Weidt
22nd November 2002, 06:15
The U.S. Embargo of Cuba
by Joe DeNeen
Internet Secretary of the Socialist Party of Michigan
www.michigansocialist.net
_____________________________________________
In 1959, the revolutionary forces of Castro were victorious over the U.S.-backed authoritarian regime of Batista. Within the next few decades Cuba would face the Bay of Pigs invasion by CIA-trained Cuban expatriates, the alignment with the U.S.S.R., the Cuban Missile Crisis, and ultimately see its financial backer, the U.S.S.R., transform under Gorbachev and Yeltsin. Even after the Cold War, Cuba continues to face, since 1961, an embargo by the United States.
There lies much contradiction in the U.S.'s policy towards Cuba in comparison to its policy towards other dictatorships and "Communist" regimes. The U.S. has, and does, trade freely with China, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and a long list of other repressive regimes. When the U.S.S.R. was being cursed as the "evil empire", the U.S. repeatedly sold food to them throughout the 1970s and 80s. China is seen as an untapped market with over one billion people ready for consumer goods and U.S. corporations are salivating for the chance to flow down the Yangtze to great profits and cheap labour. The U.S. fought a bloody war for over a decade with Vietnam, but it did not take the U.S. long to start trading after the bombs stop dropping - I guess the profits were too tempting. And of course there is Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, which are monarchies that are harshly repressive in their treatment of women, criminals, minorities, etc., but once again, the U.S. is great pals with these human rights violators and anti-democratic elites - of course they also have a lot of oil that the U.S. needs constant injections of like a heroin addict.
So what than makes Cuba so special that it incurs the U.S.'s refusal to free trade and travel? U.S. Presidents have stated that Cuba is a dictatorship and is a human rights violator, but as stated above, so are many nations with whom the U.S. trades. There is also a large Cuban-American population - who were the businesspersons, politicians, and military personnel that initially supported the Batista regime - primarily in Florida, that lobbies and gives millions of dollars to politicians to maintain the embargo. The embargo brings up two more contradictions in U.S. policy: the U.S. is in actuality blocking free trade, and thus in contrary to capitalism and the travel ban violates Americans' rights to travel freely - Article 13 of the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights states that everyone has the right to leave any country and the freedom of movement within the borders of each state. The embargo withholds money from Cuba, but in-turn restricts the free trade the U.S. is supposed to embody and the rights of American citizens to travel. (The U.S. estimates that over 20,000 Americans violate the travel ban by traveling by way of a third country, such as Canada. Over 1.5 million tourists worldwide visit Cuba yearly.) In contrast, the U.S. has an open door policy towards Cubans coming to the U.S.A. by any means necessary and granting them residency. The most recent example took place on November 11, 2002, when eight Cubans used a government-issued car to drive to an airfield, boarded a crop-duster plane, whose pilot than, illegally, flew north to Key West, Florida. The U.S. flanked the plane with fighter jets in-route to Key West International Airport, where the Cubans were detained for questioning, than released into the general population against the calls by the Cuban Government for their return.
It was only two years ago that the U.S. allowed the sale of food, for cash, to Cuba. This past summer was the first food deal with Cuba, which is expected to purchase nearly $165 million in American food and farm exports by the end of this year. Congress is expected to debate other proposals for chipping away at the embargo and freeing up more trade and ending the travel ban. Unfortunately, President-appointed Bush has stated he would veto any bill that would relax the embargo of Cuba, and with the recent victories by the Republican Party, one can be sure the embargo will continue for years to come - or until "democracy" (meaning capitalism) is restored to Cuba.
On November 12, 2002, the United Nations, for the eleventh consecutive year, overwhelmingly (173 for, 3 against, 4 abstained) passed a resolution urging the U.S. to end the embargo of Cuba. Only the U.S., Israel, and the Marshall Islands voted against it. The world speaks out against the embargo loud and clear, but falls upon the deaf ears of the U.S. Government.
Whether Cuba is a "Communist" country or not is of little concern in the grand scheme of things. The embargo, like the sanctions of Iraq, is a violation of human rights of all people. Cuba is of no threat to the U.S. in any sense of the word, especially against a country with the largest military budget on the planet that is more than the military budgets of the world combined. (To compare with some nations of the world: Russia - $29 billion, China - $14.5 billion, Iraq - $1.4 billion, and Cuba - $31 million. Congress recently passed a $380 billion military budget for 2003, which is a $48 billion increase from 2002 - almost twice the annual military budget of Russia.)
There is much complaint by the U.S. of the Cuban Government's opposition and refusal to accept the Valera Project, which collected over 11,000 signatures in favor of a referendum on whether Cubans wanted freedom of speech and the right to private business ownership. Cuba should have taken the step forward and followed through on the Valera Project. In contrast, the U.S. has had demonstrations of over 100,000 against a war on Iraq, with weekly and monthly rallies throughout the country demanding "Peace, Not War", all of which the U.S. Government has ignored. In comparison to population size, the Valera Project represented 0.098 percent of the Cuban population (11.2 million), whereas the October 26 anti-war rallies alone, nation-wide, estimating 355,000 people (200,000 in D.C., 40,000 in New York City, 15,000 in Seattle, and another 100,000 in other cities across the country), represented 0.13 percent of the U.S. population (281 million). As such the U.S. should follow its own complaints of Cuba in regard to the Valera Project and open up a dialogue with the American people on whether to annihilate Iraq or not.
