Fidel Castro

Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz (fiˈðel aleˈxandɾo ˈkastɾo ˈrus; 13 August 1926 – 25 November 2016) was a Cuban communist revolutionary politician, a Marxist–Leninist and Cuban nationalist. Castro governed the Republic of Cuba as First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from 1961 until 2011, Prime Minister from 1959 to 1976 and then as President of the Council of State and Council of Ministers from 1976 to 2008. Castro also served as the Commander-in-chief of the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces. Under his administration, Cuba became a one-party communist state, while industry and business were nationalized and state socialist policies were implemented throughout society.Born in Birán, Oriente as the son of a wealthy Spanish farmer, Castro adopted leftist anti-imperialist ideas while studying law at the University of Havana. After participating in rebellions against right-wing governments in the Dominican Republic and Colombia, he planned the overthrow of Cuban President Fulgencio Batista, launching a failed attack on the Moncada Barracks in 1953. After a years imprisonment, Castro traveled to Mexico where he formed a revolutionary group, the 26th of July Movement, with his brother Raúl Castro and Ernesto Che Guevara. Returning to Cuba, Castro took a key role in the Cuban Revolution by leading the Movement in a guerrilla war against Batistas forces from the Sierra Maestra. After Batistas overthrow in 1959, Castro assumed military and political power as Cubas Prime Minister. The United States came to oppose Castros government and unsuccessfully attempted to remove him by assassination, economic blockade, and counter-revolution, including the Bay of Pigs Invasion of 1961. Countering these threats, Castro aligned with the Soviet Union and allowed the Soviets to place nuclear weapons in Cuba, resulting in the Cuban Missile Crisis – a defining incident of the Cold War – in 1962.Adopting a Marxist–Leninist model of development, Castro converted Cuba into a one-party, socialist state under Communist Party rule, the first in the Western Hemisphere. Policies introducing central economic planning and expanding healthcare and education were accompanied by state control of the press and the suppression of internal dissent. Abroad, Castro supported anti-imperialist revolutionary groups, backing the establishment of Marxist governments in Chile, Nicaragua, and Grenada, as well as sending troops to aid allies in the Yom Kippur, Ogaden, and Angolan Civil War. These actions, coupled with Castros leadership of the Non-Aligned Movement from 1979 to 1983 and Cubas medical internationalism, increased Cubas profile on the world stage. Following the Soviet Unions dissolution in 1991, Castro led Cuba through the economic downturn of the Special Period, embracing environmentalist and anti-globalization ideas. In the 2000s, Castro forged alliances in the Latin American pink tide – namely with Hugo Chávezs Venezuela – and signed Cuba up to the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas. In 2006, Castro transferred his responsibilities to Vice President Raúl Castro, who was elected to the presidency by the National Assembly in 2008.The longest-serving non-royal head of state in the 20th and 21st centuries, Castro polarized opinion throughout the world. His supporters view him as a champion of socialism and anti-imperialism whose revolutionary regime advanced economic and social justice while securing Cubas independence from US hegemony. Critics view him as a tyrannical dictator whose administration oversaw human-rights abuses, the exodus of many Cubans, and the impoverishment of the countrys economy. Castro was decorated with various international awards and significantly influenced different individuals and groups across the world.

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