Conflict Across Latin America

36.5: Conflict Across Latin America

36.5.1: Cuba and the Castros

The Castros rose to power against a backdrop of widespread dissatisfaction with Fulgencio Batista’s corrupt and repressive regime.

Learning Objective

Discuss the rise of the Castros

Key Points

  • Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was a Cuban revolutionary and politician who governed the Republic of Cuba as Prime Minister from 1959 to 1976 and then as President from 1976 to 2008. Under his administration, Cuba became a one-party socialist state, industry and business were nationalized, and state socialist reforms were implemented throughout society.
  • In the decades following its independence from Spain in 1902, Cuba experienced a period of significant instability, enduring a number of revolts, coups, and periods of U.S. military intervention.
  • Fulgencio Batista, a former soldier who served as the elected president of Cuba from 1940 to 1944, became president for the second time in March 1952 after seizing power in a military coup. Although Batista was supported by the Communist Party of Cuba during his first term as President, he became strongly anti-communist during his second term, gaining him political and military support from the United States.
  • Fidel Castro petitioned for the overthrow of Batista, whom he accused of corruption and tyranny; however, Castro’s constitutional arguments were rejected by the Cuban courts. After deciding that the Cuban regime could not be replaced via legal avenues, Castro resolved to launch an armed revolution.
  • Castro’s Movement attacked a number of military installations, after which he and his brother Raul were imprisoned. Upon release, he took his Movement to Mexico to regroup.
  • At the end of 1956, the Movement returned to Cuba, using the Sierra Maestra mountain range as its base. Fighting between the Movement and the Batista regime would continue off and on through the beginning of 1959.
  • The US imposed an economic embargo on the Cuban government and recalled its ambassador during the conflict, further weakening the Batista government’s mandate. Batista’s support among Cubans began to fade, with former supporters either joining the revolutionaries or distancing themselves from the regime.
  • On August 21, 1958, Castro’s forces began an offensive in the Oriente province, proceeding west from the Sierra Maestra mountain range toward Santa Clara. On January 2, 1959, the military stopped resisting their progress and Castro took the city, ending the revolution in a victory for his Movement.
  • The Cuban Revolution was a crucial turning point in U.S.-Cuban relations, with the American establishment fearing further Communist insurgencies would spread throughout Latin America as they had in Southeast Asia.
  • As the Americans took a harder line against the Cuban revolutionary government, the Soviet Union became Cuba’s main ally and ideological influence.

Key Terms

embargo
An embargo (derived from the Spanish word embargo) is the partial or complete prohibition of commerce and trade with a particular country or group of countries. Embargoes are considered a strong diplomatic measure to elicit a specific result from the country on which it is imposed. Embargoes are similar to economic sanctions and are generally considered legal barriers to trade as opposed to blockades, which are acts of war.
escopeteros
Scouts and pickets from the Sierra Maestra and other mountain ranges during the Cuban Revolution. They were responsible for semi-continuously holding terrain against smaller sized Batista patrols, as well as providing first alerts, communications, protected supply routes, essential intelligence, and captured weapons to the mainline Castro forces in the high mountains.

Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was a Cuban revolutionary and politician who governed the Republic of Cuba as Prime Minister from 1959 to 1976 and then as President from 1976 to 2008. Politically a Marxist-Leninist and Cuban nationalist, he also served as the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from 1961 until 2011. Under his administration, Cuba became a one-party socialist state, industry and business were nationalized, and state socialist reforms were implemented throughout society.

 

Background and Causes of the Cuban Revolution

In the decades following its independence from Spain in 1902, Cuba experienced a period of significant instability, enduring a number of revolts, coups, and periods of U.S. military intervention. Fulgencio Batista, a former soldier who served as the elected president of Cuba from 1940 to 1944, became president for the second time in March 1952 after seizing power in a military coup and canceling the planned 1952 elections. Although Batista was relatively progressive during his first term, he proved far more dictatorial and indifferent to popular concerns in the 1950s. While Cuba remained plagued by high unemployment and limited water infrastructure, Batista antagonized the population by forming lucrative links to organized crime and allowing American companies to dominate the Cuban economy. Throughout the 1950s, Havana became the setting for the American mafia, corrupt law enforcement officials, and their political elected cronies to profit off gambling, prostitution, and the drug trade. By the end of the 1950s, Havana had about 270 brothels. Additionally, marijuana and cocaine were as plentiful as and sometimes similarly priced to alcohol.

Although Batista was supported by the Communist Party of Cuba during his first term as President, he became strongly anti-communist during his second term, gaining him political and military support from the United States. Batista also developed a powerful security infrastructure to silence political opponents during his second term. In the months following the March 1952 coup, Fidel Castro, then a young lawyer and activist, petitioned for the overthrow of Batista, whom he accused of corruption and tyranny; however, Castro’s constitutional arguments were rejected by the Cuban courts. After deciding that the Cuban regime could not be replaced via legal avenues, Castro resolved to launch an armed revolution. To this end, he and his brother Raul founded a paramilitary organization known as “The Movement,” stockpiling weapons and recruiting around 1,200 followers from Havana’s disgruntled working class by the end of 1952.

