Prodigiously researched and ambitious in scope, Jonathan Brown's new book traces the long shadow that revolutionary Cuba cast over hemispheric affairs in the 1960s. In doing so, Cuba's Revolutionary World broadens conversations about Cuban foreign policy in important ways. Piero Gleijeses, Renata Keller, Tanya Harmer, and others have written compelling recent histories of Cuba's role on the African continent and in particular Latin American countries. Yet the field was overdue for a fresh, comprehensive assessment of the Cuban Revolution's impact on Latin America as a whole.
The book is divided into two sections. The first considers both how the revolution consolidated power and how its partisans and internal enemies began extending their influence abroad. The section's title, “Revolution and Counterrevolution in Cuba,” is thus a misnomer. Readers will find chapters covering not only developments in Cuba itself but also early Cuban forays into the Caribbean and South America. Cuba's support...
