Talk:History of Cuba

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Contents 1 anti-cuban text 2 Odd Syntax strikes again 3 defense of the present Cuban government 4 Odd view of Cuban history 5 and on go the less informed criticisms 6 Plagiarism and distortion exposed 7 Mediation requested 8 Factual Accuracy 9 Third War of Independence 10 205.240.227.15 lingo 11 Women in Cuba needs better citation 12 Mulata Mistresses 13 Colombus and Cipango 14 deleted the following 15 added three unref tags 16 early history later history 17 2003 ferry hijackings 18 No poor countries have succeeded? 19 Cuba under attack 20 Cuban War of Independence 21 Article overall

[edit] anti-cuban text

2005-03-15

63.83.249.12 has added anti-cuban text and deleted bits of text that apparently aren't anti-cuban enough. I've re-installed the latter, but left his additions in place, which seems the proper thing to do; every perspective should have it's place.

I added a bit to the this writer's argument about the effectiveness of the embargo. But in retrospect I think both these bits should really be placed in the separate text on the embargo. The text is somewhat out of date; the Helms-Burton Act is not mentioned. I added one mention of it, but I suppose that needs some more work.

Is there any reason to call the cuban government Stalinist? Sounds like silly name-calling to me. Just as the usage of the word regime. I suggest that all these occurrences (here and in texts about other countries) are replaced by the neutral word 'government'.

[edit] Odd Syntax strikes again

One could notice that the above critic uses "cuban" without capitalization, suggesting that his native language is one that like Spanish does not capitalize such words as "cubano." The common English usage is

Cuban

adj : of or relating to or characteristic of Cuba or the people of Cuba; "Cuban rum" [syn: Cuban] n : a native or inhabitant of Cuba [syn: Cuban]

Source: WordNet ® 2.0, © 2003 Princeton University

One also notices that this author confuses anti-Cuban with anti-Castro clearly delineating her/his political views.

xe xe (El Jigüe, 11/2/2005)

[edit] defense of the present Cuban government

Under the missile crisis it says "the U.S. blockaded Cuba to force the USSR to withdraw their newly-installed MRBMs from the country". I believe that should be "the USA blockaded USSR ships in international waters to prevent them from delivering missiles to newly-built launch sites in Cuba". But I'm not entirely sure. Anyone? Also, a bit more about the reasons for sending the missiles and the way the situation was dealt with an the way it was resolved is called for. I'm no expert, but as I understand it, the USA had many more missiles aimed at the USSR than the other way around and the USSR tried to even the balance and this was resolved by the USA removing missiles in Turkey. But this was kept secret, resulting in the USSR looking weak. Who knows more about this?

Under 'Cuba after the Sovjet Union' it says "This led Castro to open the country to tourism from Europe and Asia". And America, Africa and wherever, I suppose, or was it done in stages? Sounds unlikely to me.

Then there's a bit about the rapid-action brigades that says they were employed against anti-government protesters. That may be, but it stands to reason that there was a lot of theft going on (as someone in Cuba also pointed out to me), so I'd say that would have been their primary target.

The US blockade was meant to stop two things: the reinforcement of Soviet and Warsaw Pact troops. SLBM’s and MRBM’s were delivered 6 months prior to the blockade and already present and fully assembled in Cuba. I am not sure if there were any more SLBM’s and MRBM’s on board the inbound blockaded ships (something that might need to be researched).

The missile issue in its totality is all a PR thing anyways. Although the Soviets had far fewer ICBM’s and intercontinental bombers that could penetrate US airspace, in 1963, they had more than enough nuclear subs with ballistic missiles to offset this. That’s the thing though, people (the public) never really thought about subs because no one could see them. Missile tests and bomber parades are high profile events, but subs by their very nature were secretive and the public, both NATO and WP , did not know much if anything about sub capabilities. The Soviets also wanted to use Cuba as a wedge in the western hemisphere, and placed the missiles there as an act of “good will” towards the Cubans. That’s why it was mainly a PR stunt to put missiles in Cuba.

