-DATE-
19720627
-YEAR-
1972
-DOCUMENT_TYPE-
SPEECH
-AUTHOR-
F. CASTRO
-HEADLINE-
DINNER IN THE KREMLIN
-PLACE-
RUSSIA
-SOURCE-
MOSCOW TASS INTL SVC
-REPORT_NBR-
FBIS
-REPORT_DATE-
19720628
-TEXT-
Castro Speech

Moscow TASS International Service in English 2230 GMT 27 Jun 72 L

[Text] Moscow June 27 TASS--Follows the full text of the speech made by
Fidel Castro Ruz at a dinner in the Kremlin given in his honour.

Dear Comrade Brezhnev!

Dear comrades, members of the Political Bureau of CPSU Central Committee!

Dear comrades, members of the Central Committee of the CPSU of the
Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet and of the Soviet Government!

We are deeply grateful for the warm feelings of fraternal solidarity
addressed to our delegation, our party and our people, just expressed by
Comrade L. Brezhnev on behalf of the CPSU Central Committee, the Presidium
of the USSR Supreme Soviet and the Soviet Government.

For thousands of years humanity knew no other than a class society. Man had
no idea of the world other than the world of hated division into the
exploiters and the exploited.

Slaves, plebians, serfs, artisans, peasants, proletarians toiled and
suffered under the oppression of the ruling minorities which replaced one
another throughout the development of human society.

The sad path of history is soaked in the sweat and blood of countless
generations of the oppressed. This history of mankind determined by
implacable laws has led to the appearance of certain material conditions
and the emergence of a social class called upon to put an end to the
exploitation of man by man once and for all, and prompted the political
thinking of the most enlightened minds towards the discovery and study of
the laws governing the life of society. Marx and Engels studied these laws
and on their basis created a scientific doctrine of the proletariat as a
class destined to change the course of history. Lenin developed and
brilliantly applied this doctrine in practice, under the guidance of Lenin
and the party he created, in alliance with the exploited peasantry, the
working class of Russia carried out the first socialist revolution, and
with it the most profound social transformations in the long, hard and
cruel process of mankind's development. To quote Marx, an end was put to
the pre-history of mankind and its true history began. Such was the role of
the October Revolution, the Russian working class, of Lenin and the
Bolshevist party he created.

There was never a date, never a fact, never a man, never an event up to
this day that had a greater influence on the life of mankind. October,
however, was only the beginning of a tremendously difficult road: Fiercely
and with profound class hatred, already manifested in the brutal
suppression of the heroic Paris Commune, the capitalist states launched
military intervention against Russia. British, French, Japanese, American
imperialists and other reactionaries sent troops to strangle the revolution
and the workers and peasants of Russia under Lenin's leadership had to
heroically defend the new-born state which was subjected to a tremendous
onslaught from every side.

Lenin's leadership, the unmatched heroism of the communists, workers and
peasants saved then the revolution, but added to the destruction and
dislocation of the imperialist war was the devastation caused by the
interventionist troops and their hirelings. The construction of socialism
began in a country completely ruined, bled white, blockaded, and this
called for efforts no less hard and heroic.

The entire policy of the imperialists during the post-war period rotated
around the USSR and was directed against it. For the struggle against
communism there appeared fascism. Hitler was supported, armed and set
against the USSR. Munich, the capitulation of the bourgeois governments to
fascism, the dismemberment and occupation of Czechoslovakia betrayed by the
other capitalist states, all this ignominious policy was inspired by the
hatred of the bourgeoisie for the Soviet Union. The Second World War, and
Hitler's aggression against the Soviet Union, was the inevitable result of
all this.

Humanity must be forever appreciative and grateful to a people which paid
with the lives of 20 million of its sons for the defence of the world's
first socialist state and for destroying fascism. The five-year plans which
prepared the country for the struggle against fascism, the evacuation of
the greater part of its defence industry while war raged around, the heroic
defence of Leningrad, of Moscow, Stalingrad, the Caucasus, Sevastopol, the
great battle of Kursk, and the sweeping through assault, which ended in the
capture of Berlin and the liberation of numerous oppressed peoples of
Europe, all these are feats which the world will never forget.

In socialist Berlin, in Prague, in Bratislava, our delegation went to the
graves and paid homage to the Soviet soldiers who fell in the battles waged
there. There is not a city, town or village in Romania, Hungary, Poland,
Czechoslovakia, or the GDR, where the blood of the sons of your heroic
people had not been shed in plenty. Such was its giant contribution to the
struggle for ridding the world from the lethal menace of fascism. And once
again socialism, this time already in a number of countries, had to rise on
the ruins of war and former battlefields. And once again the imperialists,
now this time led by the U.S., organized a siege and economic blockade of
the USSR and the other socialist countries.

