Titan and Guerrilla Man Day

Heroes of their day and for all times, who turned the struggle for independence and justice the raison d’être of their straight execution

Rosa Pérez López

Sometimes only coincidence can explain the eagerness of history for consecrating a date to the heroism of some men, and June fourteen is one of them.

That was the day that chance and greatness reserved for the birth of Antonio Maceo Grajales and Ernesto Guevara de la Serna: heroes of their time and for all time, who made the struggle for independence and justice the raison d’être of their straight execution, as much in the field of battle as in the field of ideas.

So distant in time and so close in historical dimension, there is in each of them the virile and courageous substance that characterizes the manliness of heroes: those whose physical and mental strength are devoted to freedom and the dignity of the peoples, whether in Peralejo or Santa Clara, under the mangoes of Baraguá or on a rostrum in the United Nations.

That’s why even the teachings of the Bronze Titan and the Heroic Guerrilla are similar to the voices of command that continue to point us to the most comprehensive strategy of struggle in these challenging and complex times: neither to incur debts of gratitude that compromise principles, nor granting excessive confidence that demobilizes our action.

Today a date brings them together in time, in the distance and in the unstoppable march undertaken by Cuba and the Cubans. With us, Maceo and Che are still as present as ever, with their gesture and example, so that we never lose our way to the beautiful and dignified future they dreamed of.

Translated by ESTI