As far as the rapid reaction forces, they were created to deal with a twofold problem, rising crime and anti-Castro rallies and organizations. Realistically the police could have handled the crime problem, but in order to deal with both crime and demonstrations while maintaining a degree of plausible deniability the “rapid reaction forces” were cobbled together from party and Castro loyalist. The official line was that these were spontaneous and independent organizations fighting crime and counterrevolutionaries. I believe you can find the information in the 1994 HRW report [1]. TDC 22:35, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

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On February 21, 1960 Castro nationalized all businesses in Cuba and undertook other communist reforms.

I've removed this sentence because it does not fit the facts. The first land reform bill was indeed as early as May 1959. The US owned oil refineries were not nationalized until June 29, 1960 (because they refused to refine Soviet crude oil). Other major US enterprises were nationalized on August 17. Small businesses were not nationalized until 1968.

Also, rather than using the provocative phrase "other communist reform", it would be more NPOV to simply list what those reforms were, and let the reader decide. Eclecticology 11:43 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)

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Looks like this page needs a lot of work. As it looks now it could have been written by a sitting US president. Sorry :-/ I will fix :-) --BL

As of now parts of it could have been written by a Cuban government official. The are some fairly bad POV violations now.

"The United States used this as a final pretext to enter a conflict (see: Spanish-American War), which was practically already won by Cuban revolutionaries."

A rewriting of history to minimize US involvement. True, Cuban revolutionaries had won an important battle on April 2, 1898 under Colonel J.P. Quijano at Chambas (Morón), Cuba, causing the Spanish Governor General Blanco to temporarily suspend hostilities on April 10, shortly before the USA entered the war, but Admiral Pascual Cervera was being sent from Spain with a large number of reinforcements in order to restart the conflict, which began again at the end of April. The US blockaded Admiral Cervera's ships and destroyed his squadron. "Practically already won" is too strong of a statement, since the fighting resumed and Cervera's reinforcements were so great in number. At the very least, the US involvement certainly hastened the end of the hostilities. At the time of the suspension of hostilities, the Cuban revolutionaries controlled the eastern half of the island (primarily the rural areas), while the Spanish forces controlled the western half. Most historians believe that a stalemate would have continued for some time, especially once Cervera's reinforcements arrived.

[edit] Odd view of Cuban history

The above view of history is most odd. Cervera was an admiral not the Governor of Cuba. And most odd is the mention of Quijano's battle generally considered minor. What a weird history you are consulting it appears you are following [2]. That chronology somehow has left out major battles like Peralejo, La Invasion, the taking of Tunas and Guisa, etc. ete. By the beginning of US contact General Calixto Garcia, having taken most places on the Cauto plains, was sitting in Bayamo after the Spanish had fled. waiting for the US connection and The message to Garcia. You might go to [3] and that is far from complete.(El Jigüe, 11/2/2005)

[edit] and on go the less informed criticisms

Also, I'm fairly sure that Spain did not send over one million men to the island to supress the rebellion; all other sources I've checked have it at 220,000. I'm a slight bit skeptical of the claim that so many of the Spanish soldiers stayed in Cuba after the war because of povety back home, considering how Cuba was ravaged by the war and was in abject poverty itself. Please look at some of the external links supplied in the Spanish-American War article.

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I've removed the following which mixes some fact and some fiction with sweeping generalizations to arrive at a highly POV result. Some of the material was already in other parts of the article, and much of it is not verifiable. ☮ Eclecticology 05:54, 2003 Nov 14 (UTC):===Soviet and Chinese Influence===

In 1960-61, Castro took over all industries, including those owned by Americans, except for small tobacco farms and other retailers who were allowed to remain independent while under government surveillance. Cuba?s government was state controlled like the Soviet models. Che Guevara was head of the Ministry of Industry and they set up elaborate plans for production. Sugar production was continued so that the profits could be used to pay for the increase of exports. Since these ideal plans were not well thought out they failed due to a severe lack of needed technology and capabilities, as well as, the skilled laborers and professionals to run it. They also did not have the adequate funding and consequently industrial and agricultural production fell. Add to this the amount of debt owed to the Soviet Union and Europe nations and the complete collapse of the economy was inevitable. The scarcity of food led to severe rationing and that was dependant on the stores being able to stock their shelves with the necessary goods. In 1963, Castro realized the extent of the devastated economy and reverted to self-sufficiency and a priority of sugar and tobacco production, but this also failed.

