ABSTRACT
The abortive sugar harvest campaign of 1969–70 marked the end of a cycle of efforts by the Cuban state to break out of the iron circle of dependency and distorted development through ideological appeal to the Cuban people. At the same time, the exaggerated hopes that the Revolution could be exported to Latin America were dashed by the destruction of most of the continent's guerrilla groups by the end of the decade. From the beginning of the 1970s, the Cuban leaders sought to redirect their foreign policy and reshape Cuba's economic and political structures to accommodate them to the new constraints. One of the most important of these was the increasing dependence on the Soviet Union, without whose aid and trade the Revolution could hardly survive. The deepening economic crisis facing Cuba after the campaign made the leadership all the more sensitive to Soviet pressure for internal reform and a realignment of its foreign policy.
