Fidel Castro > Quotes

“A revolution is not a bed of roses. A revolution is a struggle between the future and the past.”
― Fidel Castro

“The ever more sophisticated weapons piling up in the arsenals of the wealthiest and the mightiest can kill the illiterate, the ill, the poor and the hungry, but they cannot kill ignorance, illness, poverty or hunger.”
― Fidel Castro

“There is often talk of human rights, but it is also necessary to talk of the rights of humanity. Why should some people walk barefoot, so that others can travel in luxurious cars? Why should some live for thirty-five years, so that others can live for seventy years? Why should some be miserably poor, so that others can be hugely rich? I speak on behalf of the children in the world who do not have a piece of bread. I speak on the behalf of the sick who have no medicine, of those whose rights to life and human dignity have been denied.”
― Fidel Castro

“I’m not attached to anything.
I’m attached to what it feels it's my duty, to do my duty.
I think that I will die with the boots on.”
― Fidel Castro

“...quality of life lies in knowledge, in culture. Values are what constitute true quality of life, the supreme quality of life, even above food, shelter and clothing.”
― Fidel Castro, My Life: A Spoken Autobiography

“Today, the entire country is an immense University.”
― Fidel Castro

“A revolution is a struggle to the death between the future and the past.”
― Fidel Castro

“I will not speak of him as if he were absent, he has not been and he will never be. These are not mere words of consolation. Only those of us who feel it truly and permanently in the depths of our souls can comprehend this. Physical life is ephemeral, it passes inexorably... This truth should be taught to every human being -- that the immortal values of the spirit are above physical life. What sense does life have without these values? What then is it to live? Those who understand this and generously sacrifice their physical life for the sake of good and justice -- how can they die? God is the supreme idea of goodness and justice.”
― Fidel Castro

“Ignorance is the root of many ills. Knowledge must be the fundamental ally of nations that aspire, despite all their tragedies and problems, to become truly emancipated, to build a better world.”
― Fidel Castro, My Life: A Spoken Autobiography

“Sorry, I'm still a dialectical materialist.”
― Fidel Castro

“La historia me absolverá!”
― Fidel Castro

“Humanity can learn from those who have broken their chains. Those who have chained humanity for centuries cannot teach humanity anything.”
― Fidel Castro

“We have the lowest student-teacher ratio and spend five times as much on schools than war - the opposite of what the United States does. [explaining why Cuba has the highest literacy in the world]”
― Fidel Castro

“If people call me Christian, not from the standpoint of religion but from the standpoint of social vision, I declare that I am a Christian.”
― Fidel Castro

“I know that imprisonment will be harder for me than it has ever been for anyone, filled with cowardly threats and hideous cruelty. But I do not fear prison, as I do not fear the fury of the miserable tyrant who took the lives of 70 of my comrades. Condemn me. It does not matter. History will absolve me.”
― Fidel Castro, History Will Absolve Me

“....Kebenaran tidak perlu di iklankan...”
― Fidel Castro

“The solutions put forth by imperialism are the quintessence of simplicity...When they speak of the problems of population and birth, they are in no way moved by concepts related to the interests of the family or of society...Just when science and technology are making incredible advances in all fields, they resort to technology to suppress revolutions and ask the help of science to prevent population growth. In short, the peoples are not to make revolutions, and women are not to give birth. This sums up the philosophy of imperialism.”
― Fidel Castro

“The fact is, when men carry the same ideals in their hearts, nothing can isolate them - neither prison walls nor the sod of cemeteries. For single memory, a single spirit, a single idea, a single conscience, a single dignity will sustain them all.”
― Fidel Castro, History Will Absolve Me

