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Fidel Castro Ruz
1926 -
Fidel Castro Ruz (born ) was Cuban prime minister and first
secretary of the Communist party of Cuba. A lawyer by training,
Castro led the Cuban Revolution and transformed the island into
the first Communist state in the Western Hemisphere.
Fidel Castro was born on Aug. 13, 1926, on his family's
prosperous sugar plantation near Birán, Oriente Province. His
father was an immigrant from Galicia, Spain. Castro studied in
Jesuit schools in Oriente and in Havana, where one of his high
school teachers, Father Armando Llorente, recalled him as
"motivated, proud, different from the others…. Fidel had a
desire to distinguish himself primarily in sports; he liked to
win regardless of efforts; he was little interested in parties
or socializing and seemed alienated from Cuban society."
Became Campus Activist
In 1945 Castro entered law school at the University of Havana,
where student activism, violence, and gang fights were common
occurrences. Protected by its autonomy, the university was a
sanctuary for political agitators. Castro soon joined the
activists and associated with one of the gangs, the Unión
Insurreccional Revolucionaria. Although police suspected him of
the murder of a rival student leader and other violent actions,
nothing was proved. Castro acquired a reputation for personal
ambition, forcefulness, and persuasive oratory. Yet he never
became a prominent student leader. On several occasions he was
defeated in student elections.
In 1947 Castro temporarily left the university in order to join
in an expedition led by writer Juan Bosch to overthrow the
government of Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo, but the coup
was called off during the ocean voyage to Dominica. The
23-year-old Castro jumped into the shark-infested waters and
swam to shore carrying a gun over his head.
The following year he participated in one of the most
controversial episodes of his life, the Bogotazo - a series of
riots in Bogotá, Colombia, following the assassination of
Liberal party leader Jorge E. Gaitán. Castro, who was attending
a student meeting in Bogotá supported by Argentine dictator Juan
Perón that was timed to coincide with - and disrupt - the Ninth
Inter-American Conference, was caught up in the violence that
rocked Colombia after the assassination. Picking up a rifle from
a nearby police station, he joined the mobs and roamed the
streets, distributing anti-United States propaganda and inciting
the populace to revolt. Enrique Ovares, one of his student
companions, denies that Castro was a Communist but claims that
it was "a hysteric, ambitious, and uncontrollable Fidel who
acted in those events." Pursued by Colombian authorities, the
Cuban students sought asylum in the Cuban embassy and were later
flown back to Havana, where Castro resumed his law studies at
the University of Havana.
While still a student, Castro married Mirta Díaz-Balart, a
philosophy student whose wealthy family had political ties to
powerful Cuban military leader Fulgencio Batista. The couple
would have one son, Fidelito, in 1949, but because Castro had no
income with which to support his family, the marriage eventually
ended.
At the university Castro was exposed to different ideologies.
The authoritarian ideas of fascism and communism were widely
discussed, but above all, the nationalistic program of Cuba's
Ortodoxo party - economic independence, political liberty,
social justice, and an end to corruption - captured the
imagination of many students. The party's charismatic leader,
Eduardo Chibás, became their idol, and Castro developed into his
devoted follower, joining the Ortodoxo party in 1947. While he
would graduate three years later and and begin to practice law
in Havana, his interest in the law soon gave way to his passion
for politics.
Assumed Leadership of Revolution
Early in 1952, in preparation for upcoming elections scheduled
for June, Castro began campaigning for a seat in congress as a
replacement for Ortodoxo party leader Chibás, who had publicly
killed himself the previous summer. However, elections were
never held. On March 10 General Batista and a group of army
conspirators overthrew the regime of Cuban president Carlos Prío
Socarrás. For Castro, violence seemed the only way to oppose the
military coup. He organized a group of followers and on July 26,
1953, attacked the Moncada military barracks in Oriente
Province. Castro was captured, tried, and sentenced to 15 years
in prison. During his trial he delivered a lengthy defense in
what would become his most famous speech, La historia me
absolverá, attacking Batista's regime and outlining his own
political and economic ideas, most of them within the mainstream
of Cuba's political tradition.
