Within years of taking over from the Spanish Empire as Cuba’s imperial master, U.S. capital had achieved near total dominance on the island, with the Cuban bourgeoisie relegated to shareholder and manager status in an American corporation. A history of how that happened below.

‘Yankee Imperialism in Cuba’ by R. Gomez from The Communist. Vol. 10 No. 1. January, 1931.

THROUGHOUT the past century the policy of the White House never ceased driving toward the acquisition of Cuba, sometimes through direct purchase, as in the Ostend Manifesto during the Buchanan administration, at other times through armed invasions, as that led by Narciso Lopez (1845), and that of the Virginius expedition.

But it was not until the end of the century, with the development of capitalist monopoly in the United States and the growth of finance capital that this policy began to bear specific fruit. In 1896, two years before the “liberation” of Cuba by the Spanish-American War, investments of United States capital in Cuba had reached a total of $50,000,000, distributed in the mines, commercial enterprises, tobacco, and especially in sugar. First the Atkins Sugar Company of Boston, and later the American Sugar Refining Company, the sugar trust, began to extend their interests enormously.

In a short period at the end of the last century, Yankee imperialism was able to give the local bourgeoisie a severe blow, “free” Cuba from Spain, and establish its own domination of the colony.

In the period from 1890 to 1895 Yankee capitalism managed to establish sugar refineries in Cuba in order to protect itself from Spanish maneuvers and to prevent the Cuban producers from building their own industry.

The American tariff of 1890, which discriminated in favor of Cuban sugar, admitting it free of duty, soon greatly increased the production of sugar on the island. It also favored the Cuban producers, so that huge industries began to spring up rapidly.

The following table shows clearly the rapid growth of sugar production: (*Our Cuban Colony, by LELAND JENKS. 1929.)

Production in tons

1885-89 (average) 630,000
1890 632,000
1891 819,000
1892 976,000
1893 815,000
1894 1,054,000
1895 1,004,000
1896 225,000

This rapid development in the country brought about a radical transformation of industrial technique. The growth of fewer and larger-scale mills is indicated by the following figures: One thousand sugar mills existed in 1885; only four hundred were in existence in 1894, and one hundred and seventy-five in 1895.

It seemed that a real basis was then being laid for a big development of the Cuban bourgeoisie, but nothing was farther from the purpose of Yankee financial capital. In the first place, the majority of sugar was refined in the United States and the rest by the American Sugar Refining Company in Cuba, in this manner restricting the development of independent Cuban industrialization; in the second place, this “protection” in favor of the Cuban sugar industry was destined to end the importation of European sugar into the United States, and to lay the basis in Cuba for a strong economic force which would exterminate Spanish domination.

Already the United States was exporting much merchandise to Cuba, but it suffered greatly because Spain increased its tariff more than twenty-five per cent. Yankee capitalism had maneuvered and was now ready to deliver more decisive blows. These began with the tariff of 1894. In this year the United States adopted a new differential tariff which favored refined sugar produced by the American Refining Company and prohibited the importation of crude sugar produced by the Cuban industries. This would help to stifle the growth of the bourgeoisie through bankruptcy, and help them to mobilize the stricken masses into revolt against Spain as the apparent source of their troubles. In 1895 production reached 1,004,000 tons, but in the following year it had decreased to 225,000 tons (less than half the production of 1885) which was produced in the main by American interests. The Cuban bourgeoisie had received a hard blow economically, and was led on the battlefield by Marti in the Cuban revolution for the liberation of the colony from Spain. In this the bourgeoisie utilized the peasants, oppressed by Spanish feudalistic control, the agricultural and industrial proletariat of the sugar industry, all those who had been thrown out of work, and some strata of the petty-bourgeoisie.

THE PLATT AMENDMENT

On the basis of the economic policy of American imperialism, the Cuban revolution of “liberty” found a powerful “friend,” and while Marti was dying for his slogan of “A Republic with All and for All,” Yankee imperialism was preparing its war skirmishes. The Maine affair and other secondary pretexts brought the United States marines and infantry troops to Santiago de Cuba, Havana, San Juan de Porto Rico, and to the Philippines. It was not necessary at that time to speak of “the property and lives of American citizens”; it was more convenient to say that they were fighting for the liberty of Cuba.

