-DATE- 19670314 -YEAR- 1967 -DOCUMENT_TYPE- SPEECH -AUTHOR- F. CASTRO -HEADLINE- FIDEL CASTRO 13 MARCH ANNIVERSARY SPEECH -PLACE- HAVANA UNIVERSITY -SOURCE- HAVANA DOMESTIC TV -REPORT_NBR- FBIS -REPORT_DATE- 19670314 -TEXT- FIDEL CASTRO 13 MARCH ANNIVERSARY SPEECH Havana Domestic Television and Radio Services in Spanish 0311 GMT 14 March 1967--F/E (concluding portion of speech by Prime Minister Fidel Castro from the steps of Havana University at ceremonies marking the 10th anniversary of the assault on the presidential palace--live) (Text) Individuals acting for mere reasons of sect or dogma, those with a spirit of splittism, condemn the fighters. They will not be considered revolutionaries. The revolutionary fighters in Guatemala, in Colombia, and everywhere will have to be asked who in their judgment are the revolutionaries; who in their judgment have supported and who supports the Venezuelan guerrillas--in other words, who supports the revolutionaries--the Venezuelan guerrillas or the defeatists? Because those fighting in Venezuela, fighting against imperialism, sharing the danger from imperialists bombs, aid those fighting in Guatemala or Columbia. Those fighting in the Venezuelan mountains are the only real and possible allies of those fighting in the Columbian mountains and those fighting in the Guatemalan mountains. What have official representatives done regarding the death of Iribarren Borges? In the first place what do we think about that death? How must we analyze the act? We must analyze it in the light of the government's position and in the light of the rightist and reactionary leadership. In the first place, we have no information on Iribarren Borges. We know only the news which was published by the AP and other press agencies. We do not know who killed Iribarren Borges. The FALN representatives in Cuba have issued a statement. What can be deduced from that statement when it says that "these reasons, as reported by the leaflets which circulated in Caracas," are the FALN representation in Havana did not have other news of the deed than the news published in cables. These said that next to the Iribarren body there were found some FALN leaflets. In other words, on 6 March 1967 when they made this statement they did not have any means of knowing what was happening, other than the news agencies. What action must we revolutionaries take in any revolutionary event? We can disagree with a revolutionary event. We can disagree with a measure, with an event. We can disagree with the killing of this former government official. We can say we do not know anything about him--if he was hated or not as AP says, or if he was or was not responsible for measures against the revolutionaries. Our view is that revolutionaries should avoid actions which can be used by the enemy. A man was killed after being kidnaped. We never did this, whatever our indignation over the actions of the enemy. In our battles we know how to have presence of mind with prisoners. The revolutionary should avoid actions similar to repressive police actions. We do not know how that killing was done. We do not know who carried it out. We do not even know if it was accidental, if it was in fact the revolutionaries. Our honest opinion--and this is part of the rights of any revolutionary--in this case is: if it was the revolutionaries, we think it was a mistake. It was a mistake to use a kind of procedure that can be exploited by the enemy--which reminds the people of the enemy's procedures. Everyone knows how the revolution acts, how there are revolutionary laws, how the laws are severe, but we never mistreated any prisoner. We have enacted severe laws, and our revolutionary courts give the maximum penalty in serious crimes against the revolution and the fatherland, but we have never found a dead man on a road, in the gutter (word indistinct). The revolution carries out its action within a determined revolutionary method, and it worries about methods and persons who have committed serious crimes. Procedure has to be taken into consideration. This is our opinion. A revolutionary can disagree with an action, with a method, with something abstract, but what is not moral, what is not revolutionary is to take advantage of a certain action to join the hysterical chorus of the reactionaries and imperialists to condemn the revolutionaries. (applause) If the revolutionaries are responsible for this action, we will express our view, but we will never join the chorus of hangmen ruling Venezuela to condemn the revolutionaries. What has the official leadership of the Venezuelan Communist Party done? What has one of its spokesmen done? That we will read here:" The Venezuelan Communist Party disassociates itself from Elias Manuit, who on behalf of the so-called FALN claimed for the said organization the murder of Dr. Julio Iribarren Borges." They ended this statement by practically accusing the guerrilla leaders of this action. They accused Douglas Bravo, Gregorio Lunar Marquez, Freddy Cartez, Francisco Prada, and other heroic guerrilla fighters in the Venezuelan mountains. These leaders face legions of soldiers who are trying to exterminate them while defending the worst elements. What did