3. Batista Takes Power: the 1933 Coup¶
Core Argument¶
Chapter 3: Batista Takes Power: the 1933 Coup¶
The 1933 coup that brought Fulgencio Batista to power was not a singular event but the opening act of a protracted counter-revolution, enabled by the betrayal of the revolutionary potential of Cuba’s working class by the Stalinist Popular Socialist Party (PSP). The immediate trigger was the unpopularity of the de Céspedes regime, which angered anti-imperialist petty-bourgeois elements by retaining Machado’s appointees and announcing soldiers’ pay cuts. On 4 September, sergeants at Camp Columbia, led by Batista, rebelled and won over almost the entire army and navy. A provisional Junta of four professors and a banker was formed under Ramón Grau San Martín, who promoted Batista to colonel and later Army Chief of Staff. This Junta, however, failed to demand the abrogation of the treaty allowing US intervention, instead pledging to honour debts to US banks. While workers seized sugar plantations, many American-owned, and formed patrols and relief committees, the Junta was dissolved on 10 September, with Grau becoming provisional president.
Grau’s government introduced populist measures, but only Antonio Guiteras, the minister of labour, pursued consistently anti-imperialist actions. Batista, meanwhile, remained in secret talks with US ambassador Welles. On 18 January 1934, Batista staged a coup, installing Colonel Carlos Mendieta as president; the US recognised the government within five days. Batista ruled through puppet presidents until 1940. The Platt Amendment was abrogated in June 1934, but only to be replaced by a Reciprocity Tariff Act favouring US interests. A general strike in March 1935, involving up to 500,000 workers, was crushed by martial law, arrests, executions, and union dissolution.
The critical turning point was the role of the PCC, which, following Stalinist International policy, abandoned opposition to Batista. The Party supported him as an anti-imperialist ‘man of the people’ in return for legal status and control of the trade union movement. The PCC delivered workers’ support for Batista in the 1940 presidential election. The 1940 Constitution granted labour rights, but few were realised. The PCC policed unions during World War II, denouncing militants. Batista insisted his cooperation with the PSP was necessary for the anti-fascist struggle, distinguishing between ‘international communism’ (Lázaro Peña) and ‘local communism’ (Eusebio Mujal, who quit the PSP for the Auténticos). Batista did not contest the 1944 election, instead leaving office wealthy from corruption and a last-minute treasury raid, and migrating to Miami. The Communists supported Batista’s candidate, who lost to Grau San Martín of the Auténticos, but won nine Chamber seats, three Senate seats, and over a hundred municipal posts. In July 1944, Peña agreed with Grau to remain CTC Secretary General in return for PSP support for the Auténtico administration. With the Cold War and US pressure, Grau’s government attacked communists in the unions, murdering leaders. The formal break came at the CTC’s Fifth Congress in May 1947. The Auténticos overestimated their strength; in July, the Minister of Labour had police seize CTC headquarters and impose an Auténtico-led Executive Council. A general purge followed: Peña and over a hundred Communists were arrested, communist newspapers suppressed, and Radio Mil Diez confiscated. Communist membership declined sharply; by the early 1950s most PSP-led unions were dissolved or joined the Auténtico federation. The 1940 reforms became meaningless. Post-war inflation eroded real wages, but the new CTC leadership contained protests and did little to compensate. Grau’s government proved more corrupt than Batista’s, leading to a split in the Auténticos and the formation of the Ortodoxos in 1947. In 1948, Carlos Prió Socarrás replaced Grau, and the Auténticos won easily. Batista, from Miami, spent heavily to be elected Senator in absentia. Batista’s dictatorship, enabled by this coalition of Stalinist betrayal and US imperialism, later destroyed the revolutionary forces.