“This is highly symbolic because it shows us how crime cannot kill ideas, how crime cannot stop the victorious march of a people; how crime, no matter how monstrous, cannot kill life, and how the life of each one of us does not belong to ourselves, but it belongs to everyone. We are all part of something that is greater than we are, and that is Homeland, the people; our lives are part of the infinite and immortal life of the Cuban nation and of our revolutionary people.”
Quotes
“The homeland, brothers and sisters, is the task of all those who are prepared to sacrifice themselves for it. It is an altar and not a pedestal, as Marti used to say: an altar where each and everyone will lay down their best, without any noise or alarm, for the benefit of a collective work that cannot be postponed, and not a platform or pedestal to raise up a futile pretence of accumulating dubious and belated merits based on intrigue or treason.”
“Thank you for coming to bolster us in this difficult struggle we are involved in today to save the ideas for which you fought so valiantly, to save the Revolution, the homeland and the conquests of socialism, which is a part that has been carried out of the great dreams you harboured!”
“Never have we even played around with a single principle just to receive favours from imperialism! And it has been in that spirit and with that awareness that our people have been brought up; in the spirit that other peoples’ causes cannot be sold, that principles cannot be downtrodden, that principles cannot be reviled.”
“The feats that our country is already capable of in the field of medicine, the enormous human capital it has developed: no other country in the world has these things. We have professionals willing to travel anywhere in the world, no matter how tough the conditions are there, and this is something no one else has.”
“[…]They should know by now that, as far as the Cuban people is concerned, the ideals that inspire freedom, dignity, love of one’s homeland, its identity, its culture and the strictest sense of justice that human beings can conceive of are more valuable than anything on Earth..”
“They were born 83 years apart. The first was already a legendary figure when the second entered the world. If one of them proclaimed that whoever tried to take possession of Cuba would have to gather up the dust of its soil soaked in blood, if he did not perish in the struggle, the other soaked Bolivian soil with his blood trying to prevent the empire from taking over America”.
“Revolutionary Cubans, in the thick of the Battle of Ideas we are waging and embroiled in the arduous and heroic defence of our Homeland, the Revolution and Socialism, on a day like today we are rendering a special tribute to our two great heroes, with a firm, unshakeable decision: We shall all be like Maceo and Che”
The greatest desire of all Cuban revolutionaries is for every new generation to be better prepared for the huge challenges that the future brings for our country and all of humankind. Every minute of your lives, you must be fully aware of the great responsibility that the country and the Revolution have entrusted in you: for the moment, to study hard and fulfill your duty with honor.
"The singing of the anthem on that October 20 came at the same time as the feat of arms with which the Revolution achieved its first and most important victory over Spanish colonial troops. Bayamo’s surrender and Céspedes’ victorious entry marked the culmination of the act of rebellion begun on October 10 in La Demajagua sugar plantation which marked an turning point in the country’s history and gave birth, over the rubble of the first colonial redoubts, to the Cuban nation".
The “Henry Reeve” Brigade has been created, and whatever tasks you undertake in any part of the world or our own homeland, you shall always bear the glorious distinction of having responded to the call to assistance our brothers and sisters in the United States, and that nation’s humblest children especially, with courage and dignity.
Let’s go forward, generous defenders of health and of life, winners over pain and death itself!
"Cuba’s attitude, and its response to the empire’s provocations, will be entirely peaceful, but we shall strike back with all the strength of our moral fortitude and we shall persist in our determination to fight to the death, against whatever act of belligerence of the restless and brutal empire that threatens us. Let no one for a minute forget the oath of Maceo, our Bronze Titan, when he said that whosoever attempts to take possession of Cuba shall conquer but the blood-soaked ground beneath his feet, if he does not first perish in battle".