Perrottet. A journey through the historical underbelly of europe and most recently, cuba libre. As a College Student tony regularly disappeared to hitchhike and travel through rural india. Tonys travel stories have been published in magazines and have been translated into a dozen languages and wildly anthologized. He is also a regular television guest on the History Channel where he has spoken about everything from the crew sausad the birth of disco. Please join me in welcoming t e tonetony perrottet. [ applause ] thank you for coming out. You may be wondering from my funny accent what is an australian doing living in new york and writing about cuba. Many have wondered. The reason is that i used to live in argentina and reported all around south america. If you live in latin america, every one there is thinking about cuba. What happened in cuba and whats going to happen. In that sense i felt like i really had to go. I finally did in 1996 which is called just after the soviet union collapsed. It was cubas fortunes. It was an economic disaster. All i knew is i had to take 1,000 in cash and give it to a guy named lionel and give it to him at the airport. I did get to the airport and he did appear. I gave him the money and he gave me the handwritten thing and pointed out to russian prop plane. Six people squeezed onto this plan. It was fascinating experience. The next time i went was under the obama years and i got invited on the first private jet to fly from miami. Six passengers. Slightly different appearance. Champagne flowing. It even had wifi. After that, before i went on that trip, i asked a friend, cuba specialist, i wanted to find out about a revolution. She said it doesnt exist. You should write it. I said okay. That seems wildly difficult and extremely unlikely. I heard theres some sights still around cuba. I proposed to the smithsonian that i go back and follow this trail and follow the history of the revolution which is how that story thats in the print out came up. I should have had that up to give you an idea of the classic image of havana. After i did that, i realized theres a much more to be learned. Theres much more to be discovered. It was the tip of the iceberg. I suggested doing a book about it. Its how popular the revolution was which seemed extraordinary given what had happened since and how difficult it was to find out about the revolution here and going to cuba can be quite difficult as well. I decided to try to investigate. The image that sort of most intrigued me was just after the dictator had fled, ed sullivan flew down to cuba to interview fidel. The interview is still around. You should see it on youtube. Hes like and hes absolutely star struck. He said what do you think of america and he said veriy positive feeling. This was the sort of point where i started the book and go back to find out how it all unfolded. They sort of crash land on the coast of cuba. At one point they made it down to 12 people. How they ended up defeating 40,000 professional soldiers. It really seemed like an extraordinary story. The thing i like is its broken up into very specific chapters in a way. I should have put this in the print out. Its nice to have print outs but theres five parts to the story. Hes a very athletic character. His nickname was el loco, the crazy one. Hi friends he wouldnt drive his bicycle into a wall at full tilt. He just went down a hill, smashed into a wall. Knocked himself out. He was out for like three days. That was just to prove a point. This gives an inside into his character in way. He loved sports. It was have a rich family. He grew up with the sense of injustice because he would go to the local school there. All the other kids didnt have shoes. He was the only one with shoes. He realized his dad was paying the work. He would get into argumented. He organized a strike of his fathers workers at one stage. You can see his basically oebals there. He was offered a contract with american baseball. Its a nice one but untrue. He had a great pitching arm but not enough to get a scholarship to miami or indianapolis. He once didnt have a beard. He was this young lawyer. Quite conservative. He went to havana. Went to the university there studying law. There were all the things brewing. They take koeover and every one cut out of the process. Basically running the state, milking the state in a violent way. The secret police were going around beating up and murdering opponents. It was this thuggish environment. They had to do something kind of extreme. They decided to start an insurrection. Its the first volley. He and another hundred of his friends, students got together and sort of taught themselves how to shoot guns. Not very well and they made themselves uniforms to make themselves look like soldiers and a bunch of chevrolets and buicks and dodges and trundled off to attack this place with like 500 soldiers. It was up in the night the last night of carnival. They came to the conclusion they would be so hung over that they wouldnt fight. This was not the case. It turned out they completely blew it. Fidel nearly ran over a couple of patrolmen who led off the alert. Many were captured and tortured to death. It was kind of a disaster. Its one of those disasters a bit like australia or the battle of little big born horn thats celebrated in its own way. They were all thrown into this model prison. Its an example where a guard can be in middle there and see every one there this the whole place. It was a very sort of sinister place. It was very violent. The Political Prisoners were put in their own room together which was a strange decision. They all got together and gave each other classes and revolution theory and plotted what to do and sent messages to people outside. Fidel even managed, he wrote a book while he was in there. Sort of a pamphlet on the defense speech. He wrote on little pieces of paper and smuggled out piece by piece to his supporters in havana. Most of the time they were al writing in lemon juice. The guards never asked why. They had this sort of passion for citrus. They are still youngsters that are unknown at this stage. They go to mexico city where they organize and decide to invade cuba. They are complete amateurs. Another thing i love about the story is a bunch of phd grads were dumped in the mountains and told to get it together. They really had to teach themselves how to shoot. They would put rocks in their backpac backpacks. They found a guy to teach them how to shoot guns and they tried to raise money. They were often called. The secret police were after them in mexico city. At one stage they were all arrested. By this stage they have been joined by a young chap named ernesto. He was a medic. He was a doctor and he signed onto the expedition. He was arrested. They decided to get going as fast as they