CUBAN SUPPORT FOR NATIONALIST MOVEMENTS AND REVOLUTIONARY GROUPS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79R00603A002800070001-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 10
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 15, 2006
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: July 1, 1977
• Content Type: IM

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Top Secret
Interagency
Intelligence
Cuban Support for Nationalist Movements and
Revolutionary Groups
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CUBAN SUPPORT FOR NATIONALIST MOVEMENTS
AND REVOLUTIONARY GROUPS *
SUMMARY
During the past several years, the Cuban government has provided
only very limited and selective support for Latin American revolu-
tionary groups.
- There has been no evidence of Cubans operating with any
insurgent group since 1971.
- There has been no evidence of Cuba supplying any rebel group
with arms or ammunition in the last few years.
- Cuban training in guerrilla methods and tactics continues at a
modest level, but there is no indication that this has increased
significantly and we do not expect it to.
Cuban-
trained guerrillas leaving the island, ostensibly to return to their
native land.
- Cuba has provided limited financial assistance to some groups,
but most have been forced to rely upon other means to meet the
bulk of their financial requirements.
Cuban assistance to such organizations seems designed principally
to maintain contacts and, in some cases, to keep the groups alive. Cuban
policy has turned toward channeling assistance to local Communist
parties and encouraging broad alliances of "progressive" political
groups. In Latin America, Havana has concentrated on:
- building diplomatic ties and participating in regional and sub-
regional economic organizations; and
- providing technical assistance and/or limited military training to
a few left-leaning governments, e.g., Guyana and Jamaica.
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Cuban support for national liberation movements in Africa is of a
different genre, since in recent years it has been directed against
colonial regimes and white-minority governments in Rhodesia and
Namibia which are opposed by all independent black African states.
Cuban aid to Angola's governing MPLA is a special case which:
- began as support for an anticolonial nationalist movement
operating against the Portuguese,
- later supported the MPLA against rival nationalist movements
and other foreign intervention as Neto seized power in Luanda
following the collapse of Portuguese resistance, and
- finally became primarily a counterinsurgency effort against
continuing guerrilla operations by three nationalist groups that
survived the MPLA's assumption of power from the Portuguese.
The South African invasion of late October 1975 hastened the
recognition of the MPLA government by other African states, thus
somewhat belatedly but conveniently lending some substance to Cuban
claims that the dispatch of combat troops was in response to a request
from a legitimate government.
As in Latin America, the Cubans have emphasized development of
diplomatic relations with African states and assistance to politically
sympathetic governments. There is little or no evidence that the Cubans
are directly supporting subversion against established black African
regimes.
In the Middle East, Cuba has provided token assistance to
Palestinian nationalist groups. Reports that Cubans are training the
Algerian-backed Polisario movement in the Western Sahara remain
unconfirmed.
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DISCUSSION
Background
1. Fidel Castro has been involved in subversion and
armed struggle since 1947. Almost every Latin
American country has felt his interference at least
once. His involvement has ranged from personal
participation in an expedition launched against
dictator Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic in
1947 to sending Cuban combatants to operate with
insurgent groups in Guatemala, Venezuela, and
Bolivia. Castro's foreign policy is strongly influenced
by his perception of Cuba as the first country in Latin
America to be liberated from imperialism and of
himself as the individual chiefly responsible for that
achievement. Therefore, Castro views himself and
Cuba as pathfinders for the "liberation" of Third
World nations.
2. In the early and mid-1960s Castro attempted
to employ-on a massive scale in Latin America
and a more limited scale in Africa-the same tactics
that had brought his success in Cuba. Havana became
the center for subversive operations against other
Latin American countries. Cuban support-including
money, weapons, training, propaganda, and Cuban
personnel-was provided to revolutionary groups in
Venezuela, Colombia, Peru, Brazil, Paraguay, Bolivia,
Uruguay, Chile, Argentina, Central America, and the
Caribbean. During this period Latin
Americans received guerrilla warfare training and
political indoctrination in Cuba. With the single
exception of his struggle in Cuba, however, Castro's
revolutionary efforts in Latin America have amounted
to an unbroken string of failures.
3. Castro's subversive activities were not confined
to Latin America; he became involved with revolu-
tionary movements in Africa in 1961 when the Cubans
extended limited guerrilla warfare training to a few
African extremist groups. Links were established with
guerrilla organizations in Angola, Portuguese Guinea,
Cameroon, Congo (Leopoldville), Rhodesia, Zanzibar,
Ethiopia, and Mozambique.
advisers, led by Che Guevara, train and assisted the
Congolese rebels in the Congo rebellion during the
mid-1960s. Some of the Cubans became involved in
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the fighting as combatants. Diplomatic relations were
established with Algeria, Congo (Brazzaville), Ghana,
Tanganyika (later Tanzania) and Guinea which served
as centers for Cuban activities in the region.
