Word: batista
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...hills of eastern Cuba, 50 U.S. and Canadian citizens were caught-some to their own amusement-in the middle of the war between Rebel Fidel Castro and Dictator Fulgencio Batista. Their captor and genial host: Raúl Castro, Fidel's younger brother, who was mistakenly convinced that the U.S. is arming Batista. Wishing to teach Washington a lesson, young Castro decided to kidnap Americans wholesale from the neighboring sugar mills and nickel mines, and from among the personnel of the U.S. Guantanamo naval base. But he was also at pains to let his captives know that he meant...
...rebel sympathizers anyway.' On the 4th of July the rebels served up roasted pig for dinner. The hostages were shown bomb casings with U.S. markings, were taken to see a dead three-year-old boy 'with a big hole in his head' from a Batista air raid. They were also harangued about the delivery of 300 rocket warheads to the Cuban air force at the Guantánamo base on May 18-the event that touched off the protest kidnapings...
...base at Guantánamo Bay. The Cuban driver swung out of town, and the bus bucketed along the narrow muddy road. Suddenly the headlights picked up a band of armed men. Guerrilla fighters in Cuban Rebel Chieftain Fidel Castro's 19-month-old uprising against Dictator Fulgencio Batista, they climbed aboard the bus and ordered the driver to turn east...
...truck, loaded them with food and medical supplies. Before they left, one of the rebels turned to the wife of one of the engineers, said: "They'll be treated well and returned in a few days." He said the reasons for the kidnaping were U.S. support of the Batista regime in general and the refueling of Cuban military planes at the U.S. naval base at Guantánamo Bay in particular...
...were concerned, U.S. Ambassador to Cuba Earl E. T. Smith declared flatly that "the base has not and will not refuel or in other ways service Cuban military aircraft engaged in military operations." But the charges were beside the point. The kidnapings were obviously to get publicity and make Batista look ineffective. In forcing the U.S. to negotiate directly with them for the prisoners' release, the rebels readily accomplished their purpose of the moment...