could. This is the second part of the story where they staged the invasi invasion. This sort of demented plan. They decided to buy a boat from a doctor, at american doctor in mexico city and its called the grandma which ill show you later. They organized with the locals, the local supporters. They had planned it all out. Fidel was same day telegram. The book you ordered is out of print. This was the code they were going to leave mexico city. They planned it was going to take like five days. They all piled into the boat which is kind of like the ss minnow. It barely worked. It had been water logged. They managed to squeeze 82 people on there and they were there like sardines. As soon as they got out of the harbor, it started to rock quite a lot and they started to get seasick. They forgot the seasick tablets. They all started to get seasick. It was a spectacular disaster. The water was coming into the boat. They realized it was starting to flood. They grabbed whatever they could and started throw things over board. They thought they were going to sink until someone realized the tap was on in the toilet and it was flooding it. This set the tone for the revolution. Its got some of the worst roads in cuba. It was very remote and isolated. Fidel decided on this. Its when the mountains in the east. Probably the poorest and most isolated part of the cuba and the caribbean. Turns out they are two days late. The grounds people gave up. They come along and sort of crash land. The boat stops and its like they hit a sand bag. This is the only known photograph of them getting in there. The 81 of them go across and they realize that they havent landed on one of the beautiful beaches for which cuba is renowned. They landed in a swamp and the most sinister swamps in the east. Today you can visit the spot. They have done this sort of beautiful walk way. They had to climb over the vines. They dropped their stuff. They sort of panicked. They lost their shoes. It was a complete fiasco. They are already dehydrated and desperate. They meet a farmer. Fidel says have you fear. We have come to save the cuban people. The guy resisted the urge to birs o burst out laughing. The farmer is very helpful. He catches a chicken and will cook it for them. Suddenly they hear shooting. They decided to go towards the 30 mile walk. They are surround eed and ambushed. Bullets started appearing out of nowhere. Its a massacre. Every one else just scatters in wild directions. Helenes up against a tree. They make a run for it and end up in the bushes. People are scattered everywhere. Fidel is by himself. Hes sitting in a sugar cane field. Notes two of his friends but the army is going back and forth. They get together and they hang out in the sugar cane field for five days waiting for the army to go away. They are drinking dew in the morning. They are gnawing on sugar cane to keep themselves sustained. Much of the time fidel is ro rocking back and forth saying victory will be ours. The other two are looking at ours going he lost it. They get it together and they walk. It takes them like ten days and mostly at night. They manage to get to the Meeting Point at the mountains. They end up there as well. They its sort of like pal or australian. He ends up there as well. About 20 of them gather there as well. They are like camping out in a coffee field and recovering from their wounds. Many others are caught and butchered by the army. Those that are you aware vooifed became the great leaders of the revolution. They only found out two years later he was beaten to death with shovels. These guys. These few people and later someone would write a book. They like the religious con notatikno connotations of 12. They are up in the mountains trying to stay low, trying to survive. The only reason they do survive is through the efforts of a doctors daughter who sort of the major organizer of the revolution. You can find her notes. Her accounts. She was very meticulous. She would do things day by day. She found them new boots. She found them food. If it wasnt for her, the whole revolution would be snuffed out. They were inspired and full of especial enthusiasm but couldnt organize their way out of a paper bag. They couldnt clean their guns. Guns were going off left, right and center. At this stage, they sent out the words all their friends were dead. This was going on for some months. Eventually, word went back to havana that he wanted to get an interview going so they decided to contact the New York Times. She contacted another guy of the name of Herbert Matthews who is the great latin americaist of his days. He says well send someone. I couldnt quite believe him. He and his wife were driven by agen agents out to the east. He hikes up in the mountains and fidel meets him. Its one of the great turning points. Without this the revolution has expired. Most of them are in really ragged uniforms. They wi he tells his brother to get the men to walk back and forth and change outfits. They also had to walk sideways so you wouldnt see the backs of their shirts had been torn open. He had this stroot thing. He thought it was a heroic resi resistance. This is the image that sort of continues throughout the revolution. In many ways its right. That was the goal they could get behind. Communism came much later. What he wanted was power. Someone later said he tried to make fidel a communist and he laughed and said id be a communist if i was stalin and refused to discuss it any further. San chiz hikes in as well to meet fidel for the first time. Its his extraordinary moment. Hes showing off his favorite rifle and turns out she loves shooting, fishing, the great outdoors. Shes a huge political devotee. Totally devoted to the revolution. Theres a lot thats been written. Its quite extraordinary. Really this union between celia and fidel. Thats what becomes the motor of the revolution. He has this amazing ideas. She puts them into action. She sort of translates them into something thats practical and could happen. We have this extraordinary thing that fidel on the front page of the New York Times as the face of the cuban resistance. Its like an extraordinary thing. Thats so inspires people. Here we have a guy who decides to interview fidel and hes a tv natural. He knows how to stage things as well. He says well do it on the top of the highest mountain in cuba. They all sing these rousing songs and its broadcast of 50 Million Viewers across the United States. Sud suddenly fidel has this huge presence there. He still only had a handful of people, handful of followers. Today you can go up and its still an extremely poor place. The other reason they were able to survive is that the farmers, the local farmers decided to help them out. They had been left out. They gave food, support, carried m mes m messengers. In this early nomadic