After being released by an amnesty in 1955, Castro was exiled to
Mexico City, where he began organizing an expedition against
Batista dubbed the 26th of July Movement. On Dec. 2, 1956,
Castro, his brother Raul, and 80 other men landed in Oriente
Province. After encounters with the army, in which all but 12 of
his men were killed or captured, Castro fled to the Sierra
Maestra, forming in these mountains a nucleus for a guerrilla
operation.
At the same time, urban opposition to the militaristic Batista
regime increased. An attack on the Presidential Palace on March
13, 1957, led by students and followers of deposed President
Prío, nearly succeeded in killing Cuba's new dictator. By 1958 a
movement of national revulsion against Batista had developed.
Castro emerged as the undisputed leader of the anti-Batista
opposition, and his guerrillas increased their control over
rural areas. On April 9, 1958, Castro called a national strike,
which was called off after Batista ordered strikers to be shot
on sight, causing massive shootings. Finally, defections in the
army precipitated the fall of the regime on December 31.
Revolution Changed Course
On Jan. 1, 1959, Castro and his July 26th movement assumed
power, proclaimed a provisional government, and began public
trials and executions of "criminals" of the Batista regime. On
February 15 Castro replaced José Miró Cardona as prime minister
and appointed his own brother commander of the armed forces. A
powerful speaker and a charismatic leader, Castro began exerting
an almost mystical hold over the Cuban masses. As previous
revolutionaries had done, he lectured the Cubans on morality and
public virtue. He also emphasized his commitment to democracy
and social reform and promised to hold free elections. Denying
that he was a Communist, Castro described his revolution as
humanistic and promised his followers a nationalistic government
that would respect private property and uphold Cuba's
international obligations.
Attempting to consolidate his support inside Cuba, Castro
introduced several reforms. He confiscated wealth "illegally"
acquired by Batista's followers, substantially reduced
residential rents, and passed an agrarian reform law that
confiscated inherited property. Although the avowed purpose of
this law was to develop a class of independent farmers, in
reality the areas seized developed into state farms, with
farmers becoming government employees. By the end of 1959 a
radicalization of the revolution had begun to take place. Purges
or defections of military leaders became common, and their
replacement by more radical and oftentimes Communist militants
was the norm. Newspapers critical of these new leaders were
quickly silenced.
This internal trend toward a Communist agenda was reflected in
foreign policy too. Castro accused the United States of
harboring aggressive designs against the revolution. In February
1960 a Cuban-Soviet trade agreement was signed, and soon after
Cuba established diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union and
most Communist countries. Several months later, when the three
largest American oil refineries in Cuba refused to refine Soviet
petroleum, Castro confiscated them. The United States retaliated
by cutting the import quota on Cuba's sugar. Castro in turn
nationalized other American properties, as well as many Cuban
businesses. On Jan. 3, 1961, U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower
broke relations with Cuba.
Declaration of a Socialist State
In April 1961 anti-Castro exiles, supported by the United States
under the leadership of its newly elected president, John F.
Kennedy, attempted an invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs. The
failure of that invasion consolidated Castro's power, and the
Cuban leader declared his regime to be socialist. Economic
centralization increased. Private schools fell under government
control and educational facilities increased. There was a
nationwide literacy campaign. Sanitation and health improved
with the establishment of rural hospitals and clinics.
Confiscation of private property brought virtually all
industrial and business enterprises under state control.
Religious institutions were suppressed and clergymen expelled
from the island.
In December 1961 Castro openly declared himself to be a Marxist
Leninist. He merged all groups that had fought against Batista
into the Integrated Revolutionary Organizations, changed it
later into the United Party of the Socialist Revolution, and
transformed it into the Communist Party of Cuba - the island's
only ruling party - in 1965.
In foreign affairs Castro moved closer to the Soviet Union,
although the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 severely
strained Cuban-Soviet relations. Castro had allowed the U.S.S.R.
to install within Cuba's borders medium-range nuclear missiles
aimed at the United States, ostensibly for the defense of Cuba.
