The Cold War, from Left .... 
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I. Cuba on the eve of revolution

A. Underemployment, urban/rural split
B. Political disaffection: politiquería

- 1902, the Cuban Republic
- 1903, Platt Amendment
- 1906-09, 1912, 1917-20, U.S. military occupation
- 1920s-30s:

Ramón Grau San Martín (1933)
Platt Amendment overturned (1934)
Fulgencio Batista (1934-44)

- 1940s-50s

Grau re-elected (1944-48)
Ortodoxos
1952, Batista takes power again
July 26, 1953, attack on Moncada Barracks
Fidel Castro,"History Will Absolve Me"

II. The Cuban Revolution, 1953-59

- broad support
- moderate early revolutionary government
- radicalization, 1960-62

1960, U.S. oil embargo
1960, French ship exploded
1961, Bay of Pigs
1962, Cuban Missile Crisis

III. Exporting the Revolution: Guerrilla Warfare

- Ernesto "Che" Guevara
- focos
- Bolivia 1967-68
- classic guerrillas:

Colombia, FARC and ELN, 1960s-today
Central America, 1960s-80s
Peru's Maoist "Shining Path," 1980s-90s

- urban guerrillas:

Tupamaros (Uruguay), 1960s-70s; José Mujica
Montoneros (Argentina), 1970s

IV. Cuba as Inspiration: Social Revolutionaries

"For the first time we thought that revolution was something possible in our countries. Until then the idea of the revolution was romantic and remote to us, something we took more as an academic idea that could never become a reality in countries like ours."

--Mario Vargas Llosa

A. Universities

- Dependency theory
- Student movements: political, service
- Tlatelolco massacre, Mexico, 1968

B. The Catholic Church

- Vatican II, 1962-65
- Acción Católica; Christian base communities
- liberation theology

Medellin, 1968: "institutional/structural" violence = sin
Puebla, 1979: "preferential option for the poor"
Camilo Torres Restrepo, Colombia