¡Que País!

Graphically Generating Revolution

2009-11-25T17:30:00.001-05:00

Cuban billboards feature a wide variety of political, social, economic and cultural subjects. They range from the mundane of mosquito extermination to maintaining political unity, and from geopolitical nuances such as exporting healthcare providers to conserving energy.

I have chosen to focus on outdoor messages about the future targeted at younger generations. These messages are especially important because the continuation of the Revolution upon the exit of the aging historical leaders depends on maintaining the ideological allegiance and active participation of the younger generations. Furthermore, the code of "generation" has been perennially salient in the discourse of Cuban political culture since long before the Revolution of 1959. Implicit in this choice of thematic inquiry is the question: Is a 20^th century medium an adequate means to reach the generations of the 21^st century? However, this study limits its focus to the manifest appearance of these signs—not intended meaning of their designers or forms of perception and message reception at the level of the audience.

Having chosen messages about generations of the future, I find that they are often communicated in terms of History. While that sounds ironic on its face, it makes sense that a regime concerned with continuity would appeal to the population of Cuba's future in terms of an allegiance to the past.

Within the overall category of the Future in terms of History, this paper focuses on two tactical means by which authorities target youth. First, is the notion of Cultura—broadly interpreted as education, enlightened cultivation, the social goods and ideals that the Revolution has provided. Cultura is both a key nationalist antecedent to the Revolution and a product of the Revolution. This dialectical depiction of the past and future history of the Revolution suggests that the 19^th & early 20^th century political and cultural contributions to the success of the Revolution serve as a model for how the Revolution contributes to future generations, that is, to the Revolutions very continuance.

The second tactical means of representing history as a map for the future is what I am calling Incarnation. This concept refers to the graphic device of depicting historic leaders as embodying the nation—or future generations embodying past national heroes. Again, a dialectical process is at work: leaders of the Revolution, above all Fidel Castro (FC) embody the actions and ideals of figures from Cuba's history such as José Martí; and young people are depicted as personifying the revolutionary leadership as they continue the historic path and deepen the Revolution.

Below is a graphic representation of the general model of the strategic narrative conveyed by Cuban propaganda. At the broadest level, these messages draw from the nation's history to provide ideological direction for the future.

As propaganda relates to or addresses the younger generations, a dialectical relationship is put forth: the Revolution provided the means and ideas for young people to continue to advance the Revolution. This current transition from one generation to the next is just the latest in a sequence of torch passing. The revolutionary generation of 1959 inherited their ideas of national independence and Latin American unity from previous revolutionary and independence movements. Thus the messages to today's crop of young people is that they have a duty rooted in history to continue the path begun by their antecedents.

As seen in the visual diagram, the revolutionary leadership is just one of two interacting components of the model. Besides the personalities involved in this narrative, there are the conditions and creations of Revolution, that is, both the political environments and cultural ingredients that produced the Revolution, and the political and social products of the Revolution. If a steadfast belief in sovereignty and strains of socialism characterized the situation from which the Revolution arose, then the fruits of the Revolution include education, cultural elevation, and dogged independence in the face of imperial aggression.

It might be helpful to conceive of this dynamic double helix as an interaction between Structure and Agency. The past heralds the future via figures acting in a conditioned environment that is only partially of their making. The Marxist overtones of this interpretation may not be coincidental.

If other posters show that FC embodies all Cubans, then this supergráfrica shows that each Cuban—including, first among equals, FC—contains an entire revolutionary armed force within. Each and every Cuban carries on the preparedness for struggle first displayed by the rebels in the 1950s. Indeed, this photograph of the elderly FC recreates physiognomically the iconic arms-raised photograph of the young rebels celebrating victory that appears every morning along the banner of the daily newspaper, Granma.

The modern color photograph semiotically resurrects a younger FC, while placing the responsibility of combat on each Cuban. Certainly this message could also allude to the defensive/ideological strategy known as guerra de todo el pueblo, in which the nation's plans for repelling a foreign invasion or occupation entail mobilizing all citizens, either as conscripts or civilian guerrillas.

This supergráfica was coded as pertaining to youth because it contains the word "hijo" from a famous José Martí quote. The three gentlemen featured are the independence leaders José Martí, Simon Bolivar and José de San Martín, who led the movements to free Cuba, northern and southern South America respectively. Behind them are the flags of all the nations of the Americas.

The young Martí's 1881 quote of being "a child of America" is superimposed onto the 21^st century. Contemporary Cubans are the offspring of these founding fathers, and as such they are "indebted" to the actions and ideals of that past.

While Martí, Bolivar and San Martín delivered independence, the unrequited dimension of their political project was the unification of the continents peoples into a grand cause called "Our America". This regional integration is once again on the agenda in alliances such as ALBA, an alternative to US-led free trade models, which Cuba and eight other countries hope will be a new and cooperative dawn for Latin America.

Thus, the message can be summarized as: These great heroes bestowed to today's generations both a vision and the independence from colonialism needed to fulfill that vision; now today's youth are duty bound to pursue the ideals of regional integration.

Another iteration of this message occurs with Martí appearing in the silhouette (in the mind) of FC, and Bolivar, the liberator of Venezuela, appearing in the silhouette of Hugo Chávez. As the revolutionary leaders of the 20^th and 21^st centuries follow in the footsteps of the 19^th century Latin American independence heroes—the "children" of the 21^st century inherit the debt to the ideal of America.

Marking FC's 80^th birthday (which coincided with his near death experience and temporary transfer of authority—and thus a moment of uncertainty), this poster patriotically exclaims that FC should live 80 more years. Obviously, for biological reasons this is not a literal appeal—rather an urging that Cubans follow the path blazed by FC for another eight decades.

This is the same photograph as above but cropped here so that FC's face does not appear. The imagery is consonant with the verbal message: in the wake of the revolutionary leader march scores of flag waving followers.

According to famous Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén's line, Che is pure like a child—in which case youth are deemed to have the revolutionary potential necessary to "be like Che".

This billboard notes that the federation of high school students has been with FC and the Revolution, making a future. Past allegiance serves as the motor for the future. Unwavering adherence to the Revolution is underscored by playing with the acronym for the federation, coloring the first two letters so that it reads "faith".

"Faith" is what Che "inculcated" in Cubans.

Not only does this billboard—which honors Che's fall in revolutionary combat in Bolivia—complete the cycle of a revolutionary legacy being passed on to those who will "always carry it"; but it also falls into the category of embodiment. Che's face doubles as the map of South America—his Argentine homeland and Bolivian place of death. Che embodied Latin America, and instilled faith in the continent that lasts on.

Here the Revolution is the daughter of Culture, Knowledge and Ideas. A national symbol of a palm tree turns into a pencil which serves as a flagpole for the proud revered flag. Nationalism abounds.

Nebulous oceanic forms run into the pencil-palm-flagpole, converting into well defined sheets of paper--more symbols of learning—and more abstractly representing the institutionalization of an organic and spontaneous sociopolitical process. If the revolution is the child of culture and ideas, then culture and ideas are also the products of revolution. The revolution/education dynamic is portrayed as a dialectical process. It feeds back into the very forces that created it, providing more education and culture to the young.

The Revolution "must continue to the task of fostering healthy, educational, and useful recreation for our youth," said FC. This reminder of the provision of health and schooling is paired with the logos of the chain of state-run campgrounds and the Union of Young Comunists. This construction completes the dialogical circuit from Culture to Revolution to Culture. The next logical step is that "our youth" continue the Revolution.

But FC has warned that the state alone cannot be responsible for society's job of educating young people. He has called on parents to take seriously their part of developing their children into good citizens. "We must multiply our battle in a multifaceted way, if we want to advance."

Although this phrase has been used in provincial production campaigns, FC most notably employed it in reference to raising young people properly. Multiplying efforts means all homes share in the task of educating; but it also means, that through that very process of parental rearing, society will multiply its number of upstanding revolutionaries. Pursuing the sequence, increased numbers of prepared young people equates to multiplying battles (i.e. social development).

Incarnation

2009-11-16T04:04:00.005-05:00

Thus far I have noted the affinity between messages about the future and appeals to history. Within this thematic set, I have discussed the code of education—specifically the prevailing dialectical model that posits that the Revolution has provided education, which in turn lays the groundwork for more revolution.

Now I need to identify another categorical cluster within the future/history thematic set.

Upon further coding and sorting, I have come up with the notion of Incarnation. This code applies to messages that depict the younger generation embodying revolutionary leadership.

One billboard reads: “Fidel es un pais”; and features six smiling young boys and the famed rebel vessel, the Granma. The message contains at least three distinct yet related meanings: (1) The country is loyal (to its revolutionary history, particularly Fidel Castro) (2) Fidel Castro is a country (that monumentally important, and containing multitudes); (3) The entire country (including these boys) is like Fidel Castro.

A poster has the silhouetted profile of Fidel Castro superimposed over the flag. Within the positive space of the silhouette is a crowd of young Cubans marching in a demonstration. It reads “Somos Uno.” This also has several interconnected meanings: (1) We are all part of Fidel; (2) We are united as one; (3) Fidel represents all of us.

The theme of incarnation becomes very literal in another poster that shows an army of young Cubans, each with the face and rifle of a young Fidel Castro. It reads “The Youth, We Will Not Fail.”

The clear message is two-fold: that the revolutionary leadership is a role model to emulate; and that the younger generation has a responsibility to follow the historicos’ example.

The notion of historic role models for the future appears in a billboard with Che Guevara that reads “Con tu ejemplo comunista”; and in a mural with the youthful faces of the by-gone Che, Camilo Cienfuegos, and Julio Mella, which reads “De estos hombres se hace un pueblo”—from these men makes a people.

So within the future/history thematic set, the two subsets are Education and Incarnation. A stylized model functions along these lines:

• Revolution provided education, which instills the abilities and values to further the Revolution.

• Historic leaders made the Revolution, setting an example for the Youth to follow.

From Billboards

From ¡Que País!

Bambinazos Cuadrangulares!!

2009-11-07T06:08:00.006-05:00

Santiago outfielder Alexei Bell hit two grand slams in the first inning of opening day in the national baseball series. He ended up going 4 for 4 with 12 runs batted in. That ranks as one of the all-time top performances in the worldwide history of baseball.

Homeland is Made from the Worth of its Sons

2009-11-07T05:10:00.002-05:00

From a cursory coding of the data (yet years of familiarity with the subject matter), it appears to me that my main thematic category of The Future is often communicated in terms of History. While that sounds ironic on its face, it makes sense that a regime concerned with continuity would appeal to the population of Cuba's future in terms of an allegiance to the past.

A case in point is a billboard that appeared for the "ANIVERSARIO 113 DEL REINICIO DE LA GUERRA DE INDEPENDENCIA". It features a quote from José Martí: "La patria está hecha del mérito de sus hijos". This claims that the nation depends on its offspring, that Cuba's fate is in the hands of youth--yet the dictum about the future ironically hails from over a century prior. The context for Martí's quote was in the 1893 run-up to the "reinitiation" of the failed 10-year independence war (1868-78). The analogy of continuity cannot be missed: the Martí-masterminded War of Independence (1895-98) is to the previous 10-Year War as Cuba's near future is to Cuba's revolutionary history (which entails--at least according to the state--the entire period of struggle from 1868 to 1959). To sum up: 1868 is to 1898, as 1959 is to 2009.

The rest of the quote (which does not appear on the billboard, but may be familiar to many Cubans and thus implicit) says that 'the wealth of a nation derives from a child that beats the same path as his predecessors, leading to a more useful and complete result'. Just as the second generation of independence fighters followed triumphantly in the steps of the first unsuccessful generation, this billboard suggests that today's youth continue the revolutionary path to greater national goals.

It is important to note that the nation does not produce its offspring. Rather, "a nation is made" from the valuable contributions of "sus hijos". Just as Martí and Maceo and Gomez generated the independent nation of Cuba, the current crop of children will make their historic homeland by way of "merit".

Finally, I take a look at the visual graphics of this billboard. It is the figure of a late 19th century Cuban independence fighter on horseback, sword raised. There are three iterations of this image. The smallest and faintest one appears in the bottom left corner. Ascending is a larger and bolder iteration. Then finally the boldest and grandest rendition occupies the central space of the billboard. This image is the graphic representation of early precursors in struggle begetting later generations that ride along the same route, growing stronger and bolder.

From this single example we see how a simple quote and minimalist graphics can conjure history towards impelling the future.

(Of course, it remains to be seen how an outdated screen print of an old quote on an outdated mass medium can reach a 21st century audience. Maybe it could have better "connected" to today's youth by playing with the multiple meanings of the word "reinicio", so as to express something technologically updated while retaining the earlier historical significance--maybe meaning something along the lines of "Reboot the Revolution".)

The Wall Has Eyes

2009-11-06T03:02:00.001-05:00

Back to the Future

2009-11-06T02:44:00.001-05:00

This not subtle symbolism is a take on the very first poster of the Cuban Revolution.

Neighborhood Watch

2009-11-06T02:15:00.002-05:00

The seventh congress of the neighborhood-level organization that keeps an eye out for counterrevolutionary activity and engages in recycling and blood drives. One of the many cross-cutting modes of sociopolitical organization that check and balance each other.

Home Schooled Toddlers

2009-11-04T02:48:00.003-05:00

The program called "Educate Your Child" attempts to teach children the basics in preparation for primary school. Facilitators school parents on how to school children at home. This education augments preschools, which not all children attend--due to space limitations and parental preferences.

Rotten Fruit

2009-11-03T02:26:00.003-05:00

At a cooperative in eastern Cuba, the agricultural production of mangoes outpaced the capacity to package and to transport them, resulting in the rotting of the juicy fruit. So even when labor and technique reap abundance, the lack of containers and fuel hamper the ability to bring produce to market.

Remodeling Permits

2009-11-01T21:35:00.002-05:00

Most people do not get the legal permmission to remodel or make additions to their homes, even though state licenses allow you access to subsidized materials. The more common illicit route is pursued with private under-the-table contracters and labor, and more costly stolen or mined materials from the black market.

This AP article does not explain why Cubans do not go the legal route. The assumption is that it takes too long and often results in rejected requests. Neither does the article mention why the state would be stingy on licenses when perpetually facing an extreme housing shortage.

La Federacion de las Mujeres Cubanas--a decisive force for the Revolution

2009-09-21T00:23:00.001-04:00

FMC

fuerza decisiva para la Revolucion

aniversario 50 de la federacion de mujeres cubanas

This billboard celebrates the “decisive” role that the women’s official mass organization has played over the half-century of the Cuban Revolution. It is complimented by an arabesque print of fluid fertile flowers that provides a feminine aspect to the design.

Women’s allegiance to the revolution has always been crucial. Early on in revolutions in Cuba and elsewhere in Latin America such as Chile, the reluctance of more conservative women has presented challenges to leftist programs. Women are often the linchpin of homes; so as goes the woman in political support, so goes the rest of the family. Finally, the gains of the Cuban revolution gave women the opportunity to work--which created the “double shift” of labor at the workplace and at home. This resulted in some conflicting opinions about the new revolutionary situation.

The FMC plays a role at the neighborhood level in social communication and carrying out some house-to-house campaigns. Politically, the FMC takes part in the selection process of members of the national assembly.

For these reasons it may be important to underscore publicly the FMC’s value to the revolution.

We Work for you

2009-09-21T00:18:00.001-04:00

TRABAJAMOS Para Usted

This image is different from the printed billboard produced by the Cuban Communist Party. It is a crudely painted mural at a state-run vendor. The painted wall pronounces that the service outlet “works for us”. This double entendre means that the firm serves us (its customers) and works for us (as owners of the state firm). In a country where employees often do not have much motivation to attend to clients, this message could be attempting to counterbalance popular sentiment about the low quality of the service industry. It may also be reminding people that they themselves as citizens are owners and beneficiaries of the means of production.

The unintended message that is revealed only in this particular photograph is an ironic statement on the social indiscipline of the workforce. In the middle of the day, a crew of idle men sit under the shade of a sign that proclaims “we work for you”. Clearly, state messages can change when perceived in the social context of the signs’ “natural” environment.

Whoever wants to, finds a way; whoever doesn't, finds excuses.

2009-09-21T00:16:00.002-04:00

Quien quiere hacer encuentra medios; quien no quiere hacer encuentra justificaciones.

This is another painted wall of a state firm, a taxi company. Whether or not the message pertains to the line of work of the business is debatable. Often the managers decide what messages will grace the facades of their workplaces.

The statement, akin to “where there is a will, there is a way”, alludes to the very Cuban situation of having to make do in a blockaded economy. Often times this method of resolving problems involves technically illegal strategies such as engaging in the black market of goods stolen from state firms or privately offering to sell your labor and skills. But as the sign suggests, the authorities often look the other way, as the island society would find it difficult to function if there were a strict prohibition on proscribed activities. The hidden capitalism that greases the wheels of socialism. Beyond looking the other way, this outdoor message seems to actually encourage makeshift solutions. Although they do not have to be illegal; they could be organic grassroots initiatives that solve local problems.

The second part of this phrase aims to disparage people who simply complain about the impossibility of life in Cuba without attempting to devise inventive solutions to their problems. At times, even communists have to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

Entrenchments of Ideas are Worth more than Entrenchments of Stone

2009-09-21T00:13:00.001-04:00

Trincheras de ideas valen mas que trincheras de piedra.

This famous quote from the national hero, José Martí, serves as the standard of the Frederich Engels Printing Company. Its meaning is somewhat analogous to “the pen is mightier than the sword”. It valorizes Cuban culture and education and political ideology as great weapons in the “Battle of Ideas” with capitalism. Adopting the quote from Martí may intend to draw a historic link between the thoughts of the late 19th century and current Cuban social policy that favors education and cultural programs. That said, the massive role of the Cuban military in the society and the economy may belie the rhetorical discounting of “stone embattlements”.

Liberty is impossible without culture.

2009-09-20T23:58:00.000-04:00

Loyal to Our History--study, work, rifle

2009-09-20T23:56:00.001-04:00

Fieles a Nuestra Historia

This is a mural produced by and in honor of the Union of Young Communists. Its traditional logo depicts three fallen male heroes of Cuban history, Julio Mella, Camilo Cienfuegos and Ernesto Guevara. Besides Fidel Castro and Raul Castro and sports stars, one generally must be deceased to have one’s likeness appear on outdoor propaganda. The motto of the Union of Young Communists is “study, work, rifle”--the three main components of young people’s lives--although many young people neither go to school, nor work, nor participate in the mandatory military.

The large phrase “Loyal to Our History” implicitly creates a historic link between the current day and age and the revolutions of 1959, 1933, 1895 and 1868. The use of the word “fiel” is a synonym, and near homonym, of the word “fidel”, which means loyal or faithful. Obviously, the understanding is being loyal to the historic leadership of Fidel Castro. The use of “our” history reveals that people are progressing together through a shared history, and thus a common modern plight.

A Metaphor

2009-09-17T20:10:00.002-04:00

Eduardo Galeano recounts a short story that epitomizes Cuba.

People progress together, following their passions.
People take local initiative to resolve individual problems.
And nobody knows where the country will end up.

