Let Us Defend the Revolution: A Tribute to Raul

June 3rd is the 95th birthday of Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, a guerrilla fighter who has dedicated and dedicates his life to fighting for the Cuban Revolution. May this serve as a sincere and grateful tribute to him.

Photo: Estudios Revolución

By Alina Perera Robbio, translated from the Spanish

Twenty-five years have gone by, and as time keeps layering itself one moment over another, I find myself wondering how that conversation in the province of Ciego de Ávila with Army General Raúl Castro Ruz could ever have unfolded. What could have been going through his mind as we walked together? How could I ask about everything that interested me at the time? How did my interlocutor manage to give answers that needed almost no editing—answers with incredible synthesis, capturing both the resistance of an entire people and the saga of a nation?

That day in 2001 was one of clear skies and very hot weather. The most difficult hours of what we called the "special period" were still vivid, that phase in the nineties of the twentieth century marked by extreme challenges, the collapse of the socialist camp, and the resulting changes that forced us to endure all sorts of hardships.

Cuba had managed the miracle of enduring those drastic changes in daily life: the endless blackouts, the collapse of urban transport to almost nothing – kept alive only by the giant vehicles we fondly call “camels” – and our daily bread, which became, quite literally, the only bread of the day.

With all that I had experienced, and with it still fresh in my mind, I wanted Raúl to share his thoughts on the meaning of resilience and, above all, on getting ready for future triumphs. "You have to have the will to face problems, and to do so with the spirit of winning," The Army General told me then, in a moment of reflection, about what he believed to be the most powerful force of humanity: the will.

After sharing his ideas about the "spirit of victory," he invoked the admirable guerrilla who has inspired so many: Fidel: "I have not seen anyone," Raul said, "and I say this based on concrete facts, who has had a greater will the greater the difficulties, than Fidel. You have to think about the effort that had to be made to organize an attack like the one on the Moncada barracks, and think about how in a few hours so much dedication, so much hope, and most especially so much blood, vanished."

"Then came prison, exile, the organization of the Granma, the clandestine life and occasionally the persecution in Mexico, and then we arrived in the Homeland, and three days later, in a few hours, we saw all the accumulated effort disappear again, dozens of comrades fell... When two weeks later, on December 18, 1956, I met Fidel already in the foothills of the Sierra Maestra, in a place called Cinco Palmas, after the initial embrace his first question was: "How many rifles do you have?" I replied that I had five. And he summarized: "And two that I have make seven. Now we have won the war." I really didn't believe it, it didn't seem possible to me that with the seven rifles we were going to win the war."

The Army General told me that he and his comrades never felt defeated: "We would fight until the end of our lives. We would never surrender or abandon the struggle. But the situation was very complex."

During the era of those interviews, the great enemy of the Cuban Revolution spoke passionately about the post-Castro era. I told comrade Raúl that, according to them, once Fidel, with his magnetism and undeniable leadership, was no longer physically present, it would pose a challenge for the continuity of the Revolution. I wanted to know his ideas about it and he was emphatic:

"There will be no problem. We, naturally, want Fidel to live for many years. But eternity is not possible. We have our birth, growth, development, and the end, and it is only right that it should be so. But in our case, we will not die with physical death, we will live or die depending on what happens with the Revolution. If she dies, we will have died. If it endures, we will live. We aspire to live eternally as long as our Revolution lives eternally. The rest is the enemy's tale."

That everything depends on what we are capable of doing with the Revolution, and that "the rest is the enemy's story," was one of the ideas that I liked the most and remember from the dialogue. The phrase, by the way, feels tailor-made for today, when an infodemic tries to cloud all understanding and lies and fake stories run rampant—like the push to prosecute Raúl, a move that clearly leans toward the politically symbolic.

Cuba's grateful people stood up to say that no one will touch Raul. The enemy's attack was so outrageous and bizarre that it came off less as a threat and more like a comic mishmash. Even so, they riled up the crowd, creating a kind of wall against any effort to justify actions aimed at destroying us.

Who would have thought that some far-off, mysterious force could try to take away the treasured and respected things we hold dear? Some men and women embody the very soul of a nation, understanding it like few others and standing ready to defend it in the best way possible. Raúl is one of them; and when one says "Raul is Raul", it means he’s fully committed to his own distinctive fighting style—a blend of balance, strength, and subtlety—always looking for the smartest solutions while carrying the heavy responsibility of a nation on his shoulders.

"How much have we truly matured?" the guerrilla asked that sunny day in Ciego de Ávila, and then added with his usual sincerity: "I am not qualified to define that moment in our society. It is an endless process, but undoubtedly we can already speak of a Cuban self-esteem as it should be."

Self-esteem is a concept that helps us understand ourselves as a nation determined to take control of its own path, despite any outside influence or threat. The Revolution was an historic event that firmly protected the very thing that sustains us: love.

Those who have been very close to Raúl speak of his extraordinary sensitivity as a human being. Many don’t picture it from such a subtle perspective. "He has that power," a friend who knows him well, and who understands the value of meeting each other's gaze, sharing words, and often clashing while working and fighting for Cuba, told me.

Sometimes, even a small detail can reveal an entire world of truths. I keep more than one version of Raúl’s handwriting: the tidy script from the interview pages; the image of him walking away lost in thought – a move that resisted rest and broke all sense of convention; and his talent for picking up on the feelings of whoever he was talking to.

Later on, I remember that at the end of a trip, which allowed Raúl to see my latest version of the interview, we walked past a place where some tables were set with sweets. The Army General noticed that I was looking at them, and he said to me: "Take some and take them to your child; Vilma would have done it the same."

They were secondary events marked by naturalness and empathy. That brief, unpretentious gesture of understanding left in me a lasting mark of humanity, simplicity, and tenderness.

This work was translated and shared via a License CC-BY-NC