It was the early morning of January 17, 1957, 69 years ago, when 29 guerrillas of the nascent Rebel Army attacked the La Plata military outpost of Fulgencio Batista's dictatorship, forcing Batista to acknowledge to the world that Fidel Castro was still alive and fighting.
This was the first clash between the fledgling Rebel Army and the Cuban Constitutional Army after the ambush at Alegría de Pío. The small outpost was taken by the guerrillas after a 40-minute battle in which half of the defenders were killed or wounded.
Although the battle was of little military significance, the regime's Armed Forces were forced to recognize that Fidel Castro commanded a group willing to confront them, thus refuting the propaganda that they had all been annihilated at Alegría de Pío.
The action demonstrated the presence of the initial core of the Rebel Army in the mountains and proved encouraging for the morale of those who had begun their liberation campaign with a costly setback and the loss of most of their men and equipment.
On January 13, the guerrilla group camped near the mouth of the La Plata River, intending to attack the military post located there, where five army soldiers and five sailors, under the command of a Navy sergeant, guarded the southern coast.
The troop led by Fidel Castro consisted of 29 guerrillas: 18 of them Granma expeditionaries, eight peasants who had joined the guerrilla movement, and three men sent by Celia Sánchez, who led the 26th of July Movement in Manzanillo.
For the attack on the outpost (a wooden house with a zinc roof), the 29 rebels had only 24 weapons: nine rifles with telescopic sights, five semi-automatic rifles, four bolt-action rifles, two Thompson submachine guns, two submachine guns, one 16-gauge shotgun, and one revolver.
The arrival of the boat carrying supplies and the relief of the small outpost confused the rebels, who postponed the attack.Fidel devised a plan of surveillance and reconnaissance, convinced that a defeat would mean losing their meager arsenal and being defenseless against any army counterattack.
From dawn on the 16th, the rebel forces kept watch on the outpost.In the afternoon, they advanced on the position, and at nightfall, they crossed the La Plata River and took up positions along the road where they captured two peasants who provided information about the number of men in the outpost and other valuable details.For the attack on the barracks, Fidel divided the guerrilla group into four squads: Squad No. 1: Led by Julito Díaz, and composed of Camilo Cienfuegos, Reinaldo Benítez, and Calixto Morales, who would surround the thatched house located on the right.Squad No. 2: Led by Fidel Castro, and composed of Universo Sánchez, Luis Crespo, Calixto García, Manuel Fajardo Sotomayor, and Ernesto Guevara, who would attack from the center.Squad No. 3: Led by Raúl Castro, and composed of Ciro Redondo, Efigenio Ameijeiras, Armando Rodríguez, and José Morán, who would attack from the left. Squad No. 4: Led by Juan Almeida Bosque, and composed of Guillermo García, Crescencio Pérez, the Acuña brothers, Sergio and Ignacio Pérez, who would attack from the left in conjunction with Raúl Castro's squad.
Meanwhile, others guarded people captured hours earlier just meters from the outpost, including Chicho Osorio, the local foreman and army collaborator, who, in a drunken stupor, provided precise details about the garrison.
At 2:40 a.m. on January 17, with two bursts of machine-gun fire from Fidel Castro, the battle began and lasted about 40 minutes. Despite the limited means of defense, the soldiers resisted. The rebels threw some of the grenades they had brought on the Granma, but they failed to explode; Raúl Castro threw dynamite without a nipple, but it had no effect.
The rebels demanded the soldiers surrender, and they agreed to cease resistance. The defenders suffered two dead and five wounded (three of them critically, who died shortly afterward).The sergeant in command of the outpost managed to escape with his weapon during the fighting.
The guerrillas suffered no casualties and seized eight Springfield rifles, over a thousand rounds of ammunition, a machine gun, clothing, backpacks, food, and other supplies.
Regarding the significance of the Battle of La Plata, Commander Ernesto Guevara wrote in 1961 in the newspaper Revolución: "(...) it constituted our first victory and had a certain resonance, far beyond the rugged region where it took place. It was a wake-up call to everyone, a demonstration that the Rebel Army existed and was ready to fight, and for us, a reaffirmation of our chances of ultimate victory."