Unit 7: Cuba and the US

Overview: 

Since the Cuban revolution of 1959, Fidel Castro has changed the landscape of life on the island that sits but 90 miles from the US Florida keys. This unit has students explore some of the key events that have marked the tense relationship between Cuba and the US from the Bay of Pigs invasion to the Cuban Missile crisis. Students will have an opportunity not only to study these critical events in history, but will also be challenged to thing about leaders and their decision making. Ultimately students will be writing papers assessing the state of Cuba, either through a focus on the leadership of Fidel Castro or Cuba as a democracy. 

Essential Questions: 

What role has the US played in Cuba?     

    What was the US’s response to the Cuban Revolution?

    What was the Bay of Pigs invasion?

    What happened during the Cuban Missile Crisis?

What is Cuba like today? 

    What has life been like in Cuba since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991?

    Is communism a viable option for the future of Cuba?

    What is the relationship of the Cuban diaspora, particularly in the US to Cuba?

    What are race relations like in Cuba today? 

Final Task: 

Students will select one of two option to write a final essays assessing Cuba's past. 

Option 1 - 

History Will Absolve Me: How has history judged Fidel Castro’s record?

After students have studied the unexpected success of Fidel Castro’s revolution against Fulgencio Batista’s professional and trained army, they saw how Cuba embraced and heralded as Castro a hero. After the failure of the Bay of Pigs Invasion, support for Castro, especially against the Americans grew. But as time went on, and Castro’s relationship and friendship with the Soviet Union grew stronger, perceptions of Castro began to change. Fidel Castro famously announced in his 1953 trial after the attack on the Moncada Fort that he did not care how the court would judge him, because “history would absolve” him.

Students will be given a selection of supplemental documents to help them assess whether or not Castro was indeed absolved by the historians who studied him and his Cuba.

Option 2 -

Is Cuba a Real Democracy?

What role should the government play in people’s lives?

Did the July 26th Movement achieve the goals it set out during the revolution?

Cuba’s 1959 revolution to overthrow Fulgencio Batista, was motivated by a desire for change. Cuba has a corrupt leadership whose actions and decisions seemed motivated by greed that left the middle and lower classes by the wayside. Fidel Castro and the July 26th Movement fought to replace the old leadership with a new government that was dedicated to elimination social, economic, and racial inequalities in Cuba. Students will be given a selection of supplemental documents to help them determine whether or not they consider Cuba to be a real democracy.