zárate and Vargas (2011).

36 Omar Torrijos in a speech to the Chiefs of State or Government at the Sixth NO-AL Summit in Havana, September 1979 (Zárate and Vargas 2011: 255–61).

37 Interview with Diplomat A (2011).

38 Interview with Norberto Hernández Curbelo (19 and 25 October 2011).

39 ‘Comandante’ is an army term for a major in Cuba and for a lieutenant colonel in Peru and Venezuela. In 1974 then cadet Hugo Chávez had participated in the international celebration of the 150th anniversary of the battle of Ayacucho, Peru (the last battle against the royalist Spanish troops in Latin America).

He had received a small booklet containing the public speeches of General Velasco and became an admirer of the leader of the Peruvian Revolutionary Government of the Armed Forces (Gott 2005: 35–6).

40 Here I draw on Harmer’s excellent analysis of the Allende government (2011).

41 Harmer (2011: 36); also Ulises Estrada Lescaille, who was his direct chief (interview, 21 and 28 October 2011).

Notes to Chapter 5 | 243

42 Harmer (2011: 52, 54).

43 Interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille (21 and 28 October 2011).

44 In 1985, when I interviewed General Jorge Fernandez Maldonado, he proudly showed me a Kalashnikov, a gift from Fidel; several of his colleagues had also received similar collector’s items.

45 Joa, who had prepared the stopovers in Peru and Ecuador as ‘Fidel’s private secretary’, sat next to General Guillermo Rodríguez Lara. At the time he was Chief of the General Staff and afterwards became the president of Ecuador after the coup in 1972. He was entertained by the fact that Rodriguez Lara permanently ridiculed the aged Ecuadorean civilian president (interview with Jorge Luis Joa, 27 October 2011).

46 Earlier in 1973, Zhou Enlai, China’s minister of foreign relations, had asked his visiting Chilean colleague Clodomiro Almeyda whether Allende had a

back-up plan in the event of a military takeover.

47 Interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille (21 and 28 October 2011).

48 The Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez (FPMR) was formed in Cuba, with the assistance of Ulises Estrada (interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille). See Rojas Nuñez (2011). The Cuban authorities, however, initially had reserves about an early guerrilla detachment in the 1970s (Harmer 2016).

49 Interview with Luis Rojas Nuñez (20 January 2012).

50 I follow Dominguez Guadarrama (2013: 146–7, 260–62) and Suárez Salazar and García Lorenzo (2008: 116–19).

51 Marques Bezerra (2010: 106–7).

52 Interview with Sergio Cervantes Padilla (10 February 2012).

53 Here I draw on Gillespie (1982) and Torres Molina (2011) for revolutionary Argentina.

54 By the 1960s, there had already been some previous, small efforts at guerrilla warfare; Masetti’s group was one of them. They all were subdued by overwhelming police forces.

55 The three founders of the Montoneros – Fernando Medina, Carlos Ramus and Mario Firmenich – were influenced by the Argentinian liberation theologist Carlos Mujica. In May 1974, Mujica (who later, as a pacifist, publicly distanced himself from the armed insurgency) was murdered, very probably

by the Alianza Argentina Anti-Comunista – the anti-communist paramili-

tary branch of the Peronist right. For more information about the influence of Cristianismo y Revolución, see Celesia and Waisberg (2011: 52–68) and Morello (2007).

56 Gillespie (1982: 89 ff.).

57 Torres Molina (2011: 48 ff.).

58 Gillespie (1982: 120).

59 Guerrero (2009) analyses in detail the convergences and disputes, the secessions and efforts to reunite, and the internal sectarianism and ostracism of the Montoneros and the ERP.

60 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

61 Ibid.

62 Servetto (2010: 242 ff.).

63 See the case studies of De Lise (2007), Gordillo (2007) and Campione (2007).

64 Torres Molina (2011: 108–9).

65 Gillespie (1982: 193–5).

244 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

66 Ibid.: 244 ff., and especially Lewis (2011) and Robben (2005). A comparison between the Argentinian and the Uruguayan dictatorship and its aftermath

can be found in Rey Tristán (2007).

67 Even in 1982, during the Falklands/Malvinas crisis, Cuba’s relations with Argentina became very friendly.

68 Celesia and Waisberg (2011: 302).

69 Ibid.: 286–91.

70 He went to Spain to study economics and received, in 1999, a PhD at the University of Barcelona; his thesis tutor was the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz.

71 Interview with José Antonio López (18 October 2011).

72 Interview with Norberto Hernández (19 and 25 October 2011).

73 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

74 Nearly all guerrilla movements that appeared in Colombia in the 1970s and 1980s, heterogeneous and fragmented as they were, had relations with the

Juventud Comunista – the youth wing of the Communist Party, among them

several future guerrilla leaders: Álvaro Fayad (first FARC, then M-19), Jaime Bateman (first FARC, then the founder of M-19), Iván Marino Ospina (first FARC, then M-19) and Carlos Pizarro (the last comandante of M-19).

75 Interview with Jorge García (13 February 2013). As an M-19 member, García served as a community worker in one of Bogotá’s poorest districts.

76 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

77 Interview with Luis Eduardo Celis Méndez (13, 14 and 15 December 2011, Havana).

78 Independently from Cuba, the M-19 maintained contacts with the Peruvian MRTA and its leader, Victor Polay (2009); see also Fournier (1991).

79 Interviews with Alejo Vargas about the ELN (15 December 2011, Bogotá), with Enrique Flores (20 February 2013, Bogotá) about the PRT, and with

Nelson Plazas (11 February 2013, Bogotá) and Álvaro Villaraga (13 Decem-

ber 2011, Bogotá) about the EPL. See also Villaraga and Plazas (1994) on the history of the EPL.

80 Interview with Norberto Hernández (19 and 25 October 2011).

81 In 1983, the office of the Colombian Attorney General published a report demonstrating that, of the 163 members of the MAS that were identified, sixty-nine of them were members of the armed forces (CNMH 2013: 137). About

the AUC, see CNMH (2013: 161–162, 170 ff., 179 ff.).

82 The paramilitary forces were assisted by the army, the police, the intelligence services, ‘many times in alliance with the drugs traffickers’ (CNMH 2013: 142). For a detailed one-volume analysis of the violence, see Pécaut (2001).

83 Interview with Enrique Flores (20 February 2013).

84 Interview with Jorge Luis Joa (27 October 2011).

85 Hernández and Giusti (2006: 296–7).

86 Interview with Norberto Hernández (19 and 25 October 2011).

87 Ibid.

88 Interview with Diplomat A (2011).

89 In fact, Hernández was never formally discharged as ambassador to Caracas.

The Venezuelan minister of foreign affairs resolved the situation by ‘accepting my letter of retirement while accepting at the same time my credentials as regular ambassador’; interview with Norberto Hernández (19 and 25 October 2011).

Notes to Chapter 5 | 245

90 In 1794 the French National Convention had abolished slavery in all colonies but Napoleon had reinstated it in 1802.

91 See Hernández (2011) and Ceceña et al. (2011).

92 Otto Marrero, former head of the Caribbean Section of the Department of International Relations of the Central Committee, comments that Jamaicans and other English-speaking Caribbean residents in Cuba generally engage

in amorous relations with Cubans of the opposite sex more quickly than,

for instance, Argentinians, who share the same language (conversation,

5 December 2012).

93 In 1983, Grenada and Surinam had suspended or broken off their relations with Cuba; Grenada re-established its relations in 1992 and Surinam in 1995.

94 See Kaufman (1985).

95 In 1986, Aruba was separated from the remaining five Netherlands Antilles.

The Antilles were formally dissolved in 2010. Aruba, Curação and Saint

Maarten became ‘countries’ and Bonaire, Saba and Saint Eustatius acquired the status of ‘special municipalities’ within the kingdom.

96 See Livingstone (2009: 47) on the CIA’s involvement in destabilization policies against the PPP.

97 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (18 October 2012).

98 Interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille (21 and 28 October 2011).

99 I also draw on Kaufman (1985).

100 Interview with Humberto Castañeda (8 November 2012).

101 Kaufman (1985: 146).

102 Interviews with Osvaldo Cárdenas (28 January 2012) and Ulises Estrada Lescaille (18 and 21 October 2011).

103 During one of the many riots, Jamaican junior minister of security Roy McGann was fatally wounded. McGann was a personal friend of Estrada.

When he was informed about the shooting, he called the Cuban chief of the medical brigade for assistance and went with a group of armed embassy functionaries to the hospital. When he arrived, McGann was deceased (interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille, 18 and 21 October 2011).

104 Later, Estrada was appointed ambassador in Yemen; he pursued his career at MINREX.

105 After merging his own Movement for Assemblies of the People (MAP) with the already existing Joint Endeavour for Welfare, Education and Liberation (JEWEL).

106 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (28 January 2012).

107 Ibid.

108 Interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille (18 and 21 October 2011).

109 Livingstone (2009: 89).

110 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (28 January 2012).

111 Livingstone (2009: 89–90) and Nieto (2003: 390–95).

112 Here I draw on Hoogbergen and Kruijt (2005) and Reeser (2015), and on the interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (28 January 2012), Cuban ambassador to

Surinam from 1982 to 1983.