phase, we have this secondary army helping them out. They are all wondering around in the mountains for months and changing camp every night. Its an exhausting time. This is cuban platoon leader who is a grandma. He didnt like being rained on. He didnt like trudging around. He didnt like blisters. He was very lonely character. He writes all this down in the dairy. Theres this marvelous accounts where he falls in love with every woman he meets in the mountains. Shop girls, farmers, daughters, guerilla volunteers. He writes these lovely poems about it. He does end up in one romantic liason. It ends when the girls open up a locket around his neck and sees the image of a girl in mexico. He writes in his diary, its all for the best. Just looking for some water. There it is. He had this extraordinary insight sbos into this amateurio it yourself revolution. Three teenagers decided to disappear from their family, run away and join fidel. Fidel and frank sort of decided its quite a good idea. A good pr thing. They let the three American Kids join and then they write a letter. An open letter to the u. S. Government saying that they love the revolution. Its seem like the Founding Fathers all over again and its published in the New York Times. Its in very much calling for the americans to stop supplying the dictator with arms. Just the planes are refueling. Americans were training the secret police. It was really not an ideal situation. The three kids are there. Fidel eventually decides one of them couldnt hack the mountain life but fidel decides its too dangerous having them there. If they get killed or wounded, it would be a pr disaster. He lets them go. One guy stays for another flthr months. A all these students keep turning up. Only a few of them make it down there. Theres Great Stories of kids in berkeley who steal their parents car and try to drive to miami to join the revolution and fail. Floating around, we have another rare early photo. He was a medic. He was also quite an extraordinary character. He had a very sentimental side as well. He loved dogs. He would carry the dogs around everywhere. One of the saddest stories is that he and his group with one of their favorite dogs and an army patrol is going by and the dog starts whining and making these noises. Sort of a poetic soul. Quite good looking. He was became the poster boy of the revolution later. There are some amazing photographs. It was probably the historys most photo generalic. The Chinese Revolution paintings and statues is the golden age of magazines. The photographers would find their way in. They would do these beautiful photo spreads. Its kind of an extraordinary thing. This is the first execution of the revolution. They had a trial. A series of trials that lasted for 12 days. Theres a bunch of guys impersonating them. They were telling them they were revolutionaries and then stealing stuff. They put them op trin trial and ring leader is executed. Kieb kind of an incredible image. This is in the early days when theres like 100 of them floating around. Theyre trying to get people is trying to figure out how they did it. They would do things like they have great support base in the cities and trying to convince people to start burning the sugar plantations to undercut the economy. They put out these helpful leaflets. Or using a slingshot. It would burn and they sand it into a field that would start the conflagrations. They are making it up as they go along. Whether it worked or not, nobody knows. They would do other things as well. The army was going around bombing randomly. A lot of these bombs wouldnt go off or if they did, they did almost no jungle. A fact the younabsorbed in the mulch. They would hang them in garlands and figured out how to explode them in the distance. One of these extraordinary sort of things. Condensed millk was their favorite food. They would get them up from the lowlands. It was like the nectar of the gods. It was like sweet and rich. They would make other dishes as well. It was great guerilla recipe. He would get a sort of spicy hot dog. Shop it off. Saw tee it in one tablespoon in the lemon and sort of serve that up. That was like his favorite dish. He said it was the greatest feast that he ever had in his life. Food was a big obsession for them. They managed to make it through to the end of 1957. Just by hanging around they would sort of winning in a certain way. They would take photographs. You sea hes wee hes wearing a. With have these guys hanging out in mountains. Very little is changing. Prostitution is rife. Its one of the Great Centers and the grand green for example loves it. He goes there and the shanghai theater to see super man. The details that we shall not go into but these live sex shows. Fidel is getting ready to prepare for a five or ten year war. He decides to get a permanent base. They have about 300 men at this stage. Instead of going around medically, they have to have somewhere they can all hole up. Cecilia designs this camp. Its in an isolated place. Its up this trail. You can still go there today. The huts are still there. You have this goat trail clamoring up. You finally trudge along and something opens up. Its like secret area thats there. As you can see he started to grow his beard early on. They all decided they are throwing their raises over board any way. They decided they might as well, they were going to keep growing their beards until the the revolution was won. The bearded ones to distinguish them from every one else. They are getting the character. Fidel is wearing his sort of cap and getting this very distinctive look that will become world famous eventually. This is a hut that he made for her and herself and fidel. Its there by a bubbling brook. It doesnt compare to a chinese philosophers heart. It would be an awesome echo lodge today. Its up in the mountains. Its very breezy, very dreamy, very cool. Its still there and the kitchen is still there. They have this fridge that was brought up and still has the wholes that the air force when they do the mule train. You can still go out there. The guide will sort shoef you around. Its all sort of barricades off. Decides to lie down on fidels bed. You lie there and theres this gorgeous window thats open. Its propped open and filled with flowers. Lavic sort of tropical scene. Its such a poetic little place. It was here he started to act as ifalready president of cuba. Giving orders and coming up with plans. People were impressed that he had this sense of authority. He was also adjoined by others. At this stage more and more women are starting to join the revolution. They had been working in the cities but they were often suspicion was starting to fall on them. The cuban mail political didnt couldnt conceive of the idea women had political ideas at all. They never sort of bothered the