Fulgencio Batista was Cuba's main leader in one capacity or another from 1933 to 1958. He was elected president on a populist platform in 1940, but was in power before led the Sergeants' Revolt that overthrew the government of dictator Gerardo Machado. For a time he served as head of the armed forces, which, within the Cuban government system of the time, made him part of the five-member presidency. After his term expired he lived in Florida for a few years before returning to race again. When he realized he couldn't win the vote, he led a violent military coup that returned him to power. By suspending the 1940 Cuban Constitution that he had promulgated, Batista began to look more and more like a dictator. He ended up getting involved with the American Mafia and other criminal activities, although the US government continued to support him until the end of his reign. While the rich made fabulous money, the lives of the poor were stripped of basic civil liberties, and in his years of power nearly 20,000 people were killed by his secret police, some of them publicly executed. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay This continued until 1958, when he was overthrown by Fidel Castro and his 26th of July movement. The name of the 26th of July Movement comes from the failed attack led by Castro himself on the Moncada Barracks, a military facility in the city of Santiago de Cuba, on July 26, 1953. This armed attack is widely accepted as the beginning of the Cuban Revolution and although it failed, served as a rallying cry for the revolution. However, it ended badly for Castro who was captured and sentenced to 15 years in prison although he was granted freedom after only two due to the riots and outrages that followed. Almost all of Fidel Castro's followers were young and inexperienced. Only four of the 160 rebels who fought with him at Moncada Barracks were college graduates, and most had only primary education. Of the 137 whose ages are known, the average age was 26, the same as Fidel Castro. At the end of the revolution, on December 2, 1956, 82 men landed in Cuba, boarding a boat ready to organize and lead an armed revolt. The final battle began very badly and suffered numerous casualties. The landing party was split in two and wandered lost for two days, most of their supplies abandoned where they landed. They were also betrayed by their peasant guide into an ambush, who killed many of the remaining men. However, while the revolutionaries camped in the mountains, other rebel groups formed in the cities, putting pressure on the Batista regime. Many middle class people and professionals flocked to Castro and his movement and when they allied themselves with Castro and his people in the mountains, it was all over for Batista. Che Guevara was a major supporter of communism during the Cuban revolution. Born on June 14, 1928 in Rosario, Argentina, he worked as a doctor at the University of Buenos Aires before becoming politically active in his native Argentina. In 1954, while in Mexico, he met the Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro and his brother Raul. Guevara became part of Fidel Castro's efforts to overthrow the Batista government in Cuba. He served as Castro's military advisor and led guerrilla troops in battles against Batista's forces. When Castro took power in 1959, Guevara became in charge of the La Cabaña Fortress prison. Once Cuba was obtained, however, many thought that Castro's government was not much different from that of his predecessor. Human rights advocate Erika.