Word: castros
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Gestures All Around. Determined to outdo the traditional 21-gun salute that Ben Bella got on the White House lawn, Castro had an old Communist satellite gimmick to impress his guest-a 21-tank salute. As the long rifles of the Russian-built tanks barked their welcome, the bearded Cuban gave the slim Algerian rebel a mighty abrazo and then led him to the microphones. Said Castro: "To make this visit at a time when the powerful Yankee empire has redoubled its hostility against our country ... is, on your part, Señor Premier, an act of courage...
...maneuvers of enemy forces." Every Algerian, he said, "knows, follows and admires" the Cuban revolution; Algerians celebrate "as a national event, the victory of Playa Girón."* As a new nation, he said, Algeria has struck only one medal of honor, and this will be given to Castro...
...Bella saw little of Castro's hungry, rundown island during his day in Cuba. Most of the time was spent huddled with Castro officialdom. Castro and Cuban President Osvaldo Dorticós were particularly insistent that Ben Bella agree to a specific denunciation of the U.S. Guantánamo Naval Base. So was Che Guevara, the Argentine Communist in charge of Cuba's economy. "Sooner or later," he told Ben Bella, "you, too, will have to face the issue of the French naval base of Mers-el-Kebir." According to a later Algerian account of the session...
...keep happy. Flying back to New York the Algerian Premier would say no more about Cuba. But Algerians at the U.N. reported some interesting observations by Ben Bella and his aides about their Cuban hosts. They got the feeling that Che Guevara and Armed Forces Commander Raúl Castro were the real "strongmen" of the regime. President Osvaldo Dorticós, long considered a mere Castro puppet, was a surprisingly "strong personality." What about Castro himself? "Still immature, and too nervous...
...Fidel Castro has long complained that the U.S. naval base at Guantánamo Bay is being used as a hideout by guerrillas and underground fighters against his Communist police state. New York's Republican Senator Kenneth Keating has a complaint of his own: that Cuban refugees are being held in Guantánamo against their will. The Navy last week answered both accusations...