The Empire and Fidel's enduring lesson

Given the dramatic circumstances of the present, marked by the brutal attack against the Venezuelan homeland and the threats to the sovereignty of our nations in the Americas, we must walk hand in hand with Fidel now more than ever, reflecting on his teachings and his constant warnings about the aggressive nature and brutality of the imperialist power.

From the very beginning of the revolutionary struggle that led to the victory of January 1959—when he was still the guerrilla leader confronting the army of the Batista dictatorship—he made it clear that the paramount objective of his actions would be the relentless confrontation with the imperialist doctrine, based on oppression and crime.

This is revealed in a memorable letter sent to Celia Sánchez from the Sierra Maestra on June 5, 1958, when he wrote: “Seeing the rockets they fired at Mario’s house (a peasant living in the region where the rebel troops were operating), I swore to myself that the Americans will pay dearly for what they are doing.

When this war ends, a much longer and greater war will begin for me: the war I will wage against them. I realize that this will be my true destiny.” But it is in the exhaustive “one hundred-hour” dialogue with Ignacio Ramonet that the Commander-in-Chief, in singularly ingenious metaphors, lays bare the murderous core of imperialism and the only possible stance to avoid falling victim to its power and subjugation.

“Beasts must be confronted,” he tells Ramonet. “First, the empire needs to know there will be a fight and that the price will be high. (...) Lion tamers sometimes turn their backs on the lion, use the whip, the noisy lash, and occasionally wave, receive the applause, and then move away again, because otherwise, the lion reacts, driven by its instinct to hunt.
Even a lapdog, one of the gentlest, starts barking at you, and if you run away, it chases after you and might even bite your calf.

But if you turn around, the dog backs away. It's happened to me at sea with barracudas, with sharks; when you confront them, their instinct for self-preservation kicks in and makes them retreat,” Fidel emphasizes.

“There is nothing worse than turning your back on the enemy, because it develops that instinct for pursuit; that's the instinct of wild beasts, and an empire is much more than a wild beast.

Even the psychology of those who rule an empire and wield its weapons is that of wild beasts,” he asserts. And based on these examples, he warns his interviewer:

“During the October Crisis, Cuba faced with honor, without any concessions, the risk of being attacked with nuclear weapons in 1962. It defeated the ‘dirty war’ waged throughout the country, at a cost in lives greater than that paid for the war of liberation.

Cuba steadfastly endured thousands of acts of sabotage and terrorist attacks organized by the United States government and thwarted hundreds of assassination plots against the leaders of the Revolution.

” The lessons of this successful champion in the battle against the empire, summarized in the simplicity of these testimonies, are of particular importance in the face of the blatant aggression of the United States government that we now confront.

When the imperialist beast threatens, we must be vigilant and ready to act. Fidel made that perfectly clear.