Cuban American Communities And South Florida

Thesis: The Cuban Revolution pre-1959 was caused by a many political, economic and social factors such as: Cuba’s separation from Spanish rule in 1898, the American interest and influence on Cuba and, the social unrest that Batista’s policies and relationship with the Mob caused, which ultimately led to Castro’s fight and overall succession in 1959.

In the year 1959 a politician named Fidel Castro led a revolution against the Cuban government under Fulgencio Batista.

In order to understand the complex relationship that Cuba has with the United States and the nature of Cuban American immigrant communities that exist in South Florida, it is necessary to first understand the unique circumstances that led to the large influx of Cuban immigrants.

In 1959, the revolt in Cuba had many affluent upper or middle-classed citizens fleeing their country for the United States migrating to Miami, FL primarily. The next wave of Cuban immigrants begins arriving in the United States during the cold war. In the beginning, the United States graciously accepted Cuban immigrants. The immigrants immediately started receiving social security benefits, money, permanent legal residency after being in the country one year and allowed to establish businesses, re-qualify for their professional credentials (Stepick, A., & Carol, D. S., 2009). The United States government provided substantially to its new citizens who allowed them to achieve economically and put them in local politics. For 20 years Cuban immigrants

The terrible conditions that many Cuban citizens lived under during the Batista regime was unacceptable. The Cuban Citizens wanted a change and started a revolution. To find out why we go all the way back to 1868 when the United States defeated the Spanish Army giving Cuba its independence. The Cubans elected Fulgencio Batista who did not allow any more elections to take place. This angered many and a new revolution leader formed, Fidel Castro. Fidel overthrew the Batista Regime and named himself dictator. He started close economic ties with the Soviet Union. Shortly after this the United States ended any ties with the Cuban government. The causes of the Cuban Revolution were terrible conditions under the Batista regime, the spread of Communism, and the Spanish-American war. The effects of the Cuban Revolution were the downfall of the economy, Cuban missile crisis, and end of any diplomatic relations with the United States. The Cuban Revolution connects to Global citizenship because the citizens fought for their rights which ended up helping their daily life but hurting their economy.

Pre-Revolutionary Cuba was under rule of a dictatorship, Fulgencio Batista. Foreigners saw Cuba as a land enchantment and as paradise. People visited the casinos and there was a substantial amount of prostitution. For the native’s of Cuba, there was an economic imbalance between the social classes. Cubans had various reasons for disliking their current government. For example, they were under Batista’s rule and the United States had a large amount of influence on what happened in Cuba. This lead to a feeble economy and government, many would wonder why the economy was weak even though Cuba was a hot spot for tourism. With the thriving tourism market, there were large amounts of unequal distribution of wealth. With this Cuba had such a vast difference between social classes that eventually led to the now infamous Cuban Revolution.

In 1959, Batista himself was victim of a coup, led by Fidel Castro. Batista was very unpopular, as a fourth of the population was unemployed, the average wage was six dollars a week, and running water was scarce. President Kennedy advocated in campaigning to win the hearts and minds of the Cubans through aid programs. However, the CIA had a different plan.

Modern Cuba has been shaped by the U.S.'s abhorrence for the communist government. Today there are many problems in Cuba such as its waning economy, its health care issues, even its pollution, but almost all of them stem from the U.S. unwillingness to cooperate with the Cuban government, and ultimately, the U.S.'s goal to spread "freedom and liberty" to Cuba's "oppressive communist regime"

The Cuban revolution took place in January of 1959 when the guerilla army under the control of Fidel Castro overthrew Fulgencio Batista. Batista was supported by the United States but only because of the fact that he believed in a democratic run government. However, the president at the time, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, let the revolution play out because he believed that Batista was making Cuba an “embarrassing,” ally towards the United States, he would later realize that he made a

