A Brief History
On March 10, 1952, Fulgencio Batista, a former military sergeant in the Cuban Army and former President of Cuba from 1940 to 1944, led a successful coup against the democratically elected government of the island nation of Cuba, installing himself as “President,” or more accurately as dictator. Batista remained in charge of Cuba with the support of the United States until the Fidel Castro led revolution aided by revolutionary hero Che Guevera ousted the would be king in 1959. Castro later declared himself and his regime to be communist after 2 years of contentious relations with the United States, clearly aligning Cuba with the Soviet Union and the communist faction for the remainder of the Cold War. Batista was forced to flee for his life and live out his remaining years in exile.
Digging Deeper
The island of Cuba had been a Spanish possession since the days of Christopher Columbus, seizing the land from the Native people that had lived there since about 4000 BC. The Spanish-American War of 1898 saw the victorious United States take control of Cuba, before granting the island independence in 1902. American oversight made Cuba independent in name only, and by the 1930’s unrest had resulted in a revolving door of government, until Army sergeant Fulgencio Batista, one of the “reformers” and leaders of the “sergeants’ revolt” in 1933 was elected President in 1940. Batista, a man of many ethnic heritages, became the first non-White leader of Cuba since its Native American days. Batista was of European, African, Chinese and Native Taíno descent.
In 1944, Batista was willing to step down in a peaceful transition of power, as long as his hand picked choice to succeed him was elected. Unfortunately for Batista, Ramón Grau San Martín, a former President of Cuba and political rival of Batista became President. By 1952, Batista had led his coup to regain power for himself, this time in a dictatorial manner that would not leave succession to chance. Batista had actually attempted to regain the Presidency the legal, democratic way, by running for the office, but finding himself in third place with no hope of winning, he mounted his coup instead. Batista ran a regime of corruption that left a third of the Cuban population in poverty, although by Latin American standards that was above average! Unrest characterized his time as dictator, and despite the support of American business, American gangsters, and the American government, Castro and his buddy Che were able to finally wrest control of the island from Batista, sending the former revolutionary into exile, first in the Dominican Republic, then later in Portugal, and finally ending up on the Spanish city of Marbella in the province of Malaga, where he died at the age of 72 in 1973. Shortly after fleeing Cuba, Batista was denied asylum in the United States, and Mexico also refused to take in this wayward soul. He had made his living in exile through work in the insurance business and through investments, undoubtedly with embezzled money from Cuba.
While Batista was not exactly a humanitarian or a man of impeccable character, he at least was compliant with the wishes of the United States unlike his successor, Fidel Castro, who served as a next door reminder of the Cold War with blatant communist and Soviet influence at our doorstep, only 90 miles from Florida. Castro was certainly a thorn in the side of the United States, and the United States allegedly committed several attempts to assassinate or depose Castro, including backing the counter-revolutionaries in the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961. The threat of invasion from the US led Castro ever closer to the Soviets, and brought the world to the brink of nuclear war in 1962 when Castro allowed the Soviets to base nuclear armed missiles in Cuba. Intense negotiations caused those missiles and similar American missiles in Turkey to both be removed to resolve the conflict. Cuba had traded one power hungry corrupt dictator for another.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss!
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Batista, Fulgencio. Growth and Decline of the Cuban Republic. Devin-Adair, 1964.
Chester, Edmund. A Sergeant Named Batista: Biography on President Fulgencio Batista. Independently published, 1954.
The featured image in this article, a photograph by Batista’s private photographer of Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista while having breakfast in the Presidential Palace with wife Marta Batista in Havana, Cuba in April 1958, was created in Cuba and is now in the public domain, because its term of copyright has expired.
