By Randy Alonso Falcon on March 5, 2025
Homeland or Death
For those of small spirit it was a suicidal phrase. For Cuban revolutionaries it has always been an expression of conviction, of firmness, of an unredeemed willingness to give everything for the beloved homeland.
If our mambises threw themselves into the undergrowth for the first time to the redeeming cry of “Independence or Death!”, Fidel – who made real the national independence for which so many gave their lives – updated and multiplied the meaning of that profound belief: “Homeland or Death!” he proclaimed for History.
It was 65 years ago, in the painful farewell of mourning for the victims of the vile attack on the French steamer La Coubre, which was unloading weapons in the Port of Havana. Faced with the bloodiest attack against the nascent Revolution, Fidel raised the phrase that has accompanied us for more than six decades of fighting.
“And not only will we know how to resist any aggression, but we will know how to defeat any aggression, and once again we will have no other dilemma than the one with which we began the revolutionary struggle: that of freedom or death. Only now does freedom mean something even more: freedom means homeland. And our dilemma would be Homeland or Death!”.
To the announcement of a relentless battle for our destiny would later be added the conviction of victory. The same confidence in victory that José Martí announced in the face of the Necessary War. On June 7, 1960, at the Congress of the National Federation of Barber and Hairdressing Workers, the Commander in Chief completed the sentence that has since been the essence of the Cuban Revolution’s unyielding position:
“This trench will remain firm and invincible! Because those of us in it, those of us privileged to be in this trench, will not lose it; those of us privileged to play this role that Cuba is playing in the history of this continent will know how to rise to the occasion, certain that our people will win. Whatever the cost, our people will win! Because their children are determined to defend it, because their children have the courage, the patriotism and the unity that is needed at a time like this, because their children have said: Homeland or Death! And they have said Homeland or Death! because that is the slogan of every Cuban. For each of us individually, the slogan is: Homeland or Death! But for the people, who will be victorious in the end, the slogan is: We shall overcome!
Sixty-five years later, in difficult times for Cuba and our people, that profound cry of a nation for its right to life continues to be the certainty that guides our steps.
Homeland or Death! We shall overcome!
*Published in March 2015. Updated for the occasion.
Source: Cubadebate, translation Resumen Latinoamericano – English