Fidel not only led the Revolution at the age of 32, but also, as young as he was, made the Revolution by articulating his best comrades’ thinking, courage and actions.
How admirable was this brilliant generation which, just five years after recording its ideals, in blood, on the walls of the Moncada and the Bayamo garrisons; suffering imprisonment, persecution and torture; mourning hundreds of their comrades, massacred or killed in combat; and depriving themselves of the natural pleasures of youth, was able to defeat one of the best-equipped armies on the continent, supported by the greatest enemy of the peoples, the United States government!
It was a Revolution made by young people. How could the nation’s youth not be given the confidence and the responsibility to sustain the resplendent process that was just beginning, perhaps as difficult as the liberation war?
For Comandante en Jefe Fidel Castro Ruz, counting on younger generations was his leadership philosophy, a principle of action, a guarantee of success in every revolutionary endeavor.
He himself would explain this as early as April 4, 1962, at the closing session of the Association of Young Rebels’ first congress, which enthusiastically and very consciously approved a name change, to become the Union of Young Communists (UJC).
"For us," he began, "those of us who are a few years older than you, this act has special significance, because it is a crystallization of what the Revolution wants, it is as if the hope of the Revolution has been crystallized." And he would later explain: "Because we are making a Revolution for you, and we can make this Revolution with you."
“We have had the privilege, or the right, to begin making this Revolution, we had the opportunity to start. You will have the privilege of carrying it forward,” he added.
“For everything that young people have done, for everything they have done in the history of our country, for everything they have done in the history of our Revolution, it is because we believe in the young, we believe in our youth, we believe in young people – and I repeat it because believing in young people is an attitude, believing in young people is a way of thinking,” he emphasized to the impassioned audience.
Sixty years after that moment, Fidel's affirmations have not lost an iota of their validity, true for youth of all times, a perspective he repeated on innumerable occasions, including June 23, 2007, when he cautioned, “If our youth fail, everything will fail,” followed by a confirmation of his confidence: “It is my deepest conviction that Cuban youth will fight to prevent this. I believe in you.”
He explained the foundations of this confidence several times. On April 4, 1962, he insisted, “To believe in young people is to see in them, in addition to enthusiasm, capacity; in addition to energy, responsibility; in addition to youth, purity, heroism, character, determination, love of the homeland, confidence in the home land! Love for the Revolution, faith in the Revolution, self-confidence. It is the deep conviction that youth can, that youth are capable, the deep conviction that great tasks can be placed on the shoulders of youth!”
Accordingly, Cuban youth have always shown their worth, making great sacrifices for the homeland. Sweat and young blood were sown in all our wars, first for independence and then for liberation from the Gerardo Machado and Fulgencio Batista dictatorships; then confronting the mercenary invasion at Playa Girón, in the trenches during the October Crisis, and clearing the mountains of counter-revolutionary bandits.
Youth, in fields and mountains, made the Literacy Campaign possible, high school students led the coffee harvest in 1962, and it was mostly young people who fought in Africa for the liberation of Angola and the defeat of apartheid, on internationalist missions in numerous countries.
It is often young people who lead in the national economy, in the battle for efficiency in production and services, in conservation campaigns, and youth have made possible the development of Cuba as a country of men and women of science, at the service of humanity.
We have held at bay the global pandemic that continues to claim victims, faced with an aggravated economic crisis and the accumulated ravages of 60 years of economic blockade imposed by the world’s greatest power, key to its genocidal policy seeking to force our surrender, using deprivation as a weapon, attacking hope, sowing discouragement, frustration and doubt, especially among youth who suffer the limitations we are obliged to weather.
We have our own problems, of course, which we must address, as a second front of resistance, critical to the nation’s survival. We must combat bureaucracy more effectively and forcefully, as well as inefficiency and corruption, and unscrupulous individuals looking to profit from the needs of the population.
Party First Secretary and President of the Republic Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez has made constant calls to confront all this firmly, with hope and courage, and has insisted, with special emphasis, that Cuban youth must be recognized as "the important people they are."
Speaking to youth in 1988, Fidel stated, “What do we have to fear? What can we fear? Let us dedicate ourselves to work and we will see how to find solutions, solutions nobody here has, we don't have them; but we are certain that you we are going to find them.”
With all certainty, putting heart into our daily work, today, for the homeland and with youth at the forefront, Cuba will always emerge victorious.