It was with aggressive aims that the military pacts of NATO, SEATO, CENTO
and others were concluded. Hundreds of war bases were set up around the
USSR and other socialist countries. The imperialists monopolised atomic
weapons. They held in their hands all the world's gold, controlled the
greater part of the world's national resources and an industry virtually
undamaged by the war. Such were their advantages over the socialist camp
and the revolutionary movement in the post-war period.

The fact that tens of countries that lived under the conditions of the most
brutal imperialist and colonial domination have attained in the last 27
years independence shows that the road to the transformations sparked off
by the October Revolution cannot be barred.

The political maps of the world today differ utterly from those of 30 years
ago which showed huge colonial empires.

Our country which, just as the other countries of Latin America, lived
under the complete economic and political control of American imperialism,
shook off this yoke and made its own revolution, created the socialist
state on the American continent. It was the first to raise the victorious
banner of Marxism Leninism on the other side of the Atlantic.

The consistent implementation of the principles of Marx, Engels and Lenin
brought us to victory, helped us to consolidate this victory. All attempts
of imperialist, ideological infiltration into Cuba were dashed against the
firm revolutionary consciousness which Marxism-Leninism brought our people.

The cruel economic blockade of Cuba, which continues to this day, most
various forms of subversive activity, attacks by mercenaries and threats of
military aggression--through all this Cuba has passed. But we were not
alone in this struggle. Mostly the Soviet Union, as well as other socialist
countries to the measure of their abilities, sent us arms, gave us
technical and economic aid necessary to prevent the imperialists from
achieving their aim--to break the Cuban people's Will by means of hunger.

The prestige of revolutionary ideas grows today and they are spreading not
only among the peoples of Latin America but also within American society
itself.

Despite the difficult postwar conditions, the economy of socialist
countries has scored especially big successes in the past 25 years. The
alignment of forces in the world arena has changed sharply in favor of
socialism owing to the unprecedented achievements of Soviet science and
technology.

The growth of the USSR's might created a firm obstacle in the way of
imperialisms adventuristic, belligarent aggressive policy. This was a
decisive factor in the struggle for peace, a factor facilitating the
attainment of considerable successes in recent years, recognition of the
present borders in Europe, renunciation of the use of force, the weakening
of the war danger in this area of the world, and also facilitating efforts
directed at holding the European conference on questions of security.

Imperialism had to make important concessions. Our party supports the
Soviet Union's efforts to preserve peace and to prevent the deadly danger
of thermonuclear war.

We fully agree with your words, Comrade Brezhnev, that the assertion of the
principle of peaceful coexistence and successes along this road do not mean
at all a weakening of ideological struggle, but that this struggle will
become increasingly sharper in the course of the rivalry between the two
social systems.

In the course of this political struggle, playing its role of world
policeman, imperialism will surrender its positions there where it will
have no other way out, and will try to deal blows wherever it can.

As you have noted in your speech, the flames of war are still billowing in
Indochina. It is with profound appreciation that we greet your statement on
Vietnam, your words that the Soviet Union will further give all the
necessary aid and support to the heroic people of Vietnam until the victory
of its just cause. We know how much time and how much attention the party,
government and people of the Soviet Union are giving to the struggle of our
Vietnamese brothers. We know the tremendous importance of the Soviet
Union's statements on questions of its foreign policy, and we know that its
word is firm.

We also share your concern over the delicate and dangerous situation in the
Middle East and fully support the Just demand Of the Arab peoples for the
withdrawal of troops of the aggressors and the full return of occupied
territories.

We want to repeat here the words that we said to our working people this
May Day: Our people fully trusts the Soviet Union's principled policy. Your
heroic history, your support of the world revolutionary movement and
exploits accomplished for the good of mankind--such is the basis of this
trust. A long, complex and difficult struggle lies ahead, but victory will
be on the side of the people, on the side of the revolution, on the side of
principles.

Dear comrades, we would like to express our profound gratitude for the
possibility to visit the Soviet Union again, for the war,m welcome accorded
us by the Soviet leaders and Soviet people, for the high honour you have
accorded me by awarding the Order of Lenin to me here today.

We are deeply satisfied with the present state of our friendship, with the
present state of our fraternal relations based on mutual respect, with the
sincere relations that should exist between revolutionary parties and
revolutionary peoples. We will further tirelessly work in the name of this
friendship, in the name of strengthening it.

Comrade Brezhnev, we would like to toast your health, the health of all
Soviet leaders, and all those present, the heroic Soviet people, the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union, eternal friendship between Cuba and
the USSR!
-END-