Crónica de la ciudad de La Habana

Los padres habían huido al norte. En aquel tiempo, la
revolución y él estaban recién nacidos. Un cuarto de siglo
después, Nelson Valdés viajó de Los Angeles a La
Habana, para conocer su país.
Cada mediodía, Nelson tomaba el ómnibus, la guagua
68, en la puerta del hotel, y se iba a leer libros sobre
Cuba. Leyendo pasaba las tardes en la biblioteca José
Martí, hasta que caía la noche.
Aquel mediodía, la guagua 68 pegó un frenazo en una
bocacalle. Hubo gritos de protesta, por el tremendo
sacudón, hasta que los pasajeros vieron el motivo del
frenazo: una mujer muy rumbosa, que había cruzado la
calle.
"Me disculpan, caballeros" dijo el conductor de la
guagua 68, y se bajó. Entonces todos los pasajeros aplaudieron
y le desearon buena suerte.
El conductor caminó balanceándose, sin apuro, y los
pasajeros lo vieron acercarse a la muy salsosa, que estaba
en la esquina, recostada a la pared, lamiendo un
helado. Desde la guagua 68, los pasajeros seguían el ir y
venir de aquella lengüita que besaba el helado mientras
el conductor hablaba y hablaba sin respuesta, hasta que
de pronto ella se rió, y le regaló una mirada. El conductor
alzó el pulgar y todos los pasajeros le dedicaron una
cerrada ovación.
Pero cuando el conductor entró en la heladería, produjo
cierta inquietud general. Y cuando al rato salió con
un helado en cada mano, cundió el pánico en las masas.
Le tocaron la bocina. Alguien se afirmó en la bocina
con alma y vida, y sonó la bocina como alarma de robos
o sirena de incendios; pero el conductor, sordo, como si
nada, seguía pegado a la muy sabrosa.
Entonces avanzó, desde los asientos de atrás de la
guagua 68, una mujer que parecía una gran bala de
cañón y tenía cara de mandar. Sin decir palabra, se sent
ó en el asiento del conductor y puso el motor en marcha.
La guagua 68 continuó su recorrido, parando en
sus paradas habituales, hasta que la mujer llegó a su
propia parada y se bajó. Otro pasajero ocupó su lugar,
durante un buen tramo, de parada en parada, y despu
és otro, y otro, y así siguió la guagua 68 hasta el final.
Nelson Valdés fue el último en bajar. Se había olvidado
de la biblioteca.

Gov. Richardson on Cuba-US Relations (or lack there of)

2009-09-16T05:11:00.003-04:00

Workplace cafeterias to close

2009-09-14T03:33:00.002-04:00

Most medium to large state firms and workplaces have their own lunchrooms in which employees eat for free. They are shuttering; and employees are being given a raise so as to buy their own lunch. The problem is that in some areas it can be difficult to find a restaurant, a lunch cart on the street, or home-based food vendor. Maybe with demand increasing, more options will become available.

News Theme Song

2009-09-11T17:07:00.004-04:00

This is no longer the song used to open the broadcast--which could be heard coming from all directions, walking through any neighborhood at 8pm.

I would like to hear a hip hop beat sample this song.

La Cachita y el Ché: Patron Saints

2009-09-09T03:56:00.001-04:00

By Nelson P. Valdés as told to Nan Elsasser* in 1989

They are an unlikely duo: she is self-centered and he is self-sacrificing.
She likes to dance; he thinks it's a waste of time. She is a hedonist; he is
a fervent Marxist. She is originally from Africa; he was born in Argentina.
About all they have in common is striking good looks and the love and
adoration of the Cuban people who have adopted them.

Official Cuba lionizes Ché Guevara, the hero who fought his way to power by
Fidel Castro's side and was killed by government soldiers in Bolivia. When
Cuban soldiers return from supporting the Marxist regime in Angola, they are
awarded medals for following "el camino del Ché" (the path of Ché). Yet
within a few days of receiving their medals, the same soldiers will visit
Cachita's shrine and leave their medals among the gifts of her devotees.

Cuba's political, economic, and cultural life rests significantly on a shaky
compromise between the values represented by Cachita and Ché.

The Ermita, or shrine, of Caridad del Cobre, called Cachita, the patron
saint of Cuba, is to the north of the city of Santiago, over 400 kilometers
east of the Museo de La Revolución in Havana. It is at the Ermita, rather
than at the museum, that the rich history of revolutionary Cuba is on
display, flickering in the shadows of votive candles. In the half-light of
the tiny flames is the vial of hometown dirt that orbited the planet with
Comandante Tamayo, the first and only Cuban astronaut; gold, silver, and
bronze medals from the recent Pan American games in Indianapolis; and
petitions from Fidel's mother from the days when her son was fighting in the
sierra nearby. Side by side with these artifacts of national unity and
revolutionary sacrifice are letters requesting a new car or a bigger
apartment, and the traditional honey and cigar left in exchange for good
sex.

In this small island nation, the fact that young communist
internacionalistas, the spiritual heirs of Ché, pay homage to a virgin from
Spanish colonial times surprises no one. Nor does the fact that Caridad,
alleged mother of God, most sacred of Catholic icons, bears the decidedly
unholy nickname of "Cachita," central character of a popular song that
choruses: "Cachita está alborotá, ahora baila el cha cha chá (Cachita is
wild now she's dancing the cha cha cha)."

Caridad del Cobre is not what she appears to be. And hundreds of thousands
of Cubans know the truth: Cachita Caridad del Cobre is neither Catholic,
Spanish, nor white. She is Oshún, the mulatto goddess of pleasure. An
African hedonist masquerading as a Spanish saint, a Catholic shrine in a
communist country, consumerist dreams in a revolutionary setting - Caridad
del Cobre epitomizes the contradictions and combinations of Cuban life. In
the past and in the present, Cubans have learned to live comfortably with
the combination of power politics and mystical imagery.

In a country accustomed to signs from the other world, it was logical, for
example, that Fulgencio Batista chose December 31 [rather than January 1st]
to abandon power and flee to the Dominican Republic. For Cubans, it is
essential to leave the old year's problems behind before a new year begins.
On the last day of December housewives all over Cuba "se hacen la limpieza";
they throw a bucket of water on the floor of the innermost room and sweep it
through the house and out the front door, pushing evil spirits along with
the dirty water. If Batista had remained, he would have been burdened
throughout the coming year with the bad karma of his defeat.

Nor were Habaneros surprised when a relatively unknown Fidel Castro
descended from the mountains of Oriente. Since Spaniards first landed in
Cuba with boatloads of human cargo in the early 1500s, the easternmost
province has been a refuge for those escaping tyranny. For the past three
hundred years, Santiago and the mountains that surround it have been the
actual and symbolic home of freedom. a cradle of rebellion, and the
preferred territory of the African gods called santos. In Oriente, where
Santería (the worship of African gods with the names of Catholic saints) is
the dominant religion, everyone understood when Fidel came down from the
mountain and told the assembled masses, " . .I do not speak in my name. I
speak in the name of the thousands and thousands ... who made victory
possible. I speak in the name of our dead ... This time the dead will
continue to be in command." It does not really matter that Castro was
probably expressing his heartfelt commitment to those who died in the
struggle to overturn Batista.

To believers, those words, like the white eleke (necklace) he wore around
his neck, were a sure sign that the gods were speaking through Fidel. Any
doubts were dispelled on January 8, when Fidel first entered Havana and
addressed the Cuban nation. I remember that day, because my family owned the
only TV on the block. Everyone in the neighborhood was either in our living
room, standing in the doorway, or looking in through the front window. We
were all listening to Fidel with one ear and to a neighbor with the other.
Until, seemingly from nowhere, three doves appeared and, illuminated by
television lights, circled Camp Columbia where Fidel was speaking. As if on
cue, one landed on the podium, and all of Cuba went silent. When the second
dove perched on Fidel's shoulder, people gasped, then began chanting,
"Fi-del. Fi-del." Over the years, many interpretations of this phenomenon
have circulated. The New York Times said the dove symbolized the dawn of
peace in a troubled land; the conservative Cuban press claimed the Holy
Spirit had blessed the revolution. Both missed the mark because, appearances
notwithstanding, neither Catholic nor Marxist-Leninist interpretations of
reality have deep roots in Cuba. Behind the icons and the anti-imperialist
billboards beat Santería drums.

Originally, Santería was a new world synthesis of various animist religions
from southwest Nigeria. When threatened by Spanish slave owners for
practicing heathen rites, African slaves clothed their beliefs in the
protective coloring of
Catholicism, and a new synthesis occurred. Today, the two religions share
the same altars, the same images, sacred dates, and even prayers. In January
1988, Jaime Ortega, the archbishop of Havana visited the chapel of Santa
Barbara in nearby Guines (reputed to be a "bewitched" town). He was moved by
the profound devotion be observed, which be chose to interpret as a
manifestation of strong Catholic faith. But this chapel is maintained by
santeros, not priests. And while the forms of these two religions overlap,
the content does not. The eighty-year-old mayordomo who cleans and protects
the church will tell you that the real power dwells behind the statue of
Santa Barbara in the otá, or sacred stone of Changó. What distinguishes otá
from other stones is that sacred stones are alive. They grow up and have
children, assuring worshippers of a steady supply of supernatural energy.

The otá is not the only difference between Catholicism and Santería.
According to santero theology, Olofi created the universe. Initially, his
creation was immobile, but soon, bored with the static cosmos, be added
plants, animals, flowers, seas, clouds, rain, human beings, and more than
three hundred male and female gods called orishas. Each orisha, or santo,
bears both an African Yoruba name and a Catholic name, as well as unique
personalities and powers. Obatalá, for example, is unimpressed by money.
Oshún, on the other hand, adores it, although she prefers a good party.
Elegguá alone determines the future. What he predicts cannot be forestalled
by man, woman, or other gods.

Unfortunately, by populating the heavens with so many strong characters,
Olofi had also created interminable wrangling. Tired of endless conflict, he
chose Obatalá to rule over other gods and human beings, who were also
behaving poorly. Obatalá, who speaks through Fidel, is the leader, the god
of thinking and consciousness. He is also the god of justice.

In Santería, both men and women serve as santeros. Over them are the
babalawos, who have the power to make animal sacrifices, initiate believers
into the religion and read the future with the Ifá oracle or with the eight
largest pieces of a smashed coconut shell. Although there is a titular
"king" of babalawos, he lacks the theocratic and administrative control of a
Catholic pope. There are no "Thou shalt nots" that apply to all in Santeria.
Believers do not attain salvation through good works and a pure heart. They
get what they want in direct proportion to the adequacy of their offerings
and following what your orisha expects.

The santos communicate their feelings via the orishas, or supernatural
messengers. White doves are the messengers of Obatalá, the right-hand man of
the god of all creation. Thus when the bird landed on Fidel, everyone
watching knew that Castro was blessed; he was El Elegido (The Chosen One).
Since then, Fidel bas been called El Caballo (the Horse), the term used to
designate someone whom an orisha has mounted and possessed.

On January 8, 1989, thirty years after the triumph of the Cuban revolution,
Fidel spoke once again from Camp Columbia, and once again a white dove
perched on his shoulder. He spoke of sacrifice, commitment, and hard work,
and he invoked the spirit of Ché. But masses of Cubans attending the annual
event saw and heard the spirit of Obatalá - whether the dove, like the site,
was orchestrated, is irrelevant. What is important is the continuing
influence of Santería on Cuban popular culture, and, consequently, on
political life. Contemporary Cuban values are rooted in a past without hope.
Africans who had been seized and transported in chains across an ocean,
deprived of family, land, and language, had little incentive to believe in
their power to shape the future. Unlike Pilgrims, Puritans, and even
indentured servants, their futures were determined by the whims of a slave
master. In this despondent milieu, Santería was born and flourished. And in
times, led to revolts. A stepchild of medieval Catholicism and African
polytheism, Santería is the antithesis of Calvinism.

The descendants of slaves and landless peasants were convinced by the slave
plantation that material and spiritual well-being is not the reward for hard
work and clean living. Three hundred years of experience taught them that
happiness is fleeting and often achieved only at someone else's expense.
Whether you acquire a new house or lose the one you already have, whether
the sugar content of cane is high or low, whether the economy prospers or
stagnates, depends not on budgeting, technology, or international banking
policies; it is in the hands of a pantheon of capricious gods. The Cuban
revolution has attempted to change that.

When Oshún asks for a sacrifice, she expects you to kill a pigeon; she is
unimpressed by Ché's sacrifice, the kind where you die fighting
imperialists. Nor is she impressed by a capitalist working others or himself
to death, accumulating money for the benefit of generations down the road. A
people who worship the goddess of sex, lover of gold, and patron of parties
is not a people favorably disposed to endure the hardships required to
surmount economic dependency and construct socialism. Yet, Santería has
taught endurance.

No one knows this better than Fidel Castro. For thirty years, Fidel, chief
apostle of revolutionary sacrifice, has dedicated himself to transforming
the ideology of the Cuban people; for thirty years he bas exhorted his
people to scorn the siren Cachita for the selfless Ché.

As perestroika rolled across the former Soviet Union and much of eastern
Europe, Fidel pushed "rectification" - a return to asceticism, voluntarism,
and collectivism. Political pundits interpreted Fidel's endless sermons as a
direct challenge to Gorbachev's neo capitalist policies. But Castro's devil
was not Russian; she was/is a happy-go-lucky, mulatto goddess who cha-chas
to the name of Cachita. In a 1979 speech, Castro said, " .. the most
powerful weapon ... is an ethic, a consciousness, a sense of duty, a sense
of organization, discipline, and responsibility."

Castro knows that to bring prosperity and socialism to an underdeveloped
society, he must provide Cuban citizens with a revolutionary version of the
Protestant ethic. He has to make people believe in their power to shape
their individual and collective futures. They must have faith that in their
labor lies the foundation for the future. In other words, they must emulate
Ché, a man who gave everything and asked nothing in return, a guerrilla who
believed devoutly in his ability to shape the forces of history by sheer
willpower. To this end, whenever children in the Young Pioneers (a Cuban
version of the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts. organized by the Communist Party)
set off to work in the fields or march in a parade, they raise their right
band and pledge, "Seremos como el Ché (We will be like Ché).'

Ironically, the same government which expends tremendous energy inculcating
revolutionary values has inadvertently enhanced the power and prestige of
Santería. When Castro assumed control of Cuba, be did not exhort the poor to
construct socialism through voluntary labor. As the bourgeoisie fled, the
revolutionaries seized their assets and distributed them among their former
servants, prompting the poet Nicolás Guillén, to write: "Te lo prometió
Martí y Fidel te lo cumplió." (What Martí - hero of the Cuban war for
independence - promised, Fidel delivered).

In Santeria, promesa is a contract with a god-if you make an adequate
offering, your petition is granted. This unexpected bonanza reinforced many
people's belief in magic. According to the First Party Congress in 1975,
Santería was permissible as folklore, a relic of an ignorant past. When
religious superstitions failed to wither away, the ever-pragmatic Castro did
more than recognize them: he permitted a national association of babalawos,
invited the Nigerian king of all santeros for a visit and promised to build
a temple and hold a national congress of santeros. In the interim, Santería
benefited from the revolutionary leadership's confrontations with the
Catholic Church. As the authority of recognized "official" religion was
curtailed then, the influence of Santería expanded to fill the vacuum.

Finally, Santería's prestige was augmented by the mass movement of Cuban
troops and technicians to Africa, where religions similar to Santería are
practiced openly. More than 200,000 Cubans have visited the motherland over
the last ten years. This re-acquaintance, instigated by the government, has
made it more difficult to repress African-inspired religions.

Castro is not unaware of the extraordinary convergence between Santería and
revolutionary holy days, nor is he above manipulating their significance.
January 1, the day of El Triunfo, is also Elegguá's day. July 26, officially
commemorated as the commencement of the struggle against Batista, is also
celebrated as the day of St. Ann, mother of Mary, who, as any Cuban can tell
you, is really the benevolent Nana Burukú, goddess of Justice and mother of
Babalú-ayé. No one knows if it is coincidence or foresight that the red and
black of the 26th of July Movement happened to be the colors of this
powerful goddess.

But relying on signs from the gods is risky business. In 1987, the Ifa
Oracle, the annual prediction for the new year, announced that Castro would
die unless the Yoruba "king of kings; , the "great Oni'' of babalawos,
traveled to Cuba and kissed the ground. The revolutionary government duly
issued the invitation, and a picture of the great Oni arriving at the José
Martí Airport in Havana graced the front page of Granma, the newspaper of
the Communist Party. Reportedly, the Nigerian kissed the ground. Fidel did
not die. And neither has Santería. Contemporary Cuban politics is the child
of an unlikely marriage. The children of the revolution admire Ché, their
handsome, idealistic leader; they worship Cachita, their beautiful,
fun-loving mother, and they hope to grow up to be both.

*Nan Elsasser is a free-lance writer and has lived and taught in the
Caribbean.

Retail Shake-Up

2009-09-06T03:39:00.002-04:00

The end of the summer saw stores that deal in the more pricey convertible peso undergoing big changes. Many had been relieved of all their merchandise, as they were being put under new management. The miliary and some of its joint-stock subsidaries are taking over some chains that had been hemmoraging losses due to merchandise diverted into the black market (i.e. stolen goods).

This occured at the same time that the National Assembley passed legislation creating a high constitutional office of Comptroller that is supposed to perform widespread audits and combat corruption.

Coincidental with these changes came a modest reduction in price for some common items at the covertible peso outlets.

State Opens Website for House Trading

2009-09-05T17:23:00.004-04:00

Cuba currently suffers a shortage of over a half million homes. Popular remedies include subdivisions like makeshift walls and artificial ceilings/floors to accomodate ensuing generations and newly integrated in-laws. Or, alternately, the architectural dividers serve as the physical representation of marital separation.

Selling houses is prohibited in Cuba, but the state allows people to swap houses. One could even trade one house for two apartments, for example. Houses in Havana typically fetch two houses in the less desirable provinces.

Previously, there were informal real estate agents that worked to connect two or more parties interested in moving. More recently internet bulletins have sprouted up that serve as marketplaces. State television even had begun sporadically announcing offers to "permutar" houses on the evening news.

Now the state has entered the game with an official website dedicated to house swapping.

To Cuba NM Guv shows luv

2009-08-28T23:27:00.004-04:00

The governor of the North American state of New Mexico, William Richardson, has spent the last week in Havana, selling New Mexican agricultural produce and possibly doing advance work for a changeTM in US foreign policy toward Cuba.

Here Richardson awkwardly connects with the Official Historian of the City of La Habana, Eusebio Leal. The small crowd of hangers on stand approvingly.

Reflective Pay Demanded

2009-05-13T03:17:00.004-04:00

Authorities have not yet restructured pay grades as promised in past years. Organized workers are complaining and proposing in the press.

Doggy Bag

2009-05-13T03:11:00.003-04:00

If you request carry out of leftovers from a Cuban restuarant, the styrofoam Tetra Pak invariably appears on the bill as a $0.50 charge.

Digital TV in 15 years

2009-05-13T03:01:00.004-04:00

Cuba is just beginning to study the eventual implementation of digital television. Technical experts warn that its advent wont come for another fifteen years. Which is too bad because people are dying to see in sharp relief every single hair on the mustache whence emanates the news every evening. Also, I bet the graphics from Universidad para Todos would look amazing in high definition.

Get Out of Work Free Day

2009-05-01T15:34:00.001-04:00

Cuito Carnavale!

2009-04-23T15:15:00.001-04:00

"Graceful abdication I advise"

"But there can be only one Nuj."

