Birth Anniversary of Fidel Castro
August 13, 1926

What Defends the Sovereignty of Cuba

– Fidel Castro, 1968 –

Cuba defends its sovereignty. Mass rally in Havana in defence of the revolution, July 17, 2021.

[…] We must say how we see things. It is perhaps the principle of sovereignty, is it perhaps the law, that has protected and continues to protect our country in the face of Yankee invasion? No one believes this. If it were the law, if it were the principle of sovereignty that was protecting our country, it is certain that this revolution would have disappeared from the face of the earth.

What has protected this revolution, what made it possible, was the blood of the sons of this country, the bloody fighting against the bailiffs and against the armies of Batista, the bloody fighting against the mercenaries, the willingness here to fight to the last man in defence of the revolution — as shown in the October crisis — and the conviction of the imperialists that here they will never be able to execute a manoeuver or military parade. What defends this revolution is not a simple abstract legal principle that is recognized internationally.

What defends this revolution is the unity of our people, their revolutionary consciousness, their combative spirit, and their decision to die to the last man in defence of the revolution and the country. I do not believe that even our enemies have any doubts about the mettle and the spirit of this people. What defends the sovereignty of a country or a just cause is a people who are capable of feeling this cause as its own, capable of having a profound conviction about the justice of this cause, and the decision to defend it at any price. This is precisely what protects our revolution and what protects the sovereignty of our country in the face of the imperialist threat that has always existed here.

(Comments on Czechoslovakia, August 24, 1968)

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