Colonel Pedro Yadín reveals that the officers were asleep and were attacked with “bombs and drones”
14ymedio, Havana,January 16, 2026 –- Havana once again deployed its political liturgy this Friday following the death of the 32 Cubans who fell in Caracas during the capture of Nicolás Maduro. At the Anti-Imperialist Tribune, facing the Malecón, the tribute ceremony functioned as a platform for ideological reaffirmation and political warning at a moment of evident internal fragility for the regime.
From the stage, the First Secretary of the Communist Party, Miguel Díaz-Canel, insisted that there would be no negotiation with the United States “on the basis of coercion.” Cuba, he said, is willing to engage in dialogue, but only “on equal terms and on the basis of mutual respect.” The speech, reported in excerpts by the official press, relied on a rhetoric of epic resistance, threats of external aggression, and closed calls for unity.
According to the president, the January 3 operation opened “a new era of barbarism, plunder, and neo-fascism” and was a hard blow to the Cuban government, which experienced “very bitter hours” of “indignation and impotence.” Venezuela, Havana’s main political ally and commercial partner for more than two decades, once again occupied the symbolic center of the official narrative, now under the banner of sacrifice.
However, the martial tone of the ceremony clashed abruptly with one of the most widely cited testimonies by the state press itself. It came from Colonel Pedro Yadín Domínguez, one of the survivors. His account, published by the State newspaper Granma and broadcast in a television interview, introduces fissures that are difficult to reconcile with the heroic version the regime is trying to impose.
The statement is uncomfortable for a narrative that insists the 32 Cubans “fought back with gunfire” and died in combat
“We were sleeping, resting in the early morning hours,” the colonel told the cameras. “We barely had any weaponry,” he added, explaining that the group was performing support functions for the security of the Venezuelan president and was not in a combat posture. The attack, he said, was “disproportionate,” involving planes, bombs, drones, and Apache helicopters against a group that was neither on alert nor armed to resist.
The statement is uncomfortable for a narrative that insists the 32 Cubans “fought back with gunfire” and died in combat, as stated in the first communiqué announcing their deaths and declaring a period of national mourning. The image of heroic combat dissolves when the speaker is a senior officer of the Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces, seated in a wheelchair, describing a night of rest interrupted by a bombardment.
While Díaz-Canel evoked the Sierra Maestra, Africa, and even Caracas as stages of a single historical feat, the colonel’s testimony sketched another picture: that of an opaque mission, without sufficient weapons, on foreign soil, and an attack that caught the personnel while they were asleep.
The propaganda machinery has tried to compensate for that void with overacting. On State TV’s Mesa Redonda official commentator Oliver Zamora raised the tone to the point of boasting. He claimed that the United States “had to kill” the 32 Cubans with a “tremendous” display of brute force, and that it even took hours to do so. For Zamora, the fact demonstrated Washington’s inability to “understand” a country like Cuba, hardened by decades of confrontation.
The profusion of images from the events and ceremonies has also served to expose numerous repressors
While the propagandist speaks of fierce resistance and enemies incapable of subduing Cubans, the surviving colonel insists they were practically defenseless and without adequate weaponry. One sells epic heroism; the other describes vulnerability.
The rift also spilled into the digital space. On YouTube, under the interview with the colonel, a user identified as @Jcontre3000 wrote: “We saw that coward in the videos of Venezuelan soldiers crying and running away; that’s why he’s alive. A coward dies a thousand times, and this one is a coward.” The comment, far from anecdotal, exposes the level of polarization and distrust that surrounds even official testimonies.
The profusion of images from the events and ceremonies has also served to expose numerous repressors. Several Cuban activists have identified among the crowd agents of State Security responsible for interrogations, harassment, and episodes of direct repression. This is significant, because these individuals rarely show their faces on social networks or on official media.
Among those who have identified these officials is activist Laura Vargas, who has documented and denounced episodes of surveillance and unauthorized access to her accounts as part of the digital repression exercised against critical voices. The artist Hamlet Lavastida has done the same; he is known for his cultural and political opposition to the regime and for having been detained and sanctioned as a prisoner of conscience due to his works and public actions. The images have also revealed former power figures fallen from grace, such as former foreign minister Felipe Pérez Roque.
At the event, Díaz-Canel again called for “closing ranks” and warned that if attacked, Cuba would defend itself “fiercely.” “They would have to kidnap millions or wipe this archipelago off the map,” he said. But beyond the slogans, the tribute laid bare a tension the regime has been unable to resolve: the distance between the rhetoric of permanent war and the reality of silent, poorly explained, and deadly missions, whose details emerge only when a survivor steps outside the script.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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