Talk:Fidel Castro/Archive 16

grand
I know Chavez admires Castro, but the grand adverb is so, well, grand standing. It seems to me that admire would suffice. We don't need so many bellicose, or grandiose words sticking out in sentences. I know it's nit picking but shouldn't we just state things simply&clearly. Wiki: "The socialist president of Venezuela Hugo Chávez is a grand admirer of his and Bolivian president Evo Morales called him the "Grandfather". In Harlem, Castro is seen as an icon because of his historic visit with Malcolm X in 1960 at the Hotel Theresa.[102]"

I mean really, couldn't we leave out the first sentence and have a bit more info on the "historical" meeting with Malcom X. -Thank youEdwardito (talk) 20:53, 12 August 2009 (UTC)Edward Mckenzie
 * I took out the "grand" bit, at least. Chavez and Morales admiration of Castro is certainly relevant, given their policies in government, but I agree it's not the best place for the information. Perhaps it should be at the bottom of the section. Franamax (talk) 00:30, 13 August 2009 (UTC)


 * And now I've gone ahead and moved and reworded the bit. Everything is easily sourcable except perhaps the "icon" part - I'm not sure exactly how to phrase what is supposed to be an introductory sentence describing the recent support from newly leftist governments. Franamax (talk) 01:28, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Typos, punctuation
seniormost ... interperated ... worlds (sic) highest ... ? The punctuation needs working on, too. Caligo (talk) 18:03, 27 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Done, done and done! (But I might have the apostrophe in the wrong place on the last one - I can never figure out where it should go!) As far as punctuation goes, comment away or I could give you a bucket of commas and periods and you can just be bold and get fixin'! :) Franamax (talk) 02:31, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Canvassing
(outdent) Cerberus, this inquiry by you to User:Dodger67 could also be interpreted as an attempt to WP:CANVASS. Especially when you consider that Dodger's only edit presently on this talk page is him accusing the editors (breaking WP:NPA) here of being "Castro bootlickers". Exclusively seeking out someone who you believe may agree with your view (Roger is the only past editor that you made this request to) on a particular issue, is not proper Wiki protocol. Red thoreau (talk)RT 00:07, 19 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Redthoreau, As I read WP:CANVASS, I stayed well in bounds. I picked Roger for three reasons (after considering some others): there was some activity on his talk page (unlike most editors of this page), he professed to be interested in balance, and he was not part of this page's triumvirate.  I put little weight on the comment you cite because of its context and the kind of phrasing he finds amusing (which I deduced from his page).  Naturally I would have preferred to ask a Cuba scholar, but sadly I could not find one. Suggestions welcome.


 * That said, thanks for pointing me to WP:CANVASS, of which I was unaware. It seems clear to me that it authorizes a small number of public inquiries to other editors. Cerberus (talk) 00:08, 20 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I must admit that I don't understand Cerberus' argument. By his reasoning, you could not say "North Vietnam defeated U.S.-backed South Vietnam" because the last U.S. personnel pulled out moments before Saigon fell. The "U.S.-backed" phrasing is excrutiatingly well sourced and is perfectly clear to me, not withstanding the technical argument about when U.S. support ended. FWIW, I recommend keeping the phrase. Disclaimer: I have no dog in this fight! Cwelgo (talk) 15:31, 14 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Though I sympathize with Cerberus's fine point, I find it hard to rewrite the sentence, mainly because it is in one of the opening paragraphs. According to the sources, Batista's government was indeed backed by the US for most of its existence, but not at the end. To say all this in an introductory paragraph would make the section too cumbersome. But this is an important detail. Is Cerberus be willing to introduce this in a later paragraph within the body of the article? It would help with maintaining non POV (see WP:POV)--Luke Warmwater101 (talk) 16:55, 13 October 2009 (UTC)
 * It seems rather difficult to find an appropriate place to put further explanation within this article, since it deals with the life and actions of Fidel Castro. The article on Fulgencio Batista, wikilinked from the sentence in question, does indeed accurately describe the extent and timing of US support (i.e. right up 'til 11 days before Batista fled, although the arms embargo was the year before). So it's not like we're trying to hide or distort anything. Franamax (talk) 19:48, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

What about inserting something here like the sentence in italics:

In December 1958, the columns of Che Guevara and Camilo Cienfuegos continued their advance through Las Villas province. They succeeded in occupying several towns, and then began preparations for an attack on Santa Clara, the provincial capital. Guevara's fighters launched a fierce assault on the Cuban army surrounding Santa Clara, and a vicious house-to-house battle ensued. They also derailed an armored train which Batista had sent to aid his troops in the city while Cienfuegos won the Battle of Yaguajay. Defeated on all sides,  having lost all backup from the previously supportive US government, Batista's forces crumbled. The provincial capital was captured after less than a day of fighting on December 31, 1958.--Luke Warmwater101 (talk) 16:37, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
 * That seems reasonable to me, it's neutral and factually true, so I went ahead and made a change. However, I put the text in a slightly different place and added a sub-heading, since the "Battle of Yaguajay" section should be demarcated from the actual collapse of the government (and the collapse is probably a better place to clarify Cerberus's fine distinction). Franamax (talk) 18:04, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I finally made it back to this page and I must say I really like the changes. Thanks, Franamax for bringing this to such a satisfying resolution.--Luke Warmwater101 (talk) 00:39, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Dictator revisited
Ok, if by "critics" you mean "the rest of the world" than yes, he is considered a dictator. This article needs to reflect the fact that during his regime ppl literally risked death to escape him, and that he was a dictator. Soxwon (talk) 02:18, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Soxwon, have you ever been to Cuba? I have been there but my favorite island is Barbados, which I have been to many times, but I have also been to Bermuda, St Martin, Anguila, and St Lucia.  The Four Deuces (talk) 03:05, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
 * ...off topic much? Soxwon (talk) 03:46, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Maybe not. Cuba is just another Caribbean country and America has turned it into a rogue nation.  I would rather visit there than Iran, North Korea or many of the other countries that the US considers more worthy of their respect.  The Four Deuces (talk) 04:15, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Could be considered a dictator a man whom has been elected every five years by a National Assembly, which is elected also every five years? The candidates for elections are not postulated by parties, they are postulated at their neighborhoods by their neighbors. Since 1976, Fidel Castro has been postulated by a district at Santiago de Cuba every five years to integrate National Assembly, and then elected as President of the State Council by each legislature of each elected National Assembly. So, dictator?


 * I think we should avoid terms like dictator, tyrant, despot, or satrap, except when using them in their original meanings. Of course articles should include informed opinions which classify Castro as a dictator.  Cuba is regularly portrayed in American media in a biased manner.  It actually surpasses many other W. hemisphere countries in literacy public, health and other factors.  Nonetheless Cuba does not allow opposition parties to form or to present candidates for office.  The Four Deuces (talk) 14:32, 9 October 2009 (UTC)


 * This being an encyclopedia, we should strive to present the facts in a non POV manner. When the article says that  "Many of Castro's critics describe him as a dictator", that is a factually accurate statement. We are not attesting to the truth or falsity of this description, but simply acknowledging its existence. Similarly, it is entirely appropriate to present the opposite view, as long as properly sourced. Many view Castro as the savior of Cuba and a benefactor. It would be a good idea to present that in the same paragraph. --Luke Warmwater101 (talk) 01:06, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

NPOV?
"Castro has been portrayed as a dictator in spite of his disapproval of dictatorships."

Um...yeah. Where was his disapproval of the USSR, North Vietnam, Ethiopia under Mengistu, or Angola? He disapproved of pro-Western dictators (Papa Doc Duvalier, Alfredo Stroessner, Augusto Pinochet, etc.), but he never disapproved of the USSR and its satellites. Josh (talk) 23:44, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

The letter and Fidel Castro's age
In the letter composed to Franklin Roosevelt, Fidel Castro writes: "I am twelve years old". However, the image caption says it was "written by the 14-year-old Castro". Shouldn't the caption be fixed?. --Kray0n (talk) 13:27, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Castro says in the letter he is 12 years old, however he was born August 13, 1926, the letter is written on 06 November 1940, Castro would have been age 14 years, 2 months, 24 days old when he wrote the letter. Even at this early age he was lying to the U. S. President.Natwebb (talk) 05:42, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Scarface
Isn't this the character from Scarface..who lets the cubans into the united states!!??

--Ruthless-paki (talk) 18:43, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

The Barracks
That Angel Prado maintains that Castro's car got lost and he never made it to the Barracks needs a source and runs contrary to Castro's story in his spoken autobiog with Ignacio Ramonet. I have deleted the mention that it was carnaval time, since there is no context for this information and it seems irrelevant. It does have some relevance but needs context, which i will try to give later. I hope i'm not being too pedantic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mphayden (talk • contribs) 22:50, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Bias?
This article surprised me; I've been researching Castro for the last couple weeks for a report, and this article seems to constitute a strong pro-US bias. For instance, it says that, "Dying Oscar Fernandez and other witnesses identified Castro as the assassin.[3] The incident passed." This is true, but it fails to mention that the other key witness (aside from Oscar Fernandez) soon told newspapers that he had been bribed by police. Then the article goes on to say, "In 1948, Castro joined an anti-American demonstration trip to Bogotá, Colombia, paid by Argentinean army colonel and President Juan Perón.[3] Castro joined mob violence and property destruction, and later sought refuge in the Argentinean embassy.[3]" First of all, the driving ideal behind the trip was not anti-American protest, but rather it was a gathering of leftist, intellectual, and influential Cubans and Argentinians to discuss their respective corrupt governments and what they could do. While there, the main voice of opposition in Colombia was assassinated, and yes, mob violence broke out, and while some was senseless and merely destructive, Castro tried to involve himself in the revolutionary aspect by trying to lead a group of rebel police officers. This article obviously omits certain key details, and although it may be strenuous to add these details, and although it might make the paper seem exhaustive, it is these details that are truly important. Why would you write it any other way?

Source: "Fidel: A Critical Portrait" by Tad Szulc, I believe. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.222.133.253 (talk) 05:02, 9 December 2009 (UTC)


 * I agree with you, although I'd suggest that certain types of WP:BIAS add up to an epidemic problem that's certainly not confined to this one article. Anyway, I've put in a request to have the editing restrictions on this article lifted. If this request is granted, you'll be able to edit the article directly without much hassle. Cosmic Latte (talk) 15:56, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

What were the editing restrictions? It appears they have been lifted anyway. Mphayden (talk) 23:38, 22 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree that is a biased article. Especially the 'Allegations of wealth' section which is just libel and hearsay with no real evidence. This section should be deleted altogther.  SmokeyTheCat    •TALK•  18:33, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

To Do List
With reference to the 'to do list', i have removed much of the foreign affairs material and tried my best to integrate this into the appropriate section elsewhere. Mphayden (talk) 18:29, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

oh well i tried... looks like it's all been restored as it was by Wikopedia and i just wasted about 3 hours of my life. Why have a to do list for things that refuse to allow themselves be done! Mphayden (talk) 18:34, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Dictator
Let's call things as they are. The introduction presents Fidel as a Prime Minister, President, Revolutionary... but the main point is, and that's not even mentioned: he was a Dictator, he came to power through a coup d'etat. Same as Pinochet, but just his political antipode. I think both articles should be synchronized, otherwise Wikipedia makes a veeeeery biased impression. --194.203.215.254 (talk) 08:43, 7 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Then find enough reliable sources to show, so that it can be verified, that the point of view you exposed is the mainstream point of view; then update the article accordingly. --LjL (talk) 13:32, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

um, adolf hitler came to power in a democratic republic germany. he was DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED. does that mean he wasnt a dictator? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.171.70.116 (talk) 01:15, 11 August 2009 (UTC)


 * While he strongly denies being a dictator, a number of individuals and media outlets considered Castro to be a dictator himself. By all means, a subject's own description of himself must be presented before any other viewpoints, however, Wikipedia articles are not promotional areas by which the subject of the article may select how he or she is introduced. Richard (talk) 02:50, 19 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Here are some reliable sources: Richard (talk) 00:55, 21 August 2009 (UTC)


 * News Weekly
 * Orangeville Citizen
 * USA Today
 * Washington Times
 * WPLG
 * San Antonio Express-News
 * NPR
 * The Post and Courier
 * Associated Press
 * NY1
 * CNN
 * firstcoastnews.com
 * Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
 * Cuban National Assembly elects State Council every five years. Since 1976, Fidel Castro was always re-elected President of the State Council till his proclamation of leaving the presidency. So, dictator is quite a disputable title for him. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.55.140.181 (talk) 07:06, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Even if when he was "elected" as president, there is no question that for a period of time in the beginning of the revolution he was a dictator. He did promise multi-party elections to be held when he overthrew Batista and never held them.  He had various co-revolutionaries that opposed his marxist beliefs were thrown in jail or executed.  Isn't he like Stalin in that regard?  so dictator should be one of his titles too.. Batista was elected President in a sham election in 1954, just as fidel has had his sham elections too.  Whats the difference?  Callelinea (talk) 18:27, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
 * "Dictator" is a formal title, but it is not one that Castro holds. In contemporary usage, "dictator" is an emotionally-loaded epithet, which has connotations of "tyrant", "monster", and the like. To call somebody a "dictator" these days is to assert an opinion--not to state a fact with which few, if any, will disagree. To this end, the article already notes that Castro's critics refer to him as a dictator (I've changed "describe as" to "refer to", as a "description" usually is more elaborate than a single word), and it doesn't need to push the matter any further. Cosmic Latte (talk) 18:38, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
 * P.S. Sources can call him whatever they feel like calling him. But an encyclopedia does not simply take name-calling for granted; it rather requires maximal objectivity, through which it can say that one has been called a highly debatable name, but through which it cannot so easily agree with this name and participate in the name-calling. Cosmic Latte (talk) 18:45, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
 * P.P.S. And, speaking of horses (if you don't get it, don't worry about it), I should have just referred everyone to Talk:Fidel_Castro, where the point I'm trying to make already has been made. Cosmic Latte (talk) 18:51, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
 * It is incredible to me that there is a debate here on the question of whether Castro is/was a dictator (tyrant, despot, oppressor, authoritarian). Catsro is as much a dictator as Stalin, Lennin and Hitler ever were.  Castro is no Jeffersonian democrat.  When Castro read the novel "1984" I am sure he did not understand it was a warning, he must have thought it was a plan.  He wanted to BE Big Brother!Natwebb (talk) 06:58, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure which criteria for dictatorship you use to place Castro on the same level as Hitler and Stalin--even Len(n)in (half-Beatle, half-Bolshevik?). To me, comparing Castro to Hitler or Stalin is a bit like comparing a chihuahua to a T. rex: Castro didn't let millions die in concentration camps or Gulags; Castro didn't try to take over an entire continent. Perhaps, according to your definition of "dictator", these differences are nonessential or irrelevant. The problem (well, the first problem) is that there are too many definitions of "dictator". The second problem is that--even despite the multiple denotations--the connotations are not encyclopedic. If somebody whacks me with a wet trout, I may firmly believe that this person is "mean". Perhaps I couldn't even understand why anyone else wouldn't say he's mean. But if he happens to have an article on here, and if I'm editing it, I most definitely would not promote an opening sentence like, "Mr. Fish is a Wikipedian editor and a mean individual." Mean, monster, evil, tyrant, oddball, etc. are terms that implicitly moralize, whereas the encyclopedic voice is rather amoral and nonpartisan. It just doesn't care about that sort of thing. But the question is not whether Castro was a dictator, so much as whether "dictator" is an encyclopedic descriptor in the first place. As for the secondary question of whether it's an applicable one, you (and your sources) may say "yes", I (and mine) might say "no", and somebody else, simply having observed you and me, could say "maybe". As long as "maybe" factors in to the equation, the equation might not be much of an equation after all: A phrase like "Castro is a dictator" makes for a rather hasty copula. Cosmic Latte (talk) 20:57, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Ok lets play stymatics then. He may not be in the same leagues as Stalin or Hitler but he is in the same league as Pinochet, Duvalier and Trujillo.  He has killed thousands especially during his first 5 years in power.  He has forced over 2 million Cubans into exile.  So yea he is as much a dictaor or tyrant as any other Latin American dictator. Callelinea (talk) 17:41, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
 * The problem is that the word "dictator" is inherently non-neutral. There are ways to describe actions in less partisan terms. Nobody denies that ma ficked up life was a serial killer or that Hannibal Lecter was a cannibal. But there are quite a bit of folks who would disagree that Castro is a "dictator". By the way, I used to insist that Pinochet be called a dictator on WP; but as I came to understand what an encyclopedia is really all about, I realized that my prior edits probably were not appropriate. I may feel that he was a dictator, but as long as a lot of people don't, I can't just imply on here that these people are misguided. Cosmic Latte (talk) 18:16, 5 December 2009 (UTC)
 * In that case, I am deleting references of other people as "dictators" in other articles unless Fidel Castro is given the same label. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.169.72.226 (talk) 06:16, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * That's called making a WP:POINT and is often considered disruptive. If you think an article should be changed, get consensus at the talk page for that article, not this one. Franamax (talk) 07:58, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictator and http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2008/02/18/cuba-fidel-castro-s-abusive-machinery-remains-intact. This "debate" is bizarre: why make a perfectly good descriptive word unusable? It is not just "critics" who called Castro a dictator; it is everyone who understands the meaning of the word and the nature of the regime. Cerberus (talk) 20:32, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Edit Link
editsemiprotected

The edit link is not visible to me on the Castro page. If you can see it please add the following to the table of contents below Castro's Image.

Secretary-General of NAM

10 Sep 1979 to 6 March 1983

Preceded by Junius Richard Jayawardene

Succeeded by N. Sanjiva Reddy

16 Sep 2006-24Feb2008

Preceded by Abdullah Ahmad Badawi

Succeeded by Raúl Castro Source : Non-Aligned_Movement

HarshAJ (talk) 14:34, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I tried real hard to stil it in but two different headings got created for the same office. I am removing the second term. Someone more accustomed to Wikipedia please edit the same. HarshAJ (talk) 05:52, 11 February 2010 (UTC)


 * ✅ + Cite SpitfireTally-ho! 08:42, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

typo - someone fix this
In the Decision For Revolution section, the phrase "Castro started to have money problems. He refused to go work and others..." is incorrect. It should read "He refused to go to work ..."

