X-post from my comment in this thread. Go check it out, /r/NeutralPolitics is a great sub!

There's a few factors to talk about here. Cuba under Castro was unique in a lot of ways, politically and economically but also socially. In some aspects, Cuba under Castro was able to achieve remarkable progress in areas like education and healthcare, and to this day the nation has what is undoubtedly the best healthcare system in Central America in spite of having below-average GDP per capita. It is also important to examine the extent of political repression under Castro, and to put that in the context of the political and social situation in pre-revolution Cuba.

#Social Progress

Let's look at healthcare more specifically, since that is often lauded of communist Cuba's greatest achievements. Just prior to the revolution, Cuba had an infant mortality rate of 60 per 1000 lives, a maternal mortality rate of 125 per 1000 births and a life expectancy of about 65 years. The linked source mentions that by 1988, infant mortality had fallen to 15 per 1000 (compared to the contemporary 9 in the OECD and 22 in the Soviet bloc, and 54 in the rest of the Caribbean), while maternal mortality fell to 77 per 1000 births. Today, Cuban life expectancy is among the highest in the world at around 79.5 years, compared to the UK's 81.2 years and America's 79.3. Furthermore, Cuba has played a big role in medical development, exporting some $120 million worth of drugs in 1995 and being praised even by such conservative sources as The Economist for its medical establishments which "have made breakthroughs in vaccines, immunology and biotechnology"^1 .

Additionally, Cuba has made outstanding educational progress under Castro. Pre-revolution, it is estimated that a quarter of the nation was illiterate, yet by 1961, only a few years after the revolution, UNESCO had confirmed that basic illiteracy was essentially eradicated from the nation thanks to an intensive educational campaign. Today, the average Cuban citizen can expect to spend 10 years in schooling, compared to roughly 13 for the US and less than 8 in the average Caribbean nation.

So, Cuba achieved significant social gains in the decades since the revolution, and significantly, achieved much greater gains in social welfare than other Caribbean nations aligned with the US. But at what cost? Was the political repression worth it?

#Political Repression

There's two factors to look at here: what was the political situation like before Castro, and how bad repression under Castro actually was. From 1952 until 1959, the year of the revolution, Cuba was ruled by a military dictatorship under one Fulgencio Batista, who staged a military coup when it was clear he was about to lose the election in 1952. Under his rule, somewhere around 20,000 people were killed by the state^2 , while presiding under an economy that was an increasingly unequal and impoverished nation^3 . The most critical thing to understand here was that at this time, the Batista regime was supported both by the official US government and by private American interests, which according to President Kennedy, came to "dominate the Cuban economy":

At the beginning of 1959 United States companies owned about 40 percent of the Cuban sugar lands—almost all the cattle ranches—90 percent of the mines and mineral concessions—80 percent of the utilities—practically all the oil industry—and supplied two-thirds of Cuba's imports.

All this together paints a portrait of pre-revolutionary Cuba at least as repressive as Castro's regime, and more importantly of a repression sponsored by American public and private interests, especially private firms that saw Cuba as a source of cheap profit.

Given this situation, the violence and repression of Castro's regime becomes more understandable, if not justifiable (especially in more recent times). Especially early on, repression could be understandable if neighboring superpowers are actively attempting to overthrow your government and assassinate your leaders. Just earlier today, Human Rights Watch put out an excellent summary of Castro's dismal human rights record, which included arbitrary detainment and incarceration, widespread intimidation, state control of all media sources and a crackdown on all other political movements and a wide range of activists. Looking at the broader history of the revolutionary government, some scholars estimate that there have been some 15,000 state killings in Cuba since the revolution, only a small minority of which were prisoners lawfully condemned to death by the justice system. Today, Cuba remains the only nation in the Americas rated as "not free" by Freedom House, a largely US-government funded NGO.

#Conclusion

So how was daily life under Castro? Especially in more recent times, relatively peaceful (the last execution was carried out in 2003, with no extrajudicial killings on record), and with most repression being limited to the jailing of a few hundred activists. The average citizen is still highly restricted in their political activity, and still sees a low standard of living in comparison to most nations. However, education and healthcare remain stellar, and other basic indicators of development are decent, currently placing Cuba in 67th place for its Human Development Index. It should be noted that on the overall rankings, this places Cuba above nations like Brazil, Colombia, Jamaica and Belize, but below Panama, the Bahamas and Argentina.