Artsy Fartsy

2009-04-06T02:45:00.003-04:00

The 10th Havana Biennial art show is on. See images at the following links:

http://centrefortheaestheticrevolution.blogspot.com/2009/04/pablos-choices-havana-bienal.html

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2009/03/31/arts/design/20090401-biennial-slideshow_index.html

http://progresoblog.com/espanol/?p=883

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/slideshow/ALeqM5hnDAbUsD2Ub7obCjhcRWcsI1j-lQD97A2RIG1?index=0

http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/featured/exclusive-pictures-havana-biennial-2009/9490

Hay que cuidar su propia basura: Dr. Mentepollo

2009-04-05T01:59:00.003-04:00

Miami as City-State

2009-03-30T07:43:00.002-04:00

Rather than a semi-integrated ethnic enclave, Miami is an autonomous community with its own political preferences and overarching moral economy. As such, when it comes to matters pertaining to Cuba, ideological bias and social conformity against Cuba are inescapable elements.

So says a sociologically oriented friend of the court brief to the US Supreme Court.

How Coffee is Made (laughter ensues)

2009-03-29T22:30:00.000-04:00

House in Matanzas

2009-02-28T16:42:00.002-05:00

Infernal Migration

2009-02-26T01:47:00.003-05:00

There is a famous song that says "La Habana no aguanta más". Havana cannot take anymore (migrants from other provinces, principally eastern).

There is a joke. But it works better in Spanish.

Por qué se llama el oriente, "el medio oriente"?
Why do they call the eastern end of the island, "the Middle East"?
(Its not because of the prison at the Guantanamo base.)

Porque la otra mitad está en La Habana.
Because half of the easterners are in Havana.

A common derogatory term for people from "El Oriente", the eastern end of the island, is "palestino", Palestinian.

A researcher on internnal migration summarizes:
"La contracción de la economía a partir de la década del 90 y del cese de la
política inversionista que favorecía otros territorios se manifestó en el
incremento, desde ese momento, de la migración a la capital, que retomó
prácticamente los niveles que la caracterizaron en los años próximos al
triunfo revolucionario."

The vast migration to the capital greatly aggravates the preexisting housing shortage.

Pimps Up...On the Big Screen

2009-02-25T02:50:00.003-05:00

A clever cinematographic take on the story of a legendary pimp from a century ago. There is a monument in his honor in the central cemetery, where people go to make offerings in order to get some action.

Superior Sundries

2009-02-25T02:32:00.003-05:00

The state firm that supplies subsidized neighborhood outlets of food and limited household products has indicated that it has added fluoride to the toothpaste and made the soap more fragrant and colorful. The packaging of both have been remixed as well.

Revolutionary Training

2009-02-25T02:23:00.002-05:00

The motto of the Union of Young Communists is "Study, Work, Rifle". Seriously.

Hitchhikers Guide to the Commute

2009-02-25T02:20:00.002-05:00

Catching a ride with a stranger is a normal mode of intra-urban commute, not to mention city to city trips across Cuba.

Oil or Food

2009-02-25T01:21:00.003-05:00

Although Cuba has geologically projected offshore oil deposits, it is hesitant to use cash supplies to invest in exploration, when basic food and salary costs need paying now.

Fidel Castro

2009-02-19T05:03:00.002-05:00

The mastermind of the insurrectionary overthrow of the Batista regime and the consolidation of the revolutionary forces, Fidel Castro led Cuba for over forty years as the head of government, the head of state, and the first secretary of the communist party. He governed with charismatic authority, tremendous powers of persuasion, longwinded oratory, expansive interest in all aspects of the country’s affairs, photographic attention to detail, and a keen understanding and utilization of history.

Castro was instrumental in declaring Cuba’s nationalist revolution to be anti-imperialist and socialist in nature. Domestically, Castro was a unifier, a micromanager, an interpreter of consensus, and a moral arbiter. On the geopolitical stage, Castro’s strategic alliances and leadership of the third world allowed Cuba to obviate the US blockade and project disproportionate power across hemispheres.

Upon falling ill in 2006, Castro provisionally ceded his leadership duties, before deciding not to accept another term as president in 2008. Starting in 2007, Castro began to write political editorials, serving as an emeritus advisor to Cuban officials and visiting heads of state. Most Cubans respect Castro as having been a brilliant statesman and wise steward of the nation—even if they disagree with some of his economic policies and less democratic tendencies.

Youthful & Athletic

2009-02-16T00:30:00.002-05:00

Reminds me of the episode of The Office when Creed tries to act young and hip so he wouldnt get canned.

The US Blockade

2009-02-15T01:10:00.002-05:00

Forty-seven years ago, President Kennedy initially erected the economic embargo that prevents commerce and travel to Cuba—and it has only stiffened with the ensuing US administrations. Depriving the island of its closest and most optimal trading partner has forced the Cuban government and its firms to incur the extra costs of buying and selling goods and services farther afield. Cuba can neither import needed medicine and scientific supplies, exploit the natural market for its tourism industry, nor often send its scientists, artists, and athletes to participate in events held in the US. In addition to the human suffering, the blockade has cost Cuba more than $86 billion over the course of its implementation.

Although limited agricultural cash sales to the island are now permissible, the US continues to lose out on over $3 billion per year due to the blockade. Its imposition divides families and impinges on US citizens’ constitutional freedoms to travel.

Medical Internationalism

2009-02-15T01:00:00.003-05:00

To the wider world owe a debt both Cuba’s past (e.g. the descendents of Africa lead the independence charge) and future (e.g. the unification of Latin America will engender security and developmental benefits). And since Cuba’s well educated populace is its most valuable resource, it relies on human capital as a principal instrument of foreign exchange.

As such, Cuba’s foreign policy focuses heavily on loaning health and educational personnel to underdeveloped nations. Currently, 42,000 Cubans serve in 103 countries—responding to natural disasters, eradicating literacy, performing opthalmological surgery, and building public health capacity. Cuba also hosts without charge over ten thousand students from 113 different countries in its six year medical schools. These efforts demonstrate writ large the selflessness required for revolutionary socialism and create the favorable diplomatic relationships necessary to counteract the continued enmity from the US. However, some Cubans contend that the external emphasis has taken needed resources away from domestic health care—where it has now become customary to bring gifts to doctors to guarantee proper medical attention.

Social Indiscipline

2009-02-15T00:56:00.003-05:00

Because the Cuban state heavily subsidizes the costs of basic foods, education, healthcare, transportation, and other facets of social life, regardless of whether one is incorporated into the workforce, not everyone is motivated to hold down formal employment. Especially for those in urban centers connected to the external economy, engaging in unsanctioned commerce or living off of remittances can prove more profitable than daily labor. The lack of material incentive has left thousands of unfilled vacancies in strategic sectors such as construction and agriculture. Havana has to import police, teachers and construction workers from the provinces because not enough capitalinos will take such occupations. Furthermore, the below replacement birthrates since the depression of the 1990s have not been able to restock the general labor force. The party and the state attempt to morally incentivize insertion into the workforce by portraying absentee laborers as parasites.

Energy Revolution

2009-02-15T00:51:00.004-05:00

As an economically embargoed nation with few proven natural energy resources and historically dependent on foreign oil subsidized by geopolitical allies, Cuba has recognized the need to consume energy efficiently. It is also very attuned to the threats of climate change particular to its geography—soil desiccation and receding coastlines. The ensuing "Energy Revolution" has involved replacing all the light bulbs on the island with compact fluorescents, developing and distributing efficient kitchen appliances and televisions, and swapping out old wasteful American refrigerators and Soviet air conditioners for new efficient Chinese models. The replacement campaigns operate at the neighborhood level in the door-to-door manner of the census; and families pay for their new appliances on installment plans. The state has also purchased fleets of Chinese buses and made upgrades to power plants and the electric grid. There are no longer systematic blackouts—yet unintended blackouts still occur sporadically. Cuba is near to rendering itself efficient enough to be an energy exporter, if the seabed tracts currently being explored yield the levels of petroleum estimated.

The Five Heroes

2009-02-15T00:37:00.005-05:00

In the 1990s, as the Cuban state endeavored to build up tourism to fill the economic void left by the disappearance of Soviet supports, enemy exiles began a terrorist campaign targeting tourists. Cuba deployed counterterrorists to infiltrate South Florida groups and uncover criminal plots to bomb the island’s tourist facilities. The US caught and, in 2001, convicted five Cuban agents for conspiracy. Since then the “five heroes” have become widely celebrated in Cuba as revolutionary martyrs. The emphasis on their espionage as counterterrorism co-opts the terms of the US “war on terror” to wage a moral struggle for their release from US prisons. Currently, the US Supreme Court is deciding whether to hear their appeal, which contends that the trial venue of Miami did not ensure an unbiased jury. The case is the only judicial proceeding in US history to receive condemnation from the UN Human Rights Commission.

Unfrequented Frequencies: 2% of Cubans tune to US propaganda broadcasts

2009-02-09T02:56:00.005-05:00

Citing an inconclusive telephone poll done by a third country research firm, the GAO guesses that 2% of Cubans watch TV Martí or listen to Radio Martí.

Most foreign media consumption occurs through clandestine satelite dishes. People will install the dish on their roof and have somebody in the US purchase the service. Sometimes the person with cable will hook up his neighbors' televisions for a small fee--but they are forced to watch whatever channel the hub subscribor chooses--often Miami's Univision station known as Channel 23.

US Supreme Court might hear Cuban 5 case

2009-02-06T18:45:00.005-05:00

The "five heroes" convicted of spying on civilian terrorist plotters in Miami were tried and sentenced in the impossibly biased enclave community of Miami, FL. They are appealing that the venue did not afford a fair trial. Will the Supreme Court hear the case?

It only takes 4 justices in favor for the court to agree to hear the case. If it does not hear the case, Obama might consider trading the five Cubans for political prisoners in Cuban jails. At which point the five heroes would become instant political bigwigs in Cuba--for their mugs are plastered across the land. Young martyrs--whats not to like?

Fidel says Barack losing virginity

2009-02-06T14:40:00.002-05:00

So who is doing the screwing?

Diminished Shiny Guns: downsized military remains social force

2009-02-06T00:53:00.010-05:00

Think tank tinkers chat about the state and prospects of the Cuban military.

Points of note:

Since end of Cold War, military downsized to 50,000 from over 250,000 (though theoretically every Cuban is a soldier in the face of an invasion). A major challenge is where in society to place the hundreds of thousands that now find no positions in the armed forces.

At least half of new recruits must come from the children of workers and peasants.

Around the 20:40 mark Klepak speaks disparagingly--if obliquely--of Fidel's leadership of the military vis-a-vis Raul's. He refers to the previous administration's micromanaging and blathering without calling Fidel out by name. Is he worried about getting his next visa application rejected? Or has he been thoroughly socialized into the culture of not naming certain names?

Social density, nosiness and gossip prevent people from engaging in large scale corruption.

The British guy is not saying anything revelatory. But gives a good summary of the major moments in Cuban political economic history in the last 50 years.

The guy from the US War College drops names and intimates future courses based on officers' personal interests that he intuits. He says the military is as important if not more than the communist party. Then he notes that a key will be to see how far up the party structure the newer officers climb. Wait, what?

Secret Talks, Unrequited Relations: the US and Cuba, 1961-the future

2009-02-04T18:26:00.004-05:00

This exclusive investigation by journalist Bryan Gibel uses previously classified documents to piece together the story of unofficial negotiations between the US and Cuba from Eisenhower to Obama. A fascinating and unique piece of scholarship that bears squarely on the prospects of renewed relations in the near term.

Lessons from Diplomacy with Cuba during the Cold War

During numerous presidential debates, stump speeches and interviews, Barack Obama declared his willingness to negotiate without preconditions with Cuba and other countries where diplomatic relations are currently frigid. In late November 2008, Cuban President Raúl Castro extended a standing offer to meet with the United States to negotiate normalized relations. “Let Cubans come to visit with their families. Let Americans come to Cuba,” Castro told actor Sean Penn in a rare interview with the U.S. media. “With the United States, every objective possibility exists…We should meet in a neutral place. Perhaps we could meet at Guantanamo. We must meet and begin to solve our problems.”1

If Obama sits down with Castro, he will be the first U.S. President to meet with a Cuban head of state since the 1950s. But will he seriously pursue Castro’s offer to work towards normalized relations? As in nearly all of his major statements on policy, Obama’s talk on Cuba makes direct reference to breaking from the past and renewing U.S. standing and leadership in a new era. But Obama’s administration would not be the first to consider normalizing relations with Cuba via direct negotiation. During the height of the Cold War, the U.S. executive branch under Kennedy and Nixon/Ford pursued a series of secret negotiations with the Cuban government with the goal of improving the strained relationship between the hulking superpower and its defiant neighboring island. As I will document, the possibility of reestablishing formal diplomatic relations and ending the economic embargo was considered as an option and advocated by major players under each administration. Negotiations also produced substantial steps toward rapprochement, including lifting the ban on trade between Cuba and subsidies of U.S. companies in third countries, a bilateral anti-hijacking agreement and the release of political prisoners from Cuban prisons.

Yet the economic embargo is still in place, nearly 50 years after it was first announced in 1962. It is my contention that the efforts at direct diplomacy between the United States and Cuba carried out during 1960s and early 1970s offer an important glimpse into a period when the conflict between the two countries congealed into the simmering state of mistrust and hostility that pervades today. As I will argue, efforts at diplomacy during this period never resolved the major conflicts in U.S.–Cuban relations due to four recurrent reasons: inflexible and unreasonable diplomatic demands, domestic political pressure towards hard-line tactics, interventionist foreign policy, and contradictory signs and actions with regard to the negotiating process.

First, The United States sometimes made inflexible demands that required fundamental changes to Cuba’s internal political system as a precondition for improved relations. Cuba found this unacceptable. Alternatively, Cuba sometimes placed the lifting on the U.S. embargo as a precondition for normalized diplomatic relations. Second, U.S. electoral politics tended to pull foreign policy towards hard-line tactics to get Cuban –American support or to appear tough on communism. At times, key players involved in foreign policy thus viewed an improved relationship as unimportant or unwanted. Third, Cuban foreign policy in Africa and Latin America clashed with U.S. interests abroad and amplified fears of Soviet collusion, thereby heightening tension significantly. Aggressive anti-American rhetoric by Fidel Castro often added to strain as well. As a result, most Cuban proposals for improving relations were viewed as half-hearted and deceitful, and were therefore ultimately dismissed or rejected. Finally, motions toward conciliation made by each U.S. administration were almost always accompanied by contradictory policies that were either openly hostile or interpreted as such. These contradictions generally made rapprochement unrealistic and contributed greatly to each failure to resolve the United States– Cuba quandary. Attempts at détente with Cuba during the 1960s and 1970s were all derailed by the factors outlined above. If Barack Obama hopes to write a new chapter in U.S.–Cuban relations, both sides will have to consciously avoid the patterns of enmity that were established at the height of the Cold War.

The purpose of this investigation is not to advocate normalizing relations with Cuba. Rather, it seeks to better understand the way Cold War history informs and affects contemporary policy dilemmas, i.e. negotiating directly with countries that have long been considered adversarial to the United States. After an in depth study of direct negotiations with Cuba from JFK to Gerald Ford, I will look more closely at Obama’s policy proposals towards Cuba to determine to what extent they reflect or reject the themes of past diplomatic stalemates. Rather than simply looking at a chronology of events, I aim to provide a better understanding of the process by which negotiations progressed and ultimately failed. As such, a major focus of my analysis encompasses the discussions and debates that led to particular policy decisions on both sides. To begin, I look at a series of declassified government documents on secret negotiations between Kennedy and Castro to normalize relations against the specter of the Bay Pigs and the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Secret Attempts at Negotiation in the Shadow of Nuclear War: JFK, Camelot and Castro

When John F. Kennedy took office as the 35th President of the United States on January 20, 1961, diplomatic relations with Cuba had been severed less than three weeks before. On January 3, the Cuban government delivered a note to the U.S. embassy demanding that it limit its diplomatic delegation to eleven persons. In response, President Dwight Eisenhower announced later that day that he was termination diplomatic and consular relations with Cuba, stating that, “It is my hope and my conviction that in the not too distant future it will be possible for the historic friendship between us once again to find its reflection in normal relations of every sort.”2

Almost half a century later the embassies in each country have never been reinstated. The same month that Eisenhower announced he was breaking diplomatic relations with Cuba, the Cuban government expropriated over 70,000 acres of property owned by United States sugar companies.3 It would go on to forge a military alliance with the Soviet Union, making normalized relations with the United States extremely difficult.

Another reason relations were problematic undoubtedly relates to Eisenhower’s under the table plans to overthrow the recently victorious Cuban revolution. On January 19, 1961, the day before JFK’s inaugurations, records of a meeting between the incoming and outgoing presidents and their chief advisers states that, “President Eisenhower said with reference to guerilla forces which are opposed to Castro that it was the policy of this government to help such forces to the utmost. At the present time, we are helping train anti-Castro forces in Guatemala. It was his recommendation that this effort be continued or accelerated.”4 Not surprisingly, Eisenhower’s public support for normal relations was not achievable against a context of paramilitary aggression, and Kennedy inherited a deeply hostile relationship with Cuba that was spiraling towards violent conflict as he began his presidency.

The purpose of this paper is not to detail aggression against Cuba by the JFK administration; the numerous covert acts of sabotage and assassination attempts on Castro during the early 1960s are well documented elsewhere. The most famous adventure by Kennedy against Castro took place from April 17 through April 19 at Playa Girón, Cuba, known to the United States as the Bay of Pigs. After the Cuban Missile Crisis brought the world to the brink of thermo-nuclear war in October 1962, normalizing relations between the two countries appeared impossible. However, previously classified documents reveal that a secret initiative by Kennedy towards the end of his presidency sought just that.

At his first press conference after being sworn in, Kennedy stated publicly the White House had “no plan at present to resume diplomatic relations with Cuba.”5 A few months later, direct contact between the Kennedy administration and the Cuban government was made informally, not long after the Bay of Pigs fiasco. At 2 a.m. on August 17, 1961, Richard Goodwin, Assistant Special Counsel to the President, approached Ché Guevara at a party after a conference of the Organization of American States (OAS) held in Punta del Este, Uruguay. According to Goodwin, Ché spoke with him frankly about Cuba’s interest in improving relations with the United States. Guevara also stated the terms Cuba would set for such negotiations:

1. That they would not give back the expropriated [American] properties [in Cuba] – the factories and banks – but they could pay for them in trade.
2. They could agree not to make any political alliance with the East—although this would not affect their sympathies.
3. They would have free elections—but only after a period of institutionalizing the revolution had been completed. In response to my question he said that this included the establishment of a one-party system.
4. Of course, they would not attack Guantanamo. (At this point he laughed as if at the absurdly self-evident nature of such a statement.)
5. He indicated, very obliquely, and with evident reluctance because of the company in which we were talking, that they could also discuss the activities of the Cuban revolution in other countries.6

Goodwin then reported that Guevara recognized such issues were contentious and that negotiations could begin with smaller concerns, but “they could discuss no formula that would mean giving up the type of society to which they were dedicated.” Ché knew that making a one-party system in Cuba non-negotiable was most likely unacceptable from Kennedy’s point of view. On the other hand, he did openly offer to discuss the major items of contention between the U.S. and Cuba that he didn’t perceive to be encroachments on Cuba’s internal sovereignty—including relations with the Soviet Union, foreign interventionism and U.S. claims on expropriated properties.

