The Great Alliance against Fascist Barbarism

Sovetskaya Rossiya, May 27, 2026 —

On May 23, in Moscow, on the eve of the III International Anti-Fascist Forum, the International Scientific and Practical Conference “Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, and Hugo Chávez – Symbols of the Global Revolutionary Process” was held. It was organized by the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF) faction in the State Duma, the All-Russian Movement “Russian Scientists for Socialism” (RUSO), and the Russian Public Committee “For the Liberation of Nicolás Maduro.”

The event was opened and moderated by Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF) and Chairman of the Central Council of the Russian Union of Socialist Workers (RUSO), I.N. Makarov. After welcoming the participants, he introduced the roundtable’s distinguished guests: Deputy Chairmen of the CPRF Central Committee D.G. Novikov and L.I. Kalashnikov, member of the Presidium of the CPRF Central Committee K.K. Taysaev, Advisor to the Chairman of the CPRF Central Committee L.G. Baranova-Gonchenko, as well as representatives of Latin American countries: Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Cuba Enrique Orta González, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela Jesús Rafael Salazar Velázquez, and First Secretary of the Embassy of the Republic of Nicaragua Marvin Octavio Silva Marcia.

D.G. Novikov delivered an opening speech to those gathered.

The main report was delivered by I.N. Makarov.

Other participants also spoke at the conference. These included representatives of the Communist Party and national patriotic organizations, domestic and international scholars, and public and political figures.

The conference was prefaced by a speech by D.G. Novikov, Deputy Chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on International Affairs, and PhD in History:

“We’re having a full-fledged scientific and practical conference today. The theme is ‘Fidel Castro, Ernesto Che Guevara, and Hugo Chávez – Symbols of the Global Revolutionary Process’…”

Those present here will be taking part in an important event. We are holding the third International Anti-Fascist Forum. We have already held two: one in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, and the second here in Moscow. The topic of the anti-fascist struggle and solidarity in this struggle not only remains important, but is intensifying. We might wish for things to be different, but we see imperialism unbridled, we see it unleashing new wars and supporting the most reactionary tendencies, including fascism.

In just a short time, a matter of days, we will celebrate a very important, tragic, and significant historical date: 85 years since the start of the Soviet people’s Great Patriotic War against Nazi Germany. And against this backdrop, the significance of our III International Anti-Fascist Forum grows even greater.

We see the deepening crisis of capitalism, which means that the imperialist predator is growing ever stronger. We won’t be the first to say this, or to say it today at our conference. The pattern of this phenomenon was identified over 100 years ago. V.I. Lenin spoke about it clearly and eloquently in his outstanding work, “Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism.”

Science is science because its conclusions are confirmed over time. Lenin’s conclusions have been confirmed. Imperialism is extremely dangerous. Decaying, creeping into ever-deepening crisis, it becomes ever more dangerous. The Soviet people and all of humanity paid a huge price for liberation from Hitler’s Nazism and Japanese militarism.

It is our sacred duty to always remember the heroes of the anti-fascist struggle. These are the soldiers and officers of the Red Army, the soldiers of the Allied Powers, the fighters of the People’s Liberation Army of China, representatives of the French and Italian resistance, members of the German anti-fascist underground, Yugoslav and Korean partisans, and Polish and Czechoslovak patriots.

The difficult feat of the Great Patriotic War and the Second World War formed a great fighting alliance against fascist barbarity. It was an alliance of fighters against tyranny, an alliance of communists, patriots, and true democrats. It was a great alliance of defenders of world peace, opponents of oppression, and supporters of social justice.

It’s important to understand why that great anti-fascist alliance became possible. It emerged because by that time, workers from various countries and peoples had already accumulated colossal experience in the struggle for freedom and justice.

The European proletarians, who raised high the red banner of Marxism, accumulated extensive experience in struggle. The workers and peasants of Russia, led by Lenin, who, despite their defeat in the First Russian Revolution of 1905–1907, achieved the victorious Great October Socialist Revolution, acquired extensive experience.

The peoples of Asia, who had already entered into a battle with colonialism, increased their experience of fighting for national independence, gaining experience in the struggle for liberation – social and national liberation.

We remember the heroes of the fight against fascism, the heroes of the Brest Fortress… The names of Nikolai Gastello, Alexander Matrosov, Musa Jalil, and many others who inspire us. The legacy of the Soviet people, the values ​​of Soviet socialism, and the victory of Soviet patriotism proved so powerful that we were able to dispel much of the anti-Soviet, anti-communist propaganda.

Today, here in Russia, we have not yet achieved our greatest victory—the victory for returning our country to the path of socialism. That’s why we call our program of action the Victory Program. Our greatest victory is indeed yet to be achieved. But we have achieved something, perhaps even a great deal.

