The United States has been remarkably close to communism. Only 169 km separates Havana from Key West, and it is only 85 km across the Bering Strait separating Alaska from Russia.
Yet the US policy to Cuba has been bizarre; if anything, helping its communist opponents. The embargo signed by Kennedy on 7 February 1962 remains in place (despite minor weakening) – the most enduring trade embargo in the modern world. Incidentally, Kennedy had his press secretary, Pierre Salinger, buy dozens of boxes of Cuban cigars just before he signed the embargo into law.
The US policy on Cuba has, unfortunately, been driven by the Cuban exiles in Florida. I once met a young lady who moved to Miami at age 3 who could barely speak a word on English, despite having lived in the US for more than 20 years. Yet her hatred for Castro was so profound, that she considered him a worse monster than Hitler, Stalin, Mao or Pol Pot.
Yet the US policy has also helped make the likes of Castro and, especially, Che Guevara, as revolutionary heroes who have fought against the evil imperialist capitalist regime of the US.
How it could have been so different. If the United States had lifted the embargo in the 1960s (after the missiles were pulled out of Cuba), the life of the average Cuban would have been so much better, and Castro’s regime would probably have died long ago. The US policy on Cuba not only ensured the longevity of the Castro regime, but has added to the impoverishment of the Cuban people already suffering under communism.
Under that alternative policy, the evils of communism would be readily apparent – the low standard of living of the Cuban people could not be blamed on the United States. The US would then be the benefactor, not the oppressor. Instead, US policy has allowed Castro to blame the US for the plight of the Cuban people.
Castro will soon die; perhaps his regime and legacy will also soon die. But the lives of the many poor Cubans have not been helped by the US policy and their supposed kin living in Miami.
Some ah…. professions don’t require much English proficiency I guess.
The cruel and violent way Castro treated many of the Cubans is just dreadful, he should have been taken out long ago. Also if the embargo was properly enforced it would have succeeded way back, it is the half-assed approach that doesn’t work (and not just in embargoes of course).
Chris M
23 Jul 12 at 6:40 pm
Totally agree. Give each Cuban a Big Mac and the Castro brothers are on the next plane to Pyongyang.
Steve
23 Jul 12 at 6:41 pm
Hee, hee…..a murderous killer of helpless prisoners has an appointment with his karma wheel…..enjoy…..
Alfonso
23 Jul 12 at 6:46 pm
So who does Cuba trade with?
Mundi
23 Jul 12 at 7:46 pm
The worst thing is that it gave Michael Moore a punchline for one of his vomit inducing movies.
Still, I’ve wanted to go to Cuba for a while now. Seeing a communist (or recently ex-communist) country is something that once was entirely and routinely possible – now it’s a fast disappearing chance. Even modern day Cuba isn’t really the revolutionary home it’s all cracked up to be.
I know a guy who did the Trans Siberian railway back when the USSR was a real thing. He basically travelled from Checkpoint Charlie to Vladivostok by various means. The photos and stories he has from that – irreplaceable. Just the sort of thing to scare the kiddies with in case they’re ever feeling a bit socialist.
brc
23 Jul 12 at 7:56 pm
It’s not a zoo, it’s an interesting but quite tragic country & a place worth visiting. Most of your preconceptions about the failures of communist central planning are quickly confirmed. The people are generally pretty lovely though you could detect a sort of resignation & sadness in them, especially when talking about traveling. More than a few of the younger people I spoke to would talk about how they would love ito travel abroad but then pause & look incredibly sad and say it would “never happen though”. They more or less saw their country as their prison.
badm0f0
23 Jul 12 at 9:26 pm
*Fixed thanks
John A
23 Jul 12 at 11:54 pm
No, socialist central planning.
Communism is when the Government voluntarily gives up power to the pacified and plasticised human beings who through conditioning, are now above decadence.
Socialists never admit they are one shade of grey away from the blackness of a Marxist regime unless they are drunk or goaded into a false sense of security and boastfulness.
.
24 Jul 12 at 7:48 am
Embargoes rarely secure political change. Is Iraq 1991-2001 so quickly forgotten?
The lifting trade bans does not matter much because communism crumbles from within.
So did South African apartheid. Domestic economic problems, caused by apartheid policies themselves, were more important than foreign sanctions in crippling the South African economy. Further perpetuation of apartheid would have meant even further declines in living standards for white as well as black South Africans.
p.s. the Cuban voting bloc in the swing state of Florida decides this matter with all the hatreds of émigrés and exiles can muster.
Jim Rose
25 Jul 12 at 7:49 pm