Dr. Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz (born August 13,
) has been the ruler
of Cuba
since he became Prime Minister on February 16,
and President
of the Council of State and the Council of Ministers on December 3,
.
Resistance
against Batista
Born in Biran, Holguin, Cuba, into a wealthy farming family (son of Angel
Castro and Lina Ruz), he was educated at Jesuit schools
and then the Jesuit
preparatory school Colegio Belen in Havana. In he went to the University of Havana to study law,
graduating in .
Castro
practiced law in a small partnership between 1950 and 1952. He intended to stand
for parliament in 1952 for the Ortodoxo Party but the coup d'état of
General Fulgencio Batista overthrew the government of Carlos Prio Socarras and canceled the
election. Castro charged Batista with violating the constitution in court but
his petition was refused. In response Castro organized a disastrous armed
attack on the Moncada Barracks in Oriente province on July 26,
. Over eighty of the
attackers were killed, and Castro was taken prisoner, tried, and sentenced to
fifteen years in prison. (Castro used the closing arguments in the case to
deliver 'History
Will Absolve Me', a passionate speech defending his actions and
explaining his political views.) He was released in a general amnesty in May
1955 and went into exile in Mexico and the United
States.
He
returned to Cuba with a
number of other exiles, clandestinely sailing from Mexico
to Cuba
on the small ship Granma. They were called the 26th of July
Revolutionary Movement. The group's first action was in Oriente province
on December 2,
. Only twelve of the
original eighty men survived to retreat into the Sierra Maestra
Mountains and from there
wage a guerrilla war against the Batista government. The survivors included Che Guevara,
Raul Castro,
and Camilo Cienfuegos. Castro's movement gained
popular support and grew to over 800 men. On May 24,
, Batista launched
seventeen battalions against Castro in Operación Verano. Despite being
outnumbered, Castro's forces scored a series of stunning victories, aided by
massive desertion and surrenders from Batista's army. On New Year's Day 1959
Batista fled the country, and Castro's forces took Havana.
Foreign
policy
Initially the United
States was quick to recognize the new
government. Castro became prime minister in February, but friction with
the United States soon developed when the new government began expropriating
property owned by big American companies (United Fruit
in particular), proposing compensation based on property tax valuations that
for many years the same companies had managed to keep
artificially low. Castro visited the White House
shortly after coming to power, and met with Vice President Richard Nixon.
Castro's economic policies had caused some concerns in Washington
that Castro was a Communist with an allegiance to the Soviet
Union. Following the meeting Nixon remarked that Castro was
'naive' but not necessarily a Communist.
In
February 1960,
Cuba signed an agreement to
buy oil from the USSR.
When the U.S. owned refineries in Cuba refused to process the oil they were
expropriated, and the United States broke diplomatic relations with the Castro
government soon after. To the fears of the Eisenhower Administration, Cuba continued to establish closer ties with the
Soviet Union. A variety of pacts were signed
between Castro and Soviet Premier Khrushchev,
and Cuba began to receive
large amounts of economic and military aid from the USSR.
On the
day after Castro had described his revolution as a socialist one, the United States sponsored an unsuccessful attack
on Cuba.
On April 17,
, a force of about
1,400 Cuban exiles, financed and trained by the CIA, landed in the south at the Bay of Pigs.
The CIA's assumption was that the invasion would spark a popular rising against
Castro. There was no rising, and what part of the invasion force made it ashore
was captured while President Kennedy
withdrew support at the last minute. Nine were executed in connection with this
action. Then in a nationally broadcast speech on December 2
that year Castro declared that he was a Marxist-Leninist
and that Cuba
was going to adopt Communism.
Pope John XXIII
excommunicated
Castro on January 3, .
This was consistent with a 1949 decree by Pope Pius XII
forbidding catholics from supporting communist governments. For Castro, who had
previously renounced catholicism, this was an event of
very little consequence, nor was it expected to be. It was aimed at undermining
support for Castro among Catholics; however, there is little evidence that it
did.
In
October, 1962, the Cuban missile crisis occurred after the United States discovered the Soviet Union was
actively attempting to assemble nuclear missles in Cuba. After the tensions were
defused, relations between the United States
and Cuba
remained mutually hostile, and the CIA continued to sponsor a number of
assassination schemes over the following years.
In , Pierre Elliott Trudeau, then Prime
Minister of Canada,
made one of the first state visits to Cuba by a Western leader during the
height of the American blockade and personally embraced the Cuban leader.
Trudeau gave him a $4 million gift, and arranged a loan for another $10
million. In a speech delivered by Trudeau, he said 'Long live Prime
Minister and Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro. Long live Cuban-Canadian
friendship.'