Spain was quickly defeated, especially due to the military intervention of the United States. Maximo Gomez, general of the Cuban army of liberation, received a “generous” pension and three million dollars to distribute among the revolutionary soldiers, on the condition that they would give up their arms to the United States representative. In 1901 the American Senate sent a communication to the Constituent Assembly, which was drawing up the constitution of “free Cuba,” stating that the constitution was approved, but with an amendment proposed by Senator Platt of Connecticut. This amendment was to be made part of the Cuban constitution and considered as a permanent agreement. It states in part:

“That the government of Cuba consents that the United States may exercise the right to intervene for the preservation of Cuban independence, the maintenance of a government adequate for the protection of life, property, and individual liberty, and for discharging the obligations with respect to Cuba imposed by the Treaty of Paris on the United States…” (Emphasis mine—R.G.)

Cuba was also prohibited from negotiating treaties and from contracting debts with powers that were not agreeable to the White House, and among other things, lands (Guantanamo) were ceded to the United States to establish coaling places and naval stations.

THE CUBAN BOURGEOISIE

This is a question which has always been difficult to answer. The Platt amendment and the antecedent bankruptcy of 1896 laid the basis to prevent the independent development of the Cuban bourgeoisie. But in spite of all this it fought bitterly to maintain a position in the country.

During the years of the European war, the development of the Cuban bourgeoisie was facilitated and it succeeded then in playing an important role in the country. Sugar became a problem for the United States, which could not be solved within the limits of its own frontiers. The United States was preparing for entrance into the world war and it was not possible to concentrate the forces of its finance capital in all fields. It was necessary to make concessions to the Cuban bourgeoisie, which thus had the opportunity to develop itself.

Due to the condition of the sugar fields of Central Europe, the United States, entering the world war, was obliged to supply sugar to the Allies. Leland H. Jenks says in Our Cuban Colony: “Sugar must be controlled, if the war were to be won. And to control sugar, Cuba must be dealt with.” (p. 189.)

This is not the only case of this nature which occurred during the European war. The colonial thesis of the Sixth Congress gives us other examples equally eloquent:

“Only under the pressure of special circumstances may the bourgeoisie of the imperialist States find itself compelled to co-operate in the development of big industry in the colonies. Thus, for example, requirements for preparation or conduct of war may, to a limited extent, lead to the creation of various enterprises in engineering and chemical industry in certain of the most strategically important colonies (e.g., India).” (The Revolutionary Movement in the Colonies. Page 19.)

The sugar production of Cuba which represented ten per cent of the world production in 1908, increased to twenty-five per cent in 1918. In 1919 sugar production reached a total of four million tons.

It is certain that during this period, Yankee enterprises increased enormously, but parallel to them and of even more importance were the Cuban enterprises. The National Bank of Cuba reached assets of $124,000,000, and other banks were developing which had great capital, such as the Spanish Bank of the Island of Cuba ($105,000,000 of assets) and the International Bank. One can say that this period marked a revival of the Cuban bourgeoisie similar to that of 1890-1895. During the years 1917, 1918, 1919, and 1920, Cuba enjoyed the “Dance of the Millions,” a famous period in which the Cuban bourgeoisie, overnight, found itself with a financial capital and a wealth with which it did not know what to do.

But this inflation was no more than a soap bubble. Yankee imperialism knew only too well how to end the “Dance of the Millions,” and to trap the Cuban bourgeoisie—the dancers. Wall Street did not assist in the creation of refineries, and Cuban sugar was only semi-finished material which had to be finished in the United States. Most of the sugar that was consumed in Cuba was imported from the United States. Besides, imperialist business was much bigger than the Cuban bourgeoisie. The 1918-1919 harvest alone produced for the Sugar Equalization Board, established in New York and headed by Herbert Hoover, a profit of forty-two million dollars.

Leland Jenks says that in addition to this we should take into consideration: “…four cents a pound upon 7,400,000 tons of sugar are to be added to the patriotic contribution secured by the United States from Cuba. With a pencil and pad the generous sum of $600,000,000 may be readily computed as the cost to Cuba of sugar control.” (Our Cuban Colony. p. 204.)

The Cuban bourgeoisie was facing the same fate it had met in the last century. It was very young, and confronted by a great giant experienced in banditry and in looting. Wall Street inflated the price of sugar until it reached twenty-two and one-half cents a pound by the 19th of May, 1920; selling refined sugar in Cuba at the price of twenty-five cents a pound. This inflation produced a delirium among the Cuban bourgeoisie whose capital was concentrated in sugar. Millions and millions of dollars were invested in this industry, being withdrawn from coffee, fruit, other food production, and many other branches of industry.

Uncle Sam was laying his traps. Sugar was the cheese which attracted the Cuban bourgeoisie and the mouse was not hard to catch.

