Immediately a large number of people went to the place where the explosion had occurred, without knowing exactly what had happened, to give their support to those who had been injured.

It was then that after a few minutes a second and even stronger explosion caused many more dead, wounded and missing, including not only among the fighters and workers of the port but also among those who had come to lend their solidarity aid.

The sabotage of La Coubre was part of the vandalic actions carried out against Cuba, which began in the very first year of the Revolution.

In 1959 Cuba had been the object of defamatory campaigns, threats and even a vandalic attack on Havana by counterrevolutionary elements flying planes from the United States, which caused deaths and injuries.

Faced with the aggressive plans that were being hatched to try to destroy the Cuban revolutionary process, Fidel, on October 26, 1959, in an event held in Havana, called on the people to prepare themselves militarily to be in a position to defend the Revolution. The National Revolutionary Militias were created in the country.

And at the same time it became evident that Cuba needed to have the necessary armament to be able to face different actions and even an invasion.

Thus, the purchase of arms and other military personnel began to be negotiated and in this situation the United States began to put pressure on different governments to try to prevent this from being possible.

However, Cuba succeeded in negotiations with Belgium to acquire first rifles and in February 1960 grenades and ammunition that were transported by the French ship La Coubre.

This ship left the port of Ambers, Belgium, and after a stopover in Le Havre, France, it continued on to Havana where it arrived in the morning hours of March 4, 1960.

Immediately a group of members of the Rebel Army and port workers began to unload the ship.

Around ten minutes past three in the afternoon, an explosion shook Havana and especially the port area.

The day after the sabotage of La Coubre took place, at the mourning farewell ceremony for the victims, the maximum leader of the Cuban Revolution, Commander in Chief Fidel Castro denounced with irrefutable proof that the explosions on the French ship were the result of an artful sabotage carefully prepared outside Cuba.

Fidel pointed out in this regard: "Then, it could not have been by accident, it could not have been by accident. It had to be intentional, all possibility of accident had to be ruled out, in order to accept the only explicable thing: an intentional explosion."

The sabotage of La Coubre caused intense pain in Cuba, but at the same time it also highlighted the firmness of the people who reaffirmed their decision to face any new threat or aggression, which was reflected in a brief but symbolic phrase when they made their own the expression "Patria ó Muerte" (Homeland or Death) put forward by Fidel.