this official statement do? They accused the guerrilla fighters, taking advantage of the most repugnant opportunism, hoping to appease the proimperialist and puppet Leoni government. What it does is to ask for Douglas Bravo's head in addition to charging him with the death of Iribarrne. This position regarding heroic fighting men, who maintain the Venezuelan revolutionary banner on high, asks for their heads. What they have done is only a step from asking Leoni for a rifle to kill Douglas Bravo. A statement by Pedro Medina Silva is being talked about here. It has been some time since a revolutionary fighter has recognized Pedro Medina Silva's leadership. It is said Pedro Medina Silva and other guerrillas signed a statement, guerrillas such as German (Claidet), we know German (Claidet), and we know that German (Claidet) has never even been a guest in a guerrilla camp. There has been a wave of statements. What kind of attitude is this? This is a cowardly action, an opportunist, repugnant action. This is joining chorus of the counterrevolutionary hysteria and the chorus against Cuba. What good is it for this man to say that there never existed any anti-Cuban feeling in the Venezuelan people and that now the enemies of the Cuban revolution are taking advantage to instill such feelings? Who are the accomplices in this campaign if they are not? Who are the accomplices in the campaign of imperialism if it is not those who have been blaming us of meddling in the internal matters of the Venezuelan party? What is the difference between these charges and those of the CIA? Of the State Department? Of the counterrevolutionary worm pit? The difference is that some blame us for meddling in Venezuela's internal matters and others accuse us of meddling in the party's internal matters. Why? Because we have maintained a position of principle, because we have not denied our feelings for and solidarity with the revolutionary fighters. These statements of cowards and opportunists are never the statements of the revolutionary, for the revolutionary can criticize, he can disagree with an act, but he does not join in this shameful action. Anyone can say that the murderers are the revolutionaries and that Leoni's regime is the dove of peace, that the cruel and bloody clique which has murdered hundreds of fighters is a flock of gentle sheep. It is cowardly not to make the pertinent charges. It is cowardly not to take advantage of the situation to demand punishment of the thugs who have murdered so many Venezuelans. It is alright to bring into the open criticism if it is considered necessary, but that criticism must be made with a revolutionary spirit. That criticism should be made against the enemy and not with the enemy. That enemy is the one who has murdered hundreds of fighters--scores of heroic communist militants. If a Latin American government has recently murdered communists, it has been the Venezuelan Government, beginning with Romulo Betancourt and later Leoni. There is not a single word condemning the thugs, a single word condemning the regime which has unleashed repression and violence in Venezuela and which has, in general, made the students and revolutionaries take weapons as the only path for the liberation of their country--for the liberation of their fatherland--from the claws of the oligarchy and imperialism. It stands to reason that they should join the chorus. We do not care that they oppose the Cuban revolution. Since our revolution began it has had to live in the middle of lies and defamation. When we attacked the Moncada Barracks, the newspapers the following day printed that the revolutionaries had stabbed the hospital patients to death. We know about those weapons, those tricks always used by the imperialists and the reactionaries. All the worst genocides are attributed to the revolution by the reactionaries and the imperialists. They will never give up that system. Thus, the lies and gorilla charges and the imperialists and their lackeys do not matter to us. We will never deny our solidarity and our feeling with the revolutionary fighters. In the midst of this hysterical campaign of threats, charges, and conspiracies, in the midst of aggression being threatened against our country, we do not lose any sleep. We are serene. In the midst of this savage campaign in which treason to the fatherland and to the revolution are joined, and in which defeatists calling themselves communists and the proimperialist oligarchy are unleashing their campaign against the Venezuelan revolutionaries and Cuba, we once more proclaim without any hesitation our feeling and our solidarity with the guerrillas fighting in the western mountains, (continuous applause), and with the fighters daring the repression and the anger of tyranny in the cities. (prolonge applause) Our policy is clear. We recognize only revolutionaries as representatives of the people. We do not recognize any of those oligarchic and treacherous governments who broke relations with Cuba--thus taking orders from the Yankee embassy--as representatives of their peoples. Only one of those governments that is not a socialist government has an international position which merits our respect, only one of those