Unvanquished: Cuba's Resistance to Fidel Castro

by Enrique Encinosa

In UNVANQUISHED, Cuban-American historian Enrique Encinosa gives us the first comprehensive history in English of the forty-six-year war that Cuba's people have waged against Fidel Castro. A concise and riveting narrative, mainly in the voices of its participants, UNVANQUISHED unmistakably shows Castro's main opposition is not the exile community in Miami or the U.S. government, but rather the Cuban people who must live under his rule.

Genres: Politics

229 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2004

Reviews

[Gus V. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Encinosa's narrative of the history of the Cuban Revolution is captivating, informative and easy to read. It covers the Revolution since its triumph in 1959 until the present. I was impressed with Encinosa's recollection of the frantic early days of the Cuban Revolution, when Fidel Castro marched thru Cuba, worshipped by both the crowd and the media, both of which he would later suppress. Encinosa shows how a power hungry Castro was able to form an alliance with the Communists starting secret clandestine meetings with Cuban Communist leaders in early 1959, plotting the communist takeover of Cuba. Events in 1959-60, such as the cancellation of elections and the confiscation of private property (I wished the author would have covered that period in more detail), set up confrontations with the U.S., which resulted in the Bays of Pigs in 1961 and the Missile Crises in 1962. I found of particular interest Encinosa's account of the anti-Castro Escambray rebellion in the 60's and his description of the bad conditions in Cuban prisons- events normally ignored by other writers that focus on Fidel, the Cold War, and U.S.- Cuban relations. Other significant events are covered- such as Castro's intervention in Africa, the Mariel boatlift, and the Brothers to the Rescue murders. Books like this inspired me to narrate my family's experience on Cuba and the Revolution (Memories from the Land of the Intolerant Tyrant).

[Rhuff · Rating 4 out of 5]

"La Lucha Continua"

(Disclaimer: I am not “anti-Castro”, so be forewarned you will not likely like what follows.)

Cuban-American author Enrique Encinosa has written extensively on the anti-Castro movement in Spanish and English. This is his latest treatment – as far as I’m aware - of the “Cuban contras” and their generations-long feud with the Lider Maximo of Havana, up to the early 2000s, before the sea-changes of the next decade. An objective reader will easily glean that the two “struggles” – Castro’s against the Colossus of the North, and its anti-Castro counterpart – are perfect parallels to each other. This is perhaps why both remain technically “unvanquished,” but why neither could see their ultimate triumph. The Colossus remains, even after Fidel, still threatening his revolution; and Castro’s heirs will ensure that the subjects of Encinosa’s book will never wave Kennedy’s Brigade 2506 flag over “Cuba Libre.”

Neither side could continue its struggle without foreign support. As Fidel needed the USSR to fight Yankee Imperialism, so did his enemies need the US to wage war on him. This is understandable - Washington and Havana both tolerated no opponents to their rule and left them few options: the narrow Straits of Florida would become a yawning chasm of a polarized world. Yet just as Castro had initial misgivings about a too-close alliance with Communism, so his opponents were leery of drawing too close to “the Colossus.” Like Castro they also came out of a nationalist milieu where terms like “Plattista” and “vendepatria” were supreme insults. As Encinosa states: “Brigade [2506] members [of the Bay of Pigs operation] had mixed emotions about working with the United States. The history of Cuba and the Caribbean basin had been tainted by U.S. interventions. In the past, Cuban commentators had denounced various facets of the U.S. presence as encroachments on their national sovereignty. In the present day, however, Castro’s alliance with the Soviets left the exiles feeling they had little choice but to accept U.S. support in contesting his regime.” (p. 39.)

But as Fidel would later publicly embrace Marxism-Leninism as the price of Soviet investment, hand-in-hand with Brezhnev per the famous mural, so too would the Contra Fidelistas see the US as inseparable from their struggle. Jose Basulto, 2506 veteran and longtime continuer of la Lucha, is quoted: “The options for anyone fighting Castro were very limited, and the one that offered the best weaponry and resources was the CIA. We did not feel like mercenaries or employees of the Americans. We did what we did because we were Cubans and we loved our country.” (Photo caption between pp. 102-103.) Why did these men take up arms in what seemed a hopeless war? Because success breeds imitators; and if Fidel’s small band could bring the mountain to Batista, why couldn’t others do the same to him? The logistics defeated them: despite Encinosa's contention, guerrilla warrior Fidel was vastly more popular – and shrewder – than Batista, leaving no loophole to unseat him as king of his mountain.

Encinosa takes his discourse into the human rights movement of the 1980s, which leads one to wonder why this strategy wasn’t tried before. In Fidel’s first year it would have had far greater chance of forestalling violent polarization than thirty years later. And the answer, of course, lies in the romantic tradition of the macho warrior, gun in hand, launching at windmills beneath a black velvet sky and jeweled stars. Non-violent human rights as a cause in itself was only weakly developed, brought to Latin America as a northern import to counter cold war violence. Encinosa tries to tie the two strands together in his grand narrative but only reveals the divisiveness that crippled the anti-Castro movement. There is no comparing Luis Posada Carriles, militant terrorist responsible for blowing up a Cuban airliner in mid-flight, and Eloy Menoyo of “Cambio Cubano”, though both were anti-Batista and anti-Castro veterans. The anti-Castro movement never produced a “Lider Maximo,” or a united movement, despite Jorge Mas Canosa and his CANF. No one in Cuba’s Contra Movement paralleled Castro’s breadth (or deceit, if you prefer) in reaching out to all parties. In tying itself to the CIA, the Movement became a satellite to be launched at outside discretion; quite unlike Fidel’s blank-check partnership with Moscow.

Though I disagree with the author’s basic position, he does offer a broad look at the “Anti-Castro Resistance.” His narrative is heavily partisan and glosses over loose ends and unpleasantries that would muddy his heroic narrative. But it’s civil war polemics, after all, echoing its counterpart across the Strait. Yet Encinosa sticks to facts, and does not go into the conspiracy hyperbolics so beloved in Miami. For this I can give it four stars as an informative and well-conceived example of its type. This Cuban civil war may continue a bit longer, stoked from exile, fueled by the old, as was Spain’s til Franco’s death. But like Spain’s it will fade with time, as newer generations grow more interested in Luz over Lucha.

[Jose · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have read and re-read this excellent book so many times it is written in such a prose and full of documentation. Highly recommend for true historians and not armchair amateurs and parrots for the regime.