The Cuban revolution was a long time ago and my memory ain't what it used to be—and never was. Can someone refresh my rapidly fading memories? I seem to remember… (picture becomes wavey, loses focus and changes to a sepia tone with lots of harp strumming… as focus returns, people seem to be oddly dressed.)Of course things in Cuba aren't what we'd like them to be but they probably aren't what Fidel would like them to be either. Still, the top three executioners, worldwide, are China, Iran and the U.S.
- I have this persistant memory of a television news broadcast in which the interviewer, a very young Mike Wallace, is talking with twelve guys in fatigues on top of a mountain in Cuba. The twelve are telling Wallace they intend to liberate Cuba from Batista, the gambling industry and organized crime.
- I remember large numbers of U.S. soldiers-of-fortune going to Cuba to fight with Castro and a lot of popular sympathy for Castro's revolution here in the States.
- I remember general joy here in the U.S. when the Batista government fell and the feeling that our well-loved neighbors had finally been freed from a ruthless dictator.
- I seem to recall that Castro first turned to the U.S. for support for his new Cuban government. He (mistakenly) thought the U.S. would be delighted to help him rebuild Cuban society and become a trading partner and soure of aid.
- Castro was soon disabused of his naivety when the U.S. demanded that he return all nationalized busineses to their “rightful” owners, mostly the mob and userous agri-businesses.
- Shocked, but seriously in need of support, Castro somewhat reluctantly turned to the USSR as the only economic power willing to help. This also deepened Castro's long-standing suspicion of western capitalism and set him on a course to change the political and economic course of Latin America.
- During the 1960s a lot of young people in the U.S. romanticized the Cuban revolution and spent time in Cuba helping people build collective farms and such. As I recall, songs from this period made their way into Sing Out!.
- Cuba suffered more economic problems with the collapse of the USSR and the general fall of Western Communism. Castro's own defiant pride has been partly responsible for Cuba's failure to recover but he and his government continue to be a source of outrage for the far right in the U.S. and their religious zeal in this regard continues to hamstring U.S. policy.
- Mark