At the end of May, 1920, sugar prices began to lower; Wall Street made great purchases of Argentine sugar. European reconstruction had brought much sugar to the world market and if the price of sugar were to be lowered rapidly it would produce a financial catastrophe in Cuba. Argentine sugar in the New York market, which for Wall Street was as strange as the gauchos, helped produced the desired result. By December 13, 1920, sugar had fallen to three and three-fourths cents a pound.

Then a new method of attack was introduced. A tariff passed in April, 1921, established an increase from 1.0048 cents to 1.60 cents. During May, 1921, eighteen Cuban banks went into bankruptcy, involving one hundred and twenty-three branches. The bankruptcy of eight banks alone reached a total of one hundred and thirty million dollars. From about thirty banking institutions which existed before, only a handful were left.

The liquidation of the catastrophe was made by Rathbone, financial technician, and by Crowder, who were sent in the battleship Minnesota, with the purpose of completing the Wall Street plan by means of thirteen memoranda which made up the “financial policy of President Zayas.”

What remained of the Cuban bourgeoisie? The maneuver was a success for Yankee imperialism, by drawing Cuban industry more completely under its control, but the crippled Cuban bourgeoisie still remained.

The National City Bank of New York and the Royal Bank of Canada benefited more than the rest of the liquidators of the crisis. They opened branches throughout the country and made debtors of all the Cuban sugar mill owners. In 1921 alone, the National City Bank acquired fifty sugar mills.

The concentration of capital was accelerated at a dizzy rate. All small depositors of the banks were left penniless, the agricultural producers of the sugar industry (colonos) were ruined, and had to go into debt, mainly to the Yankee bank. Only the Cuban millionaires, some of the trading bourgeoisie and other feudal interests remained in a condition to face the situation. A great part of the Cuban capitalists became shareholders in the American companies.

The most important enterprises of Cuba belong to capital which is fundamentally American, although many Cubans who now participate as shareholders in these enterprises are at the same time representatives of the Cuban bourgeoisie. These own some big properties in the cities and some industries. Machado, for example, is the owner of paint factories, building enterprises, etc. But all are intimately linked up with the imperialist interests. Machado is also a shareholder in the Cuban Electric Company, a branch of General Electric; Tarafa is connected with the National City Bank interests; Menocal and Mendieta also have intimate connections with the United States sugar companies; the same can be said of Arrechabala, Gomez Mena, Blanco Herrera, Crusellas, Bacardi, and other Cuban millionaires and bourgeois figures.

In addition to this we must remember that Cuban landlords, although in a relatively weak position, are a factor of importance, and still own coffee, tobacco and some fruit plantations.

IS WALL STREET AGAINST YANKEE IMPERIALISM?

During the administration of Zayas, Senator Fordney proposed a higher tariff against Cuban sugar. The result of various discussions between American cane and beet sugar representatives, and Cuban sugar owners, was that the tariff established a rate of 1.84 cents against Cuban sugar, the highest tariff since 1890. It would be veritably childish to think that Wall Street was damaged through this tariff which affected eighty per cent of the capital invested in sugar, which is American. To think this, would be like believing that Wall Street could be against Yankee imperialism.

But we should solve this enigma. The profit of the Cuban sugar industry is created by the surplus value produced by the Cuban workers. An increase of tariff corresponds with a decrease in wages. In 1918 the agricultural workers of the sugar plantations got a daily wage of five dollars. In 1927 the wage was eighty cents per day; in 1928, the workers got only sixty cents; in 1929, fifty cents; in 1930, only forty cents, and it is to be expected that in the next year (1931) they will get thirty cents or less. The most violent methods of rationalization are employed in the sugar mills and throughout the sugar industry to lower the cost of production to the minimum. In reality the Fordney tariff is paid by the Cuban workers with their misery, their unemployment, their starvation, through this rationalization.

The National City Bank of New York and its subsidiary sugar interests were not the ones to pay the Fordney tariff.

We can ask against whom this barbarous tariff was aimed. Principally, the interests injured by the Fordney tariff are those of the Cuban bourgeoisie; those Cubans who are without their own financial capital and who face American imperialism as an only “protector,” cannot overcome all the disadvantages.

But more than this; the Royal Bank of Canada has great interests in the sugar industry. In 1927 this banking firm, which is the principal exponent of Canadian imperialism, had sixty-four branches in Cuba. It is true that the volume of business of this bank in Cuba increased from that date to this, but now it has only forty-four branches, having lost twenty branches in three years. This means that the Canadian sugar interests suffer from the tariff by reason of their weakness in the face of American competition.

