By Bill Hackwell on January 7, 2026 from Arroyo Naranjo, Cuba
Gerardo Hernandez meeting with the CDR in Arroyo Naranjo, fotos Bill Hackwell
Gerardo Hernandez Nordelo, the national coordinator of Cuba’s Committees for the Defense of Revolution (CDR) has a large office on the top floor of the organization’s headquarters on the busy Linea Avenue in Havana. The problem is you will never find him there. Hernandez, one of the Cuban Five heroes who spent 16 years in US Federal prisons for monitoring the activities of anti Cuban terrorists operating with impunity in Southern Florida, is making up for lost time circulating around Cuba listening to the needs and problems of the people on the community level while engaging in home grown methods of solving them.
The CDR’s were created in 1960 after the revolution when a wave of sabotage and bombings followed the victory by Fidel who said, “We’re going to set up a system of collective vigilance; neighborhood by neighborhood, block by block.” Today the CDR structure continues as a viable problem solving mechanism of the base, including with direct representation in Cuba’s national assembly and each with a medical clinic.
US Blockade of Cuba; the longest and most severe in Modern History
CDR emergency medical aid being delivered to Julio Trigo Hospital
The battle that Cuba and the CDRs face is the US blockade that has created scarcity and access to everyday things that most developed countries take for granted. This has been going on since the Eisenhower Administration followed the Mallory memo in April 1960 that recognized the overwhelming popularity of the Revolution while offering this solution to overthrow it “…. every possible means should be undertaken promptly to weaken the economic life of Cuba. If such a policy is adopted, it should be the result of a positive decision which would call forth a line of action which, while as adroit and inconspicuous as possible, makes the greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.”
The Mallory directive has been and remains the basis of US policy towards the island nation through every Democratic and Republican administration with a couple of brief periods of opening up. The bottom line is that the US perceives Cuba as the runaway colony that represents a dangerous example to other countries because it reveals that a better world is possible by establishing relations based on respect for sovereignty and based on mutual benefit for all instead of the corporate rich.
“A Cuba hay que quererla”
Nurse with Gerardo Hernandez at the Julio Trigo Hospital
Acute shortages are a way of life in Cuba and the CDR response has to be creative, collaborative and immediate, quite literally, lives depend on it. Today Gerardo is traveling to Arroyo Naranjo a community on the outskirts of Havana to bring some emergency medical supplies to the Julio Trigo Hospital so that a number of medical procedures, some of them lifesaving, can proceed. This is part of a network that he helped set up called Cuba hay que quererla, (Gotta Love Cuba) named after the song by popular Cuban musician Raul Torres. In this project he is working with Amado Riol a facilitator connecting the medical supplies with the need. Riol is on the phone constantly, working with an air of urgency talking to doctors and hospital staffs, connecting the dots. He explains that the hospital is completely out of medical stents and he has found some to deliver.
Visit to the Arroyo Naranjo CDR
While he was in the area Gerardo took the opportunity to go to a meeting with the Arroyo Naranjo CDR to get an update on the well being of the community and their ongoing projects. He makes himself accessible and listens to everyone’s comments and suggestions. This is grass roots Cuba that is forced to struggle against all odds. It is apparent here, and what the empire can’t fathom, is the sense of cooperation, respect and determination to make things happen; something that the revolution has instilled in Cuban society on all levels.
Source: Resumen Latinoamericano – US