In response, Goodwin wrote a memorandum to Kennedy on September 1, 1961, in which he recommended covertly promoting paramilitary activities that appeared to originate within Cuba, establishing a “psychological warfare group,” and “destruction of economic targets important to the Cuban economy.”7 His recommendations were turned into action through a broad program of covert violence called Operation Mongoose, which was a pillar of U.S. policy towards Cuba until the missile crisis in 1962. JFK also sought to isolate Cuba politically and economically. On February 3, 1962, he signed proclamation 3447 establishing an embargo on all trade with Cuba, effective February 7.8 Nobody knew at the time that the embargo would still be in place over 45 years later.

However, after staring nuclear apocalypse in the eyes for two weeks in October, JFK began a more concerted effort towards conciliation with Castro in early 1963. During fall of the previous year, a lawyer named James Donovan arranged to trade $53 million in food and medicine for over 1,000 prisoners captured during the Bay of Pigs invasion. That year the CIA began accumulating intelligence reports that Deputy CIA Director Richard Helms described as “suggesting Cuban interest in a rapprochement with the United States.” 9 As a result, Kennedy decided to test the test the waters of a diplomatic resolution to the U.S–Cuba conflict via diplomatic measures.

A top secret memorandum from Gordon Chase, the Latin American Specialist on JFK’s National Security Council (NSC), from March 4, 1963, documents Kennedy’s newly found determination to negotiate a better relationship. “The President does not agree that we should make the breaking of Sino/Soviet ties a non-negotiable point,” Chase wrote. “We don’t want to present Castro with a condition that he obviously cannot fulfill. We should start thinking along more flexible lines.”10 The next month, Chase submitted another memorandum to National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy in which he stated, “We are all concerned about solving our Cuba problem, but so far, we have been looking seriously only at one side of the coin—ways to hurt Castro by varying degrees of over an covert nastiness.”11 Despite identifying obstacles such as the “domestic political situation” and “Castro’s reluctance,” Chase advocate that Kennedy begin to approach “the other side of the coin—quietly enticing Castro over to us.” In the same memorandum Chase argued that, “In the short run, we would probably be able to neutralize at least two of our main worries about Castro—the reintroduction of offensive missiles and Cuban subversion. In the long run,” he declares, “we would be able to work on eliminating Castro at our leisure and from a good vantage point.” In order to achieve these goals, Chase encouraged Kennedy to maintain “our present nasty policy” to wield as leverage for future diplomacy through intimidation.

While Chase’s motives were clearly far from altruistic, his focus on negotiation and appeasement was a new approach toward relations with Cuba. In May 1963, Washington found an unsuspected method of communication to begin secret negotiations with Communist Cuba: newswoman Lisa Howard from the American Broadcast Company. On April 22 in Havana, Howard interviewed Castro for nearly five hours for a news report. When she returned to the United States she debriefed with the U.S. government and passed on an important message: “It appears that Fidel Castro is looking for a way to reach a rapprochement with the United States Government,” CIA Deputy Director Richard Helms wrote in a secret memorandum. “He said he considered the U.S. limitation on exile raids to be a proper step toward accommodation.”12 Helms also reported Howard had a direct line to Castro through his personal physician and trusted friend, Dr. René Vallejo, and she was willing and eager to arrange future meetings under a shroud of secrecy.

On September 23, 1963, Howard arranged for an informal meeting at a gathering at her house with U.S. Deputy United Nations Ambassador William Attwood and Cuban UN Ambassador Carlos Lechuga. Both men spoke of their government’s interest in pursuing a diplomatic solution to their problems, and Attwood and Howard made contact with Vallejo and Lechuga several times in the next month to try to work out the details to hold a series of secret negotiations. While things progressed behind the scenes, Lechuga made an anti-American speech on October 7 that he had warned Attwood about ahead of time. Regardless, his rhetoric resulted in a public clash with United States UN Ambassador Adlai Stevenson on the floor of the UN.13

Shortly thereafter, Gordon Chase recounted Stevenson’s blunt statement of United States’ conditions for normalized relations: “If Castro wanted peace with his neighbors, he need only do three things—stop being a Soviet stooge, stop trying to subvert other nations, and start carrying out the promises of his revolution regarding constitutional rights.” In the same memorandum, Chase wrote that the Cubans made another overture for negotiations on the 31st of October:

Vallejo called Miss Howard, apologizing for the delay…He said Castro would very much like to talk to the U.S. official anytime and appreciated the importance of discretion to all concerned. Castro would therefore be willing to send a plane to Mexico to pick up the official and fly him to a private airport near Varadero where Castro would talk to him alone. The plane would fly him back immediately after the talk. 14

A garbled Oval Office audio tape from November 5 records a conversation between McGeorge Bundy and JFK in which the president clearly says that that Attwood should be taken off the U.S. payroll if he is to travel to Cuba so the White House will have a valid alibi to deny official talks if there is a leak to the press.15 On November 22, the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated, Attwood sent another memorandum to Chase informing him of a White House decision to meet with Cuban officials at the United Nations for preliminary discussions before any decision was to be made on a secret diplomatic trip to Cuba. “We would like to know more about what is on Castro’s mind before committing ourselves to further talks in Cuba,”16 Attwood wrote. A meeting was setup with Lechuga to discuss an agenda for future talks. Only a few hours after Attwood typed up his memorandum on the subject, JFK was killed. Washington was turned upside-down.

At the time of Kennedy’s murder, several factors can be identified that were pivotal in influencing the course diplomatic efforts with Cuba had taken. On the positive side, Cuba’s interest in negotiating and its willingness to compromise on foreign policy provided an opportunity for rapprochement through direct negotiation. Near the end of his presidency, Kennedy also seemed genuinely interested in improving relations with Cuba. But hostilities and fears between the two governments still ran wild, and the bipolar mentality of Cold War affairs made cooperation tenuous at best.

French journalist Jean Daniel reported that Castro sat down when he received news of the assassination and said repeatedly, “Es una mala noticia.” (“This is bad news.”)17 Just days before, Daniel had told Castro of a conversation he had with Kennedy on October 24 in which JFK told him, “I believe there is not country in the world, including the African regions, including all the countries under colonial domination, where economic colonization, humiliation and exploitation were worse than in Cuba, in part owing to my country’s policies during the Batista regime.”18

In the wake of Kennedy’s death, Chase sent a memorandum to Bundy describing the difficulties of continuing to pursue of secret negotiations with Castro under the Johnson administration.

The events of November 22 would appear to make accommodations with Castro an even more doubtful issue than it was. While I think President Kennedy could have accommodated with Castro and gotten away with it with a minimum of domestic heat, I’m not sure about President Johnson. For one thing, a new President who has no background of being successfully nasty to Castro and the Communists (e.g. President Kennedy in October, 1962) would probably run a greater risk of being accused, by the American people, of ‘going soft’.19

On February 12, 1964, Castro tried to revive the negotiations that had been initiated under Kennedy. Using Lisa Howard as an intermediary, he sent a verbal message to Lyndon Johnson in which he made his case for rapprochement crystal clear:

Tell the President (and I cannot stress this too strongly) that I seriously hope that Cuba and the United States can eventually sit down in an atmosphere of good will and of mutual respect and negotiate our differences. I believe that there are no areas of contention between us that cannot be discussed and settled with a climate of mutual understanding. But first, of course, it is necessary to discuss our differences. I now believe that this hostility between Cuba and the United States is both unnatural and unnecessary—and it can be eliminated.

In the same message, Castro expressed his understanding that electoral politics could make public negotiations a major campaign concern for LBJ, but stressed that such concerns didn’t have to derail the diplomatic process initiated under Kennedy.

If the President feels it necessary during the campaign to make bellicose statements about Cuba or even to take some hostile action—if he will inform me, unofficially, that a specific action is required because of domestic political considerations, I shall understand and not take any serious retaliatory action…I realize fully the need for absolute secrecy, if he should decide to continue the Kennedy approach. I revealed nothing at that time…I have revealed nothing since…I would reveal nothing now.20

Both these statements reveal that Castro placed rapprochement with the U.S. as a top priority, and he was willing to compromise extensively to promote cooperation. However, no record exists of Johnson attempting to resume talks with Castro. Rather, Chase recommended that Howard be removed from the process entirely so discussions could be shifted to easily monitored, informal talks at the United Nations.21 If such conversations ever occurred, they never progressed in any substantive direction. As Carlos Lechuga explained in an oral history project conducted in 1995, “eventually Johnson did just break off the dialogue and well, you know the rest of the story.”22

Another failed step toward rapprochement initiated by Robert Kennedy around the same time dealt with travel restrictions. In a memorandum to Secretary of State Dean Rusk dated December 12, 1962, RFK argued that prosecuting U.S. citizens for travel to Cuba was troublesome and unadvisable, especially with a large number of student protest trips planned for the near future. As a result, he advocated removing restrictions on travel to Cuba by U.S. citizens, arguing that doing so would be “more consistent with our views of a free society and would contrast with such things as the Berlin Wall and Communist controls on such travel.”23

A memorandum dated the next day documents that the Department of State agreed that the travel ban should be lifted immediately, so long as traveler’s to Cuba were “required to obtain passports specifically validated for such travel.”24 However, Undersecretary of State George Ball overruled the recommendations and “decided against any kind of relaxation of travel controls to Cuba.”25 A memorandum for the President on May 21, 1964 apparently closed the discussion on lifting travel restrictions to Cuba. In that document McGeorge Bundy asked Johnson to confirm that he did not want a relaxation of such controls.26 Apparently LBJ agreed, since travel restrictions to the island were never lifted under his administration. Instead, the Johnson Administration led a campaign in the OAS to put in place a “mandatory termination of all trade and diplomatic relations” with Cuba, which passed by a vote of 15 to 4 on July 26, 1964.27 On October 17 of the same year, Johnson also signed a bill that allowed the U.S. government to sell certain assets of the Cuban Government that were held in the United States.28

What are the main reasons for the failure of direct negotiations with Cuba during the early 1960s? The most obvious reason is Kennedy’s assassination just as his plans for negotiating with Castro were building steam. However, it is unclear that rapprochement would have been achieved even if JFK hadn’t been assassinated. A look back at the four reasons for failed diplomacy that I outlined at the beginning of this essay is informative.

Generally speaking, the U.S. refrained from making demands that Cuba make fundamental changes to its internal political system as a precondition for negotiations, but talks never really got far enough for many demands to be made. However, after Ché presented a list of Cuban conditions for improving relations—the most important of which was Cuban sovereignty to determine its internal political system—the U.S. broke off contact entirely without even discussing matters of foreign policy. Indeed, both Guevara and Castro made clear repeatedly that Cuba would not accept, under any circumstances, any agreement that compromised the government’s sovereignty and autonomy within its own borders.

Electoral politics also certainly played a factor in Lyndon Johnson’s decision to break off any negotiations with Cuba, as explicitly stated by his top aides. Clearly, LBJ didn’t hold negotiations with Cuba at a premium; given Cold War fears and domestic political concerns, he ran the hard-line anti-Communist gambit instead.

With regard to Cuban foreign policy, Cuban subversion in Latin America was mentioned as a concern by the U.S., but both Fidel and Ché said explicitly that such activities, as well as Cuba’s relationship with the U.S.S.R. were up for negotiation. Moreover, while Castro and other Cuban officials did engage in anti-American rhetoric, sometimes at the very same time they were offering steps toward conciliation under the table, this should hardly have been a reason to derail diplomacy, especially given the kind of overtures Castro made in his verbal message to LBJ transmitted by Lisa Howard.

Perhaps in the end, negotiations under JFK never produced any tangible results because any motions Kennedy and Camelot made towards conciliation were always concealed by a shroud of secrecy and set against a contradictory backdrop of covert violence, attempted assassinations and blatant hostility. While Kennedy may have become intent on finding a diplomatic solution to U.S.–Cuban tensions, many in his administration viewed rapprochement as undesired or unacceptable, especially in the shadow of the Cuban Missile Crisis. When Kennedy was killed, any plausible chance at normalizing relations with Cuba appeared to die with him. However, under President Nixon and especially Gerald Ford, the State Department opened a new chapter of negotiations with Castro. As we shall see, those talks were characterized by many of the themes that led to collapsed diplomacy under LBJ. Negotiations under Nixon and Ford did, however, produce some tangible results.

Motions toward Détente under Nixon, Ford and Henry Kissinger

Nixon’s role in the Watergate Scandal and the Vietnam Ware are prominent in his legacy. However, the President and his National Security Adviser/Secretary of State Henry Kissinger were also influential as the architects of détente, a set of policies aimed at reducing tension between the United States and socialist countries like China, the Soviet Union and Vietnam. In February 1972, Richard Nixon visited the People’s Republic of China and met with Mao Zedong. That May, he travelled to Moscow and met with Leonid Brezhnev. This partial thawing of the Cold War had direct implications for U.S.–Cuban relations, despite Nixon’s avowed hatred for Castro. According to Philip Brenner:

By the early 1970s, several factors coalesced to reduce the tension between Cuba and the United States. The Richard Nixon administration had fashioned as its hallmark détente with both the Soviet Union and China: Anticommunism was less in vogue. At the same time, Cuba had curtailed its practice of supporting armed revolution in the hemisphere and had begun to develop state-to-state relations with several Latin American countries.29

Soon after taking office, Nixon requested that a study be prepared to look into the advantages and disadvantages of U.S. policy towards Cuba as inherited from Johnson.30 At an NSC review group meeting in September 1969, Kissinger considered the advantages to the U.S. of maintaining a Communist regime in Cuba to use “in a squeeze play vis-à-vis the USSR” as compared to promoting a more prosperous relationship with Cuba that might induce it to distance itself from Soviet Domination. At the same meeting, he also conveyed an order from President Nixon to look into para-military pressure as another option that should be taken into consideration.31

In the end, Kissinger’s decisions regarding U.S. relations with Cuba were based on calculated self-interest, but he kept an open mind about where U.S. interests actually lay. He made this explicit in a national security memorandum issued on February 16, 1971, to the Secretaries of State and Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Director of the CIA. “The President has directed that a comprehensive review of U.S. policies and programs in the Caribbean be undertaken,” Kissinger wrote. “The study should include recommendations or options…to advance or protect U.S. interests.”32

Kissinger’s realpolitik approach to foreign policy sometimes steered him into direct negotiations with Cuba. The first of such negotiations sought to develop an anti-hijacking agreement between the two countries. In December of 1968, before Nixon was even sworn in as President, soon-to-be Secretary of State William Rogers arranged for a note to be passed to the Cubans via the Swiss government. As he explained to the President early the next year, the note proposed a reciprocal arrangement for returning hijackers of commercial aircraft to the country of aircraft registry. However, the Cubans stalled, responding that, “it was not possible ‘under present circumstances’ to undertake bilateral commitments to return hijackers.”33

On September 19, 1969, Havana announced a new anti-hijacking law that provided for the prosecution or extradition of persons hijacking aircraft or ships, as well as people otherwise violating immigration regulations. However, extradition of offenders would only take place if a reciprocal bilateral treaty had been signed with the country seeking extradition. A memo sent to Kissinger a few days later documents that the White House viewed the new law as a “significant new development,” despite the fact that it was “heavily larded with anti-US propaganda.” As a member of the NSC mused, the move by Cuba could be symbolic, “not only with respect to the hijacking situation but perhaps in terms of relations with us as well.”34

By October 31, Rogers formally requested permission from Nixon to send a dispatch to the Government of Cuba stating that, “the United States is prepared on a basis of reciprocity to return hijackers of Cuban ships and aircraft except in the case of U.S. nationals or when we determine to grant a hijacker political asylum.” He also went on to make clear that such an agreement was not a step towards normalizing relations with Cuba and, “would not alter the status of our relations with the Castro Government.”35 Two weeks later, at Kissinger’s request, Nixon approved the Secretary of State’s request, and the dispatch was sent to Cuba via the Swiss.36

Over the next year, Cuba and the White House exchanged several notes through the Swiss embassy in Havana, but they disagreed on what bilateral talks should cover and the process stagnated.37 Disagreements centered on who the expropriation accords in the proposed hijacking agreement would apply to and what exceptions would be permitted.38 Since no real progress could be reported, Nixon put a stop to the discussion. However, hijackings continued to get worse, and two years later, Cuba jump-started the stalled negotiations with yet another note proposing bilateral talks. Finally, on November 16, 1972, Rogers instructed the Swiss ambassador in Havana to read the following message to Cuban Foreign Minister Raúl Roa:

The United States Government…is prepared to negotiate an arrangement regarding hijacking and other serious crimes which may be committed in the future…It is prepared to consider favorably any arrangements and location for such talks that would expedite agreement and awaits the government of Cuba’s views.39

Once the United States made a clear commitment to discuss the issue and removed any preconditions, the Cubans responded swiftly, informing the Swiss embassy that talks could begin within a week.40 The Swiss, it was decided, would represent the U.S. government. After less than three months of negotiations and a few compromises on minor issues, the U.S. and Cuba established a bilateral reciprocal agreement on February 12, 1973 that confirmed anyone commiting a hijacking offense in the U.S. or Cuba would either be extradited or prosecuted where they were arrested. Exceptions were allowed for individuals seeking political asylum, but only if their life was in danger in their country of origin.

