Cuba Pt. 2: ¡Viva la Revolución! w/ Manolo De Los Santos

Feb 24, 2026

Manolo De Los Santos, founder of the People’s Forum and researcher at Tricontinental, walks through Cuba’s revolutionaries and key moments. Short scenes cover the Moncada attack, exile and the Granma return, guerrilla survival in the Sierra Maestra, the Santa Clara offensive, early land reform and social programs, political education campaigns, U.S. hostility, Guantánamo tensions, and Cuba’s internationalist support for other movements.

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INSIGHT

Selective Justice After Triumph

The revolution distinguished regular soldiers from torturers and collaborators when applying justice after victory.
Public tribunals judged those who committed massacres with victims' testimonies, while many regular soldiers were treated as POWs or quickly released.

INSIGHT

Rapid Social Reforms Changed Daily Life

Early post-59 reforms prioritized land redistribution, ending segregation, public beaches, health and education as rights.
Fidel even put his family's finca into land reform to demonstrate integrity and launch nationwide de-privatization.

INSIGHT

Revolution Redefined Democracy Beyond Elections

Fidel rejected a simple return to pre-1952 electoral democracy and argued revolution changes the meaning of democracy.
Manolo explains Cubans prioritized mass participation, local committees and mobilization over immediate elections during transformative change.

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In this episode, part 2 of our new series on Cuba, we're joined again by Manolo De Los Santos for a conversation on Cuba's revolution.. Manolo De Los Santos is a founder of the People's Forum and a researcher at Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research. He is the co-editor Viviremos: Venezuela vs. Hybrid War, Comrade of the Revolution: Selected Speeches of Fidel Castro, and Our Own Path to Socialism: Selected Speeches of Hugo Chávez.

The conversation picks up where part 1 left off, in the early 50s, setting the stage for lead up to 26th of July Movement and introducing some of the main characters of the revolution, including of course Fidel Castro and Ernesto "Che" Guevara. Manolo tells us about the attack on the Moncada Barracks, Fidel's exile to Cuba where he meets Che and begins training, and their return on the Granma to Cuba's Sierra Maestra mountains where they reignite the revolutionary guerrilla army of the 26th of July Movement. We talk about the Battle of Santa Clara which led to Batista's overthrow on January 1st, 1958 and the triumph of the revolution.

We explore the role of political education in the revolution and the role that the United States played in resisting the revolution. We then talk about the reforms that were initiated immediately after the revolution, the largest and most significant being land reform and de-privatization as well as some of the complexities of the early revolution such as elections. We analyze the Guantanamo Naval Base, notions of nonviolence and Cuba's material support of revolutionary movements across the globe.

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Listen to our ongoing series on Cuba

Intermission music: "Que Se Vayan" by El Guajiro

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