government merits such respect, and that is the Government of Mexico. (applause) As for the rest of the governments, what is our diplomatic position? We will not establish diplomatic relations with any of those governments which take orders from imperialism. We are not interested. We do not want to. (applause) We will only establish diplomatic relations with revolutionary governments in these nations, (applause) and only with governments which show that they are independent. Establish relations so that they can be broken the day after tomorrow, at a mere indication from the State Department? No! We do not like to waste time on such foolishness. We are not interested in establishing economic relations with those oligarchies that broke economic relations with us until the governments leading those countries are revolutionary. We will not give financial aid to any oligarchy to bloodily repress the revolutionary movement. (applause) Whoever helps those oligarchies where guerrillas are fighting will be helping to repress the revolutionary, for repressive wars are not only waged with weapons but also with the millions of pesos with which those weapons are paid for and by which the mercenary armies are paid. The unequivocal proof of a government's lack of independence can be seen in the recent case of Colombia. A few days ago on the occasion of the attack on a train, they arrested the secretary general of the Columbian Communist Party and all the members of the party's directorate they could find in their habitual places at 0600. They did not hesitate in the least over the fact that at the same time a delegation of top Soviet officials was in the country to sign a trade, cultural, and financial agreement with the government of Lleras Restrepo. Nor did they hesitate over the fact that on this same day it was reported that a meeting was to take place between Lleras Restrepo and the top Soviet officials. On that very day they arrested all the members of the communist directorate and also assaulted--according to the cables--the headquarters of the TASS agency. Such is the friendly spirit of those oligarchies. Such is the independent spirit of those puppets. That is their meaning of reciprocity. Cannot perhaps proof of the lack of independence and of the hypocritical international policy of those puppet governments be seen from the way those in Venezuela speak, trying to demand that the UAR quit the tricontinental organization and that the USSR practically sever its relations with Cuba, the "blind alley," and enter the wide, wide open and friendly door offered it by the Venezuelan Government--the government that has murdered the most communists in this continent? No matter what the others do, we Marxist-Leninist will never re-establish relations with such governments. They have broken relations with us. We have never broken relations with anyone, and when we recognized the GDR, even those in Federal Germany broke with us. However, because it is a question of principle we do not hesitate, even though it may affect our economic interests. We did not hesitate in recognizing the GDR. Not everything is rosy in the revolutionary world. Complaints follow on complaints because of contradictory postures. While some are condemned for restoring relations with Federal Germany, a crowd is running about in search of relations with oligarchies of the Leoni and company type. Let us condemn Vietnam, let us condemn the crime the Yankee imperialists are today committing in Vietnam, and let us condemn them with all our strength and hearts. But let us also condemn as of today the future Vietnams in Latin America. Let us condemn as of today the future imperialist aggression in Latin America. (applause) What would the Vietnamese revolutionaries think if we sent delegations to South Vietnam to negotiate with the puppet government in Saigon? What will those who are fighting in the mountains of America think if we try to seek close relations with the puppets of the future Yankee aggressions and interventions in this continent? The Leonis and Lleras Restrepos of today will be tomorrow's Ngo Dinh Diems. They will be the initiators of a series of governments similar to the one that began in Vietnam only to justify the imperialist aggressions, only to legalize the interventions of the Yankee Marines. All of these imperialist puppets are conspiring against our revolutionary and socialist fatherland. This conspiracy exists not because we have imported a revolution from anyplace, but because we have generated it in our own land and under our own sky. There are some who speak of alleged fatalism but there is no fatalism that can have influenced this revolution, neither the fatalism of the 90 miles nor any other kind of fatalism. The revolution that sprang from nothing, the revolution that spring from a very small number of men who were encircled for whole years--through which encirclement noting could pass--is a revolution that has its own right to exist and a revolution, mark it well, without puppets, oligarchs, waverers of any sort, or pseudorevolutionaries of any sort. It is a revolution that nothing and no one will either be able to crush or halt. (applause) This revolution will