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Text reviewed and shaped up by its author with
absolute respect for the integrity of the ideas
expressed during his speech.
Dear
students and professors of Universities fro all
over Cuba;
Dear
comrades, leaders and guests who have shared with
us so many years of struggle:
This
is the most difficult moment, when I must say some
words in this Aula Magna, where so many words have
already been spoken. A universe of ideas comes to
mind, and it’s only logical, because time has
passed.
You
have been very kind to remember that today is a
very special day: the 60th anniversary
of my timid entry into this University.
There is a photo somewhere, I was just looking at
it: I was wearing a jacket, and I have an angry
face, or tough, or a nice, or irritated because
that photo was not taken on the first day; I think
I had already been here for several months, and I
was starting to react to so many things, that were
happening then. It was not a deep-seated thought.
There was this eagerness for ideas, and also a
desire to learn, and a spirit that was perhaps
rebellious. We were full of dreams that couldn’t
be described as revolutionary, but certainly full
of illusions and energy, and possibly also an
anxiety to take up a struggle.
I
had been active in sports, I had climbed
mountains. I had even been promoted to some kind
of Boy Scout lieutenant, I’m not exactly why, and
later on they made me a general of the Boy Scout.
So, when I was in high school, I had been given
more ranks than I have today (Laughter). Because
later on, I became Comandante, but nothing
more than Comandante; this thing of being
Comandante en Jefe doesn’t mean any more
than being chief commander of that small troop of
about 82 men, the men who came in the Granma
yacht.
That title came up after the landing, on December
2, 1956. There had to be a chief among those 82
men. Later on, they added the “in”. So, little by
little, I went from being Chief Commander to being
the Commander in Chief when we had more
commanders, because that was the highest rank for
a long time. I was remembering these things. One
has to think about what one was, what one thought
about and what feelings one had.
Perhaps some special circumstances in my life made
me react. I had to face some difficulties from a
very early age and, maybe because of that, I grew
up to be some kind of a professional rebel.
I’ve
heard talk about rebels without a cause; but I
seem to remember, whenever I think about it, that
I was a rebel with many causes; and I thank life
that I have continued being a rebel over the
years, even today, perhaps more rightly so today,
because I have many more ideas and more
experience; because I have learned a lot from my
own struggle, or because I have a better
understanding of this country where we were all
born and of this world where we live, this
globalized world living now a decisive time for
its destiny. I wouldn’t dare say a decisive time
in its history, because its history is shorter,
really brief, when compared to the life span of a
species that in recent times, perhaps 3,000 or
4,000 or 5,000 years ago, took its first steps
after its long and brief evolution. I say long
and brief because it evolved to the point of
becoming a homo sapiens some hundreds of thousands
of years after life came into existence on this
planet, as scholars believe it to be; if my memory
doesn’t fail me, around 1 or 1,5 billion years ago
a life form was born and after that came millions
of species. And we are only that, we are one of
the species born on this planet. And that is why
I said, after a brief and at the same time long
life, we have come to this point, in this
millennium, which is said to be the third
millennium since the beginning of the Christian
era.
Why
am I circling around this idea? Because I would
dare say that today this species is facing a very
real and true danger of extinction, and no one can
be sure, listen to this well, no one can be sure
that it will survive this danger.
Well, the fact that the species would not survive
was discussed about 2,000 years ago. I remember
that when I was a student I heard of the
Apocalypse, a book of prophesy in the Bible.
Apparently, 2000 years ago someone realized that
this weak species could one day disappear.
Of
course, so did the Marxists. I remember Engel’s
book, Dialectics, very well. He said there
that one day the light of the Sun would go out,
that the fuel feeding the fires of that star which
illuminates our world would run out and the light
of the Sun would cease to exist. So, a question
remains in my mind: a question that maybe you, or
your professors, or hundreds of thousands of you
have also asked yourselves, and that is if there
is any possibility that this species can emigrate
to another solar system.
Have
you never asked yourselves that question? Well,
at some point you will, because many questions
come to our minds during our lifetime,
particularly these questions, which are asked
mostly when there is a reason to do so. I believe
that mankind never had more reasons than it does
now to wonder about this, because if that Marxist
considered the problem of solar heat and light
disappearing, and if that scientist considered
that one day the solar system would cease to
exist, we too, as revolutionaries, giving wings to
our imaginations, must ask ourselves what will
happen and if there is any hope for this species
to escape to another solar system where life
already exists or could exist. All that we know
today is that there is one Sun four light years
away, among the billions of suns that exist in
that enormous outer space of which we still don’t
know whether it is finite or infinite.
For
the little we know of physics and mathematics, of
light and the speed of light, and those traveling
to the closest planets, nothing has been found,
and those who travel to Venus –I believe that
Venus was the Roman goddess of love-- those that
have the privilege of reaching that planet will
find hurricanes that are many hundreds of times
worse that Katrina or Rita or Michelle or Mitch,
or any of the others that hit us with ever
increasing fury as it has been said that the
temperature on Venus is 400 degrees, and that
there are masses of air or heavy atmosphere
constantly blowing around.
Those that have been to Mars, a place where they
said life could exist –Chavez jokes about the
likely existence of life there in the past-- and
it disappeared, everything vanished. They keep
searching for some particle of oxygen or some sign
of life. Well, anything could have happened, but
the most probable is that no developed life form
ever existed on any of these planets. The
combination of factors that made life possible
occurred after billions of years on planet Earth,
this very fragile life form that can only survive
between a few limited degrees of temperature,
between a few degrees below zero and a few degrees
above zero, since nobody can survive in a water
temperature of 60 degrees; just 20 seconds
without any protection and no human being would
survive; a few scores degrees below zero, with no
source of artificial heat, would be enough to
cause anyone’s death. It was in that limited
margin of temperature that life came into being.