Also of crucial importance, the agreement stated that each country would try and severely punish any person, “who promotes, or prepares, or directs, or forms part of an expedition from its territory or any other place [that] carries out acts of violence or depredation against aircraft or vessels of any kind or registration coming from or going to the territory of the other party.” This point in particular would be a crucial bone of contention in years to come because of exile attacks against Cuban interests. The agreement was valid for five years, at which point it could be renewed, and could be cancelled by either party with six months notice. 41

By mid-1973, Nixon was already embroiled in the Watergate scandal, and negotiations with Cuba were far down on his list of priorities. However, several members of Congress, including recently defeated presidential candidate Senator George McGovern, began to advocate forcefully for a new relationship with Cuba. In March and April, the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations held hearings to reexamine U.S. policy toward Cuba. In his opening statement, committee chairman Senator Gale McGee made direct reference to progressive steps towards détente with Russia and China. “If the President can go to Peking and Moscow,” he asked, “why can he not go to Havana?”42

In response to the successful hijacking agreement or pressure from the Senate, Kissinger, now Secretary of State, cautiously decided to investigate the possibility of détente with Cuba. In June of 1974, he validated Senators Jacob Javits and Clairborne Pell for travel to Cuba.43 After spending three days there in September 1974 and meeting with the government’s top leadership, the Senators reported back to the Committee on Foreign Relations that:

—The Castro Government interpreted our trip as an opening—a positive step on the long road back to normalization of relations;

—the Cuban leaders with whom we spoke wished to leave with us the strong impression that their Government has decided to work toward normalized relations;44

Soon after the Senators departed, the Cuban government opted to release four American prisoners as “a gesture of goodwill towards the two Senators, but not towards the government of the United States.”45 Publicly, that statement sounds harsh, but the Cubans perceived Javits and Pell’s visit as a more than just the first step toward normalization of relations with the United States. Unbeknownst to almost anyone, including many in the Nixon administration and possibly Nixon himself, Kissinger sent a hand written note to Fidel Castro in June 1974 via Frank Mankiewicz, a journalist and former director for the Peace Corps in Latin America. In the note, Kissinger said he was eager to begin direct bilateral negotiations, but they would have to be done secretly through middlemen. In many ways, the use of secret notes and a journalist intermediary parallels Kennedy’s use of Lisa Howard in the 1960s. In this case, Mankiewicz served as Kissinger’s chief mode of communication with Castro for the next six months, carrying messages to the Cuban Prime Minister in October 1974 and January 1975. 46

The first secret meeting between the two countries took place on January 11, 1975 at La Guardia Airport in New York. Representing the U.S. were Mankiewicz and Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eaglebuger. Nestor García, first secretary at the Cuban UN mission, and Ramón Sánchez-Parodi, a high-ranking official in the America’s department of the Cuban Communist Party, represented the Cubans. An aide-mémoire that Eagleburger presented to the Cubans stated explicitly that the two sides were meeting to discuss options for “a more normal relationship between our two countries.”47 A memo drafted by William Rogers and presented to the Cubans by Eagleburger in the airport that day enumerated Kissinger’s approach to the secret détente effort with Cuba:

The ideological differences between us are wide. But the fact that such talks will not bridge the ideological differences does n not mean that they cannot be useful in addressing concrete issues which it is in the interest of both countries to resolve. The United States is able and willing to make progress on such issues even with socialist nations with whom we are in fundamental ideological disagreement, as the recent progress in our relations with the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China has shown.48

At that meeting, both sides agreed that many of the issues dividing the countries would take time to resolve, but decided that both Cuba and the United States should, “identify and define the issues which may be discussed, and in what order we might discuss them.” According to Eagleburger, Sánchez-Parodi told him that, in his personal opinion, the U.S. needed to lift the trade embargo before other talks could move forward. A memorandum from Rogers to Kissinger documents that U.S. interests in the negotiations included, amongst other things: compensation for the property the Cuban government expropriated form U.S. firms, the release of American citizens in jail, improvement on human rights, and the cessation of Cuba’s “mischievous involvement” in support of “terrorist insurgents” in Latin America and other parts of the world. In an interview with reporters several months beforehand, Castro had expressed his willingness to talk with Kissinger, but only if the embargo were to be lifted.49 Still, no preconditions were placed on the negotiations that took place in Laguardia.50 After the meeting was conducted, Kissinger sent another message to Castro via Mankiewicz. “The United States is taking these steps as an expression of its interest in exploring the normalization of relations,” Kissinger wrote to the Cuban head-of-state. “A further meeting of officials is now appropriate.”51 In an interview conducted around the same time, Castro told reporters he was confident the embargo would eventually be lifted, benefiting the United States.52 In March 1975, in a major policy speech in Houston, Kissinger publicly recognized the steps that had been made toward détente. “We see no virtue in perpetual antagonism between the United States and Cuba,” he stated. “We are prepared to move in a new direction if Cuba will.”53

Senator McGovern gave another boost toward improved relations between the long divorced neighboring states when he visited Cuba in early May of the same year. During his trip McGovern spent extensive amounts of time with Fidel Castro, getting to know him personally and discussing a wide range of issues regarding U.S.–Cuban relations. “Though my stay in Havana was brief, I believe it made a significant contribution to the normalization process,” McGovern declared in his report back to the Senate. “Whatever may be the case in the past, Cuba now places first priority on internal development and external détente.” In the same report, the former democratic presidential candidate made his policy position on the embargo unambiguous:

At the earliest possible moment, I believe the United States should end its embargo against Cuba, and explicitly acknowledge and interest in establishing normal diplomatic relations with the government of Prime Minister Fidel Castro…Boycotting Cuba will not resolve the historic debate between Karl Marx and John Locke any more than did ignoring China for 25 years. We have social systems which are different, but so be it; our ideologies are at odds, but that does not preclude trade and dialogue.54

According to McGovern’s description, Castro was friendly and accessible during the senator’s brief stay in Cuba. Fidel also offered a new commitment to compromise with the U.S. at a press conference toward the end of the senator’s trip, stating that Cuba was prepared to negotiate with the U.S. if the Ford administration would ease even a small part of the embargo, like the prohibition on food and medicine exports. “We would prefer the lifting of the entire embargo,” he told U.S. news reporters, “but we are talking about the need for a gesture.”55

The same day that McGovern left Cuba, Mexican Foreign Minister Emilio Rabasa announced he would set in motion actions to try to lift the multilateral trade sanctions against Cuba that had been in place through the OAS since 1964.56 In response, the key players in the Kissinger State Department met on June 9, 1975 to discuss tactics for U.S. policy towards Cuba in light of the probability that the OAS would vote to lift its multilateral embargo in the near future. At that meeting, William Rogers and Lawrence Eagleburger lobbied the Secretary of State to allow them contact the Cubans again, this time to setup a secret meeting before the upcoming meeting of the OAS in San José, Costa Rica in late July. In response, Kissinger gave them his permission to contact the Cubans. But he also gave them very specific instructions about how they should conduct their diplomatic efforts. “It is better to deal straight with Castro. Behave chivalrously; do it like a big guy, not like a shyster,” Kissinger told his negotiators. “Let him know: we are moving in a new direction; we’d like to synchronize; New York City under the UN mantle would be the place; steps will be unilateral; reciprocity is necessary.”57

At the same meeting, Kissinger also put strict limitations on diplomacy with Cuba. Towards the start of the meeting, Rogers brought up the issue of compensation for U.S. property that had been nationalized by the Cuban government, asking if it would be possible “to agree on terms to negotiate compensation and establish diplomatic relations, leaving settlement on compensation until later.” In response, Kissinger promptly replied, “No. Absolutely not. This is out of the question. It is not my style of work.”58 Later in the same conversation, Kissinger explained his tactics for dealing with congressional pressure to end the embargo.

Rogers: Our position is being continually chiseled away by Congress.

Kissinger: Don’t let them. This should be easy.

Rogers: A Kennedy bill to abolish all the sanctions could pass.

Kissinger: That would be a great one to veto.59

From Kissinger’s point of view, lifting unilateral sanctions without getting something in exchange would be against U.S. self-interest, because it would be giving up one of the United States’ key bargaining chips for free. At one point, Rogers contrasted diplomatic efforts with Cuba to the successful normalization process Kissinger had guided with China. Never slow to respond, the Secretary of State explained why his diplomatic approach to Cuba was different than his efforts at détente with the major socialist powers:

—Cuba is not important.

—I will not cater to the propensity of the Democrats to make unilateral concessions;

—Cuba can do nothing for us except to embarrass us in Latin America…60

These three points lucidly illustrate Henry Kissinger’s basic thought process regarding policy toward Cuba. First, improving relations with the island offers little benefit to U.S. self-interest. So why bother? Second, getting bullied by political opponents is not an option. Third, direct relations with Cuba should be avoided or pursued with the utmost secrecy in a limited context. Despite these drawbacks, Kissinger approved Rogers and Eagleburger’s request to send a note to the Cubans, and which they passed to Néstor García at a 9 a.m. meeting in the Washington National Airport on June 21, 1975. Their next round of talks were scheduled for July 9 in the Pierre Hotel in Manhattan because, “it could be entered without going past the desk.” 61

During those secret negotiations, Eagleburger, Rogers, Sánchez-Parodi and García discussed with guarded optimism “a series of ideas for a reciprocal, across-the-board improvement of relations.”62 For their part, the U.S. would vote in favor of lifting multilateral OAS sanctions against Cuba. In turn, it was suggested that the Cubans might allow family visits from Cuban-Americans.63 As James Blight and Peter Kornbluh write, “Hostility toward Cuba was not a ‘permanent and organic element’ of US foreign Policy, Rogers and Eagleburger said; if the Castro government manifested ‘respect and mutual regard for other nations’—i.e., stopped supporting leftist insurgencies in Latin America—and took steps on human rights and other outstanding issues, diplomatic ties could be normalized.”64 The Cubans complained that the meeting was too short and was dominated by U.S. proposals, but both sides agreed to meet again in a few weeks.65

On July 29, 1975, the OAS voted by 16 to 3 to lift multilateral sanctions on trade and consular relations with Cuba. That meant that each OAS member state was “free to normalize or carry on relations with the Republic of Cuba at the level and in the form that each state deems fit.”66 On August 9, the Cuban government returned $2 million in ransom money that had been taken from the U.S. to Cuba in a hijacked plane. John Sparkman, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called the move “solid evidence that the Cuban government is genuinely interested in pursuing a policy of improved relations with the United States.”67 Around the same time, the State Department publicly announced that it was interested in entering “serious discussion” with Cuba about a negotiated rapprochement.68

Soon after Castro returned the $2 million in hijacked cash, Kissinger sent a memo to President Ford to advocate for a limited relaxation of the United States’ own sanctions against Cuba. In light of the removal of multilateral restrictions against Cuba by OAS member states, “the political and legal justification for our sanctions against those countries deciding to trade with Cuba has been removed” Kissinger told the President.69 He proposed that the United States lift its restrictions on third countries trading with Cuba by granting licenses for many U.S. subsidiaries abroad to trade with Cuba; lifting the ban on foreign assistance to countries that do business with the island; and allowing ships that have been to Cuban ports to refuel in U.S. harbors. In Kissinger’s own words, “these steps will be recognized by Castro and will put the onus on him to take the next conciliatory gestures towards us. Our purely bilateral sanctions would be left intact.” 70 On the back of the memorandum, Ford initialed his approval, and a National Security Memorandum three weeks later confirmed Kissinger’s recommendations as official (albeit confidential) policy.71

All of these events represented significant progress towards détente with Cuba. At the time, many people—including Fidel Castro, officials in the State Department and several U.S. Senators—were hopeful that the gradually improving relationship between the countries would lead to normalized relations and an end to the bilateral embargo against Cuba put into place by JFK in 1962. Several factors had a profound impact on the impetus towards a more symbiotic U.S.–Cuban relationship, including the overall climate of détente, the vote to lift the OAS‘s multilateral sanctions against Cuba, and the efforts by Castro and Congress to forge a more constructive rapport. However, relations between the two countries returned to their pattern of hostility within a few short months. What happened?

In this case, the conflict was centered primarily on a foreign policy clash almost halfway across the world. For over a decade, Angola head been enmeshed in a war of independence against Portugal, which was holding on to its African colonies by a thread through brutal repression. The independence movement was split into three camps which often clashed violently with one another. In early 1975, the warring factions signed a treaty with each other and Portugal, and a date for official independence was set for the end of the year.

At an NSC meeting in June 1975, Kissinger expressed concern that the Soviet Union was investing weapons and equipment in the MPLA, an Angolan faction with communist roots headed by poet and freedom fighter Augustino Neto. At that same meeting, President Ford told the council, “It seems to me that doing nothing is unacceptable. As for diplomatic efforts, it is naïve to think that’s going to happen.” For his part, Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger painted the African country as the new central front in the Cold War, suggesting that, “we might wish to encourage the disintegration of Angola.”72

On August 9, 1975, South African forces invaded Angola with quiet encouragement from the U.S. and clandestine support from the CIA.73 As a result, the MPLA requested Cuban assistance, and Cuban Major Raúl Diaz Arguelles wrote a memo to Raúl Castro from Angola on August 11 in which he reported giving $100,000 to the MPLA and advised Castro that, “we should help them directly or indirectly to resolve this situation.”74 The very next day, Rogers told Kissinger that Cuban involvement in Angola was “obscene,” and recommended that the U.S. denounce it publicly. “I think the Cubans ought to be called on it,” he told the Secretary of State. “I can’t see any reason not to. It is an extraordinary violation of international law.”75

By December 1975, Cuba had a large deployment of combat troops in Angola armed with heavy Soviet weapons. In response, President Ford announced publicly that any moves toward détente with Cuba were off. “There are between 4,000 and 6,000 Cuban combat military personnel in Angola,” Ford told reporters at a press conference on December 20. “The action of the Cuban Government to involve itself in a massive military way in Angola with combat troops ends, as far as I am concerned, any efforts at all to have friendlier relations with the government of Cuba.”76 Ford claimed Cuba was illegally intervening in Angola, however, in a book about the U.S., Cuba, and Africa, Piero Gleijeses writes that, “Castro decided to send combat troops to Angola on November 4, 1975, in response to the South African invasion of that country, rather than vice versa as the Ford administration persistently claimed.”77 A thorough analysis of declassified documents seems to support Gleijeses’ position, despite the fact that Kissinger claims otherwise in his memoirs.

By April 1976, relations between the U.S. and Cuba had devolved into the familiar arrangement of distrust accompanied by a lack of communication and the rhetoric of accusation. In his speech at the annual celebration of the Cuban victory at Playa Girón (aka the Bay of Pigs), Castro said, “Angola constitutes an African Girón for the Yankee imperialists.” He went on to make his case against U.S. involvement in the west African country, declaring that the United States had invested tens of millions of dollars in arms shipments and instigated invasions into Angola from Zaire and South Africa before a single Cuban combat instructor arrived to the country.78 In that speech, Castro went on to antagonize the U.S. President and his Secretary of State by name. “Ford and Kissinger lie to the United States people, and especially to the black population of the country, when they hide the fact that fascist and racist troops from South Africa criminally invaded Angolan territory well before Cuba sent any regular unit of soldiers there,” Castro asserted with vehemence. “Ford and Kissinger lie to the American people and to world opinion when they try to hold the Soviet Union responsible for Cuban solidarity actions in Angola.”79

To make matters worse, the 1970s were years of intense paramilitary attacks against Cuba by exiles living in the United States. The situation came to a head on October 6, 1976, when a bomb exploded on a Cubana Airlines plane that was flying to Havana from Barbados. All 73 passengers on the plane were killed, including the Cuban National Fencing Team, who had just won gold medals at the Central American and Caribbean Fencing Championships. A week later, two Cuban exiles with ties to the CIA, Orlando Bosch and Luís Posada Carriles, as well as two Venezuelans, Freddy Lugo and Hernán Ricardo Losano, were arrested in Venezuela in association with the terrorist bombing.80 Documents released in 1997 show that the CIA had intelligence from as early as June 1976 of Bosch and Carriles’ plans to blow up a Cubana airliner, yet made no efforts to stop them.81

In response to the tragedy, Castro gave a major speech in Havana on October 15, 1976, in which he detailed a long list of violent attacks against Cuba during that year.” In the end of his speech, Castro announced that such terrorist activity against Cuba made it impossible to maintain the anti-hijacking treaty that had been negotiated during Nixon’s first term as President:

The agreement signed between the governments of the United Stated and Cuba on February 15, 1973, cannot survive this brutal crime. The Cuban government finds it necessary to cancel it and will there so inform the United States government this afternoon…We will not again sign any such agreement with the United States until the terrorist campaign unleashed against Cuba is definitively terminated, effective guarantees are made to our people and there is a final end to United States acts of hostility and aggression against Cuba. There can be no collaboration of any kind between an aggressor country and a country under attack. 82

By the end of Ford’s term in office, then, relations with Cuba had come full-swing. Through a painstaking process of secret notes, negotiations and friendly gestures, both countries had made advances towards détente. They had even taken tangible steps toward improving relations, like the lifting of third country sanctions against Cuba and the release of hijacked money and political prisoners. But nearly all their efforts had deteriorated or been reversed by late 1976, and Jimmy Carter inherited a hostile relationship with Cuba when he took office the next year.

Why did the process of rapprochement fall apart so rapidly? A glance back at the four principle reasons for failed U.S.–Cuban negotiations that I discussed at the start of this paper is informative. First, both sides often indicated a degree of inflexibility with regard to the diplomatic process. Kissinger made clear before the OAS lifted sanctions against Cuba that he would not consider normalizing relations as a step to negotiating compensation for U.S. firms that lost property to nationalization. He also declared that an effort by Congress to lift the embargo would be vetoed. At times, Castro seemed ready to negotiate a compromise to resolve the countries conflicts, but the White House remained hesitant.

Second, electoral concerns almost surely affected the diplomacy process by putting pressure on Nixon and Ford to keep direct negotiations strictly secret. According to Sánchez-Parodi, Ford was forced to take a hard-line anti-Castro stance because of his contest with Ronald Reagan in the 1976 Florida primary. “The main reason [for failed diplomacy with Ford], we have always believed, was the fear that if secret talks were revealed during the election campaign, Ford would have been severely damaged,” the Cuban negotiator said.83

Third, Cuba’s interventionist foreign policy in Africa clashed with U.S. foreign policy interests and amplified fears of a Soviet attempt to shift the global balance of power. Granted, several documents appear to show that the U.S. supported multiple invasions of Angola before Cuban forces arrived. Moreover, Castro sent troops at the request of Agostinho Neto, which he argued was not an intervention but a responsible and legal effort to support a sovereign government under threat from external aggression. Regardless of its motivation, Cuba’s deployment of Combat troops in Angola surely made negotiations with the U.S. more difficult, if not impossible. As usual, anti-American rhetoric employed by Castro in many of his public speeches did not help smooth the process during moments of strain. As a result, most Cuban proposals for improving relations were viewed as half-hearted and deceitful, and were therefore ultimately dismissed or rejected.

Finally, motions toward conciliation made by the Nixon and Ford administrations were ultimately accompanied by contradictory policies that were either openly hostile or interpreted as such. While demanding a noninterventionist foreign policy from Cuba, Ford promoted aggression against Angola through some of the United States most unsavory allies. Moreover, the U.S. negotiated an anti-hijacking agreement with Cuba that explicitly encompassed any acts of violence against vessels of any type going to or from the island, but the Nixon/Ford administrations did very little to control Cuban exile terrorist groups perpetrating acts of violence against the Cuba. These contradictions between diplomatic overtures and aggressive hard-line tactics generally made rapprochement unrealistic and contributed greatly to successfully improve U.S.–Cuban relations.

The four factors described above have shown themselves to be recurrent in the administrations that followed Kissinger’s tenure at the State Department. In concluding, I contend that these factors—and the ability to evolve beyond them—will be critical in shaping the course of direct negotiations and U.S.–Cuban relations during the Presidency of Barack Obama.

Conclusion

As I have argued, direct negotiations between the United States and Cuba from JFK to Ford never led to a significant long-term improvement in bilateral relations for four reasons: inflexible and unreasonable diplomatic demands, domestic political pressure towards hard-line tactics, interventionist foreign policy, and contradictory demands and actions during the negotiating process. If Barack Obama hopes to significantly improve U.S.–Cuban relations through diplomacy, he will have to avoid the pitfalls of the past. Certainly, the contemporary world stage is drastically different than the situation Kennedy and Kissinger confronted. But is Obama’s proposed relationship with Cuba substantively dissimilar from that of his Cold War predecessors? Documents from the Obama presidential campaign offers some clues.

