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Santos Espinosa was the Cold War era leader of Yara.
Biography[]
Santos Espinosa was a communist professor who was critical of the regime of then-President of Yara, Gabriel Castillo. Espinosa was accused of brainwashing his students as well as spreading problematic ideas and was exiled from Yara. He would return with Soviet backing to lead the Revolution of 1967 with guerrilla fighters ready to depose the Castillos.
While he was leading the Legends of 67 waging a guerrilla war against Castillo regime, one of their member Lobo concluded that Espinosa would be corrupt and incompetent as the new leader of Yara. Thus he plotted with El Tigre to kill Santos Espinosa, Lucky Mama and Lorenzo Canseco, so that he can usurp the leadership of the revolution. El Tigre secretly killed Lobo instead, which Espinosa was unaware of and hailed Lobo as a loyal martyr.
Espinosa would succeed in overthrowing Gabriel Castillo and expelling the foreign corporations. He would attend the execution of Gabriel Castillo and imprisoned the future president, a thirteen year old Antón Castillo, who he made attend the execution as well and perform hard labor for fifteen years in the tobacco fields. Despite the changes in Yara, the country would continue to decline into turmoil.
The United States of America railed against the new communist Yara and imposed international sanctions along with a blockade around the islands that made it a country stuck in time. At the very least, after 1967 Yara under President Espinosa was left alone by the US, likely as the US at that point already failed with the Bay of Pigs in Cuba followed by the Cuban Missile Crisis and busy with the Vietnam War. Unfortunately, El Presidente Espinosa's Yara was in strong economic decline, which he did nothing to alleviate, and showed to be far more incompetent than Gabriel Castillo in managing the country.
Being greedy and corrupt, President Espinosa went back on the fundamental aspects of his new communist government and sold off the shores to the foreign corporations again, despite dangerous pollution to Yaran environment and his promise to Lucky Mama, likely after her retirement and around the twilight years of Soviet Union, where they outlived their usefulness to Espinosa regime. Someone even attempted to assassinate him but he was saved by Juan Cortez, a KGB agent of the Espinosa regime. El Presidente had greedy and exotic tastes emphasized by sending Juan on a mission to Uganda to steal a zebra for him.
It's likely that Santos Espinosa somehow damaged relations between Yara and numerous other fellow communist countries during this period, hence the absolute isolation of Yara without any embassy nor consulate of any country, as American embargoes cannot stop other countries from maintaining formal diplomatic relations. Santos might have caused irreparable damages to the point that other communist countries all withdrew their embassies and cut relations with Yara.
Santos Espinosa would later die with a disgraceful legacy. The Legends of 67, while nostalgic towards the Revolution, even became disillusioned with Espinosa when they realized he provided Yara with none of what he had promised. El Tigre even regretted saving his life, realizing Lobo was right about Santos true nature.
After Santos died in 2018, Antón Castillo, son of his predecessor, would be elected President of Yara and still harbors vengeance towards the man who destroyed his father's legacy by giving his home to idealists and degenerates. Antón would create a museum known as the Museum Of The False Revolution to display a propagandized view of the 67 Revolution.
Trivia[]
- Santos Espinosa is a reference to the Cuban revolutionary figure, Fidel Castro, who led a successful revolution against Military Dictator, Fulgencio Batista.
- It's likely that Yaran Pesos were previously printed and minted with the face of Gabriel Castillo, then the face of Santos Espinosa after Revolution of 1967 similar to most communist countries.
- His face on Yaran currency was replaced at some point after 2018 due to his death and Castillo family returned to power.
- Santos Espinosa Dam and Espinosa University are named after him.
- Strangely enough, the second Castillo regime under Antón Castillo still leave those location's names unchanged despite vilifying him and other Legends of 67 as terrorists. It is very likely that Antón did this as a way to posthumously humiliate Espinosa, as he was a professor, in other words, a scholar, and he would had been expected by the population to be competent enough in leading the country, yet ironically, he proved to be not being capable at all in governing Yara.
Gallery[]
