Fidel Castro: formation, trajectory, government, death

FidelCastro he was the son of a Spaniard who owned a sugarcane farm and was marked in history as one of the most important personalities in his country and in the world in the 20th century. Graduated in Law, Castro was a supporter of revolutionary ideals, and they made him fight for the overthrow of Fulgencio Batista's dictatorship.

In 1959, he became prime minister of Cuba and assumed the presidency in 1976, remaining in office until 2008, when health problems forced his departure from politics. He was praised for developing a great education and health system, but criticized for establishing a dictatorship in his country. He died in 2016 at the age of 90.

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birth and education

Fidel Castro led the Cuban Revolution and became prime minister of Cuba in 1959 at age 32.[1]

Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was born in Birán, Cuba, on August 13, 1926. He was the third of seven children who Angel Maria Bautista Castro and Argiz

had with Lina Ruz González, the second wife of the Spaniard, who had moved to Cuba during the Spanish-American War, a conflict between the United States and Spain in 1898.

After that war, Fidel Castro's father prospered by setting up a sugar cane farm and it was there that he raised his children. Fidel's mother had been a maid on Ángel Castro's property, but married him after his first marriage, to Maria Luisa Argota, ended. Fidel's six brothers were called Angelita, Ramón, Raul, Juanita, emma and Augustine.

Fidel Castro lived the first of his life on his father's farm in Birán, but at the age of six he began his student life. So he was sent to Santiago de Cuba to study at the Colegio de Dolores, and later on he moved to Havana, the country's capital, where he studied at the Colegio de Belén.

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revolutionary trajectory

In 1945, Fidel Castro enrolled in the course of Right offered by the University of Havana, where he began his political education. Involved with revolutionary ideals, Castro became part of a group known as Caribbean Legion, formed by revolutionaries who sought to fight authoritarian regimes in Central America and the Caribbean.

The members of the Caribbean Legion advocated the replacement of authoritarian regimes by democratic regimes, and in large numbers of the members was Dominican, one of the targets was the Dominican Republic, a country that at the time was under the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo. the attempt to Dominican Republic invasion, which took place in 1947, was unsuccessful.

The following year, Fidel Castro was in Bogota when a popular revolt broke out and he took part in the events in the Colombian capital. At that time, he already had an anti-imperialist rhetoric that spoke in defense of Latin American nations against interventions promoted by the United States.

In 1950, Fidel Castro finished his law course and then continued in politics. He was a member of BrokenOrthodox, a reformist party, and, in 1952, decided to run as a candidate for one of the seats in the Cuban Congress. However, his intention to run went down the drain when that year's elections were canceled because of the military coup carried out by Fulgêncio Batista.

Fidel Castro sought to use his legal knowledge to overthrow the Batista dictatorship by legal means, but, with his initiatives failing, he turned to another form of action.

• Attack on Moncada Barracks

Fidel Castro was a staunch opponent of the Batista dictatorship, and in 1953 he organized an armed group that attacked the Moncada Barracks, located in Santiago de Cuba. The attack took place on July 26, with Fidel Castro and his brother Raul Castro and ahead of 160 men. This attack was practically a suicide mission, as the barracks was occupied by trained and well-armed soldiers, but Fidel believed that the element of surprise would guarantee success.

Dozens of his men were killed, with Fidel and his brother Raúl being trapped. At his trial, Fidel Castro made his self-defense speaking for four hours and saying a phrase that was marked in his trajectory: "condemn me, it doesn't matter, history will absolve me"|1|. In that trial, Fidel Castro was sentenced to 15 years in prison. If you want to know more about the Castro brothers' first attempt to oust Fulgêncio Batista from power, read: Assault on Moncada Barracks.

Cuban revolution

Arrested and convicted in 1953, Fidel Castro did not spend that long in jail because, in 1955, a political amnesty was granted in Cuba, and he and other prisoners were released in May of that year. After being released, Fidel Castro organized the July 26th Movement, named after the attack on the Moncada Barracks.

He and his brother moved to the Mexico and there they sought to rebuild the revolutionary movement so that they could return to Cuba and oust Fulgencio Batista from power. In Mexico, Fidel Castro met and became friends with Che Guevara, one of the great revolutionaries in the history of Latin America and leaders of the Cuban revolution.

