Fidel Castro has written his latest reflection titled: “The Living and the Dead.” The Maximum Leader turned op-ed writer acknowledged recently sacked Education Minister Luis Ignacio Gómez Guriérrez as “truly exhausted” and “losing energy and revolutionary conscience.” While referencing his numerous travels abroad on behalf of Cuban education, Fidel chastised him for previous speeches whereby he took “personal accomplishment” instead of “extolling a body of work that was the authentic product of numerous revolutionary cadres.”
Fidel mentions the selection process of his replacement Ena Elsa Velázquez Cobiella, who was among the list of fifteen candidates.
However, further along his reflection, a cryptic passage summons the following:
“When I had the privilege of also being consulted on the eve of the election of the Council of State, I did not hesitate in proposing that prestigious military leaders –who brought our heroic people glory and moral authority– such as Leopoldo Cintras Frías and Álvaro López Miera, who are mature, modest, brimming with experience and energy, younger than the military officer who is one of the strongest and most threatening candidates for the leadership of the empire, should be proposed to the National Assembly as candidates for membership in the Council of State. I know other cadres, quite a bit younger than they are, highly qualified, with excellent training and not very publicized, people whom we must consider.”
Is this tacit acknowledgment that those generals selected to the Council of State where chosen because they are loyal acolytes of Raul Castro and the younger generation of capable officers were passed over?
Moreover, does this cryptic passage alert us to a discontent by officers, and that future and careful consideration by Raul’s regime should be made to advance the younger generation within the officer corps to quell such discontent?
Something worth pondering about the state of internal cohesion of the armed forces.
[H/T: La Nueva Cuba.]
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