Furthermore, the real consequence of the tariff is that it creates a basis in Cuba for a situation in which American interests can grow at the expense of the Cuban and Canadian loss.

The tariff is also, and this is a main point, a way to strengthen the internal production of sugar in the United States. American financial capital prefers to develop sugar manufacture in the United States, rather than in Cuba. In the same way that a trust can close the doors of one of its factories and transfer production to others, imperialism is able to protect the production of the United States sugar beet producers, although this may mean the closing of some of its sugar cane mills in Cuba.

The Fordney tariff is a weapon with several blades: 1. To protect the development of the sugar industry in the United States; 2. To prevent any possibility of the further rise of the Cuban bourgeoisie, and to transform it more and more into an appendage of the American trusts; 3. To help crush the foundation of Canadian investments; 4. To increase on the shoulders of the Cuban proletariat the most intense exploitation, brutally strangling it.

ANOTHER LONG ISLAND

Comrade Harrison George said in the last convention of the Communist Party of the United States: “Cuba is as much under the yoke of Yankee financial capitalism as if it were Long Island.” The figures show this easily. According to an English estimate, the wealth of Cuba is eight billion dollars, comprising both productive and non-productive wealth. According to statistics of the State Department in Washington last month, the American capital invested in Cuba reaches a total of $1,525,000,000. (To show this we could reproduce the Nearing-Freeman map in Dollar Diplomacy.)

The National City Bank of New York has fifty-two branches which dominate the economic activity of the country, mainly sugar. The Chase National Bank and the First National Bank of Boston also have branches. The capital invested in sugar amounts to eight hundred million dollars. The biggest fruit plantations belong to the United Fruit Company and the Atlantic Fruit Company. The tobacco trust is controlled by the Cuban Tobacco Company, an American concern. The electrical plants of the entire country, including that of Havana, belong to the Cuban Electric Company, child of the Electric Bond and Share Company, and grandchild of the General Electric Company. All foreign and domestic debts, which total two hundred million dollars, belong to Yankee shareholders, and are controlled by Wall Street. The telephone lines are the property of the Cuban Telephone Company, subsidiary of the International Telephone and Telegraph Company. The cable belongs to the Western Union and the Commercial Cable. Swift and Armour have great warehouses and some factories in Havana. The manganese, copper, gold, and iron mines, and also the oil fields are American owned. Hershey is a giant in the northeastern province of Havana. The Marianao Beach, the Sevilla Biltmore hotel, and the other places frequented by tourists, called “the second national Cuban industry,” belong to American capitalists. Four newspapers with a big circulation are also American property. The Havana docks belong to the Port of Havana Dock, and those of the interior are also American.

Woolworth owns skyscrapers and shops in Havana. The United States controls the fertilizer factories. The Coca Cola Company also has large factories on the island. The manufacture of carbonic acid belongs to an American company. Warren Brothers and Purdy Henderson Company are the most important builders of public works. American factories also control the production of cement and the coal industry. The biggest slaughter houses of Havana belong to the Lykes firm. On the Isle of Pines, Yankee investments total $17,000,000. Many American “drys” have interests in the Cuban Distilling Company and in the Polar Beer factory. Among his other interests in Cuba, Rockefeller is part owner of the Distilling Company. Yankee finance capital also owns the railroads of the eastern part of Cuba, many western branches, and all those railroads which belong to the sugar industry.

Figures from the Commerce Year Book for 1929 show the approximate distribution of American investments:

Sugar Industry: $800,000,000
Real Estate: 150,000,000
Railroads: 120,000,000
Government Bonds: 110,000,000
Public Utilities: 110,000,000
Industries: 50,000,000
Tobacco: 50,000,000
Commercial: 40,000,000
Mines: 35,000,000
Banks: 25,000,000
Miscellaneous: 15,000,000

Total: $1,505,000,000

ARE CANADA AND GREAT BRITAIN INACTIVE?

But, in spite of the predomination of Yankee capital, Canada and Great Britain have great investments. In 1927, the capital of the United Railways of Havana reached a total of fifty million dollars. It was England which built this railroad, beginning in 1837, and English capital had great influence until before the European war, but one of Crowder’s maneuvers in his diplomatic voyage of 1921 was to demand the organization of the Consolidated Railroads, a United States company, in which all the new railroad companies, which were to be organized, should be combined. This maneuver was directed against the United Railroads of Havana, to keep them from developing and to put them in an unfavorable situation in comparison with the United States trust, which is controlled by the National City Bank of New York.

