Significance of the Ten Years' War

Alsina González
Specialist journalist and researcher

Before finally getting your independence from Spain in 1898 with the concurrence of the United States, the Cubans had ever attempted such an achievement without success. The first was in 1868.

The call ten years war (from 1868 to 1878) was the first of the armed confrontations between the Cuban independence fighters and Spain.

The origins of Cuba's claim for independence must be sought, as in any other territory that claims its independence, both for reasons socio-political (a differentiated society, in this case a mixture of the original inhabitants, the Spaniards who arrived from the XV century, and the slaves, as well as the consideration and the colonial treatment received by the metropolis) as economic.

In the case of the economic ones, the colonial government favored the large landowners as opposed to a majority of the population that he was going through straits, when not directly hungry.

Businessmen who did not own sugar plantations were also hardships because of the taxes established since the metropolis, which did not result in an improvement in the conditions of the island, but rather that they were going to swell the Spanish coffers in the peninsula.

All this breeding ground exploded on October 10, 1868 with the so-called Yara's Scream.

He Shout It consisted of a manifesto signed by Carlos Manuel de Céspedes calling to arms to fight against Spain for the independence of Cuba.

Céspedes set an example by freeing his slaves and inviting them to join the fight. He also chose a flag that already had the color combination that the Cuban flag has today, but in a different way: with a white stripe. at the top containing a red square with a white star in the middle at its left tip, and below these elements, a strip blue. Similar, then, to the Texas flag exchanging red for blue and vice versa, and with the square with the star restricted to occupying the upper half.

Initially, the rebels were unable to fulfill their objective of occupying and liberating the towns Manzanillo or Yara, so they took refuge in the mountains, specifically in the Sierra de Naguas.

The uprising would later be joined by the populations of Oriente, Camagüey and Las Villas. On the part of the unionist side, it was counteracted with the training of irregular parties that devastated various places, fomenting panic among the rural population, but achieving the opposite effect to that they wanted: as in all liberation wars in which the civilian population has suffered attacks, this tipped many to the side independentista.

In many ways, the Ten Years' War constitutes the climax in the process of creating contemporary Cuban identity.

Bayamo was named the capital of the insurgents, although it was soon taken by Spanish troops.

In this fight, the scheme was given that was later repeated ad nauseam in other conflicts derived from colonialism, such as the Vietnam War, for example: the army The regular occupant dominated the urban areas, but completely escaped control of the rural ones, which is where the rebels had their stronghold, thus using tactics of guerrillas.

Little by little, the rebel army was increasing its ranks with new recruits, fleeing from the Spanish repression and idealists, training in military tactics, and getting together.

This meant that, around 1874, the Cuban army was already in a position to face the Spanish.

In the Battle of Las Guásimas, in March 1874, Cuban troops defeated the Spanish.

The Spanish tactic will consist, from that moment, in sending all the more soldiers to defeat the enemy by simple numerical superiority, as in "Spanishizing" the island, sending numerous colonists.

There will be no shortage of volunteers among the latter to go and try their luck in the territory, fleeing chronic hunger and poverty in some regions of Spain, or the Third Carlist War, a conflict in the peninsula, geographically limited, but which had its impact.

The Spanish troops were instilled with special terror by the mambises soldiers armed with machetes, a work tool that, in expert hands, could do great damage.

The Cuban advance was hampered and, ultimately, weighed down by political disagreements between its leaders.

lawns, the pater patriae Being the first rebel, he died in Sierra Maestra in February 1874, after being deposed as provisional president by Salvador Cisneros Betancourt, at the hands of Spanish troops.

At the same time, in 1876 the third Carlist War ended and, with a pacified peninsula, the Spanish government could fully devote its efforts to the war in Cuba.

With the new turn of the situation, both sides open peace negotiations in 1878, which will culminate with the signing of peace on February 10 of the same year.

Not all the Cubans who participated in the conflict were satisfied with the peace agreement, which would lead to the outbreak, a year later, of the so-called little war and, finally, in 1895 to the armed conflict that, with the United States in the middle, would finally lead to independence.

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