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University Daily Kansan Wednesday, March 1, 1961
Batista and Castro
Identify this man:
Born in the Oriente province of Cuba, he led a successful revolution against the corrupt, tyrannical government that gripped his country. The revolution's slogan was "Cuba for Cubans" and "Down With the Yankee Imperialists." He promised that once in power, he would free the people of Cuba from the dictatorial bonds of the past and establish a free and just government of the people for the first time in Cuba's history.
BUT WITHIN A SHORT TIME, IT BECAME evident that he, himself, was a dictator; allowing no more freedom or rights than his predecessor. Reforms followed in which land was given to the peasants, schools were built and new roads constructed. But the country was no freer than before.
If you said Fidel Castro—you were wrong. This was Fulgencio Batista in 1933, and the man later deposed by Castro's revolution.
He stepped down after four years and was followed by his hand-picked successor, Grau San Martin, who proved to be as ably corrupt.
Then a sergeant in the Cuban Army, Batista led a bloodless coup against the corrupt government and set himself up as the head of the military junta to rule. Though elections were held, Batista remained the real power behind a series of weak presidents until he was elected in 1940.
After a series of weak governments, Batista returned to power in 1952, again by force, to control the country until his ouster by Castro in December 1958.
THE SIMILARITY BETWEEN BATISTA and Castro not only lies in the manner in which both took control of the government, but also in their backgrounds and route to power.
Batista was born in the eastern Cuban province of Oriente in 1892 of poor, working-class parents. His youth was filled with hard labor—farm laborer, mill worker, railway workman, barber, and tailor. After attending missionary schools, he enlisted in the army in 1921 and rose to the rank of sergeant.
The revolt against President Gerardo Machado in 1933 was by the powerful class of Army officers, in which Batista participated. Four months later, however, he led the enlisted men in a famous "Sergeant's Revolt" to overthrow the provisional government of the officers.
CASTRO ALSO WAS BORN IN ORIENTE. His family was moderately rich and owned a large estate. He was educated at Jesuit schools and entered Havana University to study law. Like Batista, he was an able administrator and organizer in his youth. Castro formed a political party to resist the Batista regime and employed terrorist tactics against the police.
With a small band of rebels, he attacked the army barracks at Moncado on July 26, 1953—the
date subsequently used as the symbol of the revolution. The rest of the story is well known.
THE NATION MAGAZINE DESCRIBED the Batista government in June 1957 as follows:
Batista government in June 1954 as follows. "The elections of 1954 (by Batista) were one-candidate, bayonet affairs. Batista had abridged civil rights, suppressed the press and freedom of expression.
"Student groups demanded his resignation and the universities were thereafter closed.
"The military ruthlessness of the dictator followed with terrorist tactics . . . and the only purpose of the opposition was to rid the country of Batista and the political, union and military corruption that existed."
In reference to the then rebel leader, it said:
"Whatever Castro is, the amorphous new generation rises behind him. Barring some dramatic shift in Cuban politics, his destiny has only two roads: to be killed or to rule for better or worse."
THE NEW REPUBLIC MAGAZINE OF October 27,1958,prophetically remarked:
"If he (Castro) succeeds, he will himself have to become a dictator to repress both the Batista forces of the Army and those unscrupulous elements in his own camp.
"In any case, the birth of a free Cuba, which this tremendously appealing people seem so ready for and deserving of, is still beyond the horizon. It is coming, but it will be a birth fraught with pain."
These passages are quoted to show the prevailing attitude toward the revolution before it was successful and as some indication of what Cuba could expect from its new leader.
AS CASTRO SAID ON "MEET THE PRESS" on April 13, 1959, in answer to the question of his allegiance to communism or democracy:
"Democracy is my ideal, really. But many people used to call democracy some things that are not democracy. Democracy has some (short-comings)—not the idea. . . I am not Communist. I am not agreed with communism. My acts prove it—free press in Cuba. As you know, we have the full power in Cuba. The revolution destroyed all the enemy army after a hard fight, and we took the power. Which were our systems? Free press to everybody, free ideas, free religious belief and all those rights, those human rights, that we could establish in the irregular circumstances of changing from one system to the other.
"There is no doubt for me between communism and democracy. Not only democracy as a word. That is why we call our ideas humanism, because we not only want to give freedoms to the people, but to give them a way of getting their life, to eat, to live—not only theoretically."
