Consider that despite many natural disadvantages Cuba had higher standard of living, better educated public, better healthcare system, etc. than any of the countries in Latin America which started at similar level but were left under the control of US-backed right wing governments. I’d much rather live in Cuba of the 1960s–1980s than in any of Washington’s pet quasi-fascist police states or in those Latin American states undergoing active civil war with US-trained paramilitaries genocidally slaughtering peasants.

Arguably the US embargo, cut of diplomatic ties, invasion attempt, repeated assassination attempts, piles of money illicitly funneled to opposition, etc. had as much to do with Castro’s entrenchment/radicalization as anything to do with his personal ideology.

Just after the Cuban revolution, Castro was interested and open to US relations, but ideological prejudices and commitments by American elites made friendly relations impossible. Then a feedback loop ensued by which mutual trust was destroyed and both sides were increasingly radicalized.

Many things Castro did over his long career were reprehensible, but the same certainly can be said for pretty much every US president, and most other national leaders in similarly political turbulent situations.

> but the economic and societal destruction of communism is in its own category

The Human Development Index puts Cuba at position 40, despite the huge economic disadvantage of the embargo.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index#2015_H...

The fixation people have with expanding middle classes is odd. I'd say progress where the poorest are included in social gains is more valuable than any other kind. Otherwise we end up with societies like the US where some parts of the population live in ghettoes worthy of the worst of the third world.