113 The Netherlands Antilles government gently declined the offer of independence as ‘premature’.

114 Interview with Osvaldo Cárdenas (28 January 2012).

246 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

115 Ronny Brunswijk, a Maroon who launched a guerrilla movement against Bouterse and the elected government in the late 1980s. The war had a death toll of several hundred victims and resulted in the enormous migration of tens of thousands of Maroons to neighbouring French Guyana (Hoogbergen and

Kruijt 2005: 113ff.).

116 The official language is Dutch but the street language is Sranan Tongo, a language with African and English roots, which is spoken and understood

only in Surinam.

117 At least, the staff of the Brazilian embassy was not informed about Venturini’s mission.

118 See Bessa (2009) and Domínguez Ávila (2011).

119 Officially, because of Cárdenas’ involvement with parties of the left that were not Bouterse’s choice. Cárdenas had also criticized the extrajudicial killings of Bouterse’s adversaries.

120 Interview with Humberto Castañeda (8 November 2012).

121 His relations with the Netherlands are icy; there he was condemned for large-scale drug trafficking. The Dutch supported – with juridical assistance and intelligence – the indictment process against the participants in the ‘December murders of 1982’, a judgement that was suspended at the

beginning of Bouterse’s presidency in 2012.

122 In this book I will limit my analysis to the role of Cuba. For the American involvement, see LeoGrande (1998); for the engagement of the Soviets, see Paszyn (2000).

123 Interviews with Ramiro Abreu (9 October 2011) and Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011). Abreu was head of the Central American section of the

Departamento América from 1975 to 2010. Fernando Ravelo was vice-chief

of the Departamento América from 1981 to 1988, dealing with Mexico and

Central America, and was appointed Cuba’s ambassador to Nicaragua in 1989.

124 Although insistent about the necessity of unitary umbrella organizations, Cuba never threatened to withdraw its political and material support (interview with Ramiro Abreu, 9 October 2011).

125 See Bataillon (2008), Dunkerley (1988) and Torres-Rivas (2011). For the case of Nicaragua, see Alegría and Flakoll (2004) and Martí y Puig (1997).

For El Salvador, see Cabarrús (1983), De Giuseppe (2006) and Ibarra Chávez (2015). For Guatemala, see Le Bot (1995, 2009).

126 See Gustavo Porras’ memoirs (2009). Porras, a former member of the Ejército Guerrillero de los Pobres (EGP), was the government’s peace negotiator in 1996 and one of the signatories of the peace agreements.

127 Canizales Vijil (2012).

128 Kruijt (2008: 44–7); see also Bataillon (2008, 2013).

129 Interview with Julio López Campos (2 June 2011). López was the chief of the Sandinista Department of International Relations until 1990.

130 The Nicaraguan Socialist (Communist) Party agreed but remained an ally of Somoza (interview with Ulises Estrada Lescaille, 21 and 28 October 2011).

131 Interview with Jorge Luis Joa (27 October 2011).

132 Tomás Borge in conversation with Fidel Castro (Castro Ruz 1992: 40).

133 Cuban intelligence could intercept telephone conversations among officers of the National Guard, especially Major Bravo – commander of the Guard force

Notes to Chapter 5 | 247

that contested the Sandinista Southern Front. Bravo first called his wife and then his lover in Managua. The information was transferred to the Sandinista command (interview with Fabian Escalante Font, 21 December 2011).

134 Interview with the Chilean-Cuban artillery officer Luis Rojas Nuñez (20

January 2012). The Chilean contingent, formed by exiled former medical

students of the Chilean Communist Party in Cuba, was headed by a Chilean

whose nom de guerre was Salvador. Rojas and his co-officers later formed the Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez (FPMR), which launched a guerrilla campaign in Pinochet’s Chile in the 1980s. See also Rojas Nuñez (2011).

135 The urban Frente Interno (Internal Front) was headed by Joaquín Cuadra Lacayo, who was one of only two generals of the Sandinista Army after

1979; Humberto Ortega was minister of defence and Joaquín Cuadra was

Chief of the General Staff.

136 Here I draw on José Luis Moreno del Toro (interview 5 December 2011), traumatologist and poet, who was a member of the first medical brigade that arrived.

137 The Soviet Union provided the heavy equipment and oil imports.

138 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

139 Interview with Julio López Campos (2 June 2011).

140 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

141 Interview with Joaquín Cuadra Lacayo, Chief of the General Staff, in Kruijt (2008: 106).

142 An interesting biography of Lenin Cerna is Manzanhão (2014).

143 Interview with Fabián Escalante Font (21 December 2011). He published his memoirs about his Nicaraguan years (Escalante Font 2006, 2009). Montero

also became an adviser to Humberto Ortega.

144 See Merino (2011: 35). See also Martín Álvarez (2013 and 2016). About the radicalizing Catholic student movement, see Cáceres Prendes (2013).

145 Abreu (2013: 194).

146 Sánchez Cerén in his memoirs (2009: 199–206).

147 Interview with Rodrigo Abreu (9 October 2011).

148 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

149 Kruijt (2008: 75–6).

150 Interview with Fedora Lagos Aguirre (7 February 2012). This book is not the place for an in-depth analysis of extrajudiciary executions in El Salvador.

Two eminent historians with combat experience in the FMLN made com-

ments about the killing of captured adversaries and/or executions of ‘traitors and counter-revolutionaries’: Mario Vázquez (interview 3 September 2015)

and Jorge García (interview 15 July 2015). Juárez Ávila mentions the possibility of several hundred victims.

151 Interview with Jorge Juárez Ávila (15 July 2015).

152 Ibid.

153 For Handal’s political trajectory, see López Bernal (2015).

154 For the political evolution of the post-1992 FMLN, see Rey Tristán and Cagiao Vila (2011), Juárez Ávila (2013) and Sprenkels (2014).

155 Interview with Héctor Rosada-Granados (14 April 2010). Rosada-Granados was the government peace negotiator between 1993 and 1996.

156 Interview with Jorge Luis Joa (27 October 2011).

248 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

157 Interview with Fernando Ravelo Renedo (17 October 2011).

158 Through Edgar Ponce, the vice-president of the political committee of Rios Montt’s State Council (Kruijt 1999: 49, 61).

159 See Stanley (2013) about the role of MUNIGUA (Misión de Verificación de las Naciones Unidas en Guatemala, United Nations Mission for the Verification of Human Rights).

160 Here I draw on Becerra (2009) and Canizales Vijil (2012).

161 Interview with Humberto Castañeda (8 November 2012).

162 Canizales Vijil (2012: 11).

163 Interview with Humberto Castañeda (8 November 2012).

164 Interview with José Luis Moreno del Toro (5 December 2011), a traumatologist who participated in the first medical mission to Nicaragua in 1979.

165 Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (Nationalist Republican Alliance), a right-wing party, founded in 1981.

166 Abreu (2013: 192). D’Aubuisson refused the offer but he and his family appreciated the gesture.

Chapter 6: The years of soft power (1990s–present)

1 A fine analysis of this process can be found in Judt (2006: 559ff.).

2 For a detailed analysis, see Applebaum (2013) and Gellately (2013); see also Rodríguez García (2014).

3 Diplomat A (interview, 2011).

4 According to his memoirs (Noriega and Eisner 1997: 65–81).

5 According to his memoirs (ibid.: 200–201, 213).

6 Diplomat A (interview, 2011).

7 Ibid.

8 Interview with Alberto Cabrera (14 February 2012); Cabrera was minister councillor at the Cuban embassy. On the night of the invasion he was detained by CIA officers but his ambassador, Lázaro Mora, went with him. Two hours later a military officer chauffeured them back to the embassy; officially, they were detained because they were undocumented.

9 Interviews with Alberto Cabrera (14 February 2012) and Lázaro Mora (8

and 9 February 2012).

10 Joaquín Cuadra Lacayo, chief of staff of the Sandinista army in the 1980s, quoted in Kruijt (2008: 125).

11 See Pavlov (1994: 111 ff.), Gorbachev’s translator and adviser on Latin America and especially Cuba, for the conflicting ideas between the Soviet Union and Cuba about economic and political reforms. I draw here on his

and Bain’s (2007) comments about the Soviet policy towards Cuba and Nic-

aragua in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

12 Shorthand version of Fidel Castro’s speech, www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discur-

sos/1988/esp/f260788e.html, accessed 25 December 2015.

13 Here I draw on Pavlov (1994: 185 ff.).

14 On 8 October 2015 I was one of the co-organizers of a seminar in Havana, hosted by the Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales (FLACSO),

incorporated into the University of Havana. The seminar was about the con-

Notes to Chapters 5 and 6 | 249

sequences of the downfall of the socialist bloc in Europe. The proceedings are not yet published; I quote from the original transcription of the recordings of roughly twenty participants (page 22).

15 See Bain (2007: 63–6); Pavlov (1994: 231–9) blames Yeltsin and the new power structure that had emerged after the failed coup effort.

16 Pavlov (1994: 244).

17 Memorandum of a conversation between Raúl Castro and Yuri Andropov, 29

December 1982, digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/117966, accessed

15 December 2015.

18 Latell (2003: 11).

19 Bain (2007: 51).

20 Conversations with General Julio Balconi in Cuba, October 2003, when we wrote the final draft of Balconi and Kruijt (2004) in Havana.

21 Klepak (2000: 3ff., 2005: 47ff.)

22 Diplomat A (interview, 2011).

23 Interview with Jorge Juárez Ávila (15 July 2015).

24 Klepak (2005: 143, 254ff.).

25 Interviews with Jorge Bernal (31 July 2012) and Dora Carcaño (6 February 2012). Bernal was the Cuban CTC leader (Central de Trabajadores de Cuba)

and the country’s representative to the Latin American branch of the com-

munist labour movement; Carcaño was the Cuban FMC leader of the Latin

American branch of the communist women’s movement.