The Yankee capitalists hope to give a death blow to the United Railways of Havana, through the opening of the central highway which would establish competition. But English capital is not to be defeated without a fight. In 1923 a great campaign against the Consolidated Railroads was begun by means of the “Nationalist” press (El Heraldo). Now Cosme de la Torriente speaks of the desirability of the League of Nations taking Cuba under its wing, and the Cuban “Nationalists” are buying arms in England to fight Machado.

Canada has the Royal Bank of Canada, the Canadian Bank of Commerce, the Bank of Nova Scotia, all of which have big interests in Cuba. Principally the Royal Bank of Canada has many interests in the sugar industry.

The full amount of British investments, including Canada and the United Kingdom, were $237,801,000 in 1929 (Max Winkler, United States Investments in Latin America.)

WHAT DO THE CUBANS OWN?

It is a popular saying that the Cubans have only their national anthem and their flag. But through a coincidence of historical significance the flag also was imported from the United States by the adventurer Narciso Lopez. (*Narciso Lopez was a Spanish adventurer in the service of the Southern slaveholders. In 1845 he made two invasions with the purpose of annexing Cuba, to give the U.S. one more slaveholding state.)

The Cuban capitalists are being transformed into shareholders in the branches of the Yankee trusts; the few large sugar landowners that still exist, are threatened by extermination under the yoke of U.S. finance capitalism. Only in the fields of fruit, vegetable, coffee, and tobacco production, are interests under the Cuban landlord class. In general among the petty bourgeoisie the lawyer is an employee of the legal departments of Yankee business, the engineer is an employee of Yankee construction companies, and the doctor gets his fees from big Spanish societies intimately allied with Yankee capital. The rest of the strata of the petty bourgeoisie consist in the main of the government bureaucrats and those employed by American companies.

The rich farmer and the middle farmer, mostly allied with the sugar industry—colonos—are gradually disappearing under the pressure of financial capital. Only in those agricultural sections not closely connected with the sugar industry—coffee, vegetables, etc.—exist a few large and middle farmers who have a chance of living.

Lower in the social scale is the more numerous group of poor farmers, enslaved, existing in the poorer regions, principally in the coffee, food and tobacco production zones.

Finally comes the proletariat, which constitutes the largest group of the population and upon which is put the burden of the heavy scaffolding of the Yankee colonial regime.

The 1919 census (page 377) divided the population of wage earners in the following way:

These statistics can give us an approximation of the distribution of the working population, because the 1921 crisis stopped the growth of the Cuban sugar industry and some secondary industries. In any case the new statistics will give us a new item of increasing importance in the population—the unemployed, now estimated to be about 500,000.

Of the agricultural workers which are included under farmers, fishermen and miners, not less than 200,000 are workers on the sugar plantations. The workers in the industries and mechanical arts are industrial proletarians. Among the “servants” are included the food workers. Under the heading “Commerce and transportation” are included no less than 50,000 railroad workers, and almost 5,000 street car workers. Of 3,500,000 inhabitants the total agricultural and industrial proletariat and unemployed number 800,000.

This is the legacy left by the maneuvers of Yankee imperialism. Neither on the basis of the preferential tariff of 1890, or of the European war policy of American imperialism, could the national industry grow, but instead a semi-developed industrialization took place which transformed the country into one of proletarians and semi-proletarians but not of a truly industrialized type. Nevertheless imperialism is creating in the workers of Cuba its own undertakers. “The new capitalist forms of exploitation bring into the arena a genuine revolutionary force—the proletariat…” (The Colonial Thesis of the Sixth Congress. Page 20).

THE CHARACTER OF THE REVOLUTION

It would be wrong to think that there are no democratic bourgeois tasks for the revolutionary movement in Cuba.

In spite of the Cuban bourgeoisie being an appendage of imperialism, it will continue to fight. The “protective” tariff introduced by Machado is a proof of this. It is true that the tariff did not help the development of national industry and has only resulted in some American firms establishing factories in Cuba, but it represents an attempt to struggle. The attempt to protect coffee production through a tariff, tending to develop coffee production on a scale which will prevent importation of this product, is another phase of the same national policy.

The same thing may be said about the commercial bourgeoisie. Despite the fact that this is the group most allied to imperialism, it resisted the onslaughts of the 1921 crisis and sustained its bank.

