[Marxism] Celia Hart: "How can you not be a Trotskyist in the Cuban Revolution!"

["Walter Lippmann" <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

This is one of the most intriguing of Celia Hart's discussions, coming as
it did at the end of her recent visit to Argentina. It's much too long to
post to Marxmail, so you'll have to go to the full interview to get all of
it. Those Marxmail readers who believe China is capitalist will be pleased.


Walter Lippmann
==========================================================================

In Defence of Marxism
Friday, July 6, 2007 

Interview with Celia Hart:
"How can you not be a Trotskyist in the Cuban Revolution!"
By David Rey - El Militante Argentina

Following Fidel's illness, there was plenty of talk about what will happen
when he's no longer alive. Some have mentioned the need of a transition à la
China. What do you think about all this? 

When the provisional cessation of Fidel's functions was announced on July 31
last year, we thought for an instant that the world was falling apart. For
the first time we realized that Fidel would die one day. To those who accuse
us of practicing a personality cult, etc., I always say that leaders play a
critical role in history. 
------------------------------------------
Listen, David, no revolutionary in the world is indifferent to Cuba or its
process, luckier than other revolutions such as Russia's. And not just
because Fidel is still alive and, as it were, a sort of Lenin's equivalent
with all the ups and downs typical of a Head of State in a climate of
unheard-of international stress, but because the left in its various forms
and the country's topnotch intelligentsia are fighting for Socialism, unlike
the USSR when Stalinism won through or when the Berlin Wall was torn down...
That's an advantage, much like those 70 years worth of the very valuable
experience of Eastern Europe, China and its problems, the demise of the
Nicaraguan revolution in the 1990s, and so on. Above everything else, Cuba
is lucky for the unparalleled opportunity we have to see a bunch of (never
betrayed) revolutions taking place and coming together. Our links with the
young Bolivarian revolution broaden our horizons and force us to improve
ourselves more and more. 

For all the slow pace of Bolivarian Venezuela's revolution -- unlike the way
it was in Cuba almost 50 years ago -- this communion is already showing
unequivocal leanings and contradictions. We had never seen a similar process
before. 

Once again are we hearing long-lost terms like "socialist revolution" or
"caricature of revolution", etc. When my first writings were published, many
people asked me in surprise what socialism I was talking about, or what I
meant by all that about the permanent revolution, Trotsky, and so on. 

New discussions are now underway, especially in certain fora (like the
recently held meeting of the economists, or the one they called "From Marx
to Today"), all closely related to the Venezuelan intelligentsia, and I
believe it's a chance for radical intellectuals and leftists the world over
to come to Cuba and Venezuela to take part in those debates and commit
themselves to our realities. 

When people ask me about Cuba's future, I give them this picture: "Cuba's
future is also walking down the streets in Caracas, while the Venezuelan
comrades are also defending the continuity of the Cuban Revolution. They
have a huge responsibility, and that's why our unrestricted "and always
critical" support to the remarkable accomplishments of Chávez's speech has
become our main bulwark...without disregarding what we have at home". It's
like seeing how the Permanent Revolution thesis of that Russian in 1905
comes to life a century later. 

For that reason, a Chinese-style transition, which I dread, is defiantly
challenged with an increasingly radical Venezuela. Who will prevail? Making
bets is not to a revolutionary's liking. While others take time to make up
their mind, we will be fighting without respite for the sake of the only
choice that Fidel Castro's outrageously beautiful and coherent revolution
deserves. 
----------------------------------------------
Finally, Celia, how do you appraise your stay in Argentina, the presentation
of your book and other activities?

I'm glad you asked. It's been great, excellent; I never imagined it would be
like that. Still, I'll take the opportunity to tell you something I've
thought about a lot in order to understand such welcome. As I said in our
conversation, I went through the same thing that happened to Charles Chaplin
in his emblematic film Modern Times, when by sheer chance he climbs out of a
sewer right when some strikers were demonstrating and someone put a red
banner in his hand as he was lurching to and fro. It's been more or less
like that: many of my qualities don't depend on me at all. I come from the
Cuban revolution, to which my revolutionary parents are bonded, and I've
just been fairly consistent with all that. Other than a certain skill at
putting letters together, that's all. 