26 Klepak (2000: 3).

27 A full account of Cuba’s economy is beyond the scope of this book. For more general studies, see Pérez Villanueva (2006, 2010) and Dominguez et al.

(2012).

28 28 Gott (2004: 288).

29 I quote from the original transcript of the FLACSO seminar of October 2015

referred to above (pages 30–31).

30 For Cuba’s relations with the European Union, see Roy (2009).

31 For Cuba’s agriculture in the post-Soviet years, see Nova González (2013).

32 See Carmona Báez (2002: 195–215).

33 See Del Castillo et al. (2005), Xalma (2007), Fuentes (2008) and Henken and Ritter (2014).

34 Zabala Argüelles (1997), Espina Prieto (2005), Togores González (2005) and Martínez-Fernández (2014: 200–203).

35 See Ritter (2015).

36 Interview with Jorge Juárez (16 July 2015).

37 For an account of this ‘Habanazo’, see Gott (2004: 298–9).

38 I quote from the original transcript of the FLACSO seminar of October 2015

referred to above (pages 26–7).

39 For a detailed analysis, see Carbonel (2007) and especially Klepak (2009, 2012).

40 The Ejército Juvenil de Trabajo (Youth Labour Army, EJT); interview with Niurka Pérez Rojas (9 October 2011); see also Klepak (2014: 52).

41 Klepak (2009: 120–21).

42 Colomé Ibarra resigned as minister of MININT in October 2015 for health reasons (probably Parkinson’s disease); previously, in December 2013, he had ceded his functions as vice-president of the Council of State ‘in favour of a new

250 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

generation’. He was succeeded at MININT by his first vice-minister, General Carlos Fernández Gondín.

43 Mora (2007) provides a fine analysis of this process.

44 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011).

45 In 1997, Piñeiro also gave up his membership in the Central Committee and all other functions in order to write his memoirs, which he never finished.

Piñeiro died in a car crash in March 1998; he was entombed with military

honours after a eulogy by Fidel, which was attended by all of the senior Party and cabinet members. His death was lamented by his former colleagues.

46 Hernández (2005: 155).

47 I quote from the original transcript of the FLACSO seminar of October 2015

referred to above (pages 29–30).

48 Here I follow Dilla Alfonso (2005).

49 See Giuliano (1998), who reached the same conclusion, for a detailed and documented account.

50 For a general overview of Latin America’s foreign policies, see Gardini and Lambert (2011).

51 I consulted Arnson et al. (2007) about the chronology of the peace talks in Colombia.

52 I do not mention the Zapatista guerrilla movement that started in 1994 in Chiapas, Mexico’s southernmost state. The EZLN (Ejército Zapatista de

Liberación Nacional, Zapatista National Liberation Army) and its leader

Rafael Guillén (Subcomandante Marcos) quickly acquired national popular-

ity. Notwithstanding their Che Guevara symbols and rhetoric, Cuba never

had a relationship with the EZLN. Immediately after the outbreak of the

guerrilla and the occupation of the capital of Chiapas, San Cristóbal, the Mexican government sent high-ranking delegates to negotiate. They reached an agreement on non-fighting civilian protest operations and the federal government promised pro-indigenous reforms. Additionally, Chiapas became a

paramilitary base. For studies about the EZLN, see Le Bot with Najman

(1997), Le Bot (2009), Arnson and Benítez Manaut (2000) and Stephen

(2002). For a fine analysis of Latin America’s peace agreements, see Arnson (1999).

53 Here I draw on Balconi and Kruijt (2004) and Kruijt (2008: 144–53).

54 Interview with Ramiro Abreu (25 October 2011); see also Abreu (2013).

55 Castro Ruz (2009).

56 Interview with José Antonio López (18 October 2001 and 1 December 2012).

57 In 2007 another exchange of prisoners took place under the auspices of President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, who was asked to mediate.

58 ASR (2012: 3).

59 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011).

60 Ibid.

61 Here I draw on Feinsilver (1989, 1993, 2010), Kirk (2012) and Kirk and Erisman (2009) with regard to Cuba’s medical assistance. On Cuba’s civilian assistance, see also Kumaraswami (2012).

62 Discussion with and presentation by ambassador Pedro Ross Leal, ‘La cooperación cubana con Angola en los primeros años de la independencia y en el

Notes to Chapter 6 | 251

período 2005–2012’, at the international symposium ‘La Revolución Cubana.

Génesis y desarrollo histórico’, organized by the Instituto de Historia de Cuba, 13–15 October 2015 (taped).

63 Discussion with and presentation by Noemí Benítez y de Mendoza (Sociedad Cultural José Martí), ‘Internacionalismo y política exterior de la Revolución Cubana’, at the international symposium La Revolución Cubana. Génesis y

desarrollo histórico’, organized by the Instituto de Historia de Cuba, 13–15

October 2015 (taped).

64 www.ecured.cu/Colaboraci%C3%B3n_M%C3%A9dica_Cubana, accessed 12 January 2016.

65 Kirk and Erisman (2009: 8, 12).

66 Huish (2014: 188ff.).

67 Interview with Maritza González Bravo, academic vice-rector of the ELAM

system (9 November 2012).

68 Interview with Yoandra Muro Valle, former vice-rector of the ELAM and chief of the medical brigade to Guatemala after Hurricane Mitch (9 November 2012).

69 Kirk and Erisman (2009: 134ff.) provide the specifics about Cuba’s medical assistance in Latin America and the Caribbean. For a testimonial account of the medical missions in Africa, see López Blanch (2005).

70 The most recent example is that of Honduras, where progressive president Zelaya was ousted by a military coup. The Cuban government decided not to retire their medical personnel and the new Honduran administration continued to pay their counterpart obligations.

71 Granma, 12 January 2016.

72 www.unesco.org/new/en/media-services/single-view/news/education_for_

all_2000_2015_only_cuba_reached_global_education_goals_in_latin_

america_and_the_caribbean/, accessed 12 January 2016.

73 On this programme, see Sánchez (2005) and Artaraz (2012).

74 A previous programme, Creole Literacy by Radio, was tested in Haiti in 1999

(interview with Javier Labrada, 8 November 2012). Labrada was a senior

adviser in Venezuela, Bolivia and Haiti.

75 Interview with Javier Labrada (8 November 2012).

76 For a detailed analysis, see Abendroth (2009).

77 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011).

78 Ibid.

79 In 1992, when, after the first hours of the coup, President Carlos Andrés Pérez appeared on TV and ordered the military in Caracas to remain loyal, Chávez surrendered in order to avoid a bloodbath. He was allowed to speak on TV to convince his comrades-in-arms in the parachutist and tank units to capitulate.

His speech had the following message: ‘Compañeros, unfortunately, for the moment (‘ por ahora’ in Spanish), the objectives that we had set for ourselves have not been achieved in the capital’ (Gott 2000: 70). This ‘ por ahora’ clause had made him famous and was never forgotten. According to Antelo (interview 24 and 29 October 2011), Chávez told him that he had spontaneously

inserted it during the transmission, without previous deliberation.

80 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011).

81 Interview with Jorge Luis Joa (27 October 2011).

252 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

82 Historian of a city is an important official function. Leal, the Historian of Havana, is also in charge of the reconstruction of the entire historical centre of Havana (2016).

83 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011).

84 Interview with Jorge Luis Joa (27 October 2011).

85 Interview with Carlos Antelo (24 and 27 October 2011).

86 Hernández and Giusti (2006: 416).

87 Bilbao (2002: 28–9). The interview took place on 28 December 2001 in Caracas.

88 Here I draw on Gott (2005), Bitar Deeb and Isidoro Losada (2015), Bruce (2008), Ellner (2008, 2013a) and Serbin (2010).

89 Bilbao (2002: 52).

90 Díaz Polanco (2008: 17). Also confirmed by Alberto Cabrera (interview 14

February 2012).

91 Díaz Polanco (2008: 51–3).

92 Ellner (2008: 121–7).

93 Fidel Castro quoted in Gott (2005: 285).

94 Lange quoted in Pérez Marcano and Sánchez García (2007: 176).

95 Chávez quoted in Martínez Heredia (2010: 79).

96 And six smaller Caribbean island-states between 2008 and 2014. After Honduras’ affiliation in 2008, a military coup ousted President Zelaya and withdrew its membership (2009).

97 In the case of Bolivia and Nicaragua, hydrocarbon and financial resources were provided with a minimum of paperwork and at least one Bolivian cabinet member lost a ministerial position after refusing to sign ‘documents authorizing disbursements without due control’.

98 See Clem and Maingot (2012), Gardini and Lambert (2011), Kozloff (2006), Lievesley and Ludham (2009), Raby (2011) and Trinkunas (2012).

99 See Lambie (2010: 216ff.).

Chapter 7: The legacy

1 Hoffmann (2009).

2 Here I draw on Alonso et al. (2001), Gratius (2008) and Mesa-Lago (2012).

A recent special issue of Latin American Perspectives (Diaz 2014) comprises several contributions about the reform programme. I also reflect on the effects of the reforms I observed between 2009 and 2015.

3 Here I follow Piccone and Tricunas (2014).

4 Here I follow Mgr Emilio Aranguren Echeverría, bishop of Holguín, who was in charge of the episcopal Human Rights Commission (interview, 4 August

2010; I interviewed the bishop accompanied by a Dutch journalist from Radio Netherland Worldwide, RNW).

