Nobody was listening

By: Pedro Corzo - 03/08/2026

Guest columnist.
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The US State Department has just published a document, in my opinion, a kind of judicial summary against Castro's totalitarianism, which will be very useful in convincing national public opinion of the danger that the structure of hatred that has governed Cuba since 1959 poses to this country and to Western cultural values.

The document entitled “Cuba: the capital of 21st Century Communism” consolidates the numerous activities against the United States and what this nation represents that have been orchestrated or sponsored by the largest of the Antilles since the same year it came to power.

It is true that, although much of the information is public knowledge, this is the first time that an official document from such an important branch of the federal government as the State Department has compiled so much varied research on the criminal actions of Castroism.

The destructive work of the brothers Fidel and Raul Castro against the United States began in the same year as the insurrectionary victory, in parallel with the attempt to establish a totalitarian system in Cuba that would prevent the independent management of the population.

Let's look at some institutions created by the island totalitarianism that for years the blind who do not want to see and the deaf who prefer not to hear, chose to consider as harmless apparatuses dedicated to intellectual work, friendship or information.

The Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Arts and Industries (ICAIC) was founded in March 1959. It was the first institution of the Castro regime, a gift from Fidel Castro to his friend Alfredo Guevara. ICAIC was used to glorify the revolution and denigrate the United States.

One of the most powerful apparatuses of Castroism, and one that has successfully fulfilled most of its purposes, was the disinformation agency “Prensa Latina,” established in mid-1959. This entity was the inspiration of Fidel Castro, serial killer Ernesto “Che” Guevara, and guerrilla journalist Jorge Ricardo Massetti, its first director general, who died in combat.

The idea of ​​creating a disinformation center, basically aimed at refuting capitalist news agencies by generating its own information and editing that of others—of course, this was never stated so clearly. The idea occurred to Fidel Castro in the Aula Magna of the University of Caracas, based on the need to combat what he called the news agency monopoly.

In April, the “House of the Americas” was created, supposedly a cultural center entirely separate from the ideological poles represented by the United States and the then-powerful Soviet Union. The “House” awarded prizes and enhanced prestige, particularly among young creators eager to establish themselves in the intellectual world; it also invited creators to participate as jurors, with all expenses covered by the state.

However, both potential jurors and contestants had to have credentials approved by the official government and their work had to correspond to the principles of the Revolution; otherwise, their prizes could be questioned, as happened to the poet Heberto Padilla in 1968, whose work was published but censored by the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba, the apparatus that controls Cuban authors with an iron fist.

The House of the Americas not only seduced and engaged Latin American intellectuals, but also Americans, whether as jurors or contestants. The goal was to recruit them so that upon their return they would carry a message of discontent to their centers of study and work, a task accomplished with equal or greater success by the Institute of Friendship with the Peoples (ICAP), established in December 1960. This organization possessed ample financial resources, which it used to dazzle individuals with great ambitions.

Among these tools fundamentally oriented towards asymmetric warfare, the "Committee for Fair Treatment for Cuba" stands out, founded in New York in April 1960, an apparatus that grouped intellectuals, activists and American citizens who defended the Cuban Revolution, considered that the hostility of Washington against the Castros, people who never took into account the mass executions inside the Island and the confiscation of property from honest citizens, including their compatriots.

The monstrosity that assumed power in Cuba was not a political proposal, much less an ideological one, but rather a framework of hatred, envy, and resentment. While it lacks the capacity to destroy its enemies in one fell swoop, it does possess the necessary tools to corrode those who oppose it from within; hence, its efforts to manipulate students and public officials.

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