In the Years In Power section, the phrase "The mould was set." is not a proper sentence or idiom. The correct idiom, in that context, is The die is cast. (Reference: See Point of no return.)

Hey-Newsflash: NOBODy cares!


 * I've fixed the English so that it reads "refused to find work." On the other point, I think "the mould was set" actually is better. "The die was cast" refers better to a single pivotal irrevocable event (like of course the prototype event of Ceaser crossing the Rubicon). But here we talk about a recurring string of similar events, all of which are of the same type. The US tries to control Castro, and Castro punishes them. So the US sanctions him, invades Cuba, tries to kill him, or something else, and Castro in each case retaliates (finally bringing in the USSR fully, after the Bay of Pigs). Sure, Castro had socialist tendencies and anti-US tendencies from the beginning. Nor is he exactly the nicest of guys (though no Stalin). But I think there's not much doubt that the US had a lot to do with pushing him fully into the arms of the USSR. We blew that. We just figured Castro was too small to negotiate with, so we didn't bother. We never imagined that he was the kind of guy who never would give up, and would do anything not to be coerced in any way, including joining the US's worst enemies and urging them to nuke the US, if that's what it took. Had we handled Castro differently at the time he was trying to meet with Eisenhower, history might be quite different. S  B Harris 19:44, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Clarification needed
The meaning of the second portion of the following is ambiguous: "The missile swap was never publicized because the Kennedy Administration demanded secrecy in order to preserve NATO relations and protect Democratic Party candidates in the upcoming U.S. elections." The connection between a missile swap being kept secret, and NATO relations being restored/Democratic Party candidates being protected should be made more explicit.

I would clarify it but it's too vague to even understand what the original author was trying to say.

155.99.230.141 (talk) 04:49, 24 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The way I read it the statment says there were two (separate and unrelated) reasons not to publicize the missile swap: 1 - to keep NATO happy, 2 - to protect the Democratic party in the upcoming elections. Roger (talk) 16:18, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Ancestors
The family tree shown in the Ancestors section seems to be problematic. The chart shows the birth dates of Lina Ruz González' parents to be after her own birth date. Franklin Moore (talk) 17:24, 27 January 2010 (UTC)


 * That's right, I noticed it too. Castro's grandparents to his mother's side are listed as born in 1911 and 1916, respectively, and that's after Castro's mother was born. Probably that's when they died instead. I haven't got any information on that so I desisted from making any changes. Maybe someone who knows about it can take care of it. I wonder why no one did in over 2 months since Alexnovo started this section! --Krawunsel (talk) 10:17, 4 April 2010 (UTC)


 * When I first posted this issue I was hoping that someone who had more information than I would edit it. As that has not happened, I have simply removed the obviously wrong dates and replaced them with question marks.  If anyone does have the correct information, please add it. Franklin Moore (talk) 18:14, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Religious afiliation
I know this item has been controversial but "secular" is not a religious afiliation, not even a view. The term is utterly meaningless and furthermore, unsourced. Str1977 (talk) 16:37, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree. "None" would be better, but best would be to simply not mention it at all. Roger (talk) 15:05, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Problems in the article
I have detected there is one photo can not be seing unless intentionallly opened and there mkhkhkhkh. --Vmmf (talk) 16:236, 03 August 2009 (UTC) Castro was trained by the communists, and came to power with the help of Time Magazine. Cube is still bleeding and drowning as a result. He had no intentions to cooperate with the US, who actually had cut weapons suplies to the Batista regime in order to help Castro. He presented a religious facade, talked of peace "armas para que?", and then turned Cuba into a large prison, with firing squads (enjoyed by and operated most efficiently by Che Guevara) operating overtime. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.61.58.97 (talk) 01:49, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Education
Someone added "Better known for going to elite Jesuit Colegio de Dolores." to info about Fidel on the Belen Jesuit school entry. I feel that info is irrelevant. Could someone please add it to his entry, because I cannot do so without an account which I have no intrest in creating. Refrence here http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/05/AR2007070502153.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.144.164.30 (talk • contribs) 19:27:15, 01 January 2008 (UTC)

Assassination attempts
Under the article "Assassination Attempts," the statement that "According to the Family Jewels documents declassified by the CIA in 2007, one such assassination attempt before the Bay of Pigs invasion. . . . was personally authorized by the then US attorney general Robert Kennedy.[74]" is repeating a lie. The source given is a conversation Henry Kissinger had with President Ford, wherein he relates what Richard Helms told him. Helms was lying to Kissinger. Helms and CIA alumni at the time were scapegoating the Kennedy brothers after revelations that the CIA engaged the Mafia in plots to assassinate Castro. This alliance actually occurred in 1960. Furthermore, the actual "Family Jewels" document relating to assassination attempts against Castro is the "CIA Inspector General's Report on Plots to Assassinate Fidel Castro," released in 1993 under the CIA Historical Review Program. This report documents in great detail that Kennedy only learned of the CIA-Mafia plots on May 7, 1962 in a meeting with Sheffield Edwards and Lawrence Houston. The Report makes it clear that he was told only about a plot "embracing gangster elements, which presumably was terminated following the Bay of Pigs fiasco." The report further states that "The Attorney General was not told that the gambling syndicate operation had already been reactivated, nor, as far as we know, was he ever told that CIA had a continuing involvement with U.S. gangster elements." Kennedy even asked for a memorandum of the meeting summarizing for history what he had been told. THE STATEMENT THAT RFK AUTHORIZED THE PLOT IS, THEREFORE, SLANDEROUS AND SHOULD BE REMOVED IN ITS ENTIRETY.--JPKMCG_06-01-2010.

The Attorney General was not told that the gambling syndicate operation had already been reactivated, nor, as far as we know, was he ever told that CIA had a continuing involvement with U.S. gangster elements. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jpkmcg (talk • contribs) 23:34, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

Associated Press said Castro "has not been seen in public for nearly four years."
Source

Is that because he died nearly four years ago?

No, four years ago was when the last of his clones died. He probably has been dead even longer. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.121.188.49 (talk) 14:37, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Has anyone other than the Cuban government provided any photographs of Castro since the summer of 2006?


 * http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/01/04/1408779_new-photos-show-fidel-castro-using.html hth, Cerberus (talk) 13:14, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

The article categorizes him as a "living person," but where is the proof that he is alive?

Back on the Chain Gang (talk) 14:11, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * See: WP:BLP:  "Any individual that would currently be less than 123 years old is assumed to be living unless a reliable source has confirmed death."  If by August 13, 2049, he has still not been sighted in public, then we can assume he is no longer living.  TFD (talk) 15:22, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * OK. Thanks. I will wait until then. Back on the Chain Gang (talk) 02:22, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Reuters: Spotted in public
Not sure which section this would best fit in but according to Reuters he's been spotted in public Withur (talk) 22:50, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
 * It says all the pictures are from pro-Cuban government sources. For all we know, the pictures could be several years old. Until someone in the Canadian media shows us such a picture, I will not believe they are real. Canada has no embargo, so it's notable that no one from Canada has produced any pictures of Castro in recent years. 71.182.178.160 (talk) 04:12, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I am not an expert in neoconservative ideology, but is it possible for someone to be dead and a dictator at the same time? TFD (talk) 04:32, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
 * No. 71.182.178.160 (talk) 06:10, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Aaaaaaaand our old friend Fidel has been out and about again. http://www.cubadebate.cu/especiales/2010/07/12/fidel-eeuu-no-juega-limpio-ni-dice-ninguna-verdad/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.89.213.204 (talk) 02:15, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Edit request from 203.135.190.6, 27 July 2010
In this article i found few errors ,which are as follows,

As in the right section of the page,under the heading ,

Secretary-General of the Non Aligned movement In office September 10, 1979 – March 6, 1983 Preceded by	Junius Richard Jayawardene (Junius_Richard_Jayawardene)who is the former Srilankan president. Succeeded by	N. Sanjiva Reddy (N._Sanjiva_Reddy)Who is also former indian president. In office Sepetember 16, 2006 – February 24, 2008 Preceded by	Abdullah Ahmad Badawi(Abdullah_Ahmad_Badawi) Who is the former malaysian priminster. Succeeded by	Raúl Castro

Please see the information on the corresponding links.

203.135.190.6 (talk) 09:56, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please be more specific about what needs to be changed. What should be put in those names' place? Dabomb87 (talk) 22:10, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

2010 Speech on Nuclear War
I've searched the web and can not find a transcript of this speech. I think we should find a reference and post the link in this article. Agreed? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bridgettttttte (talk • contribs) 04:52, 14 July 2010 (UTC)  Bridgettttttte babblepoop 05:04, 14 July 2010 (UTC)


 * no comments as of ... Bridgettttttte babblepoop 23:45, 14 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Still no comments or references, but a search of "cumov castro" on youtube pulls up the speech. Bridgettttttte babblepoop 14:09, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

I agree, and think that more specific info should be added to the Wikipedia page. Seems to be pretty big news today that he gave a similar speech to parliament, so there are a number of reliable news sources coming out for use–though as of now none of them go into much detail. SweetNightmares (talk) 16:46, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Photo
Is that really the best we can do? It looks like Fidel has something in his eye. The older picture - from the 60s - was much better suited. I know this one is more recent, but it's just stupid looking. I don't think the image HAS to be the most recent sort available - for example, Don Van Vliet's page has a picture of him from the 70s, even though he's still alive. Carl Sagan's profile has a picture of him as a young man. Why not Fidel? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.13.51.62 (talk) 02:57, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

Any of these would be preferable:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fidel_Castro5_cropped.JPG http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cuba.FidelCastro.02.jpg http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fidel_Castro_-_MATS_Terminal_Washington_1959.jpg —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.13.51.62 (talk) 03:02, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

Wrong last name
Change name from Ruz to Ruíz with an accent on the i. His name is Fidel Castro Ruíz not Ruz. Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:To-do_list/to_do" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.75.1.34 (talk) 05:20, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Fidel Castro's 2006 illness - New source and information
News with new information about Fidel's illness/experience was published today (2010/8/31) in MiamiHerald.com.

Here are quotes from Fidel:

"``I came to be dead, he said, without clarifying whether he was in fact clinically dead at some point in what he called his ``calvary, a reference to the mount where Jesus Christ was crucified.

``Stretched out on that [hospital] bed, I could only look around me, ignorant about those [medical] devices. I didn't know how long that torment would last and the only thing I hoped for was for the world to stop,'' he added.

``I survived, but in very poor physical conditions. At one point, I weighted 50-some kilograms,'' or about 110 pounds on his six-foot-three frame, Castro was quoted as saying.

``Sixty-six kilograms, or 145 pounds, corrected his wife Dalia, who was present at the interview, La Jornada reported. ``Imagine. A fellow my height weighing 66 kilos, Castro added."

- From MiamiHearld.com

I was reading today's news and thought the editors that help to write the Fidel Castro article can use the news article to update and add additional details to the article. -- Joel M.   Chat ✐  16:47, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Edit request from 173.20.11.13, 8 September 2010
Recommend replacing word "dissents" with dissidents,in section: Years In Power,paragraph beginning "By the end of 1960..." Replace "comradely relationship" with camaraderie,in section:Foreign Relations:Soviet Union,last paragraph beginning "When Soviet.."

173.20.11.13 (talk) 01:33, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * ✅ Thanks, Stickee (talk)  01:52, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Drug connections -- dubious
"Juan Antonio Rodríguez Mernier, a former Cuban Intelligence Major who defected in 1987, says the regime made large amounts of money from drug trafficking operations in the 1970s. The cash was to be deposited in Fidel's Swiss bank accounts "in order to finance liberation movements".[94] Norberto Fuentes, a defected member of the Castro brothers' inner circle, has provided details about these operations. According to him, an operation conducted in cooperation with the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine helped Cuban intelligence to steal one billion by robbing banks in Lebanon during the 1975-76 civil war. Gold bars, jewelry, gems, and museum pieces were carried in diplomatic pouches via air route Beirut-Moscow-Havana. Castro personally greeted the robbers as heroes.[94]" The citation is a Maria Werlau article -- known as an academic associate of anti-Castro polemicist Humberto Fontova, much in the same vein as him. The hyperbole and historical revisionism of this camp is pretty flagrant, and so it's no surprise that a quote from her article would come across as especially dubious. I am currently looking at a book titled "Andean Cocaine" which says the following: - There were many cocaine dealers in Batista-era Cuba and all of them flew into exile as the gangster class (Lansky, Creole cocaine dealers, etc) was becoming persecuted. American officials attempted to claim that there were drug dealers in Cuba and Castro famously quipped something like "We are not only disposed to deport the gangsters but to shoot them." - Since then, many people have been extremely eager to tie Castro to drugs, with little success.

At the beginning of the Ochoa case, many pundits started to dream up the notion that Castro must have been behind the drug deals Ochoa was carrying out -- in this case, as with all cases, it came to naught and no connection was proven between Castro and drugs (though the anti-Cuba polemicists haven't ceased speculating about that). So this one alleged case about Fidel's supposed "Swiss bank accounts" seems very dubious and not from a reliable source as far as I can see. It seems like a pretty blatant Castro smear, unsubstantiated as these drug-connection accusations usually are.

And now I look at this other book I own called "This is Cuba" by Ben Corbett (a book that is itself quite critical of Castro and the Cuban Revolution), which states that around the time these operations allegedly took place (the 1970s) there were indeed some very public accusations of connections between Castro and drug trafficking -- even gracing a 60 minutes episode in one case -- but the accusations never came to proof. And here's what the book says: "Every year since that time, the media has diced up a new breaking story about Cuba's drug smuggling and cited 'new evidence' [something categorically skeptical given the amount of misinformation and false 'evidence' concocted in US-Cuba relations], usually testimony to a federal grand jury in which, to lighten his sentence, some convicted smuggler has cooked up an unfounded and bizarre story tying the Castros to Medellin.... when a seven ton shipment of cocaine was seized in the Colombian port of Cartagena, the newswires went berserk. The smoking gun everyone had been scrambling for linking Castro to narcotrafico had been found; Havana was the next port of call. It turned out to be just more unfounded and embarrassing hype for Castro.... Both Bush and Reagan were no doubt hungry for any crumb of evidence linking Castro to Medellin, and had they found one, there would have likely been an invasion, but it never occurred. To date, no one has yet been able to provide hard evidence linking Castro directly to narcotrafico."

In light of this quote, which comes from the Corbett book sold in mainstream stores nationwide (which has met with very little criticism of its factual accuracy), we should view these accusations of Werlau's article with more skepticism and watch out for dubious accusations coming from journalists who are known for hyperbole. Perhaps we can include the accusations but then remark that no available "hard evidence" has never proven any real connection between Castro and drug trafficking. Something that frames the Mernier claims as just what they are: uncorroborated accusations that fly in the face of the historical record of hard evidence or lack thereof: specifically, that "To date no one has yet been able..." (see quote above). I think that as long as we comment on that, we could possibly leave the Mernier quote in the article (though it still feels very dubious and not from an RS).

Now speaking of hard evidence, the proof linking drug trafficking to the Cuban exile elite (especially the more Creole "Batistatiano" exiles of the 60s) after they were routed from Cuba, is plentiful, and both books I cited contain many examples. That of course belongs in other articles and I'll get around to that eventually (the drug war is a favorite topic of mine, and I feel that accusations and proof have to be separated very often in the world of drugs). In the meantime I need to register an official account so I can edit this page -- but I thought I'd let y'all know in case anyone thinks this is debatable. 173.3.41.6 (talk) 21:35, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I love conspiracy theories too "y'all" (I love American hillbilly dialect.). Please find a reliable source that has given it any credibility.  TFD (talk) 23:29, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Well I did cite several reliable sources in my post (well-researched books that are widely sold and acclaimed), and furthermore, like I said, the sources currently cited in the article (which allege Castro-drug connections) are *not* reliable. Don't worry, though, I'll take care of it, just got an account. 173.3.41.6 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 19:35, 2 November 2010 (UTC).

Incorrect Birth Date
I'm a new member and therefore can not edit this page but Castro was born in 1926 not 1966 as is stated in the first line. Thanks

TlalocAsmodius (talk) 20:02, 5 November 2010 (UTC)TlalocAsmodius

can i make a section with every video game where u try to kill castor? plz and by the way i wasn't the guy who vandalized whatever, i just was "lucky" enough to have a proxy land on that IP. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.4.28.184 (talk) 06:49, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Should this be stated
How many Effing games you have to try and kill castro, and it turns out just to be a double. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.75.3.251 (talk) 05:12, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

Edit Request from --Maverickjh (talk) 00:22, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
Recommend replacing "Mesa Redondo" with the proper program name "Mesa Redonda"; it is under the heading "Retirement", paragraph beginning with: "Since his retirement..." --Maverickjh (talk)

✅.TMCk (talk) 00:52, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

"Significally" in the last sentence of the introduction is not a word. Perhaps significantly is the proper word. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RobertCapablanca (talk • contribs) 01:08, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

"Significally" in the last sentence of the introduction is not a word. Perhaps significantly is the proper word. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RobertCapablanca (talk • contribs) 01:10, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Fixed. Thanks. Materialscientist (talk) 01:13, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

"The mould was set."
{edit: semi-protected}

"The mould was set."