5 On 12 February 2016, Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill, the heads of the Roman Catholic and the Russian Orthodox churches, met in Havana and

issued a common statement; this time Raúl Castro was the host.

Notes to Chapters 6 and 7 | 253

6 For the evolution of Latin America’s left from the 1990s to the present, see Carr and Ellner (1993) and Ellner (2013b). For a discussion about its character, see Petkoff (2005).

7 ‘ Cuba no exporta revoluciones, sino ideas’ – Che Guevara at a press conference in the United Arab Republic on 1 July 1959 (Borrego Díaz 2013b [1966]: 46).

8 For a more recent discussion, see Lora (2011).

9 ‘Yo no sé cuántos ministros, miembros de gabinete, dejaron voluntariamente sus cargos para irse al monte a pelear, a hacerse guerrillero’ (Alarcón de Quesada 2015).

10 The OSPAAAL also publishes the journal Tricontinental. I had a long interview with Lourdes Cervantes (19 November 2012), general secretary of the

OSPAAAL, about the functioning of this Third World organization. In 2013, its executive secretariat consisted of representatives from Angola, Congo, Chile, Cuba, El Salvador, Guinea-Bissau, Palestine, the People’s Republic of Korea, Puerto Rico, South Africa, Syria and Vietnam.

11 Cabrera, the representative, had excellent relations with José (Pepe) Mujica, who later became Uruguay’s president, and with ex-bishop Fernando Lugo,

afterwards president of Paraguay (interview with Alberto Cabrera, 14 February 2012).

12 Interview with Alberto Cabrera (14 February 2012). About the tense relations between the Ecuadorean government and the indigenous peoples, see Becker

(2013) and Bowen (2011).

13 Guatemala has slightly less than 15 million, Haiti and the Dominican Republic have somewhat more than 10 million, and Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua have populations between 6 and 8 million. The two Caribbean states with relatively large populations are Puerto Rico and Jamaica, each with 3 million inhabitants (2014).

14 Zanetti (2013: 15) remarks that ‘[…] the natural conditions and the strategic location of Cuba have influenced […] interpretations that are imbued with a certain geopolitical fatalism’.

15 Crandall (2008: 119, 124–8), Golinger (2010) and Corrales and Romero (2013: 48, 58–9).

16 See Raúl Castro’s presidential speech (Castro Ruz 2016).

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INDEX

Abrantes, José, 93, 183

Allende, Salvador, 9, 87, 119–20,

Abreu, Ramiro, 46, 91, 159, 171

128, 174, 196–7, 206; Fidel Castro

Academy of Sciences of the USSR,

friendship and support, 137–8

books of, 72

Almeida Bosque, Juan, 37, 41, 50

Ação Popular, Brazil, 90

ALN (Ação Libertadora Nacional),

Accíon Democrática, 101

Brazil, 104–5

Acción Libertadora, Cuba, 27–8

Altamirano, Carlos, 138

Acción Revolucionaria Oriental,

Alvarado, Percy, 98

Cuba, 44

Álvarez Martinez, Gustavo, 169

Adams, John Quincy, 16

Álvarez, Tania, 90

Afghanistan, USSR retreat from, 172

Amat, Carlos, 56–7

Afro-Caribbean Liberation

Ameijeiras, Efijenio, 32, 62

Movement, 154

Andropov, Yuri, 177

Agrarian Reform Law 1959, 124

Angola, 47, 91, 115, 126, 140, 153–5,

Ala Izquierdo Estudiantil, 23

183; Cuban civilian volunteers, 190; Alarcón, Ramiro, 206

Cuban military involvement, 9, 79;

Alarcón, Ricardo, 59

literacy programme, 191; proxy

ALBA (Alianza Bolivariana para los

war victory, 210

Pueblos de Nuestra América),

Antelo, Carlos, 193, 97, 194

10, 157, 169, 191, 198, 207;

anti-Castro movement, infiltrated,

Venezuela financed, 199

94–5, 98, infiltrated, 98

Aldabonazo, 35

Aramburú, Pedro Eugenio, execution

Alfonsín, Raúl, 143–4

of, 141

Algeria, 12, 83, 112; Algiers, 111; Arana, Colnel, 165

Cuban medical mission, 190;

Arbenz, Jacobo, 132; CIA ousted, 92;

Morocco conflict 1963, 83

CIA coup against, 68, 92, 99

Alianza Argentina Anticomunista

Arbesú Frage, José Antonio, 87, 127,

(AAA), 142

184, 187, 189, 195

Alianza Democrática, Colombia,

Arellano, López, 168

147, 149

Argentina, 8, 27; Communist Party,

Alianza Republicana Nacionalista

142–3; –Cuba, diplomatic relations, (ARENA), 165, 171

141; military dirty war, 143; Operation Allende, Beatriz, 137

Sombra, 112; 2015 elections, 212

Index | 275

Arismendi, R., 107

Blanco Rico, execution of, 30

Armas, Castillo, 68

Blanco, Hugo, 116

Asociación de Amigos de Aureliano,

Boff, Leonardo, 131

Cuba, 27

Bolívar, Simón, 15, 195

Asociación de Combatientes de la

Bolivia, 8, 10, 93, 113, 191, 206,

Revolución Cubana (ACRC), 6,

208; ALBA incorporated, 199;

61, 77; establishment of, 182

Cuban and Venezuelan support,

Asociación de Jóvenes Rebelde

192; indigenous ethnicities and

(AJR), 73

languages, 112, 120

Asociación de Veteranos y Patriotas

Borge, Tomás, 159–62

(AVP), Cuba, 22

Borja, Rodrigo 193

Asociación Nacional de Pequeños

Bouterse, Desi, 8, 151, 157;

Agricultores, 77

Cuba secret visit, 156

Association of Caribbean States, Cuba

brain drain, Cuban, 181

relations with, 151

Bravo, Douglas, 101–2

Association for Democracy, Surinam, 156

Brazil, 8, 27, 91, 208; –Cuba

Asturias, Rodrigo (Gaspar Ilóm),

rapprochement, 140;

166, 186

independence, 15; slavery history,

Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia, 145

150

Brezhnev, Leoneid, 148; USSR era

Balconi, Julio, 100, 186

of, 70

Baltonado, Mónica, 159

Brigada Latinoamericana, 130

Barco, Virgilio, 146

Brigada Venceremos, 130

Barquín, Ramón, 36

Brooks, Gaspar, 62

Barrientos, Ramón, 119

Bunge brothers, kidnapping of, 142

Barrow, Earl, 152

Burnham, Forbes, 151–4

barter economy, Cuba, 181

Buró para la Represión de las

Batista, Fulgencio, 1, 12, 23–4;

Actividades Comunistas (BRAC),

counter-insurgency failure,

29, 51; CIA designed, 29

40; coup by, 26; flight of, 41;

Buró Político, 185

insurgency against, 5, 7; US

Busch, Luis, 34, 38, 41, 61–2

support withdrawal, 37

bauxite, global price, 157

Cámpora, Héctor, 141

Bay of Pigs invasion 1962, Cuban

Cárdenas, Osvaldo, 84, 93, 105, victory, 2, 8, 65, 68, 72; Guyana

127, 154–7

Cuba support, 152; invasion

Caamanó, Francisco, 93–4

intelligence, 96

Cabral, Amilcar, 87

Bayo, Alberto, 92

Cabrera, Alberto, 86

Béjar, Héctor, 116–17

Caguán, Colombia demilitarized

Ben Bella, Ahmed, 111

zone, 11

Bengochea group, Argentina, 115

Caldera, Rafael, 194

Bergoglio, Jorge (Pope Francis), 204

Camacho, Julio, 62

Bermúdez, Morales, 134

Camp Colombia, Havana, 24

Betancourt, Belisario, 101, 146

Canada, 57, 67, 122; Cuba

Betto, Frei, 131

investment, 179

Bishop, Maurice, 9, 128, 151, 154, 156

Cantillo, Eulogio, 41

black market, Cuba, 180

Carazo Odio, Rodrigo, 149

276 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Cardeñas, Osvaldo, 84, 93, 105, 127,

Centro de Estudios de las Américas

152, 154–7

(CEA), Cuba, closure of, 184

Cardona, Miró, 61

Cerén, Salvador Sánchez, 162,

Cardoso, Fernando Henrique, 141

165, 208

Caribbean, the: Asian labour force,

Cerezo, Vinicio, 168, 186

150–1; states, 10

Cerna, Lenin, 160–1

Carmona Herdia, Héctor, 70

Cervantes Raúl, funeral of, 1

Carretero, Juan, 111

Cervantes, Sergio, 91, 140

Carrillo Hernández, Justo, 28

CGSB, Colombia, 146, 185, 206

‘Carta de Mexico’, 30

Chávez, Hugo, 5, 10, 128, 137, 174,

Casey, William, 173

192, 199–200, 207, 212; amnesty, Castellanos, Alberto, 113, 115;

150; coup against failure, 194;

imprisoned, 114

Cuban bodyguards, 197; Fidel

Castañeda, Humberto, 121, 169

Castro friendship, 203; Havana

Castro, Fidel, 4, 10, 12–13, 30–2,

invitation, 195; presidency, 196;

