The Awakening of Latin America
That is agrarian reform, and that is how all revolutionary governments must begin. On the basis of agrarian reform the great battle for the industrialization of a country can be waged, a battle that is very complicated, in which one must fight against very big things.
We could very easily fail, as in the past, if it weren’t for the existence of very great forces in the world today that are friends of small nations like ours. I must note here for everyone’s benefit—for those who like it and those who hate it—that at the present time countries like Cuba, revolutionary, non-moderate countries, cannot respond half-heartedly as to whether the Soviet Union or the People’s Republic of China are our friends. They must answer with all their might that the Soviet Union, China and all the socialist countries are our friends, as are many colonial or semicolonial countries that have freed themselves.
These friendships with governments throughout the world is why it is possible to carry out a revolution in Latin America. When the imperialists carried out aggression against us using sugar and petroleum, the Soviet Union was there to give us petroleum and to buy sugar from us. Without that, we would have needed all our strength, all our faith, and the devotion of the people, which is enormous, to withstand the blow this would have signified. These measures taken by “US democracy” against this “threat to the free world” would have had huge effects on the living standards of the Cuban people, and the forces of disunity would have done their work, viciously playing on the effects.
There are government leaders in Latin America who still advise us to lick the hand that wants to hit us; to spit on the one who wants to help us. We answer these government leaders who, in the middle of the 20th century, recommend bowing our heads: We say, first of all, that Cuba does not bow down before anyone. Secondly, we say that Cuba, from its own experience, knows the weaknesses and defects of the governments advising this approach—and the rulers of these countries know them, too; they know them very well. Nevertheless, Cuba has not deigned or allowed itself, or thought it permissible, to advise the rulers of these countries to shoot every traitorous official or nationalize all the monopoly holdings in their countries.
The people of Cuba shot their murderers and dissolved the army of the dictatorship. Yet they have not been telling governments in Latin America to put the murderers of the people before firing squads or to stop propping up dictatorships. Cuba knows there are murderers in each one of these nations. We can attest to that fact because a Cuban belonging to our own movement [Andrés Coba] was killed, in a friendly country [Venezuela], by henchmen left over from the previous dictatorship.
We do not ask that they put the person who assassinated one of our members before a firing squad, although we would have done so in this country. What we ask, simply, is that if it is not possible to act with solidarity in the Americas, at least don’t be a traitor to the Americas. Let no one in the Americas parrot the notion that we are bound to a continental alliance that includes our great enslaver. That is the most cowardly and denigrating lie a ruler in Latin America can utter.
We, the entire people of Cuba who belong to the Cuban revolution, call our friends friends, and our enemies enemies. We do not allow for halfway terms: one is either a friend or an enemy. We, the people of Cuba, don’t tell any nation on earth what they should do with, for example, the International Monetary Fund. But we will not tolerate them coming to tell us what to do. We know what has to be done. If they want to do what we would do, good; if not, that is up to them. We will not tolerate anyone telling us what to do. We were here on our own until the last moment, awaiting the direct aggression of the mightiest power in the capitalist world, and we did not ask for help from anyone. We were prepared, together with our people, to resist through to the final consequences of our rebel spirit.
We can speak with our heads held high, and with very clear voices, in all the congresses and councils where our brothers of the world meet. When the Cuban revolution speaks, it may make mistakes, but it will never tell a lie. In every place where it speaks, the Cuban revolution expresses the truths that its sons and daughters have learned, and it does so openly to its friends and its enemies alike. It never throws stones from behind corners; it never gives advice containing daggers cloaked in velvet.
We are subject to attacks. We are attacked a great deal because of what we are. But we are attacked much, much more because we show to each nation of the Americas what is possible. What is important for imperialism—more than Cuba’s nickel mines or sugar mills, Venezuela’s oil, Mexico’s cotton, Chile’s copper, Argentina’s cattle, Paraguay’s grasslands or Brazil’s coffee— is the totality of these raw materials upon which the monopolies feed.
They place obstacles in our path every chance they get, and when they themselves are unable to erect obstacles, others in Latin America are unfortunately willing to do so. Names are not important, because no single individual is to blame. We cannot say that [Venezuelan] President Betancourt is to blame for the death of our compatriot and co-thinker [Andrés Coba]. President Betancourt is not to blame; he is simply a prisoner of a regime that calls itself democratic. That democratic regime could have set another example in Latin America, but it nevertheless committed the great mistake of not using the firing squad in a timely way. Today the democratic government of Venezuela is again a prisoner of the henchmen Venezuela was familiar with a short while ago—and with whom Cuba was familiar, and with whom the majority of Latin America remains familiar.
We cannot blame President Betancourt for this death. We can only say the following, supported by our record as revolutionaries and by our conviction as revolutionaries: the day President Betancourt, elected by his people, feels himself a prisoner to such a degree that he cannot go forward and decides to ask the help of a fraternal people, Cuba is here to show Venezuela some of our experiences in the field of revolution.
