Luis Miranda, director of Casa de las Américas, noted that apologists for Washington cannot explain how in April 1961 revolutionary Cuba was able to deal such a decisive blow to the most powerful imperialist government in the world. "Many are amazed at how the invasion was crushed in 72 hours," he said. "They forget the numerous gains the Cuban people had made with the revolution," such as the wiping out of illiteracy through a mass mobilization of young volunteer teachers and a sweeping land reform.

The new generations in the United States must learn the truth about these events, Miranda stated, "like the fact that the captured mercenaries were exchanged for baby food and medicine." The 1,179 counterrevolutionaries who surrendered at the Bay of Pigs were convicted of treason and sentenced to 30-year prison terms. The following year the revolutionary government released them in exchange for Washington supplying $53 million in food, medicine, and medical equipment as partial compensation for the damages inflicted on Cuba.

To warm applause, Miranda welcomed Yanelis Martínez, a leader of Cuba's Federation of University Students, who had just returned from an unprecedented public meeting in Miami, drawing a broad array of forces, that also marked Cuba's victory at the Bay of Pigs.

Also speaking were Bruno Rodríguez, Cuba's ambassador to the United Nations; Martín Koppel, editor of the Militant; Farouk Abdel Muhti, of the Palestinian National Alliance; Teresa Gutiérrez of the International Action Center; and Carlos Rovira of the Socialist Front. Accompanying Rodríguez at the speakers' platform was Rafael Dausá, Cuba's alternate UN ambassador.

Rodríguez stated that 40 years after defeating the U.S.-directed invasion, the Cuban people continue to stand up to the hostility of the U.S. empire, and today are in an even stronger position to defend their revolution. If Washington ever tries to launch another assault on the island, he said, "We are prepared to inflict another military defeat on imperialism."

Commenting on Washington's drive to get a resolution passed at the UN Human Rights Commission meeting in Geneva condemning Cuba for alleged human rights violations, Rodríguez pointed out that Washington has no moral authority to lecture others about human rights anywhere in the world.

Koppel pointed to the protests erupting in Cincinnati against the police killing of a Black youth--the 15th such killing since 1995--and the city government's arrest of hundreds of people after imposing a curfew. "It's this kind of daily brutality that Cuban working people put an end to in making a revolution in 1959," he said. "The young people demonstrating in Cincinnati in face of the cops' rubber bullets and arrests will be among those most interested in learning the truth about the Cuban Revolution."

Cuba's socialist revolution, he concluded, "points the way today for a new generation who will not only want to know how the workers and farmers of Cuba defeated Washington, but will want to follow their example."

The evening's event drew a crowd that ranged from longtime activists in Casa de las Américas to a number of young people from New York and New Jersey attending for the first time a meeting about the Cuban Revolution.

Among them were several Cuban-Americans who were founders of Casa de las Américas four decades ago. They proudly noted that in April 1961 they had taken part--despite harassment by the FBI and ultraright thugs--in public protests in New York condemning the U.S.-organized invasion of Cuba.  
 
 
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