Cuban citizens were not allowed to speak up or go against Batista’s rules. In the Green Left Weekly, Jill Hickson in 1996 states that “He answered any opposition with assassination, breaking strikes with machine-gun fire, and using repression against the Cuban people” (No.239). He being Batista shows that Batista was oppressing the Cuban people by not allowing freedom of speech. Therefore, the solution for Batista had to be using violence. This evidence shows how cruel Batista was to the Cuban society. The violence Batista caused only resulted into oppression from the Cuban society. Fidel Castro one of the leaders of the revolution was not going to stand by Batista’s cruel rules. Castro attacked the Moncada army barracks in Santiago. According to Batista, Jerry A. Sierra states that “Batista sent General Martin Tamayo, the military commander of the district, a note ordering him to "kill ten rebels for every soldier killed" in the attack.” (paragraph#4). This evidence shows that Batista has caused people to rebel against him by not having freedom. Also Batista is not afraid to treat other to the point that he needs to kill. The social oppression in the Cuban Revolution relates to my social oppression in my life because both do not have freedom. In the Revolution Batista does not allow people to stand up for themselves or else they

Following the overthrow of Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista’s totalitarian regime by insurgent groups during the six-year Cuban Revolution, lasting from 1953 to 1959, a radical collectivist government was put into place. In the following years, most notably during the Cold War, the Communists isolated the Cuban economy from Western, Capitalist, ideals, and its citizens were left poor and malnourished, surviving on only the bare essentials as a series of famines and food shortages left many struggling to survive. Cuba’s attempts to alleviate the tensions brought by the United States’s trade embargoes, initially a simple restriction against arms trade, but later extended to encompass the vast majority of goods produced inside the borders of the

Batista knew that he wasn’t going to win the elections the fair way, so he staged a coup on March 10tth, 1952 which removed President Carlos Prio Socarras from power and declared Batista as ‘president’. The 1952 coup was a consolidation of Batista’s power as dictator in Cuba. This coup was backed by military forces, which gave the message to the Cuban people that Batista was no man to mess with. Batista did however receive feedback from Fidel Castro who was angry at what he did, “If Batista grabbed power by force, he must be thrown out by force” he said. Fidel Castro, soon emerges as the leader of the Cuban Revolution. His leadership in the revolution will be later discussed. There was little to no resistance to Batista’s coup because no one dared to confront the country’s new declared dictator. This is where one should ask the question as to why Batista went from being a president to a dictator? Why did Batista began a dictatorial regime in his once beloved

The Cuban revolution was the spark that ignited the flame of communism in Cuba. The developing nation gained independence only as recently as 1898, and was already filled with an atmosphere of distrust and resentment towards the United States. In July of 1953, a revolution began in Cuba between the United States backed President Batista and Fidel Castro. Fidel and his brother Raul Castro lead a series of guerilla warfare battles against the forces of President Batista. “I am Fidel Castro and we have come to liberate Cuba,” stated Fidel Castro. In January of 1959, Fidel Castro became the President of Cuba. With the regime of Fidel Castro, Cuba would fall to communism.

While Felgenico Batista was running Cuba many American companies grew rich off of Cuban resources while the Cuban people remained poor. An American mobster named Meyer Lansky came to Cuba to open a hotel. The mobster gave Batista 10% of the profits of the hotel and casino, so Batista became wealthy off of that. Batista became very wealthy off of American business and also organized crime. Meyer Lansky also turned Havana into a drug port. Batista did very little to help the Cuban citizens. While running Cuba Batista did not offer the people neither health care nor education. So many Cubans lived in poverty. When they became ill they wouldn’t be able to go to a doctor because they wouldn’t be able to afford it. When Batista took over the country in

Manuel Urrutia, a very liberal Cuban lawyer and politician, was placed as president of Cuba, and Castro was placed in charge of the military. However, by July of 1959, Castro had easily and effectively taken over as leader of Cuba, which he would remain as, for the next four decades. (See figure 2) With close ties to his brother, Fidel put Raúl in charge of the military, allowing the Castro family to have most of the control over Cuba. In Castro’s beginning years as Cuba’s ruler, he made several radical and significant changes in Cuba, including collectivizing agriculture, nationalizing industry, and seizing and eliminating most American-owned businesses, factories, and farms. Fidel taxed American products so heavily that U.S. exports halved in just two years, making the United States put heavy