We
are speaking of life, because whenever we speak of
universities, we speak of life.
What
are you? If I were asked that question right now,
I would have to say that you are life, you are
symbols of life.
We
have been speaking of events in our lives, in our
university, in our Alma Mater, about those of us
who came here a few decades ago and who are
present here today, those who are in their fresh
year or are about to graduate, or those who have
already graduated and are engaged in tasks that
others with less experience would not be able to
do.
I
was trying to recall how those universities were,
what we did, what our concerns were. We were
concerned about this island, this tiny island.
There was no talk then of globalization; there was
no television or Internet; instant communication
were not possible from one end of the planet to
the other; the telephone had just been invented
and there were a few propeller driven airplanes.
In my time, back in 1945, our passenger planes
could hardly make it to Miami, and that was
difficult; although I remember as a primary school
student hearing about the trip made by Barberan
and Collar; people in Biran used to say: “Barberan
and Collar were here”. They were two Spanish
pilots who flew over the Atlantic and continued on
to Mexico. Then there was no more news about
Barberan and Collar, it is still a mystery where
they went down, whether it was in the sea between
Pinar del Rio and Mexico, on the Yucatan peninsula
or elsewhere. But nothing more was ever heard
about Barberan and Collar, those two men who had
the temerity to cross the Atlantic in a small
propeller plane that had recently been invented.
Aviation had been born at the beginning of the
past century.
There had been a terrible war that took the lives
of some 50 million people. I am speaking of the
time in 1945 when I entered the university, on
September. Well, I started on that date, and you,
of course, have taken the liberty to celebrate the
anniversary that day; it could be the 4th
or the 17th, it could be in November,
it could be today, the day that you choose as the
date. There are so many events to commemorate, and
I certainly could not attend that many, and the
greatest sorrow of my life would have been not
being able to attend, especially at this time,
this event in the Aula Magna, as your guest.
I
have many events to attend everyday and I am
speaking with large groups for hours and hours on
end, especially with groups of young people,
students, with medical brigades who go out to work
in glorious missions that almost nobody else in
this world would discharge, because no other
country could send 1000 medical doctors to a
sister nation in Central America. We have sent
just such a group that is now confronting pain and
death, in the aftermath of the greatest natural
tragedy that anyone in that country can remember.
One
after another, I have been speaking to these
brigades, and I’ve been seeing them off; the same
with those who are leaving for the other side of
the world, flying for 18 hours to where almost
simultaneously another of the greatest human
tragedies struck. I remember no other catastrophe
of such dimensions, because of the place where it
hit, and the humble people who were affected.
These people are shepherds living on very high
mountains and the tragedy struck on the eve of
winter where the cold is most intense, where there
is great poverty while the insensitive world that
wastes a trillion dollars each year on advertising
to bamboozle the immense majority of humanity that
pays for the lies that are spread depriving the
human being of the capacity to think for himself,
as he is forced to buy a soap that is the same
soap with 10 different names, and he must be
deceived because a trillion dollars are spent on
it and this money is not paid by the companies, it
is paid by those who buy the product due to the
advertising.
This
insensitive world that spends one trillion dollars
each year on the military –it’s already two
trillion-- this insensitive world that extracts
various trillions of dollars a year from the
impoverished masses, from the immense majority of
this planet’s inhabitants, remains indifferent
when it is told that around 100,000 people have
died, among them maybe 25,000 or 30,000 children,
or that there are 100,000 injured, and the large
majority is suffering from bone fractures in their
arms and legs of which barely 10% have been
operated on, that there are children with
mutilated limbs, and young people, women and men,
old people.
This
is the kind of world we are living in. It is not a
world full of goodness, but a world full of
egoism. It is not a world of justice, but one full
of exploitation, abuse and pillage, where millions
of children die every year –and they could be
saved--, just because they are lacking a few cents
worth of medicine, or some vitamins or re-hidration
salts and a few dollars worth of food, enough for
them to live. They die every year due to
injustice, almost as many as died in that colossal
war that I mentioned a few minutes ago.
What
kind of world is this? What kind of world is this
where a barbaric empire proclaims its right to
launch pre-emptive attacks on 70 or more
countries, and is capable of bringing death to any
corner of the globe, using the most sophisticated
weapons and killing techniques? It’s a world
where brutality and force prevail, with hundreds
of military bases on the entire planet. There is
one of these on our soil, where they arbitrarily
intervened after the Spanish colonial power could
no longer stand by itself, and when hundreds of
thousands of our country’s dearest sons --in a
population of hardly a million-- had perished in a
long war lasting almost 30 years. And they left us
with the revolting Platt Amendment, attached to an
equally repugnant resolution that treacherously
gave them the right to intervene in our country
whenever they considered there to be a lack of
order.
More
than a century has gone by and this piece of our
territory is still forcibly occupied today
bringing shame and horror to the world when it is
known to have been turned into a torture center,
where hundreds of people pulled in from different
parts of the world are kept in detention. They do
not take them to their own country because there
may be laws that would make things difficult for
them to illegally hold these people by force,
kidnapped for years, overriding any legal
procedure, and to the amazement of the entire
world, these people are being subjected to
sadistic and brutal torture. The world learned of
this only when in Iraq they were torturing
hundreds of prisoners from a country invaded by
the powerful forces of a colossal empire, and
where hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians
have lost their lives.
