Vol. 71/No. 9      March 5, 2007

The two declarations were each adopted by million-strong assemblies of the Cuban people on Sept. 2, 1960, and Feb. 4, 1962. Each was a response to U.S.-engineered moves by the Organization of American States (OAS) to isolate and attempt to destroy the advancing Cuban Revolution.

The new title, published in both English and Spanish editions, was one of dozens of books presented during the 10-day festival, which also included poetry readings, concerts, children's programs, film showings, dance, and other performances.

The annual book fair, the largest cultural event held in Cuba, drew more than 600,000 people this year, its organizers reported. It is now traveling to 39 other cities across the island and concludes March 11 in the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba.

The First and Second Declarations of Havana was presented by a panel of speakers that featured José Ramón Fernández, vice president of Cuba's Council of Ministers; Fernando Rojas, president of the Federation of University Students (FEU) in Havana; Mario Rodríguez, a member of the national leadership council of the Association of Combatants of the Cuban Revolution; Gladys Hernández of the Center for Research on the World Economy (CIEM); and Mary-Alice Waters, the book's editor and president of Pathfinder. The event was chaired by Iraida Aguirrechu of Editora Política, the publishing house of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party.

Some 75 people—standing room only—crowded into the meeting room, including many young people, both Cuban as well as others studying in Cuba from the Uruguay, El Salvador, Brazil, the United States, Syria, and other countries. Also participating were numerous Cuban revolutionary combatants and others who every year seek out Pathfinder books at the fair.  
 
Shows revolution is possible
The two manifestos of revolutionary struggle in the new book, Waters said, help to "explain what imperialism is. To explain why imperialism can only be successfully faced down by a profoundly popular revolutionary struggle of the workers and peasants, a struggle that breaks the military and economic power of the capitalist class, that establishes a revolutionary government that defends the interests of working people—and that helps lead the toilers toward the socialist transformation of all economic and social relations."

She quoted the Second Declaration of Havana: "What does the Cuban Revolution teach? That revolution is possible."

Waters explained how the new book was born last November at Venezuela's International Book Fair, the product of wide-ranging political discussions there. It became clear, she said, "that the real history of the Cuban Revolution is not well—or accurately—known by revolutionary-minded workers, farmers, and young people in Venezuela. Many have great hopes and illusions that a violent confrontation with Washington can be avoided because Venezuela has oil and other natural resources that U.S. capitalism needs."

Above all, the new book was published "because it is needed by militant workers and revolutionary-minded youth in the United States," Waters noted. She pointed to the mass working-class mobilizations that swept the country last year demanding the legalization of all undocumented workers.

Such resistance by working people to the capitalist attacks at home, as well as to the war in Iraq and other imperialist assaults abroad, Waters said, are all part of "the world in which the political clarity of the declarations of Havana and the revolutionary course they put forward are sorely needed."

Gladys Hernández, who heads the international finance department of the CIEM, the central economic research institute here, said she was struck by the statement by Russian revolutionary leader V.I. Lenin quoted in the book's preface: "Politics begin where millions of men and women are; where there are not thousands, but millions." She remarked, "That is the power these two declarations talk about."

Hernández praised Pathfinder for "publishing books like this one for more than 40 years. This is a publishing house, born with the October [1917 Russian] Revolution, that has dedicated itself to promote understanding, confidence, and combativity of working people throughout the world."  
 
'Nothing, nothing stopped us'
Mario Rodríguez spoke on behalf of the national leadership of the Association of Combatants of the Cuban Revolution. A fighter in the urban struggle in Havana against the Batista dictatorship in the 1950s, he later served as Cuba's ambassador to Italy and Mexico.

Rodríguez, one of those present at the 1960 and 1962 assemblies that adopted the two declarations, said the new title "enriches the political arsenal of the new generations of revolutionaries."

When these manifestos were issued, he said, the Cuban people were in the midst of "consolidating their revolutionary power. They confronted a powerful enemy: U.S. imperialism and its lackeys in Latin America, who sought to block even the very first steps we took." These included bringing to justice the hated torturers and thugs of the former Batista tyranny.

As the Cuban Revolution deepened, Rodríguez explained, Washington stepped up its slander campaign and attempts to strangle Cuba. In March 1960, La Coubre, a ship carrying Belgian arms that Cuba purchased for its defense, was blown up in the Havana harbor, killing 101 people. Four months later Washington slashed sugar imports from the island.

