FULGENCIO BATISTA (1901-1973)

Cuban revolution
istory of the Amerioas
MLTARY AND POLTCAL HSTORY
1933 he led non-oommissioned offioers in a
rebellion against diotator 0erardo Maohado in
allianoe with students and labor leaders.
Later, he oonspired with the u.3. ambassador,
3umner welles, to foroe the resignation of
provisional president Ramon 0rau 3an Martin.
By then a oolonel, Batista beoame the strongman
behind a suooession of puppet presidents until he
was eleoted president himself in 1940.
ATSTA'S 1
ST
REGME
under Batista's rule a new oonstitution was
drafted whioh was a progressive dooument.
lt oalled for government intervention in the
eoonomy and provided a sooial safety net.
ln the late 1930s Batista legalized the Cuban
Communist Party (P.3.P.). ln 1940, taking
advantage of the P.3.P.'s ability to keep labor in
oheok, he brought the party into his
government.
ATSTA VOTED OUT
ln 1944 Batista, respeoting the eleotorate's
ohoioe of the opposition ooalition, stepped
aside and the same man he had deposed in
1933, Ramon 0rau, beoame president.
Batista left Cuba to live in Uaytona Beaoh,
llorida.
1952 COUP
As new eleotions approaohed in 1952, Batista
saw an opportunity to return to government,
running for the presidenoy.
As eleotion day approaohed, Batista was a
distant third. 1hen, on Maroh 10, 1952, he
seized the government in a ooup d'etat -- taking
by foroe what Cuban voters were about to deny
him.
RETURN TO POWER
Batista's return to power did not herald a return to progressivism.
e beoame obsessed with gaining the aooeptanoe of Cuba's upper
olasses, who had denied him membership into their exolusive sooial
olubs.
is energies were devoted to amassing an even greater fortune.
Batista opened avana to large soale gambling, announoing that his
government would matoh, dollar for dollar, any hotel investment over
$1 million, whioh would inolude a oasino lioense.
Amerioan mobster Meyer Lansky plaoed himself at the oenter of
Cuba's gambling operation.
At the same time, Batista sponsored massive oonstruotion projeots --
the avana-varadero highway, the Ranoho Boyeros airport, train
lines, an underwater tunnel.
As he delayed plans to step down from offioe,
Batista faoed growing opposition
1953 Batista suspended oonstitutional
guarantees and inoreasingly relied on polioe
taotios in an attempt to frighten the population
through open displays of brutality.
1hough he made some politioal oonoessions
between 1954 and 1956 -- lifting press
oensorship, releasing politioal prisoners (inoluding
lidel Castro and his brother Raul), allowing exiles
to return -- his unpopularity oontinued to grow.
As popular unrest in Cuba intensified, Batista's
polioe proved adept at torturing and killing
young men in the oities.
But his army proved singularly inept against
lidel Castro's rebels, who were based in the
mountains.
LOSES US SUPPORT
laoed with Batista's military ineptness and
growing unpopularity, the united 3tates began
to seek an alternative to Batista and to lidel
Castro.
1958 u3 informed Batista they oould no longer
support his regime.
Lxiled to 3pain and lived lavish life
THRVNG ECONOMY AND SOCETY
Cuba's oapital, avana, was a glittering and dynamio oity.
Cuba ranked:
fifth in the hemisphere in per oapita inoome,
third in life expeotanoy,
seoond in per oapita ownership of automobiles and telephones,
first in the number of television sets per inhabitant.
1he literaoy rate, 76, was the fourth highest in Latin Amerioa.
Cuba ranked 11th in the world in the number of dootors per
oapita.
Many private olinios and hospitals provided servioes for the poor.
Cuba's inoome distribution oompared favorably with that of other
Latin Amerioan sooieties. A thriving middle olass held the promise
of prosperity and sooial mobility.
NEQUALTES
profound inequalities in Cuban sooiety -- between oity and
oountryside and between whites and blaoks.
ln the oountryside, some Cubans lived in abysmal poverty. 3ugar
produotion was seasonal, and the 2,.090748 -- sugaroane outters
who only worked four months out of the year -- were an army of
unemployed, perpetually in debt and living on the margins of survival.
Many poor peasants were seriously malnourished and hungry.
Neither health oare nor eduoation reaohed those rural Cubans at the
bottom of sooiety.
llliteraoy was widespread, and those luoky enough to attend sohool
seldom made it past the first or seoond grades. Clusters of
graveyards dotted the main highway along the foothills of the 3ierra
Maestra, marking the spots where people died waiting for
transportation to the nearest hospitals and olinios in 3antiago de
Cuba.
RACSM
Raoism also blighted Cuban sooiety.
1he island's private olubs and beaohes were
segregated. Lven Batista, a mulatto, was denied
membership in one of avana's most exolusive
olubs.
1he 1901 oonstitution effeotively imposed
disoriminatory praotioes whioh hit blaoks the
hardest. voting was restrioted to males over 21
years of age who oould either read and write, or
owned real property valued over 250 pesos, or
proved that they had fought in the liberation army.
Raoe disorimination was also evident in
oooupational distribution, with blaoks
oooupying the overwhelming majority of lower-
paid and less skilled jobs in the eoonomy.
lormation of exolusive sooial olubs, bars,
restaurants, beaohes, movie theatres and night
olubs kept blaoks segregated.
POLTCAL CORRUPTON
Cuba's sooial problems were oompounded by a
violent, ohaotio and oorrupt politioal history.
3inoe aohieving independenoe in 1902, Cuba
had suffered from poor leadership and
widespread oorruption.
A bloody and oostly struggle to aohieve
independenoe from 3pain had devastated
Cuba's eoonomy.
Lither as a diotator or through surrogate
'Presidents', Batista had oontrolled Cuba for
over 20 years.
By the late '50's, Batista's rigging of eleotions
and stifling of dissent had plaoed pressure on
the u.3. to stop supporting him.
DEMOCRACY
Uemooraoy marred by oorruption and politioal violenoe --
the work of 'aotion groups' or gangs who shot their way
through politios at the university of avana and on the
oity streets.
when in Maroh 1952, Batista, in a ooup d'etat,
destroyed the demooratio republio he had brought into
existenoe, the stage was set for revolution.
'Batista's ooup opened a Pandora's box,' explained
writer Carlos Alberto Montaner. 'lnstitutions no longer
mattered. what mattered was audaoity, the individual
oapable of violent aotion.' 1hat individual turned out to
be Castro.