In the course of imperialist penetration into Cuba, there developed increased subjugation of the bourgeoisie because the bourgeoisie does not have its own financial capital and consequently cannot adequately defend itself. The bankruptcy this year of the Commercial Bank and of other smaller banks which survived the crisis of 1921, the bankruptcy of many commercial houses and Cuban industries, and the constant advance of all the interests under the control of the National City Bank, demonstrate the forces facing the Cuban bourgeoisie.

In spite of this, the national tasks of the democratic-bourgeois revolution will not be carried out by the Cuban bourgeoisie. The Cuban bourgeoisie, like those of other colonial countries, learned a lesson from the Chinese revolution, the danger of pushing the armed struggle of the masses against imperialism. Any attempt of the bourgeoisie to encourage the struggle of the masses will run the danger of resulting in its own destruction.

If imperialism supports Machado to the end, it is because it fears that a change of regime will be the basis for great complications in the future exploitation of Cuba.

Also, for similar reasons, the “Nationalists” still maintain a vacillating and undecided attitude. The “Nationalists” will possibly utilize the revolution as a means in their attempt to get power, but they know that revolution is a dangerous weapon capable of turning against them. The method that the Nationalists will utilize depends upon future happenings in Cuba. Only in the face of a revolutionary upsurge, in the face of the impossibility of getting power “peacefully,” will the Nationalists be in the foreground of the revolutionary movement which will be mainly led by the masses. The Nationalists will be the lightning rod which imperialism will use in order to protect itself from the effects of the coming proletarian storm.

It is for these reasons that the tasks of the national fight for liberation in Cuba will be brought to an end only by the armed struggle of the proletariat, with the help of the farmers and the petty bourgeoisie.

In Cuba, as in any colonial country, the farmers will play an important role, and will be a valuable ally of the proletariat. Not to understand this would be dangerous and non-Leninist. In many parts of the country, only through the achievement of democratic slogans which lead the farmers to get land will they obtain emancipation from the yoke of imperialism and from the landlords.

But the proletariat will play the leading role. The beginning of the revolution should draw the agricultural and industrial proletarians closer on the barricades; without doubt they will be the basis and the mainstay of the struggle. If we do not link the slogans of national liberation with the turning over of the factories to the workers, the revolution will be a failure. Without the national emancipation of Cuba, the liberation of the proletariat is not possible, but the national emancipation will not be achieved if the proletariat does not get hegemony and establish a workers’ and farmers’ government.

The transition from the democratic dictatorship of workers and farmers to a proletarian dictatorship will take place very quickly. It is true that the struggle for national liberation and the other agrarian tasks mean fundamentally, democratic achievements, and find their expression in the democratic dictatorship of the workers and farmers. But we should not forget that the most important part of the population is proletarian and through proletarian slogans it must be brought into the struggle for national liberation. The interrelations of the democratic-bourgeois and proletarian tasks facilitates greatly the transition of the democratic dictatorship of the workers and farmers to the proletarian dictatorship.

But the Cuban revolution contains an especially important factor, a factor peculiar to a country of the production of semi-raw material, that is, a kind of “non-industrialized” proletariat without an adequate industrial or agricultural base for self-support.1 The semi-industrial proletariat, united with the agricultural proletariat, should confiscate the factories and the plantations in order to run them under their control. Production on the plantations can be turned to supplying food for the population. Land should be distributed to the farmers who till the soil, and part of the agricultural proletariat will undoubtedly demand and have the right to take land, to help create at once the agrarian basis upon which to produce fruit, grain, and other immediate necessities, in order to make the country self-sustaining. Great efforts will be necessary to achieve these tasks, whose achievement is of as vital importance as is the defense against imperialism. Of special importance in this connection will be such concrete aid as seed, agricultural equipment, and the like from the proletariat of the United States and other countries.

It is also necessary to emphasize that the Cuban revolution is a part of the Latin American colonial revolution, that it will have important repercussions among the other countries, helping to break the whole colonial regime in South America, and that it will facilitate the fight of the masses throughout Latin America, pointing out to them the way to overcome imperialism and its national tools.

In these moments the following lines of the colonial thesis will be both valuable and necessary to apply: “…the possibility of a non-capitalist path of development for the backward colonies, the possibility of the growing-over of the bourgeois-democratic revolution in the leading colonies into the proletarian socialist revolution with the aid of the victorious proletarian dictatorship in the other countries.” (The Revolutionary Movement in the Colonies. Page 8.) In spite of the fact that Cuba is not in some ways a backward colony, for there has been a capitalist development under imperialist control, still in order for the successful carrying out of the transition to the socialist revolution a similar leadership and help must be given to it.