When President Kennedy protested and negotiated the missiles'
removal directly with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, Castro
felt humiliated. Shortly thereafter, pro-Soviet Cuban Communists
were eliminated from positions of power. By 1964 the
Organization of American States had ended all diplomatic
relations with Cuba, effectively isolating that country in South
America and increasing its dependence on the U.S.S.R.
Until the end of 1964 Castro had attempted to maintain a
position of neutrality in the Sino-Soviet dispute. But following
the 1964 Havana Conference of pro-Soviet Latin American
Communist parties, the Soviet Union pressured Castro into
supporting its policies. Cuba's relations with China
deteriorated, and early in 1966 Castro denounced the Peking
regime. By supporting the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in
1968, he demonstrated his dependence on the Soviet Union as well
as his determination to move closer to the Soviet camp.
Spread of the Revolution
Another source of conflict in Cuban-Soviet relations was
Castro's determination to export his revolution. After the 1964
Havana Conference the Soviet Union was temporarily able to slow
down Castro's support for armed struggle in Latin America. But
by 1966 Castro founded in Havana the Asia-Africa-Latin America
People's Solidarity Organization to promote revolution on three
continents. In July 1967 he formed the Latin American Solidarity
Organization, specifically designed to foster violence in Latin
America. Castro's efforts, however, were mostly unsuccessful, as
evidenced by the failure of Che Guevara's guerrilla campaign in
Bolivia in 1967. Nevertheless, Castro's efforts in this regard
continued through the 1970s.
Repression Culminated in Boat Lift
Despite the improvements that he brought to Cuba - the country
boasted a 94 percent literacy rate and an infant mortality rate
of only 11 in 1,000 births in 1994 - Castro was constantly
condemned for human rights abuses. Political prisoners crowded
Cuban jails, while homosexuals, intellectuals, political
dissidents, and others were constant victims of
government-sponsored violence. In 1989, perceiving him a threat,
Castro authorized the execution of former friend General Arnaldo
Ochoa Sanchez on trumped-up drug smuggling charges.
One of Castro's goals was to remove opposition to his rule,
which he accomplished not only with executions and
imprisonments, but through forced emigrations. The largest of
these, the Mariel Boat Lift, occurred in response to a riot
outside the Peruvian Embassy in Havana. In mid-April of 1980,
Castro opened the port of Mariel to outsiders, particularly
exiled Cubans living in Miami, FL., who sailed into port to
claim their relatives. Taking advantage of the situation, Castro
loaded boats with prison inmates, long-term psychiatric
patients, and other social undesirables. During the
government-directed exodus, over 120,000 Cubans left their
homeland for sanctuary in the United States, causing a small
crisis upon reaching Miami.
With the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s,
Castro's revolution began to lose momentum. Without support from
its Soviet allies, who had subsidized much of Cuba's economy via
cheap petroleum and a large, ready market for the country's
all-important sugar industry, unemployment and inflation both
grew. In addition to adopting a quasi-free market economy,
encouraging international investment in Cuba, and developing a
tourist industry designed to draw foreign currency into his
country, Castro began pressing the United States to lift the
trade embargo it had imposed upon Cuba since the revolution. The
U.S. government remained firm, however, refusing to negotiate
with Cuba on trade matters until Castro ended his dictatorial
regime. In 1994, the U.S. Congress even tightened the embargo.
"This country can only be ruled by the revolution," Castro
responded, according to U.S. News & World Report; he reaffirmed
his determination to retain control by threatening further
emigrations of Cubans to Miami. Still, U.S. Cuban relations had
begun to show signs of warming by the latter part of the 1990s:
Castro visited the United States in 1996, and invited Cuban
exiles then living in the United States to return to their
homeland and start businesses. Resolute in his determination to
preserve some form of socialism in his country, Castro prepared
to groom a new generation of Cuban leaders while also
effectively restoring stability to the Cuban economy and
regaining support among its people.
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This web page was last updated on:
09 December, 2008
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