What counts is that Leon Trotsky and radical thought are in people's minds
today, and the resonance I mentioned before has taken place, albeit
momentarily. Just notice how Chávez becomes more popular as he talks about
Trotsky and Gramsci, a sign that revolutionary thinking and internationalism
belong in the present historical moment. Curiously enough, it's starting to
be a popular topic. I've done nothing in my life to deserve the treatment I
receive, except being on the same wavelength as the circumstances, by
chance, just like it happened with Charlie coming out of that sewer. 

Furthermore, I was still wet behind the ears when I aligned myself with
radical Marxist ideas. I stumbled upon Trotsky at the right time and under
the right circumstances, after I had searched and searched for a long time
-- he had been concealed from me as well as from many others. I met him a
little before the fall of the Berlin Wall, which made his ideas see all the
more fresh and reviving... 

With all my heart I undertook the Cuba revolution's radical and
internationalist route, so inherent to and manifest in Cuban history as it
started with José Martí and the class party he founded to achieve our
delayed independency; Julio Antonio Mella, whom the regrettably well-known
Vidali accused of being a Trotskyist too; Antonio Guiteras and Joven Cuba
[Young Cuba]; the Popular Socialist Party's successive strategic mistakes
(with Machado and Batista); the attack on the Moncada Garrison, where my
uncle Abel Santamaría and my mother took part together with Fidel; the
creation of the 26th of July Movement, with my parents among the founders,
which embodied the ideal of a vanguard movement fully opposed to any
electoral option, unlike the PSP, the former Communist Party of Cuba, whose
leaders stopped calling the revolutionaries adventurers only one year before
they won. 

And there's Fidel, with his immense, deep sights set on the revolutionary
processes. If ever a revolution can reveal itself to be permanent and
lacking confused stages, that's ours! Finally, there's Che and his
intangible truth. That's what got me closer to Trotskyism. 

In light of today's realities, when the means of survival of the longest and
most coherent revolution in history are going through another revolution,
the Old Man's principles are taking shape. 

All these factors are piling up on me. Many ask me in surprise, "How can you
be a Trotskyist in Cuba?" And I answer, full of confidence: "Wrong: how can
you not be a Trotskyist in Cuba", given our historic revolutionary tradition
and our quintessential internationalist nature. 

Cuban thinker and revolutionary Fernando Martínez Heredia declared at a
recent meeting: "Marxist thinking is a substantial part of Cuban culture". 
I tried to think of other countries where that happens, but was unable to
come up with more than a few. We put up with no dictators in Cuba; not one
person has ever disappeared. Our people rose up after the Moncada crimes and
the government had to pardon Fidel Castro. We were scared of neither Bay of
Pigs nor the Missile Crisis. We took a notable part in the overthrow of
apartheid in Africa; we put paid to Fukuyama's thesis by holding up the
slogan Socialism or Death. We're on our way to the 50 year of revolution; 
we have flooded the world with doctors and teachers. 

Trotsky is also ours as he was in a way "growing wild" within these events,
as others did, in perfect harmony with our sun, our rum and our cigars.
That's why I say, David, that I got smuggled in this story with a certain
naiveté, trying to use the world's Marxist thinking to accomplish the
consistency I had learned to appreciate since I was a child. 

I do assure you, comrade, that whoever tries to take away from me the little
red banner Chaplin had in Modern Times will have to do it over my dead body.


Thank you very much, Celia, and until next time. 

Thank you, and thanks again to El Militante and the Friedrich Engels
Foundation for giving me so happy moments... You're experts at that...at
making me happy.

FULL

http://www.walterlippmann.com/ch-07-06-2007.html 
A CubaNews translation. Edited by Walter Lippmann. 

Original:
http://www.marxist.com/entrevista-celia-hart-revolucion-cubana.htm   



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