Military Units to Aid Production

Military Units to Aid Production or UMAPs (Unidades Militares de Ayuda a la Producción) were agricultural labor camps operated by the Cuban government from November 1965 to July 1968 in the province of Camagüey.[1] The UMAP camps served as a form of alternative civilian service for Cubans who could not serve in the military due to being, conscientious objectors, Christians and other religious people, homosexuals, or political enemies of Fidel Castro or his communist revolution. The language used in the title can be misleading, as pointed by historian Abel Sierra Madero, "The hybrid structure of work camps cum military units served to camouflage the true objectives of the recruitment effort and to distance the UMAPs from the legacy of forced labor."[2]The majority of UMAP servicemen were conscientious objectors. A small portion or about 8% to 9% of the inmates were homosexual men, Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh-day Adventists, Catholic priests and Protestant ministers, intellectuals, farmers who resisted collectivization, as well as anyone else considered "anti-social" or "counter-revolutionary".[1] Former Intelligence Directorate agent Norberto Fuentes estimated that of approximately 35,000 internees, 507 ended up in psychiatric wards, 72 died from torture, and 180 committed suicide.[3] A 1967 human rights report from the Organization of American States found that over 30,000 internees are "forced to work for free in state farms from 10 to 12 hours a day, from sunrise to sunset, seven days per week, poor alimentation with rice and spoiled food, unhealthy water, unclean plates, congested barracks, no electricity, latrines, no showers, inmates are given the same treatment as political prisoners."[4] The report concludes that the UMAP camps’ two objectives are "facilitating free labor for the state" and "punishing young people who refuse to join communist organizations."[4] The Cuban government maintained that the UMAPs are not labor camps, but part of military service.[4] In a 2010 interview with La Jornada, Fidel Castro admitted in response to a question about the UMAP camps that "Yes, there were moments of great injustice, great injustice!"[5] Historically the Cuban government has presented UMAPs as a mistake, but according to Abel Sierra Madero, this institution has to be understood as part of a project of “social engineering” tailored for political and social control. Sophisticated methodologies were deployed that incorporated judicial, military, educational, medical and psychiatric apparatuses."[6]


Origins

It is rumored that the UMAP camps were initially proposed by Fidel Castro and implemented by Raúl Castro after a state visit to the Soviet Union and Bulgaria, where he learned that the Soviets ran camps for "anti-socials".[7] According to an April 14, 1966 article in Granma, the official state newspaper, the UMAP camps were proposed at a November 1965 meeting between Fidel Castro and military leaders.[8] Both were concerned over how to handle "misplaced elements".[8]

"Quedaba por ver el caso de una serie de elementos desubicados, vagos, que ni trabajaban, ni estudiaban. ¿Qué hacer con ellos? La cuestión era tema de preocupación para los dirigentes de la Revolución. Un día del mes de noviembre del pasado año (1965) un grupo de oficiales se encontraban reunidos en el Estado Mayor General y discutían estas cuestiones. Hablaban con Fidel, el cual compartía esas mismas preocupaciones y le propusieron la creación de la UMAP."[8]

"Still left to consider was the case of misplaced elements, deadbeats, those who neither studied nor worked. What can be done with these people? This question was the worrying concern for the leaders of the Revolution. One day in November of last year, 1965, a group of military officials met to discuss these questions. They spoke with Fidel, who shared these concerns and proposed to him the creation of the UMAP."

Third-party testimony of UMAP camps

Paul Kidd, a Canadian foreign news correspondent, provides the only known first-hand, third party account of the UMAP camps. Kidd traveled to Cuba on August 29, 1966 to write for Southam News Service.[9] On September 8, the Cuban foreign ministry asked him to leave "by the first flight" because he took photographs of anti-aircraft guns visible from his hotel room window and exhibited an incorrect attitude toward the revolution in an article he had published earlier.[9]

During this trip, Kidd departed Havana and wandered through the rural, former province of Camaguey where he encountered a UMAP labor camp near the hamlet of El Dos de Cespedes.[10] The barbed-wire enclosed camp was run by 10 security guards and held 120 internees, consisting of Jehovah's Witnesses, Roman Catholics, and "those loosely termed 'social misfits' by the government".[10] The ages of the inmates ranged from 16 years old to over 60.[10] None of the internees were given arms; all weapons at the camp were under the control of the ten guards running the camp.[10]