maintain its absolutely independent position to which the peoples who know how to fight have a right, to which the worthy peoples have a right. We proclaim to the whole world that this revolution will continue its way, that this revolution will pursue its own line, that this revolution will never be anyone's satellite or be subjected to anyone's conditions, and that it will never ask anyone's permission to maintain its posture, be it in ideology or in domestic and foreign affairs. With their heads held high and their hearts in the right place, these people are ready to face the future, whatever it is. (applause) Today we are working with feverish enthusiasm, with more enthusiasm than every. We are progressing with more impetus than we ever had during any of the past eight years in the development of our fatherland and in the development of our economy. We are winning great ideological battles on all fronts and in all concepts. We shall continue our ideological road. We do so with absolute confidence, with the confidence of true revolutionaries, the confidence we have in our people and in our masses. Perhaps had there been no need to discuss these subjects today, then it would have been necessary to speak of this profound and incredible revolution that is taking place in the awareness of our people. We look at the future with serenity and confidence. We are serene and confident in the face of all eventualities. We know that this struggle will not be easy and that it cannot be easy. We are living in a continent that is in full revolutionary effervescence and ebullience amid some 20 countries that are awakening to reality and are already either fighting or getting ready to do so. We know that threats will rain on our heads. We know that there will be plots against us and that perhaps even plots of aggression against us are being hatched. Very well. We have already and we now again declare ourselves invincible. (applause) The invasion of this country is practically what Leoni advocates and insinuates. He is not asking for sanctions now at this stage of the international situation, but he will keep the record open, which means, in a few words, that when they hope they are finished in Vietnam the time will come to demand sanctions and war against us. The first person to whom Leoni spoke with clarity and not in vain was his lordship, the Yankee ambassador in Caracas. Well, then, now or at any time--while they are attacking Vietnam or later when they have been defeated in Vietnam, because they are going to be defeated in Vietnam; they are going to be defeated in their aggression (applause) against the heroic people of North Vietnam and they are going to be defeated in their aggression against the heroic people of South Vietnam who, led by the NFLSV, whose position and policies the Cuban party upholds unhesitatingly, (applause) will defeat the imperialists; there is not the slightest doubt about this--if they believe that they are going to pluck a ripe plum here, let them be advised that they are going to encounter here at least a bloodletting and an additional 3.6 Vietnams! (applause)--and also half a dozen more Vietnams in the rest of the continent. Let them know this right here and now! As far as we are concerned, we base our calculations on a mathematical basis--the number of men measured in firepower. A firepower more searing that gunfire is the fire within the hearts of men and within the heart of an entire nation! (prolonged applause) Conspiracies and threats do not disturb us. We are not concerned in the least over the charges attributed to us, and "we don't blame them," as the old song says. We couldn't care less! This is ridiculous--for Cuba to be blamed for the accomplishments of the revolutionaries. Their tactics, their strategy--we even know how the revolutionaries and the revolutionary organizations behave and proceed. Different forces always exist in every single revolutionary process. Each revolutionary movement has different cores of authority. In our own experience in Cuba, when we went to attack the Moncada Palace, no other organization knew about it. When a group of patriots went to attack the Goycoria, no other organization knew about that either. When the comrades of the revolutionary board attacked the palace on 13 March, we who were in the mountains learned about it from radio newscasts. Within our own organization, the men in the plains never knew what the men in the mountains were going to do. The men in the mountains were not aware of what the men in the plains were about to do. We must not think of the revolutionaries as being connected by a radio or telephone system. No! In the revolution, within the revolution, there are various organizations. Various decision-making spheres exist within each organization. Organizations operating underground are largely independent. In each town one cannot even attribute to the revolutionary organizations--to all or to a single one--an individual act that might occur. It is much more absurd, ridiculous, and stupid for such an imputation to be made against the Cuban Revolutionary Government. Who are these people who have unleashed this campaign? What government? One of the most repressive