Unit 6: Cuban Revolution

There is a fair amount of resources and activities about the Cuban Revolution, this series of activities is what I put together for my students. The intention was to offer them enough sources and questions to be able to reflect effectively in their essays about why people would want to join the revolution and whether or not the revolution was successful. There are a range of primary and secondary sources, along with videos. The last activity on Nuestra Razon - the July 26th's Movement Manifesto, was challenging but the students eventually learned a lot from the task. 

Activity 1:

July 26th Movement

Opening: Share a brief biography of Carlos Franqui with the students. You can share as well the 2 photos that show he was cut out, you can also share the poem. It is usually effective in getting students' attention. Explain that the following reading is by Tana Gomez who wrote the introduction to his book about his participating the in the Cuban Revolution. 

What was the July 26th Movement?

An excerpt from "The Twelve" by Carlos Franqui

From the Introduction by Tana de Gámez

Vocabulary: Spartan clandestinity , coup d’etat , tyranny , oppression, indicted, abetting, absolve, amnesty, tacit

Short Answer Questions: 

1. Who participated in July 26th Movement?

2. How did they train and get arms?

3. How could the attack on the Moncada Fort be both “a set back” and the movements “finest hour”?

4. What arguments did Fidel put forth in his defense?

5. What is Gamez saying about the Cuban government when he says “There simply was nothing to confess to, and the truth was too compromising for the government, too indicative of oppression and discontent to be admitted.”?

6. Why did Batista offer the rebels amnesty?

7. What in your own words was the response of the rebels? 

Longer Response Question:

8. Fidel cites several different struggles and thinkers in his defense. Choose one name or event to look up. Describe in a few sentences what the significance of this person or event was and why Fidel Castro might want to discuss them in his defense. 

Activity 2:

Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolution (Guevara)

For this reading I asked students to complete a SOAPSTone, in which they had to identify the Speaker, Occasion of the piece, the Audience it was geared to, the Purpose and Significance of the piece as well as the Tone. 

Activity 3: 

Behind Rebel Lines Newsreel

Show students the following clip from Universal-International News, 

Cuba and Castro: First Films from Behind Rebel Lines (1958)

First films of Cuban rebel leader Fidel Castro and his ragged force in their mountain stronghold. Made shortly before fighting erupted in all six of Cuba’s provinces.This is the band, numbered at about 1,000 and for 16 months has held out in rugged Sierra Maestra Mountains near the islands eastern tip. Ill supplied they make many of their weapons in crude jungle workshops. Lines of grenades made prove as unreliable as they are makeshift. One of Castro’s most potent weapons has been the mimeograph. Pronouncements and propaganda have circulated throughout Cuba, by pamphlets and by radio.Despite secret police efforts to stamp out the underground, Castro himself has become a figure of legend in the 16 months since he invaded Oriente province from a small boat. Rebel achievements were actually few for most of that time, but by mere existence and survival, Castro’s force has grown and exerted an influence out of all proportion to its size.Castro’s plan of action: to fight by any means until the Batista regime has toppled.Sabotage has proved effective in paralyzing Oriente province for weeks before the general outbreak of fighting. Oriente province is the most remote from the heart of the country.

The ragged under fed, poorly armed rebels have cut off communication and supply lines, in a campaign of snipping and sabotage. But every time they have clashed in the open with Batista’s hard and efficient army and the national police, the rebels have lost heavily.

Despite loses they have fought on and their numbers grow. Today an estimated one man in ten carries a modern rifle. The United States has embargoed [refused to ship] arms for both sides. Occasional shipments are smuggled through by rebel sympathizers. It is an unequal battle of idealists against tough professional forces.

As Castro said, “If I lose I will start over again. If Batista loses he loses for good.”

Cuba’s strongman who has appeared with his family at a press reception seemed untroubled by Castro’s mounting offensive. Behind Batista stand the army, the police, and apparently Cuba’s labor unions who withheld support from Castro’s general strike call.

Batista seemed upset about reports in the American press about police brutality and corruption, but confident in the face of an unpredictable future.

Questions:

1. How are the rebels dressed?

2. What weapons are mentioned in the clip?

3. Which one is highlighted as the most potent? Why?

4. How are Castro and the rebels portrayed in this newsreel?

Activity 4: 

Battle of Jigüe (Cannon 1981) 

Opening: I opened this activity with an Excerpt from Che Guevara from 1958 reflecting on Batista’s forces:

"The enemy soldier in the Cuban example which at present concerns us, is the junior partner of the dictator; he is the man who gets the last crumb left by a long line of profiteers that begins in Wall Street and ends with him. He is disposed to defend his privileges, but he is disposed to defend them only to the degree that they are important to him. His salary and his pension are worth some suffering and some dangers, but they are never worth his life. If the price of maintaining them will cost it, he is better off giving them up; that is to say, withdrawing from the face of the guerrilla danger."— Che Guevara, 1958

Question: What is Che claiming in this statement about the men who are fighting in Batista’s army? 

