Fidel Castro Trivia
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54 free Fidel Castro trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Sep 2026.
This Fidel Castro trivia quiz covers the man who ran Cuba for more than half a century, from the Moncada Barracks to a Twitter account. The easy questions cover the basics: the dictator he overthrew, the brother who succeeded him, the Argentine doctor at his side, the failed invasion of 1961, the missiles of 1962 and the cigars he gave up in 1985. From there it moves through his birth out of wedlock on a Spanish immigrant's farm, his Jesuit schooling, the gun-toting student politics of Havana, the Bogotá riots, the divorce he learned of on the radio and the speech that ended 'History Will Absolve Me'. The harder end covers the yacht that carried 82 men and ran aground in a swamp, the New York Times interview that made him famous, the Havana Hilton penthouse, the Harlem hotel, the four-and-a-half-hour UN speech, the Escalante affair, the Ogaden, Operation Carlota in Angola, Cuito Cuanavale, the Mariel boatlift, the Ochoa executions, the Special Period, Chávez and the oil-for-doctors deal, and the funeral caravan that retraced 1959 in reverse. There are also questions on his wives, his children and Forbes' estimate of his fortune. Every answer was checked against Castro's encyclopaedia entry before publishing and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. Our Che Guevara and Cuba quizzes are natural companions.
30 of 54 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which US president was in office when Castro's forces crushed the Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961?
John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy: his new administration approved an invasion the CIA had planned since 1960, and Castro's troops defeated it within three days.
Q 02From which region of Spain had Castro's father Ángel emigrated to Cuba?
Galicia
Galicia: Ángel Castro first came to Cuba as a Spanish army conscript fighting Cuban independence, went home with the defeated army in 1898, then returned and grew rich farming sugarcane.
Q 03Which religious order ran the Dolores School and El Colegio de Belén, where Castro was educated?
The Jesuits
The Jesuits: at Belén, their Havana school, Castro devoted much of his time to sport, starring at baseball, basketball and track.
Q 04What did Castro study at the University of Havana from 1945?
Law
Law: he later put that training to use by conducting his own defence at his 1953 trial.
Q 05In 1947 Castro joined an invasion force assembled in Cuba to overthrow which dictator?
Rafael Trujillo
Rafael Trujillo: under US pressure, Cuba's own government arrested the force before it reached the Dominican Republic.
Q 06In which capital was Castro caught up in rioting in April 1948 after Jorge Eliécer Gaitán's assassination?
Bogotá
Bogotá: during the riots Castro took up a rifle seized from a police station and sided with the Liberals against the army-backed Conservatives.
Q 07Which Cuban politician founded the Partido Ortodoxo, the anti-corruption party Castro joined as a young man?
Eduardo Chibás
Eduardo Chibás: unable to produce proof of a corruption charge he had made, he shot himself at a Havana radio station in 1951.
Q 08Batista's 1952 coup cancelled the elections in which Castro was a candidate for what?
The House of Representatives
The House of Representatives: after the coup cancelled the vote, Castro's legal challenges went nowhere, and he turned to armed rebellion.
Q 09Which military garrison did Castro's rebels attack on 26 July 1953?
The Moncada Barracks
The Moncada Barracks: the attack failed and Castro was captured, but the raid's date gave his 26th of July Movement its name.
Q 10Under what title was Castro's speech at his October 1953 sentencing later published?
History Will Absolve Me
History Will Absolve Me: Castro later had the speech published, and it became the manifesto of his 26th of July Movement.
Q 11Where was the Presidio Modelo, the prison that held Castro after his failed 1953 attack?
Isla de Pinos
Isla de Pinos: after taking power, Castro's government used the same prison to hold its own opponents until it closed in 1967.
Q 12Two nephews of Castro's first wife, Mirta Díaz-Balart, went on to hold which role in US politics?
Republican congressmen
Republican congressmen: her nephews Lincoln and Mario Díaz-Balart were Florida lawmakers and fierce critics of Castro's government.