women. They smuggle food and guns around for the revolutionaries but they did, people did start to figure them out. Shes there writing and she was was an m. I. T. Chemistry graduate. She spoke fluent english and spent a lot of time in the states. She was organizing all the stuff. Frank had beenbeen grabbed on t street and plucked in the head for a 3,000 bounty. He was 22. Shes organizing it until finally suspicions forming on her and she manages to get out in nick of time. She goes up to the mountains as well. He does a spread of the guerilla gals looking like flower children. This sexy look thats the counter part of the handsome guys. All the women were going out. Sewing uniforms. Others would join and wanted to fight. Fidel starts a womens platoon. Its something of a world first. At least like 25 years before west point. They had their own platoon. Its like a dozen of them who go out into combat the whole time. Meanwhile, im sort of cracking it along here. We got a lot of revolution to get to. Meanwhile, they are becoming more and more popular. They would drift into into villages and sort of like a party. It would be like a fiesta. He decides hes got to get rid of these guys. Just by hanging around, they are sort of winning in a strange way. They are showing how weak he is. He gets 10,000 soldiers and sends it off into the mountains. He calls the operation the end of fidel. They all plow up into the mountai mountains. Fidel gets word of it. If they set up around and set boobie traps along the mountain trails. Hes got 300 men. Being a classical scholar he says its like the stand of the sparta spartans. It didnt end well for the spartans. That was his idea. The fs the overwhelming odds were there. They had all sorts of contingency plans. In the end they are able to terrify they recruits so much. They give up. They start surrendering on mass. He has this brilliant idea of treating them well. Feeding them, giving them medicine and sending them back. The guys all go back. They say we gave up. They are quite decent. They are not hurting us. Every one else in the army starts to realize why are we dying for 35 a month. They start to lose faith as well in the struggle. He gives up and they decide to leave fidel in the mountains assuming thats kind of it. Fidel has other ideas. Within weeks of this sort of ot. Within weeks of this incredible survival he decides to send two others the other great leader that is extremely popular in cuba. He decides to send them down to the lowlands on what seems like a Suicide Mission to trudge across the open terrain and to set up bases further into the island. If you go around there now, its extremely beautiful. But its quite exposed. They were often strived. They found the people in the lowlands werent that helpful or friendly. A lot of them, the propaganda went out there were communists that shouldnt be supported. At this stage, this is where chey decides to wear a beret. At the beginning stage with cavalry crosses not with a red star. Hes going on a mule. He had terrible asthma. He often had to be carried. For days guys would be lugging him around yelling at him, come on, you argentine, get moving and dragging him physically. He seemed like more of a liability in many stages than an asset. He proves his leadership in this sort of perhaps because of the asthma, he has this incredible endurance, and he goes to mountains and sets up base there and organizes all the other antibatiste forces. He meets a 26yearold from santa clara. Sort of a shes a former teacher. And she has joined the revolution, been burned, as they say and fled up to the mountains. They start this after an initial they didnt like each other to begin with, but she at one stage hes driving by in a jeep, and he sees her by the road. He says ive got to get up the road. Jump in. She hops in. And in a sense she says in a sense she never got out of the jeep. She ends up working for chey. They get married, and have four children. In fact, i was just in havana hanging out with the oldest of their four children who does motorcycle tours in cuba. Meanwhile fidel is chilling out in the mountains and doing interviews and organizing things until in november he goes down to the lowlands as well to try and take the fight to the batistes army. Thats all going on in the east. In the center of the island chey decides to attack the main town called santa clara where all the railroads intersect. Its the great basically the heart of cuba, and theres a leader behind him. Hes wandering along giving orders. None of the guerillas had ever taken a city before, let alone with 100 men. They sort of creep in and start fighting door by door, and the soldiers start giving up. And then he comes up with this other sort of very simple but sort of brilliant idea. All through the whole struggle up and down cuba, this armored train was rattling back and forth carrying troops and hundreds of guns and bombs and hand grenades. Moving arsenal. Its heavily fortified and its sent to santa clara. Chey does an attack, and the they start to retreat with the train. He got a caterpillar from the agricultural school. He got them to tear up the tracks. So the train comes barrelling down at full speed and is derailed, and its it wrecks and all the guys jump out. The ones that dont, they throw in molotov cocktails. That was their other great weapon for easy to make for cheap. Women used to carry them around in soda containers so they could fight with them. In santa clara people would make molotov cocktails for them and pass them out the windows to be used. This happens the 30th of december 1958. News filters out theyve managed to seize this train. And the men go in. They have hundreds of guns, machine guns, baa zeekas and ne filters back to havana. The dictator who was worried there would be a military coup or he would be arrested and stand trial, decides to cut and run. He has a regular new Years Eve Party. Its like god father part ii. He has chicken on rice at a party and a cup of coffee with brandy and reads this statement, that hes about to leave havana, abanden cuba and theres three dc 4s waiting on the airstrip and he has a list of names of people going with him. What happens is everyone that is in disbelief and people start running to the airplanes that are idoling away. And the pilots have no idea where theyre going. They go in there and do the list of names. Some of the military rush off trying to get money and batsite has seized money already out of the swiss bank accounts. They pile into the three planes and head off. Two of them go to florida. Not to miami which was extremely pro fidel at this stage. They go to jacksonville instead and palm beach. The other one with the dictator, the americans finally decided a couple weeks earlier that they could no longer support batiste, and not only that, they