Please remove this sentence, it does not contribute to the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Stick100 (talk • contribs) 00:46, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Baseball  Watcher  04:22, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Done It was in "Years in Power". And now its gone (along with 2 other sentences that have been marked as unsourced for almost 2 years--that's plenty of time to find the info. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:44, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

"International Relations
Cuba now has official international relations with all of Latin America: Costa Rica re-restablished relations on March 19, 2009 http://articles.cnn.com/2009-03-18/world/costa.rica.cuba.ties_1_costa-rica-president-oscar-arias-cuban-people?_s=PM:WORLD And El Salvador since June 3 2009 http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2009/06/03/2003445193 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.194.153.181 (talk) 16:08, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

"Dictator" ?
Why isn't Fidel Castro introduced as a dictator whilst the article on Batista introduces Batista as a dictator. I have no problem with introducing Batista as a dictor but why not Fidel Castro; a dictator much more brutal and mass murdering than bastista ever dreemed to be. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.49.183.242 (talk) 22:19, 13 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Hypocrisy, that's why. Or, it's because Fidel is an "enlighten" dictator, so it's okay. 97.104.77.39 (talk) 21:44, 15 May 2010 (UTC)


 * No one is referred to as a dictator while they are alive. Most living dictators today are referred to as "our close friend and ally in the war on terror".  TFD (talk) 04:32, 16 May 2010 (UTC)


 * The reason is found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Fidel_Castro/Archive_14#why_are_we_refusing_to_call_Castro_a_Dictator.3F The claim is that calling someone a dictator is a criticism, not a factual description.  This is just apologetics, in my opinion: we can look at the definition of "dictator" (e.g., here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictator) and ask if Castro was one. (He was.) Of course the Batista article calls Batista a dictator (which is fair enough).  This is just a double standard and reflects poorly on those controlling the Castro article. The decision is ideologically based, not factually based, as far as I can tell. Cerberus (talk) 16:19, 16 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Batista suspended the constitution and ruled by decree, which leaves no doubt that he was a dictator. Castro on the other hand ruled according to a new constitution.  (Whether or not he obeyed this constitution is a matter of dispute.)  A similar situation exists with absolute monarchs, including many whose legitimacy is suspect.  They are normally referred to by their titles, such as Emperor of the French, Emir of Kuwait, Shah of Iran. We cannot label a leader a dictator unless there is consensus that they are.  TFD (talk) 14:18, 17 May 2010 (UTC)


 * The response by TFD is just sophistry. From 1980 onward, Pinochet also ruled according to a constitution (the very constitution that forced the 1988 plebiscite). When the controlling editors of this article start insisting that Pinochet not be called a dictator during the 1980s, they will at least achieve a consistency they now lack.  Of course it will come at the cost of even more ludicrous "reasoning" on this matter. Castro meets the dictionary definition.  He meets the Wikipedia definition.  (Indeed, elsewhere in Wikipedia he is called a dictator; I won't say where out of fear that the controlling editors of this article will change that.)  He is also referred to **descriptively** as a dictator in contemporary media.  (E.g., http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/07/AR2010070705265.html ). The resistance by the controlling editors to labeling Fidel Castro a dictator has no non-ideological justification. Finally, there cannot be "consensus" that Castro was a dictator because some people are ideologically driven to deny it---including, it seems, the controlling editors of this article.  However, there can be a decision based on Wikipedia's own criteria to state the obvious: Fidel Castro was a dictator.  Cerberus (talk) 15:38, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Please see WQP:NPOV: "Assert facts, including facts about opinions—but do not assert the opinions themselves. Here we mean facts about about which there is no serious dispute among reliable sources."  If you disagree with this policy then you should get it changed, and stop attacking editors who follow it.  TFD (talk) 16:18, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
 * By standard criteria it *is* a fact that Fidel Castro was a dictator. It is not just an opinion.  We can determine that it is a fact in the usual ways.  We can look in the dictionary and see if the definition applies.  We can look at Wikipedia's own article on dictators.  As a matter of internal consistency, we can look at how Wikipedia labels others as dictators (which, outside this article, even includes Castro).  Castro was recognized as a dictator early on in mainstream media. (E.g., http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,941405,00.html ).  He is still recognized as a dictator in mainstream media. (E.g., http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/07/AR2010070705265.html .)  Note that I did not select right wing rags for evidence but rather (what passes for) "liberal" media. Ordinarily that kind of evidence would be enough for a Wikipedia article. Why are the criteria being used so differently in *this* article? As a matter of intellectual integrity, even those who consider him a benevolent dictator must admit that he is a dictator. Cerberus (talk) 21:10, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
 * We cannot make our own determination on who is or is not a dictator, that would be original research and must rely on consensus, and cannot even represent majority mainstream opinion as fact when there are mainstream minority views. If you disagree with this policy then you should try to get it changed.  You might want to consider though the consequences that it would have on all the articles.  As an example, I was involved in a discussion where other editors wanted to call Pinochet a "fascist" and presented the same arguments that you have:  he meets the definition of fascist" and is called fascist in mainstream sources.  TFD (talk) 21:55, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
 * 1. Out of curiosity, if we leave aside Anita Snow, what "mainstream sources" assert that Castro is not properly called a dictator? 2. You did not address the issue of internal consistency in Wikipedia's use of the term dictator. 3. I consider your question about whether Pinochet should be called "fascist" to be changing topics, and it fails to answer my question whether Pinochet should be called at dictator (based on your arguments, especially in the 1980s). Please take a consistent stance. (Naturally I think the term dictator is accurate, even though like Castro, Pinochet denied being a dictator; he even claimed that he "always acted in a democratic way"!)  4. At the very least, you must admit that the phrase "Castro himself has been described as a dictator" would be more accurately replaced by "many observers consider Castro himself to be a dictator". Cerberus (talk) 22:49, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
 * The article already points out (twice) that critics consider Castro was a dictator. But we cannot write the article from the American liberal point of view.  Please see WP:NPOV.  TFD (talk) 02:18, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Your failure to address my request for mainstream sources denying that Castro is a dictator is telling. The phrasing you refer to ("critics refer to him as a dictator") is flat out misleading. It suggests that only critics and nobody else refers to him this way.  The media quotes I cited demonstrate that to be a false implication.  And naturally so: this is a simple matter of proper usage of the English language.  Dispute over this phrasing has nothing to do with "the American liberal point of view".  It is a simple matter of honest assessment of available sources. If my proposed statement (I now propose "many observers say Castro himself was a dictator") is less accurate than the phrase I suggested replacing ("Castro himself has been described as a dictator"), please say how. I believe it would increase the accuracy and objectivity of the article. It would be similarly appropriate to change "Many of Castro's critics refer to him as a dictator" with "Many observers say Castro was a dictator".  (The current phrasing is particularly noxious when placed as it is next to the HRW reports, as it implicitly diminishes HRW to the status of Castro critic instead of recognizing its pioneering reporting on human rights around the world. Is HRW just an 'Obama critic' when it calls for investigations of border killings?? The article's implicit personalization of the HRW reporting is really unconscionable.) Cerberus (talk) 13:04, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I am a fairly well-educated Brit, for what it's worth, but I must admit when I came across the word dictator I was suprised. it doesn't ring true and represents a mainstream American view, a country that has been at loggerheads with the communist regime from the start. Despite studying history, I have never even heard him referred to as a dictator before.  Just my perception which I'm throwing in there in case it helps.91.104.220.109 (talk) 23:30, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
 * This made me curious so I did a Google search for UK media mentions of Castro being a dictator. There are many - so many that it seems quite odd that a "well educated Brit" would have "never heard" such a thing. (Here is a fairly recent example headline in a high circulation British newspaper: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1240741/Ailing-state-Cuban-dictator-Fidel-Castro-revealed-rare-pictures-wife.html .)  Were you equally surprised by the use of the term "political prisoners" when Cuba recently released a few? I'm going to guess "yes".  But whatever.  Here is the Wikipedia definition of dictator: "In modern usage, the term 'dictator' is generally used to describe a leader who holds and/or abuses an extraordinary amount of personal power, especially the power to make laws without effective restraint by a legislative assembly. Dictatorships are often characterized by some of the following traits: suspension of elections and of civil liberties; proclamation of a state of emergency; rule by decree; repression of political opponents without abiding by rule of law procedures; these include single-party state, and cult of personality." This seems like a perfectly good definition.  In what way does this definition not apply to Fidel Castro's rule? Cerberus (talk) 03:20, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

(out) Actually, the IP said he was a fairly well-educated Brit, so obviously he does not read the Daily Mail. Using a definition from Wikipedia to determine whether someone is a dictator violates policies of WP:V and WP:SYN. The description anyway could just as easily describe the rule at Guantanamo Bay. Incidentally, Castro is no longer Cuba's president. TFD (talk) 05:07, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Once again this is evasive and fails to respond to the issues raised. Please use any recognized definition you wish, and state how it fails to describe Fidel Castro's rule.  (Please note that as a matter of English grammar this does not imply that the rule is ongoing.)  It is simply not debatable that as a matter of ordinary English semantics, Fidel Castro was a dictator.  You may disdain the Daily Mail (no surprise there), but it is the second largest daily in the UK, and it has an advantage over you and your "well educated Brit" that it accepts the ordinary English language usage of the word 'dictator' rather than preferring to shock Orwell's ghost.  Anyway, back to the issues. I have shown you that Fidel is referred to as a dictator in mainstream sources, and not just by "critics". I proposed a phrasing ("many observers say Castro himself was a dictator") that is more accurate and more objective than the current phrasing ("Castro himself has been described as a dictator").  If I am wrong, please say how.  I also proposed changing the phrasing  "Many of Castro's critics refer to him as a dictator" to "Many observers say Castro was a dictator".  As I noted, the article's current phrasing is particularly noxious when placed as it is next to the HRW reports, as it implicitly diminishes HRW to the status of Castro critic instead of recognizing its pioneering reporting on human rights around the world. As I noted, the article's implicit personalization of the HRW reporting is really unconscionable.  You have responded to none of this.  Btw, if you prefer an academic rather than a popular discussion of Castro as dictator (and the nature of dictatorship), you can try Sondrol, Paul C., 1991, "Totalitarian and Authoritarian Dictators: A Comparison of Fidel Castro and Alfredo Stroessner", Journal of Latin American Studies (1991), 23:599-620 Cambridge University Press doi:10.1017/S0022216X00015868. Cerberus (talk) 17:54, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

"President" ?
This issue has been discussed Ad nauseam in the past, but I guess it merits another round. Cerberus and mark nutley seem to believe that referring to Fidel Castro as "President" is incorrect. A few things of note ... [a] It is irrelevant what any editor here thinks of Fidel or what they personally deem him to be. Furthermore, taking the definition of "dictator" and deeming that Fidel matches the criteria would be considered WP:OR and be inadmissible per Wiki policy. [b] Wikipedia does not determine "truth", we are here to reflect and mirror the majority of WP:Reliable sources, regardless of what they state. For example, if 90 % of reliable sources began to say the world was flat, then in time Wiki would parrot their findings. [c] What other similar leaders (i.e. Pinochet, Batista, etc) are referred to as is also irrelevant, and would fall under WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. "Consistency" between articles is not an automatic goal, and each article should be judged on its own merits according to its own relevant sources. It is not our job to correct any potential media biases or hypocrisies in the way they refer to leaders (were they to exist). [d] A case could easily be made here on the TP that Fidel warrants the title "dictator", however that is not how Wikipedia works. It doesn't matter what sort of case we as editors can make, what matters are the conclusions that other published writers have arrived at. [e] Lastly, the question then becomes ... how are most reliable sources referring to Fidel Castro? This is important per WP:UNDUE, as our goal should be to reflect what the majority of sources are stating. Well, below are just some of the many news sources from just the last 3 weeks and the verbatim phrase contained within the source ...

Voice of America 7/13/2010 = "President Fidel Castro"

Boston Globe 7/16/2010 = "Since he resigned as president of Cuba two years ago"

Associated Free Press 7/10/2010 = "former president Fidel Castro"

Associated Press 6/28/2010 = "President Fidel Castro"

Washington Times 7/7/2010 = "former President Fidel Castro"

The Economist 7/15/2010 = "the former Cuban president's"

NBC New York 7/2/2010 = "former Cuban president Fidel Castro"

PBS NewsHour 7/13/2010 = "President Fidel Castro"

Bloomberg 7/13/2010 = "Former Cuban President Fidel Castro"

BusinessWeek 7/2/2010 = "former Cuban President Fidel Castro"

The Christian Science Monitor 6/29/2010 = "former Cuban President Fidel Castro"

Asia Times 7/8/2010 = "then president Fidel Castro"

Globe and Mail 7/14/2010 = "former president Fidel Castro"

CBS News 7/16/2010 = "President Fidel Castro"

Sydney Morning Herald 6/28/2010 = "Cuban president Fidel Castro"

Global Times 6/28/2010 = "President Fidel Castro"

AOL News 7/13/2010 = "Former Cuban President Fidel Castro"

New York Times 7/13/2010 = "Mr. Castro, who resigned as Cuba's president"

Fox News 7/12/2010 = "former president Fidel Castro"

NY Post 7/16/2010 = "Former President Fidel Castro"

Washington Post 7/12/2010 = "Former president"

NPR 7/12/2010 = "President Fidel Castro"

[f] Note, these sources are mainstream news outlets, not WP:Fringe blogs, nor are they overtly ideologically (i.e. VivaFidel.com or MarxistUnite.org) - I purposely omitted such potentially biased refs from the list. Now sure, one could find some sources in the last 3 weeks that also call Fidel a "dictator", but what kind of sources would they be and how many would there be per WP:Undue? Keep in mind as well, that I could do the same list above for every 1 month period going back decades, and that I could also reference the "president" title to hundreds of books. In fact, even those detractors who vehemently resent Fidel, will usually note that in fact the majority of sources refer to him as "President", their thesis however is that this is hypocritical and ideologically driven. However, such a debate and battle of semantics - including the potential "correction" of the majority of sources (who have it all wrong) - is not the purpose of Wikipedia. Thus, the burden of proof is with any editor who wishes to unilaterally override the above material. Red thoreau -- (talk) 20:01, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Done 298 hits on google scholar for "dictator fidel castro" 1,850 of google books for the same Will that do? mark nutley (talk) 20:08, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Re: Mark Nutley = No, not when using your same type of simplistic search results in 1,280 google scholar hits for "President Fidel Castro" and 12,700 of google books for the same. So (1,280 > 298) & (12,700 > 1,850). In fact, all you have done is reiterate my earlier point for me. Clearly (under your rationale), over 80 % of the material refers to Fidel Castro as a "President". That should "do", for Wikipedia Wp:Undue standards, especially since the article also includes the proportionally minor viewpoint that some do consider him a "dictator".   Red thoreau  -- (talk) 20:24, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * And is it`s MSM your after, Cuba's Marxist dictator Fidel Castro Ailing state of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro Former dictator Fidel Castro Cuban dictator Fidel Castro How many would you like me to post? mark nutley (talk) 20:15, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Mark Nutley, are you really claiming that David Horowitz's FrontPage Magazine ---> linked here featuring their front page "Barack Obama’s War Against the Jews" pamphlet (complete with burning Israeli flag and sinister looking Muslim's are going to take over Europe - Eurabia map) is part of the Main Stream Media? Even accepting your additional use of Rupert Murdoch's Sky News, your minimal sources date from 2004, 7 months ago, 6 months ago, & April of this year. As I have noted, I limited myself to just the last 3 weeks - as going beyond that would leave with me hundreds if not thousands of internet articles. If you are able to provide us a similar breakdown of refs from similar sources to mine above (in the same time frame), then we can talk about WP:Undue.  Red thoreau  -- (talk) 20:43, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Please familiarize yourself with WP:NPOV: "Assert facts, including facts about opinions—but do not assert the opinions themselves. Here we mean facts about which there is no serious dispute among reliable sources."  It may be that in a perfect world everyone would think the same and these disputes would not come up.  Unfortunately, we are not there yet and have to accept that there are differeing views of Castro including the view that his brother is now the Cuban leader.  TFD (talk) 20:27, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * TFD this has nothing to do with fidals bro. It is weather or not he was referred to as a dictator, I think i have shown he was, and is now know as the former dicator fidel castro mark nutley (talk) 20:32, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * The editors were saying that he still is a dictator. Also, when you provide examples from "Mainstream Media", could you please check first that they are what other people consider to be mainstream.  Your first example is an editorial by Lowell Ponte in Frontpagemag.com.  FrontPage Magazine is edited by David Horowitz.  "It regularly condemns official enemies of the U.S. & Israel, and is a strong proponent of the war on terror, the Iraq War, and Israel's military actions."  TFD (talk) 20:48, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

Leviathan (book) William M. Connolley (talk) 22:19, 18 July 2010 (UTC)


 * TFD, I consider your "response" to be no more than an attempt to change topics. I never raised a question about Fidel's title(s).  I raised questions about misleading phrasing in the article and abuse of the English language.  Rather than address my specific questions and suggestions, you change topics. I have shown you that Fidel is referred to as a dictator in mainstream sources, and not just by "critics". I proposed a phrasing ("many observers say Castro himself was a dictator") that is more accurate and more objective than the current phrasing ("Castro himself has been described as a dictator").  If I am wrong, please say how.  I also proposed changing the phrasing  "Many of Castro's critics refer to him as a dictator" to "Many observers say Castro was a dictator".  As I noted, the article's current phrasing is particularly noxious when placed as it is next to the HRW reports, as it implicitly diminishes HRW to the status of Castro critic instead of recognizing its pioneering reporting on human rights around the world. As I noted, the article's implicit personalization of the HRW reporting is really unconscionable.  You have responded to none of this.  To repeat: I find your failure to respond very telling, and it suggests that your reasoning is indefensible because you cannot find a defense for it. Cerberus (talk) 16:47, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Here is a link to the HRW article. You will notice that although they refer to various leaders as dictators, they do not refer to Castro as one.  You are of course correct that they are not "critics of Castro", but an independent watchdog group.  I cannot accept that we should necessarily follow the usage in American media, particulary ideological columnists.  As you are no doubt aware the U. S. has poor relations with Cuba, and it would be POV for the article to support one or the other side of the dispute.  When it comes to phrasing, you should be guided by WP:WEASAL, WP:RS, and WP:NPOV.  We should avoid using terms like some or most, except where we have reliable sources that use these terms.  TFD (talk) 18:54, 19 July 2010 (UTC)