In light of the events within the last year, it seems as though Fidel Castro, patriot and dictator, has lost his way.
Frank Morgan
Since it was impossible for me to attend the meeting on Feb. 16, the news of Feb. 17 that Jim Lawing had been defeated in his try for a club office was indeed a disappointing surprise.
Positions Not Clarified Editor;
John E. Comes Hutchinson junior
I am sorry that I was not present to provide Mr. Lawing with the one (1) additional vote needed to win office, but after seeing what can happen to ability that is not properly supported by those who recognize and respect it, I will be certain not to miss any more Young Democrats meetings.
There seems to be no justice when the person who has engendered so much interest and enthusiasm among the students of this campus for the Democratic Party is rejected by a faction of that party.
--and 23 (and not 27 and 23 as stated in UDK) that are trying to build their own culture. The whole point of her discussion was missed by your reporter, and only fragments of examples quoted. The point was that there can be no mature, sophisticated society without a link between generations. She also mentioned before saying anything else that there were many good friends and wonderful experiences in the simple image that she was taking home with her. But these were not mentioned as part of the discussion because we were not supposed to say what was good about America.
We would like to clarify your write-up on Feb. 20 headed "Foreign Students Say Americans are
Miss McIntosh was misquoted when it was said, "You go alone . . ." This was only an example made to bring out the fact that people sometimes fail to recognize their acquaintances within the University. She did not criticize the racial segregation issue. Referring to Mr. Frigee's statement, Miss McIntosh would like to state that she was not "meddlesome" trying to abolish segregation; it was only an observation as a result of her three years' stay in the U.S.
Cold" by correcting some of the statements made in the UDK and restate our principal points which were left out.
FIRST OF ALL, WE WERE asked only to criticize and state what is WRONG with the U.S. as announced in the UDK, Feb. 16. The title stated "Foreign Students to Tell What is Wrong with U.S." We feel that the UDK was biased in not clarifying to the public that this was asked of us.
MISS KALAYAN WOULD first like to correct that it is Americans between the ages of 17
We would both like to allow Mr. Frigee, our Swiss friend from the blessed land of teachers, his good will towards Americans. We share with him all of this good will towards the people of the United States of America.
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS
Catherine McIntosh Montrovia, Liberia, junior Alice Kalayan Beirut, Lebanon, graduate student
"WE'VE DECIDED TO MAKE AN EXCEPTION — YOU PLEDGE US AN
ITLL BE OK. FOR YOUR VALET TO TAKE YOUR PLEEDGE TRAINING!"
By Calder M. Pickett
Associate Professor of Journalism
TENDER IS THE NIGHT, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Scribner Library, $1.45.
A mature, but somehow unsuccessful, F. Scott Fitzgerald was revealed in "Tender Is the Night." In insight, style, technical accomplishment, the book seemed a considerable advance over his novels of the 1920s.
Yet it does not command the reader's attention or impress him the way "The Great Gatsby" does. Perhaps the book attempts to do too much. It is not a sharply painted sketch like "Gatsby"; rather, it is a series of sketches, impressionistic in manner.
"Tender Is the Night" may be Fitzgerald's attempt to do a "Sun Also Rises." The story is of a brilliant young American doctor and his wealthy, neurotic wife. Dick and Nicole Diver live gaily and superficially in Switzerland or on the Riviera. They are not expatriates in the Hemingway sense, but they mingle with expatriates, and their lives have become pretty well detached from America.
DIVER IS A PSYCHIATRIST, AND HE HAS TAKEN ON what should be an assignment for no doctor—taking care of his wife. It is little wonder that he turns to other companionship; Nicole would drive any man out of the house. He finds companionship in an affair with Rosemary Hoyt, a rapidly climbing but essentially immature film star.
These people go from marriage to marriage, romance to romance, as casually as they go from party to party or resort to resort. No doubt this is a valid picture of Americans in Europe in the 1920s, but it fails to be as convincing as "The Sun Also Rises." Still it is an important novel, one that came along too late, in the 1930s, when Fitzgerald was no longer appreciated. A decade that preferred the Group Theatre and Steinbeck and Farrell could not be expected to be very interested in the immature adventures of Americans experimenting with life in the roaring twenties.
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