Today(Nov 26, 2016) Fidel Castro passes away, with mixed feelings to many South African veterans, as more relevant to Castro for the veterans is the way he treated his most astute Military Commander for his “successes” fighting the South African Defence Force in Angola, and funnily instead of rewarding him, he executed him. Why? Read on.
So, in light of revering Communist revolutionaries today, we would like to also remember Division General Arnaldo Ochoa Sanchez, commander of the Cuban Expeditionary Force in Angola between November 1987 and 1989 (seen here in the centre) and how Castro dealt with him and why, and contrary to some beliefs it does not paint a positive picture of “Communist” success fighting the forces of “Apartheid”.
General Ochoa was sent back to Angola in the late 80’s to clean up the mess after UNITA and the SADF had thrashed the MPLA and its Soviet advisers at Mavinga .
On returning to Cuba he was executed on charges, principally, of attempting to smuggle cocaine and cannabis to the US in cahoots with Columbias notorious Medellin cartel.
Or so at least the Cuban people and the world have been asked to believe. The transcripts of those sections of Ochoas "trial" that were broadcast on Cuban television, and other evidence, suggest that the truth is rather different. The General may, tangentially, have been involved in the drug trade, but that was not the key reason for his arrest and eventual execution.
General Ochoa, according to those who knew him (including diplomats involved in the Angola/Namibia settlement process), was a man of striking countenance and much intelligence and charisma. He knew his mission was to preside over Cuba's last “hurrah” in Angola and that the "heroic" defence of Cuito was, therefore, a vainglorious fraud, designed to cover a retreat that had already been decided. The thousands of additional Cuban troops who followed Ochoa in 1987 came to save Cuban face, not the MPLA – Angola’s statutory forces.
Defence Minister Raul Castro, Fidel's brother, quoted the General as saying: "I have been sent to a lost war so that I will be blamed for the defeat." That was, indeed, his view and it was his fate.
At dawn on July 13, 1989, Ochoa was executed by a firing squad at the "Tropas Especiales" military base in Baracoa, West Havana. A widely accepted account tells how he asked not to be blindfolded and to give the command to the firing squad himself. Both wishes were granted. Another version details the Chief of the Military's Special Troops, Gen. José Luis Mesa Delgado, putting a final bullet in Ochoa's head. A statement in the Granma newspaper the next day announced his execution to the Cuban public. His wife was later informed of an unmarked grave in Havana's Cemetery.
In the end, it really is a funny way to treat a returning “victorious” General, and the facts should speak for themselves, yet somehow with Castro’s death it will be washed out with re-written history glorifying "Struggle" Heroes of the "Revolution".
Researched and Posted for the South African Legion by Peter Dickens See less
