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Speech of Fidel Castro regarding Bush's  "War on Terrorism"

 May  2004
www.globalresearch.ca      1  May  2004

The URL of this article is: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/405A.html


In an address to one million people at a march in Havana , Fidel Castro said that "the US president had no right to lecture anyone on such things as democracy or human rights."

We reproduce below the English translation of his speech as well as the Spanish original.

 

Proclamation by an adversary of the US government

Mr. George W. Bush: the million Cubans who are gathered here today to march past your Interests Section is just a small part of a valiant and heroic people who would like to be here with us, if it were physically possible.

We have not gathered in a hostile gesture to the American people whose ethics, rooted in the time when the first pilgrims emigrated to this hemisphere, are well known to us. Neither do we wish to upset the officials, employees and guards of this mission, who are given all the safety and guarantees that a civilized and educated people such as ours can offer while they serve their terms. This is an outraged protest and a denunciation of the brutal, ruthless and cruel measures against our country that your country has just adopted.

We know beforehand what you believe or want to make others believe about those who are marching here. In your opinion they are oppressed masses who yearn for liberty and who have been forced onto the streets by the Cuban government.

You completely ignore that no force in the world could drag a dignified, proud people, which has withstood 45 years of hostility, blockade and aggression from the most powerful nation on earth, on to the streets like a flock of animals each one with rope around their neck.

A statesman, or whoever claims to be one, should know that down through history really humane ideas of justice have been shown to be much more powerful than force; force leaves in its wake only dusty, contemptible ruins; humane ideas leave a luminous trail that no one will ever be able to extinguish. Every era has had its own ideas, both good and bad ones, and they have accumulated. But the worst, most sinister and uncertain ideas belong in this era in which we live in a barbarous, uncivilized, globalized world.

In the world that you seek to impose on us today there is not the slightest notion of ethics, credibility, standards of justice, humanitarian feelings, nor of the elementary principles of solidarity and generosity.

Everything that is written about human rights in your world, and in the world of your allies who share in plundering the world, is an enormous lie. Billions of human beings live in infrahuman conditions starving, without enough food, medicine, clothes, shoes or shelter and without even a minimum amount of knowledge or enough information to understand their tragedy and that of the world in which they live.

Surely nobody has told you about the tens of millions of children, adolescents, youths, mothers, middle or elderly people who die every year but that could have been saved in this "idyllic Eden of dreams" which is Earth, nor have they told you at what rate the natural conditions for life are being destroyed and that the hydrocarbons which took the world 300 million years to create are being squandered in a century and a half, with devastating effects.

You have only to ask your assistants for precise data on the tens of thousands of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, bombers, smart long range missiles, battleships and aircraft carriers, conventional and non-conventional weapons in your arsenals which are enough to wipe out all life of the planet.

Neither you nor anyone else would ever be able to sleep again. Neither would your allies, who are trying to emulate your military build-up. If your allies low responsibility coefficient, political talent, inequality between their respective states and their infinitesimal inclination to reflect in the time they have left between protocols, meetings and advisors, are taken into account, those who have the destiny of the world in their hands can harbor few hopes when, half puzzled half indifferent, they gaze upon the real madhouse that world politics has become.

The purpose of these words is not to offend nor insult you: but since you have set out to intimidate, to terrorize this country and eventually to destroy its socio-economic system and independence, and if necessary its very physical existence, I consider it my elemental duty to remind you of a few home truths.

You have neither the morality nor the right, none whatsoever, to speak of freedom, democracy and human rights when you hold enough power to destroy humanity and are attempting to install a world tyranny, side-stepping and destroying the United Nations Organization, violating the human rights of any and every country, waging wars of conquest to take over world markets and resources and installing decadent and anachronistic political and social systems which are leading the human race into the abyss.

There are other reasons why you cannot mention the word democracy: among these is the fact that everyone knows you became president of the United States through fraud. You cannot speak of freedom because you cannot conceive of a world other than one ruled by fear of the lethal weapons which your inexpert hands might rain down on humanity.

You cannot speak of the environment because you are completely ignorant of the fact that the human race is in danger of disappearing.

You label a tyranny the economic and political system that has guided the Cuban people to higher levels of literacy, knowledge and culture than those in the most developed countries in the world. The same that has reduced infant mortality to a rate lower than that of the United States and whose population is provided with all healthcare and education services and with other extremely important social and human services free of charge.