We ensured that Victory Day over Nazism, May 9, became the main national holiday. We ensured that Victory Day parades returned to Red Square on this day, despite attempts to abolish them after the collapse of the USSR. We ensured that Russia now considers China, Vietnam, North Korea, Cuba, Nicaragua, and other countries that favored socialism its main allies. We ensured that the five parties represented in the State Duma unanimously voted for a resolution demanding an end to the criminal US blockade of Cuba and the removal of Cuba from the US State Department’s list of unofficial countries. We preserved the Communist Party. Today, the CPRF is the most influential opposition force in our country.

It’s clear that the imperialists will never simply surrender, and they will never be sated. It wasn’t enough for the West to tear apart our beloved homeland—the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. After that, they didn’t calm down; they didn’t stop. It was with their active assistance that the bourgeois counterrevolution ruined and greatly weakened our country economically and elsewhere. It was they who supported terrorism in the Caucasus, they who drew the former Soviet republics—Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia—into the aggressive NATO bloc, and now they are drawing in and fascistizing Ukraine. It was the imperialists who planned a coup in Belarus and attempted to overthrow President Alexander Lukashenko…

I’m confident that many important ideas will be voiced here today at this conference dedicated to Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, and Hugo Chávez, including ideas on the importance of historical awareness. Historical awareness helps people cope with any threats, sanctions, and blackmail. We in Russia know what sanctions are; our country has faced them more than once. After the Great October Socialist Revolution, Lenin’s government dealt with foreign intervention, domestic collaborators, and Western sanctions.

When we speak of the heroic deeds of the battle against Nazi fascism, we always remember the great example of fortitude in Leningrad during the siege. Hunger was the most terrible weapon for its residents, more terrifying than artillery shells, air raids, and bombs. One of the world’s largest cities then found itself on the level of a vast concentration camp. The entire city was on the level of Auschwitz and Majdanek. A few grams of bread meant life or death. If we remember this, then all the thousands of sanctions the West has imposed on us today will not inspire fear.

We understand perfectly well that Russia’s current standoff with the US and EU authorities began on the day of Russian President Putin’s speech at the Munich Security Conference in 2007. But what was so special, what was so specific about what Putin said in Munich? He simply said that Russia needs sovereign development, that Moscow will strive for this sovereignty, and that Russians advocate for a multipolar world. Isn’t this natural, isn’t this normal, is this some kind of strange way to put the question? And yet, this was enough for the West to consider Putin one of its main enemies, and along with him, the entire Russian people.

Western imperialists should know that their hostility cannot frighten the Russian people. Russia has many friends in America, Asia, Africa, and Europe. Gentlemen imperialists, we will cope with your sanctions and threats. But you, Mr. Trump, and all those who applaud him, should consider whether you can cope with the situation by declaring so many sanctions and starting so many wars. Can you cope with the situation by making entire nations your adversaries? Can you cope with the role of colonialists, after these nations have already thrown off colonial oppression once in their history and cherish their freedom?

Gentlemen imperialists, you should really think carefully about whether you can cope with nations that have such a vast experience. It was created by generations of fighters for a just world. Take Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin, Ernst Thälmann and Georgi Dimitrov, Mao Zedong and Ho Chi Minh, Fidel Castro and Ernesto Che Guevara…

We would need many more hours and conferences to list the names of all our heroes. Where are your heroes, thinkers, leaders? Where are your heroes, where are the imperialists? Who are your heroes? Harry Truman, who dropped bombs on Japanese cities? Ronald Reagan, who joked that he had already given the order to drop bombs on the Soviet Union? Margaret Thatcher, who carried out anti-social reforms? Perhaps your heroes are Joe Biden or Donald Trump? You know, if these are heroes, then heroism doesn’t exist at all… But we know for sure that heroism exists. At certain moments in history, it becomes the essence of an entire nation. Without heroes, there would have been no Paris Commune, no Great October Socialist Revolution, no victory over fascism in May or over Japanese militarism in September 1945. Without heroes, there would have been no Cuban Revolution and no entire revolutionary movement in Latin America. Without heroes, most of humanity would be oppressed by Western colonies today.

True heroes always stand on the side of justice. Following the great scientific discoveries of Marx, Engels, and Lenin, we know well that the embodiment of justice is socialism.

“If you tremble with indignation at every injustice, then you are my comrade” – this is a phrase by Ernesto Che Guevara. It signified the continuation of Martí’s ideas and the entire great revolutionary movement. These words of Che are the most important principle for each of us.

Therefore, we say today: long live the friendship and brotherhood of peoples, long live national independence, long live social justice and socialism!

The lives of true revolutionaries are directed toward the future. They do not die. They live on in the hearts and achievements of their followers.

Vivat Fidel, vivat Che, vivat Chavez!