So what's the conclusion? I'll leave that up to other users. I'll admit to writing up a somewhat pro-Cuba narrative here on the whole, a deliberate decision given many Americans' instinctive negative reactions to Castro. I encourage everyone to draw their own conclusions from the facts I have provided, and do your own research into the topic as well. Given the historical context of Cuba ahead of the revolution, it wouldn't be wrong to view Castro as a sort of liberator from an objectively awful regime. Furthermore, his oppression could be justified to an extent as a necessary countermeasure to the political meddling of the United States. However, Castro has still led a nasty regime at times, albeit nowhere near the scale of someone like Stalin or Hitler. Under Castro, Cuba has seen impressive accomplishments in social measures of education and healthcare, but its citizens still see a relatively low standard of living and constant political repression. Judge these facts as you will.

EDIT: Formatting and assorted typos.

EDIT 2: Thanks to /u/Lich-Su for pointing out one really big point on Castro I missed, namely his really cavalier attitude towards the Cuban Missile Crisis, where he basically recommended to Krushchev that the missiles be launched, and that the Cuban people were ready to sacrifice everything for the ideological cause. We've had enough boring academic sources so far in this comment, so here's a fun little video by the Armageddon Letters Project that elaborates further and explores Castro's potential internal motivations for such a mindset.

Special addition: to better help you folks judge the "goodness" of Castro's regime, please see some selected details from his foreign policy in a child comment.

Footnotes

1. Source not available online; see the September 7th 1996 issue of The Economist, article titled "One thing Cuba does right".

2. See Conflict, Order, and Peace in the Americas, by the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, 1978, p. 121. "The US-supported Batista regime killed 20,000 Cubans"

3. See Historical Dictionary of the 1950s, by James Stuart Olson, Greenwood Publishing Group, 2000, ISBN 0-313-30619-2, pp. 67–68

If I may have a follow-up of sorts: in how far were the aims of the '59 revolution achieved under Castro regime? Or perhaps I should first ask, what were the aims of the revolution besides the obvious removal of Batista regime and the installment of a Marxist-Leninist state?

We seen the so called "bad guys" of history, Hitler, Stalin and what not, but did Fidel Castro help his country?

It's hard to answer these questions. Cuba is complex, and so is "good".

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A good example is the fact that the fidelista regime embarked on a incredibly successful war against illiteracy early in the revolution, but this can easily be interpreted as a way of normalizing and spreading anti-imperialist sentiment and revolutionary culture to the countryside while allowing young urban cubans to take part in the revolution, as mythos had put such a heavy importance on the actions of the small group of sierra maestra rebels.

The early fidelista regime was populist, and dynamic. Castro was often criticized by the Soviets and PCE members for literally performing his duties out of the back of a jeep. There was no "if stalin only knew" in Cuba. Castro did know, and he was sometimes there taking notes. On the other hand, Castro was careful to not let any of his power slip into the hands of the people. A few see this as an result of Fidel's elitism, not malice.

There were no massive purges, but many are happy to point out that geography may contribute to that fact more than Fidel. At the onset of the revolution, much of the opposition fled the country fully expecting the revolution to fail in a few weeks or months.

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Hope that's an okay place to start. Let me know if you have questions or think of specific things that would define him as good or bad.

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Sources:

Cuba under Castro: The Limits of Charisma by Edward Gonzalez

From Utopianism to Institutionalization by Antonio Blanco and Medea Banjamin

The Literacy Campaign by Oscar Lewis, Ruth Lewis, and Susan Rigdon

Looking at Cuba: Essays on Culture and Civil Society by Rafael Hernandez

Revolution Within A Revolution: Women and Gender Politics in Cuba by Michelle Chase

Visions of Power in Cuba by Lillian Guerra

"Good guy" is a quite relative term and to use the label means that you choose to take a side in a particular narrative. Myself, I believe that he was a "decent guy" due a few issues with freedom of speech and representation. But let's look at a few policies of his that led me to think of him as a "decent guy".

Internal Policies When Fidel came to power he was at the head of a nation that not only just been through an internal struggle for revolution, but had been under a dictatorship for the last seven years. Batista (said dictator) was in the pocket of US big business and gave little care to the average Cuban citizen; wages were low, infant mortality was high, and a sizable portion of the population was functionally illiterate. Within a decade of the revolution Castro had effectively wiped out illiteracy, nationalized much of the foreign lands and businesses, revamped healthcare, and raised the quality of life for the average Cuban.