wouldnt let them into the country. So he flied to the Dominican Republic who welcomes him with open arms. Suddenly everyone theres a sort of word starts to filter out on new years day. The state radio doesnt announce it. They just play music over and over again. Word gets out, and then people start taking to the streets and the supporters of fidel come out with dwguns and start to take or the streets of havana. Theres shooting. Fidel is over in the east in a farm. He hears about it in the radio. He has no idea this guy is going to come in. Its like wow, at first he thinks its a coup. Then he realizes hed better do something. He goes where he he gives a rousing speech on the evening of new years day. He claims a victory for the revolution, but he makes sure to do it in the place where the spanish surrendered after the spanish american war. Part of the whole root of the revolution was that the cubans in the late 19th century have been trying to get rid to the spanish. The United States intervened right at the last minute. 1898 and saved the day. They decided to occupy cuba for three years in a military occupation. And they refused they dont even allow the cubans to come into thor is moe ceremoniecerem. It was considered one of the great historical insults, and the root of much enmity. So fidel makes certain to do this to do the declaration with the cubans there, with his guerillas there, and instead of flying straight so havana he comes up with the idea of going over land in the caravan of victory, taking a week and stopping at key points, giving speeches. His skill as an or ray or the comes out. The endless twohour speeches begin, and cubans love him. At each step of the way he gets more and more support until finally he comes to havana. This is the famous part where he has spent others ahead to get the main barraks. One of the observers said it was enough to make you burst out laughing. No one could understand there was no resistance at all. They were giving up. The cia couldnt understand it. They thought there should be some sort of negotiated opposition. But as fidel gets closer and closer to havana, its obvious he has 99 support of the population. He arrives in havana and goes to the main military base in front of the place where the new Years Eve Party occurred, and he gives this incredible speech of the revolution as it finally triumphed. As he does the women in the front row release these doves. Symbols of peace and good fortune. They land on the podium. For the rest of the speech, they are sitting there, and giving this sort of divine ora. This benediction. Its considered extremely good luck. And so in the following weeks, the main magazine has a portrait of him with a halo. He was considered this strangely christlike figure. Its a little difficult to believe, but he was considered a savior of the island. Camilo is popular. Hes from havana. Hes good looking. He was described as a more like a roomba dancer than a guerilla. Meanwhile chey gets married. They kept a 1950s relationship as they traveled around in the mountains. Most of the time they were too dirty, too exhausted or tired to have any romantic relationship. When they get to havana, things start to progress, and its one of the first revolutionary majors. Raul and vilma get married. Fidel doesnt. He starts taking up with random admirers of which there are many. And celia, she backs out. She stays the great organizer, but and they have a suite in the havana hilton, but their romantic side starts to side. The guerillas keep their look, their uniforms, their long hair. They keep their beards. Theyre like the prototype hippies. To make a complete contrast with the very staid eisenhower era madmen sort of look of the time. And one of the things that i found interesting was if you look at the magazines of the period, the contrast between the guerillas and the grail la gals and the advertisements that are there in american magazines is particularly striking, because guys are in this short back and sides. In their suits and ties. The men in the gray flannel suit going off to work. And theyre polishing their shoes. The women are all sort of the ideal house wife. Theyre cooking for the kids. Theyre doris day looking. The contrast was very striking. In a sense, the 60s as we know them as we refer to them in shorthand were beginning in 1959. This sort of idea of this rebellious youth movement. It was sort of already brewing in the United States in a time where especially in young people, theres a lot of dissatisfaction growing. Fidel was regarded, the james dean sort of character. A marlon brando, a rebel with a cause sort of thing. Fidel is having a blast, hanging out with earnest hemmingway. This period, 1959 is winding down now in case youre wondering. Its like the final period. Its what i call the honeymoon of the revolution. I steal that phrase. Its a time where everyone loved fidel. Everyone loved chey. In the United States they were heros, the barboodos. In april they were invited to speak to the American Society of editors in washington. And they all fly up. And then they are popular here. When they go to new york, theyre mobbed. Theres like 20,000 people who meet them at penn station. Fidel is carried on the shoulders. He climbs the Empire State Building and goes to a zoo and gives a speech to 20,000 people in central park. Again, all the press coverage is very its as if americans are recognizing their own better selves. This sort of sense of a small group who managed to overthrow an evil empire. And juan was popular among African Americans who at the cusp of the Civil Rights Movement saw in cuba over night they get rid of segregation laws. Suddenly all the hotels, everything is open. It turns out its not as easy as that. Theres a lot of other things but officially segregation is gone. The struggle in the United States is only just beginning. Here we have sort of fidel and chey, more and more chummy and chey is starting to wear the star as he becomes more radical and the revolution takes a drift to the left. And the fights begin after the marvelous trip to new york. Things go awry in the United States. Partly because the washington visit was not successful at all. In public as an amazing thing. Everyone loved them. Seemed like a huge success for fidel and the gang, but it turned out that eisenhower was miffed it wasnt an official visit, fidel was just turning up. He made sure he was out of washington playing golf for the whole fulltime fidel was here. He sends nixon, his vice president. And nixon and fidel hate each other on sight. They have a 90minute meeting. It doesnt go well. Nixon is convinced fidel is naive. Fidel calls nixon a son of a bitch, an opinion that others have shared, i suppose. Dislikes him and realizes things might not go as well as hed hoped. He wanted to commune