 * TFD, *None* of the sources I have cited have been columnists or blogs. (Perhaps you are confusing me with Mark Nutley.) Here are two examples I provided, one a news article from a major US newspaper, and the other a scholarly publication.  1) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/07/AR2010070705265.html 2) http://www.jstor.org/stable/info/157386 Naturally many other examples are possible (e.g., http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/11/18/cuba.human.rights/index.html, http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2009/11/in_cuba_political_oppression_i.html, http://www.parade.com/articles/editions/2003/edition_02-16-2003/Dictators, etc), which would at least justify replacing "critics" by "some observers".  Can we agree on this?  (Of course most people find it too self-evident that Fidel Castro was a dictator to state it---it is simply a matter of having a native understanding the semantics of the English language---but still there are plenty of explicit statements.) Cerberus (talk) 14:07, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * How about "various observers"? Callelinea (talk) 17:50, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I was referring to mark nutley's sources. Your sources show that mainstream reporting in the U. S. refers to Castro as a dictator.  However, using the categories that are accepted by the American media for a former leader of another country, particularly considering the unilateral embargo against Cuba, would be systemic bias.  WP should not present an American view of the world but should remain neutral.  That means that nothing is presented as a fact unless there is consensus in this case in academic literature.  You would need to find a peer-reviewed article that states the academic consensus is that Castro is a dictator, otherwise it is just an opinion.  TFD (talk) 19:39, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I did that above, 248 hits on scholar for it in fact mark nutley (talk) 19:51, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * TFD, You are using standards that are not representative of Wikipedia. Since you resist the use of the evidently correct term "dictator" you should, by your proposed standards, have to find an academic article suggesting that there is an active academic dispute over whether or not Castro is correctly described as a dictator. But of course there is not. Instead it is uncontroversial for him to be referred to as a dictator.  (See e.g. *The Political Economy of Dictatorship* by Ronald Wintrobe (Cambridge Univ Press, 2000) or academic articles across the decades including http://www.jstor.org/stable/1148959 or http://www.jstor.org/stable/20029463).  Your suggestion that this is just an American perspective is also false (see e.g. http://books.google.com/books?id=wSRf0hOcRCcC&pg=PA148). I believe you are having problems because you do not understand that this is just a matter of correct use of the English language: the word dictator is descriptive, not evaluative. (Consider e.g. the phrase 'benevolent dictator'.) It is a mistake to believe that because this word is sometimes used in an evaluative way that it no longer has descriptive use.  In any case, you have admitted that mainstream American sources refer to Castro as a dictator and that some academic sources do as well.  Therefore you should accept my only explicit suggestions on changing in wording. I proposed "many observers say Castro himself was a dictator" as more accurate and more objective than the current phrasing "Castro himself has been described as a dictator".    I also proposed changing the phrasing  "Many of Castro's critics refer to him as a dictator" to "Many observers say Castro was a dictator". As you have admitted, the implication that only "critics" refer to Castro as a dictator is flat out false. Cerberus (talk) 20:42, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Since the current wording is poor, the changes would not make it worse. But we should really state who calls Castro a dictator, their reasons and how accepted their views are.  That requires reading through the literature which can be difficult, but is the way to improve articles.  It is always wrong to draw our own conclusions about the prevalence of different views.  Here is part of an interesting article by Sidney Goldberg, the father of jonah Goldberg, in the Wall Street Journal.  Unfortunately it is not a reliable source, but we could try to find what Webster's reasoning was:
 * "Castro is clearly not squeamish about using rhetoric straight out of the Marxist-Leninist handbook, or ruling Cuba the same way. And yet the imperialist bourgeoisie seems to be squeamish about labeling Castro for what he is. The latest edition of Webster's New World College Dictionary calls him merely: 'Cuban revolutionary leader, prime minister and president.' Sounds rather impressive--you can almost see it on the résumé for a MacArthur genius award. But is Castro a dictator? Apparently not enough of one to define him as such."


 * "This is not the only instance of labeling-hesitation in Webster's New World--at least when the 'leader' in question belongs to the 'revolutionary' left. The dictionary can call Hitler the 'Nazi dictator of Germany' but Stalin merely the 'Soviet premier, general secretary of the Communist party of the U.S.S.R.' Mussolini is an 'Italian dictator,' but Tito is 'Yugoslav Communist Party leader, prime minister and president of Yugoslavia.' Franco is 'dictator of Spain' and Salazar 'prime minister and dictator of Portugal,' but Mao Tse-tung is 'Chinese Communist leader, chairman of the People's Republic of China and of its Communist Party.'"


 * "And Lenin? 'Russian leader of the Communist revolution of 1917, premier of the U.S.S.R.' This seems especially unfair, since Lenin's writings openly urged the deadly ruthlessness with which he ruled. Still, a good bourgeois dictionary must not go too far."
 * TFD (talk) 00:11, 21 July 2010 (UTC)


 * TFD, You said "Since the current wording is poor, the changes would not make it worse." On this basis, I will make one of my two proposed changes.  (The one where the current wording is most egregiously misleading, in the Human Rights section.) Cerberus (talk) 14:51, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

There are hundreds of mainstream sources that describe Castro as a dictator. There are also lots of sources that use other words, like "president," to describe Castro. These other sources are not evidence that Castro is not a dictator, any more than a news story calling Arnold Scwartznegger a politician proves that he's not an actor. If folks don't want Castro labeled a dictator, they need to come up with significant, independent sources that specifically deny the dictator label. Until that happens, it's POV to delete well-sourced changes that label him as such. Binarybits (talk) 19:25, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * It is also POV deleting the well sourced existing "president" description.TMCk (talk) 19:49, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Here is an article from the Institute of Public Affairs, which says, "For the left, Fidel Castro was a Western dissident, valiantly resisting American imperialism, not a totalitarian dictator...." By left-wing they are including liberals, not just socialists and communists.  Here is a link to the article in the Guardian, where they write, "However, his critics describe him as a dictator...."  Clearly there is no consensus that he was a dictator, and the term is avoided by many reliable sources.  TFD (talk) 20:19, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Moreover, Encyclopedia Britannica (hardly a bastion of Communism) describes Fidel as --> link
 * ""political leader of Cuba (from 1959) who transformed his country into the first communist state in the Western Hemisphere. Castro became a symbol of communist revolution in Latin America. He held the title of premier until 1976 and then began a long tenure as president of the Council of State and the Council of Ministers, handing over provisional power in July 2006 because of health problems and formally relinquishing the presidency in February 2008.""
 * Red thoreau -- (talk) 23:50, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Binarybits is correct that the editors keep turning this discussion on its head. Castro is obviously a dictator: this is simply a matter of understanding the normal semantics of the English language.  (The same is true in other languages, but my mother tongue is English.)  So those who resist labeling him a dictator need firm justification of this.  Example: point to the published academic literature demonstrating that the term 'dictator' (common in the academic literature) was inappropriately applied to Fidel Castro?  But of course there is no such literature: serious academics do not hesitate to describe Castro's rule as a dictatorship.  (E.g., The Political Economy of Dictatorship By Ronald Wintrobe, and other cites above).  There is no controversy outside certain non-academic ideological circles, and there the "controversy" is just the promotion of double-speak as a form of apologetics for a dictator of whom they approve.  (Equally, there no controversy about whether Fidel Castro held the title of premier or was president of the Council of State, and no controversy as to whether the National Assembly of People's Power chose Raúl Castro as the new President of Cuba.  Unanimously, of course...) Again, the controlling editors of this article need to drop the pretense that showing that Fidel Castro was president (obviously true) conflicts in any way with showing that he was a dictator (obviously true).  Cerberus (talk) 16:23, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Again, reliable sources are divided in how to describe Castro and therefore we cannot call him a dictator and must follow the lead of Websters, Encyclopedia Britannica, and the HRC. It may be wrong, but that is how WP works.  TFD (talk) 16:40, 27 July 2010 (UTC)


 * TFD, Reliable sources say that Fidel Castro was a dictator. What reliable sources say that Castro was not a dictator? Cerberus (talk) 21:46, 30 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Very interesting point, if many reiable sources state DICTATOR and other reliable sources say PRESIDENT are there reliable sources that say he isn't one or the other and in the absence of that shouldn't he be listed as "dictator/President"? Callelinea (talk) 19:28, 31 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Cerberus, you are asking to prove a negative (i.e. sources that say he is not a dictator). You also won't find sources that say he is not a clown or a magician - but that is not basis to refer to him as one. Since "dictator" is not a self-affirming term that leaders proudly refer to themselves by, it is somewhat analogous to terms like "strong man", "despot", "tyrant", "caudillo", "ruler", etc and comes close to the policy of WP:WTA. Moreover, although some refs can be found to label a (authoritarian / totalitarian / autocratic) leader like Fidel a "dictator", they should only be termed as such (especially in a WP:BLP) if the overwhelming majority of the sources do so (per WP:Undue). This is NOT the case with Fidel Castro, as the majority of sources (accurate or not) usually refer to him simply as a "president" (or "revolutionary leader"). Whether I or any editor here believe him to be one based on our own perspective & common sense is WP:OR and irrelevant. We are here to report the published reality, not to correct it.   Red thoreau  -- (talk) 20:25, 31 July 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm a bit lost. *why* is it that dictator is considered NPOV?  Granted, yes, here in the first world, it has a bit of a negative connotation, but that's only because our cultural ideals prefer democracy (by and large).  In theory, even Plato's elusive "philosopher king" would be a dictator by definition, despite the sort of utopic ideals it represents.  The word only appears charged to a culture that believes the opposite.  Communism has a negative connotation in the US, too.  Does that make it an unfair word to use?  That said, it needn't be the first, foremost, or only term used.  But I'm afraid I don't understand the hubbub.  Thanks for reading.  Just my two cents.  I have no interest in getting involved in edit wars, myself. 65.29.128.183 (talk) 05:22, 10 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Cuba claims to be a democracy and there are mainstream academics who consider it to be one, for example in this book published by the Cornell University Press. Reliable sources normally do not refer to him as a dictator.  Because of neutrality we cannot call him a dictator unless there is consensus in academic literature that he was.  While Communism may have negative connotations in the U. S., it is a proper noun and we may call people who belong to Communist Parties Communists.  What we cannot do is call Democrats and Republicans Communists.  TFD (talk) 08:57, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Sure, Cuba claims to be a democracy. Stress on the word "claims". Castro has been "President" of Cuba for decades. How many democracies do you know of that have the same exact leader long enough for someone to be born, grow up, get an education, obtain a PHD, have kids, the kids grow up and start working on earning their own PHD? Fidel Castro was president for about 43 years. When I was born, my grandma was 43 years old. Are we honestly expected to believe that no better Candidates were available or that no one rose to challenge him because they were completely content? Is that really the case? I suppose the people trying to leave the country and immigrate to the USA weren't dissatisfied? Even Castro himself is now admitting that Communism was not working out. Heck, not even Russia had any leaders that lasted that long. Kings, Emperors, monarchs in general sure. But never an elected official. Never.

Saying that he was a president rather than a dictator is a red herring. "President" is an arbitrary title used to describe the leader of an organization, "Dictator" is a description of the manner in which someone leads. They are not mutually exclusive.

Another red herring I'm seeing is the argument that "his motives were to oppose US imperialism, therefore he's not a dictator". This does not address the issue ... at all. Motives do not negate action. If he dictates, he's a dictator. It doesn't matter if Cuba ended up being a paragon of peace, justice, and advancement. They could have invented solutions for every single problem humanity has and he'd still be a dictator if he made decisions unilaterally. If he ruled by fiat, he's a dictator, no matter his motivations. This entire "his motives were X therefore he's not a dictator" reads a bit like "Dogs bark at strangers. Barking at strangers is noisy. This dog was barking to be let out of the house. Therefore he was being quiet." Why the dog barks doesn't change the fact that he was barking. 24.252.140.6 (talk) 12:04, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I'd also like to add that I'm not saying he was a dictator. I'm saying the arguments presented are weak and riddled with red herrings. Surely you people can do better than than what I've highlighted above. 24.252.140.6 (talk) 12:07, 9 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Please see WP:NPOV. It really does not matter whether or not Castro was a dictator but whether or not there is consensus in academic writing that he was.  Well there is not.  Our views of the opinions expressed in reliable sources are unimportant.  The example btw used to show that some writers do not consider him to be a dictator was not presented to explain their reasoning.  TFD (talk) 13:37, 9 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm laughing because the fact that people press on about calling him a dictator, when the article *already says* he has been accused of being a dictator with a whopping 3 citations, is absurd. We already say he's been called that, and that point is straightforward enough that it only merits the one sentence it currently gets -- but I see the talk page and it seems like that's not enough for some folks? What, are we supposed to refer to him as "Dictator of Cuba" from the intro on thru the article, and just assume that such a title isn't contested or that people don't call him something else ("President") a whole lot of the time? To me, it's just typical academic dishonesty from the anti-Cuba polemicists who want to use all of the most hyperbolic language possible (such as "Dictator") as if it was assumed fact or consensus that such terms applied. 173.3.41.6 (talk) 21:40, 1 October 2010 (UTC)


 * You may just laugh, but I critisize both sides. Fidel Castro is not a dictator! About "killer", you must look at how long they was in power. A man that have killed 23 000 people in less than 7 years (1952-1959 officially, the victory of revolution 1958 December 31) is worse than a man that have killed 50 000 people in more than 49 years (1959-2008)! It's just to laugh of to call Castro a dictator. Since the revolution, 3500 Cubans or tourists have been killed under terrorist actions on the island supported by the US government. More than 2500 have been hurt for life under these action - supported by US government. An African virus (don't remember what year it was) that was spread by America  killed 101 children. Under Operation Peter Pan (('59-'62), 14 000 children were kidnapped to Miami (by the government). 14 000! Under Katharina Storm inNew Oranges in 2005, Cuba wanted to help by sending doctors to |America. Look it up on the Internet. But 'USA thought it was better that their people died than to have Cuban doctors in "New Oranges".

I think the worst dictators in the East are the AMERICAN dictators. What about Pinochet's state coup in Chile in 1973, that was supported by president Richard Nixon (with a heart of stone)? Terror or to replace democratic president with dictators is NOT acceptable! If Castro is a dictator, well, then ALL U.S. presidents (including Obama) are DEFINATELY dictators. Also, people in the USA (including CUBANS that have moved to the USA!) AREN'T ALLOWED TO TRAVEL TO CUBA and get 10 years in prison as the softest punishment that is possible! That law is called 'The Regulation Law'. --A young communist (talk) 13:53, 6 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Ok "A Young Communist", I was going to ignore your rant as just being a "little" crazy, but when you claim that 14,000 children were kidnapped during "Peter Pan" I must call you out as a LIAR, or "UNEDUCATED" on the subject. I am a Peter Pan child.  My parents sent me to the United States, just as the parents of the 14,000 other children sent their children to the United States.  We were sent by OUR parents, no one kidnapped us.  Our parents believed that it was in our best interests to get us out of Cuba, and as our parents they had that right. Children are not the property of the state!

As to your claim that the US did not accept Cuba's offer of help after Katrina. That is true, but then no Cuban doctor is allowed to practice medicine in the United States until they pass a medical board exam. So doctors from Cuba would of been of no help after Katrina. May I also remind you that Cuba, has turned down numerious offers of financial and physical help from the United States after its many hurricanes. Former "President" Castro, was a "dictator" during his time as Prime Minister (just as Batista was a dictator prior to his first election as President in 1940 and was again a dictator when he overthrew Prio in 1952. But technically after his election in 1954, he was elected as "President" under the Constitution of 1940, that was in place at the time. Fidel Castro took control of the government on 1 January 1959, and was not made "President" until 2 December 1976, some 17 years (almost 18 years) as a dictator.  He proclaimed during (1952-1961)that his desire was to return to free elections and to the Cuban Constitution of 1940. ( It is my belief that if he had kept his word and returned to the Constitution of 1940 and of ran for President at that time, he would of won the election: but in time would of had to change the Constitution or leave office after serving 8 years).  So please Mr. Young Communist, do your homework before make false claims! BTW, I am a Miami Cuban, that has traveled to Cuba 15 times since 1994. Callelinea (talk) 05:45, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Wow, I had to see it for myself -- a lack of consensus that Castro is (or, at least, was) a dictator. Perhaps next we can have a debate over whether we can obtain a consensus that finds rain is, in fact, wet.JoelWhy (talk) 15:06, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
 * There are in fact some social scientists who are sympathetic to Castro and do not consider him a dictator. So long as the academic community accepts their views as legitimate viewpoints, we have to accept that no consensus exists.  If you like to see those viewpoints ignored by WP, then you should work to change policy.  TFD (talk) 19:26, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Wiki guidelines do not require us to give equal wait to ever scientist with a fringe idea. By your rational, whether or not the Holocaust happened is in dispute and the Queen of England may or may not be a shape-shifting alien because a few fringe scientists/historians make these claims; therefore there is no "consensus."JoelWhy (talk) 21:14, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Exactly, Joel. --Lecen (talk) 21:21, 11 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Could you please provide me with examples of books published in the University and academic press and articles in peer-reviewed journals that deny the holocaust and call the "Queen of England" an alien. TFD (talk) 21:30, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Can we drop the debate, Yes Castro was a dictator... That said he was also communist.. Dictator titles are not given to communist dictators, that is Wikipedia, like it or not. I am curious if Castro ever called himself a dictator.Mantion (talk) 10:09, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Bad Photo in lead
Is this really the best photo we can find? Not only does it contain blurring but it is outdated. I am sure that the previous photo, which was much more modern, was better. What do we think? ValenShephard (talk) 16:48, 6 January 2011 (UTC)


 * In my opinion, the current image is the best one available at this time. Red thoreau  -- (talk) 17:45, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Why is that? Does it give an accurate presentation of Castro? ValenShephard (talk)@
 * I think as long as a person is still living, the most recent good photo should be used. Once a person is deceased it makes sense to use a photo from the person's "best years." There is no reason the top photo in this article should be from the 1960s. Giordano Bruno (talk) 00:53, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Article outdated?
The article was tagged as "outdated" as of November 2010. I'm curious what exactly needs to be updated, as Fidel rarely makes the news these days, Raul is the public face and voice of the government, and Fidel's most recent public speech and interviews (from 2010) have already been integrated into the article. --Chimino (talk) 13:42, 19 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I agree, the tag is not justified. Roger (talk) 18:03, 19 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I removed it. <font color="#FF3333">Red <font color="#FCC200">thoreau  -- (talk) 17:46, 20 January 2011 (UTC)


 * On the contrary, this article is significantly dated. For one thing, he is still listed as First Secretary of the Party, which he has not held for 5 years (see my comment below). Secondly there is almost no mention of his Reflectiones, many of which have attracted discussion in main stream (i.e., non-Cuban) media. In fact a paragraph on his Reflectiones since 2006 probably merits its own subsection at the end of the article. Giordano Bruno (talk) 02:00, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Communist Party Secretary
The intro has him resigning from the post based on a comment to a group of students when even the source puts 'delegates' in quotes. I suspect taht we need more than that ! -- Beardo (talk) 21:58, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