This however did come with some rather draconian power consolidation that can be seen in other revolutions. Political dissent was outlawed, people disappeared in the night, media became state controlled, and there were executions of Batista/old guard supporters. Along with this Castro later on would set the economy on a state controlled path which while lowering unemployment, disallowed private means and at times caused economic crisis which can be seen in other state run economies. Eventually the government became semi-reliant on subsidies from the Soviet Union and once the bloc fell, so did the funding for many of the Cuban government programs.

Foreign Policy To simplify Cuban foreign policy I will summarize the two dominant issues that were always on the Government's list; US Relations & Global Revolution.

US Relations

Unsurprisingly the United States wasn't thrilled about having a communist state 90 miles away and while their relationship wasn't always hostile for the majority of the Castro government the US would actively try to depose Castro via counter-revolution or assassination. In return, the Cuban government aligned with the Soviet Union who through monetary support and preferential trade deals allowed Cuba to muscle through the US imposed embargo.

Global Revolution Cuba actively took part in spreading the ideals of Communism and anti-imperialism throughout the world, at times even going against the advisement of the Soviet Union. Military involvement includes various Latin American civil wars, Granada, and the Angolan Civil War, the latter of which the most important. When not in direct involvement (i.e. boots on the ground) the Cuban government would often send arms and money to support a cause.

Not all Revolution spreading though was violent, Cuba has been a very charitable state given it's own personal means. Cuban doctors are frequently sent around the world to endemic hot spots and impoverished countries and their medical school sponsor the studies of many students from said impoverished countries. This along with support with support in infrastructure to those in need has given Cuba very good relations around the world.

Conclusion

This is all of course a great oversimplification of the past 50-odd years of Castro's rule. The man was far from perfect and often took rough measures to hold onto power which to outside observes would seem harsh. But with frequent US attempts to overthrow him and with the crash of major trading partners in the 1990s, Castro seemingly always had the nation's best interests in mind. It will still take decades I think for a better picture of his time in power to be made but in all, he was far from a "bad guy", more often than not his negative image is a product of US propaganda.

Sources: Odd Arne Westad's The Global Cold War, Jay Mallin's Covering Castro: Rise and Decline of Cuba's Communist Dictator

You might get better responses if you provided a clarification: what exactly do you mean by a "good guy" or "helped his country"?

Economic development? Inequality levels? Political freedoms? Poverty? Education? Free expression? Health care? Crime levels? Foreign policy?

There's a lot that goes into making someone a good leader, and different people might reasonably disagree on the appropriate metrics by which a leader's quality is judged.

Fidel Castro’s "Bad Guy" Cuban Death Toll As with any government, totalitarian regimes especially, much sensitive information isn’t readily available for public scrutiny. Even after their downfall, exactly how many attributable deaths often remains unknown. Cuba's dictatorial regime, under Fidel Castro, is no exception; Cuba has no Freedom of Information Act and its revered Constitution of 1940 has remained suspended throughout Castro's totalitarian reign. Like with many of the other dictator-attributed death-figures, scholarly estimates remain the only sources currently accessible. Scholars too may differ on specifics, and figures may vary. With some forthright effort, estimate consensus is possible.

Accredited author, Mario Lazo in his book Dagger in the Heart : American Policy Failures in Cuba, placed his, now dated, 1968 estimate at 50,000 deaths. For some to cavalierly disregard such death toll estimates as "lunatic estimates from the exile community" unhelpful. Miguel A. Faria's book, Cuba in Revolution (2002), op. cit., pp. 415-416, states the following: "Since Fidel Castro took over the island in 1959, the best figures that we can glean is that between 30,000 to 40,000 people either have been executed en los paredones de fusilamiento (in the firing squad walls) or have died in the hands of their communist jailers. Mr. Faria also estimates: "The best conservative estimate is that between 30,000 to 40,000 Cubans have also perished attempting to flee Castro's regime, mostly succumbing in the treacherous waters of the Florida Straits. Such figures for death at sea are consistent with Juan Clark's" Cuba: Mito y Realidad, "who estimated that more than 16,000 Cubans had made it to freedom since 1959 up to the time of the publication of the book in 1992. Clark estimated that figure represented only one out of three Cubans who attempted to flee to freedom. Countless thousands of others have died indirectly as a result of Fidel Castro's collectivist policies, unspeakable privations, malnutrition, and the general desolation of a once more prosperous island."