Economic
policy
Castro consolidated control of the nation by further nationalizing
industry, confiscating property owned by non-Cubans, collectivizing
agriculture, and enacting policies to benefit workers. Many Cubans fled the
country, some to Miami,
Florida,
where they established a large, active anti-Castro community. Because of the
harsh embargo imposed by the United States,
Cuba became increasingly
dependent on Soviet subsidies to finance improvements in Cuba's economic
conditions. The collapse of the Soviet Union
in
therefore brought real economic hardship to Cuba.
The
harsh American-led economic sanctions, which include a general travel ban to Cuba for tourists, have been a major reason for Cuba's economic
troubles. However, between 1960 and 1990 much of their effects were neutralized
by aid from the former Soviet Union that in
some years was as high as one quarter of the island's Gross Domestic product.
In spite of the embargo Cuba
continues to trade with other nations. Nonetheless, Cuba
is the second most popular tourist destination in the Caribbean (behind the Dominican Republic).
Its economy also receives an large amounts of currency
(estimated at $ 850 million annually) from Cuban Americans who send money back
to their relatives or friends.
Education
and health care
Education and health care were made available to all, even those living in
the remotest corners of the island. UNESCO
statistics confirm that Cuba's
rate of basic literacy is now among the highest in Latin
America.
Few
Cuban children live on the streets - unlike in many neighbouring countries.
Infant mortality rates are the lowest in the region (and slightly lower that
those in the United States),
health care is excellent and all receive free milk until the age of six.
Besides entertainment, Cuban television broadcasts college-level courses for
the adult population.
The
Cuban media often highlight the contrast between contented Cuban children and
their counterparts in Bogotà, Los Angeles or Buenos Aires - dealing in
drugs, dragged into prostitution or living in shanty towns.
Castro's
leadership of Cuba
has remained largely unchallenged, his supporters
claim this because the masses -- whose living conditions they believe he
improved -- rallied behind him. Castro's opponents believe his continued
leadership is due to coercion and repression.
Supporters
of Fidel Castro's regime point to Cuba's relatively advanced
healthcare as a success of his government since it came to power in 1959. Much
of the post-revolutionary rebuilding of the country focused on children. Cuban
life expectancy as of 2002 is only slightly lower than the USA's.
Critics
of Castro's regime allege that although Cuba's
infant mortality rate is now the lowest in Latin America
that was also was the case before Castro -- when, they claim, it was also the
13th lowest in the world.
It is
generally acknowledged that Cuba
has made substantial progress in developing pharmaceuticals. Cuba has its
own portfolio of related patents and tries to market its medicine around the
world.
Literacy
campaign
Cuba also has improved the literacy of its
people. Castro's literacy campaign focused on rural areas where literacy was
very low. In a fall 1960 speech before the United
Nations, Castro had announced that 'Cuba
will be the first country of America
that, after a few months, will be able to say it does not have one illiterate
person.' Nearly 270,000 teachers and students were sent across the country
to teach those who wanted to learn how to read and write. By 1961, Cuba's
illiteracy rate had been reduced from 20 percent to 4 percent. People who
completed the course were asked to send a letter to Fidel Castro as a test. Cuba's National Literacy
Museum archives more than
700,000 such letters.
Popular
Image
An apparent cult of personality around Castro has arisen
despite his personal attempts to discourage it. In contrast to many of the
world's modern strongmen, Castro has only twice been personally featured on a
Cuban stamp. In 1974 he appeared on a stamp to commemorate the visit of Leonid
Brezhnev, and in 1999 he appeared on a stamp commemorating the 40th
anniversary of the Revolution. There has been a much stronger tendency to
encourage reverence for Cuban independence hero Jose Marti
and the 'martyrs' of the Cuban revolution such as Che Guevara.
Castro himself is famous for his long and detailed speeches which often last
several hours and contain lots of data and historical references. He rarely
appears in public without his military fatigues, and trademark cap.
Human
rights
The Castro regime has been frequently accused of numerous human rights abuses, including tourture,
arbitrary imprisionment, unfair trials, and extra-judical executions. Many
argue that several thousand unjustifed deaths have occured under Castro's
decades-long rule.
Critics
also point to censorship, the lack of press freedom in Cuba, the lack
of civil rights, outlawing of political opposition groups and unions, and lack
of free and democratic elections.
Castro
himself claims that the United States continue to engage in secret warfare
against Cuba using spies and mercenaries, and that many human rights activists
are in fact agents of the United States. Castro's supporters feel that Castro's
often harsh measures are justified to prevent the United States from installing a
foreign leader. Opposition to the regime is thus frequently portrayed as
illegitimate, and being a United States-led conspiracy.
Supporters
also contend that Cuba's
human rights record is significantly better than that of many other countries
in the Caribbean/Latin America region, though this is widely debated.