New
things come up every day. Recently, the press
reported that the US government had secret prisons
in the satellite countries of Eastern Europe, the
same countries that vote in Geneva against Cuba
and accuse her of human rights violations. They
accuse the country that has never known a torture
center in 46 years of Revolution, because our
country has never broken that unparallel tradition
in history where not one man has been tortured,
that not one person has been known to be tortured.
And we would not the only ones preventing that, it
would be our own people that acquired a long time
ago an extremely lofty concept of human dignity.
Which of us, which of you, which of our
compatriots would quietly admit to a story of
torturing even one citizen, in spite of thousands
of barbaric acts of terrorism perpetrated against
our country, in spite of the thousands of victims
of the aggression of that empire that has
blockaded us for the last 45 years and has tried
to suffocate us by whatever means possible? And
now these scoundrels are saying --as one of them
recently did before the overwhelming vote of 182
UN members, with one abstention-- that the
difficulties are a result of our failure, and that
great accomplice of the bandit, which is the
pro-Nazi state of Israel supports the blockade. We
must call it that, because those who commit such
crimes are doing so in the name of a people that
for more than 1500 years endured persecution and
were victims of the most atrocious crimes
committed during World War II. The people of
Israel are not to blame for the savage genocide
carried out in the service of the empire, leading
to a holocaust of yet another people, the
Palestinian. The government of Israel also
proclaims the repugnant right to launch
pre-emptive attacks against other countries.
Even
today, the empire is threatening to attack Iran if
nuclear fuel is produced there. Nuclear fuel is
not nuclear weapon; it’s not nuclear bombs. To
prevent a country from producing the fuel of the
future is like forbidding someone to prospect for
oil, the fuel of the present, which is due to run
out in a very short time. What country in the
world is prevented from seeking fuel, coal, gas or
oil?
We
know that country very well. It is a country with
70 million inhabitants bent on its industrial
development and believing, quite correctly, that
it is a great crime to use its gas or oil reserves
to feed the potential of thousands of millions of
kilowatt hours urgently needed by this Third World
country for its industrial development. And there
we find the empire forbidding them and threatening
to attack with bombs. There is already an
international debate on what day and at what time
a pre-emptive attack will be launched on the
research centers for production of nuclear fuel
and on whether it will be the empire that does it,
or its satellite Israel as it was the case in
Iraq.
In
30 more years, oil reserves will run dry.
Presently, 80% of oil is in the hands of Third
World countries, since other countries have
already depleted their reserves. Such is the case
of the United States which had an enormous reserve
of oil and gas that will barely last a few more
years. That is why the US is trying to secure
possession of oil by any means possible, in any
corner of the world. However, that source of
energy is running low and in 25 or 30 years, there
will only be one fundamental energy source for the
production of electricity, the nuclear, with some
solar and wind energy sources.
The
day is far when hydrogen may become the ideal
fuel, through still emerging technologies.
Meanwhile, mankind has reached a certain level of
technical development and cannot live without
fuel. This is one present problem.
Our
Minister of Foreign Affairs has just visited Iran,
since Cuba will be the venue of the next
Non-Aligned Countries meeting within a year, and
Iran is demanding its right to produce nuclear
fuel just like any industrialized nation and not
be obliged to destroy the reserves of a raw
material, which can be used not only as an energy
source but also as a raw material for numerous
products such as fertilizers, textiles and many
others currently used worldwide.
That’s the way of the world. Let’s see what
happens if they decide to bomb Iran in order to
destroy any facility used in the production of
nuclear fuel.
Iran
is a signatory of the Non-Proliferation Treaty,
and so is Cuba. We have never considered producing
nuclear weapons, because we don’t need them. Even
if they were accessible, how much would they cost
and what sense would it make producing a nuclear
weapon with an enemy that has thousands of nuclear
weapons? It would mean joining the game of
nuclear confrontation.
We
have a different type of nuclear weapon: it’s our
ideas. We possess a weapon as powerful as nuclear
power and it is the immense justice for which we
are struggling. Our nuclear weapon is the
invincible power of moral weapons. That is why we
have never even considered producing them, nor
have we ever considered seeking biological
weapons, what for? It is to the weapons that
defeat death, that defeat AIDS and cancer that we
dedicate our resources. That bandit –I can’t
recall the name of that guy they appointed, was it
Bolton, Bordon, whatever-- the man who represents
the United States at the United Nations, a
super-liar, the shameless liar who fabricated the
idea that Cuba was doing research in biological
warfare in the Biotechnology and Genetic
Engineering Center.
They
have also accused us of collaborating with Iran,
transferring technology for just such a purpose,
when what we are really doing is building a
factory in partnership with Iran for anti-cancer
products; that’s what we are really doing. They
want to put a stop to that as well. May they all
go to hell or wherever they want to go! They’re
idiots and they’re not going to scare anyone over
here! (Applause)
Those impertinent liars! Everybody knows that
even the CIA discovered that what the current US
representative at the UN was saying was a lie, and
they had forced a man to resign because he said
the other had lied. Others in the State Department
realized that this was a lie and the man was
furious, flying into a fit of rage against all
those who were telling the truth. That then is
“little Bush”’s representative at the United
Nations, where 182 members just voted against that
infamous blockade. This is the world where they
presume to make a show of force and conquer by the
use of lies and by their virtual monopoly on the
mass media. Just look at the battle being waged
at this moment. And they appointed the man over
the objections of Congress and over the fact that
everyone knows that he is a repulsive liar.
Everyday that gentleman who rules the United
States is exposed using new tricks, committing new
crimes, but they start falling, falling down like
the leaves of the coconut palm, as a farmer from
Santiago would say. Yes, they’re falling, and not
quietly. There are running out of tricks and still
they continue with their foolish acts.