The 'change' is not reflected here - http://www.pcc.cu/estructura_organizacion/secretariado/secretariado.php. -- Beardo (talk) 22:45, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

At list reference to this article should be reflected to the Fidel Castro article, sense are accurate sources and follow terms of Wikipedia

In 1980 the government of Cuba, In a deliberate well-planned and malicious way, Taking advantage of the noble and good intentions of the ExPresident Jimmy Carter to allow Relative old Cuban people that were residents of the United States could be reunited with their fellow family, Then in this moment. The government of Cuba, Government similar to the government of Venezuela, Empty the prisons of Cuba sending thousands and thousands of criminal to the United States And as result, Thousands of innocent people of the United States paid with their life in the hands of those criminal that, In an evil act, The government of Cuba sent to the street of the United States by Harbor of Mariel. People that by the way were not declare enemy of the Government of Cuban,


 * In his "Reflection" of March 22, 2011, Castro once again stated that he gave up the post of First Secretary of the party in 2006. http://www.juventudrebelde.co.cu/cuba/2011-03-22/my-shoes-are-too-tight/ In the section of this article called "Retirement" it says he is still First Secretary. This really needs to be changed. As far as the change not being made on the CPC website, referenced by Beardo, that's understandable. That probably just means they can't find any volunteers to remove Fidel Castro's name and photo. Giordano Bruno (talk) 01:49, 9 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Article now updated with latest information. Giordano Bruno (talk) 19:53, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

In my opinion, Castro gave up the post informally, since he is still styled as party first secretary although his functions are de facto exercised by Second Secretary Raul Castro. Raul was also credited "Second Secretary" during the Sixth Plenum of the CPC Central Committee in April 2008. According to the CPC Chart, it is the Central Committee which elects and dismisses the first secretary, so I believe that the formal change will occurr only after the ongoing congress. --FedeloKomma (talk) 13:49, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

News article
So, is this page going make any kind of reference to the front page news anytime soon? Currently absolutely nothing in the article makes any reference to anything that happened in 2011 or on april the 19th apart from the sidebar, which is unsourced. 83.117.64.26 (talk) 00:43, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

"Other Countries"
If there is a more embarrassing collection of hagiography in Wikipedia than this section of this article I've not seen in Wikpedia. For example: "Libyan de facto leader Muammar al-Gaddafi has granted Castro a "Libyan human rights prize".[106] On a visit to South Africa in 1998 he was warmly received by President Nelson Mandela.[107] President Mandela gave Castro South Africa's highest civilian award for foreigners, the Order of Good Hope.[108] Last December Castro fulfilled his promise of sending 100 medical aid workers to Botswana, according to the Botswana presidency. These workers play an important role in Botswana's war against HIV/AIDS. According to Anna Vallejera, Cuba's first-ever Ambassador to Botswana, the health workers are part of her country's ongoing commitment to proactively assist in the global war against HIV/AIDS,[109]" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.65.162.223 (talk) 21:59, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

"former communist revolutionary"
I don't why the "former" is there. He is still one and that is not likely to change. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.92.98.92 (talk) 22:23, 1 April 2011 (UTC) Very good point.. Communist Revolutionary is betterMantion (talk) 10:10, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
 * He is still a Communist, but the revolution has been over for decades. Thus he is a "former ... revolutionary", former and Communist BOTH modify revolutionary in this formulation. --Khajidha (talk) 13:22, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

The revolution is on as long as there is socialism in Cuba. They recently celebrated 50 years of revolution. Besides, whether the revolution is over or not, Fidel Castro is still revolutionary and will always be. The "former" is pointless and makes it sound like Fidel no longer supports the revolution.

Fidel The Commy?
Should we add communism templates back to this article or not? -- 92.4.109.186 (talk) 11:58, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Ancestry
Exactly what useful context into the life and character of this 20th century communist leader is learned from showing his father's father's mother's father. This whole table is just gratuitous genealogy. Agricolae (talk) 01:20, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I wholeheartedly agree. It could be more acceptable when dealing with a figure from a culture (i.e. Han Chinese or Korean) where ancestry is seen as of particular significance, but seeing as Cuban or Spanish culture doesn't, it should be removed. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 23:02, 16 May 2011 (UTC))

Relationship with other than the US
Canadians frequently travel to Cuba for vacations. There is an error in suggesting thatMexico is the only country who refused to sign on to the OAS agreement that no country in the western hemisphere should do business with Cuba. Interestingly enough, the sister city of Mobile Alabama, is of course, Havanna Cuba — Preceding unsigned comment added by Landman2010 (talk • contribs) 00:21, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Fidel cutting cane

 * Once while Fidel Castro was in power I saw on UK TV current film of him cutting sugarcane with a machete on a plantation. When and where did that happen? Anthony Appleyard (talk) 12:41, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Birth Date
Despite the Leas and Infobox stating that he was born in 1926, the article body (in the early life section) has it as 1927! Only one of these can be right. FM [ talk to me  |  show contributions  ]  23:06, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Actually the letter to Roosevelt was written on November 1940 and he states he is 12 years old, but according to his August 1926 birth date he would have been 14. So he would have had to be born at least after November 1927. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.148.245.21 (talk) 11:57, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Vandalism
Please fix expression "drunk Russians" here. This is vandalism by User:VVPushkin (aka IP:217.23.69.206 I guess). Biophys (talk) 05:01, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Misleading or incorrect reference
Reference 351 apparently intended to link to an article titled "Pope Excommunicates Castro", but instead links to one titled "Pope Condemns Embargo; Castro Attends Mass" which doesn't contain anything to support the statement for which the reference is used. A different, supporting source should be located. Also, it might be fair to include mention that the excommunication was at least in part due to the 1949 Decree against Communism, "which excommunicates all Catholics collaborating in communist organizations". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.55.209.241 (talk) 12:46, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Fidel Castro's Awards
Sorry to be a bother, but I have noticed that many other world leader pages past or present have a section for their awards and decorations, for example; Tony Blair, Gaddafi and Tito.

So I was just wounding, why doesn't Castro.

(I am not a member of Wikipedia and thus unable to create one myself).

He has amassed a few notable awards himself, such as;
 * Order of the White Lion (from the Czech Republic)
 * Hero of the Soviet Union (from the Soviet Union)
 * Lenin Peace Prize (from the Soviet Union)
 * Order of Companions (from South Africa)
 * Olive of Peace (from the World Peace Council)
 * Gen. Eloy Alfaro Delgado Decoration (from Ecuador)
 * General Emiliano Zapata medal (from the Emiliano Zapata Studies and Research Foundation)
 * Honorary Order/Medal of Honour (from the Caribbean Community (CARICOM))
 * 40th Anniversary of the Cuban Meteorology Institute Medal (from the Cuban Meteorology Institute) and
 * Amilcar Cabral medal (from the government of Guinea Bissau)
 * 17 November Medal (from International Union of Students (UIS))
 * South African Ubuntu award (from South Africa)
 * 150th Anniversary of theCuban Academy of Sciences Medal (from the Cuban Academy of Sciences)
 * 90-year Commemorative Medal of the Great October Socialist Revolution (from Russian Federation's Communist Party)
 * José Bonifacio Medal, Grand Official grade (from the Rio de Janeiro State University, Brazil)
 * Order of Service of First Grade (from the Ukraine)
 * Order Of The National Flag, 1st Class (from North Korea)
 * Gold Star Medal of the Hero of the Republic (from North Korea)
 * The title of Labor Hero (from North Korea)
 * Order of Glory and Honor (from the Russian Orthodox Church)
 * Omar Torrijos Medal (from Panama)
 * Order of Quetzal (from Guatemala) and
 * Order of the Eagle medal (from Zambia)

These are the only awards I can remember at this moment in time, if I remember more, I will add them to this list. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.150.99.213 (talk) 23:43, 9 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Set up an account and stick them in yourself, provided you are following the example of other heads of government. TFD (talk) 23:48, 9 October 2011 (UTC)


 * It won't let me, the edit option does not appear. (Unsung Comrade (talk) 00:25, 10 October 2011 (UTC)).


 * You must be autoconfirmed first, meaning that you must make 0 non-minor edits first. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 18:30, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Date of resignation
I should clarify that Castro did not resign on February 19, 2008, he merely announced that he wouldn't be seeking a another term as president come February 24. Therefore, while the announcement was made on February 19, his term ended automatically on February 24, when Raul was chosen for the presidency.

Tony Blair announced he wouldn't be seeking a further term as British PM on May 10, 2007. He resigned from the post, however, on June 27. And it is this date that is correctly listed on his Wikipedia page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.149.63.174 (talk) 00:09, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from, 7 November 2011
Please change: Cuban coin minted in 1993 to commemorate the thirtieth anniversary of Castro's attack on the Moncada Barracks. for: Cuban coin minted in 1993 to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of Castro's attack on the Moncada Barracks. because the coin clearly shows 40 aniversario

189.153.23.17 (talk) 16:34, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done --Jnorton7558 (talk) 17:16, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

"So-called" Russians?
Recent edit states that "the Soviet KGB deputy station chief in Warsaw, was the translator Castro used for contact with so-called Russians during this period." The edit simply added "so-called". Is there any dispute that the people Castro was contacting were Russians? "So-called" implies that he was contacting people claiming to be Russian but possibly weren't. Is the issue simply that the Soviets did not refer to themselves as "Russians" at the time? If so, we still shouldn't use "so called", because of the implication. Am I missing something here?JoelWhy (talk) 16:17, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Castro's age at the time of his letter to FDR
One of the points brought up on the side of the Castro article is his letter written to FDR, which states he was 12. If you look further the letter is dated as being written in 1940. Castro himself was born in 1926, so he was actually 14 years old at the time of its writing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.124.198.105 (talk) 23:37, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Inserted a comment
..that the reports was unconfirmed and got reverted. Perhaps someone should actually read what they revert! =p Jeblad (talk) 00:27, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Per WP:V, we should wait until we get confirmed reliable reports before writing anything. <font face="High Tower Text" size="1px"><b style="color:#00C">⋙–Ber</b><b style="color:#66f">ean–Hun</b><b style="color:#00C">ter—►</b> 00:38, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
 * People really need to learn that Twitter is not a coroner. Sunyavadin 02:01, 3 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Obama, Rick Santorum and the Queen are also dead according to Twitter. Move along folks. Manning (talk) 05:39, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 3 January 2012
died 03January, 2012

S0ckratees (talk) 08:22, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
 * We need a reliable source for that. Materialscientist (talk) 08:26, 3 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Here's a reliable source that dismisses the Twitter rumours. AFP. Manning (talk) 00:14, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Merger
A new article Politics_of_Fidel_Castro contains information that may be relevant to this existing article on WP and should be merged.Meclee (talk) 17:08, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
 * The article at Politics of Fidel Castro was actually created (by myself) to contain the overflow of information from this, the main Fidel Castro article. There simply is not the room here to deal with the political beliefs of Castro in any great detail – particularly his views regarding issues like the Israel-Palestine conflict and the human rights abuses of Stalin's government, which are not integral to his primary socialist ideology and his governance of the Republic of Cuba. For this reason I am afraid that I have to express my opinion that we reject the proposed merger. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 16:30, 14 January 2012 (UTC))

Edit request on 7 February 2012
Jussilinho Castro was an illigitimate son Castro had in 83. His mother move herself and her son to Madrid, Spain in 85, fearing what would happen to them. Only recently has it been made known. It's not widespread as yet, but an announcement is due soon since the son now back in Havana wants the world to know.

My Father is a Government official in Cuba and close to the top dogs. They've already known about it for a while and is thought it was party behind the reason Fidel stepped out of the limelight in 2011.

92.40.230.15 (talk) 01:41, 7 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Sorry, we can't spread rumors and need reliable sources for such information. Materialscientist (talk) 01:45, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Is This Neutral?
I noticed a picture of a poster towards the bottom. It claims to say "Fight against the impossible and win". It is labeled as a "propaganda" poster. That does not seem very neutral to me, especially with the context of the message. 68.58.103.149 (talk) 17:24, 10 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I would say you're half-right. The issue of propaganda in this article is not neutral, in that there is zero discussion of Castro's use of propaganda in the article. It should be added.JoelWhy (talk) 17:55, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

New picture
I don't know why you guys have a picture from the 1970's. Doesn't make any sense, since this is 2011. I've found another picture, high quality, that would be a good substitute, if you guys agree.

http://makanaka.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/fidel-castro-ruz.jpg —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.227.198.171 (talk) 14:32, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Great picture, but it is probably copyrighted by wordpress. We need images with wikipedia-compatible copyright status. Materialscientist (talk) 14:35, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
 * How would I check that? Because I've found several good images, but I won't bother posting them if they're copyrighted. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.227.198.171 (talk) 14:41, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
 * http://www.latina.com/files/imagecache/post-large-image/fidel_castro_latina_politics_0419_art.jpg
 * All internet images are copyrighted unless specifically stated otherwise. Free images include US government sources and some flickr images. Materialscientist (talk) 14:57, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

What's wrong with using a picture from the 1970s? There is no particular Wikipedia policy (that I am aware of) which insists on the use of the most up-to-date picture. I think the image currently used is a very good one: it displays Castro with his cigar, in what is a quintessential pose for him. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 23:05, 16 May 2011 (UTC))
 * We need a clean and neutral photo, not a "funny" one. We would have "funny" photo for almost each president of the world (think about Berlusconi), but we always select the most elegant. We have to do the same with Castro: he's the president of a nation, not just a guy with a cigar, don't you think? --Lucas (talk) 06:57, 3 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I don't view the cigar photo as "funny" or "undignified". Moreover, the cigar became an integral part of Castro’s own crafted self image and persona for many years. As for the zombie-esque photo that you would like to use instead – I fail to see how this is any more "presidential" or "elegant". Would you like to explain why you believe it is so? <font color="#FF3333">Red <font color="#FCC200">thoreau  -- (talk) 08:54, 3 June 2011 (UTC)


 * As you can see many users are putting again the other cleaner photo. I think the reason is easy: we cannot use a photo with that kind of "evil grin": it's not neutral it self. The other one shows just the modifing of the age (wrinkes, face...), and it is recent. What about this photo for Berlusconi (the bandana is a "symbol" almost as the cigar) . --Lucas (talk) 00:33, 26 September 2011 (UTC)


 * I also don't see what is wrong with the cigar photo and would like to see it as the main pic again. This zombiesque photo seems biased and unsuitable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.92.138.219 (talk) 06:05, 5 December 2011 (UTC)


 * I totally agree. This picture is terrible, and not representative for an entry "Fidel Castro" in an encyclopedia. Fidel Castro's = revolutionary uniform + cigar. Just compare with those pictures for other personalities; Che Guevara, Winston Churchuil, Roosevelt, Stalin. Even GW Bush gives a look of intelligence... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.162.198.57 (talk) 11:46, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Spelling Correction
In the section about his imprisonment, it says "Batista won comfortably, buy the election was widely recognised as fraudulent." But it should say "Batista won comfortably, but the election was widely recognized as fraudulent.". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.67.157.36 (talk) 00:05, 26 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Thank you - I have corrected it. TFD (talk) 05:20, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Fidel Castro was never excommunicated
Former secretary of the Pope John XXIII, Archbishop Loris Kapovilyu declared that "Castro [was] never excommunicated" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.155.232.86 (talk) 13:52, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

NPOV intro
"Socialist reforms" is a wildly NPOV phrasing. Dictionary definition of "reform" is "To improve by alteration, correction of error, or removal of defects; put into a better form or condition" and there is simply no concensus that the changes in Cuba under Castro improved, corrected error or removed defects.

Further, the claim is made that Castro changed Cuba into a "multi-party socialist state"? It is no such thing. For example, http://www.euronews.com/2012/01/30/castro-rules-out-multi-party-system-in-cuba/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.175.209.147 (talk) 09:34, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Someone please edit the line - "Last December Castro fulfilled his promise of sending 100 medical aid workers" in the "Recognition and legacy" section
"Last December" is meaningless. It looks like this refers to an event from Dec 2004. Reference here: http://www.africanonlinenews.com/en/articles/15034

That reference was a little hard to find, because articles from many different years all say "last December." They are probably all using Wikipedia as a source, so the error grows larger.

Meshane (talk) 19:50, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

The source we actually cite states that the President of Botswana is Festus Mogae - but he seems to have resigned in 2008. The source is clearly wrong. I'll delete the line for now. Perhaps someone can find a source that actually gives a date. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:54, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

United States, as it is being used, refers to a single entity. 'were' should be changed to 'was'.
The United States were alarmed by his involvement in the overthrow of Batista and relationship with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, implementing an economic blockade of the island.

Should read...

