Times Out of Joint

Back in December 1956, when Batista was firmly ensconced as President of Cuba, and mainly occupied with doing what he could to bolster the sagging sugar trade, Dr. Fidel Castro and a group of his followers made the first landing on the coast of Cape Cruz. The august London Times, which is generally amused by furtive rebellions in South America, took advantage of the occasion to chuckle mildly at the insurgent invasion, and in its dryest patriarchal manner advised the rebels to put down their guns and go home.

Castro's landing had been a comical affair, and the Times gleefully described it as such. It told in pointed detail how Batista had received intelligence of the landing, and disposed what must have been a large part of his navy to watch for the rebel ships. When Castro finally appeared, he was in a single motor boat, towing a barge, and flying a Mexican flag. A government coast guard cutter closed in, and the rebels, trying to escape, promptly ran aground on the shore. At this point a government fighter plane appeared and strafed the barge, so that Castro's men, numbering somewhere from fifty to a hundred, dived into the forest and dispersed. The Times happily labeled its article "Cuban Rebels Take to the Hills."

After having amused its breakfast table readers with a bit of a jest at the expense of Dr. Castro's scattered forces, the Times waxed serious. Having already praised Batista's government for its benevolent despotism, it called the insurgent plot "forlorn and suicidal." Thoroughly enjoying itself, in a rare burst of poetry the Times added: "More sophisticated nations see little rhyme or reason for these

Revolts, republics, revolutions, most No graver than a schoolboy's barring out Too comic for the solemn things they are Too comic for the solemn things in them."