I
was speaking to you about the prisons in various
countries, secret prisons where they send their
kidnapped victims on the pretext of conducting a
war against terrorism. It is not only at Abu-Ghraib
and Guantanamo, but anywhere in the world you can
find a secret prison where defenders of human
rights are tortured. They are the same people who
order their little lambs to vote in Geneva, one
after another, against Cuba, a country where
torture is unknown, something that brings honor
and glory on this generation. It is the honor and
glory of this Revolution struggling for justice,
for independence and for human decorum, and we
must keep its purity and dignity untouched!
(Applause)
But
that’s not all. This morning there was news about
the use of live phosphorus in Fallujah. It is
there that the empire discovered that a nation, to
all intents and purposes unarmed, could not be
defeated and the invaders found themselves in the
situation of not being able to leave or to stay.
If they leave, the combatants would return; if
they stay, these troops would be required in other
locations. Over 2,000 young US troops have
already died, and some are asking: How long will
these men continue to give their lives for an
unjust war justified by gross lies?
Don’t you think for one minute that they have
abundant reserves of US troops. Every day less
Americans enlist, even when enlisting in the army
has become an employment opportunity. The ones who
enlist are the unemployed and very often they try
to enlist greater numbers of Afro-Americans to
fight their unjust war. However, news is coming
out that fewer Afro-Americans are enlisting in the
army, despite their high levels of unemployment
and their marginalization, because they know full
well that they are being used as cannon fodder. In
the ghettos of Louisiana, when the government said
‘its every man for himself’, thousands of people
were abandoned who drowned in the flood waters;
others died in the Senior Citizens Homes or
hospitals, and some of them died the victims of
euthanasia because the staffs of these
institutions feared they would drown anyway. This
is the true story that is all well-known by now
and we should meditate on it.
They
are chasing after Latinos, immigrants, who cross
the border trying to escape hunger; this is a
border where more than 500 emigrants die every
year, many more in only 12 months than those who
died during the 28 years of the Berlin Wall.
The
empire talked about the Berlin Wall every day; not
one word is spoken about the wall between Mexico
and the US, where more than 500 people die every
year trying to escape poverty and
underdevelopment. Such is the world we live in.
Live
phosphorus in Fallujah! That’s what the empire
secretly does. When it became known, the US
government stated that live phosphorus was a
normal weapon. If it was normal, why was it not
published? Why did nobody know that they were
using this weapon that is prohibited by
international conventions? Napalm is banned and
so is live phosphorus for many more reasons.
There is news like this every day, and all of
these things are part of life, all of these things
are part of our world. Just look at the enormous
difference between now and those days when we came
to the University brimming with ideals, full of
dreams and good will even though we lacked the
experience of a profound ideology and the ideas
that are accumulated over the passage of years.
Young people entered this University exactly like
that. It must be remembered that this University
was not for the poor, it was for the middle class,
for the rich, although young people tended to rise
above class ideas and many of them were capable of
struggling, as in fact they did throughout the
history of Cuba.
Eight students were executed in 1871. They were
like the seeds of the noblest of sentiments and of
the rebellious spirit of our people which showed
their indignation at this colossal injustice.
Today we commemorate the deaths of nine students,
who were no different from them, murdered by the
Nazis in Prague on November 17, 1939, on the eve
of the World War II.
Our
youth always keeps alive the memory of those
medical students and of all those students who
fought against tyrannical and corrupt
governments. Mella was one of them, also coming
from the middle class because the children of
farmers who could neither read nor write,
were unable to attend high school, let alone enter
university.
As
the son of a landowner, I was able to finish sixth
grade, and when I graduated from seventh grade, I
could enroll in a senior high school.
If
you couldn’t attend high school, you couldn’t go
on to university. The children of farmers or
workers, living at the sugar mills or in a
municipality (unless it was a municipality in
Santiago or Holguin or Manzanillo, or a few
others) couldn’t go to high school, not even high
school! Of course, that left them without the
possibility of graduating from university because,
after high school, you had to come to Havana for
further studies.
I
could come to Havana because my father had the
means to send me, and so I graduated from high
school, and fortune lead me on to university. Did
that mean that I was better than any of the
hundreds of boys few of which completed the 6th
grade and none of which ever graduated from high
school or went on to university?
My
own case was like that of many others, I mentioned
Mella. I could have mentioned Guiteras, or Trejo
who died in one of those demonstrations on
September 30, fighting against Machado. I could
mention names like those that you listed at the
opening of this event.
Before the Revolution, there were always many
noble students opposing the Batista tyranny and
willing to make sacrifices, willing to die. And
so, when the Batista tyranny returned with a
vengeance, many students fought and many students
died, and that young man from Cardenas, Manzanita
as he was called, always smiling, always jovial,
always affectionate with everyone, became
well-known for his bravery, his integrity as when
he descended the university stairs, facing the
water hose of the fire trucks, or the police. That
is how all of them came to be known.
If
you visit the house where [Jose Antonio]
Echevarria lived –Jose Antonio, we’ll call
him—you’ll see that it is a good house, an
excellent house. You could see how the students
were often oblivious of their social or class
origins; at that age of so many hopes and dreams.
At
that university, there was only one medical
faculty, and one teaching hospital, yet, many
students received prizes and awards, first prize
in medicine and even in surgery without ever
having operated on anybody.
Some
made an effort; they were active and made contact
with a professor who helped them, taking part in
his practice or in some hospital. That’s how there
were good doctors, not a huge numbers of good
doctors –certainly there was a huge number of
doctors who wanted to travel to the United
States-- they were unemployed and with the triumph
of the Revolution, that’s where they went,
straight to the USA and Cuba was left with half of
all her medical doctors, 3,000 of them, and 25% of
her professors. We started at that point, until
we got to where we are today, standing up almost
like the capital of world medicine.