governments, the most bloodthirsty which this continent has ever seen. With its bloody acts and its total repression, this government is the only one responsible for bloodshed in Venezuela. Leoni's government is responsible for Iribarren Borges'; death because it unleashed repression. They unleashed violence--this in order to serve the imperialist master which hands them crumbs in exchange for Venezuelan riches. They who have murdered so many of their countrymen to serve this imperialist master are the ones most responsible. the list of Venezuelan fighters who have fallen as victims of the repression is very long. During Betancourt's and Leoni's regimes and ion complicity with Batista henchmen, they murdered a young girl named Lidia Bugernor because she participated in a solidarity-with-Cuba demonstration. In the heart of Caracas at El Silencio, a policeman murdered Alberto Rudas Mesones whose only crime was to shout: "Viva Cuba!" The following day, the pro-Betancourt political seized his body from his home to avert a popular demonstration at his burial. From August 1959 to March 1963, hundreds of Venezuelan patriots were murdered by Betancourt's and Leoni's Myrmidons. Terror began with the machinegun strafing of a demonstration staged by the unemployed during which Juan Francisco Villegas, Rafael Simon Montero, and Rafael Baltazar Gonzales were killed. Betancourt subsequently had the effrontery to say, during one of his speeches in regard to these events, that the streets are not for the people, but for the police. Petroleum labor leader Cicardo Navarro, who defeated in the elections two pro-Betancourt labor leaders, was murdered by government armed bands at a labor union meeting. Seven workers were wounded during this incident. In Barquisimeto, Julian Torres was detained, tortured, and murdered--shot in the stomach. He was subjected to the "ley fuga." Jose Gregorio Rodriguez was brutally tortured by the Digepol and later dropped from a fourth-story window to make it look like suicide. This crime was verified by a Chamber of Deputies committee whose report was concealed from public opinion. The fact that Leoni became president made no difference in Venezuelan Government policies. In Jaroa, lyceum student Rafael Urdaneta was tortured and horribly bludgeoned with rifle butts. The Digepol agents whipped him with machetes and then riddled him with bullets. A national guard officer named Pena detained and tortured many peasants in the state of Miranda. Three of the prisoners, among whom were peasant leader Trino Barrios, youth leader Victor Ramon Soto Rojas, and Jesus Maria Hernandez, were shoved out of a helicopter over the mountains in Miranda State. This act was witnessed by 10 of their detained comrades who were later executed because they refused to talk. The police shot to death a 14-year-old Maracaibo technical school student as the police attempted to disperse a demonstration precisely in support of a cessation of police repression. Pedro Rojas was hanged in a concentration camp at Cachipo. Alberto Lovera was detained by the Digepol and was savagely tortured to death. His body was found with a thick chain around his neck, and an autopsy revealed that his vertebrae had been fractured. World public opinion was shocked at Fabricio Ojeda's murder in jail. He was a revolutionary leader and the president of the FLN. Ramon Pasquier was arrested on the Yaracuy highway. He was tortured and mutilated, and his body was never found. Making the bodies of their victims disappear is a systematic practice of Betancourt's and Leoni's repressive agents. This was done recently with FLN urban command members Andres Pasquier, Felipe Malaver, Donato Carmona, Angel Guerra, Domingo Sanches, and with so many other Venezuelan patriots. On three different occasions, the congress has been compelled to investigate the Digepol. In each case, the committee has verified the assassinations and tortures perpetrated by this repressive organization. Many names could be cited here of those who have become the victims of Betancourt's police repression, the river of blood separating the Venezuelan people from the imperialist lackeys who usurp their government runs deep. To cite only a few names, there were: Samuel Sanches Alvarez, Andres Cobas Casas, Luisa Maria Cazola, Isabel Acosta, Alexis Rivero, Jose del Carmen Chavez, Natalia Chinaglia, Santos Chauron, rosario Mujica, Antonio Mogoloon, Pedro Anian, Jose Montesinos, Lusis Adrian Gonzalez, Francisco Lozada, and Edgard Gonzalez; Francisco Velazquez, Alejando Montiel, Isidro Espinosa, Lidia Gutierrez, Victor Cesari, Amadeo Cifoni, Jose Rodriguez, Alirio Mendez, Juan Gomez, Hector Trujillo, Leonidas Rojas, Alfredo Tirado, Pedro Ramos, Juan Osorio Magallanes, Miguel Arviaca, Ernesto Alvarez, Concepcion Orta, Alfredo Carmona, Isaac Valazquez, Ana Lourdes Pacheco, Anibal Gimenez, Justo Camacho, Carlota de Ochoa, Simon Caghualga, and Esther Flores; Olga de Harnandez, Ramon Guevara, Rodolfo Garcia, Rafael Hurtado, Pilar Ponce, Santiago Figueras, Emilio dos Santos, Armando Sanchez, Elias la Rosa, Martin Palacios, Alfredo Tirado, Ernesto Alvio, Antonia Diaz, Jose Zurita, Alberto Manzanares, Luis Saaverda, Francisco Rosales, Valentian