RIP Fidel Castro

Depp

BalcombeSt4 wrote: »

One of the greatest leaders of the 20th century & an inspiration for 3rd world countries all over the globe.

an inspiration for third world countries with the likes of idi amine and mugabe in charge morelike

BalcombeSt4

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Why do you oppose democracy?

Why do you opposse turning casinos & whore houses into hospitals & schools?

And democratic freedoms were suspened in Britain during the 2nd world war.

Iwasfrozen

Wanderer78 wrote: »

impossible to say really as ive very little knowledge of cuba but true democracy doesnt exist anywhere particularly within the european union. of course democracy is a good thing

You have little knowledge of Cuba but you see fit to defend its Tyrant?

Ok.

Yourself isit

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

You have little knowledge of Cuba but you see fit to defend its Tyrant?

Ok.

Your expertise comes from where exactly? There were two options in Cuba when Castro took over - a right wing pro American dictatorship or a left wing dictatorship.

Cuba lucked out. Of course it went on too long. After 1989 Cuba should have tried market reforms.

Iwasfrozen

Yourself isit wrote: »

Your expertise comes from where exactly? There were two options in Cuba when Castro took over - a right wing pro American dictatorship or a left wing dictatorship.

Cuba lucked out. Of course it went on too long. After 1989 Cuba should have tried market reforms.

Or you know, not a dictatorship.

Jawgap

harry Bailey esq wrote: »

Free education and healthcare for all?in the carribean?in the 60s?
Truly a monster.

......and La Cabaña? Was that an education or health institute, would you say?

Chuchote

Son Of A Vidic wrote: »

I wasn't aware of the perennial war mongering American regime, ever placing any nuclear weapons on an Island.

US bases around the world (since the US is the world's largest producer and deployer of nukes, you may use your judgment about what's where):

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-worldwide-network-of-us-military-bases/5564

Total Military Personnel is of the order of 1,4 million of which 1,168,195 are in the U.S and US overseas territories.

Taking figures from the same source, there are 325,000 US military personnel in foreign countries:

800 in Africa,
97,000 in Asia (excluding the Middle East and Central Asia),
40,258 in South Korea,
40,045 in Japan,
491 at the Diego Garcia Base in the Indian Ocean,
100 in the Philippines, 196 in Singapore,
113 in Thailand,
200 in Australia,
and 16,601 Afloat.

In Europe, there are 116,000 US military personnel including 75,603 who are stationed in Germany.

In Central Asia about 1,000 are stationed at the Ganci (Manas) Air Base in Kyrgyzstan and 38 are located at Kritsanisi, in Georgia, with a mission to train Georgian soldiers.

In the Middle East (excluding the Iraq war theater) there are 6,000 US military personnel, 3,432 of whom are in Qatar and 1,496 in Bahrain.

In the Western Hemisphere, excluding the U.S. and US territories, there are 700 military personnel in Guantanamo, 413 in Honduras and 147 in Canada.

One of their island bases, Diego Garcia:

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_truth_about_the_us_military_base_at_diego_garcia_20150615

Jawgap

Chuchote wrote: »

US bases around the world (since the US is the world's largest producer and deployer of nukes, you may use your judgment about what's where):

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-worldwide-network-of-us-military-bases/5564



One of their island bases, Diego Garcia:

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_truth_about_the_us_military_base_at_diego_garcia_20150615

And your point is?

If it's wrong for the US to deploy troops around the world, isn't it also wrong for Cuba to have done the same? At one stage Cuba had over 60,000 troops operating abroad.

Also, let's not forget that during the Missile Crisis it was Castro advocating a more confrontational approach with the US. Thankfully Khrushchev didn't listen to his lapdog.

Chuchote

Jawgap wrote: »

And your point is?

Someone was asking if the US had nukes on islands.

Jawgap

Chuchote wrote: »

Someone was asking if the US had nukes on islands.

And your response was to list troop deployments!?!?!

Some nukes are in a shared NATO stockpile, but most are kept in the US for obvious reasons of security.