The internees worked an average of 60 hours a week for a monthly income of 7 pesos (roughly worth a meal) and their internment typically lasted for at least six months.[10] Cubans who served in the standard SMO ("Servicio Militar Obligatorio", Obligatory Military Service) received the same monthly wage of 7 pesos a month.[11]

As long as their agricultural quotas were met, most internees at the camp were allowed a break to visit family after six months of internment.[10] Family members were allowed to visit internees at the camp on the second Sunday of each month and could bring personal items such as cigarettes to internees.[10]

Internees at the camp Kidd discovered were housed in two long, white concrete buildings with no windows just the hole in the wall which had bunk beds with sacks slung between wooden beams for mattresses. After agricultural work was complete, internees were instructed in communist ideology for two hours every night.[10]

Kidd estimated that about 200 such camps existed and in total housed about 30,000 people.[10]

Notable inmates

  • Fresa y Chocolate – 1994 Cuban film which deals with the discrimination LGBT people faced after the 1959 Cuban Revolution, also mentions the UMAP camps.
  • "El Pecado Original" – song by Pablo Milanes, considered a homage to remember the mistakes made in post-Revolution Cuba towards LGBT people.
  • Before Night Falls – autobiography by Reinaldo Arenas, deals with theme of UMAP camps.

Documentaries and books

  • Improper Conduct (in Spanish: Conducta impropia) – 1984 documentary by Néstor Almendros and Orlando Jiménez-Leal
    A book published in Spanish as Conducta impropia has the transcriptions of all testimonies appearing in the film and others never used.[16]
  • La UMAP: El Gulag Castrista – 2004 book by Enrique Ros
  • Un Ciervo Herido (A Wounded Deer) – book by Félix Luis Viera
  • UMAP: Una Muerte a Plazos – book by José Caballero

References

  1. 1 2 Guerra, Lillian. ""Gender policing, homosexuality and the new patriarchy of the Cuban Revolution"." Social History. 35.3 (2010): 268. Web. <"Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-11-01. Retrieved 2013-05-17. >.
  2. ↑ Sierra Madero, Abel. "Academies To Produce Macho-Men In Cuba". Translating Cuba. Translating Cuba. Retrieved 24 May 2018.
  3. ↑ Fuentes, Norberto. Dulces Guerreros Cubanos. Barcelona: 1999. 300-303. Print.
  4. 1 2 3 http://www.cidh.org/countryrep/cuba67sp/cap.1a.htm.
  5. ↑ C.V, DEMOS, Desarrollo de Medios, S. A. de. "La Jornada: Soy el responsable de la persecución a homosexuales que hubo en Cuba: Fidel Castro". La Jornada. Retrieved 2016-12-20.
  6. ↑ Sierra Madero, Abel (2016). ""El trabajo os hará hombres": Masculinización nacional, trabajo forzado y control social en Cuba durante los años sesenta". Cuban Studies. 44: 309-349. Retrieved 24 May 2018.
  7. ↑ Almendros, Néstor, dir. Improper Conduct. 1984. Film.
  8. 1 2 3 Ros (2004), p. 155
  9. 1 2 Kidd, Paul. ""Cuba Expels Reporter"." Edmonton Journal 10 09 1966, Print.
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Kidd, Paul. "The Price of Achievement Under Castro". Saturday Review. 03 1969: 23-25. Web. <http://www.unz.org/Pub/SaturdayRev-1969may03-00023>.
  11. ↑ Ros (2004), p. 13
  12. ↑ Ros (2004), p. 223
  13. 1 2 Ros (2004), p. 66
  14. ↑ "Verdad y Memoria" http://translatingcuba.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/VerdadyMemoriaUMAPNo1Aug2012.pdf.
  15. ↑ http://proust.library.miami.edu/findingaids/?p=collections/findingaid&id=504.
  16. ↑ Néstor Almendros and Orlando Jiménez-Leal, Conducta impropia, Madrid, Egales, 2008.http://www.editorialegales.com/libros/conducta-impropia/9788488052674/

Bibliography

  • Bejel, Emilio (2001). Gay Cuban Nation. The University of Chicago Press. ISBN 9780226041742.
  • Ros, Enrique (2004). La UMAP: El Gulag Castrista. Miami, FL: Ediciones Universal. ISBN 9781593880262.
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