ABSTRACT
The concept of military organization as a basis for communist revolution was greatly enhanced by the Cuban revolutionary experience. The leaders of the Cuban Revolution started with the focus of armed struggles as the basis for revolutionary policy formulation. The Cuban Revolution emerged from a set of circumstances in which a militant band of revolutionaries initiated armed action against city strongholds of government. The accelerated movement of the Cuban Revolution into militaristic forms reflects the multiple needs of the Cuban regime. The basic mechanism by which the military performs its internal police functions varies in Cuba from that of most countries in Latin America. Problems of the Cuban economy are too serious for an excessive reliance on the armed forces. Its political costs are also too high. The militarization of Cuba is significant not so much because it is unique but because it falls into a pattern of contemporary Latin American bureaucratic politics.