The U.S. embargo of Cuba must end immediately and relations should be normalized. Americans should not be penalized from traveling to Cuba simply because of some resentful Cuban-Americans who want their plantations and factories back. Cuba needs political change in democratic directions as well as the expansion of its democratic socialist economy, not a return to Batista-style, or any other form, of "bourgeois democracy".
by Joe DeNeen
Internet Secretary of the Socialist Party of Michigan
www.michigansocialist.net
_____________________________________________
In 1959, the revolutionary forces of Castro were victorious over the U.S.-backed authoritarian regime of Batista. Within the next few decades Cuba would face the Bay of Pigs invasion by CIA-trained Cuban expatriates, the alignment with the U.S.S.R., the Cuban Missile Crisis, and ultimately see its financial backer, the U.S.S.R., transform under Gorbachev and Yeltsin. Even after the Cold War, Cuba continues to face, since 1961, an embargo by the United States.
There lies much contradiction in the U.S.'s policy towards Cuba in comparison to its policy towards other dictatorships and "Communist" regimes. The U.S. has, and does, trade freely with China, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and a long list of other repressive regimes. When the U.S.S.R. was being cursed as the "evil empire", the U.S. repeatedly sold food to them throughout the 1970s and 80s. China is seen as an untapped market with over one billion people ready for consumer goods and U.S. corporations are salivating for the chance to flow down the Yangtze to great profits and cheap labour. The U.S. fought a bloody war for over a decade with Vietnam, but it did not take the U.S. long to start trading after the bombs stop dropping - I guess the profits were too tempting. And of course there is Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, which are monarchies that are harshly repressive in their treatment of women, criminals, minorities, etc., but once again, the U.S. is great pals with these human rights violators and anti-democratic elites - of course they also have a lot of oil that the U.S. needs constant injections of like a heroin addict.
So what than makes Cuba so special that it incurs the U.S.'s refusal to free trade and travel? U.S. Presidents have stated that Cuba is a dictatorship and is a human rights violator, but as stated above, so are many nations with whom the U.S. trades. There is also a large Cuban-American population - who were the businesspersons, politicians, and military personnel that initially supported the Batista regime - primarily in Florida, that lobbies and gives millions of dollars to politicians to maintain the embargo. The embargo brings up two more contradictions in U.S. policy: the U.S. is in actuality blocking free trade, and thus in contrary to capitalism and the travel ban violates Americans' rights to travel freely - Article 13 of the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights states that everyone has the right to leave any country and the freedom of movement within the borders of each state. The embargo withholds money from Cuba, but in-turn restricts the free trade the U.S. is supposed to embody and the rights of American citizens to travel. (The U.S. estimates that over 20,000 Americans violate the travel ban by traveling by way of a third country, such as Canada. Over 1.5 million tourists worldwide visit Cuba yearly.) In contrast, the U.S. has an open door policy towards Cubans coming to the U.S.A. by any means necessary and granting them residency. The most recent example took place on November 11, 2002, when eight Cubans used a government-issued car to drive to an airfield, boarded a crop-duster plane, whose pilot than, illegally, flew north to Key West, Florida. The U.S. flanked the plane with fighter jets in-route to Key West International Airport, where the Cubans were detained for questioning, than released into the general population against the calls by the Cuban Government for their return.
It was only two years ago that the U.S. allowed the sale of food, for cash, to Cuba. This past summer was the first food deal with Cuba, which is expected to purchase nearly $165 million in American food and farm exports by the end of this year. Congress is expected to debate other proposals for chipping away at the embargo and freeing up more trade and ending the travel ban. Unfortunately, President-appointed Bush has stated he would veto any bill that would relax the embargo of Cuba, and with the recent victories by the Republican Party, one can be sure the embargo will continue for years to come - or until "democracy" (meaning capitalism) is restored to Cuba.
On November 12, 2002, the United Nations, for the eleventh consecutive year, overwhelmingly (173 for, 3 against, 4 abstained) passed a resolution urging the U.S. to end the embargo of Cuba. Only the U.S., Israel, and the Marshall Islands voted against it. The world speaks out against the embargo loud and clear, but falls upon the deaf ears of the U.S. Government.
Whether Cuba is a "Communist" country or not is of little concern in the grand scheme of things. The embargo, like the sanctions of Iraq, is a violation of human rights of all people. Cuba is of no threat to the U.S. in any sense of the word, especially against a country with the largest military budget on the planet that is more than the military budgets of the world combined. (To compare with some nations of the world: Russia - $29 billion, China - $14.5 billion, Iraq - $1.4 billion, and Cuba - $31 million. Congress recently passed a $380 billion military budget for 2003, which is a $48 billion increase from 2002 - almost twice the annual military budget of Russia.)
There is much complaint by the U.S. of the Cuban Government's opposition and refusal to accept the Valera Project, which collected over 11,000 signatures in favor of a referendum on whether Cubans wanted freedom of speech and the right to private business ownership. Cuba should have taken the step forward and followed through on the Valera Project. In contrast, the U.S. has had demonstrations of over 100,000 against a war on Iraq, with weekly and monthly rallies throughout the country demanding "Peace, Not War", all of which the U.S. Government has ignored. In comparison to population size, the Valera Project represented 0.098 percent of the Cuban population (11.2 million), whereas the October 26 anti-war rallies alone, nation-wide, estimating 355,000 people (200,000 in D.C., 40,000 in New York City, 15,000 in Seattle, and another 100,000 in other cities across the country), represented 0.13 percent of the U.S. population (281 million). As such the U.S. should follow its own complaints of Cuba in regard to the Valera Project and open up a dialogue with the American people on whether to annihilate Iraq or not.
The U.S. embargo of Cuba must end immediately and relations should be normalized. Americans should not be penalized from traveling to Cuba simply because of some resentful Cuban-Americans who want their plantations and factories back. Cuba needs political change in democratic directions as well as the expansion of its democratic socialist economy, not a return to Batista-style, or any other form, of "bourgeois democracy".