Is Fidel Castro The Luckiest Man Alive?

THE NEWS TODAY that Fidel Castro intends to resign as presidente over in Cuba has been greeted with the usual – if not expected – responses. The US Whitehouse and even Barack Obama, presidential candidate, threw in their opinions citing that his “exit from power was not enough to bring democratic freedom to communist Cuba” and that the embargo on Cuba should continue until such time as a real democratic process is installed in the country.

News of Castro’s intention to keep his retirement permanent was met with equal cynicism and caution by Cuban exiles in Miami; residents of “Little Havana” are adopting a wait-and-see approach. Broadly speaking the reaction from across the entire world has been similar, but I think they are all missing the point. Completely.

This guy may have been one of the most successful dictators of his time. In his nearly half-century of power there have been approximately 638 failed assassination attempts (most from the CIA I guess!) upon his life, and he still managed to make it to 81 and retire from the position under his own steam.

Just think about that for a minute. Never mind the politics, forget the man and his despot ways for a second. Consider the maths… 638 attempts in nearly 50 years. That’s an average of nearly 13 attempted assassinations per year, at least one attempt per month. Can you imagine leading a life where someone is trying to kill you every single month?

Better yet, as if the sheer volume of attempts wasn’t enough, the actual types of assassination attempts are straight out of a James Bond story. In fact some of them are so outlandish that they belong in Hollywood. Maybe this says more about the incompetence and desperation of the CIA than it does about Castro’s ability to survive, but just take a gander at the following highlights from the hundreds of weird and whacky attempts that were made on his life:- Read more