Q 13How did Castro get out of prison in 1955, less than two years into his 15-year sentence?
A general amnesty
Q 21Which moderate lawyer did Castro install as Cuba's provisional president in January 1959?
Manuel Urrutia
Manuel Urrutia: he was forced to resign within seven months, by which time Castro held the real power in Cuba.
Q 22Which gangster built Havana's Riviera casino hotel, only to lose it after Castro took power?
Meyer Lansky
Meyer Lansky: shut out of Havana, he fled to the Bahamas and shifted his gambling interests there.
Q 23What did Castro announce in his May Day speech of 1960?
That there would be no more elections
That there would be no more elections: a year earlier his slogan 'Revolution first, elections later' had only postponed them.
A general amnesty: Batista, keen to soften his authoritarian image, let the rebels go, believing Castro was no longer a threat.
Q 14In which country did Castro form the 26th of July Movement's exile force and meet Che Guevara?
Mexico
Mexico: the rebels trained there for guerrilla war at a ranch outside Mexico City before sailing for Cuba.
Q 15Which Spanish Civil War veteran agreed to teach Castro's exiled rebels guerrilla warfare?
Alberto Bayo
Alberto Bayo: in 1936 he had led a landing on Mallorca against the Nationalists, which failed and ended in retreat.
Q 16What was the name of the yacht that carried Castro and 81 fellow rebels to Cuba in 1956?
Granma
Granma: the leaky, overloaded yacht later gave its name to a Cuban province and to the Communist Party's newspaper.
Q 17Which New York Times journalist's 1957 interview in the mountains made Castro an international celebrity?
Herbert Matthews
Herbert Matthews: his report proved Castro was alive after Batista's government had announced his death.
Q 18What was Batista's all-out 1958 offensive against the Sierra Maestra called?
Operation Verano
Operation Verano: Castro's guerrillas halted the army's advance with land mines and ambushes, and the offensive's failure doomed Batista.
Q 19On arriving in the capital in January 1959, where did Castro set up his home and office?
The Havana Hilton
The Havana Hilton: built with Batista's backing and opened in 1958, it was nationalised in 1960 and renamed the Habana Libre, 'Free Havana'.
Q 20Which US vice president met Castro in Washington in April 1959?
Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon: Eisenhower would not meet Castro, and Nixon's summary afterwards called him 'a leader of men', either naive about Communism or under Communist discipline.
Q 24Which French ship exploded in Havana harbour in 1960, prompting Castro's cry 'Patria o Muerte'?
La Coubre
La Coubre: at the victims' memorial the next day, Alberto Korda took his famous photo of Che Guevara, Guerrillero Heroico.
Q 25Where did Castro stay for the 1960 UN General Assembly, receiving Khrushchev, Nasser and Nehru?
The Hotel Theresa
The Hotel Theresa: Castro moved to the Harlem hotel after a Midtown hotel reportedly demanded cash, and he met Malcolm X there.
Q 26About how long did Castro speak at the UN General Assembly in September 1960?
About 4.5 hours
About 4.5 hours: he had opened by assuring the Assembly that he would try to be brief.
Q 27What were the neighbourhood spying organisations Castro created in September 1960 called?
Committees for the Defense of the Revolution
Committees for the Defense of the Revolution: Castro wanted everyone to know who lived on each block, what they did and whom they met.
Q 28When the US banned most exports to Cuba in October 1960, how did Cuba retaliate?
Seizing US companies
Seizing US companies: that month Cuba nationalised all US-owned businesses, and in January 1961 Washington broke off diplomatic relations.
Q 29What was the name of the CIA-trained exile force that landed at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961?
Brigade 2506
Brigade 2506: Castro took personal command of the counter-offensive, and more than 1,100 of the invaders were captured.
Q 30For what did Castro exchange the Bay of Pigs prisoners with the US?
Food and medicine worth $53 million
Food and medicine worth $53 million: the deal came after Castro's ransom demand went unpaid, and prisoners began flying home in December 1962.