President Betancourt should know that it was not—and could not have been—our diplomatic representative who started the affair that ended in a death. It was the North Americans, or in the final analysis the US government. A bit closer to the events, it was Batista’s men, and closer still, it was those dressed up in anti-Batista clothing, the US government’s reserve forces in this country, who wanted to defeat Batista yet maintain the system: people like [José] Miró Cardona, [Miguel Angel] Quevedo, [Pedro Luis] Díaz Lanz and Huber Matos. In direct line of sight it was the reactionary forces operating in Venezuela. It is very sad to say, but the leader of Venezuela is at the mercy of his own troops, who may at any moment try to assassinate him, as happened a while ago in the case of the car packed with dynamite. The Venezuelan president, at this moment, is a prisoner of his repressive forces.
This hurts, because the Cuban people received from Venezuela the greatest amount of solidarity and support when we were in the Sierra Maestra. It hurts, because much earlier than us Venezuela was able to rid itself of the hateful and oppressive system represented by [Marcos] Pérez Jiménez. It hurts, because when our delegations went to Venezuela— first Fidel Castro, and later our President Dorticós—they received great demonstrations of support and affection.
A people that has achieved the high degree of political consciousness, that has the high fighting spirit of the Venezuelan people, will not remain prisoners of a few bayonets or bullets for long. Bullets and bayonets can change hands, and the murderers themselves can wind up dead.
But it is not my mission to list here all the stabs in the back we have received from Latin American governments in recent days and to add fuel to the fire of rebellion. That is not my task because, in the first place, Cuba is still not free of danger. Today Cuba is still the focus of the imperialists’ attention in this part of the world. Cuba needs your solidarity, the solidarity of those from the Democratic Action Party in Venezuela, the URD [Democratic Republican Union], and the communists, and COPEI [Independent Political Electoral Committee], and any other party. It needs the solidarity of the Mexican people, the Colombian people, the Brazilian people an
d the people of every nation in Latin America.
The colonialists are scared. They, like everyone else, are afraid of missiles, they too are afraid of bombs. Today they see, for the first time in their history, that bombs of destruction can also fall on their families, on everything they have built with so much love—as far as anyone can love wealth and riches. They began to make estimates; they put their electronic calculators to work, and they saw this set-up would be self-defeating.
This in no way means that they have renounced the suppression of Cuban democracy. Once again they are making laborious estimates on their calculating machines as to which of the available methods is best for attacking the Cuban revolution. They have the methods of Ydígoras, Nicaragua, Haiti. For the moment, they do not have the Dominican method. They also have the mercenaries in Florida, the OAS [Organization of American States] and many other methods. And they have power to continue improving these methods.
[Former] President Árbenz and his people know they had many methods and a great deal of might. Unfortunately for Guatemala, President Árbenz had an army of the old style, and was not fully aware of the solidarity of the peoples and their capacity to repel any type of aggression.
One of our greatest strengths is being exerted throughout the world— regardless of partisan differences in any country—the strength to defend the Cuban revolution at any given moment. Permit me to say this is a duty of Latin America’s youth. What we have here in Cuba is something new and it’s worth studying. You will have to assess what is good here for yourselves.
There are many bad things, I know. There is a lot of disorganization, I know. If you have been to the Sierra Maestra, then you already know this. We still use guerrilla methods, I know. We lack technicians in necessary numbers commensurate to our aspirations, I know. Our army has still not reached the necessary degree of maturity and the militia members have not achieved sufficient coordination to constitute themselves as an army, I know.
But what I also know, and I want all of you to know, is that this revolution has always acted with the will of the entire people of Cuba. Every peasant and worker who handles a rifle poorly is working every day to handle it better, to defend their revolution. And if at this moment they can’t understand the complicated workings of a machine whose technician fled to the United States, then they are studying every day to learn it, so their factory runs better. The peasants are studying their tractor, to fix its mechanical problems, so the fields of their cooperative yield more.
All Cubans, from both the city and country, share the same sentiments and are marching toward the future, totally united in their thinking, with a leader they have absolute confidence in because he has shown in a thousand battles and on a thousand different occasions his capacity for sacrifice and the power and foresight of his thought.
The nation before you today might disappear from the face of the earth because a nuclear conflict may be unleashed on its account, and it might be the first target. Even if this entire island were to disappear along with its inhabitants, Cuba’s people would consider themselves satisfied and fulfilled if each of you, upon returning to your countries, would say:
“Here we are. Our words come from the humid air of the Cuban forests. We have climbed the Sierra Maestra and seen the dawn, and our minds and our hands are filled with the seeds of that dawn. We are prepared to plant them in this land, and defend them so they can grow.”
From all the sister countries of the Americas, and from our own land, if it should still remain standing as an example, from such a moment on and forever, the voice of the peoples will answer: “Thus it shall be: Let freedom triumph in every corner of the Americas!”
