The name of Cuba will go down in history for ever because of what it has done and is still doing for humanity in the fields of education, culture and health in the most difficult period that our species has known.
“Once and for all, they crushed the absurd idea that the suffering endured, and the blood and tears spilled throughout almost a hundred years of struggle for independence and justice against Spanish colonialism and its slavery-based model of exploitation, and later against imperialist domination and the corrupt and bloody governments imposed on Cuba by the United States, were to serve for the rebuilding of a neocolonialist, capitalist and bourgeois society.We did it at the exact and precise moment in history, not a minute before and not a minute later, and we were daring enough to attempt i
“It is not men who make history, it is history that makes men or the great figures and personalities; men interpret events, in one way or another, but they are born from history”.
“The merits of the Cuban Revolution can be measured by the fact that such a small nation has for so long been capable of putting up a resistance against the hostile policy and criminal actions carried out against our people by the most powerful empire ever in the history of mankind, the same that was in the habit of handling the countries of the hemisphere in its own way thus it underestimated a small, dependent and poor nation located a few miles off its coasts.
Without convictions about the value of conscience and its capacity to prevail over instincts, it would not be possible to even speak of a hope for change in any period of the very short history of man.
“I believe this to be a turning point in our history: the tyranny has been overthrown. The rejoicing is immense. But there is still much to be done. We mustn't fool ourselves into believing that the future will be easy; everything may be more difficult in the future. Telling the truth is the first duty of all revolutionaries. Deceiving the people, raising false hopes, always brings the worst consequences, and I feel it's necessary to warn everyone against over-optimism.”
"La especie humana vive una etapa sin precedente en la historia. Un choque de aviones militares o naves de guerras que se vigilan estrechamente u otros hechos similares, pueden desatar una contienda con el empleo de las sofisticadas armas modernas que se convertiría en la última aventura del conocido Homo sapiens".
“The great events of history are not forged in a day. Enormous tests and challenges of increasing complexity are on the horizon.”
“[…] It has been our tradition since our war of liberation; we made the war being generous, respecting our adversary, respecting our enemy. That is a basic fact of our history; if it were not so, we would not have the support of our people…”
“And remember this, remember what history teaches: that there is no halfway in these revolutionary processes, which either attain full victory or stand to be defeated; history teaches that the way is from extreme revolution to extreme reaction. And, of course, you can be sure that we will not be counted among those defeated.”