[R-G] Granma: We will always turn to his arsenal of ideas

[Macdonald Stainsby]

We will always turn to his arsenal of ideas

BY LAZARO BARREDO MEDINA

• THERE are not many times that this world has seen such ethical stature 
and political transparency as that just demonstrated by President Fidel 
Castro in his message, and he has done it with the verticality of always 
or, as an outstanding combatant qualified it a long time ago: "It’s a 
fact that, even in politics, Fidel is a gentleman."

Many of us supposed that that decision to communicate to us that he was 
not aspiring to, and nor would he accept the post of President of the 
Council of State was the prior announcement in that little paragraph 
contained in the profound political, economic and military analysis of 
the United States that he gave in his Reflections of last Friday, 
February 15.

But, while anticipated, the communication of the Commander in Chief of 
the Revolution has not failed to have a profound impact on us, not only 
on account of his decision, but because of the spirit of combat with 
which he has made it, its generosity and the call to meditate on the 
great significance of the responsibility that we all have in the in the 
struggle to keep aloft the banners of independence and socialism.

Fidel has not resigned, he has not bid us farewell, but on account of 
his physical limitations he has communicated to us a decision on which 
he has meditated a lot: "I only wish to fight as a soldier of ideas." 
That is the consequence of what he has always said to us and which he is 
now proclaiming with his example, that a communist has to dedicate one 
hundred percent of his or her energies, work and life to revolutionary 
undertakings.

Far from being distressed, we should support his decision and take up 
the challenge with firmness and a disposition to do things much better 
in order to attain the total invulnerability of our homeland, as he has 
asked us time and time again in the last few years.

The enemies of the Revolution, in conjunction with a gross manipulation 
by a notable section of the press, have been running their mouths off in 
the last few hours in a vain attempt to turn their desires into reality, 
and a handful of night owls have called for transitions – as if Cuba had 
not made its profound and total transformation from January 1, 1959 – 
and other deluded persons have even demanded armed uprisings. In their 
mediocrity, they fail to understand that in Cuba there will never again 
be a Zanjón Pact, but a permanent Baraguá and an unyielding Cry of 
Baire. There will be no return to petty dictatorships here, for unity 
and consensus around the Party will be maintained as an indestructible 
forge of the Cuban nation.

In this world where politics is a caricature, they are unable to 
understand that, in its thinking and action, this Revolution is a 
process of continuity; that compañero Fidel will continue being the 
leader of the Revolution of today and tomorrow, to whose ideas we will 
always have to turn. They cannot understand that Fidel has managed to 
transcend political life to insert himself as an intimate in the family 
life of the overwhelming majority of Cubans.

We shall continue awaiting the "Reflections of Comrade Fidel," which 
will be a powerful arsenal of ideas, direction and education, and we 
shall do so with the pride that we feel today on seeing that we have 
until his last breath a Comandante who roars, or, as an old worker 
emotionally said at one of the Party Congresses, in a loud voice full of 
sentiment and which has become the heritage of all revolutionaries: "The 
homeland once again contemplates with pride our Jefe, Fidel."

Translated by Granma International
-- 
Macdonald Stainsby
Coordinator, http://oilsandstruth.org
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In the contradiction lies the hope.
    --Bertholt Brecht.