Comrades,
We thank the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba for organizing this IMCWP —the 24th since this initiative began [in 1998] as part of the 150th anniversary of the Communist Manifesto, at the call of the Communist Party of Greece—despite the very difficult conditions.
This forum has now been in existence for more than a quarter of a century and has become a fundamental platform for the exchange of opinions and information under the new conditions in which the international communist movement has had to operate, after the predominance of market relations—incompatible with socialist construction—led to the temporary triumph of the counterrevolution in the USSR and other countries..
We have come to pay tribute to Commander Fidel Castro Ruz on the occasion of the centenary of his birth. From a very young age he chose the path of revolution and internationalism, convinced that it represented the emancipation and happiness of the people and workers of Cuba, and the liberation of Cuba from the dreadful chains of imperialism. The popular uprising against the dictatorship of Batista – which was supported by legal and illegal capital, the White House,and the mafia in holy alliance – linked the longed-for independence with socialism, at the time of the historical transition from capitalism to socialism inaugurated by the Great October Socialist Revolution of 1917, of the general laws of revolution, which does not specify an intermediate stage between socialism and capitalism, as Commander Ernesto Guevara summarizes in his maxim, “either socialist revolution or a parody of revolution.” In fact, in addition to facing the Cuban bourgeoisie, the US monopolies, and imperialism, the Cuban Revolution and the thought and action of Commander Fidel Castro also brought about a questioning of the opportunistic line of Browderism and its offshoots, such as class collaboration and reformism within the communist movement on our continent, and also in Cuba.
While some petty-bourgeois currents, capitalizing on the prestige of the Cuban Revolution, sought to deny the indispensable role of the Communist Party in the revolutionary process—and even the historical revolutionary character of the working class—Fidel fought with determination to bring the various revolutionary forces together into a new Communist Party of Cuba. This party was the continuation of the one founded by Carlos Baliño and Julio Antonio Mella as the Cuban section of the Third International, and by placing the proletariat at the helm of the Revolution at all levels, making it clear—as the Comandante[1] explained on several occasions—that there would never again be power of the bourgeoisie, by the bourgeoisie, and for the bourgeoisie, but rather power of the workers, by the workers, and for the workers.
Fidel earned the respect of the international communist and revolutionary movement, and his prestige grew even further when, in the face of the temporary setback of socialist construction in the USSR and Eastern Europe—and against all odds—he steadfastly maintained the socialist direction of the Cuban revolutionary process in order to preserve the socialist gains and guarantee the right to continue socialist construction in the future.
We have much to learn from Fidel, especially in his thought and action.
We also come here to reiterate our solidarity with the people of Cuba and with the socialist achievements of the Revolution.
The arrival of the U.S. fleet in the Caribbean and the Trump administration’s proclamation of the new U.S. National Security Doctrine show us that the fierce competition between the capitalist economies led by the U.S. and the EU and the so-called multipolar economies—with their conflicts and wars—also involves Latin America. The confessed goal of the US in its new doctrine is to drive Chinese capital out of the region to regain its hegemony.
That policy of aggression immediately turned to action, and after the attack on Venezuela -which had the heroic resistance of 32 Cuban fighters- and the imposition of an ad hoc government, Trump focused his aim against Cuba. Since then, week after week, measures are incessantly adopted to suffocate Cuba, the main thrust being the imposition of a total energy blockade against the people of Cuba, which reinforces and sharpens the economic blockade that is already 64 years old. Threatening with sanctions and tariffs the US has managed to get several States to yield to the pressures, giving up their own sovereignty to trade with third countries freely. They have tried to bend the revolution, sanctioning cadres and organizations, attacking with surgical precision the inflow of productive and financial inputs, but they have met with the wall of a people resolved to defend the chosen path. They have even had the cynicism and cowardice to personally attack General Raúl Castro. The Cuban Revolution from its first steps in power faced hostility, economic warfare and even direct military aggression, but in recent years, this new aggressive wave is the most serious. And the response of the peoples, of international solidarity and of the communist parties, must be up to the circumstances, both politically and concretely.
For example, the people of Mexico, with the labor movement and the communists as its backbone, conquered sovereignty over that energy resource with the oil expropriation of 1938. Unfortunately the Mexican State recently gave in to US pressures and suspended the oil agreements with Cuba. In response to this, the people-to-people campaign of “An oil ship for Cuba”, to which the PCM contributes with its activity, together with other organizations of Mexico, and with the fraternal co-operation of sister parties such as the PCTE [Communist Party of the Workers of Spain], acquires relevance.
We consider solidarity with Cuba and the defense of its socialist achievements an imperative at this time. There are countless initiatives of the PCM and the Communist Youth, in workplaces, people’s neighborhoods, schools, in favor of Cuba and against imperialist aggression. Along with the campaign against Cuba and the war of aggression against the people of Iran, Palestine and Lebanon, it is also notorious that the Trump Administration is promoting a campaign against socialism and communism. The ruling classes always keep in mind who their class enemy is. It is true that the ideological mechanisms of imperialism distort history and facts, and they manipulate. For example, they present socialism as what it is not, such as the progressive management of capitalism, or the American democratic socialists, and even the US Democratic Party itself.
However, it is clear that, in the face of these distortions and attacks, we communists have a duty to defend our theory—Marxism-Leninism—and our historical goals: socialism-communism, socialist construction in the USSR, and the characteristics of socialism, such as the socialization of the means of production, the central and scientific planning of the economy, revolutionary workers’ power, and the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Historical experience has shown us the superiority of the new mode of production of socialism-communism in satisfying the people’s needs, in bringing about happiness and progress, and in unleashing the full potential and creativity of humanity once the system of exploitation is abolished. It also showed us the suffering our peoples endure when setbacks occur, when the counterrevolution gains ground, for socialist construction is not an upward trajectory without a life-and-death struggle against commodity-money relations—which are the seed of capitalism— upon which the possibility of a temporary setback is objectively based, since accumulation and profit give rise to the petty bourgeoisie and the bourgeoisie—the remnants of the overthrown exploiting classes, mortal enemies of the socialist revolution and of workers’ and people’s power. Let us always bear that bitter lesson in mind.
We face difficult times, with an unfavorable correlation [of forces], but, with struggle, we can change that.
Difficult times must not overshadow the historical optimism based on Marxism-Leninism, of the coming of new socialist revolutions. The objective conditions show us the imperialist war and the acute inter-imperialist competition; the shocks of the capitalist economic crisis; the superprofits of monopolies and the impoverishment of the working class; the devastation of natural resources and the environment; the tragic results of facing global pandemics under capitalist management; the attacks on working women and migrant workers; the open genocide of a people seen by the world; the galloping development of new productive forces, such as Artificial Intelligence, subordinated to the logic of capital accumulation.
But in the face of all these dangers and attacks, a class capable of transforming this situation is rising up and resisting—a class that is fighting and organizing all over the world. And from all this, there is only one conclusion:
Let us strengthen the struggle for socialism-communism, for new socialist revolutions.
Cuba will win!
Long live Fidel!
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[1] For example in his speech at the Cuba Vive International Youth Festival on August 6, 1995.
Translated to English by Joseph Jamison.