Castro was determined to be the sole leader of Cuba and was already the head of the government and military and now the economy. To fix the economy, Castro and other Cuban officials turned to the Chinese models. These put the rural society before the urban cities by applying more of a Marxist approach which did not work because this was based on a working class revolution. Cuba was not industrialized to have a proletarian society living in the city slums in overcrowded conditions. They also put an end to all bureaucracy. Literacy was extremely important and he formed a system of educating the rural society and to prove that you could read and write you were expected to write Castro a letter. A change from material or profit incentives to a more moral based reward system was created so that workers gained recognition, acknowledgement and status for their hard work, dedication and production instead of monetary benefits. It was believed that patriotism and nationalism were enough to compel people to work harder. There was no longer any private ownership left except for a small number of tobacco farms. The Cuban government provided many free goods and services, none of which were of good quality, and tried to end the use of money. A goal of 10 million metric tons of sugar was created that needed the entire nation?s effort to complete. Only 8.5 million metric tons were actually produced and even though this is more than was ever produced before, it was also considered a failure and drained the production of other goods, especially food. The economy and the country as a whole was devastated and Castro returned back to the Soviet Union. (Ian Rogozinski)

[edit] Plagiarism and distortion exposed

An instance of plagiarism has been brought to my attention:

Batista's rule fueled increasing popular discontent and the rise of active urban resistance groups, a fertile political environment for Castro's 26th of July Revolutionary Movement.

Compare that sentence to the following, which appears at [4]:

Batista's dictatorial rule fueled increasing popular discontent and the rise of many active urban and rural resistance groups, a fertile political environment for Castro's 26th of July Movement.

Identical but for the words dictatorial, many, and rural, and Revolutionary, which were deleted. Evidently material from the US State Department was not far enough to the right for the purposes of the plagiarist-propagandist who wrote this text.

I am going to restore the original version of the sentence and give a reference.

I hope, but doubt, that the person who stole and modified this sentence is duly ashamed of himself. Shorne 22:53, 8 Oct 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Mediation requested

User VeryVerily's intransigence and impossible behaviour have left me no option but to request mediation. People who have anything to add to my request are asked to visit Wikipedia:Requests for mediation. Shorne 11:01, 10 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Shorn I think you should keep in mind Ana Belen Montes of the National Defense Agency, she was passing on info to Cuba and diddling all such Cuban info to make Castro a little better, until she was caught with her old fashioned short wave radio and code book. Much of the older stuff on Cuba is hers....(El Jigüe, 9/26/2005)

[edit] Factual Accuracy

This page seems to leave out things, and some of the previous debates on this talk page don't seem to be resolved. Therefore I added the Factual Accuracy warning. You can remove it if you feel this page is factually accurate, I just put it in because I have a feeling that it isn't. For instance, the entire period of the Spanish-American War is blank. They don't even mention it. YourNickname 19:22, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Third War of Independence

Since I can't imagine anyone in the context of Cuban history trying to draw a distinction between the 1895 Insurrection and the Spanish American War as separate wars, I would guess that the anonymous editor who changed Second to Third probably was considering the Ten Years' War as the Second War of Independence and either the Bolivarian efforts of the 1820s or the filibuster efforts c.1850 as the First War of Independence. Caerwine 22:19, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Caerwine most do not count Narciso Lopez's expeditions, believing them to support US statehood annexation (sp?) what you forget is "la Guerra Chiquita" of 1880,which although rapidly defeated was not insignificant (El Jigüe, 9/26/2005)

[edit] 205.240.227.15 lingo

...and civil rights legislation against discrimination was enacted ordered minimum employment quotas for Cubans.