The United States was alarmed by his involvement in the overthrow of Batista and relationship with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, implementing an economic blockade of the island. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.115.161.74 (talk) 16:30, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Done. TFD (talk) 16:37, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

human rights
The human rights situation should be clarified. Obviously it deserves prominent mention on the page, and no one will deny there is a political prisoner problem in Cuba, but (whether on a total count basis, or on a national per capita basis) it doesn't even begin to compare to the political prisoner problems in states such as the Egypt of Mubarak or modern-day China (both countries that enjoyed stellar relations with the US, whose State Dept. could not stop talking about the political prisoners of Cuba while making excuses for the latter two countries, a curious double standard). The number of people still held as political prisoners is really quite low. True enough there isn't a free press in Cuba, but most political prisoners are jailed not for simply speaking out against the government, but rather for accepting money from the US to be paid dissidents (which the US readily admits doing as part of a 50+ year, multimillion dollar destabilization campaign, and apparently sees no problem with doing). Recall that the US (and their narcoterrorist Cuban Exile clients in Miami) has sponsored countless terrorist attacks against Cuba, resulting in as many casualties as (if not more than) 9/11. So when Cuban "dissidents" receive money from the US to prompt their dissidence, it is understandably a very sensitive issue to Cuban national security -- if i was a US journalist and I accepted money from Al Qaeda, and was predictably jailed for it, by the same token I could call myself a "political prisoner," right? Anyhow, aside from the issue with political prisoners, there really aren't many other human rights complaints about Cuba that hold any water or are made by reputable sources. Amnesty International regularly puts out lists of human rights abuses in the Americas, and in Cuba there is usually just one, political prisoners (there is also usually a mention of the US for one or more abuses, such as racist police brutality, so by Amnesty's count Cuba is in the same human rights league as the US; meanwhile Colombia comes in for far more than one human rights abuse -- extrajudicial executions, internal displacement, and so on, egregious human rights abuses that *still* go on in Colombia thanks to US military aid, while there are certainly zero death squads, paramilitaries, or displacement/disappearances in Cuba). Sure, Cuba isn't perfect, I'll be the first to admit that -- but it's far from one of the worst, and even many critics of human rights in Cuba (such as Amnesty International and Oxfam) will admit that. 69.115.35.73 (talk) 11:01, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
 * An interesting analysis, but I do not belief that an in-depth discussion of human rights abuses is really warranted on this page, the biography of Castro himself. Mention of it of course necessary, considering that he was the leader of the administration that committed such abuses, but a full, well-referenced discussion should be reserved for the page at Human rights in Cuba. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 16:34, 14 January 2012 (UTC))
 * This article is not about how the U.S. interacts with countries which have a history of human rights abuses, or whether the U.S. acts hypocritically. And, your claim that "aside from the issue with political prisoners, there really aren't many other human rights complaints about Cuba that hold any water or are made by reputable sources" is utter nonsense. For starters, here's a 2009 report issued by Human Rights Watch: http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/cuba1109web_1.pdfJoelWhy (talk) 19:43, 16 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Cuba is in the same human rights league as the US? Excuse the language, but is that some kind of fucking joke? Why don't you ask Cubans if they are free to leave whenever they want.  Oh, wait, they wouldn't be able to tell you.  My bad.   Cuba hasn't had a legitimate election in over 5 decades; that is a human rights violation in and of itself.   Cubans can't worship freely.  Cubans can't criticize the government.  There is no such thing as a free press.  There is no freedom of speech or assembly.  Rights for gays are essentially non-existent in Cuba.  Are you going to claim that a lack of elections and no freedom of speech, assembly, worship and press are criticisms that "don't hold water"?   What I have stated about Cuba's nonexistent elections and a complete lack of the freedoms we take for granted in the United States are facts and they can't be changed or minimized by stating "well, some cops in the US did beat up a black kid" or similar nonsense, as if there is no difference between isolated incidents that are harshly punished and condemned by the government and something that is systematic and can only happen with the tacit, or explicit, approval of the government (again, Cuba is a totalitarian state).  And do left-wing nutjobs who are enthralled with Latin American thugs have some sort of guide book that they read from when defending said thugs? Because every time a journalist or dissident is thrown in jail, we are given the SAME EXACT EXCUSE EVERY SINGLE TIME:  they are really just paid lackeys of the United States attempting to foment a coup. Castro's pal Chavez has used that ridiculous excuse to shut down every last television station that dared criticize him.  It is quite simply amazing, and disgusting,  to read a defense of punishing people who had the temerity to criticize a dictator.  The attempt to compare imprisoned Cuban journalists to al qaeda is as despicable as it is pathetic and inapt and anyone making such an attempt is a piece of filth, period.    And while we are on the subject of political prisoners, how and hell do you know the numbers of such prisoners are "quite low"? It certainly isn' t because you read it in Cuba's free press; there isn't one.  Your attempt to blame Cuba's human rights abuses on the United States is something that far-left Castro worshippers have been doing for over fifty years now.


 * Joel -- indeed, that report is almost entirely on political prisoners. Doesn't touch on the kinds of egregious human rights issues that the US bankrolls elsewhere in the region, such as death squads in Colombia and post-Aristide Haiti, forced displacement in Colombia, extrajudicial executions in Mexico, etc. And the number of political prisoners in Cuba is actually low and steadily decreasing as more and more of them are being released -- unlike the much greater political prisoner problems of US allies such as China or Egypt's Mubarak. Anyhow, I do agree that this is best reserved for the "Human Rights in Cuba" article as the first responder suggested. But considering the soapboxing that I got in the last reply (currently hidden with link), I see I'd be up against some rabid anti-Castro folk. No big surprise. 74.102.158.68 (talk) 17:26, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Midnightblueowl
Whats going on, why were both these references removed here?
 * Midnightblueowl, how can you remove these well sourced statements, with no edit summary or explanation, did I miss something? Wrathofjames (talk) 03:02, 12 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Hello there WrathofJames! I'm afraid that I would certainly have to contest your assertion that these were "well sources statements". The latter reference, to Wright's book Latin America in the era of the Cuban Revolution, didn't specify which page number the information came from; we really can't have Wikipedia articles being referenced in such a manner. The other link, to a poorly, non-academically sourced web page (albeit written by a historian), isn't a great source either. The sorts of references that this article needs are from well-sourced, academic or similarly reliable published sources on the life of Castro and Revolutionary Cuba (for instance Leycester Coltman's The Real Fidel Castro (2003) or Robert E. Quirk's Fidel Castro (1993)). If these errors are corrected then I am more than happy to see these references reintroduced into the article. Best (Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:11, 28 April 2012 (UTC))

Multi party state?
It describes Cuba as a "multi-party" state at the top of the article. Is this true? Sounds unlikely. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.168.116.77 (talk) 15:56, 14 April 2012 (UTC)
 * The "president" is chosen by having a handful of members of the communist government "choose" him. It just "happens" that the vote is always unanimous (wonder what would happen if someone would not pick fidel or now his brother raul?). No other political parties are allowed to participate in any kind of local elections. (high level elections are nonexistent, castro always hand picked the people at high levels and was usually the judge when he needed to execute someone who got out of line (like he did with Ochoa)). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.229.155.178 (talk) 04:54, 24 April 2012 (UTC)
 * My original text read "one-party state". Clearly, someone has changed it to "multi-party" in the last month or so. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:02, 28 April 2012 (UTC))

Typo hunt
I'm an anonymous user, and thus can't make changes to the main Fidel Castro page, but in the "Personal life" section, "vindicative" should be "vindictive". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.228.106.179  (talk • contribs)  17:49, 27 Jun 2011 (UTC)

Errors
In this article does not appear Juanita Castro as a sister of Castro in Relations. Angel Castro and Maria Argota had five children, not two daughters. 7/5/2011 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.125.74.36  (talk • contribs)  07:29, 5 Jul 2011 (UTC)

Edit request on 19 June 2012
Sub section: Fidel Castro's Childhood- the untold story

Swalk1954 (talk) 12:33, 19 June 2012 (UTC) swalk1954
 * Reverted article length request with 48 uncited references. If it's untold, it doesn't belong. Each change should be supported by a reference and either uncontroversial or approved by discussion. Dru of Id (talk) 13:07, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

20,000 vs 2,000 deaths under Batista
Stumink / IP 88 (same person), I would dispute your --> added contention that the previously included 20,000 death toll under Fulgencio Batista is "less than 2,000" (via Miguel Ángel Quevedo) - which I believe to be WP:UNDUE and a WP:FRINGE point of view. Some of the confusion I believe arises because some sources address the civilian murders during the Revolution from 1957-1959 and thus 2,000 deaths - whereas the cited 20,000 killed in the article under Batista is the given number of people killed by Batista's regime collectively during all his years in office (1933-1944) & primarily (1952-1959). The 2,000 deaths during the armed insurrection from 1957-59 is often cited by anti-Castro writers as an attempt to call into question the more commonly accepted mainstream 20,000 figure (which was repeatedly echoed numerous times by President John F. Kennedy of all people). For instance, the 1959 United States Senate Hearings before the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws by the Committee on the Judiciary (digitized online), noted that = "Batista in Cuba was regarded as the butcher of some 20,000 or 25,000 of its finest youth." This matches the belief 10 years later by the 1969 United States National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence which published a report entitled: 'Violence in America: Historical and Comparative Perspectives: A Report' - where on Page 582 it states that = "It is clear that counter terror became the strategy of the Batista government ... It has been estimated by some that as many as 20,000 civilians were killed." Now admittedly many historical events have a death count that is altered over time as more information comes about, however, the 20,000 total has remained consistent in the majority (see Wp:Undue) of sources from 1959 to the present day ...

Some published examples of this include:


 * Bolivia, Press and Revolution 1932-1964‎ - Page 347 .... "Batista had been responsible for perhaps as many as 20,000 deaths"


 * The Free World Colossus: a Critique of American Foreign Policy in the Cold War‎ - Page 192 - (by current day Conservative and Castro-critic David Horowitz) .... "the 20,000 Cubans who had been killed by the Batista regime"


 * World Guide: A View from the South‎ - Page 209 - .... "Batista engineered yet another coup, establishing a dictatorial regime which was responsible for the death of 20,000 Cubans"


 * The Third World in Perspective‎ - Page 344 .... "under Batista at least 20,000 people were put to death"


 * Invisible Latin America‎ - Page 77 .... "All told, Batista's second dictatorship cost the Cuban people some 20,000 dead"


 * Conflict, Order, and Peace in the Americas‎ - Page 121 (by the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, hardly a bastion of Marxism) .... "The US-supported Batista regime killed 20,000 Cubans"


 * Controversy Over Cuba‎ - Page 3 (by the D.C. Committee on National Legislation, hardly Pravda or Granma) .... "Some l9,000 to 20,000 Cubans were murdered during Batista’s regime, some were tortured, others bled to death after being castrated"

Lastly, I would point out ---> this short clip from the documentary Fidel: The Untold Story and the section of the clip from [1:03-1:09] right after testimony by Wayne Smith (former head of the United States Interests Section in Havana). Then again as author Abbott Joseph Liebling notes in his 1981 book The Press‎ - Page 267: "On the international scene, the 20,000 shootings by Batista got considerably less space than the 700 by Castro." <font color="#FF3333">Red <font color="#FCC200">thoreau -- (talk) 23:00, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Agreed, forgive me if I misunderstand, but it appears to me that this user is apparently trying to deny the extent of the executions under Batista's regime by making reference to fringe web sources. Perhaps this page needs a greater level of protection? (Midnightblueowl (talk) 13:04, 7 July 2012 (UTC))

== U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower also ordered the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to overthrow him, which they unsuccessfully tried through multiple assassination attempts and the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961 ==

This statement is confusing as it implies President Eisenhower was the President during the Bay of Pigs Invasion when in fact Kenedy was the President. Also, sources should be cited supporting that the CIA attempted to assinate Castro and that Eisenhower orderd the CIA to overthrow him. Otherwise the statement should be changed to reflect it is thought or believed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.60.21.61 (talk) 11:38, 14 July 2012 (UTC)
 * As the article goes on to explain, it was under Eisenhower's administration that the CIA organised the Bay of Pigs invasion; when Kennedy was elected, they consulted him on the issue and then continued with their original Eisenhower-supported plan. The sections of the article dealing with Eisenhower and the Bay of Pigs invasion are already academically referenced, although more academic references could be added to improve it. As the rest of this article is referenced, there is no need to furthermore reference the introduction in this case. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 17:13, 26 July 2012 (UTC))

Algeria
Would it possible for someone to add this to the article? It's got a quality source and everything, just needs to be copy-pasted.

According to Piero Gleijeses, "The aid Cuba gave Algeria in 1961–2 had nothing to do with the East-West conflict. Its roots predate Castro's victory in 1959 and lie in the Cubans' widespread identification with the struggle of the Algerian people."

ColaXtra (talk) 14:43, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

Infobox
The infobox describes its accompanying image as "Fidel Castro in Cuba standing in front of a statue of his hero, José de San Martí". This is obviously a mistake because San Martí is not "Castro's hero", in any case, he is a historical figure considered Father of the Fatherland of Cuba, but not of anyone in particular. It should be "a statue of Cuba's national hero José de San Martí", or likewise.--190.202.87.219 (talk) 16:04, 10 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Done. Peter Talk page 12:36, 11 August 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure that this was the most appropriate move, particularly as it was undertaken without any debate or consultation with those editors who have long been working on improving this page. Castro has long regarded Martí as his ideological forebear and treated him as a great inspiration – this fact is evident in the many biographical accounts of the Cuban leader. It must be noted that Martí was no Marxist, but he was a Cuban nationalist, anti-imperialist and revolutionary, and it is these traits that Castro idolizes and upholds as tenets of his particular ideological wordview. As a result, it is perfectly accurate to describe Martí as "Castro's hero", just as it is also accurate to describe Martí as the "Father of the Fatherland of Cuba". However, I can certainly appreciate that wording other than "Castro's hero" could be used here, and would welcome alternate suggestions; I merely wish to reiterate that 190.202.87.219's assertion is factually incorrect. Midnightblueowl (talk) 21:35, 14 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Obviously my point was not as sufficiently understood as I intended. My proposition itself relied on the fact that the writer might have originally considered naming Martí "Castro's political idol", but instead wrote "Castro's hero", which is a rethorical mistake. I, on the simple role of a reader, viewed the context of the image and statue on a more historical sort than in a personal fashion. Stating that anyone is "Someone's hero" is not entirely objective, but "Someone's political father", "political inspiration", "admired historical figure" is a more formal approach. Therefore, while acting on a historiographical basis, I assumed that the editor considered the importance of the picture to befall on Castro stading with his Father of the Fatherland as a background.--190.202.87.219 (talk) 19:17, 15 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Ah, my apologies for misunderstanding your original message. No offence intended. Midnightblueowl (talk) 22:10, 16 August 2012 (UTC)
 * None taken.--190.39.167.78 (talk) 18:26, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Guinea-Bissau
I can't edit the article yet, but could someone add this?

On Cuba's involvement in the Guinea-Bissau War of Independence, Piero Gleijeses has written: "Joining the rebellion in 1966, and remaining through the war's end in 1974, this was the longest Cuban intervention in Africa before the despatch of troops to Angola in November 1975. It was also the most successful. As the Guinean paper Nõ Pintcha declared, 'The Cubans' solidarity was decisive for our struggle'."

ColaXtra (talk) 14:08, 15 August 2012 (UTC)


 * Hello there ColaXtra! It's good to see you coming onto Wikipedia and taking an interest in this article, however I have some reservations about this piece of text as you have presented it (the same applies to your quote on Cuban intervention in Algeria, below). The prose that you suggest is simply a chunk of text copied directly from an original source – in this case from an academic paper – and it is Wikipedia policy to avoid such copied texts; we try to use as few direct quotes as possible. I also have concerns that the information here is not particualrly relevent to Castro himself, but is more relevant to the article on the Cuban invovlement in Africa. Midnightblueowl (talk) 22:20, 16 August 2012 (UTC)


 * Hello! Thanks for your comments. I will added them where you suggest instead, minus the direct quotation (I'll write summaries instead). ColaXtra (talk) 22:29, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

New image
The new main image is inappropriate and outdated. The colour was edited green from the original picture. Possible vandalism, as it has been used to slander Fidel many times before. Blurtex33 (talk) 19:06, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
 * As the individual responsible for the alteration, I can assure you that the change was not vandalism. I thoroughly searched all of Wikipedia's close-up images of Castro, and I dare say this was perhaps the best (which isn't saying much really). I really don't think it fair to say that the image is "inappropriate and outdated"; it is from 2003, the same year that the previous picture was from, and Castro himself has had no official power within Cuba's governance since 2011, making an even more recent picture unnecessary. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 13:04, 3 May 2012 (UTC))
 * An editor has subsequently reverted it to the preceding image. (Midnightblueowl (talk) 23:11, 25 May 2012 (UTC))
 * Somewhat related, I've reverted a recent change to the 2003 image. I feel it needs discussing here first.-- Peter Talk page 17:47, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

I think we can use this photo or this one. They are the better ones imho. --Lucas (talk) 04:36, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

20 April 11
Under Bay of Pigs Invasion, exactly what does "and so on 20 April 11" mean?" Please re-write this for clarity.
 * That was a missed change from a month ago, thanks for pointing it out. Although it probably would be better worded if it didn't look like a date of some kind or other. Franamax (talk) 09:52, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Alyssa Parker was here on september 27,2012 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.117.145.2 (talk) 15:31, 27 September 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 8 October 2012
Jawaharlal Nehru was the prime minster of india, and never was a president but it is referred in the article as "Indian President Jawaharlal Nehru"

Singh26navneet (talk) 07:00, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Change made. TFD (talk) 07:25, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

Relations (Siblings)
Fidel Castro has other sister: Juana Castro. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.127.121.11 (talk) 21:29, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Evaluating and replacing the image captions
In the above topic of discussion, entitled "This page lacks neutrality", Wikipedia user Silverseren has recently remarked that "As for the images that are of other people (or the letter), I question their necessity, or at least their caption wording." I think that this particular user has a valid point on this issue, and so have founded this separate discussion in order to deal with it. I invite all users to comment and give their opinions on how we should best go about progressing here. Midnightblueowl (talk) 19:57, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
 * The captions may be biased and should in any case just present straight-forward information. I suggest following closely the captions from the jpg files.  If they are biased then that should be dealt with in that project.  For example, the jpg file caption for the picture of Raul Castro and Che Guevara is "Raul Castro, left, with has his arm around second-in-command, Ernesto “Che” Guevara, in their Sierra de Cristal Mountain stronghold south of Havana, Cuba, during the Cuban revolution."  The caption given in the article however says they were "devout and vocal Marxist-Leninists", then recites praise by Castro (not clear which one) for Guevara.  TFD (talk) 22:42, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
 * I concur that the text in these captions could indeed be simplified to the bare minimum of descriptive information, although personally I believe that the quote from Castro regarding Guevara has value; it illustrated his personal opinion on another significant figure in the Cuban Revolution, and in my opinion therefore adds value to the page as a whole. Nonetheless, I can see why other editors might disagree, and will go along with the consensus on this particular issue Midnightblueowl (talk) 22:54, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and been bold by making some changes to the captions. Hence I have replaced the following: "Grau and Prío, two Cuban presidents whose administrations were marked by corruption, political repression and obedience to U.S. interests. Castro protested against both of them whilst a student." The caption to this image now reads "Cuban Presidents Grau and Prío, whose administrations faced student protests that Castro took part in." Regarding the second caption, which formerly stated that "General Fulgencio Batista (left, with U.S. Army Chief of staff Malin Craig), seized power in a military coup, postponed elections indefinitely and implemented right wing policies; he would widely be labelled a dictator and Castro would believe it necessary to oust him." It now states "Castro intended to overthrow the presidency of General Fulgencio Batista (left, with U.S. Army Chief of staff Malin Craig)." Furthermore, I have removed the passage stating ", both of whom were devout and vocal Marxist-Leninists" from the Raul/Che image. I hope that these changes will be acceptable alterations to those users who consider elements of this page to reflect a pro-Castro POV. Midnightblueowl (talk) 16:14, 22 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Thank you. That really does help a lot. In regards to your reply in the section above about an alternate interpretation of the article, I completely agree that the article as a whole can be interpreted very differently. I just feel that the way I interpreted it is going to be the common interpretation for English speakers, or at least for people living in the US. Silver  seren C 23:29, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Ah, but there's that pesky U.S.-centrism of Wikipedia peeping through again :p.... As several of the sources referenced in the article attest, the United States is largely alone in its highly negative public attitude towards Castro. For Europeans such as myself (and Canadians too, from what I gather), he's no bogeyman haunting the popular imagination; sure, European public opinion is understandably critical of his communism, his single-party system, and the human rights abuses committed under his regime, but in this he is no different to a huge percentage of world leaders; certainly, his regime was far less abusive towards its people than say, Francois Duvalier's was in Haiti, or Rafael Trujillo's was in the Dominican Republic, or even Fulgencio Batista's was in Cuba itself. Castro's Cuba saw a suppression of civil liberties, the arrest and psychological torture of political prisoners and unfair trials, but it was not witness to the mass murder, ethnic cleansing and massacres that characterised many other Latin American and Caribbean governments of the 20th century, often – dare I say it – with U.S. Government backing. So yes, I agree that many U.S. readers might consider this article to be too positive of Castro, but I personally believe that that is not because it breaks Wikipedia's NPOV policy, but because they have been brought up with a particularly virile opinion of the man, and expect the article to reflect that attitude. Midnightblueowl (talk) 00:34, 23 October 2012 (UTC)