34, 38–9, 41–2, 45, 49, 52–3,

PSUV, 198

57, 62–3, 65, 67, 71, 73–4, 76,

Chibás, Eduardo, 25, 28; death of, 26,

80–1, 84–6, 90, 93, 101, 111, 113,

Eduardo, 25

117–18, 133, 136, 148–9, 158–9,

Children, El Salvador killings, 163

161, 163, 170, 182, 184–7, 190,

Chile, 8, 212; Communist Youth, 163;

198–9, 204–5, 210–11; access

Cuban embassy defense, 87, 139

to, 5; Allende friendship, 137;

China (PRC), 132

assassination attempts on, 99;

chivatos (snitches), 29, 58, 103

‘campaign against sectarianism’,

Chomón, Faure, 35

64; Chavez friendship, 150, 192–6,

CIA (Central Intelligence Agency),

203; China–USSR comment, 83;

USA, 29, 119, 173; agents in Peru,

Czechoslovak invasion support,

134; Arbenz ousting, 92; Contra

123; family background, 46; health

war, 160; Jamaica campaign, 153;

problems, 200; Mexico refuge, 29;

1960 Colombia mission, 109

nuclear missiles deployment, 69;

Cienfuegos, Camilo, 4, 32, 35, 41, 52,

‘reification of errors’ campaign,

70, 92

175; trial defence speech, 28, 55;

‘Club of Havana’, 16

Venezuela as regional leader idea,

Coard, Bernard, 155

193; war memoirs, 80

Cold War, 3, 26; end, Cuba

Castro, Raúl, 5, 28, 31–2, 37, 41,

consequences, 172

61, 63, 73, 77, 84, 111, 115, 177,

Collazo, Ariel, 106

186, 189–90, 196, 200, 203–4,

Colombia, 3–4, 6, 8, 14, 59, 86, 173;

210–11; armed forces organizer,

ceasefires, 189; Communist Party,

80; Catholic Church dialogue with,

109; Cuba peace process role,

203; CEA close down role, 185;

185, 187; –Cuba relations, 144;

family background, 46; military

guerrilla movements, 89, 109;

comrades management positions,

M-19, 11; mass murder period,

200; political generation shift, 201

108; Pacto Político por la Paz y la

Cayetona Carpio, Salvador (Marcial),

Democrataci, 147; peace processes,

161; suicide, 162

role, 147, 188, 207

Central America, 8; guerrillas, 6, 206

Colomé Ibarra, Abelardo, 113

Index | 277

Columbia University, New York

Cuba: ‘adventurism’; Africa focus,

COMACATE, Venezuela, 193

170; ageing generation, 211;

COMECON (Council for Mutual

annual growth 1975–85, 125;

Economic Assistance), 12, 97, 122,

anti-Batista exile groups, 34;

172; Cuba membership, 70, 123;

Caracas embassy, 193; –Caribbean

dissolution of, 171, 176

relations, 151; civilian–military

Comités de Defensa de la Revolución

dictatorship, 22; –Colombia

(CDR), Cuba, 76–7

relations history, 147; colonial

Comité del Exilio, anti-Batista, 34

history, 13–14, 16; COMECON

Communist Party of Cuba (PCC)

membership, 123; Communist

(ex-Socialist PSP), 5, 7, 22, 46, 63; Party, see above; Cuba Nacional

Batista collaboration, 27; Central

company founded, 25; eastern

Committee of, 47, 85, 87, 184;

region rebellion tradition, 28;

distrust of, 76; influence of, 73;

economic policy changes, 201;

insurrection ambiguity, 33; 1939

‘education for all’, 191; elite, 15; legalized, 24; M 26-7 formal

enforced austerity period, 10;

alliance, 40

exiles shelter, 80, 204; formal

Communist Parties: of Bolivia, 116,

independence, 7, 13; general

118; of Brazil, 104; of Chile, 139;

strike 1957, 32; generation shift,

of Colombia, 109; of Cuba, see

211; ‘Government of Lawyers’,

above; of El Salvador, 161; of

61 Guatemala guerrilla criticism,

Honduras, 168; of Paraguay, 94;

167; guerrilla movements unifying

of Peru, 116; of Uruguay, 107; of

attempts, 206; indigenous

Venezuela, 102

peoples disappearance, 13,

Community of the Caribbean, 152

121; informal economy, 180;

CONAIE, Ecuador, 208

insurgents religious upbringing,

Confederación de Estudiantes de

45; insurgents–communists

Cuba (CEC), Cuba, 22

conflicts, 75; intelligence services,

Confederación Nacional Obrera de

85; internationalism, 4, 190;

Cuba (CNOC), 22

ITT subsidiary, 54; late slavery

Congo, the 84, 87, 93, 111, 206;

abolition, 150; Latin American

failed Che campaign, 112

diplomatic relations, 140; legacy

Congo-Brazzaville, 47

of, 213; medical and literacy

Contra War; Contras, 175; Sandinista

teams, 170, 189–90, 207; Michael pyrrhic victory, 169

Manley visit, 153; migration rights,

Contreras, Miria, 137

202; national strike 1930, 23;

Cooke, John, 113, 115

nationalizations, 67; neo-colonial

Coordinadora Nacional Guerrillera

status, 20–1; Nicaragua military

(CNG), Colombia, 146

training, 160–1; nineteenth-

corruption, post-Cold War, 180, 183

century insurrections, 17; OAS

Costa Rica, 96, 140, 158

expulsion, 122; Oriente province,

counter-insurgency campaigns, 3, 18;

29; Panama embassy defence,

Guatemala, 100, 166

174; period of sectarianism,

crime, Special Period increase, 182

75; post Cold War/‘Special’

CTC (Central de Trabajadores de Cuba),

period, 179–82, 184, 194, 207;

24, 26, 76, 77; persecution of, 25

professional organizations, 33;

278 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

public sector, 25; quinquenio

Departamento de Investigaciones del

gris, 130; relative wealth, 27;

Ejército Rebelde (DIER), 84, 85

revolution export period, 82;

Departamento de Seguridad del

revolutionary generations shared

Estado (DSE), Cuba, 85–6, 99, 134

ethos, 43; revolutionary war

Dependency Theory, 9, 120, 128–9

criminal tribunals, 66; Socialist

Díaz Vallina, Ángela Elvira, 59, 63

Youth, 51; stability of, 208; third

Díaz-Canel, Miguel, 201

exodus, 182; –USA relations, 63,

Dirceo, 140

179, 210; USA invasion fear, 178;

Dirección General de Inteligencia

USSR dependencies period, 124,

(DGI), Cuba, 5, 85, 90

170, 210; USSR ideology influence,

Dirección General de Liberación

126; –USSR relations, 70, 83;

Nacional (DGLN), Cuba, 5, 86–7,

–Venezuela partnership, 197,

90, 105

203, 209; World War II economic

Directorio Estudiantil Universitario

success, 24

(DEU), Cuba, 22–3

Cuban Academy of History, 53

Directorio Revolucianorio Estudiantil

Cuban American National

(formerly Célula Central), 1, 23,

Foundation, 194; infiltrated, 99

30–1, 34–5, 44, 62

Cuban Communist Party, Central

dogmatism, Salvadorean, 161

Committee, 117

dollar remittances, Cuba, 180

Cuban Escuela de Lucha Urbana, 105

Dominican Republic, 13, 15, 58,

Cuban Institute of the United

92–3, 101, 208, 212, Caracoles

Nations, 57

Beach, 94; Colombia embassy

Cuban Revolution, ‘honeymoon’

stormed, 144, USA occupation

period, impact of, 3, 79

period, 21

Cuban Liberation Army, 18

Dorticós, Osvaldo, 63, 74

Cuban Missile Crisis, 66

dual currency system, Cuba

Comité de Unidad Campesina (CUC),

introduced, 179

Guatemala, 166

Duvalier, ‘Papa Doc’, overthrow

Cuesta, Ibarra, 74

attempt, 94

Czechoslovakia, USSR invasion, 123

Echevarría, José Antonio, 29–30, 35, 44

D’Aubuisson, Roberto, 171, 173

ECLAC, 128

Damas en Blanco, 203

Ecuador, 8, 10, 202, 208; ALBA De Céspedes, Carlos Manuel, 17, 52

incorporated, 199; Fidel trip to,

De Chamorro, Violeta, 169

138; OPEC joining, 136

De la Puente, Luís, 116–17

Edelstam, Harald, 139

De La Serna, José, 46

Eisenhower administration, USA, 38;

Debray, Regis, 118, 119

Castro overthrow plan, 66; Cuba

Del Valle, Amador, 53

invasion plan, 68

Deng Xiaoping, 201

Ejército de Liberación Nacional

Departamento América, 3–6, 8, 59,

(ELN): Bolivia, 118, 119; Chile,

84–7, 90–1, 127, 133, 140, 142–3,

137; Colombia, 91, 109–10, 144,

145–8, 150, 152, 157, 159, 162,

145; Peru, 90, 116

165, 167–8, 170, 173, 183–4, 187, Ejército Guerrillero de los Pobres

192, 194, 196, 204, 207, 209; (EGP), Guatemala, 98, 165; Cuban

peace negotiations role, 185

training, 166

Index | 279

Ejército Popular de Liberación (EPL):

Federación Anarquista Uruguayana

Colombia, 145

(FAU), Uruguay, 108

Ejército Rebelde, 38

Federación de Mujeres Cubanas

Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo:

