Maine monument in Havana

On January 19, 1961 the eagle that crowned the Maine monument near Havana seafront was torn down. It was a patriotic act, in which the crowd gathered in the evening in front of the statue proclaimed: "Fatherland or Death". Cecilio Curbelo, who is now a journalist for Radio Rebelde Cuban station, witnessed that revolutionary event.

In response to the breaking-off of relations between Cuba and the U.S. by the Eisenhower administration, the torture on a Cuban worker at the Guantanamo Naval Base, at the eastern Cuban region, and the imminent armed aggression, the Council of Ministers approved the removal of the imperial eagle. In addition, similar measures were taken in relation with other monuments erected to US politicians, which were built in the neo-colonial times in the first half of the 20th century.

Recalling that context Curbelo said: "They were decisive times". "All those people who defended our revolution in different ways were mobilized. There were many sabotage actions as part of the U.S. aggressions on the island," he emphasized to make the Cuban people's pain at that time understood.

"I do not think that the decision to take down the imperial eagle was planned nor announced by the media. All I know is that a lot of people supported it; some even trampled on the bronze statue. It was a terrible memory of the US government that true revolutionaries could not let be."

The Eagle made in 1926 in honor to those people killed by the explosion of the U.S. ship Maine on February 15, 1898, became over the years, a symbol of imperial power against Cuba. It seemed that the noisy collapse of the Maine monument was a way of defending Cuban sovereignty.

According to Cecilio Curbelo, the press in favor of the Cuban revolution at that time published on its pages many pictures of that patriotic action. "The information published by the press showed the people's fervor. I am sure that all the people involved in that action, are witnesses that the corpse of the eagle fell at the feet of the historical truth."

!joomlacomment 4.0 Copyright (C) 2009 Compojoom.com . All rights reserved."