Quantify, please
The article is locked & I've always been too lazy to sign up & remember another password for WP, but the article can be improved by satisfying (or adding) the following "quantify" tag: "The Ortodoxo had gained a considerable level of support and was predicted to do well in the election." ...especially if you have access to the (offline) books which are the sources for the above quote. Thanks. And are these polls, and who made these predictions (e.g. Ortodoxo itself, LOL, or credible international observers)?
 * The sources that are referenced here state this point; where they obtained such information from is unknown however. Midnightblueowl (talk) 10:25, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

This page lacks neutrality
This page is consistently pro-Castro; there is nothing neutral about it. The words used, the photographs used -everything makes him out to be a positive influence in Cuba and elsewhere. Even the critical section is tiny, even though he has a multitude of critics, and consistently defends his position in response to those critics (should be left out, that's the critic's section and his response there makes the page untrustworthy). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.40.54.252 (talk) 19:08, 19 October 2012 (UTC)
 * By all means, highlight specific instances that you consider to carry a pro-Castro bias (thereby breaking Wikipedia' NPOV policy), and we can discuss possible changes to be made. Remember, if you want to include new information that is more critical of Castro then you must provide good quality references (i.e., not politically charged right-wing U.S. sources, or anti-Castro Trotskyite web pages, or anything of that ilk), and you must be clear on the new information's specific relevence to Castro himself; this is not the page to discuss human rights abuses in Cuba, for instance. As it currently stands, this article has been built using a number of well-sourced biographical accounts of Castro's life, such as those of Peter Bourne, Robert E. Quirk and Arthur Leycester Scott Coltman, which are by no means pieces of pro-Castro propaganda. I personally fail to see how the photographs used are "pro-Castro" in nature, but admittedly the critical section is poor, on this we can certainly agree; are there any texts that you would recommend with which to improve it ? (Midnightblueowl (talk) 20:46, 20 October 2012 (UTC))
 * Just wanted to pop in to comment that the non-neutrality of this article (in relation to it being pro-Castro) was noted in the news a while back. So the IP above isn't just a one-off person that has noticed this. Silver  seren C 00:33, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Just wanted to voice my agreement with Midnightblueowl's position. ColaXtra (talk) 00:43, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
 * You need to point out the specific problems with the article. Also, could you please identify the news source about this article.  TFD (talk) 01:29, 21 October 2012 (UTC)


 * neutrality??? DIE Fidel DIE! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.12.78.253 (talk) 13:10, 30 December 2012 (UTC)


 * I really don't feel like looking up the news article right now, but as for specific problems, in addition to the critical section (which is obviously in a poor state, so nothing more needs to be said about that), I think I see what the IP means about the photos. The first photo in the article creates a joint link between Castro and a Cuban national hero. Then you have the letter, which makes him appear sympathetic and creates a positive connection to the US. Then the following two pictures show people who are described as horrible for differing reasons and that Castro stood against them (implicitly saying that Castro is a good person because he did such things).


 * Following is a picture of Castro under arrest, which one would think would be a negative contrast. However, if you consider it in relation to the section it's in, you see that it's meant to be an image that makes you feel bad for Castro, because he is being wrongfully arrested by Batista's corrupt government. Then you have an image of Castro speaking good things of Che Guevara, who is thought of even in the US positively because of his association with fighting against "the man". Even if that association doesn't express the proper nuance of Guevara's life, it's how he is thought of by the public at large.


 * I could go on, but I think you get the point. It's somewhat subtle, but quite obvious when you actually take a look at it. Almost everything in the article is positioned and manipulated in such a way so that Castro is thought of positively. Silver  seren C 03:06, 21 October 2012 (UTC)


 * If you have a picture of Castro strangling a cat, then we could put it in. Otherwise, what sort of pictures should we have?  TFD (talk) 03:46, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
 * My point is that these specific pictures being chosen and the specific captions given for them appears to be pushing a POV. Surely there must be more neutral images of Castro around? I would think there would be a number of images of him. As for the images that are of other people (or the letter), I question their necessity, or at least their caption wording.


 * Do you at least see what I mean about what the pictures and captions do to the article as a whole? Silver  seren C 04:39, 21 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Problematically, there are very few images around of Castro that we can freely use; the overwhelming majority are copywryted, and therefore beyond the grasp of Wikipedia. I'm more than happy for other free, good quality images to be introduced, but I'm really not sure that that's possible. Silverseren, you mention that the opening image, depicting Castro in front of the Martí monument in Havana, carries with it a pro-Castro bias; I can appreciate this point of view, though must highlight that it will only have a positive view for those whom already have a favourable opinion towards Martí. Personally, I still resolutely defend the use of this image, for four reasons.
 * 1) As political leader of Cuba, it is only natural that Castro would be photographed in front of this important national monument, just as one might expect Barack Obama to be photographed in front of a statue of George Washington.
 * 2) Martí was a very significant influence over Castro's political views, with both of them being anti-imperialist Cuban nationalists. Hence Castro is already closely associated with Martí, and the image reflects this.
 * 3) It is an image for which we have permission to use on Wikipedia; that in itself is rare enough.
 * 4) It is a good quality image, well composed, and just looks quite aesthetically nice as the opener (in my opinion at least).
 * For these three reasons I believe that it is perfect for use at the start of this Wikipedia page, and reiterate that there is no preferable alternative. Midnightblueowl (talk) 17:23, 21 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Equally, and I don't mean to be critical of you Silverseren, but I would argue that one could compose a very different interpretation of the images used in the page; the opening image could be seen as depicting Castro in a forceful and autocratic pose, one in which he is not smiling but raising his hand, emphasising his dictatorial credentials. His letter to the U.S. President would emphasise his confused and contradictory political beliefs (first admiring the U.S., only later turning against it), making him appear confused and un-intelligent. The images of Grau, Prío and Batista are all smiling and appear respectable and smart, thereby contrasting them with the negative image of Castro at the opener. Depicting Castro under arrest emphasises his criminal past, while the pictures of Guevara and Raul Castro only serve to associate Fidel with these two well-documented terrorists and murderers. The image showing Fidel armed and with Cienfuegos depicts him as a violent and aggressive individual because of the inclusion of weapons, while that of him in Washington D.C. is dark and gloomy and shows him scowling.... and I could go on.... What I hope to illustrate is that the interpretation of these images is all in the eye of the beholder. One reader could read through this page, and interpret it as depicting a negative image of Castro, while another could think quite the opposite. It is for this reason that I reject the anonymous IP user's initial claims that the use of images was intrinsically pro-Castro. Midnightblueowl (talk) 17:23, 21 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Charismatic leaders usually photograph well, whether they are heroes or villains. Compare Ronald Reagan and Mike Dukakis.  However, I think the captions should be shortened.  The relevance of each picture should be clear from the text in the article.  TFD (talk) 22:16, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree on the captioning issue, and have formed a separate thread on which to discuss this issue, which is not directly related to the topic at hand here: which is whether the article as it stands breaks the NPOV rule. Midnightblueowl (talk) 22:19, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 1 January 2013
In the paragraph titled: Marriage and Marxism: 1948–1950, first sentence there is a typo.

"Returning to Cuba, Castro became a prominent figure in protests against the government's attempts to raise bus fares, a mode of transformation used mostly by students and workers."

In the sentence above, the word "transformation" should be substituted with "transportation", as the word "transofrmation" does not make sense in context, and is likely a typo.

Frankydfoe (talk) 22:28, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Done
 * Thanks - well spotted. I've fixed it, though I've gone for 'mode of transport' rather than 'mode of transportation', as I think it is probably the more normal usage. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:19, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Format change needed?
I believe that the "Bibliography" section should come after the article and not before the "Reception and legacy" section. Thank you, Wordreader (talk) 19:03, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

Fidel Castro condems North Korea.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-22049234

Should something be included? Richard-of-Earth (talk) 03:45, 6 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Fidel comments on basically all significant world events, and has done for decades. If we are to include mention of this (and I'm not saying that we shouldn't), then there will probably be an awful lot that we should include as well. Midnightblueowl (talk) 20:50, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

agree and more
Fidel Castro largely redeemed himself after the breakup of the USSR. In fact I had recommended Tariq Ali's book because on the whole the book is largely pro-Castro, though Ali wasn't allowed a visa for 3 decades after a mild criticism of fidel c. 1966.

BBC is even less friendly to Fidel tho' it of course a public broadcaster and can't be as rabid as US broadcasters...

praise of fidel from sources from sources who have had a reputation rightly or wrongly for at-least-slight-anti-fidel-bias - have some extra value IMO - the 'hostile winess turning non-hostile' principle :-) ... Manojpandeyanarchocommunist (talk) 21:10, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

POV issue
article is severely biased against the cuban govt, even though fidel is/was a dictator, often very unscrupulous and brutal. Manojpandeyanarchocommunist (talk) 17:11, 8 March 2013 (UTC)

for what it is worth: my visits to cuba; and my mother's visits to cuba as a legislator from india; confirm above.Manojpandeyanarchocommunist (talk) 17:17, 8 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Hello there Manojpandeyanarchocommunist, and welcome to Wikipedia. Thank you for coming to this talk page to express your opinion as to the quality of this particular article. However, we cannot take action on your assertion – that this article is biased against the Cuban government (I assume that you mean Castro's administration, as opposed to Batista's earlier regime) – unless you provide direct evidence for this belief. Are there specific instances where this article's text pushes an anti-government bias ? If so, please highlight them, and use specialist, preferably academic literature, to support your views, as per Wikipedia policy. We cannot simply accept the opinions based upon your own visits to Cuba, or those of your mother, as evidence here, as this would breach our "no original research" regulations. Perhaps of interest is that in October 2012, an anonymous user also posted on this talk page, expressing their opinion that the article carried a pro-Castro bias, something that is quite at odds with your own opinion; as this situation highlights, Castro is a highly controversial figure and those of us active on this page must always be aware of this. Thank you. Midnightblueowl (talk) 22:41, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

let it be
okay my primary *published* source is tariq ali's book on fidel and cuba. [tariq wasnt allowed to enter cuba for almost 20 years!] But since chomsky has recently said USA is still a war with cuba, so he refuses to criticise the cuban regime. I agree with chomsky because chomsky anmd tariq iirc were together when he said this... I now want to let the article stand. Or have even less anti-fidel bias. [thats what i said before iirc: i criticised fidel on the talk page only, I dont want it as ammunination in capitalist hands!] I dont want to hurt fidel: ill - and a good man turned dictator by situation... ] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Manojpandeyanarchocommunist (talk • contribs) 14:23, 26 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Tariq Ali, a British left-wing activist and journalist, is not an academic specialist in Cuban studies, so I'm afraid that we probably wouldn't treat his book as a particularly reliable source here on Wikipedia. Equally, Noam Chomsky, fascinating and thought provoking a writer as he is, is no specialist in Castro or Cuba. There are far more accurate published works on the topic of Castro and his administration by the likes of Peter Bourne, Robert E. Quirk, Arthur Leycester Scott Coltman, and Richard Gott, and it is these which we have cited in this article; admittedly these have been written and published within a bourgeoisie society that – if one chooses to adopt a Marxist perspective – is likely to mean that they express a particularly anti-Castro and anti-communist view. However, they do represent a range of perspectives (from the far-left Gott to the staunch anti-communist Quirk), and as such I truly hope that this particular article does not carry a bias, thereby fitting with Wikipedia's NPOV policy. Midnightblueowl (talk) 19:03, 26 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Reliability is more a function of the publication than of the writer. There is no reason to believe that the personal memoirs of a British ambassador is more likely to be accurate than an article by Chomsky in a peer-reviewed academic journal.  But generally rs is not the problem, but weight.  Are there any specific views (i.e., not general)  that you think are over- or under-represented?  TFD (talk) 02:01, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Agnosticism
The infoboxs says Religion: None (Agnosticism) but nothing in the article says agnosticism not even the article Fidel Castro's religious beliefs mention anything about agnosticism. In my opinion the infobox should say Religion: None (formerly Roman Catholic) Kinamand (talk) 06:38, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Rolex collector
As a Trivia his obsession with Rolex watches should be added. http://rolexblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/rolex-revolutionary-fidel-castro-no.html --197.228.45.80 (talk) 15:03, 24 January 2014 (UTC)


 * That is not a reliable source, and not something that biographers have found significant. TFD (talk) 08:37, 25 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I second TFD's statement. If we have a reliable biographical or historical publication that mentions that Castro has a particular love of Rolex watches, then we can include a very short statement about it in this article. Until then, such information is of no relevance here on Wikipedia. Midnightblueowl (talk) 16:03, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

National Socialism
I think something should be written about Cuba and it's similarities with National Socialism. I have to find the book again but there are a lot of similar themes in Castro's ideology and Hitler's National Socialism. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.246.232.41 (talk) 23:41, 14 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Both fascist and far right ideologies such as National Socialism, and many far left ideologies such as Marxism-Leninism, share the common attitude of authoritarianism and totalitarianism. In this respect, both Nazi Germany and Communist Cuba do have some similarities, such as a censored press and a lack of multi-party elections. But these features are shared by many, many, nation-states that have existed throughout history across the globe, and I know of no good reason to argue for a particularly valid comparison between these two. In fact, there are just as many differences between the two nation-states as similarities; Nazi Germany was vehemently racist, Communist Cuba was militantly anti-racist; Nazi Germany had a mixed economy, Communist Cuba had a state socialist economy; Nazi Germany was rampantly imperialist, Communist Cuba was devoutly anti-imperialist etc.
 * In my opinion, most western sources that try to highlight similarities between Nazi Germany and Communist Cuba do so with the sole intention of trying to demonize the latter; the Nazis, of course, were responsible for the deaths of 12 million people in the Holocaust, amid a wide range of other human rights abuses. While Communist Cuba is certainly guilty of many human rights abuses (no freedom of the press, limited freedom of speech, some psychological torture of prisoners), it quite frankly is not guilty of anything as abhorrent as was perpetrated by the Nazis (there has been no genocide, ethnic cleansing, or mass killings in Communist Cuba for instance). Thereby by saying "Communist Cuba is a lot like Nazi Germany", critics of the Cuban government are able to demonize Castro's government in the eyes of others who are well aware of what the Nazis did; such arguments are dishonest and detract from reasoned and educated debate.
 * Furthermore, this particular article is devoted to the life of Castro himself, rather than a wider assessment of his government and the similarities and differences that it has or has had with other governments that have existed throughout human history. It is already too long for Wikipedia's standards, and needs to be trimmed. This being the case, information such as that which you propose would simply be superfluous. For these reasons your comment would not be implemented here on Wikipedia, but thank you for your suggestion. Midnightblueowl (talk) 01:21, 29 November 2013 (UTC)
 * - "Cuba was militantly anti-racist" explain then why most Cuban blacks are prohibited from entering tourist designated areas "Cuba devoutly anti-imperialistic" explain then the Cuban military interference in Angola, Nicaragua, Grenada, and El Salvador. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.34.232.200 (talk) 03:16, 30 January 2014 (UTC)
 * This talk page is for a discussion of the article itself, not a wider debate on the subject of the article. Midnightblueowl (talk) 11:03, 6 February 2014 (UTC)


 * - Those points you made are the premise for your argument. If your premises are incorrect then your argument is invalid.

Which image should be in the infobox ?
Hello all! As a long-term and major contributor to this article, I have taken a keen interest in how it has developed, hoping very much to get it to GA status in the near future (as I have previously achieved with Early life of Fidel Castro and Fidel Castro in the Cuban Revolution). One question however that remains divisive and problematic is which image should be used in the infobox to the right of the lede; indeed, this question is one that has been discussed here on the talk page back in 2011 and again in 2012. I have long been a proponent that our best available image for use here is "File:Cuba.FidelCastro.02.jpg", a 2003 colour photograph of Castro pointing as he gives a speech in front of the Havana statue of Jose Marti. It's a nice, well composed, good quality, and clean image, and gives a good shot of his face. It is also the perfect shape for the infobox, and because of the prominent monument in the background it appropriately associates Castro very much with Cuba, the nation-state which he governed for many decades.