Today, our people have at their disposition at
least 15 doctors for every one that remained in
the country, and they are much better distributed.
Cuba has thousands of doctors abroad fraternally
offering their services, and the number is
growing. At this time -and I specifically asked
for the exact figure-, we have 25,000 medical
students; in first year there are about 7,000 and
each year there will be at least 7,000 more; we
have more than 70,000 medical doctors. There are
also tens of thousands of students in the other
medical sciences. We believe that there are 90,000
studying in the medical field, if we include
nurses majoring, in nursing, and all those in
other health sector professions. All of them are
part of the large number of students in our
universities today.
I
wanted to bring up the differences from the year
when I entered university; what was our country
like then? We should ask ourselves that question
and meditate on it. What is our country like
today, in all areas? And. we could ask the same
question about eight, ten, fifteen, twenty
different things. Comparison is impossible.
I
was speaking about Barberan and Collar
disappearing in their light plane full of gasoline
tanks, because that’s what you had to do in those
days; they took off, and left almost in the same
way that we did in Mexico in 1956; “if we set out,
we arrive; if we arrive, we enter; if we enter, we
win”, we said then. It seems like other men
before us undertook something as audacious as
that, when they crossed the Atlantic. They took
off and landed in Cuba, then they took off again,
but they did not arrive in Mexico alive.
I
was speaking of a ship that set sail; this was
like a ship setting sail a long time ago, a small
plane that seemed to be powered by an elastic
band. Maybe you have seen those little planes
which you wind up an elastic band and then you let
go and they take off and land. When our Revolution
triumphed in this hemisphere, right beside the
empire and surrounded, with a few exceptions, by
the empire’s satellites, we started on a very
difficult journey. Now it is different times,
quite a few years after we entered the university.
We
came to the university at the end of 1945 and we
began the armed struggle in Moncada on July 26th,
1953, only eight years later, and the Revolution
triumphed five years, five days and five months
after Moncada, after a long journey by way of
prison, exile and fighting in the mountains. It
was a relatively short time historically speaking,
comparing it to earlier struggles that were so
hard and difficult on our people. There were two
stages: coming to the University, leaving it and
the coup d’etat on March 10, 1952.
The
stage when we began the struggle is where we will
start now. We set off, we attempted to set off,
not even being too knowledgeable about the laws of
gravity. We headed upwards, struggling against the
empire which was already the most powerful one but
at a time when another super-power also existed.
And we continued marching upwards, gaining
experience, seeing our people and the Revolution
gain in strength, until this point where we are
today.
I
wish I had more time to speak to you, but this
moment now is without precedent. It is a time that
is different from all the others. It is nothing
like it was in 1945; it is nothing like it was in
1950 when we graduated, but we had all those
ideas that I mentioned that day, when I affirmed
with love, respect and the utmost affection, that
I came to this University with a rebellious
spirit, with some elemental ideas of justice, then
here I became a revolutionary, I became a
Marxist-Leninist and I acquired the ideas that I
have never abandoned, nor have I ever been tempted
to do so, not in the least. For that reason, I
dare say that I will never abandon them.
In a
spirit of confessions, I could say that when I
finished studying in this university, I thought I
was very revolutionary and basically, I was just
starting on a much longer path. If at that time I
felt that I was a revolutionary or a socialist, if
I had absorbed all the ideas that made me who I
am, and I could be nothing other than a
revolutionary. I assure you today, in all modesty,
that I feel ten times, twenty times, even a
hundred times more revolutionary than I was then.
(applause) If at that time I was willing to give
up my life, today I am a thousand times more
willing to give up my life for the revolution.
(applause)
One
is willing to give up one’s life for a noble idea,
for an ethical principle, for a sense of dignity
and honor, even before one becomes a
revolutionary. Tens of millions of men died on the
battlefields of World War I and in other wars,
impassioned by a symbol, by the beauty of a flag,
by the emotional strains of an anthem like
La Marseillaise
was in its revolutionary time although it later
became the anthem of the French colonial empire.
In the name of that colonial empire and for a new
distribution of the world, millions of Frenchmen
died en masse in the trenches of World War I. Man
is willing to die, to consciously and voluntarily
give up his life; he does not fight out of
instinct like so many animals fight instinctively
moved by the laws of nature. Man is a complete
creature, I mean both men and women, and more
often one needs to include women. Yes, I have my
reasons but I don’t know if I’ll have the time to
tell you all of them. But the human being is the
only one capable of consciously rising above all
instincts, even though man is a creature of
instincts, of egoism. Man is born egotistical, a
result of the conditioning of nature. Nature fills
us with instincts; it is education that fills us
with virtues. Nature makes us do things
instinctively; one of these is the instinct for
survival which can lead to infamy, while on the
other side, our conscience can lead us to great
acts of heroism. It doesn’t matter what each one
of us is like, how different we are from each
other, but when we unite we become one.
It
is amazing that in spite of the differences
between human beings, they can become as one in a
single instant or they can be millions, and they
can be a million strong just through their ideas.
Nobody followed the Revolution as a cult to anyone
or because they felt personal sympathy with any
one person. It is only by embracing certain values
and ideas that an entire people can develop the
same willingness to make sacrifices of any one of
those who loyally and sincerely try to lead them
toward their destiny.
