The Rebel Army was the major force, formed by Cuban revolutionaries, that carried out the armed struggle for the definitive liberation of Cuba (1956-1958) under the horrors of the tyranny of Fulgencio Batista.
The Rebel Army, led by its Commander Fidel Castro, achieved the definitive victory on January 1, 1959 by making the tyrant Fulgencio Batista abandon the island when it was impossible to stop the powerful revolutionary force that was making its way towards the capital.
The embryo of the Rebel Army was born in Mexico when the assailants of the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes barracks, who on May 15, 1955, thanks to popular pressure, were released from the Model Prison of the Isle of Pines. Among the heroic men of the July 26th action was the main nucleus of the future leaders of the Rebel Army.
The landing of the expedition took place on the morning of December 2, 1956, at Las Coloradas, northwest of Cabo Cruz, in the current province of Granma. For more than two hours, the men who had come to liberate Cuba, sinking in the mud and stumbling at every step with the mangrove
the mangrove, they had to bear the weight of the weapons, equipment and gear.
There, in adversity, the Rebel Army was forged. Even small, it received, prematurely, its first setback on December 5, in Alegría de Pío, when they were surprised, after long walks, exhausted and hungry. The enemy air force punished them severely and almost annihilated them. This was, according to Ché, the baptism of fire of the Rebel Army. However, many victories awaited them since they managed to win the battle of La Plata. Twenty-five months were enough for the victory to be certain.
The group of expeditionary soldiers disembarked on December 2 grew numerically, morally and militarily. In this way, on January 1, 1959, it managed to defeat the dictatorship supported and financed by the United States.
After the revolutionary triumph, the Rebel Army became the powerful Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR). The people nourished its ranks, from the veteran of the Moncada,
the Granma and the Sierra Maestra, to the combatant of the Bay of Pigs, the October Crisis, the Escambray and the young people who today are formed in the spirit of the beautiful patriotic, internationalist and military tradition bequeathed to us by our mambises.
