Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Time for Washington to get creative with Castro's Cuba
UNITED NATIONS — The UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to end the
American economic embargo on Castro's Cuba. In an embarrassingly
lopsided outcome, the Assembly voted 184 to 4 to lift the embargo which
has been part of Washington's policy since the Eisenhower
Administration. Even the USA's closest allies from Canada to Europe and
Japan (but with the exception of Israel, the Marshall Islands and Palau)
joined the call to end the crippling economic sanctions on Cuba's
communist regime.
Now the good news; the General Assembly resolution is non-binding. Still
for the sixteenth year, the world body has sought to send a message,
some would say a slap, to U.S. policy which has enforced an economic
embargo on Cuba since 1960. Recently President George W. Bush again
tightened economic and financial sanctions on Cuba in an attempt to
force overdue political change on the communist island.
From the UN side, the rhetoric was predictable with Pakistan and the
Group of 77 saying "the embargo had caused a high degree of economic and
financial damage that had impacted the well-being of the Cuban people."
Venezuela's Deputy Foreign Minister addressed the conclave and
proclaimed hysterically that the "embargo against Cuba was genocidal and
unilateral . . . an anachronism of failed imperial policies." Vietnam
called for "non-interference in each other's domestic affairs."
Communist China's delegate offered an ironic twist saying the sanctions
"went against the principles of democracy, freedom, rule of law and
human rights."
Cuba's Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque slammed the blockade which
has lasted nearly fifty years and cost Cuba an estimated $89 billion in
losses. The Minister recited the classic Castro line that the embargo is
killing kids and ruining an otherwise sunny future for the Cuban people.
Sadly socialism ruined Cuba's prospects long ago.
The European Union believes that the United States trade policy toward
Cuba is "fundamentally a bilateral issue." Still "the EU deplores that
the human rights situation has not fundamentally changed despite a
decrease in the number of political prisoners." An EU statement
stressed, "The Cuban government continues to deny its citizens
internationally recognized civil, political and economic rights and
freedoms." The EU adds however, "we repeat our view that the lifting of
the U.S. trade embargo would open Cuba's economy to the benefit of the
Cuban people."
Beyond the droning rhetoric about Uncle Sam being the bad guy, the fact
remains that most of the world — especially Canada and the Europeans —
are trading with and traveling to Cuba despite the embargo. Since
Castro's Cuba lost its longtime economic lifeline from the former Soviet
Union, it now has ample economic support and solidarity from Hugo
Chavez's Venezuela. The blockade while having the effects to complicate
business and commerce with Cuba, has unfortunately failed to bring down
the regime.
Not surprisingly the continuing embargo has created an anti-American
backlash throughout Latin America and is indirectly reflected even in
Western democracies by the idiots who parade around in Che Guevara t-shirts
Recall the embargo started with President Dwight Eisenhower. It carried
on through John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson followed by Richard Nixon,
Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan (two terms), George Bush Sr.,
Bill Clinton (two terms), George W. Bush (two terms). The dictator Fidel
Castro and his brother Raul have outlasted ten American Presidents!
Do Castro's cronies profit from the embargo as did Saddam Hussein from
the infamous Iraqi Oil for Food Program? When shortages are created and
enforced, it encourages lucrative black markets. Who best to take
advantage of these arbitrary conditions but the very regime the embargo
is aimed against.
I would think Castro secretly wishes the embargo to continue. Why? He
plays the proletarian David standing up against the Uncle Sam Goliath.
Second, it gives Castro the attention as El Comandante on a pedestal he
long should have been knocked off. Third, it allows him domestic
political mobilization against the Yanqui threat and equally encourages
global solidarity; Fourth, it may permit him and his companeros the
power to control and cash in on corruption.
The U.S. trades with the People's Republic of China and the Socialist
Republic of Vietnam, two countries with equally odious communist
regimes. Besides the obvious commercial logic, there's the argument that
trade will encourage and foster social and eventually political
openness. Perhaps. Conversely by not trading with Cuba, the Havana
regime has the excuse that it under assault from the Americans and needs
to enforce the suffocating political conditions in this Caribbean island.
While there's too much political risk in tinkering with the embargo in
an election year, especially given the large and vocal Cuban-American
community, the next Administration must consider more creative options
in dealing with the Cuban dictatorship in the twilight of Castro's rule.
Market forces may provide the answer.
Allowing American trade, tourism and contacts — let them have satellite
TV, Telemundo, internet, will serve as a much more destabilizing force
to the communist orthodoxy than the current embargo. Importantly it will
deprive Castro the excuse that Cuba's economic ills and political
repression is justified because of Washington's hostility.
John J. Metzler is a U.N. correspondent covering diplomatic and defense
issues. He writes weekly for World Tribune.com.
http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/WTARC/2007/mz11_02.asp
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