You
are constantly reading the works of the great
thinkers, you are constantly reading history. In
our country’s history you read the works of Marti,
you read the works of many distinguished patriot
and in the history of the world and in the history
of the revolutionary movements you read the
theoreticians, those great theoreticians who never
faltered in their revolutionary principles. It is
the ideas that bring us together, ideas make us a
combatant people on a collective and not just an
individual basis; ideas make us a mass of
revolutionaries. Then, when all of the forces
unite, then the people can never be defeated, and
when the number of ideas grows, when the number of
ideas and values to be defended grows and
multiplies, that is when a people can truly never
be defeated.
And
so, when we remember our comrades, and we see the
youth who are taking on such important tasks; many
of the others were leaders in this university and
have behind them many years of struggle; some have
more than 50, others might have more than 40 and
today each one has his responsibility; many of
them are students, others come from humble
backgrounds, I see them all here today, those who
were at Moncada, those that came on the Granma,
fought in the Sierra Maestra and participated in
all the battles; I see them all here, each one of
them, defending a cause, a flag.
I
see, for example our dear comrade Alarcon. I
remember him because here we have been speaking of
the struggle for the five imprisoned heroes, and
he has been their indefatigable champion for
justice. This was the task given him by the
Revolution and he has shouldered the
responsibility with his talent and in his capacity
as President of the National Assembly.
I
see comrade Machadito, a former doctor, but not an
old doctor, who was with us in the mountains. I
see Lazo, Lage and Balaguer, I see many more out
there, I still have a good sight (laughter)/ I
think I see Saez, I think we can see the Minister
of Higher Education, I think I can see Gomez, with
a few more pounds perhaps, and further along, I
see Abel, with a biblical name, who has just come
back from Mar del Plata where he waged a glorious
battle.
Look
at this world and see all the changes, all the
aims we are pursuing today. Look at the
strategies that are being designed, leading us
into the strategies of the world. We are a tiny
country, 90 miles away from the colossal empire,
the most powerful empire ever in the history of
the world. Forty five years have passed and there
it is, farther away than ever from the possibility
of forcing the Cuban nation to its knees, the same
nation they humiliated and offended for some time.
(Applause) Once the US owned everything in Cuba:
the mines, hundreds of thousands of the best
hectares of land; the ports and its facilities;
the electrical system, transportation, banking,
commercial activities, etc. and the idiots believe
that they will return here and that we will call
on them on bended knees: “Come and save us again,
Oh Saviors of the World! Come and we shall give
you everything we have, again, this university
too, so that you can put in 5,000 instead of half
a million students; half a million is too much and
for your mentality, you would like to see us
unemployed and hungry so that filthy capitalism
can function because it is only with a reserve
corps of unemployed that it can function; come
back and make the ranks of our illiterate
unemployed grow and stand in lines out by
sugarcane fields, with nobody bringing them water
to drink, or food to eat, or housing, or
transportation. Look for them, see if you can
find them because here are their children,
hundreds of thousands of them studying in the
universities” (Applause)
I
saw it with my own eyes, nobody told me about it,
I saw it hardly 48 hours ago. I saw it there at
the Convention Center, first a group of a few
hundred, dressed in their blue T-shirts; I saw it
in the young people who graduated as social
workers, and today they are al, without exception,
university students, from the first to the fifth
year of their courses, after a year of intensive
study to become social workers, after several
years studying for this profession, first there
were 500 and now there are 28,000.
I
think it was Agramonte, others say it was Cespedes,
who responded to the pessimists when he had just
12 men with him: “I don’t care about those lacking
in confidence, because with these 12 men I can
make a nation”. If a nation can be made with 12
men, how many times greater than 12 men are we
today? And 12 men, many times multiplied, armed
with ideas, knowledge, culture, knowing all about
the world, knowing about history, geography, about
the struggles, because they possess what we call a
revolutionary conscience, which is the sum total
of many consciences, it is the sum total of a
humanist conscience, the conscience of honor and
dignity and the best values that man can grow.
This nation is born of love for the homeland and
love for the world; and we cannot forget that the
homeland is humanity, a statement made more than a
hundred years ago. Homeland is humanity, and we
must repeat that every day, when someone forgets
those living in Haiti or in Guatemala, suffering
from the ravages of a natural disaster, among
other things, suffering indescribable pain and
indescribable poverty, as it is usually the case
in most parts of the world.
That
is all that the infamous empire and its repugnant
system can show as a result of a history where the
species set out on a long march for a just society
that has not been attained over thousands of
years, which is the very short, relatively
well-known history of a species in its quest for a
just society. And they have always been as far
away from that society as we are close to it
today, that is, closer to that just society we
want to construct. And I dare say that regardless
of the many flaws we still have, of our errors and
inefficiencies, this is the society which in all
human history comes closer to being described as a
just society.
Where is justice that I cannot see it? I cannot
see it because that one over their earns twenty,
thirty times more than me as a doctor, or more
than me as an engineer, or more than me as a
university professor. Where is justice? And, why
is this happening? What does the other produce?
How many does he educate? How many does he heal?
How many are made happy with his knowledge, his
books and his art? How many does he make happy by
building a home? How many does he make happy by
growing something to eat? How many does he make
happy by working in factories, in industries, in
the electrical system, in the drinking water
system, in the streets, on the power grids,
looking after communications or printing books?
How many?
We
must to say that there are several dozens of
thousands of parasites who produce nothing and
just take that individual driving a vintage car
from Havana to Guantanamo, buying and stealing
fuel all along the way, who charged one of those
young students 1000 pesos, 1200 pesos, when he had
to travel just at a time when transportation
difficulties were at their greatest. He knows his
ways that alongside those highways, full of
pot-holes in many places and missing a lot of
signal, things that couldn’t be finished for a
variety of reasons, because of resources we lack,
for conditions we still haven’t been able to fix,
for lack of controls over the managers and other
staffs.