Maybe people need to ask themselves why the country with the largest ballistic submarine fleet, the largest inter-continental bomber fleet and the second largest number of missiles would need to station nukes beyond its borders?

Personally, I'd prefer if they were stationed on islands - it's the boomers that give other countries the heebeegeebees (although that does help keep the peace too).

Castro's problem wasn't that he agreed to accepted nukes, btw, it was that he agreed to accept first-strike weapons.

brickmauser

Wanderer78 wrote: »

impossible to say really as ive very little knowledge of cuba but true democracy doesnt exist anywhere particularly within the european union. of course democracy is a good thing

Are you in favour of one party rule the banning of opposition parties and groups a state controlled press that slavishly trumpets the glorious achievements of the unelected dictator for life mass arbitrary arrests brutal torture mass executions forced labour economic policies that include seizure of private property prohibition of private business and result in mass poverty and misery for the people while the kleptocratic elite live in comfort?

Why would anyone unless they are a sadistic psychopath or else wilfully ignorant or both support someone like Castro and his brutal regime? Communism has been unmitigated disaster for Cuba and everywhere else it has been implemented.

Have you ever spoken to Cubans who have go out of that living hell? Have you met Eastern Europeans in Ireland who lived under Communism in their countries.

Adoring Castro and Communism is on the same moral plain as adoring Hitler and Nazism.

The adoration of Castro by the liberal left makes me puke.

Yourself isit

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Or you know, not a dictatorship.

Not a hope. Any democratic anti American response to the pro American dictator would have seen that democracy crushed. Whoever came to power had to counter American power - and playing the super powers was the only game on town.

fizzypish

Does this mean we all have to trade in our Che Guevara shirts for Fidel shirts? As communist dictators go he wasn't the worst but seeing as some of the worst was Stalin or one of the North Korean oompa loompas its not a great scale to be on.

mariaalice

The sycophantic worship of him by some is silly and the same with the view of him as Beelzebub there has to be a balanced view, no matter what, Cuba achievements in education and health are impressive in the region Cuba is in.

If you looked at other extremely poor Caribbean islands, the citizens are perfectly free to fly to any other country they want provided they have the money for the flight and can get a visa. There in lies the contradiction the freedom to fly anywhere is an illusion when you living at barely above starvation level.

Iwasfrozen

Yourself isit wrote: »

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Or you know, not a dictatorship.

Not a hope. Any democratic anti American response to the pro American dictator would have seen that democracy crushed. Whoever came to power had to counter American power - and playing the super powers was the only game on town.

If a democratic leader would have been "crushed" then that would be the will of the people.

Skylinehead

Jawgap wrote: »

Some nukes are in a shared NATO stockpile, but most are kept in the US for obvious reasons of security.

Maybe people need to ask themselves why the country with the largest ballistic submarine fleet, the largest inter-continental bomber fleet and the second largest number of missiles would need to station nukes beyond its borders?

You'd ask yourself that, but they do indeed do that. Turkey for a start, which isn't in a dissimilar strategic position to Cuba.

RobertKK

Michael D Higgins is so right...

If only we followed the example of Fidel Castro, we wouldn't have that idiot living in Aras an Uachtarain.

pumpkin4life

Castro was a flat out psychopath. Cuba is a despotic, crumbling communist state. Fùck him.

Still, if it wasn't for him, we wouldn't have great movie moments like this :

Jawgap

Skylinehead wrote: »

You'd ask yourself that, but they do indeed do that. Turkey for a start, which isn't in a dissimilar strategic position to Cuba.

Isn't Turkey a NATO member?

Skylinehead

Jawgap wrote: »

Isn't Turkey a NATO member?

Yeah but does that really make a difference? The Soviets and Cuba were allied, if informally.

mariaalice

The first person that keeps personal rights to property and free democratic election while simultaneous proving free(ish) widely available health care education, and housing, eliminating the worst poverty, provide employment for everyone, a flouring civic society, and eliminating corruption in south america will be the hero. They have to do it on a consistent bases over decades to win though.

