26th July - 55 years of an alternative

FIFTY-FIVE years is a short period of time in the life of a nation, but sufficient to confirm that the 26th of July marked the beginning of a new era in Cuban history.

In his key speech at the commemorative event for the 20th anniversary, likewise in Santiago de Cuba, Fidel recalled these memorable lines of poetry by the outstanding communist leader and notable intellectual, Rubén Martínez Villena:

"We need a charge to kill rogues,

To complete the work of revolutions,

To avenge the dead who are suffering outrage,

To clean the tenacious scab of colonialism,

To not render useless, in a humiliating fate,

The effort and the hunger, and the wound and death;

So that the Republic maintains its own self,

To make real the marble dream of Martí;

So that our children do not beg on their knees,

For the homeland that their fathers won for them on their feet."


And he concluded his speech by saying:

"Rubén: the 26th of July was the charge that you called for."

We Cubans have confronted many difficulties and difficult moments since that memorable event of 1973. Only our people’s profound convictions and steadfast will to resist and overcome have made it possible to celebrate with pride and optimism this new anniversary.
Granma daily took the welcome initiative of recently reproducing, in 15 parts, that same speech. That makes it unnecessary for us to refer to the antecedents, causes, conditions and consequences of the assault on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes Garrisons, as set out by the leader of the Revolution that day in an unrepeatable synthesis.
In addition to being a sound analysis of the past and present at that time, that speech constitutes an accurate and precise evaluation of the harsh realities in store for the future and ways of confronting them.

One day like today, in 1973, Fidel affirmed that the only salvation for the Latin American peoples was to unite and liberate themselves from imperialist domination, as only in that way would they succeed in occupying a place among the great human communities.

And, referring to our region, he added the following:

"Only this will give us the strength to confront the gigantic alimentation, economic, social and human problems of a population that will grow to 600 million in 25 years’ time. Only this will make possible our participation in the science and technology revolution that will constitute life in the future. Only this will make us free."
He went on to say:
"…the luxury and squander of developed capitalist societies are exhausting natural and non-recoverable reserves like oil, whose price is threatening to rise in an exceptional way." Up to here, his words.

It would seem like he said that today and it was 35 years ago. Not without reason did Abdelazis Bouteflika, a close friend of Cuba and president of our sister country Algeria, say on one occasion:

"We have had the immense privilege of having comrade Fidel as a friend, one who has never failed us. Fidel possesses the rare quality of traveling into the future, coming back and explaining it."

Our battle today is the same as that initiated on the 26th of July

Speech given by General of the Army Raúl Castro Ruz, president of the Councils of State and Ministers, at the central event commemorating the 55th anniversary of the assault on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes Garrisons, at the 26th of July Ciudad Escolar, Santiago de Cuba, July 26, 2008. "Year 50 of the Revolution."

The full text can be found at Granma Internacional