Yes,
we have to bear that in mind and not forget it,
for we are faced with a great battle, which we
must begin to undertake. We shall undertake it and
we will win. That’s what is most important.
Yes,
we are very much aware of this, and we think about
this more than about anything else: our flaws, our
mistakes, our inequalities, our injustice.
I
wouldn’t dare to mention this subject here if I
was not firmly convinced and sure that we are
quickly getting closer to reducing them and to
obliterating them so that, barring world
catastrophes and colossal wars, we can truly
accomplish something. Listen to this well: our
country’s citizens, who at one time suffered a
10%, 15%, 20% or more rate of unemployment, our
citizens who at one time numbered one million
illiterate people, some being totally illiterate
and some being semi-illiterate, up to 90% of the
population, this nation today, and in a very near
future, will have every one of her citizens living
fundamentally on their work and their pensions and
retirement incomes.
Never forget those who for years were our working
class, going through decades of sacrifice,
suffering the attacks of mercenary bands in the
mountains, invasions like Giron, thousands of acts
of sabotage that killed our sugar cane workers,
our industrial and factory workers, those in the
merchant marine or in the fishing industry, those
who were suddenly attacked with cannons and
bazookas, only because they were Cuban, only
because they wanted to be independent, only
because they wanted to improve the lot of our
people; and there were the bandits, doing as they
pleased, those bandits recruited and trained by
the CIA. Some are criminals, some are terrorists
who blew up planes in mid-air or attempted to blow
them up, careless of how many would die, and those
over there who organized attacks of every kind and
organized acts of terrorism against our country.
Did
the empire change in any way? I ask you, “little
Bush”, where is Mr. Posada Carriles, what have you
done with that nice gentleman who despite his
shameful actions keeps trying to have the empire
on a tight rein? When are you going to answer
that very simple question which we have asked you
so many times? Where and how did Posada Carriles
enter the US? What boat did he use and through
which port did he enter? Which of the crown
princes authorized this? Could it be the fat
little brother in Florida? Forgive me for using
the term “fat little brother”; it is not a
criticism, rather a suggestion that he do some
exercises and goes on a diet, don’t you think?
(laughter)…I’m doing this for the gentleman’s
health.
Who
welcomed him? Who gave their permission? Why is
he strolling the streets of Florida, of Miami, so
shamelessly? How did he pass that academy? Was it
sailings or fish breeding? Who was that guy…the
guy who was talking on the phone with another
terrorist who had some cans of dynamite? And when
he asked him, -that really was his voice,- he
recognized the guy, everybody recognized him, he
couldn’t deny that, when they asked what he was
going to do with those cans he said: “Go to the
Tropicana and throw them through a window and
finish it off”. Look at how noble these people
are, how law-abiding, how respectful of
international laws and of human rights. And
shameless “little Bush” hasn’t been able to give
us an answer yet; there he is, mute; nobody has
answered us.
The
authorities of our sister country, Mexico, haven’t
had the time either –yes, of course, they are very
busy-- to answer the question; it’s not asking
too much, sir, to say whether Posada Carriles,
such a naïve kid, naïve and innocent, took that
ship from that port, just as Cuba has charged.
They
have a lot of nerve, these people, telling all
those lies; and if you ask them one little
question, a simple little query, they take months
and months and they still have no answer, not one
word. Months went by and they didn’t know where
their man Posada was.
That
young bright girl, what’s her name? The girl who
is the Secretary of State (Laughter) Condoleezza
or Condoliza? OK, Countess Rice (Laughter) She
doesn’t know anything either, doesn’t have a clue;
and the spokespersons don’t know anything, either;
they haven’t lied, they haven’t sinned one little
bit, they are pure and deserve our congratulations
and the trust of the entire world.
Of
course, it’s a lie that they tortured anybody;
it’s a lie that they were the accomplices of
terrorism; it’s a lie that they invented
terrorism; it’s a lie that they used torture
anywhere; it’s a lie that they used live
phosphorus in Fallujah. Or rather, they say it’s
true, but it’s legal, very legitimate and terribly
decent to use live phosphorus. So who are they
trying to scare?
We
were witness to the colossal battle fought in Mar
del Plata, in the stadium and in the area where
all the presidents were assembled. I remembered
this when I saw our comrades over there and when I
saw Abel; I won’t comment on this, but our people
had the opportunity to see, to observe –I am aware
of opinions-- that grand battle, one on the
streets and the other at the heads-of-state
meeting.
Speaking of history, never before in the history
of this hemisphere did such a battle take place,
one that resembled the battle waged by that
sad-faced gentleman, not because of any connection
with Cervantes, but because that gentleman was
grimacing, he was bored. They put him to bed at
midnight and the world may fall apart; on any
given day, the planes can take off from the
aircraft carriers and drop bombs on that bandit
territory which disturbed the slumber of the
horseman who holds the reins of the empire, and
while he sleeps, the horse wanders wherever it
wants and it could be that, as the horseman
sleeps, the horse is more aware of the empire’s
destiny than his master who had to go to bed
early. (applause)
It’s
really a pity that we can’t delay his awakening
just a bit longer, because the world could be a
better place.
And
that’s how it all goes. We have seen many things
that cannot be forgotten.
Some
have been asking whether Cuba spoke, whether Cuba
took any sides. I’m telling you this now to warn
you, because there are those scheming and making
ridiculous statements about this. Cuba speaks
whenever it is necessary, and Cuba has much to
say; but we are not in a hurry, we are not
impatient. We know very well when, where and how
to deliver the blows to the empire, its system and
its lackeys.