Only through a realization of the tasks contained in the above paragraph of the thesis, linked with the other internal tasks—with the help of Soviet Russia, can the proletarian revolution resist the barbarous attack which it will suffer from its beginning.

It is necessary to take into account the great importance of the proletariat of the United States. Cuba is a colonial country and its liberation cannot be a reality until it receives the solid support of the American proletariat. Concrete aid and mass struggles will be necessary on the part of the workers of the United States to support the Cuban revolution. We cannot forget that the colonial revolution is a part of the world proletarian revolution and that the oppressed masses of Cuba are allied with the American workers in the struggle against Yankee finance capital.

THE CHADBOURNE PLAN

This plan represents for the oppressed masses of Cuba the same thing as the Young plan for the German proletariat, in the sense that it is a halter to be put on them by finance capital. The Chadbourne Plan is an imperialist “solution” which Wall Street seeks for the terrible economic crisis in Cuba. Cuba is a country based on one ndustry, sugar, and since 1921 the post-war crisis has affected it terribly, as was explained above. With the breaking down of the partial stabilization of post-war capitalism and as a consequence of the United States crisis, the Cuban crisis has reached a climax in depth and in severity. The barometer which shows the development of the crisis, sugar, is now around one cent a pound, the lowest price in history.

Chadbourne proposes as a solution an agreement between beet and cane sugar producers that will be the basis for an international agreement, in process of formation, in which they want to combine with the producers of Cuba those in Java and Central Europe. The purpose of this agreement is to restrict production on a world scale as a basis for the restriction of Cuban production, to raise the price of sugar, and on this basis bring back “prosperity” to Cuba. On a national scale the Cuban government should buy 11% million tons of sugar through special bonds which will be issued, supported and controlled by Yankee finance capital; so that the price of sugar can be sustained by taking off the market this remnant of overproduction of the last crop; the Cuban government is also to order the restriction of the next crop from 4,700,000 tons which is the estimate, to 3,700,000 tons; also finances are to be reorganized through the establishment of one tax instead of the others, and through a loan which was originally to be $42,000,000, and which they now want to increase to $300,000,000,—$20,000,000 of the amount has already been sent to Cuba.

In the first place the international agreement, (which Chadbourne says is a “test of capitalism” at this time of antagonism between communism and capitalism) has never had a solid basis of support and less now, with the growing antagonisms between the different capitalist powers.

In the second place, the plan means new loans, which will be new public debts, and an increase through “reorganization” of the taxes imposed on the masses. The restriction of production by more than one-fifth means the stoppage of many sugar mills and rationalization in the others, low wages for the workers, especially the agricultural workers, and the brutal increase of unemployment. This is a sharpening of the Fordney attack on Cuba. In synthesis, the plan means: 1. This is another attack against the Cuban bourgeoisie as well as a covered attack against the English and Canadian investments; (2) the growth of economic oppression, of the workers and other classes exploited by imperialism, to the highest degree—placing on their shoulders the entire weight of the crisis. This is a blind alley. The Cuban proletariat and the other classes oppressed by imperialism will pay with their blood the profits wrung from them by Yankee finance capital. And if before the crisis of imperialism, exploitation was very sharp, initiating a regime of oppression and hunger, of which the regime of Machado was an exponent and an example, during the course of the crisis which has a perspective of sharpening and deepening, the methods of oppression will increase in barbarity.

The recompense given by Wall Street to the Cuban masses for the work under which they are bowed, is starvation wages, unemployment, and political oppression, today administered by Machado and tomorrow administered by the Nationalists, or another tool of imperialism.

WHAT THE “NATIONALIST” MOVEMENT MEANS

There is in Cuba a Nationalist Party that is fighting Machado, upon a basis of the restoration of the liberty of the press, liberty of thought and of speech, and other similar slogans.

This party was in the beginning an organization that represented some strata of the petty bourgeoisie—the disappearing sugar farmers (colonos) and strata of the cities—under the leadership of bourgeois politicians. In the development of the Cuban situation during the last few years, the Nationalist party became more and more reactionary and in many instances has tried to bring about intervention by the United States as a method of putting itself in power. Oscar Seigle and some other representatives of the Nationalists have been around the White House trying to get its support. Up to the present the imperialists support Machado, afraid to face a revolution. At the same time, the Nationalists are buying arms in England as well as in the United States.

