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tinue harassing because Cuba is an example
that they could not tolerate. Our assessment
was that they had two parallel plans; the first
one consisted of the economic strangulation
of Cuba in order to bring down the regime
without a military intervention. The second
one consisted of an intervention organized
by Latin American governments and their
support, as an alternative to the other plan.
We consider the victory of the Cuban
revolution as an enormous contribution to
Marxism-Leninism. Its defeat would be an
irreparable damage to Marxism and to other
revolutionary movements in other countries.
Such a defeat would mean the preponder-
ance of imperialism over socialism in the
world. Such a defeat would mean a terrible
blow against the world revolution. It would
break the correlation of forces. It is our duty
to do everything possible to defend Cuba.
“Our comrades told us that the eco-
nomic situation in Cuba had worsened due
to the yanquis’ pressure and the enormous
military expenses. This worried us for it
coincided with the plans of the yanquis. We
had a discussion about the economic decline
and we have helped without you requesting
it. You are very modest in your requests and
we try to help you. We decided to give you
weapons for free and donated equipment for
100,000 men. In addition, in our commer-
cial negotiations, we have looked at all the
possibilities and we have tried to provide
everything you needed without payments in
COLD WAR INTERNATIONAL HISTORY PROJECT BULLETIN 339
those bases we have abandoned. We only
have troops in Hungary and Poland, to pro-
tect the troops in Germany and the commu-
nications with Austria.
We do not need bases to destroy the
United States because we can attack with
the missiles deployed in our territory. We
do not have a plan to conquer North
America. The only thing we need to do is to
launch a counter strike, but that will serve
to destroy them without having to send in
our troops.
We have sent the troops and strategic
missiles only to protect the Island’s defense.
It was a plan of containment [contension]
so that the yanquis could not provoke an
explosion in Cuba. If the missiles are well
camouflaged and the yanquis do not know
where they are deployed, then they can help
to contain them. The military told us that
they could be well hidden in the palm for-
ests of Cuba. The yanquis were not going
to locate them. They could not destroy them.
During July and August, they did not find
anything, it was not until October that they
have been found. We were surprised that
Kennedy only made reference to technicians
and not to our troops. At first, it seems that
that is what he thought. Later we learned
that he knew more than he was saying, but
he was not revealing it not to hinder the elec-
toral campaign. We let the yanquis know that
we were going to solve the Berlin problem,
in order to distract their attention from the
other problem. We did not intend to act on
Berlin. I can explain this later.
It was known through diplomatic chan-
nels that Kennedy did not want to make
matters more serious and asked us not to
move on the issue of Berlin before the elec-
tions. We told him that we agreed to this.
We would please him and we would solve
it later. We thought it was convenient to
please him. In addition, we had not thought
of bringing up this problem. When the North
Americans learned about the transports to
Cuba, they also concentrated their campaign
on Berlin. Both sides had their principal in-
terest in Cuba, but appeared as if concen-
trated on Berlin. In the middle of October,
they [the North Americans—ed.] learned
about it through Cuba, via the West Ger-
many information service who passed it to
the CIA,3 they first learned about the mis-
siles. They took aerial pictures and located
them. Khrushchev ordered that the missiles
be laid down during the day and that they
be raised only during the night. Evidently,
this order was never carried out. Kennedy
did not want to talk about the missiles until
the end of the elections. But two Republi-
can Senators learned the news and they had
no alternative but to act. We did not know
what Kennedy would do and we worried
about the preparations or maneuvers of Vieti
- an operation named after Castro but back-
wards.4 When Kennedy talked about the
blockade, we did not have data showing
whether it was a maneuver or a preparation
for aggression. On the morning of the 28th
we received the news confirming that it was
an aggression. Although it was announced
that the maneuvers were suspended due to
a storm, the storm was over and the maneu-
vers were not carried out. In the meantime,
the concentration continued. Khrushchev
has strongly criticized Kennedy’s words
about the blockade. They did not
approve of the kind of weapons that Cuba
should own and thus they organized a di-
rect aggression. Their plan consisted of two
parts: using missiles with conventional loads
to destroy the nuclear missiles and then land-
ing and destroying the resistance.
In case of the latter, we would be forced
to respond because it is an attack against
Cuba and against us too - because our troops
were here and this was the unleashing of
the World War. We would destroy North
America. They would inflict huge loses on
us; but they would make every effort to de-
stroy Cuba completely. All the measures we
took were taken to protect Cuba. What
would have been the result if the plan of the
yanquis was carried out? Lose Cuba, inflict
enormous damages upon the Socialist coun-
tries with a nuclear war? While we were in
the midst of our discussions, we received a
cable from Fidel that coincided with other
information in the same vein. After that, ten
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