to the american people. To the frustration of his body guards, he loosed to leap over the barriers and start shaking hands with americans, hugging them. Yelling out i need to meet my people. I want to meet my people. Its like a rock star. And at one stage he sort of thinks hes getting his message through, and hes in the hotel room. They describe him doing a dance. Theyre starting to understand us. Theyre starting to understand us. He couldnt quite figure out why americans were so obsessed with the communist and why they didnt understand and fully sympathize with the main goal of independence of cuba. They wanted an independence, unfortunately, it was basically economic independence and america ran everything. And the best land. They owned the railroads and the electricity companies. They owned the telephones. There was sort of a crash course it was ahead. And naively the both american and cuba at the initial stages were thinking it could be avoided. But things started to go awry as 1959 progressed. Toward the end of 1959 eisenhower authorizes assassination of fidel. They start to talk about an invasion plan. By 1960 fidel comes back to new york to speak at the u. N. And is snubbed everywhere and hated, vilified. And hes in his hotel, and in the hotel guys, they accuse him of plucking chickens and killing them and cooking them in the hotel room. They go to harlem. This is hugely popular with the African American community. There was this rally outside. Malcolm x goes to visit. One of the other visitors is kr chris shef who is offering economic aid and will offer more. The americans had banned imports of cuban sugar. The russians sort of hanging around in the wings offer to buy the whole lot at inflated prices. It goes from there from bad to worst. One of the great historical accidents, cuba is like a pawn in the cold war. The russians are sort of there in the wings. The idea during the revolution that there would be missiles based in cuba within a year, within a couple years would have been like science fiction, but meanwhile here we have this iconic image of chey, the original iconic image taken at a rally in 1960 when things are going south with him in the states. Theres a huge explosion of a freighter in the harbor. Everyone in cuba is convinced its staged by the cia. Theres never been proof, but the cia was doing enough other stuff. And here he is, hes standing looking into the distance, and a cuban photographer takes a couple of snaps of him. And it went vertical and a couple horizontals. This one they publish and forget about it. He he crops it and hangs it up in his studio until after chey died in bolivia. An italian Fashion Designer comes and sees it and asked if they have borrow it. Takes it to italy and does screen prints of it. It becomes one of the worlds by 68 its one of the worlds great images, and its now so familiar that in many ways its all people can remember of the revolution. So thats that story. I dont even know what time it is. I havent got a watch. Is this its 7 51 . Is that right . Should it be time for questions . Time for questions . Okay. Down in the front there. [ inaudible ] im curious about your Research Process in cuba. What was your process in cuba, and did you have government minders . Government officials who sheparded you or not . Or were you fairly free to do the kind of research that you wanted . What was my process . And was i followed . You know, cuba changed a lot by the obama years. There was sort of a window of opportunity. Not only was this the first commuting book about cuba, i was able to zip back and forth down to cuba and stay for a week and come back. I could go to the archives, make my request. They could think about it for a month which is what they often like to do. Theres one place that celia set up, the office of historical affairs. She got everything to do with the revolution, and put it in one sort of repository. And t still there and you can go in and make requests. You have to get special permission, an academic visa. It became difficult unfortunately after in the trump era because they america and the cubans sacked all their stuff. Its hard to get a visa of any kind thats not a tourist visa. But i did manage to get academic visas. I would go in there, and i would just sort of explain what i was doing. And they were very helpful. But the real reason i was able to break into it was that a friend of mine in nancy stout had written the first biography of celia in december. There hadnt been a biography of celia in cuba. Not a real biography. She spent a lot of time meeting people. She hung out there. She had a translator who had worked at the office, so she became sort of friends with them. And when i went down, she introduced me to the translator who had also worked there. The translator introduced me to the guys and i had this group. In cuba everything is personal. Its very sort of handshakes and whatever. I would sort of hang around there. It didnt hurt that i was australian. I had a more objective view in theory, but i sort of hung around. If you hang around, t easier to give stuff than have me come in all the times. One of the funny things is they have no catalog. Theyd say what do you want to see . Im like what have you got . Theyre like no, you have to ask for something specifically. And then i would sort of id ask for the diaries and id ask for certain letters and then when it came with the letter yss, other things would come up. By the end, i took the guys who worked there. Id take them out for lunch, and around the corner there was a swiss restaurant which is absolutely indistinguishable from any other cuban restaurant. They had beer. I would buy them beer. They had never tasted that kind of beer before. They felt the sense of privilege, and i sort of became friends with them. I would email them back and forth and tell them when i was coming. They started to bring things out. Juans diary was a major thing. I was asking did anyone else write diaries or do that . Eventually they brought up rauls which is kind of extraordinary. Because its very clever and witty. He has a great sense of humor. Whatever you think of him in his later life, he was kind of like an appealing sort of character, much more fun than fidel. Fidel was you couldnt dance. He was obsessed with politics in mexico city theyd try to take him out, and he was they line up dates with people who were also in the movement, and fidel would bore them to tears. And raul would kick him under the table, trying get him to talk doing politics, but he wouldnt do it. There was that sort of thing, but also hanging around down there, theyre still quite old theyre still around the old fighters. The ones that have been very young during the revolution. Some of the leaders are still hanging around. There was one guy who became famous. He was