Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz (13 August 1926 – 25 November 2016) was a Cuban communist revolutionary and statesman who was the leader of Cuba from 1959 to 2011. He served as prime minister from 1959 to 1976, president from 1976 to 2008, and first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from 1965 until 2011. Ideologically a Marxist–Leninist and Cuban nationalist, under his administration Cuba became a one-party communist state; industry and business were nationalized, and socialist reforms were implemented throughout society.
Born in Birán, the son of a wealthy Spanish farmer, Castro adopted leftist and 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 year's imprisonment, Castro travelled 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 Batista's forces from the Sierra Maestra. After Batista's overthrow in 1959, Castro assumed military and political power as Cuba's prime minister. The United States came to oppose Castro's government and unsuccessfully attempted to remove him by assassination, economic embargo, 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 wars. These actions, coupled with Castro's leadership of the Non-Aligned Movement from 1979 to 1983 and Cuban medical internationalism, increased Cuba's profile on the world stage. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union 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 Chávez's Venezuela—and formed 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. Castro died at the age of 90 from natural causes in November 2016.
Castro was the longest-serving non-royal head of state in the 20th and 21st centuries and polarized world opinion about his rule. His supporters view him as a champion of socialism and anti-imperialism whose revolutionary government advanced economic and social justice while securing Cuba's independence from American hegemony. His critics view him as a dictator whose administration oversaw human rights abuses, the exodus of many Cubans, and the impoverishment of the country's economy.
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was born out of wedlock at his father's farm on 13 August 1926. His father, Ángel Castro y Argiz, was a migrant to Cuba from Galicia, northwest Spain. After the collapse of his first marriage he took his household servant, Lina Ruz González—of Canarian ancestry—as his mistress and later second wife; together they had seven children, among them Fidel. At age six, Castro was sent to live with his teacher in Santiago de Cuba, before being baptized into the Catholic Church at the age of eight. His baptism allowed Castro to attend the La Salle boarding school in Santiago, and was later sent to the Jesuit-run Dolores School in Santiago.
In 1942, Castro transferred to the Jesuit-run El Colegio de Belén in Havana. In 1945, Castro began studying law at the University of Havana where he became embroiled in student activism and the violent gangsterismo culture within the university. After becoming passionate about anti-imperialism and opposing US intervention in the Caribbean, he unsuccessfully campaigned for the presidency of the Federation of University Students. Castro became critical of the corruption and violence of President Ramón Grau's government, delivering a public speech on the subject in November 1946 that received coverage on the front page of several newspapers.
In 1947, Castro joined the Party of the Cuban People (Partido Ortodoxo), founded by Eduardo Chibás. Though Chibás came third in the 1948 general election, Castro remained committed to working on his behalf. Student violence escalated when Grau employed gang leaders as police officers, and Castro received a death threat urging him to leave the university, but he refused and began to carry a gun and surround himself with armed friends. Anti-Castro dissidents accused him of committing gang-related assassinations at the time, but these accusations remain unproven.
Rebellion and Marxism: 1947–1950
In June 1947, Castro joined a planned expedition to overthrow the government of Rafael Trujillo in the Dominican Republic. The military force intended to sail from Cuba in July 1947, but Grau's government stopped the invasion under US pressure, and Castro evaded arrest. Returning to Havana, Castro took a leading role in student protests against the killing of a high school pupil by government bodyguards. The protests and subsequent crackdown on suspected communists led to violent clashes between activists and police in February 1948, in which Castro was badly beaten. His subsequent public speeches took a leftist slant, condemning social and economic inequality in Cuba.
In April 1948, Castro travelled to Bogotá, Colombia, leading a Cuban student group sponsored by President Juan Perón's Argentine government. There, the assassination of leftist leader Jorge Eliécer Gaitán Ayala led to rioting and clashes between the governing Conservatives—backed by the army—and leftist Liberals. Castro joined the Liberal cause by stealing guns from a police station; subsequent police investigations concluded that he had not been involved in killings. In April 1948, the Organization of American States was founded at a summit in Bogotá, leading to protests, which Castro joined.
Returning to Cuba, Castro became a prominent figure in protests against government attempts to raise bus fares. He married Mirta Díaz Balart, through whom he was exposed to the lifestyle of the Cuban elite. The subsequent election was won by Partido Auténtico's new candidate, Carlos Prío Socarrás. Castro had moved further to the left and interpreted Cuba's problems as an integral part of capitalist society, or the "dictatorship of the bourgeoisie", rather than the failings of corrupt politicians, and adopted the Marxist view that meaningful political change could only be brought about by proletariat revolution. Visiting Havana's poorest neighbourhoods, he became active in the student anti-racist campaign.
In September 1949, Mirta gave birth to a son, Fidelito, so the couple moved to a larger Havana flat. Castro continued to put himself at risk, staying active in the city's politics and joining the 30 September Movement, which contained within it both communists and members of the Partido Ortodoxo. The group's purpose was to oppose the influence of the violent gangs within the university; despite his promises, Prío had failed to control the situation, instead offering many of their senior members jobs in government ministries.
Castro volunteered to deliver a speech for the Movement on 13 November, exposing the government's secret deals with the gangs and identifying key members. Attracting the attention of the national press, the speech angered the gangs and Castro fled into hiding, first in the countryside and then in the US. Returning to Havana several weeks later, Castro laid low and focused on his university studies, graduating as a Doctor of Law in September 1950.