CUBA, THE PEARL OF THE ANTILLES

(From notes taken during the December 1, 1957 lecture by the Very Reverend Father Rande, O.P.)

Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is an honor for me to speak at the Toulouse Geographical Society (...). I'll simply talk about LA HAVANE, where I've had the joy of visiting four times already, and again this year, when I preached a Lenten sermon. (...) Cuba is not only, as has been said, a "historical snuffbox", an "inexhaustible sugar bowl", "the land of more or less laccivious dances". Cuba is something else entirely, and deserves the nickname "Pearl of the Antilles" for its size and richness. (...)

Spain has made Cuba rich and great. She is truly the Mother Country. And its influence is still very great, in thought, art and religion. (...)

France has also had and still has influence in Cuba. French revolutionary ideas were instrumental in Cuba's independence. Victor Hugo has his bust in a square in Vedado, because he wrote in favor of Cuban independence. But France's influence was above all intellectual. Our religious Congregations, expelled from France in 1903, opened colleges there. The Frères des Ecoles Chrétiennes, the Ursulines, the Dominicans, the Dames de Lestonnac. (...) France's influence is even felt in the technical field. The Société des Grands Travaux de Marseille is building a tunnel under the arm of the sea that divides the city in two. Its project was accepted because of the speed of the work (30 months), a lower price than others and an original payment solution. The government will pay the $32 million in sugar (...) A whole world of French engineers and specialists are working in Cuba. And when we see this grandiose achievement, believe me, we are proud to be French.

American influence, however, dominates. The Americans have every interest in having the upper hand in Cuba. They have intervened several times in Cuban history, most notably in September 1906 and January 1909, in an overt way, but they continue to intervene in a covert as well. Guantanamo, in the south of the island, is an extremely fortified military base overlooking the Panama Canal. Cuba needs America. The Cubans have found an ally in the United States, and a historian of the time makes the American position clear: "A glance at the map is all it takes to grasp how important and valuable the island is to the United States, with its many natural resources and temperate climate. It is strategically the key to the Gulf of Mexico where the Mississippi Valley ends, facing the Caribbean Sea and the Panama Canal. In all truth, Cuba's situation is comparable to that of Crete, in the eastern Mediterranean."