By Graziella Pogolotti on April 10 2021
The bombardment was heard throughout the whole city. It came from the west of the capital. The militia soldiers rushed from their houses and tried to gather where the greatest danger appeared to be. Since the breaking of diplomatic relations between the United States and Cuba, it became clear that the threat of an invasion loomed over Cuba.
In Havana, security measures were activated. Artillery pieces were installed in strategic sites. Militia soldiers were on guard on the highest buildings. The bombing of the airports indicated that the attack had begun.
The university students gathered in the stadium and, led by José Elias Entralgo, the Dean of the Faculty of Humanities, dressed in his grey suit, white shirt and black tie, they prepared to march to battle. It is well known that the rapid mobilization, the effective military strategy, and the heroism displayed were decisive in achieving the defeat of the invaders in less than 72 hours.
However, in those days of Playa Girón, a number of decisive combats were carried out simultaneously. One of the most fertile occurred in the realm of ideas. Faced with the threat of invasion, unity was forged among the people as a whole, including the conduct of some who, until then, had observed the revolutionary process from a critical distance.
In conceptual terms, these occurrences sharply established the limits of our boundary. The idea of national independence acquired an anti-colonial and emancipatory content, oriented toward a project of social justice, as a result of the measures adopted since the triumph of the Revolution, especially beginning from the application of the Agrarian Reform Law.
This was the solidifying of an ideology – a set of principles – that had begun to form during the neocolonial Republic, an aspiration blocked by the United States intervention in the war against Spain, and by the imperialist interference in the proceedings following the toppling of the Machado tyranny. In its basic design, the attack carried out in Girón in 1961 brought with it an international propaganda campaign attempting to disguise the invasion under the false cover of “support for supposed manifestation of an internal insurrection.” The aircraft involved in the actions, starting with the bombing of the airports, carried false Cuban insignia.
The armed confrontations were complemented by the brilliant diplomatic battle waged in New York at the United Nations headquarters. Raul Roa, with tremendous intellectual and cultural accomplishments, and a profound knowledge of Latin American history and of the social sciences, had been one of the principal participants in the revolutionary movement of the 1930s, when he saw Rafael Trejo fall, was imprisoned, and was present for, and suffered under, the bitter deception of the final outcome.
He joined a full experience of life to his bookish knowledge. He had a huge vocabulary and could always find the exact words for his arguments. Confronting Adlai Stevenson, the well-known U.S. Democratic Party politician, he was able to show the truth and facts in an irrefutable way. The diplomatic victory was achieved through these extremely tense days.
A few weeks later, Manuel Bisbé, our representative to the United Nations, collapsed in the halls of the UN with a heart attack. He had been my professor of Greek. Evoking the classics, we called him “Fair-haired Menelaus.”
In that time, he had been parliamentary representative for the Cuban People’s Party (Orthodox.) In spite of his intense political activity, he fulfilled his teaching responsibilities rigorously. He was always punctual, sometimes sweaty, and he displayed all his passion in the efforts to start us off in the difficult translation of the Anabasis, where Xenophon records that in Ancient Persia, Darius and Parasatides had two sons. Without pausing even while his health was breaking, he gave his last breath to the defense of his country.
Several generations came together in the combat to defend our socialist homeland. There were those born in the 20th Century, witnesses and participants of the Revolution of 1930, together with those who formed part of the Centenary Generation and the still immature young people who took charge of artillery pieces on the front lines of war.
Those who confronted the Batista tyranny from the ranks of many different organizations in action in the mountains and in the cities were able to make common cause, together with the men and women of widely different backgrounds who joined in the ongoing transformation process. There were those who were even younger than that: the students who, as part of the same liberating process, carried out the Literacy Campaign.
Source: Juventud Rebelde, translation Resumen Latinoamericano – English