still around. He was shuffling back and forth in the archive. Id see him there. Hes like 90 now. Hes uniform. I told him what i was doing. He said oh, im just writing a book about the womens platoon. He was involved in it at some stage. He showed it to me. We chatted about it. He told me a few stories. And that was kind of a little breakthrough as well. And pueblo, a woman guerilla who became state in the military. I did things like theres an annual ceremony on the anniversary of celias death. Its in the cemetery. And then all the revolutionary things are buried except for fidel. I went there, and i realized that everyone was there. And i sort of went around and said hi. Not pressing or anything. Just, you know, make i could chat or whatever. And so i was sort of they knew i was kind of around and i was interested in stuff and i was actually taking it seriously. And i was doing research in cuba instead of a lot of, you know, american historians do it in princeton or in miami or whatever. I was actually going there and going to the locations and meeting all the people, and i would go out and meet minor figures who were guerillas. Theyre in their 90s. They dont remember much. Their stories are a little hard to follow. And then you sort of but then you see the photographs on the walls, and there he is with fidel. There he is with chey. Memories one jogged and theyd tell stories. The marvelous thing is in the 70s and 80s they started to write memoirs. A lot of the stories they were telling were related to the memoirs. And you could go back and find all these things. A lot of them are only published in cuba. There would be one copy at nyu because there was a connection with nyu. So you would you can go back and find this stuff that no one has really looked at. Its at a time thats not that ideologically saturated. It was kind of a story, kind of a story that everyone kind of agrees on. Things change completely obviously in 1959. And theres a big debate, the biggest is whether fidel was communist all along and he was lying and keeping to himself. Theres no evidence of this at all. In fact, the communist party and the movement, the 26th of july movement hated each other. The communists wouldnt join and didnt support the strikes. They didnt they were kind of useless. It was only at the end when fidel had a rolling thing going. The Cuban Communist Party sort of comes along. Anyway, to answer your question, you sort of hang around and things come to you at a certain stage. Any other questions . Down there . What do you see for the future of cuba . Its not looking good. Its not looking great in the shortterm. As you know trump has just tightened the embargo which has been going since eisenhower blocked sugar in 1959, 1969, and then jfk imposed the trade embargo. But there was laws passed in the 1990s that could have strangled cuba. But no president has ever enforceed this one particular law which allows people to sue companies that are basically dealing with cuba and using any piece of land that was appropriated during the revolution. And thats almost everything. And they can even sue german companies, frerchg companies, whatever. Its dubious whether it has a basis in international law, but its scaring everyone off entirely. The day it came in i was in cuba the week before it came into force, a couple weeks, the second of may. Everyone was freaking out because already shortages were going around. Shipments were shopping. Everyone is worrying its going to be going back to a special period in the 1990s, and it remains to be seen what effect it will finally have, but its not auspicious, and the very day that it was passed, a family in miami sued Carnival Cruise lines because they were using a dock taken in 1961. Not only do you get the amount in modern dollars. Its triple damages as well. I think the sum of suing was 500 million. And theres hundreds of these cases. I believe 3,000 cases that are particularly on the books. It remains to be seen the effect on cuba. Its not going to be for the best, and its not going to encourage an opening up, i dont think. Yeah. What were the circumstances that led batista to leave the country . Theres a lot of analysis and studies done on that. He still had basically 40,000 troops. The guerillas ran part of the lowlands. They cut off santa clara, but that was one city. A lot of the generals assumed they would keep going and fidel himself thought it would take a couple more years at least. Theres one book i find interesting called the war of the flee. It was robert taker, a cbs newsman who becomes prorevolution and joins the revolution after fidel wins. He becomes a journalist for the revolution newspaper. He goes around carrying a revolver and everyone shakes his hand in the street because everyone knows him from the tv show. He writes a book studying guerilla warfare and how does it manage to win . He comes up with the argument that they dont militarily win. They create the conditions for collapse. They weaken the other forces, the morale goes. The soldiers dont want to fight. Things start to crumble internality. If it was a pitched battle, you know, it would have been an open and shut case. The whole thing starts to fold to bits. Batista started to worry there was a military coup within his own forces because he was so disliked and so open about his sort of corruption. He was kind of shameless by that stage. He had when he was younger been quite progressive in certain ways. But as he got older, he became more and more cynical. The men were leaving every monday, a briefcase full of money on his desk. It was shameless. He became worried that it was he would personally be arrested and then put on trial, perhaps, executed as a war criminal. So he decides to cut and run. And it was the battle of santa clara, the victory that there that sent shock waves through the military and convinced batista the time is up. Yeah. Like a thief in the night he got out. Much of the disgust of many of his supporters. His main police chief in havana was there at the party, and said why why didnt someone tell me . I could have brought my wife and kids. He had to leave without his wife and children. Others had no way out. They prepared escape plans but many didnt get out. They were seized. In the end, a lot of them were put on trial, and some of them unfortunately not the most edifying trials. They were rather sort of a call for blood, because some the mothers went to raul running it, there was a bunch of mothers that came up and said when are we going to get vengeance . Me we know the men. Theyre walking in the streets. It was a terrible time to be a young man, they were 14, 15, 16, and they just would be seized, tortured, and buried in very shallow graves. People were going around digging up the shallow graves. Theres a longing for vengeance which