(FMC), Cuba, 76

Argentina, 141–3; see also, PRT-Federación Obrera de La Habana, 22

ERP; El Salvador, 161

Fernández, Euleterio, 108

Ejército Zapatista de Liberación

Fernández, José Ramón, 193

Nacional (EZLN, Zapatistas), 9

Fernandez Oña, Luis, 137

El Salvador, 4, 10, 59, 91, 208; Cuba

Fernández Rueda, Carmen, 70

medical support, 162; guerrilla

Fernández Rueda, Laura, 70

organization, 89; Jesuit priests

FEU, Cuba, 22, 29, 34, 59, 77

murdered, 129; military stalemate,

Fideslistas, 2

169; solidarity committees for, 162;

Figueroa Araujo, María Antonia, 48

umbrella organization push, 162

First Declaration of Havana, 82

ELAM, 190; graduates, 191

First Tricontinental Conference,

Elba Alvarez, Consuelo, 50–1, 53

1966, 100

elite, traditional oligarchy, 14

Flores, Enrique, 146

Equatorial Guinea, Cuban aided

FMLN (Frente Farabundo Martí

medical school, 190

para la Liberación Nacional), El

Eritrea, Cuban aided medical

Salvador, 10, 89, 146, 162–3, 165,

school, 190

169, 206; Cuban medical treatment,

Escalante, Aníbal, 68, 72, 75–6

164; power struggle, 165

Escambray, counter-intelligence

Font, Fabian Escalante, 86, 95, 99,

operations, 87

134, 160–1

Escola Latina, Santiago de Chile, 128

Forés, Carlos Amat, 54

Espín, Vilma, 4, 56, 76

FPL, El Salvador, 161; Cuban artillery

Estrada, Ulises, 84, 86–7, 97, 111, 113,

training, 164

115, 127, 137–9, 153–4, 158–9

FPMR, Chile, 139

Ethiopia, 154, 183; Cuban aided

Franco, Francisco, 92

medical school, 190; Cuban

Freedom Flights, 66

military advisers, 79

Frente Argentino de Liberación (FAL),

Argentina, 115

Falange, Spanish priests sympathy

Frente Cívico de Mujeres Martianas,

for, 45

Cuba, 31

Fangio, Juan Manuel, 1958

Frente de Izquierda Revolucionaria

kidnapping, 36

(FIR), Peru, 116

FAR (Fuerzas Armadas

Frente Revolucionario de los

Revolucionarias): Argentina, 115,

Trabajadores (FRT), Uruguay, 108

141; Cuba, 77, 80, 102, 125, 170,

Frente Unido de Liberación Nacional

178, 182–3

(FULNA), Paraguay, 94

FARC, FARC-EP (Fuerzas Armadas

FSLN (Frente Sandinista de

Rebeldes de Colombia – Ejército

Liberación Nacional), Nicaragua,

Popular), 11, 109, 145; –Colombia

206; fragmentation, 158; unifying

government negotiations, 146, 148;

attempts, 159

El Caguán demilitarized zone, 187

Frente Unido de Acción

fear, 60

Revolucionaria (FUAR), 109

280 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación

Group of Twelve, Nicaragua, 159–60

Nacional (FALN), Venezuela, 102

Guantánamo, 20, 24; situation of, 212

Fuerzas Armadas Peronistas (FAP),

Guaraní language, 118

Argentina, 115

Guatemala, 4, 68, 91, 212; Cuba

Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes (FAR),

peace process role, 185–6; guerrilla

Guatemala, 90, 99, 165–6

umbrella structure pushed, 167;

Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias

peace agreements, 186, 207;

Orientales (FARO), Uruguay, 108

Liberation Theology influence,

158; 1960s guerrilla fiasco, 165;

Gálvez, José Luis, 54

peace negotiations, 10–11, 168

Gadea, Ricardo, 115

Guerra, Angel, 133

GAESA (Grupo de Adminicracion

guerrillas: Cuban ideas of warfare,

Empresorial), Cuba, 183

205; defeated rural, 121; strict

Gairy, Eric, 153

code of, 52

Gaitán, Jorge Eliecer, 108

Guevara, Che, 2, 4, 31–2, 34–5, 40–1,

Gallegos, Enrique, 133

46, 52–3, 61–2, 64–5, 68, 71,

Gambia, Cuban aided medical school,

73–4, 83–5, 87, 97, 99, 101–2,

190

111, 113, 115, 117–18, 129, García, Calixto, 18

141, 152, 165, 204 Africa travel, García, Lucas, 185

84; Bolivia plans of, 87; Bolivian

García, Maceo, 18

Diary, 119; China visit, 66; death García, Orlando

of at La Higuera, 108, 119, 122;

García-Bárcena, Rafael, 28

foco thesis, 80–1, 104, 205; iconic

García-Pérez, Gladys, 53

status, 121; Korda photograph of,

Gavira, César, 147, 187

122; tragic campaigns, 93

GDR (German Democratic Republic),

Guevara, Hilda, 115

97; model of, 124

Guevara, Tita, 51

Geisel, General, 140

Guinea-Bissau, 87, 91, 140; Cuban general strike 1958: plan, 37; failure, 38

aided medical school, 190

Ghana, Cuban aided medical

Guiteras, Antonio, 23–4, 27

school, 190

Gunder Frank, André, 15

Gillespie, R., 89

Gutiérrez, Gustavo, 131

Gómez Rodriguez, Ricardo, 77

Gutiérrez Menudo Eloy, 92

Gómez, Máximo, 18

Gutiérrez Moya, Enrique, 92

Gorbachev, Mikhail, 175; attempted

Guyana, 8, 9, 120; Cuban relations

coup against, 177; Cuba visit

with, 151; Cuban aided medical

1989, 176

school, 190

Gott, Richard, 119

Graña Eiriz, Manuel, 60–1

Haiti (Saint-Domingue), 13–14, 94;

Granada, 8

Cuban aided medical school,

Gran Colombia, dissolution of, 15

190; Cuban earthquake aid,

Granma, 32, 132, 133; Fidel Castro

191–2; 1804 independence, 150; series, 200

slave rebellion impact, 15; USA

Great Depression, Cuba impact, 22

occupation period, 21

Grenada, 9, 120, 212; –Cuba

Handal, Schafik, 162–5

relations, 153, 155

Hart, Armando, 33, 36, 52, 56

Index | 281

Havana: Atlantic trade fleet, 13;

Jagan, Cheddi, 151–2

Haitian embassy refuge, 31; Latin

Jagan, Janet, 151–2

America communist parties 1964

Jamaica, 8, 14, 87, 120, 208; political

meeting, 83; United States Interests

violence, 153

Section, 98; University of, 31, 54,

Jefferson, Thomas, 16

57, 195

Jesuit priests in Guatemala, 158

Henken, T.A., 25

Jóven Cuba, 24

Heraud, Javier, 116–17

Joa, Jorge Luís, 133, 158

Heredia, Martínez, 130

Juárez, Jorge, 181, convalescence, 164

Hernández, Melba, 4, 49

JUCEPLAN (National Planning

Hernández, Norberto, 100, 127, 136,

Board), 65

144, 148–9

Junta de Liberación Cubana, 34

Herrera, Luis, 194

Juventud Rebelde, 133

Hidalfo y Costilla, Miguel , 15

Hoffman, B., 200

Karol, K. S., 71

Honduras, 160; small guerrilla

Kennedy, John F., 68–9

movements, 158; Unified National

Khruschev, N., 68–70; Stalin

Directorate, 169

denunciation, 57

Honecker, Erich, 98; ousting of, 172

Kirchners, Argentina presidents, 199

hotel chains, 25

Kosygin, A., 148

Houtart, Francois, 131

‘humanitarian support’, 9

Lage, Carlos, 198

Lagos, Fedora, 163–4

Ibarra, Abelardo Colomé ‘Furry’, 154,

Lahrem, S., 121

183

Lairet, Germán, 102

ICAP (Instituto Cubano de Amistad

Lamarca, Carlos, 104–5

con los Pueblos), Cuba, 47,

Lansky, Meyer, 25–6

86–7, 90, 129, 131, 205; ‘visiting

Larguia, Isabel, 113

brigades’, 130

Larrazábal, Admiral, 41, 101

ideological differences, guerrilla

Latell, B., 91

organizations, 89

Latin America, army status, 120

‘indigenous question’, Latin American

Latour, René Ramos (Daniel), 32

left attitude, 209

Leal, Eusebio, 195, 203

informal economy, legalization, 202

Liberation Theology, influence of, 9,

Instituto Nacional de Reforma Agrari

110, 120, 128–9, 134, 141, 158, (INRA), Cuba, 64

161, 204

Instituto Cubano del Arte y la

Lima, Turcios, 99–100

Industria Cinematográficos

Lincoln, Abraham, 150

(ICAIC), Cuba, 90

literacy and public health

International Atomic Energy

campaigns, 2

Agency, 140

Llenera, Mario, 34

International Petroleum Corporation,

Llibre Artigas, Antonio, 12, 52

Peru national, 132

Lobatón, Guillermo, 116

intra-Peronist civil war,

López Rega, José Antonio (Tony), 54,

Argentina, 142

57, 95, 142–3, 187, 189

Israel, 125

López Michelsen, Colombia

Izarra, William, 194

Presidency, 144–5

282 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

López Portillo, José, 154

Martínez Tamayo, José Maria, 113

Luanda, Cuban aided medical

Marulanda, 187

school, 190

Marx, Karl, Capital, 65

Lucas García, Benedicto, 166

Maryknoll priests, Guatemala, 158

Lula da Silva, Luiz Ignácio, 91,

Masetti, Jorge, 112–14

140–1, 199; Cuba seminars, 131

Mayans, Ramiro, 161

lumpembouregoisie, 15

Mazola, Giraldo, 86

McKinley, William, 20–1

M-14 (Movimiento 14 de Mayo),

medical service provision, Cuba, 126;