Listening to you talk of human rights in Cuba has a hollow, absurd ring. This, Mr. Bush, is one of the few countries in this hemisphere where not once in 45 years has there been a single case of torture, a single death squad, a single extrajudicial execution or a single ruler who has become a millionaire through having held power.

You lack the moral authority to speak of Cuba, a dignified country which has withstood 45 years of a brutal blockade, economic war and terrorist attacks which have cost thousands of lives and ten of billions of dollars in economic losses.

You are attacking Cuba for petty, political reasons, trying to obtain electoral support from a shrinking group of renegades and mercenaries who have no ethical principles whatsoever. You lack the moral right to speak of terrorism because you are surrounded by a bunch of murderers who have caused the death of thousands of Cubans through terrorist methods.

You do not hide your contempt for human life, because you have not hesitated to order the extrajudicial death of a secret, unknown number of people in various parts of the world.

You have no right whatsoever, except for that of brute force, to intervene in Cuba�s affairs and, whenever the fancy takes you, to proclaim the transition from one system to another and to take measures to make this happen. This people can be exterminated �it�s as well you know this� or wiped off the face of the earth but it cannot be subjugated nor put once again into the humiliating position of a United States neo-colony.

Cuba fights on the side of life in the world; you fight on the side of death. Whereas you kill countless people with your indiscriminate, pre-emptive surprise attacks, Cuba saves the lives of hundreds of thousands of children, mothers, old and sick people all over the world.

The only thing you know about Cuba are the lies that spill forth from the ravenous mouths of the corrupt and insatiable mob of former Batista supporters and their descendents who are experts in electoral fraud and capable of electing President of the United States someone who did not obtain enough votes to claim victory.

Human beings are not aware of nor can they be aware of freedom in a regime of inequality like the one you represent. No one is born equal in the United States. In the black and Latin ghettos and on the reservations for the natives who once inhabited that land but were exterminated, there is no other equality but that of being poor and excluded.

Our people, educated in solidarity and internationalism, do not hate the American people nor do they want to see young white, black, Native Americans, mestizo or Latin soldiers from that country die, young people driven by unemployment to enlist in the military to be sent to any corner of the world in traitorous, pre-emptive attacks or in wars of conquest.

The unbelievable torture applied to prisoners in Iraq has rendered the world speechless.

I do not seek to offend you with these words, as I have already said. My only hope is that in your leisure time one of your assistants would bring these truths to your notice, even though they may not be completely pleasing to you.

Since you have decided that the die is cast, I have the pleasure of saying farewell like the Roman gladiators who were about to fight in the arena: Hail Cesar, those who are about to die salute you!

My only regret is that I would not even see your face because in that case you would be thousands of miles away while I shall be in the frontline to die fighting in defense of my homeland.

In the name of the Cuban people,

Fidel Castro Ruz.


SPANISH

Discurso �ntegro de Fidel Castro en la marcha contra medidas de Bush

"Salve, C�sar, los que van a morir te saludan"

www.Cubadebate.cu

El l�der cubano asegur� que Bush no tiene moral para hablar de guerra contra el terrorismo, porque manifiesta un profundo desprecio por la vida humana. Fidel habl� poco antes de comenzar la multitudinaria marcha por el Malec�n de la capital isle�a, para protestar contra las medidas anunciadas por la administraci�n norteamericana para Cuba, sintetizada en el llamado Programa de Transici�n propugnado por la extrema derecha en el poder hoy en Estados Unidos.

Texto �ntegro de las palabras del Presidente Cubano Fidel Castro, en la multitudinaria manifestacion en la capital cubana, para protestar contra las medidas anunciadas por la administraci�n norteamericana para Cuba.

 

 

Proclama de un adversario al gobierno de Estados Unidos

Se�or George W. Bush: el mill�n de cubanos que nos reunimos hoy para marchar frente a su Oficina de Intereses, es s�lo una peque�a parte de todo un pueblo valiente y heroico que quisiera estar aqu� junto a nosotros si f�sicamente fuese posible.

No se re�ne en gesto hostil contra el pueblo de Estados Unidos, cuyas ra�ces �ticas, originarias de la �poca cuando emigraron a este hemisferio los primeros peregrinos, conocemos bien. No deseamos tampoco molestar a los funcionarios, empleados y guardianes de esa instalaci�n que, en el cumplimiento de sus misiones, gozan de toda la seguridad y garant�as que un pueblo culto y civilizado como el nuestro es capaz de ofrecer. Es un acto de indignada protesta y una denuncia contra las brutales, despiadadas y crueles medidas que su gobierno acaba de adoptar contra nuestro pa�s.