A publication on foreign policy called the “Obama-Biden Plan,” states that Obama will start a “new chapter of engagement” throughout the western hemisphere. “In the case of Cuba,” the plan states, “he will also send an important message: if a post-Fidel government takes significant steps toward democracy, beginning with freedom for all political prisoners, the U.S. is prepared to take steps to normalize relations and ease the embargo that has governed relations between our countries for the last five decades.”84

As a tangible move towards détente, his campaign stated that upon taking office, “Obama will grant Cuban-Americans unrestricted rights to visit family and send remittances to the island.” The same document makes reference to a speech Obama gave on May 23, 2008 about his proposed policy toward Latin America, quoting him as saying:

My policy will be guided by the simply principle that what’s good for the people of the America’s is good for the United States. That means measuring success not just through agreements among governments, but also through the hopes of the child in the favelas of Rio, the security for the policeman in Mexico City, and the shrinking of distance between Miami and Havana. 85

All of these statements by the Obama campaign seem to indicate an opening in U.S. diplomatic relations with Cuba. Indeed, relations under George W. Bush have been characterized by a total refusal to negotiate and an active policy of promoting regime change.86 However, some of the familiar themes that scuttled diplomatic efforts in the past are evident in Obama’s proposals his foreign policy towards Cuba. In fact, looking at the actual speech that Obama’s campaign materials quote above reveals an immediate contradiction in his statements on Cuba. Instead of closing his sentence with a calling for a closer relationship between Florida and Cuba, as he was quoted by his own campaign, Obama actually said he will measure the success of his foreign policy through, “the answered cries of political prisoners heard from jails in Havana.”87 Already, then, we can see that Obama is capable of sending contradictory messages to Cuba in a similar fashion to JFK and Kissinger.

It is not a coincidence that Obama was speaking at the annual Cuban American National Foundation (CANF) Cuban Independence Day luncheon in Miami. CANF has long been known as one of the most hard-line and hard-hitting Cuban émigré political organizations. Jorge Más Canosa, the organizations deceased founder and long-time leader, is known to have funded terrorist actions by the same that bombed the Cubana Airlines plane in 1976.88 Thus, Obama’s contradiction in terms seems to be motivated by electoral concerns that exert pressure for continued hard-line policies against the Cuban government. Many argue that anti-Castro sentiment is not as prominent in Miami as it was thirty years ago. Still, Obama’s odds of significantly improving relations with Cuba are slim if he is strongly swayed by Cuban-American lobbyist groups like CANF.

A fact sheet on Obama’s proposals for Latin American policy summarizes his three key goals in the region: to increase democracy and political freedom; to address common threats like drug trafficking, transnational gangs and terrorism; and to combat poverty, hunger, health problems and global warming.89 Turning specifically to Cuba, the campaign announces its goal is to “advance the cause of freedom and democracy in Cuba.” While Obama’s proposal calls for “a stable and peaceful transition,” it makes clear where its priorities lie, declaring that, “a democratic opening in Cuba is, and should be, the foremost objective of our policy.”90

No doubt, Obama is a far cry from George W. Bush, but his use of easily pliable terms like “freedom” and “democracy” is a continuation of the rhetoric Bush employed to justify his doctrine of preemptive intervention in defense U.S. interests. Obama’s insistence on both terms also indicates his intention to promote, and perhaps demand, fundamental changes to Cuba’s internal political affairs as necessary conditions for improving diplomatic relations with the United States. In his speech in Miami, the Senator from Illinois made these themes even more prominent in his basic approach to U.S.–Cuban relations. “My policy toward Cuba will be guided by one word: Libertad,” he told his audience. “And the road to freedom for all Cubans must begin with justice for Cuba’s political prisoners, the rights of free speech, a free press and freedom of assembly; and it must lead to elections that are free and fair.”91

Since Cuba has historically always rejected similar proposals from the U.S., this does not bode well for attempts to reach a meaningful rapprochement. Moreover, direct elections for all levels of parliament have been held in Cuba since the early 1990s, so it might be interpreted that Obama’s call for free and fair elections is tantamount to demanding Cuba give up its one party system. As evidenced in this essay, the Cuban government does not find such a demand to be acceptable under any circumstances.

Moreover, looking at Barack Obama’s laundry list of steps on the “road to freedom” gives one the impression that his stated willingness to negotiate without conditions may be ephemeral beyond the realm of semantics. At one point in his speech, he states explicitly that, “I will maintain the embargo,” since it provides the United States with leverage to demand changes in Cuba in exchange for improved relations.92 In historical context, it is clear that Barack Obama’s policy proposals toward Cuba reproduce many of the factors that led to failed negotiations under JFK and later Nixon and Ford.

Still there are number of trends that could lead to a different outcome than previous diplomatic efforts. For one, the Cold War is definitively over and Cuba no longer has a strong relationship with a threatening world super power. It does have healthy relations with China and a strong alliance with Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, but neither of these relationships has the implications of Cuba’s connection with the Soviet Union prior to 1990. Furthermore, Cuba’s economic situation since the collapse of the Soviet Bloc and its rejection of a militant internationalist foreign policy make the island drastically less threatening than thirty years ago. Finally, Congress is expected to pass legislation in 2009 that will open travel to Cuba to U.S. citizens, and such measures are being supported by incoming White House Chief Rahm Emanuel.93

If Obama opts to negotiate directly with the Cuban government to improve relations, he is in a unique position to do so. While his remarks before CANF during the presidential campaign are reminiscent of failed diplomatic efforts toward Cuba in the previous years, it remains to be seen what direction President Obama will take with regard to Cuba. However, one thing is certain: if Obama does decide to work towards normalizing relations with Cuba, he will only succeed if he learns from the past and avoids the patterns of enmity that incapacitated steps towards rapprochement between the United States and Cuba during the Cold War.

Notes:
[1] Sean Penn, “Mountain of Snakes Part II,” The Huffington Post, Nov. 30, 2008. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sean-penn/mountain-of-snakes-part-i_b_147239.html

[2] Dwight Eisenhower, “Statement by the President on Terminating Diplomatic Relations with Cuba.” January, 3, 1961. The American Presidency Project [online]. Santa Barbara, CA: University of California (hosted), Gerhard Peters (database). Available from World Wide Web: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=12048.

[3] Jane Franklin, Cuba and the United States: A Chronological History, Australia: Ocean Press, 1997, pp. 24.

[4] “Records of a White House Meeting on January, 19, 1961, Between President Dwight D. Eisenhower, President-elect John F. Kennedy, and Their Chief Advisers.” The Kennedys and Cuba: The Declassified Documentary History, Mark J. White (Ed.), Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 1999, pp. 15.

[5] John F. Kennedy, “The President’s News Conference,” January 25, 1961. The American Presidency Project [online]. Santa Barbara, CA: University of California (hosted), Gerhard Peters (database). Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=8533.

[6] “Memorandum from Assistant Special Counsel Richard N. Goodwin to President Kennedy,” August 22, 1961. The Kennedys and Cuba: The Declassified Documentary History, Mark J. White (Ed.), Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 1999, pp. 63.

[7] “Memorandum from Assistant Special Council Goodwin to President Kennedy,” September 1, 1961. The Kennedys and Cuba: The Declassified Documentary History, Mark J. White (Ed.), Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 1999, pp. 65.

[8]John F. Kenney, “Proclamation 3447 – Embargo on All Trade with Cuba,” February 3, 1962. The American Presidency Project [online]. Santa Barbara, CA: University of California (hosted), Gerhard Peters (database). http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=58824.

[9] Peter Kornbluh, “JFK & Castro: The Secret Quest for Accommodation,” Cigar Aficionado, September/October 1999. http://www.cigaraficionado.com/Cigar/CA_Archives/CA_Show_Article/0,2322,320,00.html.

[10] Gordon Chase, “Mr. Donovan’s Trip to Cuba,” White House Memorandum for the Record, Top Secret, March 4, 1963. Kennedy & Castro: The Secret History. The National Security Archive. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[11] Gordon Chase, “Cuba—Policy,” White House memorandum, Top Secret, April 11, 1963. Kennedy & Castro: The Secret History. The National Security Archive. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[12] Richard Helms, “Interview of U.S. Newswoman with Fidel Castro Indicating Possible Interest in Rapprochement with the United States,” CIA briefing paper, Secret, May 1, 1963. Kennedy & Castro: The Secret History. The National Security Archive. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[13]William Attwood, “Chronology of events leading up to Castro’s invitation to receive a U.S. official for talks in Cuba,” U.S. UN Mission memorandum, Secret, November 8, 1963. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[14] Ibid.

[15] Oval Office audio tape, November 5, 1963. Kennedy & Castro: The Secret History. The National Security Archive. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[16] William Attwood, “Chronology of events leading up to Castro’s invitation to receive a U.S. official for talks in Cuba,” U.S. UN Mission memorandum, Secret, November 22, 1963. Kennedy & Castro: The Secret History. The National Security Archive. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[17] Jean Daniel, “When Castro Heard the News,” The New Republic, December 7, 1963, pp. 7-9.

[18] Jean Daniel, “Unofficial Envoy: An Historic Report from Two Capitols,” The New Republic, December 14, 1963, pp. 15-20.

[19] Gordon Chase, “Cuba—Item of Presidential Interest,” White House memorandum, Top Secret, November 25, 1963. Kennedy & Castro: The Secret History. The National Security Archive. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[20] Message from Fidel Castro given to Lyndon Johnson, “Verbal Message given to Miss Lisa Howard of ABC News on February 12, 1964, in Havana, Cuba.” Kennedy & Castro: The Secret History. The National Security Archive. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[21] Gordon Chase, “Adlai Stevenson and Lisa Howard,” White House memorandum, Top Secret, July 7, 1964. Kennedy & Castro: The Secret History. The National Security Archive. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB103/index.htm.

[22] “Transcript of Proceedings between Cuban Officials and JFK Historians, Tape 2 of 8,” Nassau Beach Hotel, December 7, 1995. Available from the World Wide Web: http://cuban-exile.com/doc_026-050/doc0027-2.html.

[23] Robert F. Kennedy, “Re: Travel to Cuba,” Department of Justice, Office of the Attorney General, Memorandum for Honorable Dean Rusk, Secretary of State, December 12, 1963. Robert F. Kennedy Urged Lifting the Travel Ban to Cuba in ’63. The National Security Archive. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB158/index.htm.

[24] Abba Schwartz and Abram Chayes, “Travel Regulations,” State Department Memorandum for the Acting Secretary, December 13, 1963. Robert F. Kennedy Urged Lifting the Travel Ban to Cuba in ’63. The National Security Archive. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB158/index.htm.

[25] Gordon Chase, “Travel Controls—Cuba,” National Security Council Memorandum for Mr. Bundy, December 18, 1963. Robert F. Kennedy Urged Lifting the Travel Ban to Cuba in ’63. The National Security Archive. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB158/index.htm.

[26] McGeorge Bundy, “Student Travel to Cuba,” National Security Council Memorandum for the President, May 21, 1964. Robert F. Kennedy Urged Lifting the Travel Ban to Cuba in ’63. The National Security Archive. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB158/index.htm.

[27] Jane Franklin, Cuba and the United States: A Chronological History, Australia: Ocean Press, 1997, pp. 74.

[28] Lyndon B. Johnson, “Statement by the President Upon Signing Bill Relating to Claims of U.S. Nationals Against the Government of Cuba,” October 17, 1964. The American Presidency Project [online]. Santa Barbara, CA: University of California (hosted), Gerhard Peters (database). http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=26625.

[29] Philip Brenner, From Confrontation to Negotiation: U.S. Relations with Cuba, Boulder: Westview Press, 1988, pp. 17.

[30] Henry Kissinger, “United States Policy Toward Cuba,” National Security Study Memorandum 32, National Security Council, March 21, 1969.

[31] Jeanne W. Davis, “Minutes of Review Group Meeting on Cuba, Thursday, September 23,” Nation Security Council Memorandum for Mr. Kissinger, October 4, 1969.

[32] Henry Kissinger, “Review of U.S. Policy in the Caribbean Area,” National Security Study Memorandum 117, National Security Council, February 16, 1971.

[33] William Rogers, “Hijacking of Aircraft,” Secretary of State Memorandum for the President, February 6, 1969.

[34] Viron P. Vaky, “Cuba’s New Anti-Hijacking Law—A Significant Development,” White House Memorandum for Dr. Kissinger, September 23, 1969.

[35] William Rogers, “Cuban Hijacking Decree,” Secretary of State Memorandum for the President, October 31, 1969.

[36] Henry Kissinger, “Note to Cuban Government on Hijacking,” White House Memorandum for the President, November 12, 1969. Nixon’s initials and a stamp dated November 13, 1969 are visible on the last page.

[37] See for example, “U.S. Reply to Cuban response to U.S. proposal for anti-hijacking agreement,” Department of State telegram to American Embassy in Bern, sent June 19, 1970.

[38] “Proposed Hijacking Agreement with Cuba,” Department of State telegram to American Embassy in Bern, sent December 28, 1970.

[39] “Message from State Department to Amb. Masnata,” November 16, 1972.

[40] “Translation of Cuban Government Note to Swiss Embassy Havana,” November 19, 1972.

[41] Serban Vallimarescu, “Hijacking Agreement with Cuba,” National Security Council Memorandum for General Snowcroft, February 13, 1973.

[42]Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere Affairs of the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, “A Reexamination of U.S. Policy Toward Cuba,” Ninety Third Congress, First Session, March 26 and April 18, 1973. Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1974.

[43] Philip Brenner, From Confrontation to Negotiation: U.S. Relations with Cuba, Boulder: Westview Press, 1988, pp. 18.

[44] Senator Jacob K. Javits and Senator Clairborne Pell, “The United States and Cuba: A Propitious Moment: A Report their Trip to Cuba September 27-30, 1974,” Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, Ninety Third Congress, Second Session. Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, October 1974, pp. 1.

[45] Ibid, pp. 13.

[46] James Blight and Peter Kornbluh, “Dialogue with Castor: A Hidden History,” The New York Review of Books 41 (16) October 6, 1994.

[47] Ibid.

[48] Ibid.

[49] “Castro: Will Talk with Kissinger if Congress Lifts the Blockade,” Paris AFP, July 3, 1974. Available from the World Wide Web at the Lanic Castro Speech Data Base, http://www1.lanic.utexas.edu/project/castro/db/1974/19740703.htm.

[50] James Blight and Peter Kornbluh, “Dialogue with Castor: A Hidden History,” The New York Review of Books 41 (16) October 6, 1994.

[51] Ibid.

[52] “Castro Sees the Blockade Eventually Lifting, Benefiting the U.S.,” Buenos Aires LATIN, January 1, 1975. Available from the World Wide Web at the Lanic Castro Speech Data Base, http://www1.lanic.utexas.edu/project/castro/db/1975/19750104.htm.

[53] “Towards Improved United States—Cuba Relations,” Report of a special study mission to Cuba, February 10-15, 1977, House of Representative, Ninety Fifth Congress, First Session, May 23, 1977. Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1977.

[54] George McGovern, “Cuban Realities: May 1975,” A Report to the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, Ninety Fourth Congress, First Session, August, 1975. Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1975.

[55] “Towards Improved United States—Cuba Relations,” Report of a special study mission to Cuba, February 10-15, 1977, House of Representative, Ninety Fifth Congress, First Session, May 23, 1977. Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1977, pp. 70.

[56] Ibid.

[57] “Cuba Policy: Tactics Before and After San Jose,” Department of State, Memorandum of Conversation, Secret/NODIS, June 9, 1975, pp.5-6.

[58] Ibid, pp. 1.

[59] Ibid, pp. 4.

[60] Ibid, pp. 3.

[61] James Blight and Peter Kornbluh, “Dialogue with Castor: A Hidden History,” The New York Review of Books 41 (16) October 6, 1994.

[62] Ibid.

[63] Ibid.

[64] Ibid.

[65] Ibid.

[66] Jane Franklin, Cuba and the United States: A Chronological History, Australia: Ocean Press, 1997, pp. 118.

[67] James Blight and Peter Kornbluh, “Dialogue with Castor: A Hidden History,” The New York Review of Books 41 (16) October 6, 1994.

[68] Ibid.

[69] Henry Kissinger, “Third Country Sanctions against Cuba,” White House Memorandum for the President, August 19, 1975, pp.1-2.

[70] Henry Kissinger, “Third Country Sanctions against Cuba,” White House Memorandum for the President, August 19, 1975, pp.2-3.

[71] “Termination of U.S. Restrictions on Third Countries Trading with Cuba,” National Security Decision Memorandum 305, September 15, 1975.

[72] “Angola,” National Security Council Meeting Minutes, June, 27, 1975. Document obtained from Gerald Ford Library, NSC Meetings File, Box 2. Conflicting Missions: Secret Documents on History of African Involvement, The National Security Archive. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB67/index2.html.

[73] Wayne Smith, The Closes of Enemies: A Personal and Diplomatic Account of U.S.–Cuban Relations since 1957, New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1987, pp.96.

[74] Raúl Díaz Arguelles, “Informe sobre visita a Angola,” Memorandum to Major Raúl Castro Ruz, August 11, 1975. Document from the Centro de Información de la Defensa de las Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias, CIDFAR. Conflicting Missions: Secret Documents on History of African Involvement, The National Security Archive, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB67/index2.html.

[75] “The Secretary’s 8:00 A.M. Staff Meeting,” Secretary of State, November 5, 1975.

[76] Gerald Ford, “The President’s News Conference,” December 20, 1975. The American Presidency Project [online]. Santa Barbara, CA: University of California (hosted), Gerhard Peters (database). Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=5448.

[77] Piero Gleijeses, Conflicting Missions: Havana, Washington, and Africa, 1959-1976, Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2002.

[78] Fidel Castro, “Discurso Pronunciado por el Presidente de la República de Cuba, en el Acto Central por el XV Aniversario de la Victoria de Girón y la Proclamación Socialista de Nuestra Revolución, Celebrado en el Teatro ‘Carlos Marx, Años del XX Aniversario del Granma,’” April 19, 1976. Deparamiento de Versiones Taquigráficas del Gobierno Revolucionário. http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/1976/esp/f190476e.html.

[79] Ibid.

[80] Franklin, Cuba and the United States: A Chronological History, Australia: Ocean Press, 1997, pp. 128.

[81] “Possible Plans of Cuban Exile Extremists to Blow Up a Cubana Airliner,” CIA Report, June 22, 1976. Luis Posada Carriles: The Declassified Record, The National Security Archive. Availabe from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/index.htm.

[82] Fidel Castro, “Speech by the President of the Council of State and Council of Ministers at the Memorial Service for the Victims of the Cubana Airlines Plane Destroyed in Flight on October 6, Given in the Revolution Square, Havana,” October 15, 1976. http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/1976/ing/f151076i.html.

[83] James Blight and Peter Kornbluh, “Dialogue with Castor: A Hidden History,” The New York Review of Books 41 (16) October 6, 1994.

[84] “Barack Obama and Joe Biden’s Plan to Secure America and Restore our Standing: The Obama-Biden Plan.” Paid for by Obama for America. http://origin.barackobama.com/issues/foreign_policy/#onlatinamerica.

[85] “Rewriting U.S. Leadership in the Americas.” Paid for by Obama for America. http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/Fact_Sheet_Latin_America_FINAL_060608_IH.pdf.

[86] For more on the Bush administration’s plan to promote a change of government in Cuba, see: “Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba,” Reports to the President, May 2004 and July 2006. http://www.cafc.gov.

[87] Barack Obama, “Renewing U.S. Leadership in the Americas,” remarks given at the annual Cuban American National Foundation Cuban Independence Day Luncheon, May 23, 2008. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.barackobama.com/2008/05/23/remarks_of_senator_barack_obam_68.php.

[88] "Luis Posada Carriles," FBI, July 7, 1965 and "Cuban Representation in Exile (RECE)," FBI, July 13, 1965. Luis Posada Carriles: The Declassified Record, The National Security Archive. Availabe from the World Wide Web: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/index.htm.