Paraguay, 93–4

brigades, 207

M-19 (Movimiento 19 de Abril),

‘medical tourism’, Cuban income, 180

Colombia, 89, 99, 139, 144–5, Mella, Julio Antonio, 22

185–6; Palace of Justice siege, 146;

Mendieta, Colonel, 24

peace negotiations, 147

Menem, Carlos, 143

M 26-7 (Movimiento 26 de Julio), Menocal, García, 21

Cuba, 1, 31–3, 35–6, 38, 44, 49, Mexico, 6, 8, 14, 27, 56, 67, 83,

58, 60; Capitan de Micialas role,

122; –Cuba diplomatic relations

61; Havana sabotage group, 87;

consistent, 81, 84, 210; exiles in,

‘war taxes’ to, 37

185; Fidel refuge, 29

Márquez, Gabriel García, 189

Meza-Lago, Carmelo, 126

Márquez, Roberto, 75

Miami, Cuban adversaries, 65

Maceo, Antonio, 49, 87

Mikoyan, A., 66, 71

Machado, President, 22–3; rebellions military nationalist reformism, 133,

against, 27; resistance movement

135–6, 193

against, 60

military role, Cuban management

Machurucuto disaster, 149

expanded, 182

Maciel, Marco, 141

MINFAR (Ministerio de las Fuerzas

Madison, James, 16

Armadas Revolucionarias), 90, 177

Maduro, Nicolas, 197, 203; Cuba

MININT (Ministerio del Interior), 5,

seminars, 131

77, 80, 85, 90, 127, 178, 182, 205;

Maldonado, Fernandez, 133

Intelligence School, 86

Manila, Spanish fleet destroyed, 19

MINREX (Ministerio de Relaciones

Manley, Michael, 9, 87, 128,

Exteriores), 57, 86, 87, 90, 127,

151–2, 153

148, 205

Manley, Norman, 153

MINTER (Ministerio del Interior),

Mansillio, Anastasio, 65

Nicaragua, 86, 160

Marcano, Héctor Pérez, 102

Missile Crisis, Cuba, 8

Marcuse, Hebert, 131

Moleiro, Moisés, 102

Marín, Pedro Antonio, 110

Moncada military barracks, Santiago

Mariel boatlift, 173

de Cuba, 28, assault on, 55;

Marighella, Carlos, 104; killing of, 105

attackers sheltered, 48

Marquetalia, republic of, 109

Monje, Mario, 118

Marrero Núñez, Otto, 91

Monsanto, Pablo (Jorge Soto), 166

Martí, Farabundo, 28, 45, 52, 165;

Montero, Ramón, 161–2

writings of, 22

Montes, César, 99–100

Martínez, Álvarez, 173

Montes, Mélida Araya (ana

Martínez Heredia, Fernando, 71

Maria), 162

Index | 283

Montoneros, Argentina, 91, 141, 143

against, 58; USA occupation period,

Mora, Lázaro, 86

21; USSR arms suspended, 176

Mira, Víctor, 58

nickel, Cuban foreign currency

Morales, Evo, 192, 209; Cuba

source, 180

seminars, 131

NO-AL (Movement of Non-Aligned

Morantes, Luis (Jacobo Arenas), 109

Countries), 8, 80, 126, 132, 210; Morejón, Luis, 47, 96

Algiers summit 1973, 152

Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS):

Noriega, 135, 173, 174

Colombia, 145; Venezuela, 149

North, Oliver, 173

Movimiento de Independientes de

Norway, 11; Colombia peace process

Color, rebellion, 22

role, 188; Guatemala peace process

Movimiento de Izquierda

role, 186

Revolucionaria (MIR): Chile, 144;

Nova Trova, Cuba, 90

Peru, 116; Venezuela, 91

nuclear missiles, US–USSR secret

Movimiento de Liberación Dominicana,

deal, 69

Dominican Republic, 92

Nuñez, Suárez, 36

Movimiento de Liberación Nacional–

Nyerere, Julius, 111

Tupamaros (MLN-T), Uruguay, 107

Movimiento de Resistencia Cívica

O’Higgins, Bernardo, 15

(MRC), Cuba, 33

OAS (Organization of American

Movimiento Electoral del Pueblo

States): anti-communism of, 79;

(MEP), Venezuela, 149

Cuba expelled from, 67, 81, 122

Movimiento Estudiantil Cristiano

Obando, Alfredo, Bolivia, 9, 136

(MEC), Cuba, 129

Ochoa, Arnoldo, 102; case of, 183

Movimiento Nacional Revolucionário

Ochoa, Delio Gómez, 92

(MNR), Cuba, 27

Ochoa team, rescue, 149

Movimiento Nacionalista

Ojeda, Fabricio, 101–2

Revolucionário (MNR), Brazil, 90

OLAS (Organización Latinoamericana

Movimiento Revolucionario Oriental

de Solidaridad), 83; Havana

(MRO), Uruguay, 91, 106, 108

conference 1967, 83, 104, 107

Muja, Eusebio, 27

Oltuski, Enrique, 33, 62, 73–4

Mujeres Martyianas, 31

Operacíon Ayacucho, 133

Operacíon Milagro: mission, 197;

Nasser, Gemayel, 111

Venezuela co-financed, 191

National Alimentary Programme,

Organización de Militares para

Cuba, 183

la Democracia, la Integración

National Reconciliation Commission,

de América Latina y el Caribe

Guatemala, 186

(ORMIDELAC), 137

New Jewel Movement, Grenada, 154

Organización Popular Revolucionaria

Nicaragua, 4, 10, 59, 68, 91, 115,

33 Orientales (OPR-33),

149, 170, 191, 208; ALBA Uruguay, 108

incorporated, 199; Contras war,

Organizaciones Revolucionarias

86; Cuban literacy teachers to,

Integradas (ORI), Cuba, 72

160; ‘indigenous minorities,

organized crime period, Cuba, 25

209; International Brigade, 159;

Oriente province, Cuba, 17

‘Sandinistas, 9, 173, 212; Somoza

ORPA (Organización del Pueblo en

dictatorship, 165; Somoza fight

Armas), 165

284 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Ortega, Daniel, 160, 169

patriotic ideals, generational

Ortega, Humberto, 158–60

transmission, 45

Ortega y Alamino, Jaime, 203

Pavolv, Y., 177

Orthodox Party, 57

Paz García, Policarpio, 168

Ortiz Bucaram, Eduardo, 102

PDVSA, 197, 212

OSPAAAL (Organización de

People’s National Congress (PNC),

Solidaridad con los Pueblos de Asia,

Guayana, 152

África y América Latina), 83, 206

People’s National Party (PNP),

outmigrants, Cuba, 66

Jamaica, 153

People’s Progressive Party (PPP),

Pact of Miami, 34

Guyana, 151

Pact of Zanjón, 17–18

Pérez de Cuellar, J., 132

País, Frank, 29, 31, 33, 35, 37, 44–5,

Pérez German, Ricky, 1

55–6; assassination of, 32

Pérez, Carlos Andrés, 148–9, 192–3, Panama, 8, 84, 94, 158, 212; Canal

195

Zone ceded, 20; Cuban Embassy

Pérez, Faustino, 32, 37, 62, 64

defence, 86; Cuban evacuations

Pérez Jiménez, Marcos, 101; fall of, 40

role, 175; Torrijos Herrera coup,

Pérez, Manuel, 110

134; USA invasion 1989, 21, 135,

Perón, Isabel 141–2

173–4

Perón Juan: death of, 142; exile of,

Paraguay, 8, 143

141; Peronism emergence, 141;

Partido Africano da Independência

return of, 140

de Guiné e Cabo Verde (PAIGVC),

Peru, 8–9; earthquake Cuban blood

Guinea-Bissau and Cabo Verde, 87

donation, 133; Fidel trip to,

Partido Auténtico, 27, 34

137; Military Intelligence, 134;

Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT),

Operation Matraca, 112; 2016

Brazil, 140

election, 212; Velasco years, 198

Partido Guatemalteco del Trabajo,

Peter Pan operation, 66

Guatemala, 166; recognized, 68

Petkoff, Luben, 101–2

Partido Justicialista, 141

Philippines, 20; rebellion erupted, 18

Partido Ortodoxo, 27–8, 34

Piedra, Carlos, 129

Partido Revolucionario Cubano

Piedra, Colonel, killing of, 31

(PRC), Cuba, 18–19

Piñeiro, Manuel, 4, 35, 46, 59, 80, Partido Revolucionario Democrático

83–5, 90, 93–7, 105, 111–13, 115, (PRD), Panama, 135

117, 127, 133–4, 137, 140, 153–5,

Partido Revolucionario de los

158–9, 170, 185, 193, 204–5; DA

Trabajadores (PRT), Colombia,

resignation, 183

145–6

Pinochet, August, 144, 206; Chile

Partido Revolucionario de los

coup, 87, 163; Cuban relations

Trabajadores Centroamericanos

break, 139

(PRTC), 168

pirates, Cuba paradise, 13

Partido Unido de la Revolución

Pizzaro, Carlos, murder of, 147

Socialista de Cuba (PURSC), Cuba,

‘Plan FF’, 39

72–3

Platt Amendment, 20–1, 23

Pastora, Eden, 149

Platt, General Washington, 88

Pastraña, President, 187–9

Poland, Solidarity, 172

Patrick Lumumba University, 95

Polk, James K., 16

Index | 285

poverty, Cuba post-Cold War, 181

Rodríguez Lara, Guillermo, 136–7

Prague, 84; Che safe house, 87, 111

Romero, Archbishop, 165; murder

Prebisch, Raúl, 128

of, 129

Prensa Latina, 90, 112

Rosales, Ricardo (Carlos González),

Prío Socarrás, Carlos, 25–7

166

PRT-ERP, Argentina, 115

Rosas Pinilla, General, 109

PSP (Partido Socialista Popular),

Roussef, Dilma, 212

Cuba; see Communist Party of

Rubido, Rego, 41

Cuba

Puente Uceda, Luis de la, 116

Sánchez Arango, Aureliano, 27

Puerto Rico, 19, 20

Sánchez, Celia, 4

Punto Cero, guerrilla training, 85

Salta, Argenbtina, 113

Samper, Ernesto, 189

Quechua, 118

San Luis barracks, Cuba, 23

Quinquenio gris, Cuba, 126

San Martín, Grau, 23–5

Sancho, Eduardo, 89

Radio Farabundo Martí, 163

Sandinistas: Cuban training, 158;

