Moncada Barracks

Attack on Moncada Barracks
Part of the Cuban Revolution
The Moncada Barracks in 2013 after extensive renovation
Date 26 July 1953 Location Santiago de Cuba, Cuba Result Government victory; rebels forced into retreat
Belligerents
Batista Government	26th of July Movement
Commanders and leaders
Col. Alberto del Rio Chaviano	Fidel Castro Raul Castro
Strength
400 men	app. 135 men (additional 24 in Bayamo)
Casualties and losses
19 killed, 30 wounded	61 killed app. 51 captured

The Moncada Barracks was a military barracks in Santiago de Cuba, named after the General Guillermón Moncada, a hero of the War of Independence. On 26 July 1953, the barracks was the site of an armed attack by a small group of revolutionaries led by Fidel Castro. This armed attack is widely accepted as the beginning of the Cuban Revolution. The date on which the attack took place, 26 July, was adopted by Castro as the name for his revolutionary movement (Movimiento 26 Julio or M 26-7) which eventually toppled the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in 1959.

Almost all of Fidel Castro's followers were Partido Ortodoxo Youth rank and file of the lower middle class or working class. Only four of the 160 rebels were university graduates and most had only a primary education. Of the 137 insurgents whose ages are known, the average age was 26, the same as that of Fidel Castro. Nine rebels were in their teens, 96 were in their twenties, 27 in their thirties, and five over 40. The Afro Cuban composition of the group was limited to 2 blacks and 12 mulattos, partly because most biracial Cubans identified with Batista, who was of mixed blood. Castro avoided recruiting among intellectuals, who were more apt to challenge his ideas.

After Batista's military coup on 10 March 1952, Fidel Castro and his group began to train young men to engage in the struggle, along with other anti-Batista groups, against what they perceived to be an illegitimate government. Castro claimed that they trained 1,200 men within a few months, training at the University of Havana and at firing ranges in Havana, disguising themselves as businessmen interested in hunting and clay pigeon shooting.

The weapons included forty 12- and 16-gauge shotguns, thirty-five Mosberg and Remington .22 rifles, sixty handguns of various models, a malfunctioning .45 caliber submachine gun, twenty-four rifles of different caliber, including eight Model 1898 Krag-Jørgensen rifles, a .30-06 Model 1903 Springfield rifle, three sawed-off 1892 .44-caliber Winchester rifles, and a .30 caliber M1 Garand rifle with a folding metal stock.

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Wikipedia