De antemano conocemos lo que usted piensa o pretende hacer creer de los que por aqu� marchar�n. En su opini�n se trata de masas oprimidas y ansiosas de libertad lanzadas a la calle por el gobierno de Cuba. Ignora por completo que al pueblo digno y altivo que ha resistido 45 a�os la hostilidad, el bloqueo y las agresiones de la potencia m�s poderosa de la Tierra, ninguna fuerza del mundo podr�a arrastrarlo como un reba�o, atado cada uno de ellos con una cuerda en el cuello.

Un estadista, o alguien con la pretensi�n de serlo, debiera saber que las ideas justas y realmente humanas a lo largo de la historia han demostrado ser mucho m�s poderosas que la fuerza; de �sta van quedando polvorosas y despreciables ruinas; de aquellas, rasgos luminosos que nadie podr� apagar. A cada �poca le han correspondido las suyas, tanto buenas como malas, y todas se han ido acumulando. Pero a esta etapa que vivimos, en un mundo b�rbaro, incivilizado y globalizado, le han correspondido las peores y m�s tenebrosas e inciertas.

No existe en el mundo que usted quiere hoy imponer la menor noci�n de �tica, credibilidad, normas de justicia, sentimientos humanitarios ni los m�s elementales principios de solidaridad y generosidad.

Todo lo que se escribe sobre derechos humanos en su mundo, y en el de sus aliados que comparten el saqueo del planeta, es una colosal mentira. Miles de millones de seres humanos viven con hambre, sin alimentos suficientes, medicinas, ropa, zapatos, viviendas, en condiciones infrahumanas, sin los m�s m�nimos conocimientos y suficiente informaci�n para comprender su tragedia y la del mundo en que viven.

A usted seguramente nadie le ha informado cu�ntas decenas de millones de ni�os, adolescentes, j�venes, madres, personas de mediana o mayor edad que podr�an salvarse, mueren cada a�o en este "id�lico ed�n de sue�os" que es la Tierra, ni a qu� ritmo se destruyen las condiciones naturales de vida y se est� despilfarrando en un siglo y medio, con terribles efectos nocivos, los hidrocarburos que el planeta tard� 300 millones de a�os en crear.

A usted le bastar�a pedir a sus ayudantes los datos precisos de las decenas de miles de armas nucleares, qu�micas, biol�gicas, aviones de bombardeo, m�siles de certera punter�a, gran alcance y precisi�n, acorazados, portaaviones con que cuentan sus arsenales, armas convencionales y no convencionales suficientes para poner fin a la vida en el planeta.

Ni usted ni nadie podr�a conciliar el sue�o nunca. Tampoco sus aliados, que tratan de emular el desarrollo de sus arsenales. Si se toma en cuenta el bajo coeficiente de responsabilidad, el talento pol�tico, los desequilibrios entre sus respectivos estados y el poqu�simo �nimo de reflexionar, entre protocolos, reuniones y asesores, los que tienen en sus manos el destino de la humanidad, pocas son las esperanzas que puedan albergar cuando contemplan, entre perplejos e indiferentes, este manicomio real en que se ha convertido la pol�tica mundial.

El objetivo de estas l�neas no es ofenderlo ni insultarlo; pero como usted se ha propuesto intimidar, atemorizar a este pa�s, y finalmente destruir su sistema econ�mico-social y su independencia, y de ser necesario su propia existencia f�sica, considero un deber elemental recordarle algunas verdades.

Usted no tiene moral ni derecho alguno a hablar de libertad, democracia y derechos humanos, cuando ostenta el poder suficiente para destruir la humanidad y con �l intenta imponer una tiran�a mundial, ignorando y destruyendo la Organizaci�n de Naciones Unidas, violando los derechos de cualquier pa�s, llevando a cabo guerras de conquista para apoderarse de los mercados y los recursos del mundo, imponiendo sistemas pol�ticos y sociales decadentes y anacr�nicos que conducen a la especie humana al abismo.

Usted, por otras razones, no puede mencionar la palabra democracia: porque, entre ellas, su ascenso a la Presidencia de Estados Unidos todo el mundo sabe que fue fraudulento. No puede hablar de libertad, porque no concibe otro mundo que el regido bajo el imperio del terror de las mort�feras armas que sus manos inexpertas pueden lanzar sobre la humanidad.