Radio Habana Cuba, 90

guerrillas, 143

Radio Rebelde, 34–6, 38–9

Sandino, General, 92

Radio Reloj, 35

Santamaría, Haydée, 4, 38, 56

Ramirez de Leon, Ricardo (Rolando

Santander, 15

Moran), 165–6

Santiago de Cuba, 18–19, 28, 31–2,

‘Raulization’, 183

35–6, 41, 48–9, 54–5; University Ravelo, Fernando, 107, 133, 142,

of, 62

144, 167

Santos, Juan M., 188

Reagan, Ronald, 176

Sardiñas, Priest Commandante, 45

Reciprocity Treaty, Cuba-USA, 24

Sarney, José, 141

Redondo, Ciro, 32

School of Marxist-Leninist

reform-minded soldiers, Fidel affinity,

philosophy, 72

195–6

Seaga, Edward, 153

Regeiro, Julio Casas, 183

Second Declaration of Havana, 82

Reistencia Cívica, 36

sectarianism, 75

religious groups, Cuba, 33

Sendic, Raúl, 108

remittances, Cuban-American

Servicio Bolivariano de Inteligencia

diaspora, 212

Nacional (SBIN), Bolivia, 202

revolutionary generations, two, 2

Servicio de Inteligencia del Estado

Rios Montt, José, 168, 185

(SIDE), Argentina, 144

Riquelme, Samuel, 138

Servicio de Inteligencia Militar (SIM),

Risquet, Jorge, 47

Cuba, 29, 31, 60

Rivero, Tabaré, 108

Servicio de Inteligencia Regimental

Rodríguez, Carlos Rafael, 40, 83, 127

(SIR), Cuba, 60

Rodríguez, Frutuoso, 35

Serviço Nacional de Informações

Rodríguez, Leonidas, 133

(SNI), Brazil, 105

Rodríguez, Lester, 49

Shining Path, Peru, 9, 79; Cuba

Rodríguez, Luis Alberto, 183

hostility to, 210

Rodríguez, René, 130

Sierra Cristal, ‘Liberated Territory’, 37

Rodríguez Bautista, Nicolás, 110

Sierra Madre, guerrilla movement, 5

286 | Cuba and Revolutionary Latin America

Sierra Maestra, 5, 12, 23, 28, 32–5, Torres, Juan José, 9, 136; murder

37–8, 40, 46, 52, 56, 80, 84–5, 92,

of, 137

112–13, 118, 161, 187

Torres Rizo, Julián, 155

Silva, Américo, 102

Torricelli Bill, USA, 179

Sistema Nacional de Movilización

Torrijos, Omar, government of, 9, 84,

Social (SINAMOS), Peru, 135

128, 135, 144, 173, 195–6, 212; slavery: abolition history, 150; Cuba

Cuba close relations, 136

abolition, 16

torture, ‘submarine’, 60

Sojeda, Fabricio, 101

tourism, Americans via Canada, 180

Somoza, Anastasios, 92, 149;

transport system collapse, Cuba, 181

departure of, 159

Treaty of Paris, 19

Sosa, Yon, 99–100

Tricontinental Conference 1966, 82

South Africa, 47

Tricontinental, 87

Soviet Intelligence University,

Trujillo, Rafael, 41, 58, 92

Moscow, 95

Tupac Amaru II, 107

Spain: Civil War refugees, 54;

Tupameros (MLN-T), 108

colonization(s), 6; complex Cuba

Turbay, J.C., 144–5

relations, 12; Cuba investment, 179

Turkey, US missiles, 69

Spanish Civil War, refugees from, 54

Spanish Republican Army, 92

UF, Guyana, 152

Spanish-American War, 13

Uganda, Cuban aided medical

Sprenkels, R., 89

school, 190

Stalin, J., 57

UIM (Union de Industrias Militaires),

state jobs, Cuba losses announced, 201

Cuba, 183

Stroessner, Alfredo, 143–4;

UK (United Kingdom), troops to

overthrow attempt, 94; Paraguay

Guyana, 151

dictatorship, 92

Ulbricht, Walter, 97

student movements, 7

UN (United Nations): Fidel 1960

Student Revolutionary Directorate, 1

speech, 67; Human Rights

Suárez, Luis, 115

Commission, 168

sugar: ‘battle’ for, 123; plantations,

Unidad Popular, Chile, 137

14; USSR subsidies end, 177

Unión de Escritores y Artistas de

suicides, 182

Cuba (UNEAC), Cuba, 77

Surinam, 2, 8, 151, 155, 157; Universidad del Oriente, 57

independence, 156

Universidad Nacional, Colombia, 110

Sweig, J., 39

UP, Colombia, members

assassinated, 146

Tanzania, 87

urban revolutionary underground;

Tejada, Paz, 99

dangers of, 53; imprisonments, 61;

Telles, Dora María, 159

–rural insurrection difference, 44

Temas, 184

Uribe, Álvaro, 188–9

Ten Years War, 17

URNG (Unión Revolucionaria

Texas, USA annexation, 16

Nacional Guatemalteca),

Tigres de Masferre, Cuban death

Guatemala, 10, 167–8, 206; de

squad, 32

facto defeat, 169; leadership exile

tobacco, 14

in Mexico, 185

Torres Restrepo, Camilo, 110, 129

Urrutia, Judge, 34, 38, 41, 61–3

Index | 287

Uruguay, 8, 27, 105; armed left

Varela, Félix, 15

emergence, 107

Vega, Douglas, killing of, 102

USA (United States), 94, 131,

Velasco Alvarado, Juan, 9, 128,

178; Batista coup recognition,

134–5, 194, 196, 212; coup

26; Civil War aftermath, 17;

ousted, 137; Cuba visits, 138; Peru

Colombia pressure, 109; –Cuba

government of, 116, 132, 195, 198

diplomatic relations re-established,

Venezuela, 27, 101, 173, 208,

10, 178, 211; –Cuba embargo

212; Bolivarian Revolution,

intensifications, 8, 173, 179; Cuba

5; Communist Party, 149;

hostility, 7, 66–7, 212; Cuba

Cuban doctors to, 197, 202;

occupation, 6; Cuba sugar imports,

Cuban relations history, 148;

16; Cuban sugar investments, 21;

Havana Embassy restored,

destabilization effort, 209; early

140; nationalizations, 197; ‘oil

imperialism, 14; threat of, 76

diplomacy’, 199

USS Maine, explosion, 19

Venturini, General, 157

USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist

Villalobos, Joaquín, 161–2

Republics), 7–8, 121–2, 132; –Cuba

Villamazir, Darío, 89

relations, 64; Che Guevara critique,

Vice-Ministerio Técnico (VMT),

111; development assistance,

Cuba, 83–4, 90, 99, 111;

123; implosion, 171–2; KGB-

training, 115

VMT liaison, 95; Latin American

Directorate, 67; overtures to, 66;

Wheelock, Jaime, 159

Russia transformation, 178

Williams, Eric, 152

Uturuncos movement, Argentina, 115

Wolf, Markus, 97

Wright Mills, C., 71

Vásquez Castaño, Fabio, 114, 144

Valdés Menendez, Ramiro, 85

Yeltsin, Boris, 172

Vanguardia Revolucionaria, 149

Yemen, Cuban aided medical

Vanguardia Armada Revolucionária

school, 190

(VAR), Brazil, 104–5

Youth Labour Army, 125

Document Outline

- Front Cover

- About the Author

- Title Page

- Copyright

- Contents

- Acknowledgements

- Select Acronyms and Abbreviations

- 1 Revolutionaries

- 2 Historical context

- 3 From insurgents to socialists

- 4 Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s)

- 5 The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s)

- 6 The years of soft power (1990s–present)

- 7 The legacy

- Appendix: Biographical Data of Interviewees

- Notes

- Bibliography

- Index

- Back Cover

Table of Contents

Front Cover

About the Author

Title Page

Copyright

Contents

Acknowledgements

Select Acronyms and Abbreviations

1 Revolutionaries

2 Historical context

3 From insurgents to socialists

4 Revolutionary fervour (the 1960s)

5 The mature years (early 1970s–late 1980s)

6 The years of soft power (1990s–present)

7 The legacy

Appendix: Biographical Data of Interviewees

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Back Cover