[89] Rewriting U.S. Leadership in the Americas.” Paid for by Obama for America. http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/Fact_Sheet_Latin_America_FINAL_060608_IH.pdf.

[90] Ibid.

[91] Barack Obama, “Renewing U.S. Leadership in the Americas,” remarks given at the annual Cuban American National Foundation Cuban Independence Day Luncheon, May 23, 2008. Available from the World Wide Web: http://www.barackobama.com/2008/05/23/remarks_of_senator_barack_obam_68.php.

[92] Ibid.

[93] Tim Ashby, “Cuba/US: Relations Under Obama,” World Association of International Studies, Stanford University, CA – PAX et LUX, December 3, 2008. http://cgi.stanford.edu/group/wais/cgi-bin/?p=23953.

Racial Inequality in Socialism

2009-02-02T02:13:00.004-05:00

The leveling of society did not eradicate socioeconomic disparities that correlate highly with pigmentation.

"...on average, the black population has worse housing, receives less money in remittances from abroad and has less access to jobs in emerging economic sectors like tourism, in which blacks represent barely five percent of managers and professionals, than the white population."

A documentary maker said "So far, racism has only been talked about in academia, among intellectuals. I think there should be an open, public discussion, even in parliament."

It is preposterous to claim that regular working class Cubans do not discuss matters of race. Racism and lack of opportunities due to pigmentation are discussed frequently by most segments of Cuban society.

There is even a gesture to indicate that somebody is black: rubbing one's forearm. Such a gesticulation is generally incorporated into a statement that are--even if implicitly--racist and derogatory.

Cuba Libre: Open Air Freestyle & Rum

2009-01-30T02:45:00.004-05:00

Cola Loca, the most popular pop rap duo in Cuba right now, gets drunk, clowns and raps for your voyeuristic enjoyment.

First Daughter Spits Game

2009-01-30T02:21:00.004-05:00

An interview with Mariela Castro, daughter of Cuban President Raul Castro and deceased President of the Federation of Cuban Women Vilma Espin. She is an activist for gender and sexual orientation rights.

"Yes, he is supportive of my work thanks to the positive influence of my mother on his sexual education."

Tip of the hat to Latin American News Review.

Cola Loca--crazy queue, wild tail, dyslexic soft drink, or silly reguetoneros?

2009-01-27T15:21:00.004-05:00

This is the jam of the moment on the streets of Havana. Catchy and hilarious. The whole island is chanting "No me da mi gana americana". Watch the video to the end--comiquísimo!

Cell phone activation cheaper by half

2008-12-14T04:31:00.006-05:00

As announced in Granma, the cost to activate a cellphone has dropped from $120 to $65.

With phone in hand, one can purchase prepaid cards that deplete by minute used.

Since the cost of a call is about $0.30/minute, most Cubans that own cellphones use them as pagers--noting the incoming number and calling back on a land line.

Most cellphone owners are city dwellers--predominantly in Havana.

It still can take years to have a land line installed in one's home--and one's place in the waiting list is secured through one's workplace.

Apparently, this slashing of activation rates--which will grow clientele--is prospectively good for business.

Signs of Revolution

2008-12-11T20:30:00.003-05:00

“And just when they seem engaged in revolutionizing themselves and things, in creating something that has never yet existed, precisely in such periods of revolutionary crisis they anxiously conjure up the spirits of the past to their service and borrow from them names, battle cries and costumes in order to present the new scene of world history in this time-honored disguise and this borrowed language.” --Karl Marx, "The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte", 1852.

Billboards

Citizens in Concert

2008-12-09T20:04:00.005-05:00

To commemorate the 50th anniverary of the Cuban Revolution, top musical groups will play free open air concerts and there will be other music and dance opportunities across the capitol and the wider island. This is common for holidays such as 1 January or 26 July--but this year will probably be more spectacular than usual--if the state budget allows.

Chéoreographic!

2008-12-09T02:57:00.004-05:00

Now showing in Cuban theaters.

Putting the Lager in Bloggers since 2008

2008-12-06T01:53:00.004-05:00

Only built for Cuban links.

Can haz traid relashunz?

2008-12-05T11:53:00.005-05:00

The X-Man met Castro.
Which caused Republicans to exit from the Hispanic Caucus.
Which may have contributed to the vast Democratic gains among Hispanics (after the immigration issue, of course).
Now Obama has chosen the X-Man as lead trade negotiator.
Just saying.

Buff Dude + State Loans + Abandoned Land --> Feed Capitol's Development

2008-12-05T04:29:00.006-05:00

"Estoy pegado a la tierra desde niño y aquí seguiré, con mi modesto aporte, para que La Habana pueda responder a los programas de desarrollo que tiene en marcha".

To experienced and capable farmers, the Cuban state is providing the use of forsaken land as well as credits for tools, fertilizer, and seed. The goal is to make efficient use of those willing and talented enough to raise a multitude of crops; to attain economies of scale instead of limiting productive agriculturalists to their original small plot, Soviet tractors, and grunting oxen.

The epigraphic farmer's quote reveals that the rural folks shall grow the crops that feed Havana, as it develops its industrial, medical, scientific, and human capital.

The metropolitan dwellers will have an outstanding debt to their rural compatriots for the foreseeable future.

Generation Why...would I get married if I cant own stuff?

2008-12-02T02:07:00.003-05:00

The mainstream global establishment, in search of a courageous hero that does not challenge its core values, continues to heap praise on a Cuban blogger who constantly bemoans and decries the society she finds herself in. She is the perfect cyber-underdog--a dissident who celebrates capitalism. Where else could you find such a combination?

In one of this material girl's latest entries, she says its no use getting married anymore because there is little to no private property for which to enter into the contract.

Capitalist agitators say the damnedest things.

Industrial Layoff

2008-11-28T16:07:00.003-05:00

The Industriales have cut their top pitcher and best hitter.

There will be no other topic of conversation in Havana this weekend but this baseball intrigue.

[Update--This happened last week.]

Land Reform Redux

2008-11-28T15:45:00.003-05:00

The hurricanes have delayed but not terminated the redistribution of idle or inefficiently used state lands to small farmers and private cooperatives that will have usufruct rights to cultivate for decade-long stints.

Eighty thousand applicants have requested land thus far in a program that could be the largest redistribution of land since the 1960s.

Prior to this reform Cuba had a quarter million family farms and over a thousand private cooperatives.

Sectoral Hypoglycemia

2008-11-28T04:23:00.003-05:00

The island formerly ruled by sugar barons continues to diverge from its roots as an azucracia. Much land controlled by the Ministry of Sugar is being transferred to the auspices of the Ministry of Agriculture. At the risk of sacrificing a source of foreign currency, this move likely intends to bolster Cuba's drive toward food security.

I Am (Uncle) Sam meets Yo Sí Puedo

2008-11-28T03:21:00.002-05:00

A great gringo actor does mediocre journalism with Hugo Chávez & Raul Castro--but gets inadvertent scoop that Cuban president considers Guantanamo Bay a "neutral place".

Why would Raul Castro propose Guantanamo Bay as a neutral locale to meet with Obama?

Doesnt Cuba maintain claims of full legal possession of the entire island?

It seems to me that implying Guantanamo as neutral is tantamount to conceding Cuba's sovereign right to the area and saying its OK for the US military to continue to occupy it.

Explanation eludes.

Grassroots call for single currency

2008-11-26T02:44:00.004-05:00

An apolitical criollo group has gone to the trouble of collecting and presenting 20,000 signatures to the National Assembley in favor of adopting one unified currency--something everybody & their mothers & all the most elite communist officials had already said would be a nice occurrence.

Trouble is its not that easy.

The peso is worth little and not traded outside the island. It is the backbone of the socialist aspects of the Cuban economy. The convertible is backed by foreign currency reserves and worth 24 times more than the peso. It is the money of the tourism, remittance, and certain industrial sectors.

The dual currency system was established during the special period to both partially engage with the global market and to retain the socialist morals and incentives achieved up to that point. It has always been known to be irritating--but deemed the least worse option available.

This interview in English with a Spanish economist explains very well the current duality, how it came to be, and the prospects of going to a single currency.

Here are simple critiques of the wild calls for economic reform that do not take basic economic consequences into account.

Birth rates up 9%

2008-11-25T03:30:00.002-05:00

In a nation whose population had actually been decreasing in recent years, almost 9% more babies arrived this year than last.

Those babies were conceived and passed the first trimester while Cuba's economy was looking up, before the hurricanes destroyed the food and housing situations. So I would guess that people have put the breaks on bringing more mouths to the table--which we would see evidence of next year.

From the Department of Scorpion Farming

2008-11-25T03:25:00.003-05:00

Down on the scorpion farm, Cubans are boosting the yield of the blue variety that fights cancer.

Somehow that is a true statement.

Deflated Exultation

2008-11-16T05:48:00.004-05:00

Were it not for the flurry of forceful hurricanes that wiped out $10 billion (around a quarter of GDP) in housing, infrastructure, agriculture and other economic activity, Cuba might have been sitting rather pretty (at no less than 6% growth in GDP) during this moment in world history that sees capitalism catch a critical case of cyclical comeuppance.

Alas--due to natural forces wholly unrelated to socialist political economy--Cuba is not in a position to feel schadenfreude; it cannot freely shout that it told you so, let alone offer up its model as an alternative to the creatively destructive capitalists.

So the Cuban political leadership wryly watches the market states run around with their heads cut off (capital punishment?)--yet cannot speak, on the world stage, from a position of objective solvency.

Undaunted defenders of capitalism should be thankful that violent weather muted what otherwise might have stood as a formidable alternative for a world searching for a path forward.

Socialized Rewards

2008-11-16T05:02:00.004-05:00

The mode of incentives in revolutionary Cuba has tended to center around benefiting groups rather than individuals; from rewarding productive workplaces with communal bonuses (shop-wide vacation and recreation subsidies) to rewarding entire provinces that perform well (medically or economically speaking) with special events (such as the 26th of July festivities).

In keeping with this socialist tradition, Cuban airport authorities celebrated the arrival of the year's two millionth tourist--not by singling out one lucky winner--but by flagging the entire plane and letting all passengers partake in the prizes.

The revolutionary ethic has been extended to the visiting capitalists.

Constituent outreach

2008-11-13T03:15:00.003-05:00

Raul Castro speaks to people evacuated and effected by Hurricane Paloma. During his visit he recalled that a hurricane killed three thousand people around the same town of Santa Cruz del Sure, circa 1932.

For this third major tropical cyclone this season, the Cuban authorities evacuated 1.2 million people and not one person died.

Fired!

2008-11-13T03:06:00.003-05:00

This ministerial replacement demonstrates the general civics point that the Council of State executes proposals advanced by the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party. That is, a small cohort drawn from the top echelon of the broad-based party makes recommendations, which are carried out by the select executive group elected from the hundreds of national legislators. This, my friends, is an institutionalized revolution.

The narrower point of this case, is that somebody just got fired. The habanero elite are probably all gossiping incessantly about this.

[[UPDATE--Apparently the Foreign Investment Minister was let go because of premature praise for Obama's victory. Of course, all of Cuba had been rooting for Obama for months. And its not like she gaffed by rhetorically intruding on the sovereignty of another country's internal affairs--the election results had been determined, which in fact was the subject of her comment...When I said the Havana chattering classes would be all aflutter, it may have been more accurate to mention Miami's nattering chismosos.]]

Track suits and bling!

2008-11-13T02:58:00.003-05:00

What?!?!?!?!?!?!!

Cultural typologies of Cuban youth

2008-11-11T04:02:00.003-05:00

Starring (the easy cognates) roqueros and friquis, miquis and punkie, reguetoneros and reparteros.

This cultural distillation is a must read for anyone wanting to identify style types in their natural habitats of house parties, apartment stoops, matinee discos, and the malecon.

Mex med students just became most popular on campus

2008-11-11T03:01:00.003-05:00

Thanks to advocacy by Mexico's workers party, DF will now give $300/month to every Mexican student in Cuba.

Hurricanes blow reforms off the table

2008-11-11T02:51:00.002-05:00

With the passing of yet a third disastrous hurricane this season, priorities now focus wholly on recovery efforts. Any economic and political changes that might have seemed possible during last spring's moment of leadership transition are now firmly on the back burner.

Independent Labor Unions

2008-10-25T16:35:00.004-04:00

Asia Times correspondent Pepe Escobar asserts that as foreign industry increases operations in a liberalizing Cuban economy, Cuban employees of those enterprises will need to form unions independent of--but not in opposition to--the state.

Death to the Bureaucrats?

2008-10-14T04:30:00.003-04:00

Can an ideally institutionalized, rational bureaucracy be destroyed?

Although the initial assumption is no--because by its very nature, a properly insulated bureaucracy should be able to withstand political assaults on its integrity and attempts to capture its lever-wielding echelons--there have been moments when state bureaucracies "went away".

In 1960s Cuba, the shift to state socialism suddenly multiplied and imbued greater power in public administrators. This led them to begin to function politically like a stratified economic class--acting not as impartial bureaucrats, but in ways that protected their own interests. So no sooner had the bourgeoisie been done away with, but a bureaucratic class formed asserting its special rights.

This bureaucratic class quickly became a political target for politicians operating on behalf of the working class. Castro and Che et al sent bureaucrats into rural areas to cut sugar cane--thereby leveling again the social landscape. This was possible because the bureaucracy was not invulnerably isolated by a notion of legalistic authority; ultimately it answered to Castro's charismatic authority.

Another example of a decimated bureaucracy is found in Venezuela circa 2000. But this time the destroyers of the bureaucracy were the bureaucrats themselves.

In the later half of the 20th century, civil servants were gradually installed in the state bureaucracy due to (and reinforcing of) allegiance to either Acción Democrática or COPEI, the two main political parties in Venezuela's 4th Republic "partidocracia" (limited competition--like in the US).

Once Chavez won power and began to roll out socialist reforms that threatened the higher class position with whcih the bureaucrats identified, they began to opt out of working for the state. This was a political statement--akin to "exit" among Hirschman's three options when facing an uncomfortable situation.

Once Chavez filled the empty bureaucracy with inexperienced loyalists, it took time for efficient administration of the socialistic agenda to come online. There was a lagged learning curve that gave detractors ample opportunity to claim an inefficient squandering of oil wealth.

Now that the bureaucracy is filled with functioning loyalists, we see a similar situation as occurred in Cuba: the formation of a bureaucratic class. In fact, as it becomes a class of its own, the quality of its members' loyalty to the participatory goals of the Bolivarian revolution gets called into question.

It is figured that the Chavez-backed referendum last year failed because of abstention from millions of official party members. These so-called chavistas may have frowned upon the decentralizing measures included in the referendum that would have curtailed the centralized power they held as "state administrators". Now we see warnings that Venezuelan bureaucrats limit their decadence.

The similarities between 1966 Cuba and 2008 Venezuela are striking.

CSI: Havana

2008-10-06T04:08:00.004-04:00

The crime solving division of the Interior Ministry is implementing new technology to help it solve cases and catch criminals.

Real cases from this ministry's work get adapted into teleplays for the popular Sunday night police drama Tras la huella.

Fidel Castro Advocates Democracy

2008-10-06T03:34:00.003-04:00

Semi-retired Cuban statesman Fidel Castro--who has served in executive leadership positions both dictatorially (charismatic authority) and semi-democratically (rational/legal/institutional authority)--has expounded, in a recent op-ed, on the virtues of the democratic processes occurring throughout the hemisphere.

This statement seems like conspicuous condoning of democracy. Of course, nobody should think that the Cuban democratic system will conform to anyone's idealized expectations (let alone demands) but those of the Cubans. Still, the piece seems quite an overt normative approval of a democratic path.

Turning Living Rooms into Classrooms

2008-10-01T05:37:00.004-04:00

With many schools damaged by the hurricanes, families are opening their doors to displaced students. Some teachers are now giving classes in the confines of a neighbor's living room.

A longtime leader of the Cuban revolution, Armando Hart Dávalos, notes that this recent invention by necessity is the intertwining of three main pillars of society: family, community, and school.

Youth Land on Island of Youth

2008-10-01T01:50:00.005-04:00

Young Cubans from across the country have gone to Cuba's hurricane-damaged satellite municipality to volunteer in recovery efforts. They are rebuilding domestic tourist infrastructure on exotic black sand beaches and laboring in the agricultural sector for a period of six to twelve months. Similarly, thirty-five hundred volunteers have deployed to Piñar del Rio province to resuscitate the infrastructure of the tobacco industry.

Intensive harvests will be necessary for Cuba to alleviate the food scarcity inflicted by the hurricanes and boost production for export.

Teenagers customarily help out in an annual rite of picking crops for a month or two during the summer. This is a way for them to contribute in exchange for the free education they receive, and an opportunity to get to know another part of their country. Its especially useful for insular urban youth to comprehend the rural nature of a large part of the island.

Sending brigades of younger generations to serve their nation in tackling specific issues is a tradition. The current campaign is reminiscent of the 1961 literacy mission in which 100,000 educated urban teenagers flocked to the countryside and nearly disappeared all illiteracy. That campaign showed the privileged firsthand the impoverish conditions in which the rest of the country lived, making them more amenable to a revolutionary socialist program. It also served to make every citizen capable of reading propaganda.

Former Teachers Unretire to Fill Posts Left Empty By Diminished Labor Force

2008-09-30T03:53:00.008-04:00

As economic dearth renders pregnancy unappealing, deaths continue to out pace births in Cuba.

The depleted population structure is unable to reproduce the workforce to fill the positions vacated by retirees.

Add to that the fact that some Havana residents tend to opt out of formal state employment (due to official material benefits being less attractive than the informal economic opportunities derived from inputs of tourist dollars in the capitol city). Willing professionals--namely police, teachers and construction workers--must be imported from the provinces.

In order to close the deficit in teachers--which may or may not be near 8,000--new legal provisions encourage retired teachers to return to the classroom by letting them earn a salary while still receiving their monthly pension.

"No Ike"

2008-09-30T03:24:00.006-04:00

Produce markets remain bare after hurricanes;
price gouging by private sellers rampant.

First came Gustav.

Then came Ike.

Now Cuba is experiencing "No Ike".

As in "No Ike Comida"--a tragicomic play on the words "no hay", or "there is none", as in "there is no food".

In the wake of two hurricanes that flattened crops and ruined recent agricultural yields, produce markets are mostly empty.

International relief donations have been routed to the areas most severely struck by the violent weather systems, leaving Havana--which escaped direct contact from the storms--suffering shortages of food that is normally trucked in from the surrounding rural municipalities.

State run markets have set prices, but checks do not always exist to curb opportunism. Scarcity has lead to price gouging, as its a seller's market. Produce vendors are exploiting the law of supply and demand. The illegally steep food prices are found most often in the semi-private markets, which are reported to have relatively more goods in stock.

The attorney general has promised to be more vigilant and punitive against people who try to profit off of the situation of hardship.

Classical Sociology Told You So

2008-09-26T04:57:00.003-04:00

or

Anomie Goes to Wall Street (and Beyond)

Reacting to impending economic doom, France's President, Nicolas Sarkozy--formerly an unabashed free trader--has begun to sound a lot like his erstwhile compatriot, Monsieur Durkheim.

