Cuba: The Need to know Our Enemies

The history of the social development of mankind leaves convincing evidence that all revolutions in the different latitudes of the world have had to face powerful external and internal enemies with the clear objective of preventing them, defeating them or, at least, diverting them from their paths and purposes. The Cuban Revolution is not and has never been an exception.

Our Revolution, which began in 1868 with the purpose of achieving the independence and sovereignty of the country, had to fight from very early on against such powerful enemies as the division in the revolutionary ranks, caudillismo, annexationism and reformism.

From the outside, the United States immediately became the main enemy of our people, a condition it has maintained up to the present day when we are engaged in the construction of socialism.

The objective of this article, which is guided by the thought of Fidel Castro, is to contribute to broaden and update the knowledge about the enemies that constantly act to destroy the Revolution or to mediatize it.

The first thing we must emphasize is that from the first moments of the revolutionary triumph Fidel and the Party have been alerting the people of the dangerous role played by the dark forces of the counterrevolution as allies of the United States in their plans to take over Cuba,

In three of those moments (At the V Congress of the PCC in 1997, in the Aula Magna of the University of Havana in 2005, on the occasion of the 60th Anniversary of his joining that institution, in the Book One Hundred Hours with Fidel by Ignacio Ramonet, 2006), Fidel explained at length the possibility that one day the Revolution could be destroyed by the revolutionaries themselves, which would be propitiated above all if we were not capable of correcting our own mistakes.

Therefore, the importance of having clearly defined the internal enemies that endanger the existence of the Revolution is key to prevent this from happening.

There are many factors that can engender the existence of a powerful enemy with destructive capacity, among these the following stand out: selfishness, lack of faith, hesitations, lack of patriotism, individualism, absence of ethical and moral values. The experiences accumulated by the Revolution during more than 60 years confronting and defeating them on every occasion when they have arisen and acted through the guidance and support of U.S. imperialism allow us to describe them as follows:

Bureaucratism continues to be a silent enemy that acts clandestinely causing the decontrol of resources, hindering economic efficiency, impeding the creativity of cadres and workers, generating indolence while discouraging, demotivating and hindering the solution of problems.

Corruption, theft and illegalities, especially if they act under the rule of impunity, are enemies that little by little corrode the foundations of the Revolution and damage the combative morale of the people.

The lack of exigency, tolerance and the absence of combativity in the face of all wrongdoing, including antisocial attitudes, strengthen the enemies of the Revolution and weaken the fighting spirit of the people.

Economic inefficiency, waste, uncontrollable inflation, shortages of basic products, especially foodstuffs, the constant increase in prices become enemies that seriously damage the stability of the Revolution.

A highly damaging factor, whose manifestation occurs unconsciously, is that of the political, state or administrative cadre that acts with total indifference and insensitivity to the problems suffered by the people, that does not connect with the people, does not know how to listen to their opinions, their complaints or demands, that lacks creativity to incorporate the masses in decision making or that is not an example in the community; this is a phenomenon that obeys totally to the field of subjectivity, and, therefore, that does not require material resources for its solution.

Defeating such a dangerous enemy depends only on being faithful to the work methods bequeathed to us by Fidel, to his teachings and examples, that is: to comply with the definition he made of what socialism is in the central act for the 36^th anniversary of the assault on the Moncada Barracks.

Of course, in the analysis of the internal enemies that daily lie in wait for us and endanger the existence of the Revolution, a prominent place must be given to those who as mercenaries, or those who are ideologically convinced, or those who from naivety and ignorance carry out diversionary actions that could make possible a military action against Cuba on the part of Yankee imperialism.