Fidel Castro managed to rally a few dozen men in support of his cause and decided to return to Cuba in December 1956 aboard the yacht granma. The crossing from Mexico to Cuba took longer than anticipated, causing members of the MR-26-7 to fall victim to an ambush by the Cuban army.

Most of Fidel Castro's men were killed in confrontation with the army, and the Cuban leader and the few survivors went into hiding to save their lives. They settled in the mountainous region of Sierra Maestra and formed a guerrilla that fought for two years against the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista.

At the end of 1958, the guerrilla formed and led by Fidel Castro managed to place the regime in Fulgencio Batista in a delicate situation. The dictator, realizing that the situation was bad and that Fidel Castro had support, both in the countryside and in the big Cuban cities, decided to flee Cuba on January 1, 1959.

A week later, Fidel Castro, at the age of 32, entered the Cuban capital and was received with a party by the population of the city under the promise of guaranteeing the stability of the country and implementing a regime democratic. Later, Fidel took power and remained in power for nearly 50 years.

read more: One of the biggest diplomatic crises in history involved Cuba - the Missile Crisis

ruler of cuba

Fidel Castro was Cuban Prime Minister from 1959 to 1976, and from that date until 2008 he served as President of Cuba.[2]

Fidel Castro only took up a post in the Cuban government on February 16, 1959, when he became Prime Minister from the country. He remained at that post until 1976, when he became president of Cuba, on December 2nd. Fidel Castro only left the presidency due to health problems in 2008, passing the role to his brother Raúl Castro.

Throughout this period, Fidel Castro was the victim of 638 assassination attempts planned by the US intelligence service, the CIA. As we know, he survived all of them and only died in 2016, of natural causes. This happened because the Cuban example was terrible for US interests in Latin America.

It is a consensus among historians that the Cuban Revolution was of character nationalist and that it was the erosion of relations between the United States and Cuba that led the Caribbean island to ally itself with the Soviet Union. This is because the United States was not satisfied with the overthrow of its ally (Fulgência Batista) and much less with the first measures taken by Fidel in power, such as the agrarian reform law, which harmed the economic interests of US companies installed in Cuba.

The American response against the measures taken in Cuba was to determine the disruption of diplomatic relations between the two countries in January 1961, and in April of the same year, the CIA supported a group of Cuban opponents of Fidel Castro in an invasion of the country. This was the Invasion of the Bay of Pigs, a counterrevolutionary action that failed.

Cuba was also the target of a economic embargo of the United States that is still in force today. The purpose of this embargo was to stifle the Cuban economy in order to force the overthrow of Fidel Castro's government. THE Cuba's rapprochement with the Soviet Union it was a way of sustaining its economy, and the Soviets provided that support until 1991, when the country ceased to exist.

As Cuba's ruler, Fidel Castro managed to develop a education and health system of high quality and recognized around the world. However, his regime received criticism for the authoritarianism and lack of freedom of expression of the Cuban population. The criticisms and praises of Cuba continue to this day.

readalso: Augusto Pinochet - the life of one of the best known dictators in Latin America

Personal life and death

Throughout his life, Fidel Castro had twoweddings, and he is estimated to have had 11 children, born from their marriages but also from extramarital relationships. Fidel Castro's first wife was Mirta Diaz-Balart, to whom he was married between 1948 and 1955. The motivation for the end of this relationship was an extramarital affair he had. From this marriage, Fidel had a son, Fidel Ángel Castro Diaz-Balart.

the second marriage was with Dalia Soto del Valle, whom he married in 1980. With her he had five children, called Alexis, Alexander, Antonio, alejandro and angel. The rest of his descendants were born from extramarital relationships he maintained throughout his life.

As of 2006, Fidel Castro's health problems began to prevent him from continuing in the government of Cuba. he if moved away of the Cuban presidency in 2008, and since then, his public appearances have become increasingly rare. On November 25, 2016, his death at the age of 90 was announced. To learn more about the circumstances of the Cuban leader's death, read: Death of Fidel Castro.

Note

|1|WHEELS, Sergio. Cuban lawyer specializing in self-defense Fidel Castro dies at the age of 90. To access, click on here.

Image credits

[1] emkaplin and Shutterstock

[2] Rob Crandall and Shutterstock

By Daniel Neves
History teacher