Is it me or is it the phrase? I can't figure out what is meant here. DirkvdM 04:56, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

That should be ordering. It was in the Menocal administration and the legislation was to assuring a quota of Cubans employed in businesses. It was aimed primarily at Spanish owned firms who prefered to import their relatives from Spain. My grandfather was instrumental in its passage.....xe xe (El Jigüe, 10/16/2005)

[edit] Women in Cuba needs better citation

In particular the line "Although the official line is that "The Revolution" freed the women of Cuba, even Castro supporters have to admit prejudices did not fade overnight. Cuban women in authoritarian Cuba where superiors hold much power, still have to "fight" for respect in the workplace." should have a direct footnote as it is stated as a fact. If no footnote is added, I'm going to assume it's POV and remove it. Vanessa kelly 03:35, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mulata Mistresses

A paragraph from "Race and Women":

However, it should be noted that elected president Carlos Prio, as well as the first President in Arms of Cuba Carlos Manuel de Cespedes, kept Mulata mistresses e.g. the most beautiful Celia Touzet who gave him three children [34], [35]. In 1894 Elena González Núñez, a beautiful woman married José Maceo [36] (Estenger, 1939); José Maceo although said to be mulatto, was far darker than his brother Antonio Maceo yet Elena was “White” with blue eyes.

The claim regarding Carlos Manuel de Cespedes is unsubstantiated here or in the separate article about him. The footnoted reference for the Carlos Prio/Celia Touzet claim is a cached gossip item from what appears to be a Miami talk radio station. The Jose Maceo sentence is out of place. Is there a story that follows? Consequences? Social reaction? Otherwise, it is again simply a gossip item. Unless someone objects, I'm going to remove the paragraph. The same De Cespedes/Prio sentence appears in the Carlos Prio Socarras article. There's no discussion over there, so I'm announcing here my intention to axe it. Orestesm 04:18, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Cespedes mistress was given a Cuban Government pension....and she is placed by some at the site of his death, other historians emphasize that only old women were there, but they seem determined to write her out of Cuban history. Whatever, Cespedes mistress is buried close to him in Santiago de Cuba. El Jigue 11-12-06

[edit] Colombus and Cipango

No mention in this article that when Christopher Colombus explored the island he thought it could be Cipango (european name for Japan at that time), since Colombus was looking for a short route to Asia.--tequendamia 11:59, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] deleted the following

Fidel...

as a student-gangster, one of the "trigger happy boys" (los muchachos del gatillo alegre) Enrique Ros and is widely believed responsible for several murders.

Please source the "trigger happy boys", and put it in context, what does this mean? I have no idea?

Enrique Ros and is widely believed responsible for several murders.

who is Enrique Ros, why should a wikipedian care? Please explain who this man is

"widely believed" is a weasel term. Widely believed by who? Please source your information, add footnotes peferably.Travb 09:15, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Chibás , entangled in an accusation that proved false

What accusations? How were they proven false? At least list what that accsation are. Travb 09:23, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

After a very promising start in his first (elected) term his policy was now very hard on the people and discontentment grew.

How was this dictator term "promising" at the start? This is not explained.

How was it a very hard policy? This is very important to explain, because it seeds the disconnect for the revolution. why would people support the overthrow of this leader? Travb 09:26, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] added three unref tags

Three large important section of the contemporary history of Cuba is unrefenced. Please verify your sources.

As per: Wikipedia:Verifiability

This means that we only publish material that is verifiable with reference to reliable, published sources.

