History has absolved Cuba
By
Caleb T. Maupin
Published Jul 26, 2007 12:20 AM
“What heart is not set aflame by the promise of freedom?” Fidel
Castro asked a kangaroo court of the U.S.-backed regime of Fulgencio Batista so
many years ago in 1953. He was being charged with the crime of attempting to
overthrow the Batista dictatorship and the corrupt, decadent, colonized and
impoverished order in Cuba along with it.
On July 26, 1953, Fidel Castro and 160 others attacked the Moncada military barracks in Santiago de Cuba.
|
Fidel Castro and 160 others had led an attack against the Moncada military
barracks in Santiago de Cuba. The attack failed. Some of the young
revolutionaries were killed outright or tortured to death; Castro and others
were apprehended. The speech Castro gave in his defense was soon widely
circulated under the title “History Will Absolve Me.” It became a
recruiting tool for the building of a guerrilla army that eventually toppled
the regime in 1959.
Who can deny that Castro was correct? In terms of medical care, education,
literacy and employment, Cuba stands far ahead of any other nation in Latin
America and the Caribbean.
Fidel Castro being
arrested after the attack.
|
Some are skeptical of such claims, but they need look no further than the
CIA’s own World Fact Book.
While the CIA has done its best to drown the Cuban Revolution in blood with
terrorist attacks, bombings and assassinations, it is nevertheless forced to
concede the facts about Cuba in its own publication.
The fact book shows that a child born in Cuba has a better chance of surviving
than one born in the United States, despite the fact that the U.S. contains the
most wealth of any country in the world.
It shows that Cuba’s life expectancy is far ahead of every other Latin
American nation, and is just slightly lower than that of the U.S.
These figures show that Cuba has a government devoted to the welfare of the
people. It has built countless hospitals, clinics and medical research
facilities since the revolution. Cuba has a medical college where people from
all over the world are trained to be doctors in their home countries. It
exports more medical aid than any nation on earth. It even offered medical aid
to the survivors of Hurricane Katrina—an offer that Washington
spurned.
Unlike the government in Washington, the Cuban government has devoted itself
fully to the fight against AIDS. As a result, the rate of infection with
HIV-AIDS in Cuba is only a sixth of what it is in the U.S.
The fact book shows that Cuba now has a 99 percent literacy rate—again,
far above all the capitalist nations of Latin America.
Even while Cuba was fighting off the CIA-sponsored Bay of Pigs invasion in
1961, its literacy campaigns did not stop. Cuba now has free, high-quality
schools and all children are guaranteed an education through secondary school.
All education, including the university level, is free to Cubans.
How is it that a small island in the Caribbean has been able to accomplish so
much?
What is it that Cuba has that the rest of Latin America and most of the
developing world do not have?
It has socialism. Cuban society is not based on greed and profits. The Cuban
Revolution, which started out as a struggle against a bloody dictatorship, went
on to free the land from the control of agribusiness, much of it in the hands
of U.S. corporations. In the words of Che Guevara, it was “an agrarian
reform that grew over into a socialist revolution” as the
revolutionaries, in order to keep their promises to the people of a better
life, began to liberate the offices and factories as well.
The means of production—the factories, the big farms and banks—are
now in the hands of the Cuban people, who are using them to build a better
future for themselves and their children.
“What heart is not set aflame by the promise of freedom?” Castro
said so many years ago, and when the people of the world look upon Cuba their
hearts are set aflame. They see the lie in the claim that capitalism is the
best we can do and that humans are naturally greedy.
History has absolved Fidel Castro, as it will absolve all who fight for
socialism, not just in Cuba but all over the world.
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this notice is preserved.
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
Email:
[email protected]
Subscribe
[email protected]
Support independent news
DONATE