The disguises they use are varied: at times they appear as defenders of dialogue, at others they are defenders of human rights or of free expression and demonstration for which they lash out against “the evil cultural policy of the Revolution”, ignoring and ignoring on purpose that the Revolution is the most important cultural fact in our history; or as if Fidel had never pronounced his “words to the intellectuals” which have since become the cultural policy of the Cuban Revolution, the same one that turned our people into one of the most cultured in the world. At this point it is valid to remember that it was Fidel who affirmed that the future of our people lies in culture, and that without culture there is no freedom, no salvation possible.

A historical analysis of the enemies that from abroad and systematically promote actions to destroy the Cuban Revolution, place without any doubt whatsoever, that Yankee imperialism is the main and most dangerous. And bearing in mind the inviolable principle that in order to defeat the enemy, the first thing to achieve is to know him in all his potentialities, strengths and weaknesses, our Commander in Chief did not cease for a single moment in transmitting to the people his broad and profound knowledge of the plans and strategies of the empire, from the most general concepts that define it as such, to the odious practices they carry out to take over our resources and those of the other peoples of the Third World.

In the Central Report to the Second Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba Fidel affirmed: “The relations with the United States summarize our greatest contradictions in the international field; in them there are insurmountable and permanent elements, which derive from the socialist character of the Cuban State and the imperialist nature of the system that dominates in the United States”.

In an interview granted to Siempre magazine (May 9 and 10, 1991), our Commander in Chief expressed: “By definition, imperialism is aggressive, it is hegemonic, it is dominant”; and in his Reflections (August 27, 2010) entitled 238 reasons to be concerned, he wrote: “imperialism will disappear because its existence is incompatible with human life on the planet.”

These definitions are enough to know the character and destructive essence of the main enemy of the Revolution and why it does not rest in its desire to destroy it and take over Cuba; but it is also necessary for us to know the different ways they use to cover up their plans, of which we will mention just a few.

• Establish patterns of capitalist ideology such as individualism and selfishness.
• Inculcate the profit motive, banality and exaggeration of consumerism.
• Encourage social indiscipline and resignation in the face of wrongdoing.
• To promote family divisions.
• Promote lack of faith, discouragement, distrust, the belief that we are a failed State, with no possibility of solving problems and no future prospects.
• To corrupt, depoliticize, demoralize and pervert the youth.
• In the cultural and intellectual sector, to sow the uprooting of the autochthonous, the denial of ethical and moral values and the love and respect for traditions; also to promote personal interest above the homeland and society with the final objective of culturally colonizing the people so that they come to understand and share the logic of their executioners.

But even knowing the potentialities, strengths and weaknesses of our main enemy is not enough to continue defeating each of their aggressions, therefore, to continue building the socialism that we want and need, it is also essential to continue applying the rules that Fidel taught us and that have allowed us to get this far:

• If we are weak in front of the enemy it is dangerous, if we fear the enemy it is dangerous. That encourages aggression.
• The main enemy cannot be shunned.
• The enemy respects those of us who do not fear him, the enemy respects those who challenge him.
• You cannot turn your back on the enemy because he develops the chasing spirit of wild beasts and attacks you.
• It does not matter that the obstacles are great, it does not matter that the difficulties are great: union and common strategy is the essential condition and the only way to victory.

In a situation as complex as this one, it is understandable that our people ask themselves: What would Fidel say? What would Fidel do? In the development of this work I have been explaining some ideas of our Commander in Chief which, although expressed in different concrete historical moments, are referents for the conduct we must assume to face such an unequal combat. Those that I will now quote to conclude this analysis also try to interpret the message that Fidel would say today to all Cubans:

(…) the wall must not be built around the island, the defense, the true defense must be made in the conscience and in the dignity of each citizen.

(…) If the Revolution should fail, those who will suffer the most terrible consequences are the workers as a class. (…) the worst repressions that can be produced are those that are produced against defeated revolutions. (…) Here there is no room for third positions.

(…) socialism, whatever mistakes men may make -and there will be no human work in which men do not make mistakes-, is the noblest, the most just and the most worthy thing that can be carried out.

Source: Resumen Latinoamericano – Buenos Air