Apparently, some thought, or pretended to think,
that there were no Cubans at Mar del Plata, that a
first-class Cuban revolutionary force was not
present in the glorious march in which thousands
of world citizens, and mainly Argentines, took
part; those who were offended by the emperor’s
parked aircraft carriers, his army, his renting
hotels and hiring thousands of police officers.
Nobody was going to do anything to him physically,
really, what they wanted was that someone would
throw a rotten egg at him. No, really, I think
that would have been an honor he doesn’t deserve
(laughter).
The
highly civilized Argentineans, together with the
increasingly expert and aware citizens of our
hemisphere, where the imposed order is not only
untenable but beyond salvage, know exactly what
they are doing. They said that it would be a
peaceful demonstration, that not a blade of grass
would be disturbed. This mass of people, coming
together under the cold drizzle, marching for
hours to the stadium and making their presence
felt in that stadium, taught an unforgettable
lesson to the empire, because they showed that the
people know what they are doing and, they who know
what they’re doing, march straight to victory.
Those who do not know what they are doing, are
crushed by the people.
We
don’t want to give the empire any excuse to put on
a little show. We shall see who is going to
check-mate in this 50-piece chess game.
When
I use the word “empire”, I am not referring to the
American people, make sure you understand me
well. The American people will salvage many of
the ethical values, many of the forgotten
principles. They will adapt to the world we live
in, if this world can save itself, and this world
must save itself. Everyone should struggle and we
should be the first in that struggle for the
salvation of the world. Ideas are our invincible
weapons.
Some
speak of the battle of ideas, that battle of ideas
which we have been waging for several years now
and which is becoming a battle of ideas throughout
the world. These ideas will triumph, these ideas
must triumph. Let’s carry this message, let’s open
the eyes of a humanity that seems condemned to
extinction. It won’t be eternal, as it is very
likely that even the light of the Sun will go out
one day. It is almost certain that there will be
no way to move living, solid matter to a distance
that is light years away from Earth; the laws of
physics are much more rigorous, much more exact
than historical or social laws.
In
any case, I believe that this humanity and all the
great things it is capable of creating must be
preserved while it is still possible to do so. A
humanity that doesn’t care about the preservation
of its species would be like the young student or
leader, who knows that his life is very limited to
just a few short years and, nevertheless, worries
only about his own existence.
I
have mentioned the names of a few comrades present
here today, some are older, some are not so old,
but we never know how long we have left. In no
way do I think that any of them wants to save
himself without considering the fate of this
admirable and marvelous nation. Yesterday, it was
but a seed and today it is a mighty tree with deep
roots. Yesterday, it was filled with noble
potential and today it is filled with true
nobility. Yesterday, it dreamed of knowledge and
today that knowledge is real, when we are just
beginning in this huge university that today is
Cuba.
Just
look how new cadres are springing up, young
cadres. There is Enrique who is leading a small
army of 28,000 social workers, plus the 7,000 who
are still in school perfecting their skills in
that noble profession.
As
you know, we are presently waging a war against
corruption, against the re-routing of resources,
against thievery, and there is this force which we
didn’t have before we started with the battle of
ideas, one designed to wage this battle.
I am
going to say something, just to see if it will
raise the sense of honor of the construction
workers because when they want to be heroic, they
are. But don’t you think for a moment that
stealing resources and materials is just a
present-day illness, nor is it an exclusive
phenomenon of the Special Period. The Special
Period aggravated it, because in this period we
saw the growth of much inequality and certain
people were able to accumulate a lot of money.
I
recall, we were building an important
biotechnological center in Bejucal. There was a
little cemetery close by. I was making my rounds,
and one day I passed by the cemetery. There I saw
a colossal market where the construction crew,
both the foremen and many of the workers, had put
up a market selling cement, steel rods, wood,
paint, you name it, all kinds of construction
materials.
You
know that construction has always been a very
serious problem. We have resources now; sometimes
there have been shortages, but now we have the
possibility of improving the situation of
construction materials. However, it’s tragic the
dilemma with the workers, the weaknesses of the
foremen, and of others in leading positions.
But
this is nothing new. In the times I’m referring
to, we needed 800 kilograms of cement to produce a
ton of concrete; it was good quality concrete, the
kind needed to put up floors or columns, and it
was supposed to last much longer than El Morro
castle and La Cabana fortress. Well then, they
should use only around 200 kilograms. See the
wastage, the re-routing of resources, see the
larceny.
In
this battle against vice there will be no truce
for anyone and we shall be thoroughly scrupulous.
We will appeal to everyone’s sense of honor. We
are sure of one thing; every human being possesses
a healthy dose of honor. When one looks in the
mirror, one is not always the harshest of judges,
even though, in my opinion, the first
responsibility of a revolutionary is to be
extremely severe with oneself.
We
are speaking of criticism and self-criticism,
that’s true, but our criticisms tend to be almost
grouping criticisms; we never resort to criticism
in a wider circle, we never resort to criticism on
a larger scale.
For
example, if an official from Public Health fudges
the data documenting the existence of the Aedes
Aegypti mosquito, he is summoned, he is
criticized. I know some people who say: “Yes, of
course, I criticize myself.” And with that they
are content. What a laugh! They are actually
happy. So, you criticize yourself, and what about
all the harm you have caused and all the millions
that were lost because you were careless or acted
incorrectly?
Criticism and self-criticism, it’s all very good,
as it did not exist in the past. However, if we
are going to war we need weapons of greater
caliber; we must carry out criticism and
self-criticism in the school room, in the party
cells and then outside the party cells, in the
municipality and finally in t |