Signed: Travb 09:32, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] early history later history

Early history parts of this article need help. There are paragraphs of duplicate material that need to be consolidated into single paragraphs. In some of the later history, writing needs to be re-done in standard English--some material is still in rough English translated from the Spanish. Thanks Hmains 18:29, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 2003 ferry hijackings

This had two ferry hijackings with six executions from the first, and ? from the second. All sources I have seen had one hijacking and three executions. -- Beardo 08:32, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm amazed you managed to find such a subtle piece of baloney on this page otherwise rampant with errors. I've removed it - it was certainly 1 hijack 3 executions. And the Catholic church did not openly back the Varela project. --Zleitzen 08:37, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] No poor countries have succeeded?

"Another consideration here is that Cuba already was a very poor country in 1959 and hardly any poor countries, capitalist or socialist, have managed to escape poverty in the 20th century, so political orientation can't be conclusively said to be the determining factor."

What about Greece, Portugal, and/or Ireland?

Not to mention (South) Korea, which went from being a Japanese colony to having the 10th-largest economy in the world.

It's bollocks and has been removed.--Zleitzen 23:58, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't call it complete bollocks. It says 'hardly any countries', not 'no countries'. You have to admit there is something to it. Out of more than 100 poor countries in the world just a few have escaped poverty over the last century or so. The division between rich and poor countries has remained pretty much the same, so that seems to be the most decisive factor (money makes money). Also, Greece, Portugal and Ireland happened to get rich after they joined economically with the EU, so having rich trading partners is more likely the cause (hint!). Anyway, there have been too few 'communist' countries to base any statistically sound conclusions on (and Russia has certainly improved economically). Whether any of that is relevant here is another issue. :)

However, I notice another strange phrase in that section: "But now the United States pressures other nations and U.S. companies with foreign subsidiaries to restrict trade with Cuba. This hinders Castro's historic argument of blaming the United States for Cuba's grave economic situation." I'd sooner say that supports it. Or do I misunderstand this? If so, it might need a rewrite. DirkvdM 18:11, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

There are many strange phrases on the page Dirk. I'm still at about the year 1540 with my gradual rework of the article and can only work chronologically so I may reach that phrase in about 6 months! As for the above, by bollocks I mean that the sentence is meaningless within the article and has no context, it is also an uncited opinion. The other phrase you noticed makes absolutely no sense at all, you're right! --Zleitzen 18:43, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

It seems inaccurate to state that Cuba was a very poor country in 1959, since despite the damage to infra-structure in the countryside in late 1958 there was little damage in major cities. Of course before 1958 Cuba's economy/per capita was ranked among the upper three or four countries in the Americas. To verify this statement one has only to look at the buildings built during this period e.g. La FOCSA. Will supply references at a later date. El Jigue 12-8-06

[edit] Cuba under attack

In this section the disastrous effect of disease on the English and English Colonial (North American troops) is seemingly rarely mentioned in histories, and yet this must have been a major factor in 1763 exchange. Will add some references once I finish a pressing project. El Jigue 12-08-06 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 208.65.188.149 (talk) 00:41, 9 December 2006 (UTC).

Thanks EJ. I mention it as a critical factor in relation to the earlier Cumberland bay episode. I haven't read anything yet about disease and the British in Havana 1762. Will look further into it.--Zleitzen 06:46, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I'd love to see some references. (Despite being a Brit in Cuba, I am almost as ignorant of this episode as the average Cuban !) -- Beardo 21:43, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cuban War of Independence

I cannot believe that there isn't a separate article on the Cuban War of Independence (when there is on the Ten Years War) - unless it is under another name. I wonder about starting it by copying what is here. -- Beardo 21:43, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article overall

There are lot's of things that need work. Not enough pre-1959, too much post.

There needs to be something about Angola (that looms large in the history of Cubans - almost the way Vietnam does for Americans - except the side Cuba supported won. There are lots of veterans wounded there. [Does anyone have statistics on Cuba's casualities]. Many Cubans first trip overseas was to Angola. (Either that or a separate article).

The section on Castro's illness is way too long, as it is covered in detail elsewhere. In the long term it will not be a main section - a footnote in the history.

-- Beardo 21:43, 9 December 2006 (UTC)