No puede hablar de medio ambiente porque ignora por completo que la especie humana corre el riesgo de desaparecer.

Usted acusa de tiran�a al sistema econ�mico y pol�tico que ha conducido al pueblo de Cuba a los m�s altos niveles de alfabetizaci�n, conocimientos y cultura, entre los pa�ses m�s desarrollados del mundo; que ha reducido la mortalidad infantil a un �ndice menor que el de Estados Unidos, y cuya poblaci�n recibe gratuitamente todos los servicios de salud, educaci�n y otros de gran trascendencia social y humana.

Suena hueco y risible escucharlo a usted hablar de derechos humanos en Cuba. Este es, se�or Bush, uno de los pocos pa�ses de este hemisferio donde jam�s en 45 a�os hubo una sola tortura, un solo escuadr�n de la muerte, una sola ejecuci�n extrajudicial, ni un solo gobernante que se haya hecho millonario en el ejercicio del poder.

Usted carece de autoridad moral para hablar de Cuba, un pa�s digno que ha resistido 45 a�os de brutal bloqueo, guerra econ�mica y ataques terroristas que han costado miles de vidas y decenas de miles de millones de d�lares en p�rdidas econ�micas.

Usted agrede a Cuba por razones pol�ticas mezquinas, en busca del apoyo electoral de un grupo decreciente de renegados y mercenarios, sin �tica ni principio alguno. Usted no tiene moral para hablar de terrorismo, porque lo rodean un grupo de asesinos que mediante actos de ese tipo han causado la muerte de miles de cubanos.

Usted no disimula su desprecio por la vida humana, porque no ha vacilado en ordenar la muerte extrajudicial de un n�mero desconocido y secreto de personas en el mundo.

Usted no tiene derecho alguno, que no sea el de la fuerza bruta, a intervenir en los asuntos de Cuba y proclamar a su antojo el tr�nsito de un sistema a otro, y adoptar medidas para llevarlo a cabo.

Este pueblo puede ser exterminado -bien vale la pena que lo sepa-, barrido de la faz de la Tierra, pero no sojuzgado ni sometido de nuevo a la condici�n humillante de neocolonia de Estados Unidos.

Cuba lucha por la vida en el mundo; usted lucha por la muerte. Mientras usted mata a incontables personas con sus ataques indiscriminados preventivos y sorpresivos, Cuba salva cientos de miles de vida de ni�os, madres, enfermos y ancianos en el mundo.

Usted lo �nico que conoce sobre Cuba son las mentiras que emanan de las bocas voraces de la mafia corrompida e insaciable de antiguos batistianos y sus descendientes, expertos en fraudes electorales y capaces de elegir Presidente en Estados Unidos a alguien que no obtuvo los votos suficientes para alcanzar la victoria.

Los seres humanos no conocen ni pueden conocer libertad en un r�gimen de desigualdad como el que usted representa. Ninguno nace igual en Estados Unidos. En los guetos de personas de origen africano y latino, y en las reservas de indios que poblaron esa tierra y fueron exterminados, no existe otra igualdad que la de ser pobres y excluidos.

Nuestro pueblo, educado en la solidaridad y el internacionalismo, no odia al pueblo norteamericano ni desea ver morir a j�venes soldados de su pa�s, blancos, negros, indios, mestizos, latinoamericanos muchas veces, a quienes desempleo los arrastr� a enrolarse en unidades militares para ser enviados a cualquier rinc�n del mundo en ataques traicioneros y preventivos o en guerras de conquista.

Las incre�bles torturas aplicadas a los prisioneros en Iraq han dejado estupefacto al mundo.

No pretendo ofenderlo con estas l�neas -ya lo dije. S�lo aspiro a que en cualquier instante de ocio alg�n ayudante suyo ponga delante de usted estas verdades, aunque realmente no sean en absoluto de su agrado.

Puesto que usted ha decidido que nuestra suerte est� echada, tengo el placer de despedirme como los gladiadores romanos que iban a combatir en el circo: Salve, C�sar, los que van a morir te saludan.

S�lo lamento que no podr�a siquiera verle la cara, porque en ese caso usted estar�a a miles de kil�metros de distancia, y yo estar� en la primera l�nea para morir combatiendo en defensa de mi patria.

 

En nombre del pueblo de Cuba,

Fidel Castro Ruz


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