Word: batista
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...week that was supposed to open Fidel Castro's battle for Cuba, his ragged rebel army showed clearly enough what it could and could not do against the well-armed troops of Dictator Fulgencio Batista. Disorder spread through Oriente province as five rebel columns, totaling about a thousand men, roamed almost at will, blockading highways, cutting overhead wires, hacking down telephone poles. But when Castro dared close with the army in battle, the rebels were slaughtered...
Clumsiness v. Caution. One raiding force of rebels staged a clumsy daylight attack outside Manzanillo, planning to lure Batista's armor out from the big city garrison, pile it up by triggering a homemade mine in the road, and then pick off the soldiers with rifle fire. The armor did not come out, but truckloads of soldiers did. The mine was a dud. Coordinated ground fire and strafing planes caught the rebels in an open field, and at least half of the 21-man force was wiped out. The government reported that twelve more rebels were killed when they...
After 16 months of sabotage and threats, Rebel Fidel Castro vowed to start his vaunted "total war" this week against the regime of President Fulgencio Batista. As Cubans waited the call to a general strike and armed attacks, the usual wave of bombings and skirmishes gave way to ominous silence. Batista made ready for the showdown by asking his obedient Congress to vote him emergency powers, including the right to impose martial law, govern by decree, and use troops to meet any strike...
...Castro sticks to his schedule, the normal round of pre-Easter holy days and holidays will give him a natural assist in closing down the country. The rebel chieftain has long delayed his big move in the hope of winning over enough of organized labor, still officially pro-Batista, to ensure the strike's success. But now he faces another problem: if he postpones the big push again, his Havana network, which must lead the strike, may be fatally weakened by mass arrests and killings...
...Batista decided that his regime's future lay with cops rather than conciliation, the army announced that it would augment its 22,000-man force by calling up another 7,000 recruits...