WILL CUBA’S FUTURE BE VERY DIFFERENT FROM WHAT IT IS TODAY?

….The young dictator Fidel when he took control of Cuba

 

President Obama has not condemned Castro’s years of a blind eye to justice for his people.

 

As many people know, in general, I have been a strong Obama supporter.  But that does not mean that I am an across-the-board Obama supporter.

 

I did not agree when Obama drew a red line around Syria’s Bashar al-Assad’s use of poison gas, and then when he walked away from it.  I have not agreed with Obama’s approach, or lack of indignation, against the slaughter of those civilians caught in Russia’s military support of al-Assad in Syria.  Obama has continued to allow the Syrian regime to exist without US resistance, while the Russians and the Hezbollah continue to kill innocents with impunity. Unfortunately, the so called Obama Doctrine in these areas has comes down to what appears to be a level of indifference with which I do not agree.

 

And now I have another issue where I disagree with the president.  It's his lack of recognition for how horrible Fidel Castro was during his 50 years of being a vile dictator.

 

Obama spent 223 words in his statement on the death of Fidel, and in all that he said, he did not condemn Castro’s years of having a blind eye to justice for his people.  He has appeared indifferent to all the injury and deaths caused by this tyrant. 

 

Many Americans are not aware or are too young to know that Fidel Castro has been such a killer. He came to power in a revolution and then ordered hundreds of mass executions and imprisonments of his own people.  He is known for ordering hundreds of firing squads against his own citizens.  He imposed a totalitarian system on Cuba even harsher and more homicidal than the dictator that he replaced.

 

I remember when early on, Americans were generally in support of Fidel when he was expected to offer Cuba the shining star of democracy if his army won the war against the then Cuban dictator.  But after winning the war, he decided to personally take on the reins of power and from then on, he was only fighting in support of himself and his family.  Where it was initially expected that he would bring democracy to Cuba, he instead gave his allegiance to the Soviet Union and to its communism, instead of democracy.  From then on, there would be no elections, and the Castro family was to be Cuba’s rulers for life.

 

Castro regularly persecuted homosexuals, dissidents, all opposition writers and journalists. He would not tolerate a free press, and his own political party was the only party permitted in Cuba. In the end, he ruined his country’s economy while at the same time, he exported terrorism. As a result of this activity, Venezuela is today a quasi-police state run with the invaluable assistance of the Cuban government.

 

In the early 1960’s, Fidel even went so far as to agree to install hidden Russian nuclear ballistic missiles on the island that could have reached all the major cities in the United States.  But due to the “eyes in the sky” of the American U-2 surveillance aircraft, the then Kennedy administration learned of the massive Russian missile plot.  However, instead starting another war and invading the island, JFK decided to surround and embargo the island.  Eventually this forced the Russian leader Khrushchev to order the dismantling of the missile sites and the shipping of the missiles back to the soviet mainland. 

 

It is expected that even if Fidel’s brother Raul, who now runs the country, were to die, the nation is so use to running under the strict rule of the Castro family, it would probably take another generation before any real political changes could occur.

 

Trump, who everyone knows I never agree with, did at least in a tweet remark that Castro had finally died and he denounced him as a “brutal dictator.”  President Obama hasn’t even gone that far.

 

Trump has said that if the Cuban government doesn’t let its political prisoners go, allow a free press and open up the internet, he say he will stop the executive orders that President Obama established for opening up the Cuban talks.  But since Trump never sticks to his promises, it may be too far into the opening of Cuba for Trump to stop it from continuing.  That is, now that US airlines are landing in Cuba and Americans are allowed to send unlimited money to relatives and to visit the island. 

 

But the current official trade embargo against Cuba cannot be stopped by any US president.  That will still take a positive vote in Congress.  The US Congress will not agree to stopping the trade embargo without Cuba having at least allowed the freedom of the press and the release of their political prisoners.

 

In his latest statement, President Obama said he looked forward to a Cuban future in which they and the United States will have a better relationship.

 

However, Obama has refused to publicly recognize why the relationship has been so bad in the past, and he has not acknowledged the vast crimes of Fidel Castro. The president is basically letting the Cuban people know that the future may not be much different than what it is today in Cuba.

 

My hope is that this is not the basis of what we will eventually be calling a part of the “Obama Doctrine”.  Obama had said that what we did for 50 years did not work, so he decided to try something different.  So far, it is mostly a one-way deal benefiting the Cuba government and the Castro regime.  Over time, things may change, but then again, as usual with Cuba, there are no guarantees.

 

Copyright G.Ater  2016