The Nationalists represent the discontent of some strata of the bourgeoisie, an attempt to organize an outlet for the discontent among the masses, and mainly the discontent of the petty bourgeoisie.

The Nationalists are the expression of the instability of the Cuban situation, and the party’s presence is for the purpose of “resolving” the situation for the imperialists. This is the reason why the United States government never was an enemy of the Nationalists, and why also the Nationalists, through Oscar Seigle, sent its message of agreement to Chadbourne’s arrangements.

It is true that among the Nationalists there is some bourgeois discontent with the imperialists, but none of them try to overcome the imperialist regime as a whole or wish to fight it. The nationalists want only to be the new managers of the Yankee Colony.

A couple of weeks ago the Nationalists recruited some of the bourgeois forces. Menocal and Zayas, both former presidents and tools of American imperialism, together with Cosme de la Torriente, a former president of the League of Nations, joined its ranks.

All of these facts make it clear that the composition of this Cuban clique is similar to the South American cliques which have been taking power recently. The Nationalists just as the Brazilian, the Peruvian, the Argentinian, and the Bolivian forces, represent a movement of fascization, of persecution and oppression for the masses.

They can make a revolt but only because of the pressure of the masses. If they get the support of the masses, it is not because the masses can trust in them, but because they stand in a position where they are in the way of the expression of this discontent.

As the Nationalists say, they are in agreement with the Chadbourne plan and as a consequence they will carry it out if they get power, as good tools of American Imperialism.

FORWARD TO A REVOLUTIONARY SOLUTION

The workers of Cuba have made great gains in the revolutionary struggle. It was the masses of cigar makers who paid with their wages for the arms of the revolution in the last century, the arms which were sold by Maximo Gomez. In 1902 when the republic was started the Havana streets were red with blood through the struggles of the workers against the Palma regime. The general strikes of the second Yankee intervention (1906) shook the government of Magoon. The general strikes of 1920 and the following years mobilized all sections of the proletariat in answer to the first attacks of the post-war imperialist offensive. The general strike of the workers of the sugar mills and plantations in 1925 made the base of the imperialist regime tremble, and the railroad workers’ strike in 1926 could only be defeated by a bloody terror. All these traditions constitute a legacy of experience for the proletariat which will serve well in its future struggles.

Now, in the course of a new revolutionary wave, the proletariat has shown that it knows how to benefit from past experience. The bloody fight in Havana streets December 14, 1929, the political strike of January 10th, the general strike of March 20th against unemployment and against the persecution of the trade unions, in which 200,000 workers participated, the demonstrations of May 1st, and the hundreds of strikes developing in the course of this year, all these heroic struggles led by the National Workers Federation of Cuba and by the Communist Party are the first skirmishes of the future revolutionary battle.

The farmers have defended their lands arms in hand in the eastern region and the students fight daily battles in the streets of the important cities.

All these struggles can culminate victoriously only in the revolutionary action of the proletariat, in alliance with the farmers and the petty bourgeoisie in the fight for the defeat of imperialism and for the establishment of a workers’ and farmers’ government.

1. It is possible to see how American capital develops raw material production at the same time that it heads off industrialization by the following statistics on exports of tobacco and cigars:

1913—1925—1926—1927

Tobacco, manufactured, 1,000 pounds: 30,245–33,628–40,642–40,130
Cigars, thousands: 184,942–108,722–87,940–90,864

Tobacco factories have been built in United States (Florida) at the same time that factories are being closed in Cuba.

There are a number of journals with this name in the history of the movement. This ‘Communist’ was the main theoretical journal of the Communist Party from 1927 until 1944. Its origins lie with the folding of The Liberator, Soviet Russia Pictorial, and Labor Herald together into Workers Monthly as the new unified Communist Party’s official cultural and discussion magazine in November, 1924. Workers Monthly became The Communist in March, 1927 and was also published monthly. The Communist contains the most thorough archive of the Communist Party’s positions and thinking during its run. The New Masses became the main cultural vehicle for the CP and the Communist, though it began with with more vibrancy and discussion, became increasingly an organ of Comintern and CP program. Over its run the tagline went from “A Theoretical Magazine for the Discussion of Revolutionary Problems” to “A Magazine of the Theory and Practice of Marxism-Leninism” to “A Marxist Magazine Devoted to Advancement of Democratic Thought and Action.” The aesthetic of the journal also changed dramatically over its years. Editors included Earl Browder, Alex Bittelman, Max Bedacht, and Bertram D. Wolfe.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/communist/v10n01-jan-1931-communist.pdf