4. The Tricontinental Conference, held in Havana
in late January 1966, was an effort by Castro to assume
a major role in the leadership of revolutionary
movements throughout the world. The conference was
attended by more than 500 delegates and resulted in
the formation of the African-Asian-Latin American
Peoples Solidarity Organization (AALAPSO). This
body was created to coordinate the activities of all
antiimperialist rebel movements. Havana was desig-
nated as the location of the organization's headquar-
ters and a Cuban was appointed AALAPSO Secretary
General. At the conclusion of the conference, Cuba
sponsored the formation of the Latin American
Solidarity Organization (LASO) with headquarters
also in Havana. Controlled by Cubans, it was designed
to act as a support mechanism for Latin American
guerrilla groups.
5. During the latter part of the 1960s, however, the
Cubans experienced a series of setbacks. Guevara's
effort to organize a revolutionary offensive in Africa
failed and he returned to Cuba in 1966. In 1968, most
Cuban advisers in Congo (Brazzaville) were ex elled.
Similar reversals occurred in Latin America.
6. The Guevara fiasco is generally seen as a
watershed in Cuba's foreign policy, but it was not the
only factor that influenced Castro's decision to alter
his tactics. He was experiencing strong pressure from
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the USSR to abandon guerrilla movements and
cooperate with local Communist parties. Cuba was
virtually isolated from the rest of the hemisphere and
the Cuban economy was experiencing serious prob-
lems. Consequently, in 1968 Castro began to disengage
from the guerrilla groups and improve his ties with
Communist parties in Latin America. At the same
time he sought to establish government-to-government
contacts with "progressive" countries in Latin Amer-
ica and elsewhere.
7. The process of disengagement provoked com-
plaints from leaders of guerrilla movements in
Venezuela and Colombia. Castro responded with a
bitter attack on his critics, stating that true revolution-
aries willing to fight and die could always count on
Cuba's assistance, but pseudorevolutionaries who
fumbled away opportunities would get nothing.
Fidel's break from large-scale support of violent
revolution was neither quick nor clean. He was
impressed by the headline-grabbing exploits of the
Tupamaros in Uruguay and Carlos Marighella in
Brazil, and for a short period espoused and promoted
urban terrorism. This too was deemphasized, however,
following the death or capture of important pro-
Cuban rebel leaders in Bolivia, Brazil, Nicaragua,
Haiti, and Panama in late 1969 and 1970.
8. To project a more respectable image, Havana
began a gradual expansion of cultural, sports, and
technical exchanges with other nations. The Cubans
attended an increasing number of international
meetings and conferences. Economic, medical, and
technical assistance became a standard Cuban offering
to underdeveloped nations in Africa and the Carib-
bean; trade ties and eventually diplomatic relations
followed. The new policy achieved rapid success. The
Cuban government now has diplomatic relations with
11 Latin American and 34 African nations.
The Current Picture: Overview
9. The Cuban government is still providing limited
support to a variety of revolutionary and terrorist
groups, but,
e believe that the level of assistance is
neg igi a compared to Castro's revolutionary offen-
sive of the 1960s. Havana is probably in contact with
most of the remaining guerrilla movements in Latin
America, but there has been no evidence of direct
Cuban participation with an active guerrilla force
Training in guerrilla methods and
terrorist tactics in Cuba is continuing, but at a reduced
level. Propaganda support does not compare with the
vitriolic hyperbole of the past. The two Cuban-created
revolutionary support organizations, LASO and
AALAPSO, have been allowed to wither. Partly
because of Havana's reduced support and partly
because of their own desire to function independently,
the revolutionary groups still in existence have
acquired necessary arms and funds by robberies and
kidnapings.
11. Despite Havana's success in establishing formal
diplomatic ties with many governments in Latin
America, Castro retains deep antipathy toward several
regimes. His strongest enmity is reserved for the
military government of Chile. After the overthrow of
the Allende government in September 1973, Castro
promised the antijunta Chileans "all the aid in Cuba's
power to provide." The divisions within the Chilean
left, however, have forestalled any significant Cuban
operations against the Pinochet regime.
12. So far, Havana has given limited support to the
Chilean revolutionaries. There is little doubt that the
Cubans maintain contact with most of the antijunta
groups.
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13. Other reporting indicates that the Cubans have
little interest in sponsoring a major campaign against
the Chilean regime.
Guatemalan rebels with considerable material assist-
ance as well as training and guidance. The rebels were
soundly thrashed by government security forces in the
late 1960s and since 1970 Cuba has sharply reduced its
assistance. Nevertheless, there is evidence of some
Cuban support for both the Revolutionary Armed
Forces (FAR) and the Guatemalan Army of the Poor
(EGP).