“What has Capitalism resolved? It has solved no problems. It has looted the world. It has left us with all this poverty. It has created lifestyles and models of consumerism that are incompatible with reality. It has poisoned the waterways. Oceans, Rivers, Lakes, Seas, the Atmosphere, the Earth. It has produced an incredible waste of resources.
I always cite one example; imagine every person in China owned a Car, or aspired to own a Car. Everyone of the 1.1 Billion people in China, or that everyone of the 800 million people in India wished to own a Car, this method, this lifestyle, and Africa did the same, and nearly 450 million Latin Americans did the same. How long would Oil last? How long would Natural Gas last? How long would natural resources last? What would be left of the Ozone layer? What would be left of Oxygen on Earth? What would happen with Carbon Dioxide? And all these phenomenon that are changing the ecology of our world, they are changing Earth, they are making life on our Planet more and more difficult all the time.
What model has Capitalism given the world to follow? An example for societies to emulate? Shouldn’t we focus on more rational things, like the education of the whole population? Nutrition, health, a respectable lodging, an elevated culture? Would you say capitalism, with it’s blind laws, it’s selfishness as a fundamental principle, has given us something to emulate? Has it shown us a path forward? Is humanity going to travel on the course charted thus far? There may be talk of a crisis in socialism, but, today, there is an even greater crises in capitalism, with no end in sight.”
― Fidel Castro

“Today you cannot talk about a United Nations system;… what actually exists is a domination system over nearly all countries in the world by a small group of powers under the aegis of the United States, determining all issues.”
― Fidel Castro

“To the accusation that Cuba wants to export its revolution, we reply: Revolutions are not exported, they are made by the people.”
― Fidel Castro

“Es que, cuando los hombres llevan en la mente un mismo ideal, nada puede incomunicarlos, ni las paredes de una cárcel, ni la tierra de los cementerios, porque un mismo recuerdo, una misma alma, una misma idea, una misma conciencia y dignidad los alienta a todos.”
― Fidel Castro

“A revolution is not a bed of roses.”
― Fidel Castro

“In consequence, the National General Assembly of the People of Cuba proclaims before America:

the right of peasants to land;

the right of the worker to the fruit of his labor;

the right of children to receive education;

the right of the sick to receive medical and hospital care;

the right of the young to work;

the right of students to receive free instruction, practical and scientific;

the right of Negroes and Indians to 'a full measure of human dignity';

the right of woman to civil, social and political equality;

the right of the aged to secure old age;

the right of intellectuals, artists and scientists to fight through their work for a better world;

the right of States to nationalize imperialist monopolies as a means of recovering national wealth and resources;

the right of countries to engage freely in trade with all other countries of the world;

the right of nations to full sovereignty;

the right of people to convert their fortresses into schools and to arm their workers, peasants, students, intellectuals, Negroes, Indians, women, the young, the old, all the oppressed and exploited; that they may better defend, with their own hands, their rights and their future.

”
― Fidel Castro, The Declarations of Havana

“inspired my own life.
Victory has thousands father but failure always find itself an orphan.
--Fidel Castro”
― Fidel Castro

“From Marx, I received the concept of what human society is; otherwise, someone who hasn't read about it, or to whom it hasn't been explained, it's as though they were set down in the middle of a forest, at night, without knowing which way north is, or south, east or west. Marx told us what a society is and the history of its evolution. Without Marx, you can't formulate any argument that leads to a reasonable interpretation of historical events - what the tendencies are, the probable evolution of a humanity that has not yet completed its social evolution.”
― Fidel Castro, My Life: A Spoken Autobiography

“I view Che, furthermore, as a moral giant who grows day by day, whose image, whose strength, whose influence has multiplied throughout the world.
How could he fit below a tombstone?
How could he fit in this plaza?
How could he fit solely in our beloved but small island?
Only the world he dreamed of, which he lived and fought for, is big enough for him.”
― Fidel Castro

“I began revolution with 82 men. If I had to do it again, I do it with 10 or 15 and absolute faith. It does not matter how small you are if you have faith and plan of action.”
― Fidel Castro

“Why did they believe that by killing him he would cease to exist as a combatant? Today he is not in La Higuera. Instead, he is everywhere; he is to be found wherever there is a just cause to defend. Those with a stake in eliminating him and making him disappear were incapable of understanding that he had already left an indelible mark on history; that his shin­ing, prophetic vision would become a symbol for all the poor of this world, in their millions. Young people, children, the elderly, men and women who knew him, honest persons throughout the world, regardless of their social origin, admire him.
Che is waging and winning more battles than ever.”
― Fidel Castro

“U.S. imperialism's avowed policy of sending soldiers to fight the revolutionary movement in any Latin American country, to kill workers, students, peasants, to kill Latin American men and women, has no other purpose than to maintain its monopolistic interests and the privileges of the treacherous oligarchies which support the monopolies.”
― Fidel Castro, The Declarations of Havana