unfortunately they didnt carry out in a very good way at all. They sort of mocked the show trial in the sports stride yum. It was unfortunately called the coliseum. Its still there. People were howling for blood. They only had a few show trials when they realized what a pr disaster they were, but chey was put in charge of the trials over in a spanish fortress. Some in the end about 550 of the men were executed. But it was a big rift in National Opinion when that happened. Was there another question . Have we got time yeah. Another one back there. Sure. Whats the state of the cuban Education System and whats the ideology of the Younger Generation there . The state of the cuban Education System and the ideology of the Younger Generation . Well, i think the Education System is going fine. Its still at the highest literacy rating in latin america. There hadnt been the resources. Again, like the hospitals are great. They just dont have the medicine. Its because of the various trade problems, and they go on. But the younger peoples opinions, its difficult to generalize about this sort of thing. Theyre definitely much more jaded about the revolution. Theyre not necessarily about to rise up and revolt against the system. They just sort of are trudging along waiting for something to change, waiting for these guys to die off like raul. They had this sort of unusual view of things in my opinion, of my experience, that they regard them as kind of crazy grandparents. Theyve got this sort of you know, these ideas. Theyre out of date. They dont work, but yeah, its like you know, theres an affection for them. They still have an admiration for the revolution itself. Its still first name basis, fidel, chey, others. The heroic nature of that is sort of not denied. But its gone so far awry. And the changes that everyone is expecting are so slow, and theres so many false starts that its theres a sense of theres a sense of a lot of the young people dont have much to do. Theres a sense of lost theres no opportunity. Its kind of a very tragic sort of mood, especially now. And under the obama years theres a sense of incredible optimism. Even more than obama years, it was when the Rolling Stones concert occurred. That was the most symbolic thing. Hundreds of thousands of people converged to listen to the Rolling Stones and they all trudge back into havana. Theres a sense that anything is possible. That all sort of fell to bits. Now the rhetoric is and the opportunity in the United States and cuba is harsh. The new president is a party guy. The reforms that they started in 2011 which were an opening up of the economy. Theres 200 jobs that now people can earn foreign currency on. That was changing things more than the normalization of relations with the United States or the flights, the travel, making it easier to travel. Because tourists have always been going to cuba, and they will still. The United States was a weakened force. People were shocked. The place is crawling with japanese and italians and australians. Havana is a touristy place. The rest of the world has been going all this time. Thats still going to go along and theyre going to start relying more and more. So the sense of optimism that it was three or four years ago really has died. The last times ive been in havana, theres a bleak mood there, and the young people are like, you know, anyone who can get out, who can get out is getting out. Its a flight of creative people sort of younger people, and theres sort of a sadness that settled over. Theres always been sort of a melon collie in havana, but the moment of optimism has withered, unfortunately. Anyway, i think were all right. Thats it. Ill hold my hands up like fidel. There we go. Thank you. This is a special edition of American History tv. A sample of the compelling history programs that air every weekend on American History tv like lectures in history, american artifacts, real america, the civil war, oral histories, the presidency, and special event coverage about our nations history. Enjoy American History tv now and every weekend on cspan3. Featuring American History tv programs as a preview of whats available every weekend on cspan3. Tonight a look at the 50th anniversary of the kuyahoga river fire in 1969 which helped start clean water and environmental movements. A historian joined us to talk about the fire, the myths associated with it, and the campaign to find solutions. He is the coauthor of where the river burned j the struggle to save cleveland. American history tv airs tonight on cspan3. Saturday at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on lectures and history, female activists and the 1960s civil right movement. While women were instrumental in helping to organize and put the march together, the event was purely dominated by men. Sunday at 4 30 p. M. Eastern, the global significance of the declaration of independence during and after the american revolution. Multiple translations of our declaration also made their way to colombia, venezuela, and ecuador over the course of the 50year period after 1776. A half century known to scholars as the age of revolutions. And at 6 00 p. M. , eyewitness accounts from inside the white house during the apollo 11 lunar landing. And we really staked ourselves into the cabinet room throughout the day. The windows were dark. Were into nighttime. The module landed at 4 15 in the afternoon, and then the astronauts did not walk until later. Explore our nations past on American History tv every weekend on cspan3. Sunday night on q and a. We were taken out of the hall and confronted this mob of angry people. Middle bury College Political science professor talks about being physically attacked in 2017 after an appearance by author Charles Murray on campus. At the end of your discussion, you left that room and went where and what happened . The fact of the matter is i dont really remember much of it. I couldnt even tell you what door we went out, but we were taken out of the hall and confronted this mob of angry people. Some of whom were in masks. They were shoving and jostling. Their target was Charles Murray. Sunday night at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspans q and a. Next on American History tv, a discussion with former u. S. Secretary of state Condoleezza Rice about the changing role of u. S. Democracy and foreign policy. This is about an hour and 20 minutes. Good afternoon, everyone. I am tom, the director of the hoover institution. Im please to have had you join us as we celebrate the institutions 100th year anniversary. In recognition of this occasion, we have organized a centennial Speaker Series titled a century of ideas for a free society. This features 11 Panel Discussions that span the course of the year to showcase the scholarship and Research Central to the institutions mis