The Revolution

Fidel and Raul gathered Movement fighters and attacked a number of military installations, including the Moncada Barracks in Santiago. Many rebels were captured and executed by the military, and Fidel and Raul were imprisoned following a highly political trial in which Fidel defended himself for nearly four hours, ending with the infamous words, “Condemn me, it does not matter. History will absolve me.” The brothers were sentenced to more than 10 years each, but released in 1955 as a result of broad political pressure placed upon the Batista government. Soon after their release, the brothers traveled to Mexico with a group of exiles to prepare for Batista’s overthrow. In June 1955, Fidel met with the Argentine revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara, who joined his cause. The revolutionaries named themselves the 26th of July Movement in reference to the attack on the Moncada Barracks that took place on that date in 1953.

Che and Fidel

Che and Fidel: Revolutionary leaders Che Guevara (left) and Fidel Castro (right) in 1961.

 

On November 25, 1956, the 26th of July Movement departed Veracruz, Mexico for Cuba, arriving a week later. They took to the Sierra Maestra mountains, a range in southeastern Cuba, and were attacked three days after beginning their trek by Batista’s army. No more than 20 of the original 82 participants survived. On March 13, 1957, a separate group of revolutionaries, the anticommunist Student Revolutionary Directorate (RD), stormed the Presidential Palace in Havana, attempting to assassinate Batista and decapitate the government. The attack failed and the RD’s leader was killed during a shootout.

After this, the United States imposed an economic embargo on the Cuban government and recalled its ambassador, further weakening the Batista government’s mandate. As a result, Batista’s support among Cubans began to fade, with former supporters either joining the revolutionaries or distancing themselves from the regime. Nonetheless, the mafia and U.S. businessmen maintained their support for the regime. Batista’s government resorted to brutal methods to keep Cuba’s cities under control.

Meanwhile, Castro’s forces in the Sierra Maestra mountains staged successful attacks on small garrisons of Batista’s troops. Additionally, poorly armed irregular forces not associated with Castro known as escopeteros harassed Batista’s forces in the foothills and plains of Oriente Province. Eventually the escopeteros provided direct military support to Castro’s main forces by protecting supply lines and sharing intelligence. Over time, the Sierra Maestra mountains came under Castro’s complete control. In addition to armed resistance, the rebels used propaganda to their advantage. A pirate radio station called Radio Rebelde (“Rebel Radio”) was set up in February 1958, allowing Castro and his forces to broadcast their message nationwide within enemy territory.

Although Castro’s forces remained fairly small, they were continuously successful in forcing Batista’s army to retreat whenever the two forces met. Finally, Batista responded to Castro’s successes with an attack on the mountains called Operation Verano, or to the rebels, la Ofensiva. The operation was close for some time, but the tide turned in Batista’s favor on July 29, 1958, when his troops almost completely destroyed Castro’s 300-man army at the Battle of Las Mercedes. Castro asked for and was granted a cease-fire on August 1. Within a week, Castro’s forces escaped back into the mountains.

Raúl Castro and Che Guevara

Raúl Castro and Che Guevara: Raúl Castro (left) with his arm around his second-in-command, Ernesto “Che” Guevara, in their Sierra de Cristal mountain stronghold in Oriente Province, Cuba, in 1958.

On August 21, 1958, Castro’s forces began their own offensive in the Oriente province, proceeding west toward Santa Clara. As a column of rebels led by Guevara entered territory where the RD had been fighting Batista’s forces, the two groups, seeing past initial friction, joined together to rout the army. By December 31, 1958, both groups of rebels met with the 26th of July Movement troops headed by Camilo Cienfuegos in Santa Clara, and the city fell to their combined forces. News of his defeat in Santa Clara caused Batista to panic, and he fled to the Dominican Republic hours later. When Castro learned of Batista’s flight from Cuba, he began negotiations to take over Santiago de Cuba. On January 2, 1959, the military commander in the city ordered troops not to fight, and Castro’s forces took the city. Castro then arrived in Havana on January 8 after a long victory march.

International Reactions and Foreign Policy

The Cuban Revolution was a crucial turning point in U.S.-Cuban relations. Although John F. Kennedy expressed sympathy for the initial goals of Castro’s rebel movement and the U.S. government initially intended to recognize the new regime, the fear that further Communist insurgencies would spread throughout Latin America as they had in Southeast Asia caused a reverse in tactics. After the revolutionary government nationalized all U.S. property in Cuba in August 1960, the Eisenhower administration froze all Cuban assets on American soil, severed diplomatic ties, and tightened its embargo of Cuba. In 1961, the U.S. government backed an armed counter-revolutionary assault on the Bay of Pigs with the aim of ousting Castro, but the counter-revolutionaries were swiftly defeated by the Cuban military. Castro, meanwhile, resented the Americans for providing aid to the Batista government during the revolution and attempting to subvert the Cuban revolutionary government militarily and economically in subsequent years.

Following the American embargo, the Soviet Union became Cuba’s main ally and ideological influence. The two Communist countries quickly developed close military and intelligence ties, culminating in the stationing of Soviet nuclear weapons in Cuba in 1962, an act that triggered the Cuban Missile Crisis. Influenced by the expansion of the Soviet Union into Europe after the 1917 Russian Revolution, Castro sought to export his revolution to other countries in the Caribbean and beyond, sending weapons to Algerian rebels as early as 1960. In the following decades, Cuba became heavily involved in supporting Communist insurgencies and independence movements in many developing countries, sending military aid to insurgents in Ghana, Nicaragua, and Yemen, among others. Cuba continued to maintain close links to the Soviets until the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991. The end of Soviet economic aid led to an economic crisis and famine throughout Cuba known as the Special Period.

Attributions