Uruguay
14. Elsewhere, there is evidence of meager Cuban
support for revolutionary groups opposing rightist
military governments.
15. There has been little evidence of Cuban
subversive actions against Bolivia since the Banzer
regime took power in 1971. Some propaganda support
has been provided the Bolivian National Liberation
Army (ELN) since its resurrection from the Guevara
16. In past years Guatemala was a major focal point
for Cuban subversive efforts in the hemisphere. Its
importance to Castro as a target was exceeded only by
Venezuela and Bolivia prior to 1967. Cuban involve-
ment with Guatemalan subversives began in 1962 and
during the rest of the decade, Havana supplied the
20. The Cubans, however, may have reduced or
suspended their contacts with Argentine subversives
since mid-1976.
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while the primary emphasis is still aimed at aiding
legitimate governments, guerrilla groups have not
August two Cuban embassy employees were been foresaken. Support for the insurgents operating
kidnaped and never found. against the white minority governments of Rhodesia
ubans suspected that they were killed by and Namibia has increased sharply. There are
rig tist a ements in the Argentine government. There probably a few hundred Cuban military personnel in
have been no reports of Cuban involvement with Mozambique, some of whom are reported to be
Argentine revolutionaries training and assisting the Zimbabwe People's Army.
21. In the Caribbean, Havana has provided support
for proindependence groups in Puerto Rico; inde-
pendence for the island has been a major Cuban
propaganda theme since the early 1960s. The Puerto
Rican Socialist Party (PSP), the largest of the
proindependence groups, maintains a permanent
representative in Havana. The Cubans have provided
the PSP with extensive propaganda support, some
financial assistance, and a limited amount of training.
This training reportedly has included courses in urban
guerrilla tactics, sabotage, and weapons handling. The
The Current Picture: Africa and the
Middle East
22. Havana's failures in Africa in the late 1960s
prompted Castro to shift tactics in this region also.
From 1971 to 1975 activities in the Middle East and
Africa were oriented toward establishing political and
economic ties with "progressive" governments. Small
numbers of Cuban economic, and occasionally mili-
tary, advisers were dispatched to assist with the
problems of underdevelopment. Cuba simultaneously
continued its support for the liberation movements
operating against the Portuguese colonies and some of
the Palestinian terrorist groups.
Angola, Mozambique, and Namibia
23. Cuba's sudden military intervention in Angola
in 1975 dramatically accelerated Havana's African
involvement. This massive buildup of forces in Angola
was followed by modest increases in the number of
advisers assisting other governments in the region;
Appr4
he Cubans
apparently are giving some assistance to Joshua
Nkomo's Zimbabwe African People's Union which has
set up a guerrilla training camp in Angola. The
Cubans may have provided some training and logistics
support for the Katangans who invaded Zaire. There is
no credible evidence, however, .that any Cubans
accompanied the insurgents into Zaire.
24. Havana sharply increased its aid to the South-
West African People's Organization (SWAPO) follow-
ing the visit of its leader, Sam Nujoma, to Cuba in
October 1976.
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The SWAPO guerrillas have 25X1
been cooperating with a joint Angolan-Cuban offen-
sive against Jonas Savimbi's insurgent National Union
forces still active in southern Angola. SWAPO will not
be able to threaten Namibia until a secure base has
been established in Angola.
25. The Cubans have been providing limited
support to several Palestinian nationalist groups at
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is aid reportedly includes military and 25X1
political training as well as propaganda support for the
Palestinian cause. Although the majority of Cuba's
assistance goes to Yasir Arafat's Fatah, the Cubans
reportedly have also aided the Popular Democratic
Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PDFLP) and the
more radical Popular Front for the Liberation of
Palestine.
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26. The Palestine Liberation Organization, which
serves as an umbrella organization for most
Palestinian commando groups, established a perma-
nent office in Havana in 1974.
I idel Castro has met with Arafat
occasions,
Nayif Hawatma leader o the PDFLP,
visited Cuba last January and reportedly received a
Cuban promise for continued training and logistics
assistance.
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Western Sahara
27. There have been several reports that the Cuban
government has provided training and logistics sup-
port for the Algerian-backed Polisario movement
which seeks independence for the Western Sahara.
The area, formerly the colony of Spain, was parti-
tioned by Morocco and Mauritania in 1976. The
presence of Cubans has not been confirmed, but we
annot rule out the possibility that a token number
ay be involved in guerrilla training within Algeria.
President Boumediene's strong nonaligned position
and Algeria's capability to provide effective training
would tend to rule out any more than symbolic
Cuban assistance.
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