These deaths-at-sea figures could be debated in total. I would argue that the Fidel Castro regime came to power as a result of a revolution that unequivocally promised prompt, free, and fair elections with a speedy return to its democratic principles and to its preexisting Constitution of 1940. This point is uncontested and well documented by Fidel Castro in his own words, both in print and on film. Unlike many politicians who may fail to keep their political promises, for an egregious lie of this magnitude, Castro must be held accountable. For 57 years Castro has not allowed Cubans the freedom to travel abroad for fear of defection and mass exodus. For this Castro must, therefore, also be held responsible for the deaths of those Cubans who, risking life and limb succumbed in attempting to escape Castro's island prison.

In January of 2003, Mr. Castro also had the ‘distinction’, along with: Yasser Arafat, Saddam Hussein and Ivory Coast’s Laurent Gbagbo, of being tried for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Belgium. Trials proceedings were suspended, in June of that year, only after the Brussels appeals court ruling of ‘functional immunity’ for all world leaders. Belgium’s then Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt said he supported a change to the country's indemnification-law for senior state-officials in order to then allow the prosecution of such world leaders to proceed. It is my perfervid hope these cases will be reopened. In excess of half million Cubans have been processed into Fidel's political prisons since 1959 (as substantiated by Freedom House), and Cuba's overall, shameful human-rights record is legion and has been well-reported by 'Human Rights Watch International.’ See: https://www.hrw.org/legacy/worldreport99/americas/index.html

The Harvard-trained scholar Armando Lago, in his book The Black Book of Communism, first published in French, (1997) then in English 1999, made an attempt to list Castro’s deaths since 1959. So far the deaths of 97,000 persons have been named, each confirmed by at least two sources. Some 30,000 executed by firing squad, 2,000 extra-judicial assassinations, 5,000 deaths in prison due to beating by guards and denial of medical care and 60,000 deaths while trying to escape Cuba by sea. According to Dr. Lago's and his ongoing-research partner, Cuba Archive President Maria Werlau, 78,000 innocents may have died trying to flee the dictatorship. Another 5,300 are known to have lost their lives fighting communism in the Escambray Mountains (mostly peasant farmers and their children) and at the Bay of Pigs. Another estimated 14,000 Cubans were killed in Fidel's revolutionary adventures abroad, most notably his dispatch of 50,000 soldiers to Angola in the 1980s to help the Soviet-backed regime fight off the Unita insurgency. Their 2005 total ranges between 90,827 and 102,722 deaths. The estimates of Cubans killed range from 35,000 to 141,000 (1959-1987) according to and available on the site of R. J. Rummel-University of Hawaii, “Power Kills.”

Other estimates may differ on the breakdown but they result in similar death-toll figures: The "Truth Recovery Archive on Cuba" published its updated Jan. 1, 1959 to March 25, 2005 data on Non-combat Victims of the Castro Regime: a total of 87,073 deaths. The 'Truth Recovery' notes their total exclusion of "documented deaths of civilians - both Cuban and otherwise - resulting from international military incursions, sabotage, or support for international subversion sponsored by Cuba [on several continents]" See: http://www.cubaarchive.org/downloads/CA03.pdf

"The Revolution's Toll" is a project to list each person killed for and against the Cuban revolution by name and date is underway, but it struggles to garner the funding it needs to complete its mission. At 31,173, the tally of 'documented cases' keeps growing, and includes: 5,728 killed by Castro firing squads, 1,207 extrajudicial killings after Castro took power 1,216 deaths in Cuban jails.

It thus seems realistic to suggest a 100,000 deaths figure (only as of 2005) in an effort to avoid the accusation of exaggeration in this lamentable area of human atrocity. While some less 'modest’ death toll figures far exceed those of the Castor regime, given Cuba's relatively small population, it is a very 'respectable' per-capita number, comparable to, or even exceeding Stalin's own per-capita statistics.

Finally, as I stated at the onset, the currently 'non-documentable’ death toll may never be fully revealed, but the unfortunate death of those additional thousands is nonetheless also real and will someday be subject to an even more-verifiable accounting. I do remain convinced, however, that the figure of attributable Cuban deaths to Fidel Castro's regime is, tragically, far greater.

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