In Support of the Declaration of Havana
Camagüey, September 18, 1960
In a mass assembly in Havana on September 2, 1960, the people of Cuba adopted the Declaration of Havana, which denounced US maneuvers against Cuba and ratified Cuba’s sovereign determination to proclaim its full independence. It was a historic moment, because Washington immediately began to blackmail other Latin American nations into denouncing Cuba at the Organization of American States—actions that finally led nearly all the countries in the region to break with the Cuban revolutionary government.
Che Guevara addressed a mass rally in Camagüey on September 18, 1960, which adopted the same declaration.
Compañeros:
Once again, the people and representatives of the revolutionary government of Cuba have met to talk about the latest events that have taken place in this part of the world, in the Americas, and to place before you, for your consideration and possible ratification, the resolution of the People’s General Assembly in Havana.
It is good to recall that the Declaration of Havana, as it will be known from now on in history, is the reply of the Cuban people, meeting in a General Assembly, to the imperialist acts of aggression that the “master” Herter and his Latin American lackeys devised in San José, Costa Rica.
It is also good to remember that all of the revolutionary advances that have been made in the past year and a half, a period filled with very important events for the history of Latin America, constitute a steady response by the people to acts of aggression both from abroad and from inside Cuba by large landowners and other counterrevolutionaries.
Just after January 1, 1959, we began executing the war criminals who had been convicted of having committed terrible crimes against humanity. Then the US press and the mercenary press in Latin America unleashed their first campaigns against us, condemning the executions in the name of humanity— that same humanity they ignored here in Cuba, as in many other parts of Latin America, when the people were being pitilessly assassinated. The revolutionary government’s response was to call all of the people together in front of Havana’s Palace of Government for them to decide whether or not they wanted revolutionary justice. And you will remember that the entire people spoke out for revolutionary justice and against foreigners’ meddling in our laws and our development.
When the Agrarian Reform Law was passed, a campaign immediately began—and is still going on—against all the members of the government, accusing us of having committed iniquitous crimes and also accusing us of being a “beachhead” of international communism here in Latin America. Among other things, they accused us of having a missile base in Camagüey, of having a submarine base south of our island and of launching attacks against the colossus of the North.
It seems they really considered us a dangerous adversary. Now, when the United Nations is opening another session of the General Assembly, there are only four leaders in the whole world that have the exalted privilege and great honor of being detested by the US plutocracy, and one of those four leaders is precisely our Prime Minister Fidel Castro.
We should be asking ourselves, what is it about Fidel that worries the US authorities so much? What is it about the people of Cuba, a small, underdeveloped island—as they describe us—with a population of only around six million, that makes the United States hate us just as much as the Soviet Union, which has a population of over 200 million, possesses the most powerful means of destruction on earth, has the most powerful army in the world and is the declared enemy of the United States? What is it about Cuba that makes the United States compare it with [the] People’s [Republic of] China, which has 650 million inhabitants—the nation with the largest population on earth—and is the second greatest power in the socialist world? What is it about Cuba? What is the danger posed by the Cuban revolution?
Men and women of Camagüey, the danger posed by the Cuban revolution is you and me. The danger is that what we’re doing may spread throughout Latin America, that the custom of talking with the people and asking the people’s advice whenever necessary may spread through Latin America. Because, if you ask the people of Latin America what should be done with the large landowners, all of them will give the same answer as you; all of them will denounce large landholdings.
And if you ask the people of Latin America who
their enemy is, who has sabotaged their development for 50 years and who has installed rulers such as Trujillo and Somoza who have massacred their people, all of the Latin American people will say that the US government is guilty of the most terrible crimes. They will say that the US government has promoted genocide in Latin America and still uses its rifles (as Batista did here) to maintain the system of oppression by a few over the people as a whole. This is why they fear us and why they want to isolate and destroy us: they are very afraid that our example will spread, that cooperatives will flourish, large landholdings will be broken up and bearded guerrillas will appear all over Latin America. They are afraid that the Andes will become another Sierra Maestra.
That is what the US authorities fear: our example. They know just as well as you do that what they have said about missiles in Camagüey and about a submarine base are lies. They know that this government has not sold out to any other government on the face of the earth and that if the Soviet Union or the government of the People’s Republic of China or any other power on earth should ever make its assistance to us dependent on our giving up a part of our sovereignty or our honor, Cuba would immediately break with them. We have accepted assistance from the Soviet Union and the hand of friendship that all of the socialist powers have extended to us, because they have offered that assistance and friendship without attaching any political strings to it.
They know we don’t have the same conditions they have; they know that socialism has not been established here. They simply offer us their assistance so we can continue along the path we have freely chosen, and this is why we have accepted it, because no stipulations have dishonored that assistance, because these weapons that you see are weapons that the government of the Republic of Czechoslovakia sold to us unconditionally. There is no pact of any kind that restricts us in the use of these weapons; they are ours, to be used in defending our sovereignty—there are no other stipulations limiting their use.