Weekly Summary

Approved for Release: 2023/03/28 C03154550
L).l_1
(b 3
play to the reported arrival in the ranks of the
Colombian ELN of Father Domingo Lain, a
Spanish priest who was expelled from Colombia a
year ago for interfering in the country’s internal
affairs. Castro has commented favorably on the
revolutionary clergy several times in his speeches
and probably looks on cassocked rebels as having
excellent potential for guerrilla support activities
such as those carried out by various religious
orders in Brazil in conjunction with Marighella’s
terrorists.
THE IMMEDIATE FUTURE
Castro will continue to support subversion
abroad but is now being much more cautious as
to whom he should support and what type of
support is to be supplied. If the situation were
particularly promising, he would not hesitate to
send money, arms, or even Cuban advisers, but
the rewards would have to be commensurate with
the risks. He seems to have learned that exporting
Cubans to lead a foreign revolutionary movement
is counterproductive, and he will probably de-
pend on foreign nationals who have the charisma
and aggressiveness of a Carlos Marighella to pro-
vide the necessary leadership. He will not insist, as
he did with disastrous results in Bolivia in 1967,
that he control the revolutionary movement, and
he will probably be satisfied to confine Cuban
participation to support and advice. He is showing
signs of being parsimonious with financial and
material assistance, urging revolutionaries to sus-
tain themselves by means of holdups, bank rob-
beries, and similar actions that have become so
prevalent in Latin America in the past year.
He will exert special care in situations like
that in Peru where military officers seem to be
making a genuine effort to institute fundamental
economic and social changes by means of na-
tionalization and agrarian reform. In such cases,
he will soft-pedal violent revolution to avoid up-
Special Report -
setting the applecart. He considers the case of
Bolivia a special one, however, and will oppose
the Ovando government no matter what changes
are instituted. Castro blames Ovando for the exe-
cution of Guevara and seems to be intent on
exacting revenge. Honorato Rojas, the Bolivian
who led Guevara’s rear guard into a fatal ambush
in August 1967, has already been liquidated by
the ELN, and the same fate has apparently been
decreed for Mario Monje, the now-imprisoned
Bolivian Communist Party official who refused to
aid Guevara, and for Ovando himself.
The bulk of Castro’s support for revolution-
aries will probably consist of propaganda and the
training of recruits in guerrilla warfare and special
operations techniques. Candidates for training
will probably be screened much more closely than
in the past, and this policy may result in a drop in
quantity but an improvement in quality.
Castro will establish and maintain liaison
with, and support, those groups that are willing to
engage in armed struggle for the overthrow of
their native governments but will be less dogmatic
when it comes to the fine points of revolutionary
theory. He now recognizes that each country has
its peculiarities and that the Cuban experience
cannot be repeated in other countries unless his
general theories on revolution undergo consider-
able revision. He will continue to scorn most of
the established Communist parties in Latin Amer-
ica and will seek out those revolutionary leaders
who are willing to apply in their respective coun-
tries the general guidelines of urban terrorism (to
create the proper revolutionary climate), guerrilla
warfare (to provide a combat nucleus for con-
fronting the forces of repression), and the
people’s army (to overthrow the government,
seize power, and continue the revolution’s eco-
nomic and social phases). Castro is a compulsive
rebel and will probably remain committed to vio-
lent revolution
b 3
- 8 May 1970
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Approved for Release: 2023/03/28 C03154550