Fidel's legacy, present in these difficult times

This August 13th would have been Fidel's 99th birthday. During his 90 years of life, he chose to storm heaven, defying enormous obstacles, dogmas, and accumulated difficulties in the face of the great historical need for a revolutionary transformation in his homeland, which for decades remained unfulfilled dreams for entire generations of Cubans.
From his early youth, he was his own guide, although his qualities did not escape the prediction of the Jesuit priest and professor at the Colegio de Belen, the Spaniard Armando Llorente, who, in an assessment of the student, wrote: "I always saw in Fidel Castro the makings of a hero and was convinced that the history of his homeland would one day speak of him."

Upon beginning his law studies at the University of Havana, he joined the student struggles for the regeneration of the republic, as envisioned by Jose Marti.

He studied his work and the ideas of Marxism-Leninism. However, he did not limit himself to calm analysis and became involved in the enlistment of an ill-fated expedition to liberate Santo Domingo from the dictatorship of Leonidas Trujillo.

The coup d'état of March 10, 1952, carried out by Fulgencio Batista, was supported by the United States—very accommodating of military dictatorships on the continent—and put an end to the island's bourgeois democratic formalities.

While the traditional parties did not confront the de facto regime, neither could the leftist sectors challenge the army.

Fidel, then a young lawyer of just 26 years old, understood that armed struggle was the only solution and emerged as a different kind of leader at the head of a vanguard detachment of the so-called Centennial Generation. Shattering prejudices and fears, he organized and led the attacks on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Cespedes barracks in Santiago de Cuba and Bayamo, respectively, on July 26, 1953.

No one was better prepared than he to face the harsh military setback of that epic battle, in which he lost more than 50 comrades murdered by soldiers following the orders of the tyrant, who handed out ranks and privileges in exchange for crimes.

But nothing intimidated him, and before his captors, he denounced the massacre and outlined his plan for the Revolution in his self-defense campaign known as "History Will Absolve Me."

This was followed by the imprisonment of the leader and the revolutionaries, their release under popular pressure, exile in Mexico, preparations for a new phase, and the disembarkation of the yacht Granma on December 2, 1956.

Another severe blow followed with the dispersal of the combatants in Alegria de Pio and the reunion of only 12 survivors days later in Cuatro Palmas.

At that moment, he secured victory, and his prophecy, though seemingly insane, came true two years later, with bloody battles, setbacks, and ultimately triumphs that made January 1, 1959, possible.

During the joyous atmosphere created by the victory, however, he warned that everything would be more difficult from then on. He led the Cuban people for more than 50 years, facing all forms of military aggression, terrorism, blockades, and media campaigns that did not prevent the consolidation of the Revolution and socialism in the empire's own backyard, which forever changed the history of Latin America and the oppressed countries of the world.

It was a well-known fact that whenever he addressed his role in history, he would resort to Marti's maxim that "all the glory of the world fits in a grain of corn," and as his final wish, he asked that his cult not be embodied in monuments, nor that his name honor any work.

Although Fidel does not need such tributes to continue living. In this present, of resistance by the Cuban people against the intensified blockade and subversive plans of all kinds, of economic crisis, and defying dissimilar natural disasters, the legacy of the undefeated Commander lives on.