First, at the UN on Tuesday, he told the world:

[English translations in comments section]

"On ne peut pas attendre pour préparer le monde de l’après-pétrole, pour lutter contre le réchauffement climatique, pour sauver les océans, pour en finir avec les dumpings monétaires, sociaux, écologiques. On ne peut pas attendre pour moraliser le capitalisme financier."

Then Thursday, in a major domestic economic address à la Bush, he affirmed:

"ce système a creusé les inégalités, il a démoralisé les classes moyennes"

and

"Le capitalisme c’est la propriété privée, la responsabilité individuelle, l’engagement personnel, c’est une éthique, une morale, des institutions."

and

"Si l’on veut reconstruire un système financier viable, la moralisation du capitalisme financier demeure la priorité."

and

"Voilà quelques principes simples qui relèvent du bon sens et de la morale élémentaire sur lesquels je ne céderai pas."

Clearly, Sarkozy views--or at least describes--the contemporary crisis in Durkheimian terms of a moral deficit; that the system has failed because no morality was governing it.

He went into a refrain stark in its declarative finality:

"L’autorégulation pour régler tous les problèmes, c’est fini. Le laissez-faire, c’est fini. Le marché qui a toujours raison, c’est fini."

But even though with these statements he seemed to condemn unequivocally the basic logic of the free market, Sarkozy still managed to let capitalism off the hook.

"La crise financière n’est pas la crise du capitalisme. C’est la crise d’un système qui s’estéloigné des valeurs les plus fondamentales du capitalisme, qui a trahi l’esprit du capitalisme."

In the end, Sarkozy blames the present state of ruinous affairs not on capitalism itself, but on the lack of morality imbued in the system. He says that this unregulated, amoral financial anarchy betrayed "the spirit of capitalism".

Which, fittingly, brings us to Max Weber.

Don't ever say classical sociology didn't tell you so.

Putting on a Clinic Clinic

2008-09-25T21:43:00.002-04:00

Universalizing health care in Cuba has meant shifting the focus from major overcrowded hospitals to smaller decentralized polyclinics. Each neighborhood has a clinic in which residents can just drop in to have their health checked out. This medical system emphasizes preventative care.

Clinics are so readily accessible and close to home that people feel comfortable visiting the clinic regularly. Instead of waiting until an ailment causes a severe crisis, people can nip health problems in the bud by seeking medical attention early on. Even if the expansive network of clinics means more immediate resource allocation, preempting catastrophic conditions is much cheaper in the long run.

Each polyclinic serves an average population of twenty-two thousand people. Doctors become familiar with their neighbor-patients to whom they provide regular check-ups. If they detect more serious symptoms, they refer patients to specialists at larger regional hospitals.

People will stop in to polyclinics at a moments notice. Walking back home from a game of dominoes in the darkness of early night, a middle-aged Cuban man will suddenly come to a halt and tell his friend to wait a moment while he goes in to see if the doctor can check his blood pressure. If the doctor is available, great; if not, the man can revisit the clinic another time since it is only a few blocks from his house.

This method of frequent contact keeps both patient and doctor abreast of the citizen's condition.

The polyclinics endeavor to be ever to deal with drop-in patients. Even political bigwigs can pop in without any notice for a check-up--of the state of the system.

Building Revolution

2008-09-23T02:53:00.004-04:00

Before the hurricanes, Cuba had a housing shortage of around half a million dwellings. The natural disasters destroyed or damaged over a third of a million homes. Thats a current shortfall nearing a million houses.

In a move to redouble sheltering efforts (where materials are available), the Ministry of Construction is offering to train anybody who wants to learn the building trade.

The all-hands-on-deck modus operandi will not only focus on erecting homes, but also on repairing hotels in time for the peak mid-winter tourism season, as well as on concretizing ALBA-related projects.

The ministry's motto is "Construction is Revolution".

16,000 Requests for Land Use in 3 Days

2008-09-22T03:10:00.004-04:00

At the most recent meeting of the National Assembly in July, a law was put forth to allow Cubans the right to hold in usufruct and to work unused state lands. The strategic purpose was one of national food security, to expand and to rationalize agricultural production in order to wean the nation off of alimentary dependency. Cuba currently gets about 80% of its food from abroad, much from the United States, which plays the odd role of enemy-mercantilist.

The importance of greatly increasing production has grown exponentially after the recent spate of hurricanes crippled major portions of Cuba's agricultural sector. Completed harvests, pending yields, and crucial infrastructure were lost in the tempests.

After three days of the newly decentralized state agricultural authorities accepting applications for acreage, over 16,000 once and future farmers have requested land to grow crops and/or raise livestock.

The state is encouraging the new small scale farming operations to focus on crops with quick turnarounds, like squash, sweet potatoes, and greens, so as to feed more rapidly the populace hungry from post-storm shortages. As many a Cuban are presently wont to note "los agros están pela'o"--the markets are barren.

Ministry of Basic Industry

2008-09-18T18:14:00.003-04:00

Each Cuban, An Army.

An oddly reminiscent phrase.

"Latin America is Irrelevant"

2008-09-15T04:39:00.007-04:00

On the morning of 11 September 2008, Luis Ernesto Derbez gave a keynote address at a Latin American conference on UNM's campus. Dr. Derbez was the Secretary of Economy and Secretary of Foreign Relations under former Mexican President Vicente Fox. He is currently the president of the University of the Americas in Mexico.

What follows is an English-language paraphrasing of Dr. Derbez's speech. The words are mine, but the concepts, structure and examples are from his address. In only a few places have I editorialized, and those thoughts appear parenthetically and italicized. This essay tries to reflect the content of Dr. Derbez's speech; I take full blame for any unintentional misrepresentations.

LATIN AMERICA IS IRRELEVANT

Derbez began his speech with the declaration that Latin America is irrelevant. The continent is irrelevant on the world stage of geopolitics. That is, it does not have an influential voice in major world decisions.

For starters, Latin America is not represented on the UN Security Council, an agenda setting body with overwhelming veto power. Another among myriad examples of Latin America's irrelevance is that its participation in the failed Doha Round was largely marginal, with Brazil playing a small but inconsequential role.

Latin America is irrelevant because, in this emergent multi-polar world, it has not sufficiently integrated to constitute a major block that can articulate its shared interests in a forceful and coherent way. As they engage in diplomatic negotiation and statecraft, the prepotent regional poles of power do not have to seriously heed Latin America as an equal. The formidable positions of the US, the European Union, the Russia Federation, China and India demand careful consideration by all parties. Latin America, on the other hand, has not achieved such status due to its incomplete integration.

Derbez says that the obstacles to integration stem from three situations currently encountered in Latin America: disagreement and competition among divergent models of integration, the failures of Latin American businesses, and the still wanting democratic character of Latin American nations.

As Latin America confronts the need to integrate, its various players have initiated different models for regional integration. First there is the NAFTA model, which represents the traditional posture of turning towards the US. Because of an entangled history and geographic determinism, Mexico is torn between this US-centric model and one that looks south for alliances. The problem with the NAFTA model is that it would necessarily subordinate a Latin American block to the North American block in global interactions.

An alternative option for integration is MERCOSUR, which is the South American free trade organization spearheaded by Brazil. Although its locus of power is decidedly southern, it is similar to NAFTA in that it remains trade focused and relies on nation-states as the units of membership.

The third model of Latin American integration is represented by ALBA, the "Bolivarian" alternative to the Free Trade Area of the Americas, rolled out by Venezuela and Cuba, and now counting Nicaragua and Bolivia as members. ALBA differs from the traditional country constituted and trade focused alliances in that it involves people-to-people integration on energy, education and health issues. Overlooking national boundaries and integrating populations rather than markets, ALBA is a decidedly Marxist model, says Derbez.

The disagreement on which model to follow has, in part, prevented Latin America from more fully integrating, and thus from developing a unified voice that commandingly advocates for the region's common interests on the world stage. Curiously, Derbez notes, the three-way divergence that has stalled integration on the continental level is reminiscent of the fractious tripartite conflict found in Mexico's domestic politics, where the PRI, PAN and PRD regularly enter into intense gridlock.

Derbez proposes that if a consensus model of integration is not arrived at, then it may be up to the business sector to exert Latin America's influence on the world. The problem with the so-called multilatinas is that they are generally more dedicated to distribution than to innovation. Suitable examples are found in Mexico where some of the most successful companies distribute telecommunication goods and services or specialize in rational distribution of food products, but do not invent novel technology. Until Latin American industry begins to offer revolutionary products, it will remain on the margins of the world's balance sheets and attention spans. (Interestingly, where international business is involved, Derbez does not express the same discomfort about borderless integration that he did in reference to the ALBA case. Implicitly, Derbez seems to approve of capital ignoring political borders, but frowns on social movements doing so.)

A final characteristic of Latin America that impedes regional integration, common cause, and unity of purpose is the anti-democratic tendencies still found among the continent's political leadership. Derbez points out that the excesses of presidentialism still rear their ugly heads.

Supposedly, Latin American citizens have confidence in strong leaders that make firm decisions, regardless of whether they violate institutional norms. So we see Latin American presidents acting increasingly dictatorially, in defiance of constitutional limitations and other branches of government. Examples include Hugo Chavez reconstituting Venezuela's Supreme Court and proposing an end to term limits, and Alvaro Uribe gaining extra terms by meddling with the legislative and judicial branches. Derbez takes pains to note that this anti-democratic nature finds expression in both right wing and leftist administrations. (However, Derbez fails to explain why such an anti-democratic trend occurs especially in Latin America. This makes his contention rest rather shakily on a premise of discredited essentialism.)

This anti-democratic prong of Derbez's thesis seems to assert that as long as domestic institutions remain weak, designs for integrationist institutions will not gain traction.

Despite the impassioned rhetoric and strategic vision exhibited by Latin American leaders, the region has yet to integrate effectively. Disagreements over the route to follow—on whether to take the form of a common market or to adopt a more humanist community model, on whether to adopt a US-centric perspective or a more southerly orientation—have delayed the realization of Nuestra America. Also, the failure of Latin American businesses to develop a reputation for innovation has prevented that sector from serving as an influential de facto representative of the area's mutual interests. Finally, the disregard for democratic institutions at the national level has not only further entrenched political stereotypes about the region, but also slowed progress towards the formation of hemispheric institutions. According to Derbez, the totality of these dilemmas has obstructed the path to integration.

However long Latin America continues to be fragmented, it will not be able to formulate coherent claims on the world stage; it will not command the deference given to other major power blocks in the prosecution of international affairs. In a word, Latin America will remain irrelevant.

Produce Markets Empty

2008-09-13T18:15:00.003-04:00

When hurricanes Gustav and Ike tore through the Cuban countryside last week, they destroyed much of the agricultural harvest.

As a result the "agros"--outdoor vegetable markets--have very little produce in stock, and the prices have increased for what is available. Supply and demand seem to be having an effect on cost.

The state is even selling food donated by Russia at the new higher prices.

Many homes are still without electricity, and are predicted to remain so for up to three months, while the government gets its hands on blockaded materials to repair the "mangled grid".

Thousands of people have lost their homes and are living in schools and other secure state buildings.

24% of Cuba's population evacuated

2008-09-09T02:13:00.003-04:00

{{{UPDATE 09/09/08--As Hurricane Ike made a second crossing, battering Cuba, the toll of evacuees rose to over 2.6 million people. That is nearly a quarter of the population that mobilized to secure locations.

It appears to have spared Havana major damage.

Nevertheless the devastation to housing, agriculture and infrastructure is vast.

Today the entire Cuban nation sympathizes with Tina Turner.}}}

In the face of Hurricane Ike, about 1.3 million Cubans and 10 thousand tourists have been evacuated to secure locations on the island. At this point, only 4 people have died.

Last week, Hurricane Gustav ravaged two provinces. During Gustav there were no deaths, despite millions of dollars in damage caused by the 100+ mph winds of the Category 4 cyclone.

There is something to be said about the social use of limited resources, a highly organized society, public control of airwaves, and the prioritization of saving human lives over every other goal.

Presently, Ike appears to be doing its damnedest to impact all fifteen provinces.

Much of the southern coast is flooded.

Ike is headed for Havana.

How to Achieve Zero Deaths in a Hurricane?

2008-09-08T15:05:00.004-04:00

It is not a miracle that Cuba avoids that its citizens perish in the hurricanes that regularly pound the island. The entire nation is well organized with systematic routines for withstanding forces of nature.

First, there is the informative phase in which state media and neighborhood committees warn people of the approaching danger.

Second comes the cyclone alert stage in which civil defense teams and neighborhood committees organize specified evacuations of vulnerable populations, locals and tourists alike, to secure locations. These evacuations are obligatory.

Hurricanes destroy Cuba's infrastructure and economy. But take none of its citizens.

Retail Gas Price Raised in Response to World Price

2008-09-08T09:56:00.002-04:00

While oil prices skyrocketed on the global market in recent years, state-run gasoline stations have not raised the retail price of gasoline since 2005. The state taking the loss represented a 36% subsidy of petroleum.

Today, the retail price has been raised.

It is probably not a coincidence that this move, which naturally must be highly unpopular, was rolled out as the populace is distracted by a category 4 hurricane attacking the entire length of the island.

Castro Mummified!

2008-09-03T23:39:00.001-04:00

For those interested in US-Latin American relations, it is useful to study the rigorously-conceived party platforms of the Democrats and Republicans.

In their final platform, the Republicans have committed 374 words to Latin American affairs. The Democrats 241 words.

Since the Latin American policy sections of these platforms are so lengthy and complicated, I have provided brief summaries below.

Elefantes:

* God and buying stuff connects people.
* The war on drugs = the war on terror
* Fidel Castro is a mummy.
* Expanding freedom is based on free market principles (and occasional bank bailouts).
* The US appreciates Canada for its valuable trade (and being willing to take our friendly fire in Afghanistan).
* Mexico and Colombia are so awesome they are worth mentioning.
* The free trade agreement with Colombia is being obstructed only by Democrats and people that want to keep their jobs.
* Colombia deserves to buy our stuff since they have been so brave (in killing their union members and journalists).
* Hugo Chavez is a clown.
* We do Cuban people a favor by staying out of their island and giving them free teevee.
* Evo Morales is a neural net processing cyborg.
* Cuban immigrants are like aborted fetuses: they should be safe, legal, and rare.
* We want to continue our strictly long distance relationship with Latin Americans.

Burros:

* The 2008 Democrats proudly will use JFK's 47-year old strategy for dealing with Latin America.
* Diplomacy should be like gay marriage.
* The Americas should have more self-esteem than to be Anti-American.
* Mexico and Colombia are awesome. And so is Brazil!
* Cuba should be free and sovereign and follow our orders.
* If Cuba does as we say, we will formulate moves toward becoming prepared to consider taking steps to initiate talks on beginning preliminary relations with Cuba.
* Haiti is like so permanently screwed.

Here are the unabridged Latin America sections from the platforms, just so you can see that Im not making any of this up.

Strengthening Ties in the Americas
Faith and family, culture and commerce, are
enduring bonds among all the peoples of the
Americas. Republicans envision a western hemisphere
of sovereign nations with secure borders,
working together to advance liberty and mutually-beneficial
trade based on sound and proven free
enterprise principles. Our relations with our immediate
neighbors, Canada and Mexico, are grounded
on our shared values and common purpose, as well
as our steadily increasing trade. We pledge to continue
this close association and to advance mutually
beneficial trade agreements throughout Latin
America, promoting economic development and
social stability there while opening markets to our
goods and services. Our strong ties with Canada and
Mexico should not lead to a North American union
or a unified currency.
Two factors distort this hemispheric progress.
One is narco-terrorism, with its ability to destabilize
societies and corrupt the political process. In an
era of porous borders, the war on drugs and the
war on terror have become a single enterprise.
We salute our allies in the fight against this evil, especially
the people of Mexico and Colombia, who have
set an example for their neighbors. We support
approval of the free trade agreement with Colombia,
currently blocked by Capitol Hill Democrats and
their union boss supporters, as an overdue gesture of
solidarity for this courageous ally of the United
States.
The other malignant element in hemispheric
affairs is the anachronistic regime in Havana, a
mummified relic from the age of totalitarianism,
and its buffoonish imitators. We call on the nations
of Latin America and the Caribbean to join us in
laying the groundwork for a democratic Cuba.
Looking to the inevitable day of liberation, we
support restrictions on trade with, and travel to,
Cuba as a measure of solidarity with the political
prisoners and all the oppressed Cuban people.
We call for a dedicated platform for transmission
of Radio and Television Marti into Cuba and, to prepare
for the day when Cuba is free, we support the
work of the Commission for Assistance to a Free
Cuba. We affirm the principles of the Cuban
Adjustment Act of 1966, recognizing the rights of
Cubans fleeing Communist tyranny, and support
efforts to admit more of them through a safe, legal,
orderly process.

Recommit to an Alliance of the Americas
We recognize that the security and prosperity of the United States is fundamentally tied to the
future of the Americas. We believe that in the 21 st century, the U.S. must treat Latin America
and the Caribbean as full partners, just as our neighbors to the south should reject the bombast
of authoritarian bullies. Our relationship with Canada, our long-time ally, should be strengthened
and enhanced. An alliance of the Americas will only succeed if it is founded on the bedrock of
mutual respect and works to advance democracy, opportunity, and security from the bottom-
up. We must turn the page on the arrogance in Washington and the anti-Americanism across the
region that stands in the way of progress. We must work with close partners like Mexico,
Brazil, and Colombia on issues like ending the drug trade, fighting poverty and inequality, and
immigration. We must work with the Caribbean community to help restore stability and the rule
of law to Haiti, to improve the lives of its people, and to strengthen its democracy. And we must
build ties to the people of Cuba and help advance their liberty by allowing unlimited family visits
and remittances to the island, while presenting the Cuban regime with a clear choice: if it takes
significant steps toward democracy, beginning with the unconditional release of all political
prisoners, we will be prepared to take steps to begin normalizing relations.

Cuba A&M

2008-08-30T11:30:00.005-04:00

"Majoring in farming."

To meet internal food security needs in the face of rising international grain prices, and in concert with proposed legislation to distribute fallow land, Cuba's universities are placing increased emphasis on training people in agricultural science and related technical fields.

Queuebanismo

2008-08-30T03:20:00.006-04:00

If long bread lines are the derogatory stereotype of socialist societies, Cubans have made waiting in line an art form.

Queues are rarely physical files of humans; rather they are mental abstractions in which everyone knows behind whom they are positioned, no matter where they wait. You can be third in a line of twenty and sitting in the shade of a tree a block away.

The procedure for "formando cola" entails arriving at the bus stop/bank/social club and shouting an interrogative "¿último?" to find out who is last in line. When that person identifies themselves, you ask them whom they are behind. This is because people do not wait in their physical order, and if that person leaves the line you need to know behind whom you are then positioned.

This free form way of lining up lifts the weight of the wait for a lift, and is one of the many types of "lesser" freedoms that Cubans enjoy.

An infuriating wrinkle of this otherwise logical and flexible process for interminable waiting is that people physically present at the queue can be holding the place of multiple others who are basically waiting in absentia, around the block or even asleep in their homes. So if you arrive somewhere and see a short line of only 12 people, you could actually be 200th in line. Although that is an extreme example, it illustrates the concept and is not unheard of.

People sometimes offer to hold others' place in line for a small fee.

Even in Cuba, freedom isn't free.