Recently however, User:Giovanosky has been repeatedly changing this lede image to another option, "Fidel Castro.jpg", without any attempt to gain consensus, something that has been described as "disruptive editing" by myself and, more strongly, as "vandalism" by User:Pdfpdf. While I disapprove of the manner in which Giovanosky has done this, and the edit war that has ensued, I recognise the importance of constructive dialogue here at Wikipedia, and thus approached Giovanosky on their talk page. That brief correspondence has resulted in my decision to open up a section here at the talk page. I however think that the option that Giovanosky has backed is simply innapropriate; it is not the best shape for an infobox, and when produced at the necessary size is not of sufficiently good quality (it gets slightly grainy and blurred). I also have to agree with the comment made by User:Redthoreau in June 2011 that it is "zombie-esque", and that made by an anonymous user in that same thread that it is "biased and unsuitable" in that it strips Castro of some of the dignity befitting a major head of state. So it would be great if we could have many different editors coming and giving us their opinions on the issue. All the best, Midnightblueowl (talk) 14:16, 20 April 2014 (UTC)


 * I'd prefer a crop of this. I do not believe it makes Castro look undignified in any way.
 * The problem with the finger-pointing one is that his face is not as clearly recognisable. It is a great pose though, and should be retained in the article with an appropriate caption. But for the purposes of the infobox—which is "this is what Mr. Castro looks like"—the photo is not the best.—indopug (talk) 21:18, 26 April 2014 (UTC)


 * FWIW, I think both 1) & 2) should appear in the article, with 2) in the infobox because, one can see his face more clearly. I much prefer both 1) & 2) to 3). As to a crop of 3) - I'd like to see it before I make a comment. Pdfpdf (talk) 12:31, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Pdfpdf and Midnightblueowl, I've replaced the full-length Castro with a couple of crops (one horizontal and the other vertical). I'm fine with either. —indopug (talk) 04:06, 29 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I made a couple of test edits to see what they'd look like in the infobox:, .—indopug (talk) 04:22, 29 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks indopug! Pdfpdf (talk) 14:03, 30 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I'd say that Image 3a is a lot better than 3b due to its shape. My preference is still for Image 1, for the reasons that I have outlined earlier in this conversation. However, in my opinion 3a is certainly still far superior to option 2. Midnightblueowl (talk) 19:56, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

I'll try a summary - please correct it if I've got something wrong. I'd say that we do not have consensus for what should appear in the infobox. Comments? Pdfpdf (talk) 13:40, 3 May 2014 (UTC)
 * The only "consensus" I can derive out of the above is that 1 should appear on the page, (but not in the infobox).
 * There seems no clear consensus about the other photos, or on the infobox.
 * 3a seems to be 2nd most popular, but it's not clear what this means wrt the infobox.
 * 2 seems to be least popular - in all categories.
 * Agreed; we lack anything even resembling a consensus. We'll have to get some more editors in on this one. Midnightblueowl (talk) 09:19, 5 May 2014 (UTC)


 * Something you have missing in the pic, you should show is how Fidel Castro is know in all world, is like symbolism he with his military uniform and his beard, you should keep that symbolism since this is the first thing that people will see when they look in internet. PS. I'm Cuban anticastro.

Typo in the second paragraph.
In the second paragraph "righ-wing governments" should be "right-wing governments". Could someone please fix it, I cannot make the edit, because my account is not yet confirmed. Bgrozev (talk) 12:18, 13 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for alerting us to that little error; it has now been fixed by User:Michael A Bekoff. Best, Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:48, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Personal life
I think the part about him being a womanizer should be added in his personal life. I've read for instance that he is estimated to have had sex with over 35000 women in his life.<font color="DarkOrange">Bobby <font color="DarkOliveGreen">shabangu <font color="GreyBlue">talk  18:33, 24 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Agreed; this is worth including in the article. It would be best were we to use the source quoted in The Telegraph article; Ann Louise Bardach's Without Fidel, rather than any of these other online sources, which are of dubious reliability in some cases. Hopefully this book will cast much fresh new life on elements of Fidel's personal life which may be worth including in this particular article; at the same time we shouldn't focus too much on "gossip" regarding Castro's personal life. After all, he is famous as a revolutionary and politician, not for simply being a celebrity in and of itself. Midnightblueowl (talk) 18:41, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

The true story of the Fidel Castro beginnings
Sorry, I have (not a present) sources for what I'm writing here, but the story of the beginnings of Castro (here, and in many US sources) is completely false.

I'm now trying to resume in a telegraph-way my knowledge.

Castro born not as a "Marxist Leninist", but as a catholic university student, involved together with many of his comrades in a struggle against the Fulgencio Batista Tyranny, on a democracy enforcing base. Before he took the political power in Cuba, he traveled in US, as invited by a group of US Newspaper publishers, in order to raise funds for his struggle. He got a room into a Harlem hotel, which was an about impossible gesture for any other white people at these times. He became famous into the US press for this reason.

He was pro-US, and his movement was backed by United States, despite what US official can say nowadays, following the wrong habit to cache the responsibilities of having backed someone who turned against US. And this even when these responsibilities have to be accounted to the trivial circumstance that none can predict the future.

It has to be taken into account that the Fulgencio Batista regimen included the not marginal contribution of the PCC, the Communist Party of Cuba, which was pro-URSS and quite stalinist, and which had nothing to do at these times with the Castro's movement. Moreover, PCC attacked Castro and student position accusing them to be "Pitty-Bourgeois".

For this reason US backed Castro: to remove a regime which was tied in some way to URSS (or appeared to be so).

In the midst of the struggle (the "Sierra Maestra"), PCC completely reversed its attitude, I believe because it understood clearly that the Batista regimen was at its odds, because of the US attitude against it. They met the "barbudos" and stated an agreement, for which in the future government PCC would be included in some way or, better, some officials of PCC would be included. This has nothing to do with Che Guevara, which was an "outsider" communist, not pro-soviet, as PCC was. This included instead person as Julio Antonio Mella and Anibal Escalante. We will see something interesting about the last man later.

It was a few months after he took the political power in Cuba that Castro turned towards URSS. Someone believe it was the influence of Che Guevara, but I don't think so. I have at present no idea about that, and I couldn't find any useful reference nor analysis being able to clarify that.

When Castro told to the Revolutionary Movement, after they took the power, about the need of transforming it into a party, he proposed the name of "Partido Comunista de Cuba". There where some minutes of silence in the audience, because the movement considered the PCC as an enemy, allied to Batista regime. Many comrades of Castro abandoned the movement, and there are some news about some struggles with the "old guard". Also the death of Camilo Cienfuegos (one of the best comrades of Fidel) was attributed by someone to this fact, suspecting that the famous plane accident in which Cienfuegos passed away was not an accident.

During the Castro regimen, there was the Anibal Escalante episode. It was atheist, stalinist, pro URSS, former representative of the previous PCC. He used to attack the catholic origins and culture of the revolutionary movement in order to enforce atheism, mainly about the writing of Jose Antonio Echevarria, one member of the student's movement against Batista which was killed in an infamous episode during Batista regime, and which was considered an hero by the Castro movement. The target of Escalante was, very likely, to put some control by Moscow on the Castro regime.

Escalante was sent to exile and then, accused of "microfractionism", condemned by a tribunal to some years of Jail. It is worth noting that Latin America and European Trotskyst movement, even being badly against the Escalante ideas, defended him as prosecuted by a "socialist legality violation".

You can find more of that in this site: http://campello.tripod.com/castro.html

It isn't a source, of course, but to what is my knowledge, the content is quite correct. Now, my problem is as follows: I would like to ameliorate this wikipedia article, but English it isn't my mother tongue, as you can see looking at my rough English text. So I need some help from someone. Is it someone who is interested in this topic out of there, who like cooperating with me? Not only writing, but also finding and picking valid references and sources? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.141.72.155 (talk) 19:20, 15 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Until sources are provided, there is no way that any edits can be made - we don't base article content on contributors' personal knowledge. And expecting other contributors to look for sources to support your unsourced claims isn't really reasonable - if this is 'personal knowledge' you must have got it from sources somewhere. What were they? AndyTheGrump (talk) 19:34, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Hi. I completely agreed with you. Sources are the very problem, and are more than necessaries, essentials. I had some book, in the sixties and seventies, and I can remember newspaper articles, TV documentaries (of US source), even text published by the Castro regime, which apparently is now telling a completely different story. Unfortunately, I lost many of my books, and I can't remember dates, sources, etc. exactly. You can find into the Internet many "non-sources" as the campello's one, any of them telling about the same (true) story, because at the times of the facts, or a bit later ('60s or '70s) they were a universal common knowledge. With time, this knowledge seems lost, and a different story emerged. I was a testimony of these events, and the recent reconstructed story appears to me (and to many others) as completely false. There is a lot of work to be done. I'am nevertheless pretty sure about what I'm talking. This work is too big to be done by only one person. I believe sources can be found, despite the fact that the epoch of these events is well before Internet, so many sources can be found very likely only into some paper library, mainly in USA, to which I don't have access because I live in Europe. We can't limit our historical knowledge to the Internet era! 92.141.72.155 (talk) 00:28, 17 September 2014 (UTC)


 * I think the article is clear - Castro adopted Communism when the U.S. opposed reform. What do you disagree with?  TFD (talk) 05:55, 17 September 2014 (UTC)


 * I am similarly perplexed as to precisely what this anonymous user is requesting. As I understand it, they are asking for changes to be made to the Wikipedia article on the basis of their own personal recollections of events, even where those recollections contrast with the consensus produced by a variety of Castro biographers and historical specialists of Cuba's modern history. In that case, their proposed reforms would be completely innapropriate. Have they considered the idea that U.S. and other media sources produced in the 1950s and 60s (on which their recollections appear to have been based) might not have been particularly accurate, and that it is only later, more in-depth examinations of the evidence (both textual and oral testimony) that has led to us developing a better understanding of the actual events that engulfed Cuba in the revolutionary and early socialist period ? For instance, were they well-versed in recent scholarship on the subject then they would be aware that according to Castro's own account, during the revolution he hid his far left-sympathies (for at the time they remained sympathies, rather than an all out allegiance) and thus courted the U.S. in the hope of gaining their support against Batista ? I must apologise for being somewhat critical and perhaps a little negative here, but I really do fear that the suggestions being put forth by this anonymous user have the real potential to seriously wreck an article that could, with a little more work, make it up to GA status (and from there, to FA!). Midnightblueowl (talk) 19:59, 21 September 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 October 2014
"devoting much of his time to playing sport" should be "devoting much of his time to playing sports."

2601:A:E80:6DA:9502:1C4A:855E:C925 (talk) 11:58, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

❌ - As stated in Sport So the current phrase is correct. - Arjayay (talk) 14:15, 13 October 2014 (UTC)
 * "The singular term "sport" is used in most English dialects to describe the overall concept (e.g. "children taking part in sport")"

Semi-protected edit request on 13 February 2015
In the section "Consolidating leadership: 1959–60", this shaky POV claim can be found: "In contrast, critics condemned the new regime as non-democratic;". These "critics" (WP:WEASEL) who allegedly "condemn the new regime as non-democratic" (WP:LABEL) are then only referred to in a single case. The follow-up: "U.S. Secretary of State Christian Herter announced that Cuba was adopting the Soviet model of rule, with a one-party state, government control of trade unions, suppression of civil liberties, and the absence of freedom of speech and press."

Although Herter's claim is certainly noteworthy on its own, it - being made by a U.S. official - conflicts with both WP:NPOV and WP:COI, and is therefore unsuitable for claiming to be of NPOV (without further support from a nonpartisan group or body). I therefore advocate the removal of the insufficiently backed up claim regarding certain "critics".

In short, please change: "In contrast, critics condemned the new regime as non-democratic; U.S. Secretary of State Christian Herter announced that Cuba was adopting the Soviet model of rule, with a one-party state, government control of trade unions, suppression of civil liberties, and the absence of freedom of speech and press." to only: "U.S. Secretary of State Christian Herter announced that Cuba was adopting the Soviet model of rule, with a one-party state, government control of trade unions, suppression of civil liberties, and the absence of freedom of speech and press."

77.165.250.227 (talk) 19:24, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

✅ I agree this is more NPOV. Joseph2302 (talk) 19:49, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Sending this article to GAN
This is just a post to notify any interested watchers of this page that I am sending it off to Good article nominations. This is something that I have been working towards for a long time; since May 2011 in fact. Back then the page looked like this, and I hope that many will agree with me when I say that the current page (this) is a vast improvement in various respects. Not only is it more comprehensive and better referenced, but it has been re-structured and has seen further images integrated into it. I believe (and hope) that it is also NPOV, in that both a devout Castroist and ardent anti-communist dissenter can agree that it represents a fair overview of the factual issues of Castro's life and times; admittedly those with highly fringe interpretations of Castro might think differently, but they can always turn to the Conservapedia or Metapedia articles on the subject if they wish. That certainly doesn't mean however that this is the end of the road for this article, for it still has to pass its GAN and then can potentially face FAC, and I also have no doubt that further (significant) information about Castro will come to light in the years following his death, which we will need to integrate into it. Nevertheless, I hope that others are pleased with the result of my contributions, and that they will consider contributing further to it, where necessary. Midnightblueowl (talk) 17:01, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Line Change Suggestion
I think the line, "During speeches Castro regularly cited reports and books he had read, thereby presenting himself as an expert" should be changed because it contains a contradiction. Citing books and reports is precisely what a one is supposed to do when speaking about areas in which they do not have expertise. Therefore, the fact that Castro regularly cited reports and books in his speeches would not entail that he is presenting himself as an expert. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.252.25.21 (talk) 08:09, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Agreed. I shall alter the prose accordingly. Thank you for raising this issue at the talk page. Midnightblueowl (talk) 21:05, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

Request for Comments
There is an RfC on the question of using "Religion: None" vs. "Religion: None (atheist)" in the infobox on this and other similar pages.

The RfC is at Template talk:Infobox person.

Please help us determine consensus on this issue. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:57, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

How did Fidel Castro Make the approximate $900 million self worth as a communist Leader? I need someone to verify this and the various sources of his income. Is this a classic example of George Orwell's "Some Animals are more equal than others"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mamaoffababy (talk • contribs) 14:06, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Angola
"Castro ordered a further 18,000 troops to Angola, which played a major role in forcing a South African retreat" No they didn't. Despite numerical superiority the Cubans got their asses kicked properly there. --154.69.34.226 (talk) 15:09, 7 September 2015 (UTC)

First Photograph
I noticed that Fidel's photograph in the info box was changed to an older picture. Considering he is still living, shouldn't his photograph be a more recent one? If there is a policy on this, I would greatly appreciate being informed about it.Fischia Il Vento (talk) 01:36, 19 September 2015 (UTC)
 * You're right. I can't see any reason why the image was changed. The same image is used later on in the article, where it helps to illustrate the main body of text. I'm restoring the image that was in the infobox a few months ago, which is a more recent image. -- Hazhk (talk) 12:46, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
 * I was responsible for changing the lede image. While the picture of Fidel in 2003 is suitable, the photographic clarity of the image is not great. Conversely, the 1959 image is far clearer and crisper and thus – in my opinion – is slightly preferable for usage in the infobox. I'm not aware of any policy claiming that a more recent picture is preferable for BLPs (nothing of the sort is mentioned over at WikiProject Biography, Manual of Style/Biographies or Biographies of living persons, for instance). Perhaps this might be an issue worth taking to RFC, to see if we can get a wider range of editors providing their views on this matter? Midnightblueowl (talk) 12:32, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 December 2015
I would like to edit the history of Fidel Castro because my great-great grandmother's maidan name was Castro, and it turns out that Fidel Castro was her half-brother. I have some accurate information I would like to add to this page.

Doodiepiesunday (talk) 21:57, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Do you have a reliable reference for this? Materialscientist (talk) 22:00, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

[http://www.silviamorganti.com/#/fidelcastro/ CASTRO: THE WORLD'S MOST WATCHED MAN, a one-hour documentary looking at the life of Fidel Castro through the eyes of the spies who have observed him for over a half-century. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2606:6000:669D:4300:206C:D0E5:9C2A:823D (talk) 21:24, 18 December 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 18 December 2015
http://www.silviamorganti.com/#/fidelcastro/ CASTRO: THE WORLD'S MOST WATCHED MAN, a one-hour documentary looking at the life of Fidel Castro through the eyes of the spies who have observed him for over a half-century on AHC — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2606:6000:669D:4300:206C:D0E5:9C2A:823D (talk) 21:29, 18 December 2015 (UTC)

Not a politician
Hi,

I would like to make an edit to this page.

The page describes Mr. Castro as a "politician". However, Fidel Castro has never been elected to office. The country he leads is not even close to a democracy. He became Prime Minister through force, not politics. He often represses basic human rights, including freedom of speech.

Mr. Castro ought to be listed as a dictator, not a politician.

Thanks.


 * Castro was indeed a politician, for he achieved his notability and fame as an active presence in Cuba's political sphere. That he reached the heights of his political power and influence through military force rather than through an election makes him no less of a politician. The term "politician" applies just as much to those who are active in the political and governmental arenas of one-party states as it does to their counterparts in liberal democratic states. Lenin, Hitler, and Castro are as much "politicians" as Obama, Thatcher, and Raegan, even if the political systems in which they operate differ substantially. Moreover, the term "dictator" is one that is primarily used as a pejorative rather than having a specific, value-free meaning. While we do mention that critics have accused Castro of being a totalitarian dictator (both in the lede and the main body of the article), we don't state outright that "Castro was a dictator" because this is a term that many, particularly Marxist-Leninists (and indeed Castro himself), would openly dispute; they would argue that the Cuban system is a democratic one, even if is not a liberal democracy involving competing political parties. We cannot openly state "Castro was a dictator" when that is a subjective judgement that people disagree on. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:41, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Presidential transition
I was reading this article to understand how Fidel Castro transitioned to being the President of Cuba. This does not seem to be addressed in the current article. Additionally, the article about the preceeding president, Osvaldo Dorticós Torrado, also does not give much of a discription about what had happened and why. (Side note: the article sometimes refers to Osvaldo Dorticós Torrado as Osvaldo Dorticós, and I am not certain if this is Wikipedia's style for Spanish names.) Thanks for the good editors who might be able to address this. Thelema418 (talk) 09:25, 28 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Although sparely, there is some information in the last paragraph before the presidency section. As for Spanish names, see Spanish naming customs. Thus the current usage is correct.--TMCk (talk)