Araujo, Daniel Matute, Aquiles Bellorin, and Alvaro Ruiz; Manuel Infante, Rafael Guerra, Enrique Perez, Eduviges Colorado, Eulalia Fuenmayer, Angel Linares, Julio Manzano, Jose Vazquez, Esteban Padilla, Carlos Novoa, Enrique Leal, Rafael villegas, Manuel Cachutt Shoudal, Alfonso Rodriguez, Jesus Osuna, Omar Ramones Prieto, Jesus Manuel Rojas Figueroa, Luis Martinez Anez, Vivian Hernandez, Elvina de Morales, Rafael Clemente Acosta, J. Pfeifer, Ignacio Diaz Nino, Carlos Martinez, Alejo Celis, Alejandro Sandoval, and Eduardo Mirabal Machado; Ivan Alfredo Cardero, Jesus Alberto Trujillo, Ramon Jimenez, Humberto Mendez Figueredo, Antero Mendoza Angarita, Francisco Barreto, Manual Antonio Mujica, Efrain Cordero, Carmelo Mendoza, Luis Vicente Garcia, Hector Beltran Diaz, Nancy Alvarado Palma, Luis Rafael Tineo Gamboa, Rafael Antonio Briceno, Ivan Daza, Alaijo C. Peredes, who was murdered in the presence of his own mother, and an endless list or patriots, of fighters--all cowardly and treacherously murdered. I have not mentioned the fighters who have fallen heroically in battle making a stand before the tyranny's henchmen or soldiers. These names belong to other Venezuelans who have become the victims of shootings, tortures, and murders. This is the history of Venezuela in the last few years! This is the history of Betancourt's crime! This is the history of Leoni's crimes! These are the crimes for which Leoni and Betancourt must each answer to history! These are the crimes they try to hide! This is the reason for the smokescreen! This is the reason for the hoax and for the crude little scheme with which they are trying to make Cuba responsible for Iribarrne's death! These are the crimes they will have to answer for any any time and anywhere they wish. If they want to do so in the United Nations, so much the better; if they want to go to the United Nations, magnificent! Let them be ready to discuss there their crimes, felonies, and betrayals of Venezuela, the thousands of millions of pesos they are handing over to Yankee imperialism, and the rivers of blood they have shed. (applause) If they want to call that bloody mess a democracy, I ask them: how come you cannot meet with the university students? Today we are meeting especially to commemorate that glorious date, that heroic date, when--as in Venezuela--some fought bravely, and others who were fulfilling other missions were killed; when, in some cases, some fought like Jose Antonio Echeverria with his pursuers, while others, wounded and taken prisoner, were shot full of holes and killed. We meet today after have experience similar to the ones the Venezuelan people are living through today. We gather here to recall the glories of our fighters; someday in the future Venezuela will also gather to remember its heroes and martyrs. Someday many places in Venezuela, many plants, and many industries will bear the names of all the heroes murdered by the thugs of the tyranny. We challenge the democratic Leoni, the nation's traitor, the man who sold his country, the imperialist thug, the repressive agent of Yankee imperialism to try and go to the University of Venezuela, for it is traditional and accepted the world over that youth represents the healthiest feelings, that the youth of any nation is the most pure, the most idealistic, and the best of any nation. The best of the Venezuelan people is found in the Venezuelan students, just like the best is found in many students of other nations. How does Leoni treat that segment of the heroic, rebellious, worthy, and fighting people of Venezuelan people? He shoots them! Who goes into the university? The tanks, thugs, and police! The traitors to the fatherland, the thugs, and the murderers cannot go to meet there. And we challenge Mr. Leoni to go to the university, to meet with the people, and to explain his policy. This is possible only when there are no contradictions between people and government, only amid a revolutionary process in which the unity of the people, of the laboring masses, of the peasant masses, of the youth masses, and of the intellectual masses is fused. It is not possible amid the sound of the sirens, as happened on that heroic 13 March. It is not possible amid the shooting. It is only possible when one has an optimistic spirit of faith in the future, of a revolutionary awareness, and of patriotism. We, the leaders of this people, can meet here with the students, in the mountains with the peasants, and in the factories with the workers, for this is what a revolution is. We also have had an inglorious past marked by crimes, shootings, evictions, massacres, and murders. Our university also had those heroic demonstrations which were attacked with firehoses, nightsticks, and rifle fire. However, the revolution perserved, fought, and won. It attained the right to construct its future. It attained its right to occupy a worthy place in the world. It attained the right to be really free. It attained the right to be really independent. We are sure that some day Venezuela will attain this goal and that the heroic slogan, "To Free Venezuela or Die for It," will be fulfilled! This slogan is like ours: "Fatherland or Death! We shall win!" (applause) -END-