Apr. 28, 1963 - Premier Fidel Castro declared today that his regime owed its life to the Soviet Union. Standing beside Premier Khrushchev atop the Lenin Mausoleum in Moscow, Castro told a cheering throng that Soviet arms shipments and economic aid had prevented the destruction of the “Socialist revolution in Cuba.” The Cuban Premier did not mention the crisis of last October when he quarreled with Khrushchev about the Soviet decision to withdraw nuclear missiles from the Caribbean island. Denouncing what he described as an imperialist slander that the Cuban revolution had been directed by Moscow, Castro said “slander collapses when it meets life.” The Soviet capital provided one of its most lavish welcomes for the Cuban visitor, who was hailed by Khrushchev as “the envoy of the first Socialist revolution on the American continent.” To mark the occasion, Soviet scientists put into orbit another satellite, the 16th in a series of unmanned, data-collecting space shots.
