The executioner's rifle cracked across Cuba last week, and around the
world voices hopefully cheering for a new democracy fell still. The men
who had just won a popular revolution for old ideals—for democracy,
justice and honest government—themselves picked up the arrogant tools
of dictatorship. As its public urged them on, the Cuban rebel army shot
more than 200 men, summarily convicted in drumhead courts, as torturers
and mass murderers for the fallen Batista dictatorship. The
constitution, a humanitarian document forbidding capital punishment,
was overridden. The only man who could have silenced the firing squads was Fidel Castro
Ruz, the 32-year-old lawyer, fighter and visionary who led the
rebellion. And Castro was in no mood for mercy. “They are criminals,”
he said. “Everybody knows that. We give them a fair trial. Mothers come
in and say, 'This man killed my son.' ” To demonstrate, Castro offered
to stage the courts-martial in Havana's Central Park—an unlikely spot
for cool justice but perfect for a modern-day Madame Defarge. In the trials rebels acted as prosecutor, defender and judge. Verdicts,
quickly reached, were as quickly carried out. In Santiago the show was
under the personal command of Fidel's brother Raul, 28, a slit-eyed man
who had already executed 30 “informers” during two years of guerrilla
war. Raul's firing squads worked in relays, and they worked hour after
hour. Said Raul: “There's always a priest on hand to hear the last
confession.” In a Mass Grave. The biggest bloodletting took place one morning at
Santiago's Campo de Tiro firing range, in sight of the San Juan Hill,
where Teddy Roosevelt charged. A bulldozer ripped out a trench 40 ft.
long, 10 ft. wide and 10 ft. deep. At nearby Boniato prison, six
priests heard last confessions. Before dawn buses rolled out to the
range and the condemned men dismounted, their hands tied, their faces
drawn. Some pleaded that they had been rebel sympathizers all along;
some wept; most stood silent. One broke for the woods, was caught and
dragged back. Half got blindfolds. A priest led two of the prisoners through the glare of truck headlights
to the edge of the trench and then stepped back. Six rebel executioners
fired, and the bodies jackknifed into the grave. Two more prisoners
stepped forward, then two more and two more—and the grave slowly
filled. Lieut. Enrique Despaigne, charged with 53 murders, got a
three-hour reprieve at the request of TV cameramen, who wanted the
light of a full dawn. When his turn came, Despaigne was allowed to write a note to his son,
smoke a final cigarette and—to show his scorn and nerve—to shout the
order for his own execution. On a hill overlooking the range, a crowd
gathered and cheered as each volley rang out. “Kill them, kill them,”
the spectators bellowed. As the death toll reached 52 and the pit was
halfway full, one rebel muttered: “Get it over quickly. I have a pain
in my soul.”