Reading: Battle of Jigüe 

This is a great anecdote that truly helps to demonstrate the success and appeal of Castro's troops during the revolution. For this reading I asked students to complete a SOAPSTone, in which they had to identify the Speaker, Occasion of the piece, the Audience it was geared to, the Purpose and Significance of the piece as well as the Tone. 

Battle of Jigüe (Cannon 1981)

An excerpt from Terrence Cannon’s book: REVOLUTIONARY CUBA (1981) 

    The battle of Jigüe, which lasted for ten days in mid-July (1958), was probably the most important and certainly one of the most interesting, revealing the complex nature of the war. During it, letters were exchanged, troops on opposite sides shared their food, and a commander changed his allegiance. 

    Battalion 18 of the government forces was camped at a river fork close to the rebel headquarters. Rebel units took up positions surrounding it. Seventy-two hours passed in silence, during which the government troops ran out of food. They made several attempts to break out and were beaten back. 

    “On the morning of the fifteenth, the air force appeared,” Fidel reported over Radio Rebelde. The aerial attack against our positions, with machine-gun strafing and 500-pound explosive bombs as well as napalm, lasted uninterrupted from six in the morning until one in the afternoon. The pasture and forest… were left scorched, but not one of the rebel combatants moved from his position.” 

    That same day Fidel learned that the commanding officer of the besieged battalion was Major José Quevedo, a former classmate of Fidel’s at the University of Havana. Fidel wrote his opponent a letter, which was delivered by one of the government soldiers who had been taken prisoner. 

    “With great sorrow I have learned… that you are in command of the surrounded troops,” Fidel wrote. “We know that you are a learned and honorable military officer of the Academy, with a law degree. You know that the cause for which your soldiers, as well as yourself, sacrifice and die is an unjust cause.” 

    Fidel offered Quevedo “a dignified and honorable surrender. Accept this offer; you will not surrender to an enemy of the fatherland but to a sincere revolutionary, a man who fights for the welfare of all Cubans, including that of the soldiers who fight us. You will surrender to a university classmate who wants the same things that you want for Cuba.”Still believing that reinforcements could break through, Quevedo refused. Four days later, the rebels beat back the last reinforcements advancing from the coast. 

    “On the morning of the twentieth, we ordered a cease-fire from six in the morning until ten,” Fidel reported. The enemy soldiers, who were weary in the trenches, accepted the cease-fire. Little by little several of those who still could walk laboriously came close to our trenches and asked for water, food, and cigarettes. On seeing that our men did not shoot and shared the food they had in their hands, they embraced our soldiers and cried with emotion. How different was the treatment from that which they expected perhaps, fooled by the dictatorship’s false propaganda! The sight was an emotional one for all.” 

The next day, the battalion surrendered. 

Major Quevedo, who remained at the Rebel Army headquarters, deeply influenced by what he had experienced and by his discussions with Fidel, joined the revolutionary forces and convinced several other military units to surrender or defect to the rebel side. 

Activity 5: 

Nuestra Razon: Manifesto of the July 26th Movement 

This activity was certainly a challenge for many of my students, but it was worth the effort. The material is rich with a idea about what make an ideal society and helps to establish clearly what the rebels were fitting for. The text is long so I divided certain sections up amongst students who then studied their section and presented it to the rest of the class. The jigsaw method was especially effective in this activity. 

As a class: we read the introduction (bottom of 126 -129  and students were asked to answer the following questions. I don't have an electronic version, but when I printed the reading I whited out parts that I thought were less relevant to try and shorten the reading.

Questions: 

1. Does the movement see violence as necessary? Explain using evidence from the text.

2. What are the stated goals of the Cuban revolution? Why can’t these exist in “isolation” in your opinion?

3. What does it mean if the movement wants to “avoid abstract ideologies” and rather have it “come forth from the land and the Cuban people”?

4. How does the July 26th movement define democracy?

5. How does the July 26th movement define nationalism?

6. What is the movement’s reflection on capitalism?

In groups: Students divided up into groups of 3 or 4 and each was assigned a section of the reading. The reading is already subdivided into categories: National Sovereignty, Economic Independence, Work, Social Order, Education, Politics, Civil Authority, Freedom of Conscious, Public Morality and International Position. You can hand pick based on your own curriculum or the size of your class which sections to cover. I completed a model that I shared with the students on the last category. The model was intended to demonstrate how i expected the assignment to be completed as well as how students were expected to present their work. 

Activity 6:

Reflecting on Revolution

Excerpt from JFK, US president in 1963 during the Cuban Missile Crisis:

"I believe that there is no country in the world including any and all the countries under colonial domination, where economic colonization, humiliation and exploitation were worse than in Cuba, in part owing to my country’s policies during the Batista regime. I approved the proclamation, which Fidel Castro made in the Sierra Maestra, when he justifiably called for justice and especially yearned to rid Cuba of corruption. I will even go further: to some extent it is as though Batista was the incarnation of a number of sins on the part of the United States. Now we shall have to pay for those sins. In the matter of the Batista regime, I am in agreement with the first Cuban revolutionaries. That is perfectly clear." - U.S. President John F. Kennedy, interview with Jean Daniel, 24 October 1963

Question: Did JFK support the revolution in Cuba? What reasons does he give?