BalcombeSt4

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

You have little knowledge of Cuba but you see fit to defend its Tyrant?

Ok.

I think you've watched Scarface one two many times.
I see fit to tell the truth as I see it. Tell me your feelings for American support for the Contras & brutal fascists like Pinochet who over threw democratic governments. Don't talk to me about dictators, Britain & America have supported the worst ones since the 2nd world war all over the world not just in Latin America.

Jawgap

BalcombeSt4 wrote: »

I think you've watched Scarface one two many times.
I see fit to tell the truth as I see it. Tell me your feelings for American support for the Contras & brutal fascists like Pinochet who over threw democratic governments. Don't talk to me about dictators, Britain & America have supported the worst ones since the 2nd world war all over the world not just in Latin America.

.....and so that justifies Castro???

Everyone else in the region was a right wing, imperial puppet dictator, therefore it was ok for Marxists to have their left wing puppet dictator?

Equal opportunities repression?

Jawgap

Skylinehead wrote: »

Yeah but does that really make a difference? The Soviets and Cuba were allied, if informally.

Actually it does - the Jupiters in Turkey were under joint control (just as the weapons there are now) and the Americans had and have a much more sophisticated system of PALs to ensure there's only 'launch on command.'

The Soviet system at the time because of their deficient technology was a 'launch on warning' system - now you take that, put it with first strike weapons on an island ruled by someone who was unstable and paranoid(to be fair, the US was trying to kill him) and show how it could've ended well?

Elmer Blooker

Jawgap wrote: »

Equal opportunities repression?

No. There were no economic embargoes against the countless dictatorships in Latin/South America installed and propped up by Uncle Sam.
Human "rights" and democracy don't seem to be an issue among allies.

brickmauser

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

No. There were no economic embargoes against the countless dictatorships in Latin/South America installed and propped up by Uncle Sam.
Human "rights" and democracy don't seem to be an issue among allies.

How does that excuse Castro?
That's like saying because the cops in Chicago were in league with Capone so what right had they to arrest serial killers?

McDermotX

Back in your box Higgins..........you're not travelling for Castro's funeral.

Jawgap

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

No. There were no economic embargoes against the countless dictatorships in Latin/South America installed and propped up by Uncle Sam.
Human "rights" and democracy don't seem to be an issue among allies.

All of which is true - but if, quite correctly, Pinochet (for example) doesn't get a pass because of the the atrocities he inflicted on the people of Chile, why is it Castro should get a pass?

Because he built a decent primary care driven health system on the back of a system of political repression of dissent, extra judicial murders, imprisonment without trial, attacks on fundamental freedoms etc.?

Pinochet, and any number of US backed dictators were evil bast@ards - is Castro different because while he was bad, he was just not as bad as them because he only killed or disappeared tens of thousands and launched his foreign wars in Africa instead of hundreds of thousands and destabilising their neighbours?

He was an ok guy because it was all done in the name of the revolution? Is that it?

brickmauser

Jawgap wrote: »

All of which is true - but if, quite correctly, Pinochet (for example) doesn't get a pass because of the the atrocities he inflicted on the people of Chile, why is it Castro should get a pass?

Because he built a decent primary care driven health system on the back of a system of political repression of dissent, extra judicial murders, imprisonment without trial, attacks on fundamental freedoms etc.?

Pinochet, and any number of US backed dictators were evil bast@ards - is Castro different because while he was bad, he was just not as bad as them because he only killed or disappeared tens of thousands and launched his foreign wars in Africa instead of hundreds of thousands and destabilising their neighbours?

He was an ok guy because it was all done in the name of the revolution? Is that it?

Demented that people are defending this monster.

This is what gives scum like this their power - that otherwise decent good people allow themselves to be seduced.

We know they know and everyone knows what Castro was.

Why this silly fantasy?

Admit the truth because the truth sets you free.

pumpkin4life

Am I the only person who thinks Higgins is an outright embarrassment of a president and that Gallagher was the best (though shìte) of a bad lot all the way back in 2011?

I mean, look at the violence and torture Castro committed. What in bejaesus is going on like?