In face of these attacks, "nothing, nothing stopped us," Rodríguez said.

"As the military and civilian repressive institutions were demolished, the people organized into battalions and companies of the Revolutionary Armed Forces, into popular militias," unions, and other mass organizations.

"The First Declaration of Havana was proclaimed in this revolutionary atmosphere," he said. "We proclaimed our sovereign right to establish relations with the People's Republic of China, with the Soviet Union, and we accepted their aid and solidarity in face of imperialist aggression."

In the months after the First Declaration, Cubans mobilized in a campaign that wiped out illiteracy in one year, despite murders of literacy volunteers by counterrevolutionaries. In April 1961 workers and peasants defeated a U.S.-organized invasion at Playa Girón (Bay of Pigs). By then many Cuban revolutionaries were fighting "consciously for socialism," he said.

That was the context in which the Second Declaration was issued in February 1962, when "we proclaimed before the Americas and the world that the duty of every revolutionary is to make the revolution."

That same year, Rodríguez said, the Union of Young Communists was born, steps were taken to build a revolutionary party, and working people mobilized massively to stay the hand of U.S. imperialism's threat of nuclear attack in the October 1962 "missile" crisis.

Like the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Rodríguez said, the First and Second Declarations of Havana are not "manuals or recipes." They come out of the revolutionary struggle in Cuba for a future in which "the exploitation of man by man must become a thing of the past."  
 
Accessible to new generations
Fernando Rojas, president of the Federation of University Students (FEU) in the city of Havana, was one of the many Cubans and others in the hall who had not been born when the First and Second Declarations were issued. "They need to be available as broadly as possible today," he said. "Pathfinder Press has presented them in a way that makes them more accessible for new generations of militants."

Underscoring his point, many people who stopped by the Pathfinder booth during the book fair commented on the importance of the new book precisely because the two declarations have been out of print here in Cuba for many years.

Above all, Rojas said, The First and Second Declarations of Havana shows "the profoundly popular character of the Cuban Revolution," bringing important lessons, especially for those who did not live through the victory of the Cuban Revolution and its early years.

The book's 16 pages of photos, chronology, and glossary of names help to "make it very educational for the youngest readers," he said.

The student leader noted that he had also spoken during last year's book fair at a presentation of the two most recent issues of the Marxist magazine New International. He expressed appreciation "that both times Pathfinder insisted on the participation of Cuban youth" on the panel.

José Ramón Fernández, whose remarks concluded the presentation, described some of the events he had taken part in during the period marked by the 1960 and 1962 manifestos. Referring to the La Coubre incident, he explained that after the initial deadly explosion, a second blast occurred just as scores of workers and medical personnel had rushed to the scene to pick up the dead and tend to the wounded.

In September 1960 Fernández was heading the school that graduated the first classes of officers of the newly formed Revolutionary National Militias. The militia members, he said, were responsible for defending the large public square that was filled by 1 million people who gathered to hear, and then ratify, the First Declaration of Havana read by Fidel Castro.  
 
Conviction and clear knowledge
Fernández was also commander of the main column of forces that crushed the imperialist attack at Playa Girón in April 1961. Cuban working people defeated this invasion, Fernández said, "not because of their weapons or technical skills, but because of their conviction and clear knowledge of what they were fighting for."

More than four decades later, he said, millions of Cubans have a deeper political understanding. Nonetheless, "our generations would have accomplished nothing without striving every day to educate the new generations and instill consciousness and a fighting spirit in order to keep defending and advancing the revolution, the struggle for a better and more just world.

"That is why we thank Pathfinder, which always brings books that contribute to this work," Fernández said.

At the end of the meeting, dozens lined up to purchase the book. Among them were three students from the University of California at Davis who are taking courses in Havana. "I didn't know anything about these declarations until I came here," said Ana Ochoa, 22, who was eager to delve into the book.

Seventy-two copies of the book were purchased at the event—52 in Spanish and 20 in English. Another 43 were sold at the Pathfinder stand in the course of the book fair. Nearly 100 more were distributed to numerous libraries, organizations, and individuals.
 
 
Related articles:
Donate to cover costs of ‘Militant’ reporting team to Cuba  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home